Emerging smokepowder weapons in my fantasy

[SandmanBr]

Air jet can be weaponized but works only for mages, you could make a gun similar to a paintball gum that shoot small iron pellets… combining this with cornucopia and will be really useful…. Stone missile would be a good option for a weapon but only for mages too… And the same goes for all useful magics to make weapons… all of then can only be used for mages…

[bolondro2]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Well, let's keep in mind that entries below #5 did pretty badly in battle against those higher on the list.

First of all, the 1-2-4 entries can be discarded. They correspond to special troops, to few for making a decisive impact in the battlefield.

3 entry, British light infantry

Moyle Sherer of the 34th Foot wrote on the British skirmishers: "Not a soul….was in the village, but a wood a few hundred yards to its left, and the ravines above it, were filled with French light infantry. I, with my company, was soon engaged in smart skirmishing among the ravines, and lost about eleven men, killed and wounded, out of thirty-eight. The English do not skirmish so well as the Germans or the French; and it is really hard work to make them preserve their proper extended order, cover themselves, and not throw away their fire; and in the performance of this duty, an officer is, I think, far more exposed that in line fighting." (Rory Muir- "Tactics and the Experience of Battle in the Age of Napoleon")

Not a single world speaking about marksmanship, but about tactical doctrine,
The only infantry who have an edge in expending ammo in training was the British line against the French (that was +/- in line with the 1809 Austrian), and despite some usual believes, the British infantry don't show a clear superiority against other countries.

Campains where the british infantry was sondly beaten

Flanders in 1793-94;
Holland in 1799;
Buenos Aires twice; (against militia....)
Holland in 1809;
the Dardenelles in 1807;
Egypt in 1806;
Spain and Sweden in 1808;
Naples and Hanover in 1805;
Spain and Italy in 1800.

Yes, in the Peninsular campaign they have an edge. But less that it's usually believed-. Most of the British claims of victory are indeed dubious, like La Coruña (getting your C-i-C shouted, having to kill all your horses and lossing your artillery), Busaco and Talavera (both followed by a retreat of the supposed winner).

British have the finest troops of a volunteer army, was leaded by the 3rd best general of the age, and have also the local population cooperation and a have a near perfect intelligence. French have second rate troops of a conscripted army, was leaded in some cases by second rate generals (Victor, Junot or Jourdan) and had the problem of a hostile local population and almost no intelligence, due to guerrilla warfare. I thing that all those factors are, by far, more important in explaining the edge of the British army that the 30 training rounds-by-year advantage.

Sorry for the length of the post, but some misconceptions touch the hearth of an old wargamer grognard

[martinl]

Originally Posted by Icelander

I'm saying that their species, due to factors such as the frailty of infants and the reduction in birth rate during times of less nourishment, has an inbuilt resistance to explosive overpopulation.

Sorry, I will be less obscure:

I am trying to say that some individual or groups of humans will be tempted to ally with or exploit the orcs to deal with their human enemies. Humans often let their personal interests overrule their organization's interests.

I'll also say that monolithic murderous speciesism, while traditional in fantasy RPGs, creeps me out just a little.

[Joseph Paul]

Originally Posted by SandmanBr

Air jet can be weaponized but works only for mages, …

Is that a function of the FR setting? Where is the dividing line in regards to magic working for non-mages? Cause smokepowder is, from what I have gathered here, a magical concoction that non-mages use just fine.

[SandmanBr]

I don’t now in FR setting but some enchanted items Will only work for mages... in game terms you must have magery to use the item…
Maybe it’s useful for mages with little to no power or combat oriented spells to make themselves worth in combat…

[Opellulo]

Originally Posted by Joseph Paul

Hmmm. Just how does an Orc or goblin female carry six fetuses that are delivered live and "more capable"? What is the birthweight of those Orc babies? How soon do they walk on their own? How fast are they maturing?

Absolutely OT but this is an obscure point that fails in almost every fantasy setting: by "common rule" eleves live and maturate late, humans always have some kind of civil war and/or plague... So the in the long time orcs always wins!

