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[Dai Grepher]

Dworkin the Mad for DA4 companion!

[Medhia_Nox]

If the South doesn't have Gaatlok after Tresspasser it's a major facepalm... the amount of barrels of it left over are ridiculous.

 

In MoTB Celene is shown listening to an elf discuss Zero - a not insignificant mathematical advancement (though one I find odd given the culture presented for the Orlesians) - there "has" to be alchemists in the south and by that I mean proto-chemists.  Dagna alone could probably figure it out with a pinch of gaatlock. 

 

Speaking of... the dwarves SHOULD get their hands on it.  We know they've been trying to emulate it since Awakening. 

 

And, if the South gets it... Tevinter will be right behind him which would be a major turning point in the war.

 

History:  Emperor Justinian was having GREAT success rebirthing the Roman empire.  Yes, he was a major ****** and was only saved by his wife (thank you Theodora)... but his failure to advance the Eastern Roman Empire was due very heavily to bubonic plague. 

 

So.. without plague and WITH the great equalizer - the Qunari would very likely be pushed back (let's forget that they're not turning their mages into atomic bombs... which could be their next wild card) and the Ottoman turk analogy ends. 

[Typhrus]

With the arc of the Dreadnought's cannon fire, it seems like it could be designed like an early bomb vessel, utilizing mortars on the deck instead of firing broadside. 

 

*snip*

 

Of course, the Dreadnoughts that were in the comics appeared to be firing broadside, so it's probably just a shortcut for the cutscene. Unless Dreadnoughts can be built with different specs... nah, it's probably just a shortcut. 

 

I guess early mortars might be the case, but I'd have to question the range at which it was fired from (close enough for mages to counter attack). I've assumed that they would use early cannons more so than mortars as my understanding of the codex entries this seemed the most accurate. Of course I could be completely wrong because the codex in question would be 'in-universe' and not some external meta source.

I'd still go with a resource short cut though to provide the effect of how deadly they are, but not necessarily go into the specifics of how they work.

I have to admit I didn't know about the Musket being a specific term for men wielding a long arm with a rest. I'm not terribly good on shot and pike army history, where most of my research has been mainly social and political history of that era. I'm much more comfortable with technology from the 18th century onwards, where the common usage of 'musket' is much more common place. I know enough of the basics to make a half decent argument for a forum as to why such weapons would not be practical for a player character in DA. So thank you for that Ashagar, anything that improves my historical knowledge is greatly appreciated.

[Ashagar]

If the South doesn't have Gaatlok after Tresspasser it's a major facepalm... the amount of barrels of it left over are ridiculous.

 

In MoTB Celene is shown listening to an elf discuss Zero - a not insignificant mathematical advancement (though one I find odd given the culture presented for the Orlesians) - there "has" to be alchemists in the south and by that I mean proto-chemists.  Dagna alone could probably figure it out with a pinch of gaatlock. 

 

Speaking of... the dwarves SHOULD get their hands on it.  We know they've been trying to emulate it since Awakening. 

 

And, if the South gets it... Tevinter will be right behind him which would be a major turning point in the war.

 

History:  Emperor Justinian was having GREAT success rebirthing the Roman empire.  Yes, he was a major ****** and was only saved by his wife (thank you Theodora)... but his failure to advance the Eastern Roman Empire was due very heavily to bubonic plague. 

 

So.. without plague and WITH the great equalizer - the Qunari would very likely be pushed back (let's forget that they're not turning their mages into atomic bombs... which could be their next wild card) and the Ottoman turk analogy ends. 

 

There are also no hijacked crusades to rip the heart of the empire, nor are they fighting two major wars (which was the major factor in the turks over running asia minor in the first place as the Byzantines were also trying to fight off the then powerful holy roman empire and the normans over italy. A war that was also the reason Poland became a independent country instead of another part of the HRE.)

 

Though come to think of it major factors in the decline of the entire roman empire as well there were third and fourth century plagues(suspected to be the first cases of smallpox in history) that each wiped out almost the entire roman army and nearly half to over half the civilian population of the empire. Which was especially bad for the roman army as its support base was decimated and the solders that would train the next generation in centuries of carried down tradition, lore and discipline were killed causing the passed down knowelege of many centuries to be lost.

[Mistic]

In MoTB Celene is shown listening to an elf discuss Zero - a not insignificant mathematical advancement (though one I find odd given the culture presented for the Orlesians) - there "has" to be alchemists in the south and by that I mean proto-chemists.  Dagna alone could probably figure it out with a pinch of gaatlock. 

 

Speaking of... the dwarves SHOULD get their hands on it.  We know they've been trying to emulate it since Awakening. 

 

And, if the South gets it... Tevinter will be right behind him which would be a major turning point in the war.

