Steam and Steel-II Casting Call

[Crossroads Inc.]

So, how far b ack is the restart going? Are we going to shuffle the locations of powers? Resources? In other words, is my old OOB gonna be worth jack?

pretty much what Beowulf said. It's restting fro mthe start of the game itself, all setup and reosurces is still in place.

[Beowulf]

My gut is telling me that amalgamating different concepts into one idea is deeply lame. Whatever shall I do!

Come up with something less lame?

[Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba]

My gut is telling me that amalgamating different concepts into one idea is deeply lame. Whatever shall I do!

Come up with something less lame?

I have begun the process of un-laming Indochina. I'm of two minds whether or not to sweep away the last vestiges of the Lameness.

[Adrian Laguna]

There's always the option of using RedImperator's nation description for... um, inspiration. Though you might want to ask permission, depending on just how much inspiration you take from it.

[Cincinnatus]

My gut is telling me that amalgamating different concepts into one idea is deeply lame. Whatever shall I do!

Come up with something less lame?

I have begun the process of un-laming Indochina. I'm of two minds whether or not to sweep away the last vestiges of the Lameness.

You've made a mistake in your Hand of God and Angkor class ships.

1) You can't have ships over 300 points, so you'll have to downgrade the Hand of God

2) Ship tonnage is twice its point value multiplied by 100, so the Hand of God would be 20,000 tons and the Angkor would be 15,000 tons.

You'll have to remove 50 points from the Hand of God's attributes, knock it's value down to 300, and fix the tonnage of the Angkor.

[Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba]

Thanks. I had just assigned tonnage arbitrarily, and had no idea about limits. Looks like I'll have to scrap my Dreadnought idea.

[Stormbringer]

2) Ship tonnage is twice its point value multiplied by 100,

Actually, that's not right at all. You buy hull tonnage, you get 100 tons of displacement for every point spent. Your ship is limited to having as many points in attributes as you have in hull.

For the max size battleship that means you spend 150 points for the tonnage/hull. You then may have 150 points of attributes.

At this time 15,000 tons is the maximum displacement. That means that you cannot have a vessel worth more than 300 points and it may not have more than 150 points of attributes.

[Stormbringer]

Question, only Pablo and I seem to have paid for anything like a merchant marine shipping. I take it that means that most nations won't really have the shipping capacity to actually transport troops over any sort of significant distances?

Or should I change that before I waste the points on unnecessary realism?

[Cincinnatus]

2) Ship tonnage is twice its point value multiplied by 100,

Actually, that's not right at all. You buy hull tonnage, you get 100 tons of displacement for every point spent. Your ship is limited to having as many points in attributes as you have in hull.

For the max size battleship that means you spend 150 points for the tonnage/hull. You then may have 150 points of attributes.

At this time 15,000 tons is the maximum displacement. That means that you cannot have a vessel worth more than 300 points and it may not have more than 150 points of attributes.

Whoops, I actually meant half its point value, and not twice, so that 300 points would net you a 15,000 ton ship.

Going back and reading the Grand Rules Thread, though, I see that you're right about 1 point equals 100 tons. That would mean that a 15,000 point ship would be worth 150 points. However, everyone's been setting up their OOBs with the 1:50 ratio. Was the 1:100 ratio just a typo, or is there something I'm missing?

EDIT: Oh, wait, I see. It's a combination of the attribute points and the tonnage that equals the total points spent. Sorry, now I get it.

Question, only Pablo and I seem to have paid for anything like a merchant marine shipping. I take it that means that most nations won't really have the shipping capacity to actually transport troops over any sort of significant distances?

Or should I change that before I waste the points on unnecessary realism?

Everyone starts with 1,700 points of shipping, and setting up a trade route with someone costs 500 for iron, coal, cotton, or food, 250 for sulfur and rares, and only 100 for the other luxury goods.

[Stormbringer]

Redleader, your ships are also rules breaking. The max you can spend in points on a ship is 300. And you can only match the value of the hull in attribute points. Again: 150 points of hull, 150 points of attributes.

