So, the Arquebus Creation for Skyrim introduced a weapon that relies on the usage of gunpowder for propelling metallic balls at targets. I.E. a primitive but serviceable firearm that is (in the Creation's lore) a Dwemer construct made millennia ago during their heyday. This got me thinking about the ramifications of what this technology would have if introduced into society on Tamriel and possibly even beyond.
That being where a means of creating firearms and black powder would become public knowledge, with some blacksmiths deciding to become gunsmiths and people taking up the usage of guns for their own personal devices. I personally think that opinions would be highly divided amongst the mortal and immortal inhabitants of Nirn, with just as many people fearing the power that such weapons could inflict as there would be people who'd relish at a chance to tinker around with something so deadly yet surprisingly simple to operate.
To clarify, the definition of "firearms" and "guns" in this situation are meant to include primitive models of these weapons. Things such as flintlocks, muskets, blunderbusses, jezzails, cannons, and even volley guns if you want to get creative. Along with the obvious arquebus that forms the central weapon that inspired this post. You wouldn't exactly see assault rifles or RPG's used by the people of Nirn and beyond. Though you could expect the Dwemer and Sotha Sil's Clockwork Apostles to at least have a few prototypes (whether they're functional or not is uncertain) sitting around somewhere.
As always in posts such as this, I've included my own thoughts for the Races of Nirn and beyond. Along with how they'd seek to implement them into their societies or respond to them if they're seen as dangerous.

It's totally ridiculous I know in an age of cartridge guns by this point, but think of the memes jack.
While others were more common by this point the 1816 Harpers ferry would be a personal choice, as I own one, reproduction of course. Firing a 65 caliber bullet from its 69 caliber barrel made it a fair hitter.
But how would you even implement such a thing when it has a shit ton of limitations? if they were absurd enough to do it I can see only one way.
Well, The 1816 fires a .65 caliber bullet, So it should do .65 caliber things, if slowly.
Power, that would be its gimmick, it's whole point
It should have the same damage and drop off as a regular Nitro.
HOWEVER.
Its bullet penetration should be standard long or medium ammo rifle.
And it's bullet can only go 350m/s, which is typical of its contemporaries.
So it's basically single shot Nitro with lower penetration and a slow bullet.
While strong because of it damages, you would be bogged down by a ... 20 second reload time, That was about the fastest you could expect back then by the best.
This would perhaps be the trickiest thing for them to do as you would have to somehow give it "save points", Similar to how it does with regular magazine loading.
Say you fire and you blast some dastardly ruffian down to the ground with your massive alpha damege.
Then you start reloading, you get halfway through but have to switch to whatever secondary becuase here comes slate-slugs boi coming around the corner.
Somehow you win and switch back to start reloading again. You should be able to pick up where you left off, to some degree, After all, starting completely over is unreasonable if you already put the powder, paper patch and ball down the bore
Then there is accuracy.
To address the bad accuracy, while it is a old-fashioned smooth bore. Muskets are actually somewhat more accurate than most people realize or have been lead to believe over the now century and a half from common use.
You can hit someone in the chest reliably from 50m away with quite a few shots before fouling starts to interfere. Even at 75m with little wind it can be done. Heck, I've seen this old guy with smoothbore hit a 1 foot diameter plate from 100 yards "91m" away 5 times out of 8 shot, man I wish I had his ability.
So while they would need to give it some rng, even in ads, it would not as much as one would think. In most compound fights it would still be what I would call ... serviceable.
As to other stats, maybe It should come with 9 rounds in reserve, be special ammo only and perhaps already have a bayonet attached for maximum style points.
Still, at the end of the day, it is a total meme meant to style on people. It's one shot ability up to 45 is quite strong but right after you are screwed for 20 seconds untill you can fire again and the chance to miss is high.
It's a stupid idea.
But it is a swesome, stupid idea.
And no, while I do indeed own a musket. I do not own it for home defense, tehe.

Hypothetically, if you did not put a bullet/round ball down in the muzzle how much powder could you safely put down the muzzle?
Ie: say you had a 34 in musket. Could you fill the entire barrel with powder and it not blow up in your face, or would that amount still ignite too quickly and act like a bomb (again without a bullet)

I have a massive set of 28mm models that I’ve played Sharp Practice, Muskets and Tomahawks, and Black Powder and I’m thinking about getting into 15mm. I know I could play blackpowder but I think it’s a little too simple. It doesn’t adequately account for the wide variety of troops types, cultures, or qualities for me, it’s a great starter game but for me there’s not enough crunch there.
Any suggestions?

Brownies come in many forms. And they're used to create all sorts of desserts, from the basic brownie sundae to brownie doughnuts to brownie ice cream sandwiches.
Sometimes you need a brownie fix, but when you do, which kind should you buy? There are many different types of brownies out there that you may not know about.
This is the list of different types of brownies. Including some lesser-known varieties you should try next time you're in the mood for chocolate!

Different Types of Brownies

There are all sorts of special diet brownies out there these days. From gluten-free to Paleo to vegan, there's a brownie for everyone.
And they're not just healthy versions of the classic chocolate brownie - they're delicious in their own right. So if you're looking for a special diet-friendly treat, give one of these brownies a try.

1. Better Than Box Mix Brownies

These different types of brownies are made with real chocolate, butter, and eggs. This makes them more prosperous and delicious than your average box mix brownie. Plus, they're super easy to make!

2. Buckeye Brownies

If you love chocolate and peanut butter, these brownies are for you, named after the state tree of Ohio. Buckeye brownies are different types of brownies made with a chocolate batter and a peanut butter center. They're best served cold, so pop them in the fridge before you take your first bite.

3. Cream Cheese Brownies

These are other different types of brownies. They have a dense, fudgy texture with a slight tang from the cream cheese. And they're easy to make, too! Just be sure to use a block of cream cheese in a tub, not the spreadable kind.

4. Frozen Brownie Sundae

Start with a store-bought brownie or make your favorite recipe. Cut the brownie into bite-sized pieces and spread them on a baking sheet.
Freeze for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, make your favorite ice cream sundae toppings once the brownies are frozen, and top with ice cream and your favorite toppings. Serve immediately.

5. Marshmallow Crunch Brownie Bars

Imagine a soft and chewy brownie loaded with chocolate chips and topped with ooey-gooey marshmallows. Now, add a layer of crunchy toffee bits. That's what you'll get with these divine bars. They're perfect for satisfying your sweet tooth.

6. Peanut Butter Cup Crunch Brownie Bars

One of the best different types of Brownies out there is peanut Butter Cup Crunch. They have a layer of peanut butter cups and a crunchy topping that takes them over. If you're a fan of peanut butter and chocolate, you need to try these brownies!

7. Outrageous Brownies

These different types of brownies are for the chocolate lover in all of us. They start with a chocolate fudge base and are then topped with chocolate chips, more fudge, and a marshmallow creme filling. If that's not enough chocolate for you, they're also dipped in a rich chocolate ganache.

8. Sweet & Salty Brownies

These Different types of brownies are the best of both worlds for those who can't make up their minds. A classic chocolate brownie is topped with a layer of flaky sea salt, giving you the perfect bite every time.

9. Chocolate Mint Brownies

If you love chocolate and mint together, these brownies are for you. They have a rich chocolate flavor with a refreshing mint twist. These different types of brownies are perfect for any occasion, from a casual get-together to a more formal event.

10. Chunky Blond Brownies

A cross between a blondie and a chocolate brownie, these have all the buttery deliciousness of a blondie with chocolate chips throughout. They're perfect for those who like a little variety in their bite.

11. Cream Cheese Swirl Brownies

These different types of brownies are fudgy and delicious, with a rich cream cheese swirl running through them. They're easy to make and even easier to eat! If you're a fan of cream cheese, these brownies are definitely for you.

12. Peppermint Brownies

Start by preheating your oven to 350 degrees F—Line an 8x8 inch baking dish with parchment paper. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, cocoa powder, and salt.
In addition, in a large bowl, melt the butter and chocolate together. Stir in the sugar and eggs until combined.

13. Candy Bar Brownies

Start with a layer of your favorite brownie recipe. Top it with a layer of miniature candy bars, such as Snickers, Milky Way, or Three Musketeers. Add another layer of brownie, then repeat the process until you reach the top of the pan.
Meanwhile, press the candy bars into the batter so they'll stick. Bake according to your brownie recipe's instructions.

14. Cookies & Cream Brownies

If you love cookies and cream, these different types of brownies are for you. They start with a chocolate cookie base, then topped with a rich and creamy frosting.
In addition, the frosting is made with Oreos, so you know it will be good. These brownies are best served cold, so let them sit in the fridge before digging in.

15. Frosted Fudge Brownies

A classic brownie made even better with a layer of rich chocolate fudge frosting. These brownies are the perfect balance of sweet and rich and will bring you back for more.
A classic brownie recipe that is still wildly popular today. These different brownies feature a buttery base, topped with a thick layer of decadent chocolate fudge frosting.
If you're looking for something new to try this summer, these fruit-filled bars are your best bet! If you're going to have just one kind of brownie in your life (and we don't blame you), make it this decadent chocolate version.

16. White Chocolate Cranberry Blondies

These White Chocolate Cranberry Blondies are the perfect holiday dessert! They're packed with white chocolate chips and dried cranberries and have a delicious blondie base. They are very much festive, and they're always a hit at parties.

