Reflecting Upon RTH -- SPOILER THREAD

n7axw wrote:Ive been thinking about the end of RTH. Specifically what I have in mind is that scene where Zindel is blown off the balcony by that explosion. He falls heavily, catches a table first, finally ending up in a flower bed.

We know from Relatha, the healer trainee who rushes to him that

1. He is alive, but with a very weak pulse.

2. She can feel dozens of broken bones, some of which lay near to arteries that could be opened up if he were to be moved and a bone slashed an artery. This last might include some hyperbole, but it is safe to say that several bones were broken.

3.He is semi-conscious and apparently can move since he heaves in response to the pain and has to be restrained to avoid injuring himself.

4.He calls out the name of his younger daughter Ambessa and apparently begins fighting for his life once assured that she is alright.

Everybody chip in here if there is something I've missed. Yhe next issue is what happens next for Zindel. This is a bit more open ended.

1.He could still die even though has has been at least momentarily stablized.

2.He could live and mostly recover from his injuries.

3.It would be hard to imagine a fall like that not damaging some vertebrae. If his spinal cord is damaged, he could be paralysed from the point of the injury down.

4.He could suffer moderate to serious brain damage. He was responsive to the news of his daughter which is a good sign. But that's all we know at this point.

The possibilities of spinal cord and head injuries are really what's worrisome. Bones can be set and everything else can heal.

So...let's speculate. Will the healing talents work? Can he be gotten to Arcanan healers? Will he have to abdictate his crown? Where will all this go...

Don

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Keith_w wrote:

n7axw wrote:Ive been thinking about the end of RTH. Specifically what I have in mind is that scene where Zindel is blown off the balcony by that explosion. He falls heavily, catches a table first, finally ending up in a flower bed.

We know from Relatha, the healer trainee who rushes to him that

1. He is alive, but with a very weak pulse.

2. She can feel dozens of broken bones, some of which lay near to arteries that could be opened up if he were to be moved and a bone slashed an artery. This last might include some hyperbole, but it is safe to say that several bones were broken.

3.He is semi-conscious and apparently can move since he heaves in response to the pain and has to be restrained to avoid injuring himself.

4.He calls out the name of his younger daughter Ambessa and apparently begins fighting for his life once assured that she is alright.

Everybody chip in here if there is something I've missed. Yhe next issue is what happens next for Zindel. This is a bit more open ended.

1.He could still die even though has has been at least momentarily stablized.

2.He could live and mostly recover from his injuries.

3.It would be hard to imagine a fall like that not damaging some vertebrae. If his spinal cord is damaged, he could be paralysed from the point of the injury down.

4.He could suffer moderate to serious brain damage. He was responsive to the news of his daughter which is a good sign. But that's all we know at this point.

The possibilities of spinal cord and head injuries are really what's worrisome. Bones can be set and everything else can heal.

So...let's speculate. Will the healing talents work? Can he be gotten to Arcanan healers? Will he have to abdictate his crown? Where will all this go...

Don

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I don't think there are spinal cord injuries, I just re-read the chapter and with no mention of those injuries and definite mention of her telling him to hold still, it implies to me no damage to the spinal cord. Also it mentions that Darcel "bound his right arm to his chest to keep it from moving" which I am not sure how you manage without moving his body, but I am sure Relatha would not have let him do it if there were a spinal injury. Everything else will heal, although perhaps the broken bones won't heal perfectly.

Randomiser wrote:I think Chava is done for. He is very wily and experienced, but his plots have never had to withstand a full bore investigation of the depth and intensity that Zindel, or heaven help him, Andrin, is now going to unleash. The kind of forensic Talents available to the Ternathian empire, plus whatever little surprises the Imperial Guards have in stock, are going to get behind the Seneschal's plot to the guy who was egging him on. Too many of those meetings were held in Tajvana to hide all the traces. Plus the fact that the Imperial Sharonian investigation will have the right to go full bore into Uromathia for the first time, if necessary, isn't going to help.

Unfortunately for Chava the war is going well enough at the moment that he isn't going to be able to use it to dodge an investigation.

Mil-tech bard wrote:

Howard T. Map-addict wrote:I don't know that the RN attacked harbors often.
I can think of Zeebrugee in WW1, Dieppe and Taranto in WW2.
Respectively success, failure, and air attack success.
Can you find any others, as far back as 1850?

HTM

AKA the attacker.

The Royal Navy was in charge of heavy/siege artillery while the British Army was in charge of fixed coast defense fortifications.

Royal Navy Brigades with heavy/siege artillery was involved in the Indian Revolt of 1857 and the Boer War of 1880.

See:

The Royal Navy: A History from the Earliest Times to the Present, Volume 7

By Sir William Laird Clowes, Sir Clements Robert Markham, Alfred Thayer Mahan, Herbert Wrigley Wilson, Theodore Roosevelt, Leonard George Carr Laughton

https://books.google.com/books?id=Ax9EA ... ns&f=false

See also this --

Military History Journal
Vol 4 No 3 - June 1978

THE NAVAL GUNS IN NATAL 1899-1902
by Major D.D. Hall

http://samilitaryhistory.org/vol043dh.html

Since the 1860s, the navy had provided its landing parties(2) with either 9-prs or 12-prs. In 1899, the standard gun was the 12-pr 8-cwt QF, but it was no better than the guns with which the army was equipped.

Without further ado, Scott decided to provide a gun with a greater range than that available to the army and which could deal with the Boer guns. Possibilities were guns held in the various depots ashore and guns mounted in the ships of the Cape Squadron - none of which was normally considered for use ashore.

