Guns 'n' bullets

While writing Hansel VS. Felarya, I made a crack about invisibility potions requiring a permit in Negav. And that made me think...

...what weapons could one find in Felarya? I don't mean the artifacts. I meant, if you walk into a weapons store, what would you get? Because when reading the Felarya manga, I saw a Chidokai neko with a... gun. How do Chidokai nekos get their hands on guns? What do they make the bullets with? Where are they getting the metal? What's the propellant and what's the primer? Where do they practice their craft without drawing undue attention?

Blacksmithing makes a lot of noise and a lot of smoke, you can't do it in the middle of a rainforest and expect to go impune. Even with the vietnamese smoke tunnel trick, you would still be found sooner or later; predators aren't americans you can kill with a bullet the moment they find you. And let's not even get into shooting practice...

So I'm thinking... that Negav, with its nearby mountains crammed full of useful minerals (ascarlin, diamonds... iron couldn't be such a stretch) would be the source for most metalworking needs. However, guns and nitrocellulose require a kind of infrastructure that if Negav had, it wouldn't get away with, Isolon eye or not; there's no mention of the "toxic waste dumps" near the city, or the dead river downstream.

That makes me think someone has to be importing guns into Felarya, or at least bullets. Since random portals don't usually open under giant trucks full of weapons (else fairies' answer to opal mingos would be birdshot), we've got to assume that there are only three possible culprits for the reliable presence of guns and bullets in this world.

1- The Delurans
Bad choice. They're isolationist and don't want anything to do with anyone; what could they gain by giving guns to people? Also they shouldn't have that many guns, they're not colonists or warriors.

2- The Miratans
The moderate choice. Miratans want food, and got guns. The idea's pretty simple: sorta like the Africa situation. However, they keep a solid and discrete presence... very far away from the Chidokai forest, and foodstuffs aren't exactly easy to come by in Felarya. Also they've got better than guns when they have to fight the people with guns.

3- The Vishmitals
The good choice. They had an empire, and they want it back; I'm pretty sure that if they've got spaceships, they might have space factories as well, which would explain where they can make guns, and they would be happy to give guns to other people and level the advantage against some of their enemies.

So where do you think guns are coming from into Felarya?

Felarya crosses over to a ton of universes. The presence of guns isn't surprising: Consider for a moment that the Followers of Oth are considered to be "Technologically Advanced", and they consider Felarya important enough to have a sizable clergy presence. Unless they're just dumping off excess priests, odds are they have some sort of technological base / foundation in Felarya. And that's just one of the named factions from crossovers.

Furthermore, toxic waste dumps to produce firearms? Just what do you think happened during the American Revolution? Did the Redcoats avoid [x] city because they didn't want to get horribly mutated by flintlock drop-off? If Negav has itself bristling with cannons and all sorts of weapons, I'd say it's safe to assume they at least have the capability to supply ammunition for said weapons and replace them should they get damaged.

Lastly: Delicious Kevin started work on a Firearm Provider. Not sure if it's a botched idea or not.

Speaking about guns and hi-tech stuff in Felarya, I think I read somewhere that a group of humans (I think it was the Delurans, but correct me if I'm wrong) had mechs and stuff like that.

If this is true, what kind of "mechs" are they?

G-Man1989 wrote:

Speaking about guns and hi-tech stuff in Felarya, I think I read somewhere that a group of humans (I think it was the Delurans, but correct me if I'm wrong) had mechs and stuff like that.

If this is true, what kind of "mechs" are they?

Miratans have Mechs, but I'm not quite sure on their specifics (haven't read the main stories featuring the Miratan military might). I recall reading part of one that had single-pilot Mechs that seemed more like Mobile Infantry than "IT'S A GUNDAM!" Mechs, but can't recall if that was by one of the main contributors to the Miratan idea or someone else trying to play their own interpretation.

Very Interesting!

I imagine weapons aren't that rare in Felarya. People are constantly coming in from many different worlds, and I imagine Negav itself has open trade with different worlds through its portal mages. Foreign supplies wouldn't be that uncommon. Also, there is likely a fairly large weapon's salvage market. People bring in damaged weapons, are paid for them, and gunsmiths and such will repair them for re-sale. People would probably obtain their weapons from the larger settlements, if there is a market there, or also likely, salvage whatever they can find in the jungle for their own use. Predators don't really care about human posessions, so they likely just leave them.