[Stormbringer]

Going back and reading the Grand Rules Thread, though, I see that you're right about 1 point equals 100 tons. That would mean that a 15,000 point ship would be worth 150 points. However, everyone's been setting up their OOBs with the 1:50 ratio. Was the 1:100 ratio just a typo, or is there something I'm missing?

Well, technically half of it is put into attributes. Either way, 300 points boils down to a 15,000 ton ship with 150 points of attributes to shuffle.

Everyone starts with 1,700 points of shipping, and setting up a trade route with someone costs 500 for iron, coal, cotton, or food, 250 for sulfur and rares, and only 100 for the other luxury goods.

So pretty much yes then?

[Beowulf]

You buy hull tonnage for 100 tons per point. You then buy equipment to stick on the hull, to a max of the amount you spent on the hull.

So, 100 ton ship, costs 1 point, plus another point because I want extra torpedos on it. Few people see any point in not spending up to the maximum allowable by the hull, so it appears that you get 50 tons per point.

[Cincinnatus]

Going back and reading the Grand Rules Thread, though, I see that you're right about 1 point equals 100 tons. That would mean that a 15,000 point ship would be worth 150 points. However, everyone's been setting up their OOBs with the 1:50 ratio. Was the 1:100 ratio just a typo, or is there something I'm missing?

Well, technically half of it is put into attributes. Either way, 300 points boils down to a 15,000 ton ship with 150 points of attributes to shuffle.

Okay, got it. I didn't make the connection that you add the tonnage and the attributes together. (I also edited my post to correct myself just as you posted this, funnily enough.)

Everyone starts with 1,700 points of shipping, and setting up a trade route with someone costs 500 for iron, coal, cotton, or food, 250 for sulfur and rares, and only 100 for the other luxury goods.

So pretty much yes then?

Unless you're going to need extra to ferry troops around, I guess.

[Stormbringer]

Unless you're going to need extra to ferry troops around, I guess.

Probably not. And I have some of that 1700 left anyway.

[Rawtooth]

Okay, I can't make head nor tails of the infantry system. Could someone explain it to me?

I also would like my updated little isles so I can poke at them with Corel.

Edit: And Chewbaca gets six resources?

[Dahak]

Okay, I can't make head nor tails of the infantry system. Could someone explain it to me?

I also would like my updated little isles so I can poke at them with Corel.

Edit: And Chewbaca gets six resources?

They were randomly distributed. Like in real life

[Stormbringer]

Redleader,

I know in a sense much the game is abstract, but a lot of people will have a very hard time taking your navy seriously when you're telling them they're facing decrepit broadside iron clads. The technology is set for early 1890s so you may want to update it more for that time period.

[Beowulf]

I'll have no problem with his relatively anciently designed ships... I'll be able to stand out of his range and pound his ships into splinters. Torpedo attacks should also be fun. I wouldn't be surprised if a torpedo attack was able to break the keel of a ship of the line.

[Redleader34]

Oh. I thought this was post civil war, not pre WW1. I must update my navy to relfect that then After doing research via the internet, and the libary, I have found out that ships of this era were quite odd.

[Adrian Laguna]

I suggest you read the first posts in this thread and this thread. Then, you should skim through, and at least read an entire OOB, in this thread. With any luck you'll learn something, fix your OOB, and I won't get headaches when I try to read it.

[Beowulf]

Nietz, your BBs seem undergunned. 2x 13" naval rifles is about half the number of guns a typical BB of this era would have. Your battlecruisers are anachronistic. The battlecruiser concept doesn't get invented until post-Dreadnought. And it's overly well armed as well. It seems even better armed than your BBs.

The protected cruisers are interestingly armed. A single 13in rifle would probably be best replaced with a quartet of medium caliber guns (7-9"). Also, by the points allocated to it, it should be 5,000 tons. The destroyer design as also interestingly armed (and classified, for that matter). Destroyers don't have battleship caliber weapons. Battlecruisers might, but not anything lighter, really (with some exceptions). Destroyer guns are meant to take out lighter opponents. A battleship gun fires too slow and moves too slowly. The destroyer is also about 4 times heavier than it should be. Destroyers in this era are about 500 tons. You have what are really protected cruisers.

