Hi guys, I was thinking about a way to make Rayya’s children different from the other two kingdoms and then it hit me!
what if Rayya’s children used bronze to make tools and weapons instead of iron? it would add a different dynamic
to playing as them interns of both crafting and defense. an example would be a sword instead of needing 1 iron+ 1 wood
to make a sword; they would need 1 copper +1 tin instead and since Rayya’s children are from the dessert and wood would be rare, maybe only used in high level/quality items so having to mine for copper or tin make more since. if you wanted to relay get fancy you could even give their blacksmith a unique crafting bench like a crucible in order to smelt the tin/copper into bronze plus bronze’s, well, bronze color would go well with their red/gold theme better then iron. well thats my idea
what do you guys think?
Also, can’t you cast bronze in clay molds? Yet more use for the potter!
Still, the Ascendancy spends a bit of time in bronze, so I think Rayya’s Children would still need iron/steel in their later game. But I’d definitely love to see them do a lot more with bronze.
I didn’t even think about making molds and i agree that they would still need some iron just as the ascendancy will likely use some bronze but the majority of their metal work would be bronze you could even give them unique weapons, like the Khopesh for instance,
I like the idea. Seems like the way to do it would just be to require a higher blacksmith level for steel and iron items, so they use bronze longer. Maybe given them a few extra Bronze items to balance it out (bronze pike? khopesh?) Otherwise it would probably be a weakness though since the net result would be a delay in the good gear, not that you really need the good gear.
I do like the idea but then in multi player this kingdom would be disadvantaged in front of those carrying iron or steel (it is well known why iron replace the bronze over time). So something need to be introduced to counter balance this problem and keep the three kingdoms appealing.
actual their isn't that much of a difference in strength between iron and bronze
believe it or not, iron is stronger/ harder then bronze, don’t get me wrong but its not like a guy with an iron sword would be at too much of a difference when fighting a guy with a bronze sword of equal length. steel is another story of coarse but it didn’t really come around until the mid- lat middle ages and wasn’t common place until the industrial rev. the main reason people started using
iron over bronze is that since bronze is a compound mental made of, copper and tin, it was more expensive; copper ,like iron was pretty common but tin was very rare, at least at the time. plus copper and tin had a lower melting point so it took
far less time for people to figure out how to make bronze then iron. plus since Rayya’s children are the cultural/trade/magic
kingdom they could probably enchant them to be equal if their was any difference
I thought the main reason iron won over bronze was because iron (like steal later) could be hardened… Well as you said, they could have a special blacksmith top tier level allowing some “special” treatment, magical or not!
no your right that was one of the reasons it eventually one out but it was manly because iron was more common that
it became, well common, it could also be used to make longer swords then bronze but that was was only in the last
thousand years or so as apposed to bronze which has been around for far longer. as i said a guy with a bronze sword wouldn’t be at too much of a disadvantage against a guy with an equally long iron sword would the iron sword be harder, yes, would be dent the bronze sword, possibly, would cut through it or damage it beyond repair no.
plus rayya’s children could still use iron for top tier items if necessary they are, after all the craftier/ magic nation
But have Rayya’s Children paid the bronze price?
You could replace wood costs with bronze, so their items are less wood dependent, but metal is a bit harder to acquire…
With the trade system in Stonehearth, I don’t think we can assume that wood is going to be rare. It wasn’t uncommon in our world for trade to move wood into desert areas for use in various goods. There might not be too much wood in a desert (although the biomes devblog post showed a decent amount), but if you buy everything from the traders you’ll probably get enough to do the job.
In the desert mineral deposits are far more common place so finding copper and tin to make bronze would be more reasonable then trying to gather wood which should far scarcer in the desert so wouldn’t a more metal based community be more appropriate?
They already have it set that Raya’s Children will be building their structures out of clay do to its abundance in the desert and lack of timber.
And if we are talking about regional development wouldn’t that mean that Northmen’s alliance should have a harder time gathering in a tundra since the ground would be frozen?
Then the dwarfs, timber shouldn’t even be available in their options if they reside underground so how should they forge their weapons that would require timber in their construction/ And i’m not talking about running the furnace when coal would be the alternative in both desert and underground.
In my opinion, the material Rayya’s Children are short of is good wood, not metal. So we could replace the wood pieces in wepons with bronce, but keeping the iron/steel blade. The weapon will be more expensive and, likely, more beautiful that ascendancy counterparts, but also as effective. It will just be harder to get. But that is the problem when you don`t have an easy material to use, like wood.
Rayya´s children seem to take inspiration from real world Near East. And those cultures developed a well know iron/steel tech (Damascus). I don´t think it would be nice to deprive them of widespead use of iron.
When it comes to weapon efficiency, iron and bronze are very simillar. Both materials gave the weapons about the same strength. Bronze can be sharpened a lot more and does not rust. Iron allows for longer weapons cause is less likely to bend. Bronze appeared earlier because, as already stated, its lower melting point. But at one point a real shortage of tin happened. This forced the smiths to find a way of using the easily (at that time) available but hard iron.
Initially Iron replaced bronze in the weapons manufacturing, but not in armors (the longer reach was very desirable). It wasn´t until later, with a better technology, that iron became the metal used for everything. Tin was too rare and too expensive.
Rayya’s children could have a widespread use of copper and bronze. Containers, decorations, anything you can think. Mostly instead of wood. But should not be left with out Iron.
Have Fun, Kyth
PS: The eventual development of steel left Iron and bronze mostly obsolete.
your right that iron/steel shouldn’t be left out as a material to use, however it should be limited, ether as a late game, high tier item that you could make, such as a steel scimitar; or as a rarely crafted item for high skill blacksmiths, similar to the way fine lanterns are currently crafted in game. the reason i decided on bronze, rather then iron, was partially for cultural, partially for ascetic, and partially for game play. the Near East is home to some of the oldest and, in my option, the most
fascinating civilizations in the world, Babylonian, Assyrian, Egyptian, Hittite, Phoenician, ect the list goes on
and each of these civ’s used bronze for the majority of their history and i think it would be good to represent that in the game. their ascetic doesn’t really look good with silver, but matches well with bronze, a petty thing sure but as it is a
game ascetic is important to note and bronze looks better with red then silver does, and in terms of game play as the dessert lacks wood as a common resource, and yes they could trade for it but at the moment that would be an unpredictable variable as you never know when a trader will arrive and/or what they will be selling, as such they will be using what is common to them, so stones and metals and by making bronze it would add a different variable to them in terms of crafting as they would take two metals instead of one in order to make a sword or an ax, as for them being at a military disadvantage their not supposed to be an overly military faction and any initial tech disadvantage, interns of weapons, could be overcome with numbers, as they are supposed to have more hearthlings then the other kingdoms, they would be able to over tun the other kingdoms with sheer numbers if they had iron in multiplayer thats why the Norsemen’s alliance has smaller numbers, because they are combat oriented.
and i agree that they would still need some iron just as the ascendancy will likely use some bronze but the majority of their metal work would be bronze you could even give them unique weapons, like the Khopesh for instance,