How would magic interact with late TL5 naval warfare? & Campaign idea

[seasalt]

Originally Posted by Rupert

Bear in mind that, assuming a mage capable of making a golem is merely Comfortable, each energy point costs $100 - and that's using the very generous assumptions in Magic - that mages won't be charing a premium for having to work continuously without days off for six months at a stretch (fewer with a circle, but this increases the chances of someone falling ill and delaying the project), or of there being delays. On the other hand, even if stokers are paid Struggling wages the wages alone will pay for it in only four years.

A few things though - they obey the order of their creators and those that their creator tells them to obey. So, how many layers of delegation of command authority will that allow? Is it just the creator and those directly assigned command authority, or can the creator say "Follow the orders of this person, and anyone they order you to obey", and if so, can those people also say that?

Another thing is that it's explicit that only the creator can heal a golem, so if they break it might be quite difficult or impossible to get them repaired (this is one good reason to have circles of mages make them).

Hmmm, interesting. I didn't realize golems were quite that cheap and efficient to create. It seems that if there's not some limit imposed on them, they would pretty much replace ALL manual laborers, not just ship crews. So, if you are going to have them doing most of the work on ships, you'll have to say it's a setting element that they have to do most of the work in general.

And if you don't want that - either just make creating them impossible, or reduce their intelligence (maybe to IQ 5), or put some arbitrary limit on them. Maybe say the enchantments maintaining them can't be made permanent and need to be maintained at a cost of 10 FP per day, or something. So you could make limited use of them in industry or military roles but filling whole factories, mines, etc. with them would be non-viable.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by seasalt

Hmmm, interesting. I didn't realize golems were quite that cheap and efficient to create. It seems that if there's not some limit imposed on them, they would pretty much replace ALL manual laborers, not just ship crews. So, if you are going to have them doing most of the work on ships, you'll have to say it's a setting element that they have to do most of the work in general.

And if you don't want that - either just make creating them impossible, or reduce their intelligence (maybe to IQ 5), or put some arbitrary limit on them. Maybe say the enchantments maintaining them can't be made permanent and need to be maintained at a cost of 10 FP per day, or something. So you could make limited use of them in industry or military roles but filling whole factories, mines, etc. with them would be non-viable.

The built-in limit is that it takes a half-mage year per golem, and the Enchant spell requires Magery 2, so if mages are rare, and the more powerful the mage the rarer (a fairly standard assumption), there just won't be that many mages able to produce golems, and the odds are they'd have other things they'd rather be doing.

This suggests that persuading such a mage to make golems for you might cost rather more than a merely 'Comfortable' wage, and you still might not get that many out of a mage before they decide they'd rather go off and do whatever it is that they actually like doing.

[RGTraynor]

Originally Posted by Rupert

The built-in limit is that it takes a half-mage year per golem, and the Enchant spell requires Magery 2, so if mages are rare, and the more powerful the mage the rarer (a fairly standard assumption), there just won't be that many mages able to produce golems, and the odds are they'd have other things they'd rather be doing.

Eh, that's my ongoing argument on why only in a few areas magic as RAW has any pervasive effects to change society. But it's plain that presumption's been ditched for this thread. If mages are indeed rockstars who can make a better living elsewhere, then you don't get mages on your ships at all, except for losers, the ultra-patriotic, conscripts and apprentices, and those in sparse numbers.

In such a case, then the question becomes "How would magic interact with late TL5 naval warfare, where you might have a single mage with Magery 1 and a couple dozen spells on a capital ship, and maybe a single mage with Magery 3 attached to the North American Squadron?"

If we imagine there are more mages than that, then there's a good bit less of a stretch to imagine a shore establishment with a dozen mages outfitting a capital ship a year with a Black Gang.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by RGTraynor

Eh, that's my ongoing argument on why only in a few areas magic as RAW has any pervasive effects to change society. But it's plain that presumption's been ditched for this thread. If mages are indeed rockstars who can make a better living elsewhere, then you don't get mages on your ships at all, except for losers, the ultra-patriotic, conscripts and apprentices, and those in sparse numbers.

In such a case, then the question becomes "How would magic interact with late TL5 naval warfare, where you might have a single mage with Magery 1 and a couple dozen spells on a capital ship, and maybe a single mage with Magery 3 attached to the North American Squadron?"

If we imagine there are more mages than that, then there's a good bit less of a stretch to imagine a shore establishment with a dozen mages outfitting a capital ship a year with a Black Gang.

The numbers we seem to be talking about suggest that a great naval power (the British Empire in 1860-1880 period that's equivalent in TL to what we're discussing) could have such a production line of golems. A competing power (France in our world) might be able to get one over time as they lure their mages away from other industries. Other powers would find uses more related to armies for their military-industrial and military mages.

Thus a major naval power's ships would be noticeably more effective than those of a minor power's or a land power's. OTOH their army would be small or poorly supported.

