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[evictedSaint]

I gave them magic-aided hand-chiseled cannon rifling as a design, bumping their cannons to 'elite' status.  As this game becomes further and further removed from reality it's harder to say "No, even with physics defying magic you can't make xyz".  I admit that perhaps I let them get away with a bit too much, and I will address it soon.

After Moskurg rolled a series of 1's on their revisions, I decided flat-out saying "it fails" kinda kills the fun in the game.  Instead the revision works, but either not in the way you expect or it causes the Expense to go it.  This was because - as you pointed out - you could barely get bodkins to work after multiple 1's and it didn't seem fair.  Arstotzka has rolled five 1's in the past three turns, and all of them on revisions.

[Madman198237]

Alright, I can see a little bit of leniency. But those dumb guns need to be a multiple-minute job to reload. And, HAND CHISELS?? I don't know about you, but I'm not freakishly inhuman enough to stretch my to such length and thinness that I can reach into a cannon barrel and chisel it out. Unless it's unusually large. And even then, length is still probably an issue. Magical hand chisels or not, there's no way to do that with a hand chisel. Unless it's a self-aware self-propelled hovering flying chisel, in which case the next cavalry raid needs to steal some.

[evictedSaint]

Eh, like I said, I found it more fun to let you guys get away with designs you probably shouldn't pull off, but it's getting away from me.  I'm not a particularly strict GM, but I guess I need to beat you guys back a bit.

[Madman198237]

Feel free to be a decent, easy-going GM, just don't go all ludicrous. Or I'm exploiting that with a spell that has some.....interesting properties that you won't see coming.

[NUKE9.13]

I mean, to be fair, their rifled artillery has only a slightly longer range than a ballista. So, you know, it's pretty shitty rifling.

Okay, going easy on them because they rolled five ones in a row, I can sort of see that. Just so long as the next time we roll a one on a revision we get the same treatment. And maybe retroactively better bodkins.

[S34N1C]

I'm not sure how I'm missing it, but where does it say their cannons had rifling? Not denying that it says that, I'd just like to know where

[Madman198237]

Devastator, I think, did a little bit of spai work. He checked what they had done for some reason, and it turns out they rolled 2 ones and got perfectly fine rifled cannons.

[S34N1C]

So Dev was snooping in the Arstotzkan thread?

[Madman198237]

He gave a reason, I thought. I disagree with the snooping, but I disagree more with the GM error. But if it's going to get fixed, I'm fine with it.

Brazen Flight (4) Egan_BW, Devastator, AoshimaMichio, Aigre Excaliber
Enchanted Steel (1) Detoxicated
Desert Winds: (7) NUKE9.13, Taricus, Happery, S34N1C, Sosoku234, Crazyabe, Kashyyk, Madman198237

Why in the name of all that shoots idiots out of the sky would we want flying HORSES??? With a mechanical solution?!?!?!!?! What a WASTE! Just strap the wings to a few thousand flierbombers (See what I did there) and you can kill all the enemies! INSTANT VICTORY AT SEA! Or, we develop telekinesis and can then do all that and more.

[evictedSaint]

Yeah, I made a mistake and messed up.  I'm...honestly getting pretty tired of this game.

[Madman198237]

Give your old buddies a 6, even if we don't roll it, and let us develop a telekinesis spell.

I'll detail exactly how it will win the war.

But seriously, if you're feeling burned out, see if anybody's willing to take over. I don't think that Iituem wants to, from the sound of it, but he might if asked.

[Happerry]

The only thing all arms race games have is the whining, sadly.

Personally, I'm having a lot of fun in this game, even if other people get upset.

And even if they did get rifling... well, magic greek fire throwing ballista that hit with pinpoint accuracy from extreme range is just as unhistoric, isn't it? It's not like any arms race game is strictly realistic, and this is a magic one in the first place. From fireballs to directed lightning strikes to the weaponized terraforming that is the temperature manipulation... none of that showed up in history either. What does 'Realism' have to do with it? They do rifling, sure, sure. At least that's, you know, physically possible, unlike our telepathy, probability manipulation, weather control, divination, and complete immunity to the knock on effects of manpower loss.

I mean, if they replaced their cannons with lightning magic powered railguns, that'd still be just as unrealistic and non-historical as rifling but is still just as distinctly possible. Hell, that's literally what I was originally going to suggest after they made their cannons, I just got on late and by that time the magic ballista already had votes going for them and I didn't feel like arguing about it. Who gives a crap about history? A fricking wizard did it, for realz.

How much does it really matter, in the end, as long as we're all having fun making up new designs and killing each other?

It's not like it's unfairly balanced in effect. We've both spent around the same amount of turns on artillery, and hell, for all the complaining we can see around here about the enemy's advancements, I'd like to point out we're still winning the artillery duel.

[Taricus]

Pretty much what Happery said. Soldier on Moskurg! The end of Arstotzka is within reach!

[Devastator]

Yeah, I made a mistake and messed up.  I'm...honestly getting pretty tired of this game.

Well, one way to make it easier would be to give me the boot for breaking the rules.

I think all I'd want to be satisfied for the rifling is a rate of fire nerf, because it's harder to reload a rifled cannon than a smoothbore one, and probably a penalty to making new rifled designs in one of the three categories until they roll a 6 in the relevant one due to it being a sort of ad-hoc thing.  It's mostly because I don't want them to have a brilliant army of riflemen next turn after one design for rifles and one revision for cartridges.

Why in the name of all that shoots idiots out of the sky would we want flying HORSES??? With a mechanical solution?!?!?!!?! What a WASTE! Just strap the wings to a few thousand flierbombers (See what I did there) and you can kill all the enemies! INSTANT VICTORY AT SEA! Or, we develop telekinesis and can then do all that and more.

Mostly because none of you madmen are designing anything like this.  Just endless varients on 'lets blow wind at the enemy!'  Personally, I don't believe any proper Moskurgian gentleman is properly dressed without his horse.

[Happerry]

I mean, this is a game where we could literally start inventing airpower tactics in the 900s by way of things like air elementals, flying carpets, warrior angels, demons, turning storm clouds into cloudships, beholders, pegasus riders, or dragons.

Does it really matter what exact form their artillery takes?

If they were summoning giant insects to shoot acid bombs at us with the same effectiveness instead, how many complaints do people think they'd be seeing in this thread?

I think all I'd want to be satisfied for the rifling is a rate of fire nerf, because it's harder to reload a rifled cannon than a smoothbore one, and probably a penalty to making new rifled designs in one of the three categories until they roll a 6 in the relevant one due to it being a sort of ad-hoc thing.  It's mostly because I don't want them to have a brilliant army of riflemen next turn after one design for rifles and one revision for cartridges.

Personally I am entirely satisfied with how things currently are, and will be until this stops being a wands race and starts being a rifle race.

Mostly because none of you madmen are designing anything like this.  Just endless varients on 'lets blow wind at the enemy!'

Hey now, I wanted Mirages if you remember, and once we get those flying carpets done I fully plan on starting up the age of the carrier around a thousand years early.