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[Madman198237]

The Shift Mod and the Old Reliable seem fairly similar. The main differences being that the Old Reliable goes into a bit more detail regarding how things work, and also tries to imply that the gun should become 'substantially' easier to produce as a result of this fix, which seems a tad ambitious. I'd like to see the word 'substantially' replaced with 'somewhat' or 'slightly', and then I'd vote for it.

I feel like the choice of a single word is unlikely to substantially, somewhat, or slightly alter the judgement of the design difficulty-wise but, sure. Also it *should* probably make a serious alteration since the precision of the mechanism is said to be the majority of the costs due to outright waste.

It's not a bad gun at all. Is it perfect? Definitely not. But even with its rate of fire reduced in the user being as safe as possible and manually rotating the cylinder, it's still an extremely competent gun. The civilian sector bit is to playfully point out that this isn't historical fiction; it's just fiction. There's a reason you're in year -3 and not given some specific 18th/19th-century year or anything, after all.

My problem with how it was judged is that it's received what definitely seems to be a major bug. It *doesn't* work as intended, since the double-action part fails so often. So the gun itself, while functional as a gun, is still not up to the spec of what it was supposed to be, which sounds to me more like an "above expectations" of a VH difficulty, where the device has trouble, but is greatly functional, whereas I was kind of expecting "above expectations" on Hard to be a basically functional device. Anything less seems, to me, like it might push the desire for innovation backwards to make sure we don't get modifiers that are going to always leave us with issues we'll need to fix.

EDIT: I changed the wording a little in the proposal.

[TricMagic]

Chinese Fingertrap: (2) MoP, eS
Finger Trap - Shift Mod: (1) Doomblade,
"Old Reliable" Imperial Arsenal Revolving Rifle Mark 2: (2) Taricus, TricMagic

[evictedSaint]

It's not a pun. How do you expect me to vote for it if it's not a pun?

[TricMagic]

It's not a pun. How do you expect me to vote for it if it's not a pun?

As a punishment maybe for the bad pun?

[NUKE9.13]

Jolly good.

Chinese Fingertrap: (2) MoP, eS
Finger Trap - Shift Mod: (1) Doomblade,
"Old Reliable" Imperial Arsenal Revolving Rifle Mark 2: (3) Taricus, TricMagic, NUKE9.13

[ConscriptFive]

Revision: Snapping Tortoise Rotary "Snow Plow"

You see, this is why public education was a mistake.  Some kids sit down with some liberal snowflake professor, and they come back thinking they know better than you.  Right now we have reports of students blocking our troop trains: lots of songs and carrying signs, saying such banalities as "Zounds No, We Won't Go" and "No Blood for Coal."  These obstructionist Red Minstrels have no appreciation for the Empire and need to be cleared from the tracks.

The standard cow catcher plow on the front of our locomotives will be replaced with a fan-like set of spinning angled blades.  While this industrial strength snow blower was designed to clear snowy passes, it will happy clear nearly any obstruction on the tracks, including large animal carcasses.  The public should be made aware that the engineer has very limited visibility, and should not be held at fault should someone carelessly stand in his way.

Reference Videos:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hbLyXtzLX3I
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jo-mA5KCsyI

We still get two revision, right?

Chinese Fingertrap: (3) MoP, eS, ConscriptFive
Finger Trap - Shift Mod: (1) Doomblade,
"Old Reliable" Imperial Arsenal Revolving Rifle Mark 2: (3) Taricus, TricMagic, NUKE9.13
Snapping Tortoise Rotary "Snow Plow:" (1) ConscriptFive

[Taricus]

No, we only have the one for this turn, unless Chief changes his mind on that too.