By the way, golems or enchanted creations (servants, etc.) would also be very useful for providing power for the operation of the ship's sails (we're in a period where ships still needed sails for long sea voyages), weighing anchor, and operating the rudder (it took about 40 men to turn Black Prince's rudder and other early ironclads were little better) until steam auxiliary power becomes good enough to do this work - and not needing a head of steam for this work would be a handy thing if it could be arranged without costing too much.

Of course, steam power would get better at least as fast as it did in our history, given access to bound fire, air, and water elementals, and to essential metal. Again, this is probably something only leading powers would be able to afford to make full use of.

Sail-less sea-going ironclads are a definite feature of TL6, as they appear nicely at the 1880 transition point. If using magic-enhanced steam you'd be at TL5+1, but in this setting apparently there aren't enough mages for this tech to be used for more than a limited number of ships. The inability to field an entire fleet that's sail-free would doubtless be a source of frustration to leading navies.

Others might look to enchanted sails to make a ship independent of the wind (it has its own wind), thus making more use of air mages, but the problem is that sails just don't provide enough power to move large ironclads at good speeds.

[RGTraynor]

Mm, but beyond all that, there's the innate conservatism of the naval establishment. I imagine the resistance against magically-enhanced warships to be at least as strong as the resistance against steam powered warships. Just because an innovation has obvious advantages doesn't prevent conservatives from digging in their heels.

[Witchking]

Originally Posted by RGTraynor

Mm, but beyond all that, there's the innate conservatism of the naval establishment. I imagine the resistance against magically-enhanced warships to be at least as strong as the resistance against steam powered warships. Just because an innovation has obvious advantages doesn't prevent conservatives from digging in their heels.

Conservatism sure...how about every Admiralty is tight!

IME no Navy ever has enough money. It just a question of which collection of Peters you are robbing to pay Paul.

Whether it is a King, an Elected Body, or the mass of the Citizenry; it is almost certain that the Navy will get shortchanged at least until a War happens. Often even after it happens.

It is a strange alinement of the stars that causes a nation to build a strong Navy.

The prime example in our reality is England. For them the choices were build a first class navy and contend for the world or do not build that navy and contend with continual raiding visitors to hold on to what they had.

Even then the long history of the RN, whatever era, can be summed up by three words. 'Not enough money.'

So paying for mages to make, run and maintain whatever navy is proposed will be the true magic.

[mlangsdorf]

The rough conversion of GURPS $ to 1880s British pounds is about 1:2,000. The Magic's book suggested price for a clay golem at TL3 is about $8,000. Quadruple costs for TL5 and multiply it by 6 for a more reasonable understanding of the value of magic (so enchanters are Wealthy, not Average wealth) and you're still looking at 1,000 pounds per golem. The HMS Inflexible ironclad launched in 1874 with a price of 812,000 pounds. Total crew was around 450, and it only had 12 boilers, so most of that crew probably wasn't coal stokers. If the RN had to buy 3 golems per boiler, that raises the cost to 846,000 pounds, and they would probably get a little of that cost back in a cheaper design (small galley, mess hall, berthing, etc) and lower crew wages.

I can believe that not all naval ships have golem stokers, and possibly for any given ship, not all stokers are golems. But I would expect that any first class navy would have at least some golem stokers on at least some of their advanced ships.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by mlangsdorf

The rough conversion of GURPS $ to 1880s British pounds is about 1:2,000.

That seems way off. In the 1860s a labourer in London was paid about 20 shillings a week. That's 1040 pennies a month, and TL5's monthly income for average wealth is $1100/month. A labourer is probably not of average wealth, though they might be doing better than the base level of Struggling. A farm labourer got 14/0 a week, or 728p/month and probably was Struggling.

If we put the farm worker in the middle of Struggling and the Londoner towards the top end, we get $1 buying ~0.75p (three farthings), and thus a pound (240p) is $320.

If a mage is wealthy they'll be getting paid $5500/month, or 17 pounds, 3/9. This is about double what an engineer (exact job unspecified) got, so not unreasonable.

This makes a mage's daily pay 15/10 (190p), and a 250-energy golem about 200 pounds.

But... you'll need more than one stoker per boiler. While the boilers of those old ships might've only need one stoker to shovel coal into the boiler, you needed other stokers to move coal from the bunkers to where the 'boiler stoker' could easily reach it.

Warrior's coal bunkers held 853 long tone of coal (just under 1,000 short tons), and this was good for 190 hours of steaming, so she consumed 5 short tons of coal per hour. Coal has a density of about 50 pounds per cubic foot, so this is 200 cubic feet per hour. According to the rules on digging, a person can move their BL in cubic feet of broken up rock per hour (and that's what coal is), assuming proper tools. So Warrior would need ten stokers working whenever steaming to feed the boilers (as she had ten boilers that works out nicely), plus ten more to move coal once the bunkers right by the boilers have been emptied, and possibly another set of ten when using the coal from the furthermost bunkers (or a half-set and have them move the distant coal as soon as there's space for it in the nearer bunkers). All this per shift, but golems don't work in shifts, so we don't need to worry about that.

