Martian Vehicles, or Do Martians Dream of Reliant Robins?

Another of my long-term projects has been to work out how Martians get around the place.

Walking is an option, naturally, as is riding the ubiquitous gashant or in a ruumet brehr howdah. I could also see sedan chairs and palanquins being good for those who could afford it.

There's liftwood for cloudships and screw galleys obviously - where would Space:1889 be without it? There are boats on the canals, and the large ruumet brehr-drawn wagons of the Wagon Masters of Meroe are legendary.

But how are the bulk of people and goods transported? Ruumet brehr wagons are (I'd guess) too big to get through most city streets. Your average rich merchant might be happy to ride in a howdah on his ruumet brehr, but he won't get astride a gashant to cross the city for a meeting - it's just so barbaric and last millenium, don't you know. Palanquins might be good for carrying ostentatious princelings (and rich merchants), but they're not much use for moving goods.

For smaller items handcarts, wheelbarrows and carry poles would work fine. But what about larger loads?

Some form of gashant-drawn carriage or cart makes sense, but how would they work? OK, confession time: I'm no expert on hitching horses, far less gashants. My experience of horse-drawn transport is pretty much limited to being driven round tourist locations at eye-watering expense.

But if I was willing to allow such a lack of qualifications stop me, why would I have started a blog in the first place, eh? So here goes!

I don't think you could put a single gashant between the shafts of a carriage or cart. Its bipedal gait may make it lurch from side to side, but that could perhaps be ignored - ostriches seem to move pretty smoothly. The bigger problem is probably the tail - think of the beast stretching forward; its tail coming up level behind it as it picks up speed, and whirling around as it changes direction (think of a cheetah cornering in full chase mode). How can it do that between two fixed shafts? Gashants side-by-side in traces might also be a problem as they would have to be a long way ahead of the cart to keep their tails away from the front wheels. Wouldn't that make control and steering a lot more difficult? And how do you stop the traces interfering with the tails?

A two-wheeler like a Hansom cab might be workable, perhaps with a single long shaft curved high over the rump of the Gashant. The wheels are set towards the rear of the passenger compartment, so are out of the way of the tail. I see the shaft as the weakness in this design, needing it to be strong whilst keeping the weight to a minimum. It should still be workable as a light cab, but it's not a means of moving goods around a city due to the difficulty of getting the weight distribution right for a single-axle vehicle.

Maybe a three-wheeler would work? (Yes, gentle blogee, that's where the Reliant Robin comes in, with due posthumous apologies to Philip K. Dick.) The cart would be somewhat boat-shaped, with a solid keel extending between the pair of draught-gashants, with the "hull" curving up sharply from the keel and out over their rears. Presumably the driver's position would be in the "prow".  The single front wheel would be secured to the keel and be somewhere between the pair of gashants - probably at a level just behind their feet - and shrouded to prevent their tails being caught up. The rear wheels would be on a heavy axle towards the rear (stern?) of the vehicle, but not too far back in order to take some of the weight off the front wheel.

In fact five wheels would be better for load distribution, but this would make any cornering much more difficult unless you introduce some steering (and thus complexity) to the forward pair.

Then there's the question of what gashant tack would look like. (I know, I know, I need to get out more.) You probably need something similar to a horse collar, but would it fit round the relatively narrow shoulders of a gashant, or in front of its much heavier hips? The latter would make more sense to me (for all that's worth!), but how would it be secured? Perhaps it's a cushioned inverted U that is permanently fixed to a high central shaft, and is secured below the beast's belly by straps. (And I shall not speculate here on the existence or location of male gashant external reproductive organs.)

Of course it might be easier to posit some form of domesticated quadruped (or hexaped!) that doesn't get a mention in the Space:1889 canon, which can use wagons very similar to those on Earth, but that's no fun at all. (Or did I miss one?)

That's several solutions looking for a problem that exist only in my own imagination, I know, but it's cheaper than therapy any day :-)

Am I talking total nonsense?  Has anyone out there seen or come up with better ideas on how to keep Mars moving?

Fnuuk and Jee-oo

Some of the longer-term readers of this blog (two years and counting!) might recall that I decided that My Mars needed a bio-engineered form of bamboo that was used for things like musket barrels that I called Jee-oo.