[Doomblade187]

Chinese Fingertrap: (2) MoP, eS
Finger Trap - Shift Mod: (0)
"Old Reliable" Imperial Arsenal Revolving Rifle Mark 2: (3) Taricus, TricMagic, NUKE9.13, Doomblade

[Madman198237]

Chinese Fingertrap: (2) MoP, eS
Finger Trap - Shift Mod: (0)
"Old Reliable" Imperial Arsenal Revolving Rifle Mark 2: (5) Taricus, TricMagic, NUKE9.13, Doomblade, Madman

[Chiefwaffles]

Game Update: Revision Reports, Year -3 TURNTURNTURN

Revision: "Old Reliable" Imperial Arsenal Revolving Rifle Mk.2
(Normal) 2d4 = 6: Above Expectations

General mechanical reinforcement of the mechanisms involved in the Finger Trap Old Reliable have resulted in great overall improvement. We've brought the weapon down from its ambitious but not-really-working double-action roots to a still fairly ambitious but arguably more sane single action. All the end user of the weapon has to worry about is shooting it and cocking the hammer (and loading it, and some other minor things but you get the idea). Misalignment of the cylinder is a rare to impossible occurrence and while still not the safest thing by itself, less reason for people to put their vulnerable flesh next to the hungry mechanisms equates to less fingers sacrificed to the thing. A few people have complained that this will "reduce the moral and upstanding character in our soldiers" and that the constant risk of flesh shearing was "motivation for soldiers to shoot right the first time to minimize loading." These people luckily do not make the decisions. Most of them. Hopefully.
The supply of existing prototype Finger Traps has been offloaded to Imperial prisons who we're told have "creative disciplining" in mind for their use of the things. We've opted not to ask more.

Rate of fire is effectively increased, as one may expect. While not the hardest thing to do independently, we were lucky that we had time to revisit manufacturing of the mechanism during the rest of the changes. With the internals of the firearm a bit more robust, we can afford to play more loosely with manufacturing and thus decrease materials wasted.

"Old Reliable" Imperial Arsenal Revolving Rifle Mk.2": [0][1][1]

Spoiler: Designs (click to show/hide)

Firearms

• "Old Reliable" Imperial Arsenal Revolving Rifle: .45 caliber revolving breech-loaded caplock carbine utilizing a 5-chamber revolving cylinder working with a single barrel. Once each cylinder is manually loaded, they can all be fired in sequence via revolving the cylinder between shots. Cocking of the hammer pulls trigger back into position and revolves cylinder to bring next (ideally, loaded) chamber in line with the barrel. Mind your fingers. Powerful, but low-velocity. Medium range.
  [0][1][1]

Logistics

• "Tortoise" Protected Train, Colonial Duty: Series of armored train cars impervious to rifle fire and resistant to blasts (with decreased but not-minimized risk of derail) against the car connections, engine car, and passageways across all the cars. Firing and viewing holes are present for return fire.
  
  • "Tortoise" Boiler Engine Car: Tortoise engine car that uses standard coal boilers upscaled beyond regular engine cars to compensate for weight of armor plating. Completely armored.
    [0][2][3]
  • "Tortoise" Steam Core Engine Car: An engine car variant that completely ditches the boiler and operates entirely off of a single steam core for high speeds and/or weight loads. Completely armored.
    [1][2][0]
  • "Tortoise" Cargo Cars: (Partially) armored cargo cars best used with a Tortoise engine car. The cargo itself isn't directly protected, but a lesser chance of train disruption is more than enough to increase cargo safety.
    [0][2][0]

It is now the Internal Affairs Phase; stand by for the report.

[Chiefwaffles]

Game Update: Internal Affairs, Year -3 TURNTURNTURN

The fighting overseas goes great! Our military is merely temporarily staying in the area to ensure a high quality of life for the new citizens of the Empire.  We are not experiencing attrition, our rail lines are not being sabotaged, and deserting is not at an all-time high. Claims to the contrary are false, and if you have made such a claim please report to your nearest Imperial official for a brief re-education.
The Imperial princess, heiress to the Emperor, has temporarily taken the throne in the esteemed Emperor's absence fighting overseas. As you all surely expect, there is no discontent to this announcement. The 1st Imperial Guard Legion has been deployed to the Empire's greatest ports and rail lines directed towards those ports. Their duty is merely to politely dissuade the misguided patriots who appear to accidentally be blocking our rail lines. With polite, small amounts of force. Politely.

You have been instructed to continue with your duties. To help bring the military back home. Not that they need the help. Because they don't. Just look at these legitimate letters received from overseas!

