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[dreiche2]

I'm not a huge fan of adding muskets for several reasons

1: Crossbows can already shoot out 1-3 internal organs at once. I don't think we need a weapon more powerful than that.

2: I dislike the idea of anything that is "powerful, but..." because either A-people will find workarounds to negate those disdvantages, or B- they will not and said items will barely be worth using. Why pick up a weapon that will explode in your face, or break or can't shoot straight?

Well, what about this idea then?

Yeah, I had a similar image in my head. Maybe you could make guns a special gadget just for the dwarves, and basically a one-shot weapon that needs to be reloaded in between battles, or even totally replaced after just one shot. Make it close range and easy to use (but not necessarily accurate - at all), possibly without any skill involved.

So I picture dwarves carrying around their one-shot blunderbuss, charging their enemies, shortly stopping to fire off a single shot, and then engaging with their hammers... or similarly welcoming the charging goblin hordes with a single clap of thunder...

So blunderbosses would just be an extra equipment item (maybe like backbacks), essentially giving your melee dwarves an extra first-strike attack (i.e. one-shot, low range, before it comes to melee). Nothing said about whether they would have to be powerful or not...

[Tormy]

dreiche its pointless to add guns imho. Firstly, I dont consider guns "fantasy weaponry". What request will be next? Cannons?
Secondly, ranged weapons are already overpowered. Also your suggestion is making no sense, why should melee units use a ranged weapon for first attack..and if they do use it, why should that be a gun instead -for example- a hand x-bow?

[Granite26]

Rare makes a poor balancer, especially in an open ended game where people *refuse* to play unless they can get all their desired features on one map.  (Why can't I find a starting location with HFS, Iron, Flux, Magma, Running water?).  Add saltpeat and sulfur to the mix and it won't be 'rare' so much as you'll see people complaining about how long it takes to generate a map with all of it at one place.

As for the people complaining about 'why use something that's dangerous', take a look back at the historical reasons.  Basically, it's easy to train up a competant gun user.  Sure your xbows do more damage(?), have better range and accuracy, don't blow up, never misfire, and can be build from a treecap and a dead rabbit, but it takes a year to train them up.  The advantage to going through all the crap to get gunpowder is that you can draft your haulers as emergency militia and give them even odds of doing something useful.  Sure the guns'll blow up in a few hands, but they're just haulers.  peasants...

Plus, as mentioned, the smoke effects would be cool

dreiche its pointless to add guns imho. Firstly, I dont consider guns "fantasy weaponry". What request will be next? Cannons?
Secondly, ranged weapons are already overpowered. Also your suggestion is making no sense, why should melee units use a ranged weapon for first attack..and if they do use it, why should that be a gun instead -for example- a hand x-bow?

Cannons are actually a MORE appropriate weapon for the setting.  The oldest surviving cannon dates to 1288, well within our setting period.

Xbows require the long spars to create the force.  Thus, a handbow would be extremely weak.  In a firearm, thus size of the weapon only increases accuracy.  It is a staple of swashbuckling fiction that the fighter fires off rounds from a few pistols before engaging in melee.  (Read 3 Muskateers) 

If you want to go back even further, it was a standard barbarian technique to use large throwing axes as an initial strike before engaging in melee.  These were often used to lodge into the wooden shields, weighing them down.

[Poco a Poco]

Although steam power does pass the deadline, I could easily see dwarves using it. For example, only they would have the job tag.

Mostly because I've always seen dwarves as heavily industrious, and quite capable of technology.

At the cost of love! D:
...
j/k

[penguinofhonor]

As for the people complaining about 'why use something that's dangerous', take a look back at the historical reasons.  Basically, it's easy to train up a competant gun user.  Sure your xbows do more damage(?), have better range and accuracy, don't blow up, never misfire, and can be build from a treecap and a dead rabbit, but it takes a year to train them up.  The advantage to going through all the crap to get gunpowder is that you can draft your haulers as emergency militia and give them even odds of doing something useful.  Sure the guns'll blow up in a few hands, but they're just haulers.  peasants...

This is the best argument for how to handle guns, in my opinion. Easy to use, but inferior. That's balanced, in my opinion.

Cannons are actually a MORE appropriate weapon for the setting.  The oldest surviving cannon dates to 1288, well within our setting period.

The oldest recorded cannons were made in the 3rd century BC, but these were probably only accurate enough to hit the walls of a large city.

[Moron]

Suggestions about adding technology always seem to centre on either gunpowder or steam power (or both), so there are obviously a fair number of players in favour of these.

