(SPOILERS) Hot air ballons?

evilauthor wrote:IIRC, the balloon idea basically boils down to the following:

1) It is well within Charis' technical abilities to make. The Church's too, although it'd be much more expensive for them because of their over-reliance on manual labor for making things like steel-thistle silk and whatnot.

2) The real question is whether the Writ (or at least the Writ as interpreted by most of Safehold) forbids balloon use through disallowing flight. Certain powers are reserved for the "Angels" and flight is almost certainly one of those.

3) With SNARC surveillance and a huge tech lead, Charis quite simply doesn't need balloons. Which means that whether they get balloons or not depends entirely on their willingness to fight the resulting religious battle involved to make balloons acceptable. In the middle of an actual religious war, they'd probably decide (if they haven't already) the distraction of such a fight isn't worth the minuscule gains.

4) We all know how Clyntahn would react to the idea of ballooons. If it can't be used to DIRECTLY attack enemy forces (or just kill people), ANY innovation is going to be a tough sell to the Inquisition. An innovation that directly violates common interpretation of the Writ is going to be even harder to sell to the Church side, and not just to the Inquisition.

I pretty much agree with this post.

But just responding out whimsy, I think it would be great fun to see steam powered aircraft introduced. No great need for it right now...but still fun.

Don

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n7axw wrote:

Dauntless wrote:it is the safehold version of "if you just reffited those SLN SDs" which seems to appear every couple of months in the honorverse section

Hasn't anyone poured holy water over those SD threads and driven a stake through their heart yet?

Don

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OH! Holy water!! I thought it was vodka... no wonder my martini was so weak

evilauthor wrote:IIRC, the balloon idea basically boils down to the following:

1) It is well within Charis' technical abilities to make. The Church's too, although it'd be much more expensive for them because of their over-reliance on manual labor for making things like steel-thistle silk and whatnot.

2) The real question is whether the Writ (or at least the Writ as interpreted by most of Safehold) forbids balloon use through disallowing flight. Certain powers are reserved for the "Angels" and flight is almost certainly one of those.

3) With SNARC surveillance and a huge tech lead, Charis quite simply doesn't need balloons. Which means that whether they get balloons or not depends entirely on their willingness to fight the resulting religious battle involved to make balloons acceptable. In the middle of an actual religious war, they'd probably decide (if they haven't already) the distraction of such a fight isn't worth the minuscule gains.

4) We all know how Clyntahn would react to the idea of ballooons. If it can't be used to DIRECTLY attack enemy forces (or just kill people), ANY innovation is going to be a tough sell to the Inquisition. An innovation that directly violates common interpretation of the Writ is going to be even harder to sell to the Church side, and not just to the Inquisition.

Good question.

I think Hot Air balloons could get past the proscriptions but lighter than air ships would have to be a second step (maybe by a long way) but I also think that they would provide better logistics and communications as well as provide a platform for machine guns or bombing.

I think Charis could easily build balloons, and I think that if the war isn't over in the next book, we'll likely see them in the book after that.

Regarding SNARCs making balloons irrelevant: Yes, SNARCs are better recon tools. However, not every field commander has SNARC access, and they're also useful for forward fire control.

I was long in agreement, but it's just occurred to me that we have an additional data point since the last time this was thrashed out: the kit list for at least one, and by implication most or all, seijin included a skimmer or similar flying machine. More importantly, neither Sandaria nor our friendly Inquisitor [or his controller, come to think of it] turned a hair at the thought of flying _themselves_. Sandaria, at least, isn't likely to have been classifying herself as 'Angelic or in the immediate service of the Angels', who would be the logical exemptions to an express or implied restriction on mortal flight. Given how calmly she took that part of it, I imagine that the stories of the seijin mention them giving people a lift regularly enough that while being allowed to fly might be an indication that you're in tight with God and Langhorne, it's not something that isn't permitted to ordinary mortals.

There is still the fact that flight was associated with angelic gifts, not bags of hot air, but most on the Charisian side are likely to accept that with only normal trepidation. Particularly so if the word passes that 'Merlin doesn't see any problems. Neither does Archbishop Maikel.' Whether Clyntahn would excoriate or adopt would have to depend on how he runs the calculus, but he'd probably be running on the basis of vague generalities, not the authority of the Writ.

n7axw wrote:

evilauthor wrote:IIRC, the balloon idea basically boils down to the following:

1) It is well within Charis' technical abilities to make. The Church's too, although it'd be much more expensive for them because of their over-reliance on manual labor for making things like steel-thistle silk and whatnot.

2) The real question is whether the Writ (or at least the Writ as interpreted by most of Safehold) forbids balloon use through disallowing flight. Certain powers are reserved for the "Angels" and flight is almost certainly one of those.

3) With SNARC surveillance and a huge tech lead, Charis quite simply doesn't need balloons. Which means that whether they get balloons or not depends entirely on their willingness to fight the resulting religious battle involved to make balloons acceptable. In the middle of an actual religious war, they'd probably decide (if they haven't already) the distraction of such a fight isn't worth the minuscule gains.

