Armour & weapon designs (part V).

[Lephys]

Sweeet! I had my best guesses narrowed down to that eyepatch thing, some or all of the torso garb/mantle, or the hat I finally noticed was folded between his hand and hip. I internally put my "money" on the hat. I was so, purely chancically correct! And that makes me feel accomplished.

 

(Really, all I did was learn what it was).

 

I started to google it, but all the results were coming up with "uterus" in them. I got worried and bailed, haha. I decided that maybe Karranthain had made a typo or something.

[quest1on]

 

  this is waaaaaaaay more handy. (:

Does this thing have separate cover for each priming pan? (By the way, I'm pretty sure you saw it yesterday on Reddit).

[Woldan]

It does, if it didn't you'd have to prime each pan after firing a chamber. Not very practical. All matchlock guns had lids to cover the pan. 

[quest1on]

Do you think these ones are automatic or hand-opened? If they opened with pulling of the trigger I would be really impressed.

[Karranthain]

These gentlemen are wearing bicornes:

 

 

And that's a tricorne:

 

 

Both would probably be a bit too modern for PE, but who knows? There might be some stylish Vailian pirates out there.

 

 

[quest1on]

Polish hussars of the first phase (first half of 16th century) wore something that looks like a top hat, so I think there's no problem with different hat shapes. Here's a pic

[Lephys]

These gentlemen are wearing bicornes:

 

(image)

 

And that's a tricorne:

 

(image)

 

Both would probably be a bit too modern for PE, but who knows? There might be some stylish Vailian pirates out there.

Never knew the official name for those bits of headgear, . Schweeet!

 

I think Tricornes are my favorite. Now I want my character to wear a dodecahedricorne, just to be different. (I'm well aware that probably doesn't make any sense).

[Woldan]

Do you think these ones are automatic or hand-opened? If they opened with pulling of the trigger I would be really impressed.

I asked myself the same question, I imagine the priming pan covers could open when the chamber reaches the barrel position. In fact, I think that the lever that rotates and locks the chambers into place also c0cks the lever that holds the match. It would kind of dumb to make the entire gun work with one movement of a lever but leaving out the priming pan covers.

Though I don't think they're spring loaded, one of the lids is half closed. Guess they simply stay closed through friction and when the lever is operated a small pin pushes open the topmost cover.

 

Its like a leveraction-revolver-matchlock-handgonne-thingy.    I don't want to know how much time the gunsmith spent on designing and making this thing with nothing more than 16th century tools. CAD, lathes and dremel? Nope. 

Edited March 28, 2014 by Woldan

[Karranthain]

Here's another piece illustrating the Hussite Wagenburg tactic:

 

 

As I've mentioned before, I could really see it used frequently in a world filled with all manners of dangerous beasts.

 

How would combat tactics evolve in the world of PE? What's your opinion?

[Nonek]

I'm assuming that the Vaillian's and their offshoot Republics are at the forefront of modern (for the world) warfare, combined arms making use of the new technologies and what not. Perhaps infantry have evolved into the push of pike, with support from firearms and the deciding hammer blow of the cavalry waiting on the flanks, but that may be a little anachronistic.

 

For the Dyrwood i'm assuming that the bomb destroying Saint Waidwen was a desperate and unproven method of combat, because the young nation could not seemingly match the traditional army of Raedceras, i've no proof here of course except for the use of such an unusual method of warfare. Expanding on that estimate i'd judge that the young colony has not much formal military cohesion, instead relying on veterans training up militia, and the natural tough and resourceful nature of settlers and pioneers in that levy.

 

I'd further assume that a young and seemingly prosperous colony has a problem with law and order, but that there is also a place for rapid advancement and all the benefits of a meritocracy for those who can carve out their own demense, which most likely the protagonist will be doing if choosing to. Banditry I think would be the primary problem, as well as perhaps the monstrous, with setlers who failed to find easy wealth turning to another source of easy money, preying on their erstwhile neighbours. I imagine that under the wild wood however almost every settler is armed and ready to defend themselves.

 

It might be interesting to explore what the wild wood comes to represent to natives of the Dyrwood in such a situation, just as it represented in fairy tales the dangerous and uncivilised aspects of mankind, to be tamed by the woodcutter. So it might begin to be demonised by the settlers of the shore and meadow who suffer from the predations of those haunting the place, and what does this mean for the natives of Eir Glenfath and the two cultures relationship? 