(or skavens in you play warhammer setting)

I know it's fantasy but why ever so implausible?

[SuedodeuS]

To make the math easy, let's assume your army can get powder for $7000/lb. This means each grain costs $1. Thus, each round for a Theskan Heavy Caliver costs $50.857. Now, with powder as costly as it is, you want every shot to count. So, while you'll be firing in formation, you also want all of your soldiers to be good shots. After all, DnD follows a similar paradigm to the Greek epics - and when individual combatants are as game-changing as they are in, say, the Illiad, you want your soldiers to be able to hit Achilles rather than just sending some rounds in the general direction of the Myrmidons.

Even so, we'll assume 10 shots is sufficient for proficiency. This means you're burning through about $510 to train each soldier, and you aren't allowing them to practice outside of this. Your soldiers go through basic, learn to march, shoot their weapon a few times, and then it's off to war. If we assume the reusability of the devices (those $510 you spent training Joe Guy are gone as soon as an orc hits him with an arrow) can allow them to be about twice as expensive as the powder, and we assume that you only need about one-quarter as many such weapons as you have soldiers (as they aren't all going to be training at the same time), we're looking at an upward limit of around $4000 per training musket. Would it be possible to build such a device (with illusory sound, bullet, and recoil) for so cheap? Keep in mind that the soldiers of a military with such equipment are likely to be much better shots (and probably quicker to reload) than those of militaries that lack such devices.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Opellulo

Absolutely OT but this is an obscure point that fails in almost every fantasy setting: by "common rule" eleves live and maturate late, humans always have some kind of civil war and/or plague... So the in the long time orcs always wins!

(or skavens in you play warhammer setting)

I know it's fantasy but why ever so implausible?

Sounds like a feature, not a bug...if the Orcs aren't set up to win by nature, you wouldn't need the desired level of heroics by the defenders of civilization.

And, of course, technology (magical, agricultural, strategic...) counts for something.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Joseph Paul

Hmmm. Just how does an Orc or goblin female carry six fetuses that are delivered live and "more capable"? What is the birthweight of those Orc babies? How soon do they walk on their own? How fast are they maturing?

The vast majority of mammals deliver their young far more capable of surviving on their own than humans.

The birthweight is low, I'd think, but the young would grow quickly.

I'm guessing they walk on their own pretty soon. And are able to eat solid foods within a very short time too.

I recall some lore stating that orc litters often fight for food, so only the strong grow to adulthood. On the other hand, any injury that doesn't kill an orc outright will have a much better chance of eventually healing on its own than for a human.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by martinl

Sorry, I will be less obscure:

I am trying to say that some individual or groups of humans will be tempted to ally with or exploit the orcs to deal with their human enemies. Humans often let their personal interests overrule their organization's interests.

Well, sure.

The Zhentarim employ orcish soldiers and mercenaries, the Red Wizards of Thay have not only created a magically modified subrace of them as elite soldiers, but are also responsible for bringing millions of them to the world in a great magical ceremony known as the Orcgate Affair (they needed cheap troops) and so on.

Most such relationships, however, are decidedly less beneficial to the orcs than they could be. Orcs are used as shock troops and arrow fodder and their losses are usually even heavier than they would be if they were living their own traditional lifestyles.

On one hand, orcs do have a real tendecy towards violent behaviour, so it's not like it's unjustified to hate and fear most of them, on the other, it's easy to see the grievance orcs have against the 'civilised' races.

Originally Posted by martinl

I'll also say that monolithic murderous speciesism, while traditional in fantasy RPGs, creeps me out just a little.

In the real world, when different races have competed for the same resources, we often enough see murderous racism that is damn near monolithic. And that's in cases where the differences are mostly cosmetic.

Most humans are quick to hate what's different and when you only meet individuals of that species when they are raiding your cattle and/or hunting you for meat, it's not difficult to understand that impulse.

Is is creepy? Sure. A brutal war for supremacy of a world is not meant to be pretty.

But even for a wise leader who has nothing against orcs, it may well be that the best course for humans is to wipe them out or at least keep down their numbers so that they'll never manage to challenge human realms militarily.