Having just got my hands on the new production of Space:1889 by Clockwork Publishing* it appears that they have also come up with a bamboo-type plant.:
"... but across the steppes close to the equator grows a plant called ‘Fnuuk’. Known as the bamboo of Mars, it grows as tall as 25 feet and even forms real forests. Whilst the colder steppes of the Northern and the Southern hemispheres are easily accessible by mount or wagon, travelling the Fnuuk groves is true torture as the leaves of the Martian bamboo are as sharp as knifes."

Clearly Hill Martians use Fnuuk for poles and other building materials, and I could also believe it is used to create temporary zarebas such as those seen during the recent unpleasantness in the Sudan. Thankfully Colonel Burnaby was able to rescue Gordon (Hurrah!) without the need for a major rescue expedition which would have been an extremely difficult undertaking due not least to the geography of any route to Khartoum.

I am therefore happy to report that the latest publication of the Royal Martian Geographical Society has confirmed that various strains of Jee-oo appear to be domesticated forms of Fnuuk. I shall therefore be using the names interchangeably in future.




* This is essentially a translation of the Uhrwerk-Verlag production in German, which uses the Ubiquity system from Exile Games. The German release has been out for over a year, I think, and the artwork for their Venus and Mercury sourcebooks looks stunning - I can hardly wait for their publication!

Hojaan-nuu I

The latest invention of my febrile imagination, whilst on holiday, is to be mixed in with my jingals for the skirmisher units.

Hojaan-nuu
The Hojaan-nuu is a crossbow that is used to launch a small rocket and is another example of the Martian's apparent backwardness actually being an inventive way to adapt older technology in their straitened circumstances.

The crossbow itself is fairly standard and lightweight, and can even be used as one in extremis. It is usually cocked with a lever or just by hand, but heavier ones have also been seen. Principally it is used as a device for launching a rocket ("Hojaan"). Most such rockets propel shrapnel-type shells, but others are explosives, flash-bangs, fragmentation devices or even solid projectiles. The crossbow launches the rocket in the desired direction and elevation, with the rocket igniting as it is fired - an ignition lanyard is wound round the crossbow string and is pulled out as the rocket parts company with the bow. This means that the missile is already about 10 yards away before it truly flames, ensuring that the firer is not fried, and quickly increases the velocity of the missile from about 180 ft/s to nearer 750 ft/s.

Shrapnel munitions
The shrapnel rocket is a tube about two fingers in diameter (2 inches) and two palms in length (8
inches) and is composed of thin bambuu. The front cap is usually conical and additional to the length of the tube. The shrapnel (typically ¾ inch heavy ceramic cubes) is packed round a fireproof fibrous inner tube in the forward half of the rocket, with a disc separating this from the propellant in the rear half. The inner tube extends down most of the length of the tube.

The firer is able to select he range of the shrapnel projectile by altering the angle of the launch, clearly, but also by pricking a hole in the side of the tube at a particular point and piercing the inner tube. The outside of the rocket is usually marked with approximate ranges to help the firer - the nearer the propellant end, the shorter the range. The inside of the inner tube is coated with an explosive that burns much faster then the rocket propellant. When the flame of the propellant reaches the hole in the inner tube (at the selected distance) the explosive is ignited and flares rapidly, blowing the rocket cap off. This causes the sides to fall away and releases the shrapnel to spread out in a cone. Et voilà - a long range shotgun!

The rockets will usually burn for no more than about three seconds, which puts the rocket range at about 600 yards, but the shrapnel will still be deadly for a further 100 yards. The minimum effective range is about 150 yards - less than that and the shrapnel has had little time to spread. But there are also shorter range 'grapeshot' rockets that are far more effective at short ranges (20 - 100 yards).

Clearly these weapons are not particularly accurate, but they are useful for harassing and breaking up enemy formations at long range and, with luck, can be quite deadly at any range. It should also be noted that these weapons can be quite deadly to their users too, and strolling around a battlefield with a dozen-or-so explosive tubes strapped to your body takes a certain sang-froid. In Parhooni these troops are jokingly called "fire-throwers", but the term used is also a pun on the word for "cooked" in Son-Garyaani.

Modelling the Hojaan-nuu
I will be using the ubiquitous Black Hat Imperial Martians with guns, with the muskets cut down, and a deeper stock built up with green stuff. Once that is nice and hard, a gentle filing at the end will create a smooth seat to superglue a bent piece of brass rod for the bow. Then a wee bit more green stuff to extend the stock beyond the rod, just for luck. I do fear that the join might not be very robust, so I will have to be careful how I base them to minimise accidental pressure on them. I'll mount them two per base plus one other figure to maintain the three-to-a-base ratio; two bases of these plus two more of jingals and I'll have a complete skirmish unit.