 

Also can I just say that it's nice to see a more realistic style embraced by the devs, with Dragon Age deciding to have their characters making use of impractical and over designed ceremonial items for adventuring and combat, it's nice that there's a well detailed and logical alternative that assumes the characters are not dullards incapable of dressing and arming themselves. I've nothing of course against the opulent and extravagant, but even the most overdressed Landsknecht's harness will no doubt be both practical and eminently sturdy, rather than unsuitable pretentious frippery.

[Jarmo]

 

Not sure if the posting works, being from facebook.

Anyway, a way neat helm thingy that came across in the Byzantine military history group.

[Mor]

I'm assuming that the Vaillian's and their offshoot Republics are at the forefront of modern (for the world) warfare, combined arms making use of the new technologies and what not. Perhaps infantry have evolved into the push of pike, with support from firearms and the deciding hammer blow of the cavalry waiting on the flanks, but that may be a little anachronistic.

I assumed that the Vaillian Republics would follow the Italian city-states examples using contracted mercenary companies, but from what we know so far the Vaillians are united, they are situated in a defended enclave with no apparent threats from the north, so unless they have major enemies to the south east, I think that they primary focus is would be a fleet to defend their trade routes.

 

For the Dyrwood i'm assuming that the bomb destroying Saint Waidwen was a desperate and unproven method of combat, because the young nation could not seemingly match the traditional army of Raedceras, i've no proof here of course except for the use of such an unusual method of warfare. Expanding on that estimate i'd judge that the young colony has not much formal military cohesion, instead relying on veterans training up militia, and the natural tough and resourceful nature of settlers and pioneers in that levy.

It was confirmed that during that war the army was mostly peasant one. As for the bomb, it was made by priest of Magran, who commonly employ firearms, I assumed that it was just a very well placed s***load of explosives.

[Prometheus]

For the Dyrwood i'm assuming that the bomb destroying Saint Waidwen was a desperate and unproven method of combat, because the young nation could not seemingly match the traditional army of Raedceras, i've no proof here of course except for the use of such an unusual method of warfare. Expanding on that estimate i'd judge that the young colony has not much formal military cohesion, instead relying on veterans training up militia, and the natural tough and resourceful nature of settlers and pioneers in that levy.

both readceras and the dyrwood were aedyran colonies. and the revolution in readceras happened after the revolution in the dyrwood. The dyrwood wasn't that young the war happened 10-15 years ago and the revolution was a few centuries ago. (Edit: on the wiki is a timeline and the info used for the article) I think the main target of the bomb was the leader of readceras St. waidwen. He was described as a living vessel of Eothas, so it's likely that he was more powerful as normal humans and that could be the main reason why they used a bomb. For more information about the dyrwood military see quote below:

 

a) There are quite a few military structures/fortified areas in the Dyrwood ranging from fortified cities to castles.  The Dyrwood does not have a standing army, but many erls keep professional soldiers organized in groups the size of a platoon or (for high-conflict areas) a company even during peacetime.  The Saint's War was fought in part by these private armies but dominantly with peasant soldiers.  The Dozen, the twelve men and women who held Dana Eobhainn Bridge to ensure the destruction of St. Waidwen, were all peasants.

 

b) More-or-less yes, though there may be a few differences.  The "lieutenant" rank in the Dyrwood uses the title "steadman" but is functionally the same.  There are no subdivisions of steadman, sergeant, or corporal ranks.

 

c) Yes.  Fortified communities are not uncommon, especially near the Dyrwood/Eir Glanfath border.

 

d) Professional armies serve their employers, who often are nobles (though sometimes simply wealthy individuals).  Of course, all of those nobles pledge (and re-pledge) to serve the will of their elected duc.  This does not always work in practice.  When nobles levy armies in the Dyrwood, they only lawfully do so under a ducal order of conscription.  The service that peasants pledge is to the duc and their country, not individual nobles.  In practice, they always serve under regional nobles (typically erls and thayns).  Erls and thayns hold hereditary positions.  Ducs are elected by the seven erls.

Edited March 31, 2014 by Prometheus

[Living One]

I know it's not the most realistic but Ornstein's armour is so f*cking cool

[SarevokBestVillain]

I was always fascinated with Sarevok Anchev armor.  I would like to see some dark demon/skull type armors in Pillars of Eternity.

[Monte Carlo]

I reckon military tactics in a PoE style universe would turn heavily on mage-slaying. After all, you've got one person who is basically an artillery battery on legs.

 

Whole units might evolve dedicated solely to killing the pointy-hatted bastards.

 

Then of course, you need a counter. So a mage deploys with their bodyguard unit. And so on and so forth.

 

We know firearms can pierce the arcane vale, so marksmen would become extremely important. The development of long rifles would be supremely important and even (this is fantasy, right?) crude optics might develop. Your mages might craft these optics for you.

