Paradigm Concepts

[Archangel]

Ok so I'm a bit of a military history buff and watching a show about the evolution of firearms last night got me thinking about how Flintlocks in Arcanis are designed. I know I'm way over analyzing this, but I do see some possible plot hooks in here as well as inspiration for tactics.

First I think it is implied but not stated anywhere that I saw that A.Shot is just as vulnerable to water as real world black powder of the day was. Can I get confirmation that this is correct?

Assuming the above is true then would the flintlock be useless in the rain or extreme humidity? As real world flintlocks had issues from water due to having an open pan of powder for the flint to ignite. That pan also made it so that if you tipped the gun too far in any one direction you would lose your priming charge and the gun would be unable to fire then as well.

To the shot itself the book states it is pre-packed in paper or cloth wrappers. This is pretty much exactly how muzzle loading cannons worked. The issue here would be you have to puncture the wrapper otherwise the gun can't fire or would have an extreme delay due to having to burn through the wrapper first. I assume there is some sort of, tear open the package and pour in the powder or ram it in then jab the package through the opening from the priming pan involved in avoiding this. Would that be correct?

As for what I mentioned about some inspiration and plot hooks here are some ideas based on expected answers to the above questions.

NPC forgets to open the shot packet and fails to shoot a PC, leading to their capture and a subsequent adventure. (think about a person sent to kill the PC who isn't trained to use a flintlock, now we have to find why).

Altherian combat group is rendered vulnerable due to Elorii using magic to make it rain, thus the flintlocks are useless to them while arrows don't seem to be bothered.
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Brian Trahan

[Nierite]

There are rules out there for blast powder and moisture, but from what I've gotten from GM's and such it is considered 'fine' unless the Mod itself deals with it. However, as a GM myself, I would impose restrictions against blastpowder use in conditions of heavy rain and such.

For example, I my val'Abebi Philosophic warrior lost 1d10 shots of blast powder to the storm in the middle of "Whispers of the Gods" before he got a Shot Bandoleer. Likewise, there was a miss-chance to firing his pre-loaded flintlocks in that same rain.

As for how the shot itself works, that is up to Henry. Since a "shot" of Blast powder seems to include the ball, I tend to assume that it comes in a pre-measured paper package which is punctured as part of the loading process (ram it down, puncture with the rammer, then put the ball down). Alternatively, it MAY be possible that the whole thing is an enclosed 'round' with the ball included in the paper. When the shot goes off, it burns the paper covering the whole round, launching the ball. Then again, if this were the case we'd start getting a lot closer to modern firearm designs.

My one question for the whole thing with blastpowder is: Why hasn't anybody made an effort to investigate BLACK powder? Arcanis has a thriving Alchemy scene, so it SHOULD be possible that they have discovered black powder. By all accounts, Blastpowder is more powerful and (almost certainly) more stable and safer to use than 'real life' gun powder, but the advantages in being able to make it yourself could outweigh the benefits of Blast powder in some cases.

Maybe I'll have to write an adventure about this. . .
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Cody Bergman

aka = Haakon Marcus val'Virdan, Priest of Nier (Divine 1.
aka = Dyabe val'Abebi, Templar of Althares (Divine 1.4)
aka = Jorma Ostoman, Battlemage of the Coryani Empire (Arcane 1.2)

[Archangel]

Paper cartidges are a bit older than you may think. I knew of them from the revolutionary war but this article says they go even further back.
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Brian Trahan

[Nierite]

Pre-weighing cartridges is a time-honoured way of doing firearms. However, when you start incorporating both the powder and the shot, you start forming individual rounds along the lines of modern bullets. It (shouldn't) be long after that where people start looking into things to use as percussion caps (fulminated mercury, for example) before you get a modern bullet.
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Cody Bergman

aka = Haakon Marcus val'Virdan, Priest of Nier (Divine 1.
aka = Dyabe val'Abebi, Templar of Althares (Divine 1.4)
aka = Jorma Ostoman, Battlemage of the Coryani Empire (Arcane 1.2)

[Archangel]

[Nierite]

A point to raise: Blastpowder is supposed to be (I recall hearing) more powerful than Black Powder. This is all fine and dandy, but it does bring up the question on what they make their firearms OUT OF. If you make the barrel of the firearm out of too weak of a material, there is a major chance of the barrel cracking or even exploding from the pressure. Metallurgy in Arcanis seems advanced enough that they would probably have little problem producing materials that in the real world required a great deal of industrialization to make. For example, in real life they had to invent water wheels to power blast furnesces to make good amounts of steel and even iron. In Arcanis, somebody simply casts a fire spell to do that work with less time and effort.

However, it doesn't seem like there was a huge 'trial and error' testing leading up to the production of flintlocks in Arcanis. There were no Matchlocks, wheel locks, etc. There is no mention of a difference between smooth and rifled bores, which greatly affects loading times as well as accuracy and range. All we have is that Althares gave the Altherans Blastpowder, and they came up with these (relatively) advanced weapons from the equivalent of late-Roman Empire technology. I know that there is a large tradition of Golems in Arcanis, and Altherans have been playing around with 'clockwork' items for a while, but it still seems to be a major change.
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Cody Bergman

aka = Haakon Marcus val'Virdan, Priest of Nier (Divine 1.
aka = Dyabe val'Abebi, Templar of Althares (Divine 1.4)
aka = Jorma Ostoman, Battlemage of the Coryani Empire (Arcane 1.2)

[Harliquinn]

Actually in Codex Arcanis, it makes brief mention of the early firearms, including matchlocks: