Building times

[Susano]

Re: Building times

 

In the US' date=' there was a proposal in the south to offer freedom to slaves who were willing to fight for the Confederates, when the war was going badly, though the fear of armed slaves meant that went nowhere.[/quote']

 

It was also stated that if said slaves stood and fought, and also fought well, it would kind of disprove the reasons white Southerns used to enslaved Africans in the first place.

[Narf the Mouse]

Re: Building times

 

...Huh, some societies were stupider than I thought.

[Markdoc]

Re: Building times

 

...Huh' date=' some societies were stupider than I thought.[/quote']

 

No, they weren't stupid. It's just that your assumptions are different from theirs and based on current thinking ... which doesn't necessarily reflect reality.

They did what worked for them. And recall, in many cases, it worked for centuries longer than the US has existed, so we're not talking about a quick fix here.

 

In Athens, the golden age of Pericles, Aspasia, Phidias and all the rest? It was also the golden age of slavery in Athens. Slaves helped build important public works - freeing up citizens for other tasks (like counting the profits ) Slaves made important contributions to military building too (walls and ships and weapons) as well as to purely commercial exercises. Stupid? Slavery made their society richer and more powerful than ever before (or indeed, for a long time after). And the philosophical explorations made by Athens' elite - who lived a life largely underwritten by slave labor shaped world history ... resonating all the way down to, say, Thomas Jefferson - another philosophical gentleman who perhaps not coincidentally also lived a life of leisure, underwritten by slave labour.

 

In Rome, slave labour fed the citizens and maintained public facilities ... and in doing so freed up capital for a vast imperium that subjugated half the known world. You might think it stupid, but it surely worked for them.

 

The Turks impressed and imported slaves by the hundreds of thousands. Not only did they use them for private work, but they trained them as soldiers and gave them the best weapons and training available. Stupid? Not so much. These slave soldiers were the empire's elite, in the forefront of virtually every major offensive by the Ottomans and even their opponents agreed that they were fierce, dedicated, skilled and fearsome opponents.

 

You are assuming that slaves are always recalcitrant and always seeking for ways to harm their masters and escape, but sadly, that's not how it was. And that's the case 'round the world. One could argue that slavery is one of the few universal human institutions ... and that's because it worked. Edit: that is to say - it worked for the slavers. I've never seen any great enthusiasm on the part of the enslaved.

 

cheers, Mark

[Barwickian]

Re: Building times

 

As for building Buildings' date=' I was more thinking of Socage. At least for moving the parts it was an option, but overall still needed skilled labour.

 

I don't understand how you relate socage to building works. Socage is a form of inheritable agricultural tenancy where cash, rather than labour service, is the primary way of paying the rent.

 

As to the debate on how long it took to build things, I am staying well out of that. There are too many variables (what size of building, what size of ship, what materials and labour available, cash supply, construction techniques used) to make much more than a wild guess.

[Christopher]

Re: Building times

 

I don't understand how you relate socage to building works. Socage is a form of inheritable agricultural tenancy where cash' date=' rather than labour service, is the primary way of paying the rent.[/quote']

Sorry, only know the german words for that stuff. I meant Serjanty:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serjeanty

[Barwickian]

Re: Building times

 

Sorry, only know the german words for that stuff. I meant Serjanty:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serjeanty

 

Ah. That could be more appropriate.

 

I don't think the sergeantry formed a major part of the class make-up in medieval England - they were definitely there, but not common compared to other kinds of freemen or sokemen.

 

I think the practice, or something similar, was more common on the continent.

 

The issue with sergeants - at least in England - was that their form of service was specific. One might be a hawker, another a messenger, another a soldier (the military sergeantry), another a household servant. You couldn't assume you could suddenly assign one to building works (as with anything else, a willing worker might help you out, particularly if there's a crisis on, but they'd be very keen to make it clear they're doing you a favour and this isn't part of their regular duties and shouldn't become such).

[Narf the Mouse]

Re: Building times

 

No, they weren't stupid. It's just that your assumptions are different from theirs and based on current thinking ... which doesn't necessarily reflect reality.

They did what worked for them. And recall, in many cases, it worked for centuries longer than the US has existed, so we're not talking about a quick fix here.