17. Coffee & Cream Brownies

Start your morning with a little jolt of caffeine and a lot of chocolate deliciousness. These different types of brownies are made with natural coffee grounds in the batter. And are topped with a rich cream cheese frosting. They're also gluten-free, dairy-free, vegan, and refined sugar-free.

18. Dark Chocolate Pomegranate Brownies

These different types of brownies are made with dark chocolate and pomegranate seeds, giving them a unique flavor that is rich and tart. The pomegranate seeds also add a lovely texture to the brownies. If you're looking for something different, give these a try!

19. Butternut Brownies

These brownies are made with butternut squash puree, which gives them a unique flavor and a moist, fudgy texture.
Also, They're studded with chocolate chips and walnuts for an extra bit of deliciousness. If you're looking for something a little different, give these different types of brownies a try!
Conclusion
Traditional brownies will always have a place in our hearts, but why not branch out and try something new? If you're looking for a new brownie recipe to try, check out this list of these different types of brownies. There's sure to be a recipe that you'll love. And who knows? You might even find a new favorite.

My uncle used to be really into reanactments has a functioning civil war era musket. I want to shoot it this weekend, but we don't have any powder. He says the place he used to buy it from doesn't sell it anymore. Does anyone know where in the panhandle or Alabama one can buy powder? Willing to drive anywhere within about 2hrs of Pensacola.

First Chapter. Discord. Link for all the chapters available here: Engines of Arachnea on Royal Road
Deschane had Ven cover for him at the Mapping Agency before he left that morning. She was to say that he’d gone to confer with the main cartographer’s office to discuss standardization of the filing system; as alibis went it was as mind-numbingly boring as the poor suffering adjutants had come to expect of the navigator.
He hobbled down the alleyways of the bottommost galleries of Mound Shakka, grabbing at the walls for balance as he tried to make do without his crutches. He’d topped up on morphine for the pain was wearing a plaster ankle brace inside his oversized boots.
Deschane’s injuries were healing well. He estimated that in a few days he could walk unassisted. Which was fortunate, given that the cobbles were slick with stagnant pools of groundwater seeping up from the reservoir below. Shakka had hit maximum occupancy years ago, the engineers forced to bore and blast their way deeper into the foundations to make room. Now all that separated the bottom dwellers from a watery grave were a few meters of gneiss rock. The resulting subsidence where the water table met the rotting wood shanties meant that malaria and dysentery ran rampant through the slums.
Deschane kept his cycler pistol handy in the waistband of the civvy denims he’d worn to blend in. He kept a weather eye on the gangs of feral youths who haunted the entrances to every lane, their small, quick hands always ready to slip into unsuspecting pockets.
No one gave Deschane any trouble, however—one look at his hovering trigger finger was enough to keep them honest. Men in hard shell hats clomped out of their hovels, leaving their hollow-eyed wives and children as the work gongs summoned them to another shift in the mines, a clattering funicular carriage lowering them into the shafts a dozen at a time. The luckier ones headed up towards the fungus gardens near the central feeder towers. These were the porous lungs of the settlement which not only helped regulate internal atmosphere, but were also where most of the food was grown.
The very richest of the farmers donned their expensive sealant suits to work on the terraces carved into the exterior slopes of the mound. Agriculture on the surface was a high-risk, high-reward activity, especially now that the rains had gone and left the daggergnats to spawn in their thousands. The swarms that hovered just outside musket range could leech a man dry in seconds if given the chance.
Then again, even the interior of the mound wasn’t safe from the other type of bloodsucking scavengers that preyed on civilians.
The army recruiters were out in force this morning. Deschane had always hated them: fat, men in slovenly uniforms that hung around the chop-suet stalls and shoved pamphlets into people’s faces when they were trying to suck down their melted lard and salted rice porridge. He’d never forgiven them for all the promises they’d made to him all those years ago, the same lies they were peddling right now:
“How can you stand eating that slop every day, son?” one called out, “Sign up for the line infantry and it’s three square meals a day, plus extra rum ration.”
“Forget those sissies in the line infantry,” another swooped in, “You look like a big strong lad! Why don’t you give the grenadiers a try?”
“Who are you calling lad, dipstick?” was the outraged reply of a brawny redhead in farmer’s overalls, voice several octaves higher than it should’ve been.
“Oh! Erm, sorry ma’am. Didn’t see you there. But the offer still stands!” the recruiter rallied, “The grenadiers would be glad to have you. The pay’s nearly twice that of a common soldier.”
“And how much is that?”
“Twenty-two carbos a month.”
“How bout that,” the girl sounded impressed, “For twenty-two I’d fall in so quick you’d see me red-shifting. What’s the catch?”
“How’s your throwing arm?”
“Better than yours, lardass,” the woman bragged, rolling up her sleeves to show a set of shoulders like small boulders.
“Then the only ‘catch’ is when you’ll start tossing live grenades down those Amit bug-hole. They’ll be doing all the catching then, that’s fer sure!”
That got a snort of laughter out of the ginger. She reached for the recruiter’s pen to sign on, and she wasn’t the only one. Deschane turned away in disgust. He’d heard it all before.
Everlasting glory for the first man through the breach. The Amits were on the ropes, teetering on the verge of extinction—why not help give them a shove on their way down? Every comrade a willing martyr, every skirmish a victory. There would be a lot of martyrs from this place before the war was won.
Most of the inhabitants of Shakka were freckled, blue-eyed locals, though Deschane did see some fellow Ulysseans in the crowd, the curly brown locks of their hair setting them apart from the rest. Well, that and the scarlet armbands which designated them as foremen and senior technicians.
It was only natural, Deschane thought. You needed men from the core mounds to really get things done. Natives were good workers, but required a firm supervision to meet the monthly quotas.
As for the native he was supposed to meet today, Deschane didn’t know what to think of him yet. All the signs pointed to Sec-Com, the Security Committee which handled internal threats to the Fleet. Was all this just an elaborate trap laid for him by Colonel Leelan and his cronies in the brass? Were they onto him? Deschane’s budding anxiety proved justified only moments later when a strong hand seized his elbow from behind, yanking him into nearby alleyway.
The navigator’s response was immediate. Unable to reach his pistol with the tight grip on his arm, Deschane turned on his heel and executed a tight spinning backfist. Though he was striking blind and off-balance he felt a solid contact, the bony edge of his forearm chopping with the back of his assailant’s head and knocking him off. Deschane drew his pistol, cocking the hammer so that the five loaded chambers rotated with a loud click and pressing the snub-nose into the man’s cheek.
“Alright, you got me!” Nong said, reaching for the sky, “That was my bad!”
“Galloping galaxies, man! What were you thinking, sneaking up on me like that?” Deschane fumed.
“In case you were followed,” the tribesman chuckled, “We had to lose them somehow.”
“I wasn’t. I took precautions.”
“Well, you can’t accuse me of being too careful,” Nong gently nudged the pistol out of his face and dusted himself off, “Not when we’re this deep into the game. Shall we?”
The tribesman had shucked his outlandish garb and put on a miner’s outfit almost identical to the one Deschane wore, with one exception: a purple armband emblazoned with the crossed pick and hammer of a district director. Deschane flicked a finger at it, said disapprovingly:
“I thought the whole idea was for us to be inconspicuous.”
“I’m the Commissioner of Mining for the Occupied Territories. People will recognize me eventually.”
“You told me you were a geologist,” Deschane protested.
“I started out as one, but they promoted me. People skills—I’m told that I have them.”
“I wouldn’t have guessed it,” Deschane said, still somewhat peevish.
“Officially I’m just here to make an inspection of Mound Shakka’s copper mining operations. Command just loves it when us savages come crawling on our bellies to learn from our betters. It’s your cover I’m worried about, navigator. Doesn’t it hurt, walking around without your crutches?”
“Of course it hurts,” Deschane muttered through a clenched jaw, waves of pain radiating from the ankle that he’d just managed to twist all over again, “Let’s just get this over with.”
