So, after a conversation with Amanda about a possible new character/rebuild of her character, I was reminded about this thought that I had floating through my mind. I will warn: Most of this is me trying to force 'real life' on a fictional universe, but hopefully it is a reasonable informed crow-barring of such things into the world of Arcanis. . .
Naval Technology of the Known Lands:
One area of Arcanis that is very little-explored within the adventures is naval tactics, design, and generally naval-related stories. There is a very good reason for this: You CANNOT represent naval combat and life at sea appropriately with a random bunch of Heroes. For the most part, Heroes lack all appropriate skills for ship handling, most 'random encounters' would be little more than Seamanship Action Skill Rolls, combat would be pretty 'generic' within the bounds of some of the combats in the campaign, and unless the Heroes were the captain of the ship they would have almost no authority over their destinies while aboard ship (being little more than passengers). As I have been informed on many occasions by various people, this does not make for fun mods for most people, so they do not often get made.
That said, we do have some information about how people on Eastern Onara deal with travel over water. Alas, a lot of adventures dealing with this were written by a wide variety of people, not all of whom gave a consistent view of how ship design works or the historical analoges which have been established in Arcanis fluff. In some adventures, you are manning a Roman-style Galley appropriate for the Punic Wars, and other times you are aboard a schooner appropriate for the 18th Century Golden Age of Pirates. A good chunk of this comes from the fairly desperate components of cultures and even other campaigns and books which found their way into Arcanis Canon. For example: The Pirate Isles were brought almost wholesale over from the Green Ronin Freeport book, which painted a picture similar to places such as Tortuga or the other European ports in the Caribbean, which is somewhat incongruous with late-Roman Empire, early Holy Roman Empire setting of most of the rest of Onara.
But, for better or worse, this IS Arcanis canon, so let us try to sort out at least commonalities between these technologies and designs for the major naval powers.
The first thing that we can see is that there really are no TRUE naval powers among the Known Lands. The largest canon navies belong to Milandir, Entaris, Altheria, and the Coryani Empire, with all of them maintaining at least some warships to protect their commerce. Technically Ymandragore also fits into "naval powers" as well, but their ships are in a class of their own for many reasons, so they will not be discussed in relation to the other powers.
The second major point to think about for most Known Lands powers is that there really isn't much need for a large navy as a major military force. Aside from Ymandragore (and debateably Entaris), all the nations of the Known Lands are land powers, with most of the military actions being done using land forces. If all your enemies are building armies and not navies, there is less imperative for you to build a navy, instead focusing your attention towards armies yourself to counter your enemies. A good example of this was the Roman navy in the later-Empire period where Rome held almost complete domination over the Mediterranean Sea. During the Punic Wars and into the days of Augustus Caeser, there were foreign powers around the Mediterranean Sea, which lead to the creation of a strong Roman Navy, but once these powers were conquered, the only real role of the late-period Roman navy was commerce protection and anti-piracy, leading to a steady build-down and demotion of the navy from importance to the Roman military machine. In the Known Lands, the only TRUE naval threat is Pirates and Harvesters, which typically would mean that the navies would generally stagnate.
That said, we can make a few assumptions as to the needs of the various vessels of the Known Lands and their designs based on the operational realities of their ships. As stated above, almost all the powers of the Known Lands are continental land powers, with no real trade being done across wide, deep bodies of water. As far as we know, there is no trade between the 'known' nations and any far-off nations such as whatever powers may exist on the Southern Continent (such as the remains of the original Myrantian Empire or other such powers) or any group to the East of what we have seen on the maps. This means that all sea traffic would travel in what is essentially coastal waters rather than over deep ocean. This means that all ships being used by the known powers would make use of littoral ships, which are typically less 'weatherly' than the kinds of tallships that were common among European powers during their age of colonization. After all, if you are never more than a few dozen miles from shore, and the shelter that entails, why go to the expense of building a ship that would need to survive in a squall in the middle of the ocean? Galleys could be useful in this regard, but the necessity to include oars and oarsmen would cut into cargo tonnage, so merchant ships would take a more galleon-type (similar to the Spanish treasure ships of the colonial ear).