On a similar note, your torpedo boats should probably actually be classified as destroyers. And have more torpedoes. And probably a slightly heavier gun. And for that matter, be lighter. While I'm tearing it apart, "slow, heavy, well-armed and armoured torpedo boats" is an oxymoron and a target. A slow, heavy, well armored torpedo boat is not going to be heavily armored enough to with stand a battleships fire, nor fast enough to be able to effectively avoid it.

[Redleader34]

So I updated my ships to reflect the naval spirit. One question about the era. Would the WW1 pratice of Convoys, be accepted as a valid anti-pirate defense?

[Stormbringer]

So I updated my ships to reflect the naval spirit. One question about the era. Would the WW1 pratice of Convoys, be accepted as a valid anti-pirate defense?

Against routine piracy? No. Maybe if it's a valuable military cargo or something.

[Stormbringer]

So I updated my ships to reflect the naval spirit.

Not enough. Not nearly enough.

The Globe Defense vessels are severaly overgunned for 7,500 tons. 4 x 12in guns is on a par with a typical battleship.

The Warrior. Broadside, multi-deck warships. Turrets. Casemated guns. Get with the times.

Monitors. Severly, retardedly undergunned. At this point you've got a decent colonial cruiser size vessel. It should be carrying more guns and probably torpedoes.

Oh, and muskets? Cartridge firing weapons are the least standard around here.

* * *

Please look at other's OOBs. Some one like Pablo would be a good example.

[SirNitram]

Luminiferia

As the Great War's first causes revealed themselves, before the cannons first spoke, there were those who realized what was coming. They were men who had nothing to gain by such a war; foreign wars, far removed from Europe and the still-adolescent United States, could be profitable, but war on the Dying Continent was nothing to celebrate. Still, with America erupting into it's own internal conflict, there had to be a new land to settle on. Thus it was that some of the greatest minds and captains of industry conspired quietly, until the perfect location was found.

A long stretch of the African east coast was surveyed, valued, and simply bought from the Great Empires, granting the seemingly suicidal leaders even more money to throw away on their pointless struggle. The stretch of land was named Luminiferia, for the founders hoped it would grow in the light of science and reason, not the nationalism or extreme religion that has come to plague so much of the world.

Luminiferia has grown almost entirely by immigration through it's past thirty years. Freedmen from the lands who until recently still practiced slavery, moderate Muslims fleeing the Kaliphate, Europeans seeking solace from the seemingly endless war, and endless natives who saw the collapse of empires as their chance to start a new life. And their new home has treated them surprisingly well.

Though bias and racism still raise their ugly heads in the Land Of Light, extensive efforts are made to pursue true equality of opportunity. A shaky and newborn Meritocracy has been forged, seeking to position each citizen in a role where their natural talents are best used. A large, well-funded public education system has been erected, and the Lumin government often headhunt for great minds across the world, offering government grants when the old powers deny them.

Among those greatest acheivements in stealing away minds from the warring powers are Charles Babbage and Nicolai Tesla. Babbage had advanced his computing engines from far-fetched dreams to working, clacking-and-whirring reality before his death. Nicolai Tesla is a new citizen of Lumin, caught by the ever-watchful consulate when the American Thomas Edison reneged on a fifty thousand dollar contract with the inventor. His work has already advanced the understanding of Etheric Science, by revealing it's capability of liberating energy bound up in matter, and the methods to transform vacuum into a conductor, not a resistor.

The government of Luminiferia is democratic layout, with eligibility to vote based not on age, creed, or gender, but on passing a standardized test administered crafted by the heads of the universities within the Land of Light. Two houses of Parliment are in place(Lords Disciplina, elected from the science and engineering guilds, and the Lords Civitas, normal citizens elected by their peers), with a Chancellor elected by the unified houses.

With a long border with the Kaliphate and a history of promoting Natural Theology, Deism, and moderate religions, Luminiferia has often suffered attacks from it's less enlightened(In their own view, at least) neighbours. For this reason, the Lumin's borders are watched by a massive network of fortresses armed with weapons designed to fully exploit the advances in science that emerges from this strange country. Etheric Resonance Cannons and Beyond-Horizon-Cannons, guided by the powerful Analytical Engines, have cast more than one army back into Africa Proper.