Thanks to Nong’s indiscretion they managed to skip the line for the funicular entirely. The miners took one look at the tribesman’s armband and parted like the waves before the prow, eyes lowered and backs hunched in an effort to make themselves as tiny as possible. As a commissioner he held the power of life and death over every one of them, though you wouldn’t have guessed it from the way Nong was grinning at them, an uncle come to visit his favourite nephews.
“Carry on, carry on,” he said indulgently, “Pretend like I’m not even here!”
The miners did exactly that and let the two have the carriage all to themselves. An operator fed the guttering motor a jerry can of canefuel and they started down.
“Why didn’t you just tell me you were a commissioner yesterday?” Deschane said after minutes of silence broken only by the rattle of iron chains, “I would’ve taken you seriously from the start.”
“Wanted to see the kind of man you were,” Nong confessed, “The priests of the Chaplainage claim that all men are equal, but this does not bear out in practice. If I had presented myself as another one of your superiors you would’ve just shut up tighter than a clam. That’s the funny thing about people. We like to pretend that we’re above the Amits, but when you get right down to it our society is just as caste-based as theirs. Lock two men in a cell together for a month, and if they haven’t murdered each other by the end of it, you’ll find that they’ve divided the place right in two.”
“One can relate,” Deschane replied, his irritation returning as the tribesman went into another one of his long lectures. He could feel the ambient temperature climbing with every meter they descended. The sweat was making his fresh scabs itch like the devil.
“Very droll, navigator. But I was just getting to the core of my thesis. Humans create order where there is none. Over time, our civilization tends towards greater and greater expressions of organization. Not so long ago we were lobbing rocks from trebuchets and besieging each other’s mounds as often as we did those of the Amits. There used to be eleven distinct human cultures on Arachnea, all competing for the same dwindling resources. Today there is only one: the Fleet.”
The funicular shuddered to a halt as they scraped the bottom of the mineshaft. Deschane grabbed onto the rails to keep from toppling over and hissed:
“I didn’t come all this way for some half-arsed lecture on the human condition. What’s your point, Nong?”
Nong looked positively scandalized at the interruption. No doubt he’d been planning his little speech for some time. He took out a pair of electric torches and held one out to Deschane, saying stiffly:
“If you’ll please come this way.”
The commissioner led Deschane into a narrow borehole dug horizontally into the side of the shaft, the wide beams of their torches throwing long, stalking shadows across the ceiling.
“Here it is,” Nong said as they came to a dead end, shining the circle of yellow light at the blank wall, “The one secret that threatens to undo us all.”
Deschane frowned. All he could see was a pile of dirt. Several layers of dirt, to be fair, neatly stacked atop the other and each a slightly different shade of brown or orange than the others. Seeing that Deschane was unimpressed, Nong produced a geologist’s clawhammer and began to chip at the layers as he explained:
“Do you remember what I told you about the law of superposition?”
“The deeper the layer, the older it gets. Simple.”
“Good. Then what we have here is a summary of mankind’s entire history on Arachnea. These three meters of soil and the strata contained within them are windows into the past. Not that far into the past, though. Only a few thousand years, a geological blink of an eye. The fact is, we haven’t been on this planet very long at all. The reason these young strata are all the way down here is because a fat slab of them slid down during an earthquake—Mound Shakka sits atop a shear zone, you see.”
Nong hacked at the lowest layer and pried out a jagged stone shaped like a teardrop. He handed it over to Deschane and shone a light on it, saying:
“Familiar?”
“It’s an Amit axe head,” Deschane replied, easily recognizing it.
“Four and a half thousand years old,” Nong said. He dug into the layer just above it until his clawhammer struck something with the loud plink! Nong brushed away the sods to expose a twisted heap of lime green bronze.
“Human work. A frying pan. Forged two thousand eight hundred years ago.”
And in the strata above that Nong picked out another Amit tool, this time an awl made from antler and bone.
“So the Amits retook this mound not long after,” Deschane said, “So what? We’re the ones who hold it now.”
“Please bear with me.”
Nong continued his work. In the next one they unearthed fragments of a human skull. The area inside the right eye socket was fused with spidery etchings of gold-hued metal that ended in fibrous roots that stabbed inwards into where the occipital lobe would have been.
“This civilization had working eye implants,” Nong told Deschane, “Some sort of mind-machine interface. Can you imagine that? Some of the skeletons we found were more metal than man. But even that didn’t save them. In the end they only lasted six centuries.”
Nong started digging at the one above it when Deschane put a hand on his shoulder and stopped him.
“Let me guess. Amits again?”
“It’s a pattern,” Nong nodded, confirming it, “Our antiquarians identified four distinct human civilizations in this geological formation alone, all of varying levels of technological advancement. All of them were more primitive than the Fleet as it exists today, save for one which was so far beyond us that their power rivalled that of the progenitors. All of them conquered this mound from the Amits, existed here for a time, then were completely eradicated.”
“By what?”
“We don’t know,” Nong said simply, switching off his electric torch and plunging them both into an impenetrable murk, “Both we and Fleet Command believe in this cycle of eradication. The disagreement lies in the interpretation of the data. Command believes that the Fleet has always existed ever since the moment that the ancestor-gods bequeathed Arachnea to us with their dying breaths.”
“To them, all these repetitions of the cycle are just part of one continuous chain of the Fleet’s development, a sinusoidal curve with upswings and downswings. The periods of Amit inhabitation are simply periods during which the Fleet temporarily collapsed due to internal tensions. Their theory is that disunity, mismanagement of resources and civil war hurled us back into the stone ages, not the Amits.”
Deschane could understand the logic behind that. Militarily speaking the Fleet was quickly outstripping the Amits. Ever since the discovery of powder weapons the army had won the majority of large-scale surface battles against its subterranean foe. As a species the Amits lacked the necessary cohesion to wage the kind of total war that the Fleet was capable of waging, marshalling the industrial might of the entire species to mount campaigns of genocide. Each mound was an isolated colony that fought alone or even competed against its neighbours for forage.
“But you don’t agree with their assessment?” he asked.
“No, we don’t. Our interpretation is that these cycles are culturally distinct and have nothing to do with each other. Each time the catastrophe stuck, humanity as a whole underwent a hard reset and had to start all over again from nothing. In which case it follows that we are not the authors of our own destruction. Something else is.”
“And your proof?”
Nong waved a hand at the layers of strata and told Deschane:
“Prota’s team discovered that this fossil record is completely absent at Mound 13 and the far-flung outposts along the front line. There is only one conclusion to be drawn from that: none of the other cycles have ever expanded this far north as we have. But if the external threat is real, then it is out there waiting for us beyond the hills we know.
“And the Fleet is walking right into it,” the navigator finished for him. Curse it all, but he’d known this himself as a gut feeling that he’d never admitted aloud. An existential dread that he’d felt in his gut ever since he’d seen the extent of Mound Euler from a distance, a cruel and obscene obelisk raised by the will of Arachnea, eternity laughing at the futility of life itself. It was the real reason he had tried to stall the offensive for as long as he could. Out there in the silence of the green one could not escape the certainty that there existed forces far beyond the ken of mortal man, forces which had laid low the progenitors at the height of their glory and before which the Fleet could not stand.
“What would you have me do?” Deschane asked.
“What you Pathfinders do best, sirrah. Find the threat and kill it, before it’s too late.”
“If what you say is true, then this thing has a habit of making mincemeat out of all mankind. How could I possibly make a difference against something like that?”
Nong pressed something into the palm of Deschane’s hand and strode back up the tunnel, saying:
“The gods provide, navigator. The gods provide.”
Shining his torch at it, the navigator saw that he was gripping the tiny Divine Engine once again. Deschane clutched it tight amidst the darkness and held to his heart. And just like that, Deschane knew what to do.
First Chapter. Discord. Link for all the chapters available here: Engines of Arachnea on Royal Road

