Wyvern communication relays for Empire of Charis

I was re-reading HFAF and the information on wyvern ranges and speeds made me think about communications using them for the Empire of Charis.

Granted, the Empire's communications are already secretly linked by Owl and SNARC's much of the time, among the inner circle, but that still needs at least cover stories for "officially" finding things out. Semaphore chains handle things overland quickly, but the Empire consists of seven main islands/continents (Tarot, Old Charis [including Margaret's Land], Silverlode, Emerald, Chisholm, Zebediah, and Corisande) and lots of smaller ones, connected only by courier ships.

Wyvern's, however, are a lot faster, and you can get a two-way relay with each of two stations keeping wyverns that home in on the other station. Range may be something of an issue, but the sea crossing distances (Tarot-Margaret's Land, Charis-Silverlode-Emerald, Zebediah-Silverlode [including an intermediary island], Zebediah-Chisholm [also including an intermediary island], and Zebediah-Corisande [possibly including intermediary islands, but those are very small ones]) are none of them all that great, so one or another of the wyvern breeds ought to suffice to make those crossings. I had some concern about how well they would take to making those crossings in terms of how well they may be able to hunt for food or go without it at sea, but then Nahrmahn was using them for Charis-Emerald communications without trouble and that's a sea gap as long as any of them.

This does assume also a good semaphore network across northern Silverlode, which may be overly optimistic. But in a pinch, more wyvern relays could work there, or possibly a longer distance Zebediah-Emerald one.

So - is there any reason they can't set up stations to use wyverns to make those crossings for (granted, low-bandwidth) communications? Should we assume they do by now?

Incidentally, the Tarot-Siddermark sea gap is also not much longer than some of the rest of these, but the southern Siddermark semaphore communications themselves are a hash by now. The Chisholm-Trellheim and Tarot-Fallos gaps are also modest, in case of future Charisian expansion, or at least making inroads for better relations with those parties than the Temple would care for. (The Temple has not much ability to prevent Charisian contacts with Fallos, Trellheim, or the handful of people on the Barren Lands, though Charis hasn't the spare means to do too much coercion in those parts either.)

First of all, the Charis-Emerald sea gap isn't that large so use of Wyverns isn't that hard.

The "problem" IMO with your idea is that its so obvious that if it was possible, the Church would have been doing it already.

So IMO, either there are problems that we aren't seeing with your idea or your idea is already in use.

Also, IMO an aspect with Wyvern communications is that the message size is small because it has to be written on the amount of paper that a Wyvern can carry.

While use of "code groups" can cut down on the size, "code groups" depend on the sender and receiver setting up the meanings of the "code groups" before hand.

JeffEngel wrote:I was re-reading HFAF and the information on wyvern ranges and speeds made me think about communications using them for the Empire of Charis.

Granted, the Empire's communications are already secretly linked by Owl and SNARC's much of the time, among the inner circle, but that still needs at least cover stories for "officially" finding things out. Semaphore chains handle things overland quickly, but the Empire consists of seven main islands/continents (Tarot, Old Charis [including Margaret's Land], Silverlode, Emerald, Chisholm, Zebediah, and Corisande) and lots of smaller ones, connected only by courier ships.

Wyvern's, however, are a lot faster, and you can get a two-way relay with each of two stations keeping wyverns that home in on the other station. Range may be something of an issue, but the sea crossing distances (Tarot-Margaret's Land, Charis-Silverlode-Emerald, Zebediah-Silverlode [including an intermediary island], Zebediah-Chisholm [also including an intermediary island], and Zebediah-Corisande [possibly including intermediary islands, but those are very small ones]) are none of them all that great, so one or another of the wyvern breeds ought to suffice to make those crossings. I had some concern about how well they would take to making those crossings in terms of how well they may be able to hunt for food or go without it at sea, but then Nahrmahn was using them for Charis-Emerald communications without trouble and that's a sea gap as long as any of them.

This does assume also a good semaphore network across northern Silverlode, which may be overly optimistic. But in a pinch, more wyvern relays could work there, or possibly a longer distance Zebediah-Emerald one.

So - is there any reason they can't set up stations to use wyverns to make those crossings for (granted, low-bandwidth) communications? Should we assume they do by now?

Incidentally, the Tarot-Siddermark sea gap is also not much longer than some of the rest of these, but the southern Siddermark semaphore communications themselves are a hash by now. The Chisholm-Trellheim and Tarot-Fallos gaps are also modest, in case of future Charisian expansion, or at least making inroads for better relations with those parties than the Temple would care for. (The Temple has not much ability to prevent Charisian contacts with Fallos, Trellheim, or the handful of people on the Barren Lands, though Charis hasn't the spare means to do too much coercion in those parts either.)

DrakBibliophile wrote:First of all, the Charis-Emerald sea gap isn't that large so use of Wyverns isn't that hard.