This means that the ships being designed would reflect this necessity because there would be no real NEED to advance more than this. They would build merchant vessels to carry maximum weight of cargo instead of dedicating tonnage and crew to more powerful sailplans, weaponary, heavier timbers that can resist weather and damage, etc. Similarly, warships will be designed to be fast in all conditions and tend to be far lighter in tonnage than the big lumbering merchant vessels. After all, warships have to 1) Catch other warships, 2) run down slower merchant vessls (ie: commerce warfare or piracy), 3) be able to maneuver to do the most damage to their enemies. Big battleships are designed to fight other big battleships, and if there are not big battleships, then there is no need for them.
After having discussed this with Mr. Lopez some time ago when trying to write one of the afore-mentioned naval stories, he let me know that the Coryani and Milandesian Navies (the largest of the major Human powers) typically use galley-style warships for the majority of their warships. These warships would use either square sails or possibly a lanteen rig, depending on their needs. Ultimately, for a galley-type warship the sail is simply a cruising form of propulsion, with their 'fighting' locomotion being provided by banks of oars. This is because 1) Sails are vulnerable to enemy fire, and 2) oars let them maneuver without having to rely on the wind. This means, while a ship requiring a sail would need to tack into the wind, making huge course changes to ensure that the wind is hitting the sails from the right direction to give them motion in the direction of the wind, a galley can simply row directly into the wind, cutting off the tacking ship.
In terms of armament, galleys are not the ‘typical’ sail warship most people think about when thinking about sail warships. Because of the banks of oars, galleys can only carry a fairly light cannon load on their broadsides, mostly due to the fact that to support the rowing deck(s), the ship cannot afford the tonnage of having heavily reinforced gundecks without completely tipping over (in ships, you want weight lower to prevent the ship from tipping over). Instead, Arcanis galleys would use Battle Mages, ballistae (large crossbows), and ramming/boarding tactics to deal with other ships in the ‘land battle at sea’ paradigm of naval warfare. However, we know that the galleys of Milandir (at least) utilize cannons as armament, which means that they are almost certainly either light (placed in broadsides, mostly for anti-personnel fire) or mounted in the castles. These structures are in the bow and stern (front and back) of the ship, and typically consist of fairly thick timbers which are built up to make it difficult for boarders to come over after ramming the front and rear of the ship. These weapons in the forecastle and aftercastle are called ‘chase’ weapons and would be used against targets that the galley is intending to ram and board to ‘soften them up’, or to use in the ‘fire across the bow’ tactics to get ships to heave too for boarding.
Another major naval power is the Republic of Altheria, and (like so many other things) have been described as using far more technologically advanced weapons than the other powers. In the invasion of Entaris (the Plexan Armada), the fleet was escorted by a fleet of a hundred “Altheran Galleons,” and assuming that this was meant to be descriptive, it means that the Republic of Altheria (or, at least the Province of Altheria under Coryan) produced gun-armed warships along the galleon style. These ships would mount large banks of cannon along a gundeck (or multiple decks) and are designed to pound ships into splinters rather than kill the crew like a galley would do. These ships are absolutely deadly to any other ship which happens to enter its broadside arcs, but unlike galleys are completely dependent on the winds to maneuver. As such, if a Galley can pen in a galleon, it will rip it apart, but first the galley has to get close enough to board.
But if cannons are such a powerful weapon, why don’t all nations use Galleons? Well, one has to remember that the chemical composition we know as gunpowder does not exist in Arcanis. The only equivalent that is allowed in the universe is Blastpowder, an alchemical formula that is monopolized by the Church of Althares and the Republic of Altheria. Without a locally-produced alternative to Blastpowder, all other nations of Onara are utterly dependent on the Altherans and their “Second Gift” in order to utilize these powerful weapons, significantly restricting the utility for anyone other than the Altherans.