Wood creaked softly, and the wind sang in the sails of the Maiden’s Curse.
The three-masted frigate rocked through gentle swells off the coast of a small, uncharted island thick with trees and sandy beaches. Gulls cried and wheeled. The air was warm on his skin, and tasted of the sea. It was a good day, as days went. Good to take a prize.
Yet, Captain Gregious was troubled.
He sat alone in his cabin, frowning at a strange object perched on a gilded stand atop his desk. It was black and iridescent, warm to the touch, and burnished with scarlet swirls that rippled in the dim light of his oil lamp. Any other fool would think it was some kind of marble sculpture, a piece of porcelain, a priceless work of art crafted by some long-dead, faceless artist who’d lived and died in a kingdom whose structures had long since turned to dust. But Gregious was a learned man. He’d studied at the naval academy before unfortunate circumstances had forced him into a life of piracy, and he knew the truth. This was no creation of man. This was the rarest of things: a dragon’s egg. And it was on his ship.
This troubled him.
I should just toss the damn thing over and be done. His frown deepened because he knew he couldn’t. His crew would not understand or believe him if he tried to explain. They would only see an object worth a mountain of gold and their halfwit captain trying to toss it to the deep. They would mutiny, and his head would decorate the bowsprit without so much as a trial. No, that would never do. He planned to live for a very, very long time. He had to get rid of it, but in a way that kept his head atop his shoulders. But how?
He drummed the first finger of his right hand on his desk, resting his chin in the crook made by the thumb and forefinger of his left, brooding and morose. What to do? He couldn’t keep it, that was certain. Who’d ever heard of a Pirate Captain keeping a dragon as a pet? They were far too dangerous. Even a hatchling possessed enough power to rend his ship into kindling and send them down to old Davy with their sails aflame. If you believed the stories.
And Captain Gregious believed.
Dragons were evil by nature, unpredictable and cruel, solitary creatures given to hoarding treasure enough to make all the world's greedy kings sick with envy. And guess where they got their gold? Besides, when it hatched, whoever happened to be near would become the dragon’s first meal. That certainly wouldn’t be Gregious.
He stopped drumming his finger and sat forward, a grin slowly spreading across his face as an idea took root. Perhaps he could rid himself of two problems at once. And solve a third that had begun to plague him.
“Caerl,” he shouted for the ship’s quartermaster. “Get in here.”
A moment later, the door to his cabin, which doubled as his quarters, opened, and a tall man in clothes that had seen better days stepped through. “Cap’n?”
“Close the door. Where’s Gradie?”
“Sir?”
“Gradie, damn it, the one keeps falling asleep at the watch.” He should have killed the man outright for falling asleep at his watch, but Gregious was feeling generous that day.
“Oh, him,” Caerl tucked his thumbs behind his belt and rocked back on bare, filth-stained feet. “Got’em down at the bottom. Swabbing out the pens.” He grinned at that, treating Gregious to his crooked, stained teeth. A few gaps showed where some were missing.
“Bring him up,” Gregious said. “And bring yourself and another witness. I have a task for you.”
The smile dropped from Caerl’s face, but he moved to obey. Gregious would need to arrange an accident for his overly ambitious quartermaster. The man was a snake with an eye for the captain’s seat. He’d have already done it if the crew didn’t have such a strong love for the man.
The door opened, and Gregious tucked the thought away for another time.
Caerl shoved a wiry man with shaggy brown hair and matching beard through the door. A third man followed, bald and weathered with a long black beard.
“Here he is, cap’n.”
Gradie wrung his hands and glanced around the cabin like a mouse caught in a wolf’s den.
Gregious put on a warm smile.
“Sit,” he said, gesturing at the chair on the other side of his desk. “Whiskey?”
Gregious reached for a cut crystal decanter, part of a prize taken last year, and poured four glasses of the good stuff. He slid one across his desk to Gradie and motioned for the other two men to take theirs. He leaned back and lifted his glass to his lips, watching Gradie over the rim.
“I have a way for you to pay your debt to the crew in full and earn back your good standing,” Gregious said, sipping his whiskey and watching the man’s reaction.
Gradie’s eyes widened, and he glanced at everyone in the room, fiddling with one of many stains on his tattered shirt. “I…cap’n,” Gradie stopped and swallowed hard. “Whatever ye need, cap’n. I’m yer man.” He reached for his whiskey, hand shaking.
Gregious watched desperation turn to hope in Gradie’s eyes. Then they hardened with suspicion.
Gregious affected a reassuring manner. “Caerl, have the crew take us to skiff range and weigh anchor at our beach. You three will be putting to shore.”
Caerl exchanged a glance with James, the third man. “Cap’n?” He drained his glass in one shot and set it on the desk. “Yer sending us to shore? Where we keep—“ he cut off and appeared to try to think of another way to put his thoughts. “You know…the gold?”
“That’s right, Caerl,” Gregious said, pouring more whiskey. “You will take swords and muskets, powder and rounds. Wasn’t it you who said we needed to guard our gold? What better way for Gradie here to earn back his standing and for you to make sure he doesn’t make any mischief.”
“But cap’n—“
“Surely you’re not afraid of a little shore time?” Gregious cut him off with a good-natured chuckle. “It’s an uncharted island in the middle of the ocean, hundreds of miles from any semblance of civilization. More importantly, it is our island. Should he conduct himself with honor while we are chasing our next prize, this will show he is reformed and worthy to rejoin the crew. A good plan, yes?”
Caerl considered the captain’s words. It looked painful. He glanced at James, who shrugged and nodded.
“Good plan, Captain,” James offered.
“Aye, cap’n, a good plan,” Caerl said, nodding slowly, still suspicious. “Alright, Gradie, on yer feet. It’s to the shore with you.” He hauled Gradie to his feet and started for the door.
“Oh, and Caerl,” Gregious said, lifting a hand. “Would you be so kind as to have him keep a special eye on this?” He nodded at the dragon egg. “Keep it with him at all times. Nothing can happen to the egg. It is worth more than you know.”
Caerl’s eyes flicked to the egg, then back to Gregious. “That? Just a fancy bit o’ painted plaster, ain’t it?”
“It's much more than that, my friend. I need to confirm with a contact back at Masseau, but I believe it is worth enough gold to fill our hold to bursting. But we must keep it safe until I return. Will you do this for me?”
Caerl puffed out his chest proudly. “Aye, cap’n.” He fastened a threatening glare on Gradie. “You heared the cap’n. Get it, and let’s go. He’ll do as he’s told, cap’n. I’ll make sure of it.”
Gregious smiled. “I have no doubt, Caerl.”
The door closed behind them, and Gregious lounged back in his chair.
He wished he could be there to see when the dragon came. Gregious laughed and poured another whiskey. He would have to find another quartermaster, of course. One he could dangle from his strings. And he had just the fool in mind. Gregious stood and walked to his balcony door.
He sighed, sipped his whiskey and gazed out across the sparkling water. Things were coming together. Such a good day. His problems would soon be solved, his gold would be protected by an unlikely ally and he would be the richest and deadliest pirate captain on the high seas.
A sinister smile curled on his lips. He would need to bring the dragon more offerings, of course and more gold. That wouldn’t be a problem. Merchant galleons plump with riches were ripe for the taking.
He laughed again, running a hand down his oiled beard. He knew just how to turn this dragon into an ally and how to control it. He glanced over his shoulder at a bookshelf stuffed with volumes. He still had the text.
What was it he’d said earlier? Oh yes. Who’d ever heard of a Pirate Captain keeping a dragon as a pet?
He laughed again. Who indeed.