The "problem" IMO with your idea is that its so obvious that if it was possible, the Church would have been doing it already.

So IMO, either there are problems that we aren't seeing with your idea or your idea is already in use.

Also, IMO an aspect with Wyvern communications is that the message size is small because it has to be written on the amount of paper that a Wyvern can carry.

While use of "code groups" can cut down on the size, "code groups" depend on the sender and receiver setting up the meanings of the "code groups" before hand.

It's plausible that the Church didn't feel the need to bother with wyvern links to the Out Islands before things went poorly at Armageddon Reef and Darcos Sound. Courier ships making the same connections wouldn't suffer the message size limit - they just suffer from much lower speed and the need to use ports and wind and water currents instead of just flying from A to B. I can believe that that satisfied the Church, and the sacrosanct Temple courier galleys certainly represent a stronger statement of power than a wyvern.

For a politically united Out Island Empire though, and one at war with the whole mainland, having wyverns to cross those gaps too could be a lot handier. Message length is certainly a limiting factor, but then, the semaphore imposes some of that as well. I wouldn't see wyvern connections between the semaphore links replacing courier ships entirely - just being an important supplement.

JeffEngel wrote:

DrakBibliophile wrote:First of all, the Charis-Emerald sea gap isn't that large so use of Wyverns isn't that hard.

The "problem" IMO with your idea is that its so obvious that if it was possible, the Church would have been doing it already.

So IMO, either there are problems that we aren't seeing with your idea or your idea is already in use.

Also, IMO an aspect with Wyvern communications is that the message size is small because it has to be written on the amount of paper that a Wyvern can carry.

While use of "code groups" can cut down on the size, "code groups" depend on the sender and receiver setting up the meanings of the "code groups" before hand.

It's plausible that the Church didn't feel the need to bother with wyvern links to the Out Islands before things went poorly at Armageddon Reef and Darcos Sound. Courier ships making the same connections wouldn't suffer the message size limit - they just suffer from much lower speed and the need to use ports and wind and water currents instead of just flying from A to B. I can believe that that satisfied the Church, and the sacrosanct Temple courier galleys certainly represent a stronger statement of power than a wyvern.

For a politically united Out Island Empire though, and one at war with the whole mainland, having wyverns to cross those gaps too could be a lot handier. Message length is certainly a limiting factor, but then, the semaphore imposes some of that as well. I wouldn't see wyvern connections between the semaphore links replacing courier ships entirely - just being an important supplement.

Wyvern communications relays are used extensively by the Church, but until Nahrmahn's family got into breeding really long ranged varieties, they weren't very well suited for use over long water gaps. In addition, there's the problem that the wyverns have to be physically transported back and forth. They only "home" in one direction, so there has to be a circulating courier vessel of some sort to return them to their distant station after each transmission. This is a very cumbersome process, which is why wyverns are used (at least across water gaps) only for extremely urgent messages. If you've been noticing, they are used quite frequently across shorter distances (generally on the mainland) for urgent messages. Of course, where the semaphore chain is intact, the message actually moves faster by semaphore than by wyvern, but the wyverns can be used if the semaphore chain is cut or if it is particularly important to get an actual, written message delivered rather than using one of the semaphore codebooks for transmission.

Charis hasn't set up a messenger wyvern chain for a couple of reasons. One is the set of logistics issues I mentioned above. Another is that even with Nahrmahn's long-range wyverns, covering the water gap between somewhere like Old Charis and Corisande or Chisholm would be impractical. And yet another is that they don't really want to advertise the operating radius of Nahrmahn's wyverns. The fact that no one knew a messenger wyvern could get from Delferahk back to Tellesberg was a major factor in the inner circle's ability to engineer Irys and Daivyn's rescue, and it's quite possible that advantage will be needed again before things are over. It's true that having a plausible high-speed (relatively speaking) means of passing messages might cover some of the inner circle's ability to communicate near-instantly over long distances, but the truth is that it would offer very little in situations where they don't already have contacts — or, for that matter, the "unseen, invisible seijin network" to transmit messages for them — in place.

runsforcelery wrote:Charis hasn't set up a messenger wyvern chain for a couple of reasons. One is the set of logistics issues I mentioned above. Another is that even with Nahrmahn's long-range wyverns, covering the water gap between somewhere like Old Charis and Corisande or Chisholm would be impractical. And yet another is that they don't really want to advertise the operating radius of Nahrmahn's wyverns. The fact that no one knew a messenger wyvern could get from Delferahk back to Tellesberg was a major factor in the inner circle's ability to engineer Irys and Daivyn's rescue, and it's quite possible that advantage will be needed again before things are over. It's true that having a plausible high-speed (relatively speaking) means of passing messages might cover some of the inner circle's ability to communicate near-instantly over long distances, but the truth is that it would offer very little in situations where they don't already have contacts — or, for that matter, the "unseen, invisible seijin network" to transmit messages for them — in place.