Other implications
The Daa-nuu (see one of my May 2014 offerings) is capable of firing similar munitions, but with greater payloads and over longer ranges. (Think the Congreve Rocket, but safer for the crew.)

Safety note
Frankly I have no idea if it would really work, but don't try this at home children, just in case!



EDITS: fixed a few of the typos, plus added a couple of hyperlinks now I'm not limited to my iPad

Daa-nuu

Per the Space:1889 canon large quantities of metals, and thus cannon, are fairly rare on Mars. I have posited elsewhere that this is not due to lack of skills, but a shortage of resources and lower levels of atmospheric oxygen (which make smelting that much more difficult). It's not that the Martians are backward, it's just that they can use their limited supplies of metal more efficiently on other things.

But being an ancient and inventive people, could they not have come up with other ways of protecting missiles with an intent to do damage? (That's "shoot things" for those of you who aren't yet awake.)

Why not torsion engines? Basically we're talking giant arbalests or "Daa-nuu" as they are known in Parhooni

Classical Antiquity
Here is an interesting site with a ¾ size working model of a Roman stone-throwing engine. It mentions that the model (a "medium" engine) can throw a 3-pound ball 200+ yards. Without intending to belittle their efforts in any way, if weekend reenactors can achieve this performance then I am quite sure that thousands (or even a few tens) of years of practical development would easily top that. Josephus mentions a Roman engine with a range of up to 400 yards in his Jewish Wars, for example.

These engines varied in size, from 10 minas (over 9lb missile weight) up to 2-talent monsters (over 100lb). These were the field and siege artillery of classical antiquity! (Lots of wiki goodness here!)

The Daa-nuu
OK, but how would these fare on My Mars?

Wood to make the frames isn't exactly abundant on Mars, but it's not scarce either. Metal could be used for the small parts where required (nuts/bolts, clamps, ratchets, ...). The skeins used for the torsion by greeks and romans were hemp, hair, leather or animal sinews, and I could see the tendons of gashants and ruumet brehrs easily being of the size and strength necessary. Alternatively my jee-oo is a material that naturally resists deformation, so perhaps if properly harvested and preserved it acts as the perfect skein for a torsion engine.

So what might be the downsides of such machines?
- Maintenance was apparently difficult in classical antiquity, with damp being the number one headache. That one's not much of an issue on Mars at least! Wear and tear on the arms and the skeins are also mentioned, but these are at least renewable resources, and I'm sure that Martian skill and ingenuity could get round some maintenance issues. It's still a weapon that requires some technical expertise, but so are cannon.
- Range might be a problem, being outranged by cannon and not out-performing martian muskets by much, if at all. This reinforces the need for daa-nuu to be area effect weapons: there's no point one engine trying to outshoot ten musketeers if all it can fire is a 10lb rock, and that more slowly that a musket can reload.


Missiles - what would daa-nuu fire?
They can fire stones obviously.  If you want some obstacles knocked over they'll do the job, but they aren't going to have much effect on anything solid like a city wall or an entrenchment. I'm pretty sure a 20lb rock travelling at speed would give even a ruumet brehr something to think about.

How about an explosive shell? Space:1889 canon is silent on these as far as Martian technology goes, but perhaps that's the fault of extant Martian metallurgy, with shells being unable to survive the pressures of being fired from a cannon. But being fired from a daa-nuu is a very different prospect and should be a simple manufacturing job. They could even be a ceramic casing, with a simple burning fuse to light the breaching charge. Pack in a few sharp objects as well, if you want lots of shrapnel. That should keep musketeers' heads down!

How about gas of some description? Or smoke shells? Perhaps flashbangs (or caltrop-filled) to disrupt gashant charges? The only limit is Martian ingenuity.

Deployment
I would see daa-nuu being deployed behind walls and in entrenchments, and masked from artillery fire until the enemy starts to close. Their main use is to break up enemy attacks.

They might be wheeled for improved manoeuvrability, but they are tall and bulky by the nature of the drums/skeins, so I can't see them being horse artillery analogues. You might be able to mount them on a solid cart, but this just raises their profile and makes them an even easier target for artillery. That might still be a handy way to use them against the more backward hill martians, of course.

Daa-nuu would work well on the back of a ruumet brehr as well, as there is far less recoil than with a cannon, and they are also MUCH quieter.