 

Actually, Tevinter may be above the South in science matters. That famous scene in chapter 1 of The Masked Empire, when Celene chastises Chancelier Morrac for not accepting that elf student, is often interpreted as part of Celene's politics to favour elves. However, it also points out that no professor in the best high-learning centre in all the empire can understand "the work of a simple Tevinter scholar", in Celene's own words.

 

Maybe it's a reflection of the real-life situation of the Byzantine Empire keeping centers of higher learning and libraries with thousands of volumes centuries before Latin Europe could match them. Who knows, perhaps in DA4 we'll meet the DA equivalent of Leo the Mathematician or, better yet, Kallinikos of Heliopolis, inventor of the Greek fire. Which could fit in the narrative as an adaptation of gaatlok.

[Ashagar]

Later eras like to over-blow the lack of knowelege in western Europe during the middle ages generally so they could say see how much better we are then them, look they even foolishly bathed regularly allowing evil miasma into the body not knowing that all you had to make your self clean was change your cloths.

 

A lot of knowelege was lost indeed and they didn't have access to many of the Greek works yes which was unsurprising given that western Europe was the Latin speaking half of the empire but they did have access to vast amounts of Latin texts everything from roman government documents to the works of classical and late Latin writers, scientists and scholars. The two most popular Latin writers were Vegetius with his pitoma rei militaris which was treated as the art of war for the west during the medieval period into the early modern age and Pliny the elder's Natural History. They also had to access to Plato's works and rediscovered arterioles works among other ancient philosophical writings.

 

Also in medieval western Europe mechanical clocks were invented, steel weapons and armor were widely produced and vast advancements in architecture were made were invented amoungst many other advancements. Also Monks invented spacing and most of punctuation we use today along with glasses.

[Halfdan The Menace]

The others wouldn't find out. The gaatlok was discovered by the Kossith's alchemists, I imagined everyone who knew how to create the original formula were executed.

[Ashagar]

If the Qunari didn't think anyone was capiable of coming up with it and other techologies they wouldn't have death squads trying to kill inventors like Dworkin the Mad. As for the Kossith I expect they are likely further along with their technology than the qunari given they sent the qunari fleeing into exile.

[Dai Grepher]

To be clear, the southerners would need written information about gaatlok in order to reproduce it. Just examining the gaatlok itself probably would not be enough.

[Ashagar]

Though it would be more likely than trying to greek fire something that the western Europeans, arabs and turks all consistently failed to do in spite of capturing entire barrels of the stuff.

 

Also we have a historical account of what was likely gunpowder being created independently of Asian contacts though it went nowhere as apparently the alchemist in question was so scared by it he burned his notes and entered a monastery. I wouldn't be surpised if something like that has happened with gaatlok before the qunari showed up who then precided to send death squads to make sure the locals didn't invent anything like it.

[Walter Black]

Don't be surprised if in DA4 we uncover gaatlok, only to find Tevinter agents trying to suppress the information.The Magistarium certainly wouldn't be too keen on such a powerful weapon in the hands of mundanes, no matter how much it could aid their war effort. If nothing else, it could possibly lead to a bit of ironic comedy with Vint and Ben Hassrath assassins working in an Enemy Mine situation against the player.

[The Baconer]

Don't be surprised if in DA4 we uncover gaatlok, only to find Tevinter agents trying to suppress the information.The Magistarium certainly wouldn't be too keen on such a powerful weapon in the hands of mundanes, no matter how much it could aid their war effort. If nothing else, it could possibly lead to a bit of ironic comedy with Vint and Ben Hassrath assassins working in an Enemy Mine situation against the player.

 

Firearms aren't really the equalizer some people like to make them out to be. Especially against individuals who can throw fireballs. 

[Arvaarad]

Chance that the recipe leaks (or has leaked) at some point: pretty high.

 

Chance that anyone besides the Qunari would be able to use gaatlok: significantly lower.

 

 

 

Think about our world. Everyone knows how nuclear missiles work in theory. The physics is more-or-less common knowledge. But it requires a large, expensive, dedicated manufacturing pipeline to produce anything remotely polished. In practice, countries don't need to control the information in order to control the technology, they can just identify and interrupt the manufacturing chain.

 

Now, gaatlok is obviously way easier to manufacture. However, Thedas is "behind schedule" on tech, due to their reliance on magic. Even the Qunari have trouble making large amounts of gaatlok - that's why they needed that dragon. So someone needs to get their hands on the recipe, then hike it to a civilization that has enough chemistry knowledge to manufacture non-trivial, decent-quality amounts of the stuff.

 

Best bet would probably be Orzammar, which meshes with the fact that Javaris was the one trying to buy it. The dwarves have strong trading connections with Tevinter, so they would have compelling reasons to produce this stuff. Not to mention the potential for faster lyrium mining.