Spoiler: Designs (click to show/hide)

Firearms

• "Old Reliable" Imperial Arsenal Revolving Rifle: .45 caliber revolving breech-loaded caplock carbine utilizing a 5-chamber revolving cylinder working with a single barrel. Once each cylinder is manually loaded, they can all be fired in sequence via revolving the cylinder between shots. Cocking of the hammer pulls trigger back into position and revolves cylinder to bring next (ideally, loaded) chamber in line with the barrel. Mind your fingers. Powerful, but low-velocity. Medium range.
  [0][1][1]

Logistics

• "Tortoise" Protected Train, Colonial Duty: Series of armored train cars impervious to rifle fire and resistant to blasts (with decreased but not-minimized risk of derail) against the car connections, engine car, and passageways across all the cars. Firing and viewing holes are present for return fire.
  
  • "Tortoise" Boiler Engine Car: Tortoise engine car that uses standard coal boilers upscaled beyond regular engine cars to compensate for weight of armor plating. Completely armored.
    [0][2][3]
  • "Tortoise" Steam Core Engine Car: An engine car variant that completely ditches the boiler and operates entirely off of a single steam core for high speeds and/or weight loads. Completely armored.
    [1][2][0]
  • "Tortoise" Cargo Cars: (Partially) armored cargo cars best used with a Tortoise engine car. The cargo itself isn't directly protected, but a lesser chance of train disruption is more than enough to increase cargo safety.
    [0][2][0]

It is now the Design Phase of Year -2. Please submit proposals and vote on a final two to be considered for this year's designs.

[Kashyyk]

Now that our soldiers have a good weapon, its time to give them some fire support.

"Big Boy Blue" Imperial Arsenal Revolving Pneumatic Steam Cannon
Weighing in at around 1.2 tonnes, the "Big Boy Blue" is a crew served artillery piece that can reliably fire 18 pound shells out to at least Long Range. These shells come in the following types:

- Armour piercing
- Smoke
- Star
- Incendiary
- Shrapnel shell
- High explosive

With its revolving six-shell side-loading cylinder (because top-break is not reasonable with a 1 tonne weapon), it should have a burst fire rate of 60 RPM, and thanks to the lack of propellant, the shells should be easier to handle and thus allow for rapid reloading of the cylinder in 30 seconds, for a sustained 10 RPM.

Speaking of, the weapon is attached to a separate Steam Core generator via hose, which will provide the high pressure steam required for the pneumatic firing action. As a separate item, the generator will be able to support multiple weapons simultaneously, allowing us to field the typical three gun battery with just the one Steam Core.

[TricMagic]

Here's a combat airship I thought up for next turn. sorry for the terrible proposal

'Victoria' Imperial Combat Dirigible

The pinnacle of Imperial flight engineering, the Victoria is a rigid airship designed for combat. It is filled with hot air produced by a steam boiler on board. The very same boiler drives a propeller shaft, giving the airship a means of propulsion. The boiler is also designed in such a manner that several devices requiring steam may run off of it, in a quite modular fashion. The Victoria carries several rifles in gun ports, and it contains a bay for carrying bombs or perhaps other devices.

The basic idea is that it could function as both a bomber or a carrier, perhaps for small landships or the screw propeller vehicle than Andrea proposed.

Bring in the air bombers. And air recon. And airship in general.

Also another design that now that it's not transport could work as a base.

Design: "Falcons's Nest" Command Dirigible

Why lead from the front when you can lead from above?

The "Falcon's Nest" Command Dirigible is a flying headquarters, enabling senior leadership to maintain a birds-eye view of the battlefield.  Fog of war no more, our generals can use state-of-the-art optics to personally observe fires and maneuver from a sky-borne war room.  Safe above the fray, general signal/communication is executed by signal (flare) rockets, or a loud and distinct steam whistle.  More detailed communiques can be transmitted via an aerie of highly trained messenger falcons.  (Falcons were chosen over mere pigeons due to their speed, grace, and nobility.)

[evictedSaint]

Hail to the Princess!  May her rule be as Just and Righteous as her fathers!

What is her name?

[Madman198237]

...that wasn't meant to convert it to single action. In fact the connection of all the elements together (trigger, hammer, cylinder rotation/indexing) would force it to be a double-action revolver, albeit in this case one that would allow you to manually cock the hammer (also rotating the cylinder into place and moving the trigger most of the way backwards) so that it could be fired in single action if necessary.


Kashyyk, the use of a steam core on a mere 3 18-pounder guns seems....a little too much for too little gain.