4) We all know how Clyntahn would react to the idea of ballooons. If it can't be used to DIRECTLY attack enemy forces (or just kill people), ANY innovation is going to be a tough sell to the Inquisition. An innovation that directly violates common interpretation of the Writ is going to be even harder to sell to the Church side, and not just to the Inquisition.

I pretty much agree with this post.

But just responding out whimsy, I think it would be great fun to see steam powered aircraft introduced. No great need for it right now...but still fun.

Don

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River Monster wrote:I think Charis could easily build balloons, and I think that if the war isn't over in the next book, we'll likely see them in the book after that.

Regarding SNARCs making balloons irrelevant: Yes, SNARCs are better recon tools. However, not every field commander has SNARC access, and they're also useful for forward fire control.

Yes, The Earl of Hanth and the Captain that took the iron clad in through the canals are two that come to mind quickly

SNARCs are strategic tools.
They can only be used for tactical uses when there's a member of the Inner Circle around and in charge - and the situation allows for them to make use of the SNARC/remotes and the information so provided.

Balloons are tactical tools that any Imperial or Republican commander can utilize. Admittedly, if you've got somebody up in an observation balloon and things going to hell in a major way, it's going to be awkward for them to get back down quickly enough to be pulled out. But for siege lines? Priceless. Probably even useful for ships, but at the moment, only as a means of extending the ship's field of view and the horizon, as it's probably going to be a while before naval artillery fire has to worry about firing anywhere near the horizon, much less over it.

However, I doubt we'll see LTA or HTA aircraft in the war against the COGA/Temple. We might see them in the next war, though - the war when the truth gets revealed.



I don't think that flight is specifically prohibited or even frowned upon in the Writ. After all, to Langhorne and company, flight would be something that would require a higher technology base than they gave and restricted Safehold to.
There is, after all, no point in banning something that they can't fiddle with on purpose or even stumble across by accident.
Plus, y'know, birds and wyverns all fly plenty.

Louis R wrote:I was long in agreement, but it's just occurred to me that we have an additional data point since the last time this was thrashed out: the kit list for at least one, and by implication most or all, seijin included a skimmer or similar flying machine. More importantly, neither Sandaria nor our friendly Inquisitor [or his controller, come to think of it] turned a hair at the thought of flying _themselves_. Sandaria, at least, isn't likely to have been classifying herself as 'Angelic or in the immediate service of the Angels', who would be the logical exemptions to an express or implied restriction on mortal flight. Given how calmly she took that part of it, I imagine that the stories of the seijin mention them giving people a lift regularly enough that while being allowed to fly might be an indication that you're in tight with God and Langhorne, it's not something that isn't permitted to ordinary mortals.

There is still the fact that flight was associated with angelic gifts, not bags of hot air, but most on the Charisian side are likely to accept that with only normal trepidation. Particularly so if the word passes that 'Merlin doesn't see any problems. Neither does Archbishop Maikel.' Whether Clyntahn would excoriate or adopt would have to depend on how he runs the calculus, but he'd probably be running on the basis of vague generalities, not the authority of the Writ.

Of course, on their initial flights, both Sandaria and friendly Inquisitor are under the impression that the Seijinn are on the side of the angels. With that in mind, any use of flight by them (as PASSENGERS remember) comes with God's automatic approval.

IOW, THEY aren't doing the flying under their own power. They're just being flown under the auspices of presumed divine authority. That's a far cry from developing your own flight ability and flying under your own will without tacit approval from divine higher ups.

Of course. I did note the difference, but I think that there is sufficient precedent that the debate shifts from "Fly/No fly" to "Is _this_ version kosher?" [a debate that seems to have shifted ground in the last 30 years RW, BTW]

evilauthor wrote:

Louis R wrote:
There is still the fact that flight was associated with angelic gifts, not bags of hot air, but most on the Charisian side are likely to accept that with only normal trepidation. Particularly so if the word passes that 'Merlin doesn't see any problems. Neither does Archbishop Maikel.' Whether Clyntahn would excoriate or adopt would have to depend on how he runs the calculus, but he'd probably be running on the basis of vague generalities, not the authority of the Writ.

Of course, on their initial flights, both Sandaria and friendly Inquisitor are under the impression that the Seijinn are on the side of the angels. With that in mind, any use of flight by them (as PASSENGERS remember) comes with God's automatic approval.

IOW, THEY aren't doing the flying under their own power. They're just being flown under the auspices of presumed divine authority. That's a far cry from developing your own flight ability and flying under your own will without tacit approval from divine higher ups.

cawest wrote:just finished the latest book...the range and Line of site (LOS) issue made remember something. your FO's are only going to be able to see only so far.


what about observation Balloons. they were flying in 1794 and were also used in the ACW till WW1.

how would they get the info to the gunners blow?

signal flags, flashing lights or when/if telegraph.

Good call!
Got it almost right!