Moving away from human nations, the other major naval power (or, at least that of the ‘good guy nations’) is Entaris. Unlike the Human nations, the Elorii cannot make use of Blastpowder weapons in their fleets (especially after the war). Without this, they are forced to make due with far more traditional galley-style naval warfare. However, we have a reference to Elorii warships being the small, fast raider-type vessels (with technology as it is, probably lanteen or even schooner rigged) that have been the dominant class of pirate craft throughout the age of sail. They are fast, sturdy vessels which have been described as being “long and slender.” I assume this is in relation to the stubbier merchant vessels which would be used for cargo carrying, as if you make a ship too long and thin, you will not be able to maneuver it in combat particularly well. After all, too narrow prevents you from being able to hold the wind in your sails without flipping the ship over, and too long makes it slow to steer. As such, from the description of the craft and the references I’ve been able to find, they would fall closer in line to the Mediterranean sailing frigates from the medieval period of history—that being a smaller class of warship smaller than a Galleass with both oars and sails—though with a nonstandard (from our history, anyway) weapons mix.
Unlike the human warships, the Elorii make extensive use of their Berotars: Arcane shipmasters who not only can command the wind and waves to move their ships at their will, but also call up the legions of the depths to fight for them. Add in the Elorii propensity towards elemental warfare (ie: Elemental Bolts), and they would probably use their magics where a human crew would use cannons. That said, despite what I’ve seen of Elorii in the campaign, I doubt that the majority of their people are arcanely gifted, and therefore the supply of Berotar on a ship would be fairly limited. Without the arcane (or, in some cases, divine) magics to support them, they would have to rely on boarding tactics and possibly even ramming to eliminate enemy vessels. The ramming becomes slightly more problematic if it is more of a frigate-type ship, as frigates are more heavily focused towards sailing than rowing, so lining up for a ramming attack becomes far more problematic. Additionally, ships built for speed cannot have heavy castles on its bow and stern, meaning the ship itself is also probably far more prone and vulnerable to a Coryani galley than the galley would be to it (assuming it gets past all that Elder Magic).
There are two other ‘naval powers’ existing in the Known Lands: Ymandragore, and the Pirate Isles. The Ymandrake fleet seems to consist of a number of foreign craft (galleys, galleons, etc) bearing black sails to proclaim their allegiance (though still being common enough to enter port), and the dreaded Black Ships. These ships are completely products of the Sorcerer-King’s (and his minions’) arcane might, being hewn from the black rock of the island itself. These vessels are said to use summoned infernals as rowers, meaning that they follow a more typical galley-style structure, though with even more magical effects being used than even the dreaded Berotar ships of Entaris. The only picture of an actual Ymandrake fleet we have, however, is found in Eldest Sons (the D20 supplement by PCI), which clearly shows the Black Fleet being more galleon-style tall ships. Alas, I would assume that this was more artistic liscence than a ‘realistic’ view of the ships that have been portrayed in other sources, as such designs almost certainly would not be built to make use of rowers. It is possible they are of a Galleass type of ship (about halfway between a Galley and a more recognizable ‘tall ship’ like, say, the USS Constitution), though there is nothing to clearly state this.
The Pirate Isles, alas, are even more problematical in many ways. In real life, almost NO pirates would have ever used the large ships such as the Black Pearl from the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. Instead, they would operate small vessels closer to a corvette or even a small schooner as those vessels would contain enough firepower and crew to overpower any merchant vessel, and enough speed to outrun a warship that they could not hope to fight. It does not pay for a pirate to attack enemy warships, so they would all run. However, there are several references to the forces of Freeport and the other Pirate Isles making use of these cinematically large tallships, which even the larger nations of Onara cannot hope to afford at Altheran Blastpowder prices. As such, I would assume that any such fleet would be retconned (I would hope) down to a more reasonable size, but that is ultimately up to PCI. Without the need to kowtow to the Green Ronin establishment, this should be easier to do than when such supplements found their way into Arcanis cannon.
_________________ Cody Bergman Legends of Arcanis Campaign Staff Initial Author Contact/Adventure Vetting
Haakon Marcus val'Virdan, Divine Holy Judge of Nier Ruma val'Vasik, Martial Crusader and Master of the Spear Jorma Osterman, Arcane Coryani Battlemage
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