As for the types, I imagine the usual assorment of pistols, rifles and shotguns aren't that uncommon. Mainly for hunting game for food, and to provide some protection from thieves, bandits, opportunists, etc. Nothing, in general, that would down a pred, but honestly, most people know that trying to wage an open battle on a predator is pretty much a suicide mission.

Now there would be SOME military grade weapons, but these would likely be extremely uncommon for the average person. They would be brought in by the military escorts of expeditions, or by people already living in Felarya. The Delurans, for example, have a sprawling underground base and likely have a good stockpile of weapons. They just try to avoid having to use them, since the jungle atmosphere is extremely damaging to the metal they forge their guns out of, and without constant maintenance, their guns rapidly become inoperable in the open jungle air. The Miritans are extremely advanced, and have powered-armor (mechs), and a heavily defended base on Frost Peak. They keep to themselves though.

As for types of military weapons, probably assault rifles for personal defense, and some heavier stuff as a predator deterrent. Grenade launchers, while likely not very lethal would certainly be startling and probably sting quite a bit to a pred, anti-material rifles firing armor-piercing rounds could be pretty lethal with good aim, portable rocket-launchers would likely be lethal with the proper types of rockets. Basically, the ideal weapons would be high-damage weapons with as much mobility as possible. anti-material rifles and portable rockets would likely be as big a type of weapon as anyone would bring in, and even they are extremely cumbersome.

I imagine the private militaries of the Negav nobles (the Isolon Fist, and such) probably keep a nice armory and horde any military grade weapons brought into Negav. I believe the members of the Isolon Fist in the manga had grenades and assault rifles.

I agree with rcs619, although I not entierly sure on how rare they would be. At least in Negav, which I believe to be a nexus for just about everyone in Felarya with a population of many times that of any Earth city. With firearms I'd see it as although there would be no offical suppliers of weapons to the city I imagine there would be at least a few low brow shops specialising in technology. Firearms probably would be scaenged or purchased off of arrivals to the city, repaired if needed and then sold on. Prices would be very high probably due to difficulty of getting the weapons/ammo and such. Like rcs said, small firearms up to assault rifles would be highly numerous due to the fact that anything bigger would be harder to scavenge or impractical in the forest. Personally I can't see anything larger than an anti-tank rifle or RPG like weapon.

If those guys get mechs i want a Blood Asp!....or at the very least a Nova Cat

Don't the people on the Felarya Express get Shotguns?

im definatly not calling shotgun on that train

The Felaryan Express is an Airship transit business, if I remember right.

what ever I don't care what it is..im still not riding shot gun (note sorry if that offends you...i didn't read up well and i really don't care about a HUMAN transport buisness...

Saironthis wrote:

Don't the people on the Felarya Express get Shotguns?

Yep. Mainly for insurance purposes.

what? you think a shot gun is gonna do any damage against a fairy that can teleport you into her stomach as long as you are in sight...or a naga...who probably wouldn't take any damage from you.

EliteCreature wrote:

what? you think a shot gun is gonna do any damage against a fairy that can teleport you into her stomach as long as you are in sight...or a naga...who probably wouldn't take any damage from you.

No. Read my comment.

I've always wondered if you could find 'Technological Artifacts' to go along with the magic ones, hidden away in different places across Felarya. They'd be left over from when Felarya connected to various extremely technlogicaly advanced worlds, or adventurers from those some worlds who were to stupid to use their technology effectively, etc.

JohnDoe wrote:

I've always wondered if you could find 'Technological Artifacts' to go along with the magic ones, hidden away in different places across Felarya. They'd be left over from when Felarya connected to various extremely technlogicaly advanced worlds, or adventurers from those some worlds who were to stupid to use their technology effectively, etc.

Yes, yes, a thousand times yes! This is a wholly unused concept in my opinion. Bravo for thinking about it. It is just as likely, and perhaps even more likely, that such things will be lying around. After all, many dimensions don't have magic in them. Of course, it's likely that they will no longer work, or at least not work properly. After all, most technologically advanced things need power sources, a rare commodity in Felarya proper.

On the other hand, Felarya is a magical dimension. The main export of Felarya is Ascarlin, a magic enhancing mineral. Magic artifacts will be highly prevalent.

JohnDoe wrote:

I've always wondered if you could find 'Technological Artifacts' to go along with the magic ones, hidden away in different places across Felarya. They'd be left over from when Felarya connected to various extremely technlogicaly advanced worlds, or adventurers from those some worlds who were to stupid to use their technology effectively, etc.