Just a question I've had for a while but I'm wondering what others think on the topic.
In lore, some Jobs are very rare. Others are far more common. Some are unique to the point there's only single digit numbers of them, or even just the one (WoL).
Here's my thoughts on it, thinking "roughly how many practitioners are alive", from a scale of Unique(1, or possibly 2-3)/Very Rare (1-10 in the world), Rare (10-99, or "a few dozen/less than a hundred"), Uncommon (100-400, or "a few hundred"), Common (400-2,000), and Very Common (everywhere). Note that all CLASSES (the base classes) are probably Very Common, as are DoH/DoL. I'm curious if this jives with what others think/know.
Here's where I'd place the various Jobs and an explanation of why I think they are this. Note this includes Job quest discussion and such. Most of it is pre-EW, or even as old as HW/ARR, I just spoiler tagged to be sure. If you haven't gotten to an expansion where you can unlock a Job yet, you probably don't want to read about that Job yet. Fair?
.
Tanks:
PLD: Uncommon. While the Job stone the WoL has is unique (per the story; this is true of a number of Jobs), there are dozens if not hundreds of PLDs in Ul Dah of the Sultansworn. Many Knights of Ishgard would also be considered more Paladins than Gladiators (due to oaths). And while the game sort of dropped it after HW, forgetting PLD was a Job and giving it GLD quests in SB, the WoL was a founding member of a loose Order of "Free Paladins" who travel the world doing good. There are also PLD-adjacent organizations, like some among the Radiant Host of Radz-at-han. So it's safe to say that between the outright Sultansworn PLDs and the similar groups, there are a few hundred in the world at least. If we included generic knights, this would easily be Common or even Very Common, but we're still limiting here to PLD, which is a more rare form of the discipline.
WAR: Uncommon. While generic "warriors" are very common, the specific discipline of awakening AND taming one's Inner Beast is more rare. From the quest, we can assume that different cultures have people whose Inner Beast awakens (the girl from the Au Ra of the Azim Steppe), though many cultures may not know what to do with them, and their self-destructive tendencies tend to cut their lives short even with a welcoming society. So the amount who learn to harness and control it are probably more rare. We haven't been to the Northern Isles yet to encounter the ancestral tribes practicing the WAR arts (that the questgiver comes from), but by virtue of being a tribe and tradition, as well as the random individuals from other cultures, it's logical to think there are a few hundred at least.
DRK: Very Rare. We know of only 2 in existence. While they MIGHT be more common, it seems they do not really spread their arts much, and likely have something akin to the Sith "Rule of Two" where a master only trains one or two apprentices. While it's hard to get solid numbers on a group that is largely in hiding, it's reasonable to think there aren't a LOT of them. While not all of them wait to, you know, be dead before taking on a student or two, they're probably still pretty rare.
GNB: Uncommon. WoL and Thancred were trained by the same guy, who thought he was the last one, but then learned through the Bozja questline there were others. It seems there are dozens and possibly a few hundred GNBs of the Bozjan school. Note there are hundreds (or thousands) MORE of the Garlean take on it, but their discipline is distinct in several ways (one of which is having actual guns, another is a lack of aether for powder gauge charges). Still, a few hundred is probably a decent educated guess.
Healers:
WHM: Unique. The WoL is said to specifically have A-Towa-Kant's Job stone AND be the only non-Padjal White Mage alive. Further, the other living WHM's, all Padjali, are few in number, less than a dozen being known. Many are CNJs instead of WHMs. In fact, most "White Mage-like" NPCs in quests and encounters are Conjurers, with a few exceptions being Geomancers. So while the Job is common with players, it's exceptionally rare in current lore. Oh, and at least one Moogle (one of the members of the Pomguard of Good King Moogle Mog the XIII, may his pom shine forever).
SCH: Unique. Like WAR, we're speaking specifically of the Job, not the general term of being a student and studying various disciplines. While we know other SCH Job stones exist (and help find one for someone in one of the quests), we know of only that one, and she has just recently regained the ability to summon her Faerie successfully. As we've encountered no others, this is still considered a very unique Job. (Most of the book holding people you encounter in quests and such are Arcanists). While it's possible other Nymian SCH Job stones have been found, and even some people learned to use them, we've had no direct evidence of this in lore to date. While Alo Alo teased us as possibly hinting at more, the people we encounter there are not explicitly SCHs of Nym's discipline, and are probably more akin to Arcanists as well.
AST: Uncommon. Probably the most abundant of the healer Jobs, AST is a school of healing and divination aiming to bend fate a bit in Sharlyan, a more limited school focused on divination (telling the future for the Dragon's movements and warning of future attacks) in Ishgard, and a mix of Sharlyan's school and something loosely akin to Conjury in the case of Hingashi's Geomancy schools. While not falling from trees left and right, this is a much more common overall discipline, and of the two Sharlyan healers, probably the more common one. (Indeed, of the four healer Jobs, this is probably the only remotely common one; remember that CNJ is a Class, not a Job, and Churgeon - an archaic irl spelling of "Surgeon" - isn't a Job, at least not one available to us yet or ever).
SGE: Rare. Like doctors in our own society, there's not one on every street corner, but they also aren't exceedingly rare to the point you have to climb a mountain to find one hiding out. Between SGE and AST, there are probably fewer SGEs since it's an extensive amount of training and study across no less than three disciplines; anatomy, aether manipulation, and sorcery. Imagine being a doctor in our world that also dual majored in being a wizard. Rare, but not VERY Rare like some other Jobs.
Melee:
DRG: Rare to Uncommon. This somewhat depends on which type of Dragoon we're referring to, but there are dozens if not triple digits of them among the ranks of Ishgard's warriors. Though there are only a handful of exceptional ones in each generation.
MNK: Rare, but increasing. In ARR, it's presented that you and your trainer are the only ones remaining. Eventually, you find out there were more in hiding, though they were largely exterminated in the wake of the Mad King's rampages. However, with the restoration of Ala Mhigo, the MNK tradition has at least one school back in operation taking on new disciples and training a generation of new MNKs, increasing the commonality of this Job.
NIN: Uncommon. It's possible this COULD be Common, but we don't know how populous the secret Ninja villages are (on account of them being...secret), or the percent of their population that are trained outright as NINs (many are likely farmers, blacksmiths, etc that support the village in other ways). But like WAR, we know there are entire villages that practice the Ninja arts on at least some level, even if they are seldom seen.
SAM: Uncommon to Common. It's very possible this could be Common, and honestly fairly likely. There are dozens of them around the areas of Kugane and Doma that we can go to in-game, dozens more in dungeons and solo instances in SB, and we haven't even been to Hingashi proper aside from Mount Rokkon, but we do know that the various warlords have dozens if not hundreds more in their service. While one could argue how many are actual trained and skilled in combat SAMs (as opposed to family lineages that simply inherit the title and likely only do token amounts of training, or the somewhat raw recruits of the Sekisegumi), there are, at the least, a few hundred capable of combat and worthy of the name Samurai.
RPR: Very Rare or Rare. We know of only The Family, which might be a few dozen people, and we don't even know how many of them are RPRs. We only explicitly know the guildmaster is (and a certain someone, at least until she decided to be a [REDACTED]). So needless to say, few, though not QUITE Unique.
Ranged:
BRD: Very Rare or Rare. This depends on how you count, though most practitioners who are not the WoL are Moogles. There's obviously at least two more between the ARR quest NPC and the HW-SB quest NPC, and the questline seemed to indicate the Twin Adders and/or God's Quiver are attempting to train and incorporate more into their ranks.
MCH: Uncommon. Probably. And likely increasing towards Common. The Job stones have been made and the art is new, but the founder NPC is training people by the dozens if not a few hundred, and fielded them as a contingent in some of the quest instances. The current discipline is a combination of the Musketeer class (unimplemented from 1.X, but the 1.X dude does some of the training of the new recruits), combined with Hilda's people from the Brume, and assorted other volunteers, probably even more now from outside Ishgard itself now that the Dragonsong War has ended. MCH is kind of "Second Amendment: The Job", or the invention of the crossbow in the middle ages (a weapon that would allow a commoner with minutes of training to be able to take the life of a noble family's knight with years or decades of it, standing toe to toe upon the lines of war). Needless to say, if there aren't a hundred of them YET, there soon will be.
DNC: Rare. Like WAR and SCH (and BRD), the specific art of the Thavnarian DNC isn't just the generic ability to dance, but the ability to instill some magic into the dancing, even arguably being able to counter the power of the Song of Despair. I didn't do the DNC questline until I had finished EW, but if it was intended as foreshadowing, it is ONE HELL of a foreshadowing. The specific special power of the dance is passed from the head of their troupes to their hand-picked successor, generation to generation. While there might be a few dozen overall, those picked to learn their most powerful dances and secrets, the DNC Job, are still probably Rare. Though not AS rare as some other things on this list.
Caster:
BLM: Very Rare. While not QUITE Unique (there's at least one other, the questgiver, and probably a few more, and of course the Pomguard BLM), it's very close. Though post SB, the books that teach the arts of Black Magic (as opposed to mere Thamaturgy) are likely no longer entirely forbidden, they are still strictly controlled, which means even now with probably a few more people training in the art, it is very rare that the Thamaturge's Guild would entrust another with such power, and may be limited to only the WoL, BLM trainer, and the Guildmaster brothers themselves. Note that BLM is not quite the same as SorcereSorceress (what Y'Shtola is in lore), though the EXACT distinctions in how they cast their magics haven't been made entirely clear as far as I know. While you meet some people TRYING to be Black Mages in the questlines, they aren't in various ways (either they're still burning their own aether like THMs and consuming their life force, or they're using some kind of medium of power to fuel their spells; and in neither case do they have the restraint and control the WoL does).
SMN: Rare. You might think this should be VERY Rare, but the ShB capstone quest revealed that the Grand Companies learned that, when they freed people from Tempering, some of those individuals were able to learn how to summon the Egi they had been thrall to. While they are still subject to being Tempered if put into a fight with a Primal due to lacking the Echo, they could summon their Egis and send them into battle to support those with the Echo fighting the Primals, such as Fordola and Arenvald. While still rare, given the Grand Companies are now actively training their former-Tempered who have aptitude into this discipline, and probably inviting into their ranks volunteers from among those who were cured of Tempering (the random non-military people that had been captured as sacrifices but saved, many of whom would like to ensure that fate never befalls anyone else and would be willing to volunteer), it's safe to say in at least a limited way, there are probably either already or in the near future a few hundred SMNs, though some/most may be limited to only one Egi and minor summoning skills and no where close to the WoL in prowess. Still, a Summoner is a Summoner.
RDM: Very Rare. I think there are a total of 6 known RDMs. WoL, Alisaie, Aria (who's still mostly a trainee/student), their trainer (can never remember his spelling), and at least two from Bozja (one from Southern Front and one from Zadnor...and maybe one more there). Not Unique, but there are probably less than a dozen in the world. Note that RDM is nothing like Sorcerer, as it's not directly using Black or White Magic...exactly, instead using a more efficient (and physically demanding) emulation of Black and White Magic that doesn't require sucking aether out of the surrounding environment. RDM is the environmentally friendly BLM/WHM, so to speak.
BLU: Rare to Uncommon. There are dozens, perhaps a hundred of them at this point, though many probably only know a spell or two. Martyn was handing the things out like candy at first with no real discernment other than if the person had sufficient gil for him to toss them a stone and basic spellbook hint guide. We do know there have been some others, mostly inspired by Azuro the Second (WoL) and some by Martyn, which is the lore reason for the Blue Mage Log and running dungeons on BLU, and you even meet several of them in the quest series. We aren't given an exact number, but it's implied there are probably dozens, and more adherents all the time. Though again, some may be minimally skilled.
Misc:
Classes: Various levels of Common and Very Common. Most NPCs are not Jobs, but rather Classes...at least up until SB. At that point we started getting a lot more Jobs (like SAMs in Kugane).
Note Also: There are other things that are probably Jobs or very like Job things. For example, Sorcerer is probably a Job or something rare-ish like one, but isn't playable for us. Same with (for now) Beastmaster. And I'm obviously not including the new Jobs since we don't really know anything about them yet other than that Pictomancy was developed by a Sharlyan Archon at...some point, but we don't even know if it's a recent development or an old one that just happens to be esoteric enough it's shelved with few practitioners.
.
So what do you guys think? Would you rate some as more rare? Less rare? And what's your reasoning for placing them where you do?