 

In Athens, the golden age of Pericles, Aspasia, Phidias and all the rest? It was also the golden age of slavery in Athens. Slaves helped build important public works - freeing up citizens for other tasks (like counting the profits ) Slaves made important contributions to military building too (walls and ships and weapons) as well as to purely commercial exercises. Stupid? Slavery made their society richer and more powerful than ever before (or indeed, for a long time after). And the philosophical explorations made by Athens' elite - who lived a life largely underwritten by slave labor shaped world history ... resonating all the way down to, say, Thomas Jefferson - another philosophical gentleman who perhaps not coincidentally also lived a life of leisure, underwritten by slave labour.

 

In Rome, slave labour fed the citizens and maintained public facilities ... and in doing so freed up capital for a vast imperium that subjugated half the known world. You might think it stupid, but it surely worked for them.

 

The Turks impressed and imported slaves by the hundreds of thousands. Not only did they use them for private work, but they trained them as soldiers and gave them the best weapons and training available. Stupid? Not so much. These slave soldiers were the empire's elite, in the forefront of virtually every major offensive by the Ottomans and even their opponents agreed that they were fierce, dedicated, skilled and fearsome opponents.

 

You are assuming that slaves are always recalcitrant and always seeking for ways to harm their masters and escape, but sadly, that's not how it was. And that's the case 'round the world. One could argue that slavery is one of the few universal human institutions ... and that's because it worked. Edit: that is to say - it worked for the slavers. I've never seen any great enthusiasm on the part of the enslaved.

 

cheers, Mark

Before you say they were brilliant social engineers, how many times was the possibility of an industrial revolution kicked over in favour of having power over others?

 

Glutonous ambition may not be stupid by some definitions, but it's at least similar.

[Diamond Spear]

Re: Building times

 

There’s also the fact that many times in the ancient world slaves were defeated enemies. And if the choice was wholesale slaughter or enslavement……

[Sundog]

Re: Building times

 

Before you say they were brilliant social engineers, how many times was the possibility of an industrial revolution kicked over in favour of having power over others?

 

Glutonous ambition may not be stupid by some definitions, but it's at least similar.

 

Industrial development required more than just opportunity, though. The industrial revolution occurred through a fairly unique intersection of numerous factors...one of which, almost certainly, was the 1833 prohibition of slavery by the British Empire, which removed one possible source of labour from the rising industrialists of the day. But without the damage to organized religion wrought by the schismatic wars of the previous few centuries and the enlightenment, the drive towards egalitarianism promoted by the American and French revolutions, the reorganization of Europe post-Napoleon, and a dozen other factors, our industrial revolution would likely also have been stillborn.

[Barwickian]

Re: Building times

 

Industrial development required more than just opportunity' date=' though. The industrial revolution occurred through a fairly unique intersection of numerous factors...one of which, almost certainly, was the 1833 prohibition of slavery by the British Empire, which removed one possible source of labour from the rising industrialists of the day. But without the damage to organized religion wrought by the schismatic wars of the previous few centuries and the enlightenment, the drive towards egalitarianism promoted by the American and French revolutions, the reorganization of Europe post-Napoleon, and a dozen other factors, our industrial revolution would likely also have been stillborn.[/quote']

 

Hoo, boy, did you just open a can of worms. I'm not sure how much slavery affected the industrial revolution in America, but since industrialisation was more closely linked with the non-slaveholding states of the North, I suspect the Empire's ban on shipping slaves didn't have a huge impact.

 

I am fairly sure that the ban on slavery didn't affect the industrial revolution in the UK that much, since there weren't many slaves on the home front. And since it's generally accepted that the industrial revolution started in the UK some 40-60 years before the ban...

 

In brief, major reasons for the industrial revolution are:

 

The agricultural revolution of the 16th-18th centuries, including new techniques and use of machinery to improve land quality, adjust land use (such as the creation of artificial water-meadows, which enabled overwintering of more stock) and use existing arable land more intensively, and breeding programmes to improve the productivity of stock.

 

Protoindustrialisation, most notably in the textile industry's putting-out programmes, which allowed specialisation in cottage industries.