Yet science and industry, the twin gears that power the Land Of Light, are voracious. Demand for raw materials, most notably the incredible material known as Aether, is pushing Luminiferia to look to the world for more than just new minds. A military almost entirely geared for defense now must contemplate the option of striding forth, to protect and, if necessary, claim new sources of materal.

120pts
LDV Babagge-class Armoured Cruiser.
6,000 tons
Armament: 1x16 inch Etheric Cannon.
4x8 inch guns
8x6 inch guns
4x18 inch torpedo tubes
Protection: 10
Speed: 8
Fire: 25
Maneuver: 10
Torpedo Protection: 7
x2

80 pts
LDV Dawn-class Protected Cruiser.
4,000 tonnes
Armament: 2x8 inch guns
6x6-inch guns
4x18-inch torpedo tubes
Protection: 7
Speed: 10
Fire: 14
Maneuver: 8
Torpedo Protection: 1

x17

8 pts
LDV Temptest-class Fast Destroyers.
400 tonnes
Armament: 1x12-pounder
5x6-pounders
2x2 inch Etheric Cannon.
Speed: 2
Maneuver: 1
Fire: 1

x40

2pts
LDV Shield-class Torpedo Boats
100 tonnes
Armament: 2x24 inch torpedo tubes
2x.303 Maxim guns
Fire: 1

x90

Standard Navy Cost: 2000 pts

Luminiferian Cavalry.
Operate in units of 1,000 cavalry apeice. Fast troops equipped with proven bolt-action rifles. Battle-hardened against Kaliphate invasions.

5 units.

(5,000 Cavalry, * 4 for Elite, = 400 pts)

Thor's Hammer Artillery.
The myriad difficulties of making mobile Beyond Horizon Cannons is nothing compared to the difficulty of getting the analytical engines that make them work so well mobile and training up spotters to range ahead.. But Luminiferia seems to have done it. Integrated directly into the main army, they work excellently with the normal horse-drawn maxim guns and bolt-action rifles.

(20,000 troops w/artillery, x6 for 'Elite and Artillery, 600 pts)

Fortress Gateway
200 pts.

Built in the largest pass into Luminiferia by land, Gateway administers the entry of refugees from the Kaliphate while holding the line against the rare attack across the desert. Equipped with Beyond-Horizon Cannons and large analytical engines to lengthen their ranges, it has never fallen yet.

Fortress Storm
300 pts.

Near identical in form to Gateway, Storm was built on the coast near the capital of Luminopolis to fend off Kaliphate naval assaults. The BHC gunners who use their loud, clanking engines to gain firing solutions are well-drilled to take spotting data from assisting naval vessels and score devastating hits.

'Hell's Strait'
100 pts.

A minefield set off the Lumin coast with narrow and patrolled paths through. Through the use of Tesla's work with the wireless telegraph, the minefields spend much of their time inactive, though can become armed within a few hours.

Defenses and Army: 1700 pts

Supertechnology:

Luminiferia is well known as being on the bleeding edge of science, though rarely for warfare. For better or ill, the following prototypes have been refit for use on the battlefield.

300 pts
LDV Nautilus-class submarine.
15,000 ton battleship
Armanant: 8x24 inch torpedo tubes
1x16 inch Etheric Cannon
Protection: 50
Speed: 20
Fire: 30
Maneuver: 20
Torpedo Protection: 30

The Nautilus was originally built simply for exploration of the undersea world. She has been rushed into military service by the addition of a massive spinal Ether Resonance Discharge Device(Etheric Cannon or EC for short) and four massive torpedo tubes, facing fore and aft. She is unique in submarines with both her sheer, epic size, and for her use of the bizarre element 'Uranium', first located in Oslo as part of what was dubbed a 'natural reactor'. Exploiting the same mechanics observed, the metals tendency to give off heat powers the Nautilus while submerged, allowing it to reach unparalled speeds while submerged. She remains primarily a research vessel, both to fully prove the concept of submarines in military use, and to fully chart the wonders of the underwater world.

Experimental Vessels: 300 pts.