Own a musket for my Ohio defense, since that's what Baby Gronk intended. Four ops break into my crib. "What the skibidi?" As I grab my powdered wig and Kentucky rizz rifle. Blow a golf ball sized gyatt through the first man, he's gooned on the spot. Pull my pistol on the second dude, miss him entirely because it's smoothbore and nails the neighbor's dog doing the skibi. I gotta resort to the cannon mounted at the top of the stairs loaded with Grimace shake, "Tally ho lads" the Grimace shake shreds two guys in the load, The boom and extra bits set off whip alarms. Fix bayonet and charge the last scared NPC. He bleeds out waiting for the ops to show since those bayonet wounds just hit diff, just as the founding alphas planned.

Link for all the chapters available here: Engines of Arachnea on Royal Road
The Colonel’s tent was leaking again. Ordinarily such a mistake would’ve earned his adjutant an hour-long dressing down and possibly, if the Colonel was feeling particularly enthusiastic, a sharp backhanded slap across the face. After all, a leaky tent could hardly be said to be hermetically sealed, now could it? But this affront to his sensibilities paled in comparison to the utter travesty and exemplar of sheer incompetence that now sat before his desk, a sagging wreck of a man in the tattered uniform of a Fleet officer. Colonel Moch Leelan curled his lip at it and barked:
“Once more, if you please. And I don’t want this on record,” he added, darting a look at the clerk poised to take dictation in the corner of the room, “Not a word of this gets out. There’s been enough of a snafu already, and the brass won’t stop shitting down my neck about Mound 13 and the loss of Prota’s pestilential pet project. Did you hear me, man? I said start from the beginning!”
Outside the monsoon was intensifying into one of those proverbial downpours which prompted doddering old men to remark that it was ‘raining cats and dogs’, though what either a cat or a dog were, none could now say. A trickle of it seeped in like a string of winking glass beads, catching the orange glow of the gas lamp and turning into sparks of amber, into seeds of flame. They dripped on the bald man seated on the low footstool, and he raised his head to meet the scornful gaze of the Colonel, grey eyes unabashed and unafraid. He spoke then, in a hoarse voice that matched his pallid flesh and buzzard nose:
“It was the third day of reconnaissance. We were forced to abandon our pack-beasts in the mire. My assistant and I—”
“Name, rank and serial number!” Colonel Leelan interrupted, for the sole purpose of seeing the coward blink and quaver like the worm he was. But in that he was to be disappointed, for the man continued in the same flat tone:
“Sollem Deschane, Lord Navigator, 3^rd Pathfinder Regiment, serial number 18911944. We received orders from the Admiralty and Fleet Command to reconnoiter the area around the enemy concentration designated as Mound Euler. I was to lead a platoon of twenty handpicked volunteers across the river Foss at its lowest point, then scale the outlying cliffs to get better readings as we mapped out the approaches to Mound Euler. It was the third day of reconnaissance. We were forced to abandon our myropods in the mud and carry our own gear. My assistant navigator Rene Louvoture and I noticed a discrepancy with our visually confirmed data and the aerial sketches of the Aeronautical Division. We quickly worked out that the enemy concentration far exceeded initial estimates by an order of magnitude. Mound Euler is an omega-class colony the likes of which the Fleet has faced only once in its entire existence, during the Scouring of Assail. It is my belief that—”
“Leave your hysterics for later and get on to meat of things,” Leelan snapped. Deschane straightened a bit in his seat and scowled as his layers of bandages shifted. The man was practically mummified by the sheer extent of his wounds that it was a wonder he had managed to limp into the tent in the first place. But the navigator had made a point of refusing to be debriefed in his sick bed and had insisted that he be given no further pain killers. This was to prove that his report was not at all influenced by the effects of opiates, as well as to underline the supposed importance of his eyewitness account as the sole survivor of the siege of Mound 13.
But Colonel Leelan was no fool. He knew the tactic for what it was: a bit of playacting by a soon-to-be-disgraced officer, a desperate attempt to pass himself off as a tragic hero rather than the author of the most monumental military cock-up of the decade.
You may very well get that wish, Deschane, Leelan smirked inwardly. If you play your cards right. You’ll find that I can put on a pantomime as well as the next man.
Deschane regarded him cooly, replying:
“You asked for my report, sir. I am stating the facts as I understand them.”
“Understand?” Leelan guffawed, “There’s precious little to understand about this debacle! Explain to me how a routine scouting mission winds up in the loss of 5,000 men, a Rear-Admiral and an entire frontline outpost! Explain to me how you not only got every last one of your own men slaughtered, but still managed to save your own sorry arse!”
Now that had an effect on the navigator’s bearing. He dropped the holier-than-thou attitude and even pretended to dab at some moisture in corners of his eye. For a moment his mask of iron cracked and he looked tired enough to sleep for a thousand years, never to waken. Then he seemed to recall that his career was at stake and had the temerity to argue with the Colonel:
“We were given faulty intelligence. I made mistakes, I’ll admit that here and now. We should never have continued after our pack animals were trapped in the mire. The gear slowed us down in enemy territory. I can’t wash my hands of the loss of my platoon. They were the best and bravest men I ever fought with, and I will carry the shame of losing them to my grave. The fact that I am still alive when none of them are breathing is an accident that was not of my choosing. As for Mound 13, it was only a matter of time before they were discovered and dealt with. They were only two day’s travel from Mound Euler. In fact, it was miracle they managed to exist for so long undetected.”
Magnificent deflection. Colonel Leelan had to admire the snake and his flawless attempt to pass the blame onto the shoulders of the dead Rear-Admiral Prota.
Yes, I think we can make an arrangement here, the Colonel thought wryly. He waved Deschane’s prattling aside and said:
“This omega-class colony of yours. A mound so large that is beggars belief, you say? Curious, then, that such an object should have escaped your keen senses for three whole days!”
“Visibility in that terrain and climate is poor. But yes, it was another one of my errors.”
“I’m so glad that you agree,” Leelan purred, his words dripping with condescension. He reached into the drawer of his desk and took out a bottle of fermented honeydew. Uncorking it with a loud pop, he poured out two glasses and lifted one to his lips, saying:
“On a related note, it’s funny how the fog of war can obscure so many important details. Even the best commanders can lose their bearings, lose sight of the greater picture, fixate on the wrong things. Take our dearly departed Rear-Admiral Prota, for example (may she rest in the Flight Eternal). Not to speak ill of the dead, but she was assigned an entire sector for her research into enemy behavior. And what does she do with it? Cultural studies! Anthropology! As if the Amits have a culture worth sneezing at! They’ve been working with flint and wood since this primeval war of ours began, and they’ve never taken the hint. Meanwhile, we’ve finally gained the advantage of powder and artillery and mass-produceable gas masks.”
“One big push! That’s all it would take to clear the northern highlands. We have the men, the will and the technology to do it! The last thing we need is some starry-eyed academic telling us that the Amits have somehow found religion. I mean, really!” Colonel Leelan warmed to his subject, “Five thousand soldiers dedicated to safeguarding some blessed cave paintings, right on the frontlines, too! What a waste. Like you said: if you hadn’t led the Amits directly to them, someone else would have down the line.”
“We took steps to ensure they wouldn’t follow us. We tried, but they found the fear-death pheromones—”
“Steps?” Leelan pressed him mercilessly, “What steps, exactly?”
Deschane looked away and said nothing. Leelan sniffed, continuing:
“I thought so. As I was saying, Prota’s project was doomed from the start. It was an ill-conceived, harebrained mission, and now the Admiralty will have to explain to Fleet Command and the general public how it lost an entire regiment in the name of some woman’s flight of fancy. But there is a silver lining to all this. Seeing as how we recaptured what was left of Mound 13 within mere hours of it falling, we think there’s a way to salvage the situation after all. You can be part of that, Deschane. Every victory may have its price, but it must also have its heroes.”
Leelan sipped his honeydew, waiting for the offer he’d made to sink in. Deschane smiled, a humorless crack in his granite features.
“You’re going to make me a hero?” he asked. Leelan nudged the other glass towards him, shrugging:
“And why not? Someone has to wear the medals. ‘Lone Survivor of Desperate Last Stand’,” Leelan exclaimed, dramatically forecasting the future headlines, “He tried to warn them, but did they listen? You get the rest, I imagine. We’ll have to improve some of the details, of course. Like how it was the 3^rd Pathfinder Regiment which held back the flood of Amits in the final hour and ignited the fortress’ ammo depot—”
“We never did that,” Deschane objected, rudely cutting off Leelan’s train of thought, “It was the Divine Engine. I saw it with my own eyes. It broke out of Mound 13 and slaughtered the enemy.”
Leelan sighed.
“Not this again. Deschane, I’d appreciate it if you’d save your hallucinations for the regimental shrink. Think, man! The honor of our unit is at stake here. You have a chance to redeem the men of your platoon, even if you can never truly redeem yourself.”
“I saw it,” Deschane growled, and for a moment Leelan almost reached for his ceremonial saber hanging by its belt on his coatrack, “Sir, it left footprints the size of—”
“For heaven’s sake, you witless worm, the earthquake was felt all the way in the Southern Delta! Not very big one, but certainly enough to account for the avalanches and landslides that took place around Mound 13, not to mention the sinkhole we found you snoring in! It’s certainly not the first time an uncontrolled detonation triggered a seismic event. Deschane, I’ll only say this once: either you get your story straight or by thunder, I’ll bury you so deep in shit you’ll start to think you’re made of it! And you are! If you breathe a word of this delirious vision of yours to the press, you’ll not only receive no medals, but I’ll have you court-martialed faster than you can say ‘diddly-squat’. Which is precisely what you’ll be left with unless you jump like a good boy and ask how high. No honor, no rank, no reputation, no pension. Nothing! Do you understand?”
Colonel Leelan wrathfully thrust the glass at Deschane, spilling most of it in the process.
“Well, do you?”


Deschane hobbled out of the tent, escorted by a pair of grenadiers in fluffy white shakos. They sealed the adhesive lining of the tent airlock after him and the Navigator went on his way, the taste of honeydew lingering on his tongue like a bitter poison. He lifted his mask and hawked up a gob of spit that eloquently described his opinion of the colonel, wiping his scowling mouth with the back of his hand.
Ven was waiting for him with the crutches, a young and rather portly corporal with apple cheeks and a worried, pouting mouth. She helped Deschane as he made the slow and painful walk across the encampment to his field tent, the lord navigator deep in thought. Along the way they cut across the central avenue of the camp where a seemingly endless artillery train was lumbering its way up from the south and curving around the broad talus skirts of Gorgo Plateau, teams of scuttling myropods hitched to six or twelve-pounder guns, their hundreds of tiny legs threshing the soil into a quagmire. Behind them, plodding dejectedly into the rapidly liquefying mud, were ranks upon rank of fresh colonial levees, their brand-new sealant suits creaking loudly at the joints as they made what for most of them would be their first expedition into the surface world.
And what a foray it would prove to be. Almost two hundred thousand men amd women were mustered here at the edge of civilization, poised on the cusp of what was to be the largest surface offensive in recorded history. The Fleet had arrived in the Northern Hinterlands, and it had come to conquer.
"Gangway!" the levees hollered at Ven as she tried to cut a path for Deschane through the line, "Can't you see we's marching 'ere, ya stoopid bint?"
"He's an officer, ain't he?" she screamed back, pointing at the navigator.
Upon noticing the faded chevrons on Deschane's shoulders some of them clumsily snapped to attention, stopping in their tracks. Their comrades behind them, oblivious to this turn of events, bowled right into them, causing a minor stampede. Men and women cursed as they dropped their pristine muskets, never fired in the heat of battle, into the churning soup at their feet, or themselves went sprawling on their hands and knees. Baton-wielding sergeants descended on the mess, screaming for them to get back up, generously assisting them with a boot to the rump or a smack on the side of the head. Deschane looked back at the display for a long moment, as if considering something. Abruptly he grunted at Ven and they continued on their way to the outskirts where the Pathfinders were billeted.
She waited until they were inside the tent and Deschane was back in his sick bed, the navigator turning his back to her in stony silence. Cautiously, she ventured:
“What now, sir?”
“Draw up a list of volunteers,” he rasped, “But do it on the sly. We’re going back out there."
"Very good, sir," Ven squeaked, and went scurrying out of the navigator's chambers, sealing the tent flap softly behind her. She knew that tone and what it signified: the lord navigator had made up his mind, and heaven help whoever would stand in his way.
Link for all the chapters available here: Engines of Arachnea on Royal Road