Scott’s first choice was the 12-pr 12-cwt QF. This gun was specially designed for use against torpedo boats. With a range of 8 000 yds (7 385 m) for common shell and 4 500 yds (4 154 m) for shrapnel, it would be able to hold its own against Boer field artillery.

Scott bought a pair of Cape wagon wheels, and an axletree. The carpenter, shipwrights and blacksmiths worked around the clock and in 24 hours the first gun was ready. Although the result looked amateurish, it worked, and some trial rounds were fired to ensure that all was well. In the face of some official obstruction, Scott produced four guns by 25 October. Longer in the barrel (and in range) than the army’s 12-prs, these guns were soon to be known as ‘Long 12s’.

Later Scott said that had he been asked, fifty of these guns could have been prepared for field service in a week. Hitched to the tail of Cape wagons which could serve as ammunition limbers, they would be able to go anywhere. Events were to prove this claim right.

The relative position of the Royal Navy and how it was intimately entwined with the British Army coast defense can be seen in these articles as follows --


BL 12 inch Mk X naval gun
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BL_12_inch_Mk_X_naval_gun

"From 1917 several Mk X guns were deployed ashore on the section of the Belgian coast still held by the Allies, near Nieuport. They were part of the "Royal Naval Siege Guns" under the command of Admiral Sir Reginald Bacon, and were used for attacking German heavy gun batteries."

BL 9.2 inch gun Mk IX–X
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BL_9.2_in ... %E2%80%93X

"M15-class monitors M15, M16, M17, M18 from 1915"

"Mk X gun on Mk II "straight-back" truck

In 1916 Elswick adapted a small number of Mk X guns, 2 Mk X variants originally intended for coast defence in Australia, and 4 45-calibre Vickers export guns (under the designation 9.2 inch gun Mk XIV) and mounted them on Mk 3 railway truck mountings for service on the Western Front in France and Belgium.[16]

Belgian coast[edit]

From 1917 several Mk X guns were deployed ashore on the section of the Belgian coast still held by the Allies, near Nieuport. They were part of the "Royal Naval siege guns" under the command of Admiral Sir Reginald Bacon, and were used for attacking German heavy gun batteries."

See also

Britain 9.2"/47 (23.4 cm) Mark X
Updated 06 December 2015
http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNBR_92-47_mk10.htm

"The following comments are by Nathan Okun:

The British Coast Defense Gun 9.2" APC shell weighed 380 lb and had a 3.4% filler (12.9 lb) for all versions made during World War I and World War II. The last version, the 9.2" Mark XIIA APC, had two versions, one made in Britain and one made in the US during World War II by Crucible Steel Company.

The US version was identical to the British version as to the body shape, base plug, weight, and windscreen, but the nose of the shell was the US Navy early World War II very blunt point and it used a US-style early World War II AP cap and, I believe, the US Sheath Hardening Pattern, not the British more deformable World War II APC hardness pattern. Under test the US design satisfied all ballistic test specifications, though the base plug was exposed more by base slap breakage at oblique impact as it penetrated than the British softer lower body was. The British cup-shaped Patent Relief Base Plug worked though and both the US and British designs were still effective ("fit to burst") after penetrating the armor.

The post-World War I designs all used Shellite fillers, though those during World War I were much like their contemporaries and used Lyddite prior to 1918 and Shellite afterwards (there was a Greenboy version of this projectile, too).

I would have thought that with this large cavity, which was exactly the same as in World War I, the 9.2" Mark XIIA APC would have had problems with projectile breakup against thick armor at moderate obliquity (circa 1-caliber-thick plate at around 30 degrees obliquity). However, this was not the case. In fact, these projectiles -- both the US and British designs -- are, from the tests I have seen, THE BEST BRITISH APC PROJECTILES EVER MADE!! They penetrate armor better and remain in one piece under more extreme impact conditions (I even gave them a separate entry in FACEHARD's British projectile table). I have no idea why they were so good. Obviously there are "sweet spots" for every kind of mechanical design and this shell happens to be right on top of one."

You can see various UK newsreels of WW1 thru 1950's vintage of British Naval & Coast Defense positions at this link --

http://www.britishpathe.com/workspaces/ ... rtillery-1

Astelon wrote:The Imperial investigators can legally go where they need to when investigating the crime. That does not mean they can actually find out anything, or survive if they do. Chava could arrange an accident or some criminal activity to get rid of pesky investigators. And Chava will do his best to keep track of any imperial investigators or spies that he knows about.

n7axw wrote:

Astelon wrote:The Imperial investigators can legally go where they need to when investigating the crime. That does not mean they can actually find out anything, or survive if they do. Chava could arrange an accident or some criminal activity to get rid of pesky investigators. And Chava will do his best to keep track of any imperial investigators or spies that he knows about.

To be sure. However if investigators were to start disappearing in job lots, it would be a rather broad hint that they were on to something...

Don

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PeterZ wrote:It has been repeated over and over that the Imperial Ternaithian Crown has a far deeper bench of Talents at its disposal than any other government. Chava or some Uromathian POV laments this once. Text also stipulates that there are near unique Talents associated with the Imperial protective service. They are especially good at sniffing out spies, assassins and conspiracies or the Caliraith dynasty would not have survived for nearly 5 millennia.

All of this suggests that Chava has as much chance at hiding his activities as a snowflake trying to survive in a blast furnace. He'll try to kill the investigators but won't surprise them. Any such attack will expedite the unraveling his well designed plans.