 

I don't know if the money would necessarily outweigh the Qunari attention they'd attract. Without lots of help from Tevinter, I'm pretty sure the dwarves would fold under direct Qunari assault. That would spell doom for their entire civilization. If they wanted to produce gaatlok, there would be a very, very vulnerable period before production is up and running, where they can't let a single Ben-Hassrath catch wind of their plans. And during that vulnerable time, they'd be striking alliances/trade deals with Tevinter, potentially revealing their plans to spies.

 

In other words, even when the recipe gets out, the Qunari have time before anyone can manufacture it in any threatening amount. They'd have at least a several-year window, which they could prolong by disrupting production where they find it/killing people who've learned the recipe. Likely, people with the recipe wouldn't share it widely (both for safety and to protect their trade secrets). The Ben-Hassrath would only have to assassinate a small number of people to completely undo the damage of a recipe leak.

[Ashagar]

Dworkin the Mad ended up with death squads after him just for improving dwarven explosive technology which already existed. I have no doubt that the locals have likely invented gunpowder repeatedly over the centuries only for the inventors to be killed by the qunari not that it would have mattered if they hadn't.

 

Gunpowder came on the European scene in the 13th century and spread rather quickly across Europe but it took centuries of refinement in both the powder and refinement in firearm, rocket and canon technologies for them just to become viable weapons on the battlefield along side armor and melee weaponry.

[The Baconer]

Chance that the recipe leaks (or has leaked) at some point: pretty high.

 

Chance that anyone besides the Qunari would be able to use gaatlok: significantly lower.

 

 

 

Think about our world. Everyone knows how nuclear missiles work in theory. The physics is more-or-less common knowledge. But it requires a large, expensive, dedicated manufacturing pipeline to produce anything remotely polished. In practice, countries don't need to control the information in order to control the technology, they can just identify and interrupt the manufacturing chain.

 

Now, gaatlok is obviously way easier to manufacture. However, Thedas is "behind schedule" on tech, due to their reliance on magic. Even the Qunari have trouble making large amounts of gaatlok - that's why they needed that dragon. So someone needs to get their hands on the recipe, then hike it to a civilization that has enough chemistry knowledge to manufacture non-trivial, decent-quality amounts of the stuff.

 

Best bet would probably be Orzammar, which meshes with the fact that Javaris was the one trying to buy it. The dwarves have strong trading connections with Tevinter, so they would have compelling reasons to produce this stuff. Not to mention the potential for faster lyrium mining.

 

I don't know if the money would necessarily outweigh the Qunari attention they'd attract. Without lots of help from Tevinter, I'm pretty sure the dwarves would fold under direct Qunari assault. That would spell doom for their entire civilization. If they wanted to produce gaatlok, there would be a very, very vulnerable period before production is up and running, where they can't let a single Ben-Hassrath catch wind of their plans. And during that vulnerable time, they'd be striking alliances/trade deals with Tevinter, potentially revealing their plans to spies.

 

In other words, even when the recipe gets out, the Qunari have time before anyone can manufacture it in any threatening amount. They'd have at least a several-year window, which they could prolong by disrupting production where they find it/killing people who've learned the recipe. Likely, people with the recipe wouldn't share it widely (both for safety and to protect their trade secrets). The Ben-Hassrath would only have to assassinate a small number of people to completely undo the damage of a recipe leak.

 

If the Dwarves decide to turn their own blackpowder for profits, how would the Qunari even stage a direct assault? Do the Qunari even have a relevant amount of Dwarves in their Gestapo to execute the assassinations? 

[Al Foley]

One has to wonder what the Qunari would do to stop this sort of thing from happening?  Would they risk all out war with the South, again?

[Ashagar]

If the Dwarves decide to turn their own blackpowder for profits, how would the Qunari even stage a direct assault? Do the Qunari even have a relevant amount of Dwarves in their Gestapo to execute the assassinations? 

 

Indeed how would they even invade the dwarves in the first place? All the known remaining dwarven cities are heavily fortified having survived repeated assaults by vast hordes of darkspawn and far from Qunari Territory. They are also needless to say underground and marching armies though the deep roads is not a option.

[Al Foley]

Indeed how would they even invade the dwarves in the first place? All the known remaining dwarven cities are heavily fortified having survived repeated assaults by vast hordes of darkspawn and far from Qunari Territory. They are also needless to say underground and marching armies though the deep roads is not a option.

Actually I would love to see the Qunari try.  Send a massive army into the Deep Roads.  Get slaughtered, but thin out the Dark Spawn probably in turn. 

[Fiskrens]

Firearms aren't really the equalizer some people like to make them out to be. Especially against individuals who can throw fireballs.