Of course. I'm sure Felarya is littered with objects "left behind" by visitors who, um, no longer need them. Many would be ordinary enough, but I'm sure there'd also be interesting technological gadgets.

Not necessarily "hidden away", either; many would be lying in plain sight.

what if one of those ancient technological peices was an uber battery (or something like a never ending power source)?

Perpetual power sources do exist already, some magical, some technological. If you want to go up the tech tree, there are numerous power sources that don't nessisarily have to be of our own age or less, or even just a little bit beyond. There are literally loads of ideas you can use, everything from fission generators to technobable style dark matter cores and antimatter drives. But I assume that more advanced tech is more rare, as most people who posess such advanced tech probably don't bother with Felarya unless they really need to, and even then, the most advanced ones don't stay very long/arn't stupid or weak enough for predators to overpower them and their tech.

For energy based weapons that use batterys, anything from god ol' fashioned chemical batterys (very heavy) to Niling D-sinks (A zero sized sink hole in space-time that can be filled with near infinite amounts of energy. They usually look like a cylinder about a foot wide and 2 feet high) could probably be found somewhere in Felarya

Malahite wrote:

Felarya crosses over to a ton of universes. The presence of guns isn't surprising: Consider for a moment that the Followers of Oth are considered to be "Technologically Advanced", and they consider Felarya important enough to have a sizable clergy presence. Unless they're just dumping off excess priests, odds are they have some sort of technological base / foundation in Felarya. And that's just one of the named factions from crossovers.

Aha... okay, the followers of Oth bring guns in regularly.

Malahite wrote:

Furthermore, toxic waste dumps to produce firearms? Just what do you think happened during the American Revolution? Did the Redcoats avoid [x] city because they didn't want to get horribly mutated by flintlock drop-off? If Negav has itself bristling with cannons and all sorts of weapons, I'd say it's safe to assume they at least have the capability to supply ammunition for said weapons and replace them should they get damaged.

Toxic waste dumps to produce REAL firearms. The infrastructure required for producing nitric acid and cellulose in mass amounts... is no joke. I don't remember the industrial processes at this time, but believe me, you'll get some nice smokestacks to shade out the sun.

Malahite wrote:

Lastly: Delicious Kevin started work on a Firearm Provider. Not sure if it's a botched idea or not.

Probably a good idea.

Silent_eric wrote:

Yes, yes, a thousand times yes! This is a wholly unused concept in my opinion. Bravo for thinking about it. It is just as likely, and perhaps even more likely, that such things will be lying around. After all, many dimensions don't have magic in them. Of course, it's likely that they will no longer work, or at least not work properly. After all, most technologically advanced things need power sources, a rare commodity in Felarya proper.

Yes, but technological things, the more advanced they are, at least here, the sooner they break, and the more work they require to fix up. You could find technological artifacts, but anything worth it will probably look like it isn't.

Saironthis wrote:

Don't the people on the Felarya Express get Shotguns?

Okay, forty or so shotguns walk into Felarya every flight. Makes you wonder why do fairies fear opal mingos, don't you think?

rcs619 wrote:

I imagine weapons aren't that rare in Felarya. People are constantly coming in from many different worlds, and I imagine Negav itself has open trade with different worlds through its portal mages. Foreign supplies wouldn't be that uncommon. Also, there is likely a fairly large weapon's salvage market. People bring in damaged weapons, are paid for them, and gunsmiths and such will repair them for re-sale. People would probably obtain their weapons from the larger settlements, if there is a market there, or also likely, salvage whatever they can find in the jungle for their own use. Predators don't really care about human posessions, so they likely just leave them.

Ah, that's right, Negav had portals.

rcs619 wrote:

As for the types, I imagine the usual assorment of pistols, rifles and shotguns aren't that uncommon. Mainly for hunting game for food, and to provide some protection from thieves, bandits, opportunists, etc. Nothing, in general, that would down a pred, but honestly, most people know that trying to wage an open battle on a predator is pretty much a suicide mission.

I agree. You'd need military grade equipment... or a shotgun (and real good luck or be a crack sniper with nerves of steel, with the surprise element to fire at something that's narrow and under the skin with a subsonic round at point-blank range without it eating you first).

rcs619 wrote:

Military issues

I agree.