Taroniah is happy to be home in Alcitran finally, even if keeping up with demand for leaf springs and pipes keeps her busy. In the southwest, the adherents of a new faith are proving to be troublesome with their plans for expansion. Korlah sets a wedding date, but heading to the wedding means Taroniah has to leave two new and largely untried magicians in charge of her enterprises for several weeks, which is a considerable risk. A few days before the wedding, the Goddess Davina pays Taroniah a visit and tells her about a dragon entombed in a frozen lake and how Taroniah is the only one powerful enough to deal with it!
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rhodanblog 
Just downloaded! Thanks Peter, this will make my dull, wet Sunday evening.
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Thanks Peter. I’m about 70% through and really enjoying the book. So far I have one minor quibble plus something that’s bugging me.
The quibble is Devina shows Taroniah the old firestorm spell while she’s visiting but later Taroniah is wondering how it compares to hers.
What keeps bugging me is why she’s building a ship to ram the fanatics. Getting up close with fanatics who like to swarm enemies and believe dying for their god is good sounds like bad tactics to me.
Seems like you would rather be using ranged weapons. Water cannon, the never miss arrow spell applied to ballista, maybe even accidently figuring out coherent light?
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It’s not “one” ship and the arrows that never miss need magicians (even if weak)
Consider Roman style ballistas but with magical springy iron for the cross arms rather columns of sinew.
There are other things as will yoiu haven’t really considered…. or that I have not thought out properly – which I imagine I’ll find out when I come to write those bits….
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When I said ‘a ship’ I was referring to the ship design or class. Knew she meant to build a number of ships. Also knew that a small amount of magical ability was needed to trigger the never miss spell. But I believe it was slight, if I remember correctly they were using archers who displayed an above average magic level. Certainly Kryon was teaching untrained people to trigger minor spells. I’m sure they could find some sailors with the same ability.
Still think ramming is the absolute last tactic you use with suicidal fanatics. Know books need ‘dramatic tension’ as one author referred to it. But smart characters need to stay smart too.
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Let me ask you this – if you have a fleet of ships that like viking longboats combined with early medieval carracks – longer and lower than a carrack – higher and less handy than a longboat and something like a WW1 torpedo boat with a ram bow smashes into it at like 15-20 knots its going to cut right through and continue on the other side…… hence the vertical axe ram shape
Magical metal on a metal frame at 20 knots – let me know what you think of that….
The arrows were used by members of the military who had low level magic and could use those basic military magic spells….
You will note there is no mention of them in action because they proved to be of limited utility
I never said the ram would be the only weapon but it is going opt be the decisive one
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I assume she would recruit Marines with similar talents to use the spell on Roman style ballistas. Believe in Taroniah at Large she considers the lack of use by the military to be a mistake caused by unimaginative hidebound leaders. Especially since here she would be using them to hole ships rather then just pick off individual enemies.
First time ship might be going 15-20 knots but hitting another ship is going to slow it. Getting back up to speed in a fleet action is going to be hard if not impossible. If enemy commander doesn’t mind the losses he’d just position ships behind each other until the cumulative effect stopped the ship. Really the classic problem with using heavy cavalry against massed infantry.
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yes – although she will have multiple ships – I have to be careful not to influence things she is doing by the knowledge of things Kyron is doing too.
You have to also take into account morale. Seeing almost invincible ships demolishing your fellows will become a morale problem for even the most fanatical force sooner or later….
Plus, her ships won;t necessarily be operating alone.
Plus – well – I haven’t written the book yet so it is all subject to change without notice
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Are comments screened here? I posted something a week ago and it still does not show up here.
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Taroniah needs to have some good size rocks on the deck of her ship. That way she could just teleport them into the other ships to destroy them. May add a fireball as she goes past. I have enjoyed your books. Thank you for them.
I still hope Taroniah “invents” the printing press with moveable iron type to cut the cost of books and make them so the common people can buy them.
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They already have the printing press – its just not that widespread because printing using letterpress is slow without steam power.
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