Modelling
In terms of modelling, there are plenty of companies that make them, with the Essex "30 mina bolt or stone thrower" (XEQ12) being a good size for my Black Hat figures. Unfortunately there's not a photo on their website, so you'll just have to believe me!


Again, that's my shilling's worth.  All comments and suggested improvements gratefully received.

Edit July 2015
See my Hojaan-nuu I post discussing rocket-assisted munitions that would work well fired from a Daa-nuu. But bigger, of course!

Technology - Armour

Armour is not a standard issue on Mars, but is also not uncommon.  Armour built to withstand a properly-made ceramic slug would have to be extremely thick and heavy, and would render the wearer immobile.  But short range fire is often with a cannister round.  Add to this the danger from flying sabots, and it becomes apparent that a lighter form of armour will suffice for protection from a significant portion of musket fire.

Unsurprisingly, metal armour is too expensive (and probably too heavy) to be in common use.  Most armour is therefore made from boiled, shaped leather or from laminated wooden strips.  Both armours are usually coloured, often by dying (leather) or in the lacquering and sealing of the wooden strips. Shaped leather helmets are quite common, as are breastplates, vambraces and greaves.   Armour is nevertheless often limited to officers and to royal troops due to its expense. 

Technology - Melee Weapons

A proportion of infantry (typically around a quarter) are armed solely with melee weapons, normally halberd-like pole arms.  

At first glance this appears quite anachronistic for such an ancient civilisation.  However, like the smoothbore musket, these are actually a sign of adaptation to straitened circumstances rather than of backwardness. Given the inability to mount a decent bayonet on their musket, the halberd was probably (re)introduced to provide a degree of protection to the musketeers.  The halberd is basically a large lump of metal on the end of a hardwood pole, and so is an expensive piece of kit.  Over time they have developed into a status symbol to reward the loyalty and bravery of troops.  Only the best and bravest therefore tend to be so armed*, which also limits the number that are likely to go missing upon desertion!  Halberds are also more effective than muskets in a policing role, and when putting down civil disturbances with minimum force, so have rightly earned their place as a useful weapon on Mars.

The typical Martian sidearm is a sword of some description.  Steel swords do exist, but these are museum pieces and family heirlooms rather than a commonplace.  Most blades are made from a laminate of bone, wood, leather and sinew.  Blades come in all shapes and sizes, and can be extremely strong and flexible, holding a good edge if properly maintained.  Even those of poorer quality are quite capable of causing dreadful damage and of severing limbs. 

*This also helps to explain the ease with which Earth governments have been able to raise such good quality auxiliary forces.  In essence, and initially unknowingly, they have entrusted each Martian recruit with a Prince’s ransom of steel in the form of a rifled musket and bayonet.  It is little wonder that such “trust” is returned. 

Technology - Infantry Firearms

The relative paucity of refined metals on Mars means that rulers are reluctant to hand large lumps of very valuable metal to their troops in the form of weapons.  Wherever possible the amount of metal has been reduced over the millennia to a point where only the bare minimum is carried by your average ranker.

The standard infantry weapon is a wooden-barrelled smoothbore firearm.  Metal gun barrels and rifling are certainly known and are even made on Mars, but these tend to be for the wealthy or for select guard troops.  For the common ranker, metal barrels have been replaced by a specially-bred form of wood, known locally as “Jee-oo”, whose lattice-like structure can resist rapid deformation in a manner analogous to modern kevlar.  This makes them suitable for use as gun barrels once dried and treated.  The breech-end of the barrel is secured within a metal block and trigger mechanism – the only significant lump of metal in the firearm - with a light wooden stock and fore stock.  

The standard ammunition round is a ceramic slug and sabot together with the smokeless propellant and ignition all wrapped in a sealed waxed package.  The ceramic slugs can take a variety of forms.  The most common has a square cross section, is slightly tapered towards the tip and has a quarter twist along its length.  This tapering and twist provides an element of aerodynamic form and spin to the round, and so these smoothbores have a decent range compared with Earthly ones.   The sabot also allows the manufacture of shotgun-style rounds for use at close range, without excessive wear and tear on the barrel.  