Why would I ever bother with another weapon again? I'm rolling around with a flintlock pistol loaded and ready for when they close too quick for my sixty second reload time (vault musket training was woefully lacking) All of my post apocalyptic dreams have come true already. Anyone else wanna line up with me and march across the wasteland, unleashing black powdered hell across any we should meet, let me know

Every anime is either medieval or modern, no in between.
Attack on titan has been the only one ive seen use muskets.

I noticed that sometimes when discussing battles whether historical or modern, people make mistakes in terminology and come away with incorrect conclusions and perceptions. Likewise, they often fall into a simple analytical fallacy regarding killed vs wounded and come away with incorrect conclusions about the effectiveness of certain weapons vs others.
Let's define some terms.
Wounded In Action (WIA): Anybody who receives a wound. Usually this covers any wound serious enough to warrant medical treatment, so a bruise or scrape or very light graze probably wouldn't be serious enough to qualify.
Seriously Wounded: Anybody who receives a wound which takes them out of the fight. Many wounds can be sustained without necessarily making a person ineffective as a soldier, but this class covers more serious ones which are either debilitating or life threatening. Either way, a soldier who is seriously wounded probably won't be fighting for days to weeks or even months.
Killed In Action (KIA): Self-explanatory.
Missing In Action (MIA): Anybody who cannot be accounted for. In most cases, MIA individuals have been taken prisoner, deserted, or are dead.
Irretrievable/Irrecoverable Casualty/Losses: Anybody who is permanently incapacitated as far as fighting goes. This includes KIA and for practical purposes MIA, but also include anybody who receives wounds which make them incapable of returning to the fight - amputees, people with brain damage, spinal damage, etc.
Casualty: Anybody who is WIA, MIA, or KIA.
I frequently see casualty being conflated with KIA. This is not correct. As a rule of thumb for any KIA there will be between 2 and 10 WIA. These numbers vary depending on the conflict, weapons used, armor used, availability of medical care, and so on. When a force has "100,000 casualties" it doesn't have 100,000 KIA, it likely has a few tens of thousands KIA and the rest are WIA.
Now, I'd like to highlight a fallacy I see when people are discussing how deadly certain weapons are or how effective certain armors are. Here's an example from another Reddit thread discussing Napoleonic weaponry.
About what percentage of the Revolutionary War and Napoleonic War's casualties were caused by melee combat vs ranged combat? :

Looking at a larger sample of veterans admitted to the Invalides in 1715, Corvisier arrived at the following breakdown of wounds:
71.4 % from firearms
15.8 % from swords
10.0 % from artillery
2.8 % from the bayonet
According to another sample taken (in 1762) in Invalides;
69 % of the wounded were wounded by musket balls
14 % by sabers
13 % by artillery
2 % by bayonets

I've seen commentators rely on the same data on Reddit and elsewhere to conclude that the "king of battle," artillery, was only responsible for 10% of casualties on the Napoleonic battlefield.
This is a fallacy based on the conflation of WIA and casualties. It causes the assumption that the WIA and KIA rates are the same for these weapons, which is a poor assumption. There are two glaring issues. First a little context for those who are unfamiliar.
Napoleonic-era artillery was composed of cannons/guns and howitzers. Guns fired round shot which were usually solid iron balls or canister shot which were packages of many small iron or lead balls. Round shot acted like a massive bullet which could also bounce, tearing through any men in its path. Fired at a line it could kill two or three men at a time but fired at a dense column it could kill a dozen or more. Howitzers fired shells filled with powder and a fuse and they would ideally explode in the air just above their target to wound via fragments of the shell. Howitzers could also fire canister. Fragmentation and small balls can easily wound someone without killing them. Round shot on the other hand is very likely to kill sooner than wound. It will go straight through the body, producing nearly instant lethal damage to the torso and head or else ripping off limbs. Limbs ruined by round shot could be amputated and cleaned up, but surgeons were in short supply and someone whose femoral artery got ripped open by round shot probably couldn't make it to a surgeon anyways. That is to say, I would expect round shot wounds to be deadly in short order and unless the individual wounded was of importance evacuation to the surgeons to be unlikely in the midst of a battle.
So, round shot victims would inherently be under-represented in a surgeon's tent.
Next, to address canister shot. As stated earlier, canister shot was a shotgun-like blast of dozens of metal balls. Sometimes these were special large diameter balls. At other times these were indistinguishable from musket balls. I suppose in some cases it's possible to distinguish whether an individual was fired at by a cannon or a musket, but canister shot had a range in the hundreds of meters and if a company is under fire from both enemy muskets and canister shot, who's to say whether a man was hit by a ball fired by a musket or a cannon?
In other words, I suspect many canister wounds could have been written off as wounds caused by muskets.
Coming back to the collected statistics we see:

1. They are unreliably because there may be a conflation between canister shot and musketry wounds.
2. As far as "casualties" go round shot will be greatly undercounted due to its very high likelihood of killing rather than wounding anybody it hit.

There was a similar analytical fallacy made in WW1. When soldiers were issued with helmets to protect against artillery fragmentation, there were reports that head wounds greatly increased. Someone might conclude that helmets somehow made things more dangerous for the infantry but the truth was just the opposite: The men who would have once been killed by hits to the head were now "merely" wounded.
So, please be careful not to conflate casualties with any subcategory and also question how statistics are generated and what they mean in their context.

First time asking anything here... I can find plenty of articles about specific weapons (muskets and cannon), and some on production and strategic supply; even some notes on what ammunition an individual soldier might carry. What I'm looking for is what a regiment's (or company, or army) powder supply would look like in the field, and how powder was provided from that supply to the rank & file. Barrels? Crates? How large & heavy? Concentrated in a few wagons or dispersed for safety?

I left this as a comment in another thread but I’m so riled up about it that I felt like it deserved its own thread.
The ending of Kingdom bugged me sooo much. This is supposed to be 300 years after Cesar’s death, long enough that ape society has all but forgotten who Cesar really was and the nature of mankind. I like this time jump; it gives the story time to breathe. Yet we cut back to this magic bunker where humans have somehow survived for three hundred years in total isolation, have a deep understanding of contemporary technology, and harbor some recent feeling grudge that apes have taken over from them, even though they, and their parents and grandparents and great great great great great great grandparents would have lived in this new order. I don’t think the screenwriters thought through just how long 300 years is. 300 years ago there wasn’t even a United States of America. How in the world would a population survive that long in a hole in the ground? How would they reproduce at a rate successful enough that ten plus generations went by? How do they know how guns work? That would be like us picking up a black powder musket and just popping it off no sweat. And don’t get me started on powering on THREE HUNDRED YEAR OLD satellites, that don’t even have paneling and are covered in dang vines, and picking up a signal within minutes. I was iffy on the movie to that point but that end is what broke me. Honestly I’d believe in apes gaining the ability to speak before I believed that a small group of humans could survive in total isolation underground for longer than the history of some major countries. It felt like the screenwriters wanted to have their cake and eat it too; make it long enough that the apes have forgotten their heritage but also have contemporary human beings. Maybe cryosleep or something like that will be revealed to be in play, but if not this trilogy will be too much of a stretch in logic for me.

I'm pretty new (21) and I'm all over the place. Just got the perfect storm smg and am using that alot, but it is EATING through ammo. I also have black powder pistol, sniper, vampire shotgun, and a melee. As well as a throwable and radaway. Do I have too many or too few guns in my loadout? Am I spread too far out? Is it bad for my only "sidearm" weapon to be a 1800s musket in pistol form?