All granted. I'd had in mind not so much the extreme long range wyverns though so much as ones that only just cut across the shortest water gaps, so that the semaphore chains support the messages everywhere possible. The shortest water gaps between Imperial Charisian islands aren't that long - even the classic short range wyverns would do for those, if distance is the only issue, so there'd be no need to advertise Nahrmahn's extreme long range breed.

It would assume semaphore chains running to some odd coasts though - Charis' NE corner, across northern Silverlode, from one end of Zebediah to another - and on some cases, either semaphore chains across some medium-small marginal islands or at least a tiny port and wyvernry on the smallest islands between Zebediah and Corisande or Zebediah and Chisholm. And it assumes a real working imperial government throughout, especially across Zebediah and northern Silverlode. Those aren't trivial assumptions. And the courier ships the wyverns would be replacing would still be replaced by ships carrying wyverns back to their homes across those gaps as the far side wyvernry's stock gets depleted sending the messages.

Still and all - I could believe that they may not want go to too much trouble to set up a system that would be used primarily to offer cover for the secret communications they already have, that would be a clear, public revelation that the Empire's internal communications loop (and theoretical ability to chatter with Fallos, Trellheim, and southern Siddarmark) is not that much slower than the Church's based on the mainland semaphore.

I am wondering, suing their increased steel and iron making ability, to produce platforms in the oceans at the right places, to transmit the semaphor. SOrt of like those oild drilling platforms, but dedicated to a light house and semaphore. not all away accross oceans, but the short gaps between island.

SYED wrote:I am wondering, suing their increased steel and iron making ability, to produce platforms in the oceans at the right places, to transmit the semaphor. SOrt of like those oild drilling platforms, but dedicated to a light house and semaphore. not all away accross oceans, but the short gaps between island.

I see 2 problems with that idea. One, from the descriptions of the sea life on Safehold , and the ferocity of the weather, building and maintaining platforms would be difficult, if not impossible. Two, they have a lot more dire need for steel elsewhere for the foreseeable future. By the time they could build platforms, the war might be over, and they could just build radios, comms, whatever.

Ramhawkfan wrote:

SYED wrote:I am wondering, suing their increased steel and iron making ability, to produce platforms in the oceans at the right places, to transmit the semaphor. SOrt of like those oild drilling platforms, but dedicated to a light house and semaphore. not all away accross oceans, but the short gaps between island.

I see 2 problems with that idea. One, from the descriptions of the sea life on Safehold , and the ferocity of the weather, building and maintaining platforms would be difficult, if not impossible. Two, they have a lot more dire need for steel elsewhere for the foreseeable future. By the time they could build platforms, the war might be over, and they could just build radios, comms, whatever.

They have been building lighthouses for centuries. There is no need to build them out of steel. You could build them out of brick or stone. The oldest lighthouse in the US was built in 1764. England has one that has been operating since 1807.

I see 2 problems with that idea. One, from the descriptions of the sea life on Safehold , and the ferocity of the weather, building and maintaining platforms would be difficult, if not impossible. Two, they have a lot more dire need for steel elsewhere for the foreseeable future. By the time they could build platforms, the war might be over, and they could just build radios, comms, whatever.[/quote]


They have been building lighthouses for centuries. There is no need to build them out of steel. You could build them out of brick or stone. The oldest lighthouse in the US was built in 1764. England has one that has been operating since 1807.[/quote]


I had the impression he was talking about building platforms in the ocean between islands, not lighthouses on the coasts. If if misunderstood, I apologize.

Thinking a bit more -

Even if the Church hadn't built semaphore chains along routes that would minimize communications time across the Out Islands, that's within the means and expected needs of the Empire of Charis. _Not_ doing that sort of thing may be positively suspicious.

Wyvern communications for the short sea gaps would still require ships moving back and forth to return "used" wyverns. Ships would be going those very same routes if they were to be used to cover the gaps, so the wyvern communications could be developed as a later or simultaneous stage of the same network, and would be able to maintain a low profile. The network wouldn't be for the sole use of the government (that often does not strictly need it, thanks to SNARC's), but would also be useful for (e.g.) commercial uses. (The EoC already has a policy of letting other parties make a lot freer use of its semaphore network than the Temple has, and you know merchants and bankers in Tellesburg, Cherayth, and Manchyr would cherish advance word of distant markets. It would also help integrate Tarot into the larger Out Island economy.)

Granted, ships covering the sea gaps would be slower than wyverns, but could also carry messages limited only what the semaphores can accumulate for them to carry along. Politically, the development of semaphore chains, small ports, and the use of small, fast ships along them would help underline the political unity of the Empire in Emerald, Silverlode, Zebediah, southwestern Chisholm, and northwestern Corisande. Some of the ships used there may well be surplus galleys, too. They're not standing platforms for constant semaphore use, but they're unquestionably available.