Talk:Ship's Wizards

So are ships easy enough to build that the incentive is to destroy them rather than capture them? The big problem with fire is that it's pretty hard to go back from, even with bunches of Create Water spells. (Still not back, just spending some extra minutes in an internet cafe)-Slitherrr 02:13, 9 February 2010 (EST)

Well, Petrans won't let their ships get captured: they'll scuttle before they let mainlanders get ahold of the bombards. Likewise, what use does a dwarf have for a Odessan swift boat, or what use does an Odessan have for a huge, ponderous floating invasion platform. Generally speaking, naval combat is rare, but when it does happen, the Petrans and Odessans aim to sink, while the dwarves are more inclined to capture, simply based on their preference for boarding tactics over ranged attacks. -gm

At the very least, any ship will have salvageable, seasoned wood--that's if ransoming the ship is skipped completely, or selling to other countries for that matter. But the wood is a big thing--to season wood for a ship takes years of warehouse-sitting, and we're talking big logs, the sort that take most of a lifetime to get from a tree if it's hardwood. That alone makes ship-building wood extremely valuable. Granted, the Odessans might go the French route and use unseasoned wood (it has more "give", so it needs to be bilged more, but holds up a bit better to bad weather due to flexibility). -Slitherrr

They have magic to control weather, extend life, cure every natural disease and sickness, restore sight to the blind, summon flaming hellstorms from the sky, animate the dead, and conjure all sorts of creatures and items out of whole cloth: you really think things like wood farming and treatment are years-long processes? *flamboyant hand waves* MAGIC! Besides, the Odessans and Petrans have access to staggering amounts of natural forest, even without magical shenanigans and shortcuts.

Also, besides, you seem to be talking mostly about the Age of Sail during the so-called Age of Exploration, which I don't think is the best model here. Before the discovery of the new world and the proliferation of cannon, navies and naval warfare were far more rare and modest. Consider Europe, particularly Northern Europe: its interior waterways are eminently navigable and it's a self contained land mass, much like our own beloved mainland, of what use is a gigantic navy, especially if you're someplace like France or Germany. Medieval navies are almost always in support or policing/anti-piracy roles, hm?

The only real naval conflicts in any sort of recent memory have all been between Odessa and Petara. I'm sure the Odessans would kill to get their hands on a Petaran ship, or more precisely, a Petaran bombard, but the Petaran's are well known to blow up their OWN ships to avoid capture. Given that, there's doubly no incentive to try and capture rather than kill. The Petarans, for their part, have more access to shipbuilding materials than just about anywhere else in the world, via The Ulan. -gm

So, in other words, our future objective will be to capture a Petaran bombard. I hope the money's good. -Slitherrr

Let's hope not. You don't want to get on the bad side of the Petarans. They'll hunt you till the end of your days. -gm