Blurb: Stranded on the hell-planet of Arachnea, the last remnants of the human Fleet fight to survive in a world overrun by insectoid monsters and a sentient ecosystem gone mad. It is a war they are destined to lose, as with every century that passes, more of the ancient science lies forgotten, replaced by myth and superstition. That is, until assistant navigator Rene stumbles the mightiest weapon of the ancestor-gods...
Link to 1st chapter here: 1st chapter on HFY
Link for all the chapters available here: Engines of Arachnea on Royal Road
“I can’t agree with your conclusion,” Deschane said, “This calcite formation is remarkable, but how can you say with certainty it’s the work of thinking beings?” “Because there are obvious symbolisms. Again, another thing we thought them incapable of. Notice how the stalactites are arranged?”
Rene squinted. There was no pattern to it. Then Prota asked: “What star points northward in the month of Clemdas?”
“Brahe.” Both he and the navigator said simultaneously. Comprehension dawned upon them. The Amit had shaped the ceiling with careful applications of acid, carving it such that every major constellation in the night sky was represented in the domes by a glittering array of water droplets. Even Deschane gaped at the realization: the Amit could read the stars just as they did.
“But that isn’t all.” Prota took a torch from a nearby stanchion and held it aloft. The curious geometric figures etched into the ceiling above them resolved themselves into abstract images.
Three great ovoid shapes threaded their way through the star-strewn sky, each trailing behind it wavering tails of fire.
“Thus it came to pass that the sons of Man fled from the desolate earth. In three gilded ships they rode, and tails of flame as fierce as a dying sun burned behind them as their mighty engines drove them into the deathless void. Of these blessed machines it was decreed that three would be their holy number, for then if one lost resonance and rebelled, then two could set the course aright…”
She had quoted from the first page of the Book of Old Terra, oldest and most sacred of texts that dealt with the coming of the ancestor--gods.
“Three ships. Three tails of fire for each one.”
Rene’s head swam with the implications.
“Then why haven’t we seen such things before? In other conquered mounds?” Deschane demanded.
“You know as well as I that each individual mound contains an entirely separate race of Amit. You were not here when we took this place. It exacted a terrible price. There was a week of close quarter fighting in the entrance hall. In some places there the bodies were stacked four or six deep.”
“They were a strange sub-species. Jaundice yellow rather than white, small yet highly vicious. They led us into countless ambushes. They knew how to feint a charge to draw a volley, retreat and charge again while we reloaded. When the eastern wall finally fell…” her voice trailed away, and she looked away troubled. “As we swarmed in, we found what was left of them all hunched together. As though they were holding some final communion. As we neared, we saw what they’d done. They’d sat in circles facing one another, and thrust their claws down their own throats. They severed their own cortical bundles. A mass suicide. It was rather disturbing. We only had a few corpses of them to examine, and all heavily damaged, but from what we could see they had abnormal growth in their frontal lobes. They were special. They were aware of the massacre that awaited them, and they chose their own way out. It was almost noble, really”
“You sound as though you admire them.” Deschane said.
“I appreciate the function they serve. Surely, navigator, you realize that without them the Fleet would have died out long ago?”
It was true. The Amit expanded cave systems, honeycombing the limestone with claw and acid, building the feeder towers in such a way that the life-giving mixture of carbon dioxide rich air extended all throughout the confines of the mounds. These were the sites for the only permanent settlements the Fleet could inhabit. And so they took the works of the enemy and put him to the bayonet, making homes of his fortresses, hard won in battles that raged far from the light of the twin suns of this cruel planet. They bored their way through, blasting apart his alien warrens to make way for smooth white tunnels, egress points, ventilation shafts, fields to grow glowing crops of fungus. In so doing they survived.
Deschane scoffed.
“That is entirely coincidental. We evolved to become their predators, and vice versa. Nature designed us to be adversaries. Besides, if the ancestor--gods willed them into being, then why did they vanish and leave us to tear each other apart?”
“That is what we hope to learn.”
“This makes no sense,” Deschane growled, “So they share the same legends as we do. What of it? They merely confirm what we already know.”
“But we don’t know, navigator. The knowledge we possess is next to nothing compared to what we have forgotten.”
“We know enough. We know that it is our destiny to claim this planet even if it means striding over the corpse of every single living thing on it.”
“Navigator, you seem to forget that we only rediscovered the uses of black powder a century ago. We have lost so much in our time on this world. Anything that can begin our process of recovery is to be cherished.”
“Even when it comes from the hand of the enemy?” Deschane’s eyes glinted fiercely.
“This is not the only depiction within the mound. There are sculptures, acid paintings, more engravings like the ones you see before you now. Most have no parallel in the book of old terra-they are events unrecorded in all the annals of our history. That is why 13 is so important. There are mysteries here both sacred and profane. It is touched by the god--ancestors themselves.”
“Our structural engineers have surveyed this place. They say it is impossible for it to have remained intact as it has for millennia. They said that wind or gravity should have destroyed it long ago. Yet it stands. Something is keeping this place together. Something which given time we may discover. It is almost as though it has been waiting for us to take it.”
“What does it all mean?” Rene said aloud.
“That old myth is merely history distilled. That we do not belong here, and never have. That the Amit are intelligent beyond a doubt and know us for what we truly are.”
“Delusional,” spat Deschane.
“Calm yourself Navigator,” Prota drew herself. “There is a reason command is willing to sacrifice you and thousands of others to keep this place safe. I understand your frustrations-”
“Do you? I’ve just lost eighteen good men for the sake of meaningless conjecture!”
“Please consider the implications. For the first time, the Fleet will know where it came from, and why it is here! For the first time, we can move forward on a basis of solid fact rather than doubtful superstition! We will have true knowledge of the past!”
“To the void with the past!” Deschane was raging, “Why waste breath upon it? There are beasts out there, madame, in their millions, slavering hordes that eat children and empty whole settlements of life! They are the sole reason mankind cannot live in comfort and security. They must be eradicated. All else is irrelevant.”
They locked eyes and stood inches apart.
The situation was only defused when a man came running up to Admiral Prota. He leant forward and whispered in her ear.
Her eyes widened in alarm.
“One of your men has been seen approaching the outpost.”
“Lethway!” Rene yelled. He ran in the direction of the pressure gate, pounding through the corridors and thrusting aside the people standing in his way.
“Open the gate!” cried Prota as she, Deschane and her retinue came followed from behind. He scrambled into the decontamination chamber, hastily pulled on his sealant suit and strapped on the mask. The others donned their surface gear and joined him as the great iron slabs heaved aside.
Hurriedly they made their way down the rough-hewn steps of the barbican, all the way down to the palisades, where a small crowd had gathered on the walls to watch. They cleared a path when they saw the Admiral.
“Where is he?” Deschane asked the men standing about. They pointed vaguely northward, unsure themselves, and he pulled out his binoculars.
“It’s him alright,” he said, sounding impressed. “He survived.”
“How?”
“Ask him when you meet.”
With a rare smile he handed the lenses to Rene, whose heart leapt. Beyond a small thicket of trees in the distance was a wide clearing, into which a familiar figure now emerged. Against all odds, he was back safe. Rene could have shouted for joy.
But as he adjusted the magnification knob and the image of his friend came into crisp focus, he realized there was something wrong.
“He’s not wearing a mask.” Rene said in horror.
“Rene! Ensign, wait!”
He bounded off the platform and ran for the entrance. Cursing, Deschane snatched the musket from the hands of the nearest trooper and yelled:

“Someone get me a spare!”
A mask was found in haste and tossed his way. He caught it and dashed after Rene, who had already begun making for the tree line.
“Ensign, stop! That’s an order!”
Rene ignored him and ploughed on.
He reached the thicket and was about to burst through the other side when a strong hand grasped his ankle and he came crashing down.
“Wait,” Deschane said gruffly. Rene squirmed but the navigator was sitting calmly on the back of his knees, and he could not pull free. “Rene! Listen to me.”
“What are you doing! He’ll die out here without a mask-”
“How do you suppose he lost it?” hissed Deschane, as he pulled Rene forcefully back into cover.
Hundreds of meters away, Lethway emerged into the clearing. He was sprinting at full pelt, not jogging as they had supposed. His clothes were torn and besmirched with mud, his sealant suit one great ragged mass of polymer that hung by a single sleeve.
They stopped struggling and turned to watch. Fear was evident in his posture: every movement of his body suggested that of a hunted man.
“Those clever bastards.” Deschane said sadly. “Haven’t you realized? He’s already dead.”
“What are talking about, sir? He’s right there! If we give my mask to him in time, we can rush him into the depressurization chamber-”
“They let him live. They knew more of us had survived, so they held off and followed him home. He doesn’t know it, but he’s led them straight to us.”
Sure enough, in the acre of woods across the clearing they saw scores of shadows moving furtively between the trees. Rene’s blood ran cold.
“Ancestors preserve us.”
“Don’t count on it. There’s enough of them there to level a full settlement.”
Lethway drew closer, looking constantly behind him and stumbling over his feet. Deschane pursed his lips. His hand ran down the length of the musket and found the trigger guard.
“There’s nothing more we can do for him. And if he keeps running this way, they’re bound to find the outpost.”
It took Rene a few moments to process what he was saying. He looked at him in disbelief.
Deschane went down on one knee. He placed the percussion cap and thumbed the hammer back.
Rene watched him in horrid fascination.
“It’s a hard thing,” the navigator was saying, settling into a marksman’s crouch, “But there’s still a chance we can save Mound 13.”
He aimed down the iron sight.
It was a terrible form of arithmetic, to weigh the value of one life against that of a thousand. But in that moment, Rene reached the same, gut-wrenching conclusion. He reached out and placed a hand on the barrel, forcing it to point at the ground. They looked at each other, and an understanding passed between them.
A few yards away, Lethway sobbed as he caught sight of the outpost rising up from out of the trees. It was nothing short of a miracle that he’d made it this far. He caught the glint of metal in the undergrowth, and with a cry of delight saw a human face peering back at him from beneath the shade. He raised his hands up high in greeting.
There was a sharp report, and a blinding flash. Lethway stumbled as though he’d been tripped and lay very still.
Link for all the chapters available here: Engines of Arachnea on Royal Road