The loading process is relatively quick: a first pass down the barrel with a ramrod to clear the worst of any residue, followed by the sealed round being forced down until seated against the firing block.  The waxing of the round ensures an element of lubrication and also better sealing within the barrel, while the base of the sabot expands upon the ignition of the propellant to reduce windage.  The weapon is cocked manually by pulling back a hammer which is then released by the pull of the trigger.  The hammer drives the platinum-coated firing pin (actually a cone) forward, sealing the block and piercing the base of the round.  There the cone acts as a catalyst causing the two dry chemicals to flare, igniting the propellant and driving the sabot along the barrel.  The force of the ignition returns the firing cone back into the breech and the hammer into a “safe” position (so that the loading process will not result in firing). 

These muskets do have a number of drawbacks.  They foul quite easily, and can suffer from splitting at inopportune times.  They are therefore replaced at regular intervals – quite a simple process if you still retain both hands - and this can even take place in the field.  The propellant used is smokeless, but there is always some visible discharge from the weapon, with the combustion of the packaging, sabots flying around, and so on.  Finally, Jee-oo barrels are not a suitable fixing for a bayonet, and neither does it make a good club, so troops are reliant on a sidearm (sword or axe) for melee. 

A proportion of infantry in a unit (typically a quarter) comprise teams armed with a long-barrel musket (referred to as jingals by Earthmen).  

Jingals are essentially Jee-oo muskets with longer and larger barrels (up 2.5m long, with a bore of as much as 5cm in some cases).   The loading teams carry a variety of rounds depending on need and availability.  Most will be solid slug rounds which are effective at 800 yards.   Others are a form of cannister which can be devastating are close range. Each weapon requires a crew of four – one to carry and fire, one to carry a spare barrel plus a bipod rest, and two loaders.  This weapon is especially effective against Giant Martian troops and mounts, but also as a siege weapon and as light artillery in the field. 

Technology - General thoughts

It is certainly true that the level of Martian technology is far below what it once was.  Even the means of making the canals so long ago, surely their greatest achievement, is wreathed in legend myth and folklore.  If any Martian knows or understands how it was done, then they are not telling the Earthmen. 

As a society they also suffer from a lack of resources.  Fossil fuels were exhausted long ago - coal-burning came as a surprise to this generation of Canal Martians.  Iron ore is abundant – this is the red planet after all – but it is difficult to turn it into good quality iron or steel in any quantity for two reasons.  Firstly, the thinner air on Mars, with its lower oxygen levels, makes it difficult to achieve the temperatures needed to smelt iron.  Secondly, the general shortage of fuel means that it becomes an economic and environmental impossibility to feed any large-scale production.  Iron and steel are made, but Martians have gone back to small-scale production and use alternative materials wherever possible.  In part they use softer metals, such a copper and tin, but these minerals are also in relatively short supply and so a great deal of recycling takes place.  But Martian society has also developed the use of plant materials – and other renewable resources – to replace metals in many areas of life.

Canal Martians cultivate a great many crops that have been bred for very specific reasons other than for food.  Some are for straightforward uses such as coloured dyes and cloth (similar to cotton and linen/flax).  But many more are quite different form any earthly forms.  Presumably these have been selectively bred from now-extinct species to meet specific requirements.  

Two examples.  

They have a plant very similar to bamboo, “Jee-oo”, but which is far stronger when treated.  It has a resistance to deformation that makes it very valuable as building frames, scaffolding, fencing, and even as weapon barrels.  When split and treated it can be moulded into extremely hard plates.  

Another plant with a much spongier interior, is also used in construction.  This “Betaan” is mashed and left to break down in water for several weeks.  It is then mixed with sands with a high iron content to create a substance similar to concrete when dry.  In its liquid form it can be poured into moulds or forms to create beams and panels.

Canal Martians and Technology

Over time I will be posting some rambling thoughts on the technology used by "my" Canal Martians, in particular, and as it trickles down to the other denizens of the Red Planet.  Obviously I'll be mostly be looking at the technology used in warfare, but you can't totally divorce that from more peaceful pursuits.

As stated before, I do like to follow a great deal of the Space:1889 descriptions of society and technology (so liftwood is definitely in!).  However, and unsurprisingly, Mr Chadwick had to be a bit sparing on some of the details. Some ideas did pop up in various TRMGS publications and in some of the published scenarios, but I just wanted to add a bit more colour to help me picture the Martian way of life.

Rather than creating a long thesis I will probably just jot down ideas as they occur to me.  With a bit of luck they might even be internally consistent, but I'm not holding my breath.  There is far less chance of them being scientifically viable, so I apologise in advance to the more practically-minded out there.