Now, golems have ST15 and thus BL45, and the 15-20 stokers that just move coal can be replaced by 8-9 golems. The stokers fuelling the boilers could be replaced by 5 golems with each one could servicing two boilers adjacent to each other (given the layout common at the time, probably one each of port and starboard boilers, fuelled from the accessway down the centreline between them). Overall you're looking at about 14 golems, plus supervisors (but you'd need those for a human crew as well, so no change there).

That's 2800 pounds for the golem stokers. It seems stokers were paid about the same as labourers, so the three dozen or so you'd need for continuous steaming would cost more over only two years than the cost of the golems, never mind the reduction in rations, and the reduced chances of mutiny.

Given that the stokers were a small portion of the crew of early ironclads, I don't think there'd be much savings in berthing and messing spaces, especially as the crews generally did these things in spaces already required for the guns, etc. Later ironclads would benefit more - they had much larger stokers complements, much smaller gun crews, and berthing and messing was no longer in a huge gundeck that's required for the guns anyway.

Note that stores for the crew took up a lot less weight and space than the coal and boiler feed water did, so the savings there are actually very minor.

[seasalt]

Originally Posted by RGTraynor

Mm, but beyond all that, there's the innate conservatism of the naval establishment. I imagine the resistance against magically-enhanced warships to be at least as strong as the resistance against steam powered warships. Just because an innovation has obvious advantages doesn't prevent conservatives from digging in their heels.

It depends on the sort of world. If magic has been around much longer while these types of steam-powered vessels are brand new, it may go in the other direction: resistance to ships that rely mainly on armor and technological weapons rather than being merely a transport for a powerful magician and his or her summoned creatures. Although, that would've probably been a conflict that played out back around TL4 when things where a bit more even - if you get TL 6 technology, if magic doesn't advance in power somehow, technological weapons and shipbuilding are just too good to keep up with.

Even so, in a world where they exist, and especially if they are rare and have an innate gift, talent, bloodline etc., I would imagine that magicians have a bit of a superiority complex and probably hold themselves aloof from the affaris of "craftsmen". I really doubt they would be interested in working closely with grubby engineers and metalworkers.

Rather than something the regular military/navy hierarchy has disdain for, I imagine that a main reason for magic not being used to its full potential is just because the wizards can't be bothered with such trivial affairs. They probably make golems in sparse numbers and give them only to official guild-masters and noblemen, instead of just selling them for coin. That isn't to say they wouldn't enhance industry and technology with their magic to some degree, just that they're only interested in doing so when it was their idea. You probably couldn't just "buy" golems in exchange for paying the mages a modest salary. But a kingdom or empire's military would certainly have access to enough to serve in the furnaces.

For that matter, summoning and controlling a fire elemental INSIDE the furnace would be useful as well. Even though a couple of summoned elementals wouldn't be enough to move a capital ship by themselves, they could certainly help the coal burn more efficiently.

All this being said, to get back to the original topic: in the boiler room specifically, golems seem like one of the most efficient uses of magical talent.

The existence of super-strong fantasy races is also something to consider here. Since "giants" violate the square cube law they are proportionally stronger than their weight would suggest (and gurps stats in dungeon fantasy, etc., do bear this out). It might be worthwhile to build a special deckhouse for a 15 foot tall giant on your ironclad just so he can turn the rudder and help rig the sails, and serve as a living crane in general. It'd be worth the risk of him possibly stepping on somebody.

(According to the Monster Manual of DnD, a 15 foot tall frost giant weights about 2800 pounds. That's heavy, but not so heavy a ship couldn't carry him. That's less than a single large-caliber gun. Hmm.... I guess he might be at serious risk of falling off and would have to duck to avoid hitting his head on the masts if they exist, but if anything, he'd have an easier time of climbing back aboard after falling off the ship than a human, as long as he's capable of swimming. Such a giant would need about 50 pounds of food and water a day (~2% bodyweight), which is a lot, but not unmanageable.)

Actually, compared to historical navies, which usually had constant health and readiness problems with the crew, some kind of magical apothecary with "body control" magics who can make the sailors able to work longer, temporarily improve their strength or speed when needed, prevent strains, and heal minor injuries, might be no less valuable than directly attacking the enemy or increasing the ship's speed...

[RGTraynor]

Originally Posted by seasalt

Even so, in a world where they exist, and especially if they are rare and have an innate gift, talent, bloodline etc., I would imagine that magicians have a bit of a superiority complex and probably hold themselves aloof from the affaris of "craftsmen". I really doubt they would be interested in working closely with grubby engineers and metalworkers.

Rather than something the regular military/navy hierarchy has disdain for, I imagine that a main reason for magic not being used to its full potential is just because the wizards can't be bothered with such trivial affairs. They probably make golems in sparse numbers and give them only to official guild-masters and noblemen, instead of just selling them for coin.

It depends on the culture you want to postulate, of course. The degree to which any small group can give the finger to society is the degree to which the ruling authorities let them. I can well imagine that wizards too snooty to sully their hands and do their part in the Defense of the Realm might come with ... consequences.

And if there aren't any, and the wizards do disdain service, then there's no magic interacting with late TL5 warfare -- naval or otherwise -- and the question is moot. (shrugs)