 

Pre-emptive strikes on mages prior to mobilization would be the norm and a combat indicator of enemy preparedness. In fact you'd lock up / protect your mages in the run-up to hostilities, in and of itself strategically significant.

 

* sigh *

 

I love stuff like this.

 

Of course, after mages you want to kill clerics and druids. To that end...

[Greensleeve]

I reckon military tactics in a PoE style universe would turn heavily on mage-slaying. After all, you've got one person who is basically an artillery battery on legs.

 

Whole units might evolve dedicated solely to killing the pointy-hatted bastards.

 

Then of course, you need a counter. So a mage deploys with their bodyguard unit. And so on and so forth.

 

We know firearms can pierce the arcane vale, so marksmen would become extremely important. The development of long rifles would be supremely important and even (this is fantasy, right?) crude optics might develop. Your mages might craft these optics for you.

 

Pre-emptive strikes on mages prior to mobilization would be the norm and a combat indicator of enemy preparedness. In fact you'd lock up / protect your mages in the run-up to hostilities, in and of itself strategically significant.

 

* sigh *

 

I love stuff like this.

 

Of course, after mages you want to kill clerics and druids. To that end...

 

Well, if we're talking military tactics, then that depends entirely on the effectiveness of regular artillery by comparison. But in general, yeah, I think you're right. 

[mur'phon]

Not necessarily, since everyone with a strong soul is essentially a mage, killing them might not be as important. A barbarian might not throw fireballs, but his soul powers let him smash into a formation like a wrecking ball.

[Suburban-Fox]

 

Interesting v-blog about fantasy weapons, the general opinion of which I generally hold to.  

[quest1on]

In most books with mages on the battlefields I've read, it ends up with them trying to kill each other while formation try to wreck each other until either one mage dies so the other can fireball the armies of his enemy or the army gets defeated first and the mage has to flee before some 150+ guys with halberds and swords gut him out. Your ideas sound better than that.

[Jarrakul]

 

Interesting v-blog about fantasy weapons, the general opinion of which I generally hold to.

 

I totally agree. Ridiculously impractical fantasy weapons just look... kind of dumb, to my eyes. Give me a good old fashioned German longsword and I'm a happy man.

 

That said, I do think it's a bit of a trap to ignore the fact that fantasy has, well, magic. Real weapons are cool because they're feats of precision engineering to produce the best results given certain constraints (physics and materials, mostly). If weapons can be magical, the constraints change, particularly with respect to weight. Historically, there was a fairly strong push to make weapons longer. So if you have a world where you can slap a lightness enchantment on a weapon without impacting the strength of the materials, you might be well served by making a magic sword a foot or so longer than it would be in the real world. If you can go really fancy and make the weapons lighter just for the wielder (or make the wielder significantly stronger), you might get some good mileage out of unusually thick blades for added chopping power. This is the sort of thing I'd like to see fantasy weapons explore. Not ridiculous spikes for no purpose, but "here are the tools we have, how do we make this more practical by using them?"

[Lephys]

That said, I do think it's a bit of a trap to ignore the fact that fantasy has, well, magic. Real weapons are cool because they're feats of precision engineering to produce the best results given certain constraints (physics and materials, mostly). If weapons can be magical, the constraints change, particularly with respect to weight. Historically, there was a fairly strong push to make weapons longer. So if you have a world where you can slap a lightness enchantment on a weapon without impacting the strength of the materials, you might be well served by making a magic sword a foot or so longer than it would be in the real world. If you can go really fancy and make the weapons lighter just for the wielder (or make the wielder significantly stronger), you might get some good mileage out of unusually thick blades for added chopping power. This is the sort of thing I'd like to see fantasy weapons explore. Not ridiculous spikes for no purpose, but "here are the tools we have, how do we make this more practical by using them?"

That's why the best magic systems (imo) are actually worked into the rest of nature/physics, instead of just arbitrarily separate from it. For example, I think it was mentioned in some Animancy lore that different metals/materials held differing affinities for effective animancy, and that bronze was one of the best? So, you don't just get "ULTRA TITANIUM ALLOY STRONGEST ARMOR EVER, + SOUL!". Imbuing your construct with a soul comes at a cost. In this case, a material cost.

 

Also, for what it's worth, I've always been very interested in the very specialized nature of certain armor/equipment designs of history. Really any and all specialization aspects, like "these guys almost always fought in marshlands, so they had armor that, while not ideal in a non-marshland setting, was especially suited for that." Etc.