Gunpowder came on the European scene in the 13th century and spread rather quickly across Europe but it took centuries of refinement in both the powder and refinement in firearm, rocket and canon technologies for them just to become viable weapons on the battlefield along side armor and melee weaponry.

Yeah, I think magic is a major factor in why science isn't developing in Thedas as in comparison to our middle ages; no real drive behind it when most of what it may accomplish already can be done with magic. Dwarves, since they're lacking this ability, are perhaps the only who should be really interested in making progress in that area, but the twelve years gone since Awakening is really nothing from a scientific development point of view.

[Mistic]

Gunpowder came on the European scene in the 13th century and spread rather quickly across Europe but it took centuries of refinement in both the powder and refinement in firearm, rocket and canon technologies for them just to become viable weapons on the battlefield along side armor and melee weaponry.

 

True. However, bear in mind that Thedas has an advantage here: the Qunari have already viable cannon technology. History teaches us that once such technology is invented, stealing and copying it becomes faster. I wouldn't be surprised if Tevinter and other nations have some captured cannons for study, but are unable to replicate them precisely because they don't know Gaatlok. But if the secret behind it was discovered, well, the process to weaponize it wouldn't probably be as long as inventing firearms and cannons from scratch.

[Dai Grepher]

If the Dwarves decide to turn their own blackpowder for profits, how would the Qunari even stage a direct assault? Do the Qunari even have a relevant amount of Dwarves in their Gestapo to execute the assassinations? 

 

Jerran makes the suggestion in Trespasser, maybe they got to the carta.

 

The carta is the Qunari's way in. Plenty of carta willing to sell the nobles out in exchange for mere coin let alone the promise of a better life. Think of it. No more casteless, a constant supply of food, money, and resources to push back the Darkspawn and fortify the Deep Roads, and a newfound respect for the dwarven race. The Qunari do not waste lives.
 

[MisterJB]

In any event, the implications for Thedas should be enormous. I hope future installments do not gloss over this in order to enforce a conventional high-fantasy stasis. 

They will.

[The Baconer]

Jerran makes the suggestion in Trespasser, maybe they got to the carta.

 

The carta is the Qunari's way in. Plenty of carta willing to sell the nobles out in exchange for mere coin let alone the promise of a better life. Think of it. No more casteless, a constant supply of food, money, and resources to push back the Darkspawn and fortify the Deep Roads, and a newfound respect for the dwarven race. The Qunari do not waste lives.

 

They wouldn't get any of that from the Qunari, but it wouldn't surprise me if the Qunari tried to sell it that way. 

[The Baconer]

To add on to that last piece, Orzammar making bank off of selling gunpowder to the surface means the Carta is also making bank. The rigidity of the Dwarven caste system is actually what allows the Carta to thrive. I can see a small number of individuals being spiteful enough to try and strike back at Orzammar's society, but overall the Carta really doesn't have anything to gain in helping the Qunari. 

[Medhia_Nox]

Firearms aren't really the equalizer some people like to make them out to be. Especially against individuals who can throw fireballs. 

Totally disagree.

 

Even catapults and trebuchets would make "Annulments" unnecessary - except that they're purposefully trying to keep the architecture and the knowledge.  They could have lobbed trebuchets ammunition across Lake Calenhad to destroy the tower without even thinking about whether or not a mage was going to toss a fireball.

 

Mages can't throw fireballs the same distance as ancient siege weaponry, forget anything as advanced as a cannon.

 

The Qunari dreadnought is painfully laughable in it's bombardment distance.  That it comes anywhere near the shore is an indictment of the whole questline.

 

Remember, DA mages are nowhere near "wizards" (in fact, they're some of the mentally stupidest casters I've ever seen represented) and have none of the magic that make most fantasy wizards actually dangerous.  They're really just medium range IEDs or mobile healbots (and healing magic is very difficult in real DA lore)

 

Yeah, I think magic is a major factor in why science isn't developing in Thedas as in comparison to our middle ages; no real drive behind it when most of what it may accomplish already can be done with magic. Dwarves, since they're lacking this ability, are perhaps the only who should be really interested in making progress in that area, but the twelve years gone since Awakening is really nothing from a scientific development point of view.

 

Here's the real problem. 

 

Magic - and the danger's it presents - would push "mundanes" to the greatest heights to compensate.  Let's also not forget about mundane runecrafting. 

 

- Sciences (our familiar Earth-based science)

- Runecrafting

- Alchemy

 

Those last two Dagna has all but mastered as an Arcanist which should be a growing profession for mundanes (at least dwarves and Tranquil) especially after the three years of the Inquisition's existence. 

 

And Orlais "must" be advanced scientifically... you don't get architecture like the winter palace without certain achievements in understanding.

 

Then we have the rogue Tempests who aren't mages but employ potions to emulate magic (am I getting that right?  I haven't touched them.)