How about some kind of Greek fire or similar tar/bitumen based incendiary substance that could be fired out of catapults or used in traps? This was used in ancient Greek/Roman times so should easily fall within the required time period.

As a second suggestion - how about clocks? Spring driven clocks only just fall within the time deadline (late 14th century) but mechanical clocks powered by water or suspended weights existed much earlier.

I'm not exactly sure what the game effects would be - maybe they could make dwarves slightly more productive; they wake earlier and spend less time on breaks if they know what time it is, but also cause some unhappy thoughts because they feel they're being worked too hard.

[Silverionmox]

Clocks could allow the player to influence the time dwarves spend on various tasks.

Possibly through a taskmaster/foredwarf/manager; labor management is an area that could use some attention.

[Tamren]

Yeah lets not allow gunpowder to rule the thread. Pre-1400 tech is a pretty broad topic so im going to start another thread about guns and other ranged weapons.

[penguinofhonor]

So, I like how clocks would give you greater control over dwarves' actions, with the consequence of unhappy thoughts if you worked them too hard. That's a good idea.

[Granite26]

Cannons are actually a MORE appropriate weapon for the setting.  The oldest surviving cannon dates to 1288, well within our setting period.

The oldest recorded cannons were made in the 3rd century BC, but these were probably only accurate enough to hit the walls of a large city.

I seem to recall reading that those didn't use gunpowder and instead relied on compressed air.  The Chinese had a lot of stuff for a while, but the 1288 date was the earliest I found mention of modern society's general idea of a large, cast, reusable cannon.

[penguinofhonor]

Well, I like chinese technology.

One of the most important military treatises of all Chinese history was the Huo Long Jing written by Jiao Yu in the 14th century. For gunpowder weapons, it outlined the use of fire arrows and rockets, fire lances and firearms, land mines and naval mines, bombards and cannons, along with different compositions of gunpowder, including 'magic gunpowder', 'poisonous gunpowder', and 'blinding and burning gunpowder'.

Look at that stuff. That is some awesome weaponry there. And all in the 14th century.

Oh, yeah, they also had paper before westerners did. And printing.

[Silverionmox]

Cannons are actually a MORE appropriate weapon for the setting.  The oldest surviving cannon dates to 1288, well within our setting period.

The oldest recorded cannons were made in the 3rd century BC, but these were probably only accurate enough to hit the walls of a large city.

I seem to recall reading that those didn't use gunpowder and instead relied on compressed air.  The Chinese had a lot of stuff for a while, but the 1288 date was the earliest I found mention of modern society's general idea of a large, cast, reusable cannon.

Gunpowder produces a lot of gas very quickly when burning, and this pressure launches the bullet/cannon ball/fireworks.

[Granite26]

My 2 cents:

Archemedes Mirror:  I think the df way to do this would be to make mirrors heat things up and make it so that an array of them would heat things up a lot.  Imagine the Archemedes Mirror forge!  Simply focus enough light on a square to get magma, and then build a magma forge on top of that!  Sure it's practically impossible to focus that much light, but this is a game...

Damascus Steel:  Last I heard, scientists STILL don't know how they made this.  It leads back into the speciallized alloys knowledge.  Why not have a special mood produce 20 bars of this?

The Arch:  Ok, so this is more of a limitation on the players, but there is no architectural skill (player or dwarven) needed to build a 60 z level tower.  I think that's a shame.

Indoor Plumbing:  Minoans, anyone?

Fire, the Wheel, the Alphabet, Pottery:  Seriously... (pardon the civ refs)

If mining weren't so scary efficient already, powered drills and hydraulic mining would be cool

Gunpowder produces a lot of gas very quickly when burning, and this pressure launches the bullet/cannon ball/fireworks.

The earliest known cannon was invented by Ctesibius of Alexandria, in the 3rd century BC. Little is known about this primitive invention—as most of Ctesibius' works were lost—but it was noted by Philo of Byzantium that it operated using compressed air.

From here : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_cannon

[penguinofhonor]

Oh, gosh. I just looked up that Archimedes mirror thing and it sent me to the Wikipedia page for death ray. That sounds like it would fit in DF, especially considering how dangerous fire is.

Also, wootz steel! The best named metal in the world! Made by adding glass to iron. I think that would be an alternative to steel, but slightly weaker. Although it would just make maps with sand even better.

[MMad]

I think everyone would like to see bombs. EVERYONE.

Erm...not me. 

Me neither. I don't really think gunpowder fits with the DF setting and theme, regardless of when and where it was invented.