 

I like when that gets applied to a fantasy setting. "These guys are mage hunters. While their armor offers less protection from physical attacks, they are especially prepped for a lot of common mage stuff." That, and like, Geralt's gear from The Witcher, etc.

Edited April 2, 2014 by Lephys

[Merlkir]

Real weapons are cool because they're feats of precision engineering to produce the best results given certain constraints (physics and materials, mostly). If weapons can be magical, the constraints change, particularly with respect to weight. Historically, there was a fairly strong push to make weapons longer. So if you have a world where you can slap a lightness enchantment on a weapon without impacting the strength of the materials, you might be well served by making a magic sword a foot or so longer than it would be in the real world. If you can go really fancy and make the weapons lighter just for the wielder (or make the wielder significantly stronger), you might get some good mileage out of unusually thick blades for added chopping power. This is the sort of thing I'd like to see fantasy weapons explore. Not ridiculous spikes for no purpose, but "here are the tools we have, how do we make this more practical by using them?"

 

That would require game designers to know and care about weapon properties and blade mechanics and all that. Most games don't even bother with physics. But yeah, it's a cool niche.

[Kjaamor]

I respect the guy's personal standpoint on what he wants to see, but as he graciously points out, it's just personal preference. For me, it depends how high your fantasy is. In Mount and Blade, I would want to see relatively realistic weaponry because the setting and mechanics encourage it. In Final Fantasy VII (Yes, yes... Generic jrpg disclaimer, etc) I am happy to see bizarre and outlandish weaponary that would be functionally useless because, frankly, after a guy with a sword beats two guys with guns in the opening minute, my disbelief has been suspended.

 

In terms of the involvement of magic or any other fantasy factor, I would argue a similar but slightly different line to Lephys, which is to say that the important thing is consistency. As players, readers and viewers, we've suspended our disbelief over a lot of things over the years but what tends to break the spell (npi) is jarring inconsistencies. FFVII (jrpg disclaimer, etc) manages this because it is consistent with itself 95% of time and crucially when it matters most. For the same reason I'd argue that its expanded universe is a heap of alienating crap because it repeatedly reinvents rules and story to serve the... narrative ...and gameplay.

 

PoE, of course, sits in the middle, so I would expect its weapons and armour to sit somewhere there as well.

 

The other crucial factor, relating to size in particular but also shape, is what for lack of a better term I shall call the Warhammer effect, which is simply to say that when viewing small models larger, exaggerated weaponary is prefererable because it makes it clearer to see what the model is using, and gives the weapon a reasonable sense of scale on the battlefield - if not on the model itself.

[Suburban-Fox]

 

That would require game designers to know and care about weapon properties and blade mechanics and all that. Most games don't even bother with physics. But yeah, it's a cool niche.

 

Considering that the current wiki lists many arms and armour with their actual historic names, rather than their popular D&D derived names, I think there's a good chance that Obsidian are at least considering that.

 

I respect the guy's personal standpoint on what he wants to see, but as he graciously points out, it's just personal preference. For me, it depends how high your fantasy is. In Mount and Blade, I would want to see relatively realistic weaponry because the setting and mechanics encourage it. In Final Fantasy VII (Yes, yes... Generic jrpg disclaimer, etc) I am happy to see bizarre and outlandish weaponary that would be functionally useless because, frankly, after a guy with a sword beats two guys with guns in the opening minute, my disbelief has been suspended.

 

True, it does depend on the setting. For me, games with Final Fantasy style graphics don't work. Obviously they work for some, and that's fine. But...I dunno, I'd say Baldur's Gate 1 was also somewhere in the middle, in terms of magical content, and their graphics still looked quite reasonable (with the possible exception of Sarevok's armour - it's okay to have armour like that but it's got to come with limitations, and huge blades on your pauldrons is going to severely limit one's agility, especially when combined with enormous ram horns on the helmet!   ).

 

I actually prefer low magic settings, tbh, for the same reason. I'm a fan of Tolkienesque fantasy, and for things to work for me, magic has to be a majorly big deal that only a few people in the world know how to do, not something that every man and his dog can throw around at will.

 

 

That's why the best magic systems (imo) are actually worked into the rest of nature/physics, instead of just arbitrarily separate from it.

 

This was the case in Runequest. Although I didn't really like the bronze age setting, or the fact that everyone can do magic (who needs a weaponsmith? I can repair my weapons with a magic spell that everybody in the world knows!), I did like the way magic works with bronze but not with iron weapons/armour. But then, I'm one of those weird types that actually finds certain limitations interesting.

Edited April 3, 2014 by Suburban-Fox