 

Increasing investment in capital and infrastructure projects, notably canalising rivers (and, later, digging new canals) and improving the road network with a series of turnpike roads.

 

These set the stage.

 

The revolution, gradual or not, began with the development of machinery for the textile industry and the discovery of a process to use coke, rather than charcoal, in the iron industry. The latter increased the demand for coal to a point where sea coal, bell-pits and drift mines couldn't keep up. The need to pump water out of deep mines led to the development of steam-powered pumps.

 

Would it have happened if the UK were a slave-holding country? Probably not. But the British ban on slave-trading, which it took upon itself to enforce on other nations' ships as well as its own, didn't affect it.

[Sundog]

Re: Building times

 

Didn't cause, I totally agree. Didn't affect? That's a totally different claim.

The Industrial revolution was more than an introduction of new technologies and systems. It was a new way of thinking and considering the world around you. And that could have been lost - conservative opposition (that the changes were bad) and progressive opposition (that the changes weren't enough) could have either or both derailed it had they gained preeminence in the halls of power. The banning of slavery (and there were more slaves than you might think in Britain) advanced the conceptual framework that made the IR possible.

[lifo]

Re: Building times

 

I still don't have the faintest idea on how many men and days are needed to build something, but the derived discussion is really interesting.

Please, continue.

[bluesguy]

Re: Building times

 

I still don't have the faintest idea on how many men and days are needed to build something

I came here to find out

...

[Martin2]

Re: Building times

 

I still don't have the faintest idea on how many men and days are needed to build something, but the derived discussion is really interesting.

Please, continue.

 

Do you have a specific thing you want to build?

 

If you start with a list I am sure everyone will sugest a time frame with or without slave labour (both skilled and unskilled slaves).

 

As mentioned it would depend what you want to build and how much money you want to throw at it.

 

Buildings tend to grow over time.

 

Castles can start as only a hill with a fence around it and as then progress to a full blown stone castle over hundreds of years.

 

Simliar sort of things for palaces and churches. They start little and grow and depends on the budget of the builder.

 

Why do you want to know? Are the players trying to make money from a manufacturing industry?

[Lucius]

Re: Building times

 

Personally, I'd like good information on the time, costs, materiels, facilities etc for crafting weapons and armor. one of my players has given his character weaponsmith and I am pretty sure he wants to eventually set up a forge and create weapons.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

Weaponsmith: Palindromedary Mounted Weapons

[L. Marcus]

Re: Building times

 

Fantasy Hero, at least for fifth, had weapon crafting times. They at least felt plausible -- good enough for gaming, at the very least.

[mhd]

Re: Building times

 

I don't know if I'm allowed to recommend that here, but GURPS Low-Tech Companion 3 has some crafting and building rules that could easily be converted, seem at least somewhat researched and aren't very complex (e.g. for buildings you calculate the cost according to some easy formula or table and divide that by the wages of the builders to get duration. A bit too "mythical man-month" at times, but better than some D&D "name level fortress" stuff I've seen).

[Bolon]

Re: Building times

 

Harn had a lot of information on building and construction of things. I would probably look at something like that. I would also make the necessary morale and leadership skills to get staff, and keep the project on time. Is it crucial for the plot of the story or is it just to make it seem more realistic? I would just have the players go on an adventure and hire a NPC to do the work and have it done when they return. They will need someone to control the manor or whatever when they are away or are you looking to become a political game in building a kingdom?

[lifo]

Re: Building times

 

Do you have a specific thing you want to build?

 

If you start with a list I am sure everyone will sugest a time frame with or without slave labour (both skilled and unskilled slaves).

 

As mentioned it would depend what you want to build and how much money you want to throw at it.

 

Buildings tend to grow over time.

 

Castles can start as only a hill with a fence around it and as then progress to a full blown stone castle over hundreds of years.

 

Simliar sort of things for palaces and churches. They start little and grow and depends on the budget of the builder.

 

Why do you want to know? Are the players trying to make money from a manufacturing industry?

Thank you for your help, and to the others too, but actually I don't have a list.

My PC's are just in that phase in which straight adventuring is making way to the responsibilities of managing dominions, cities, families and so on. One of them, especially, has went full fledged expansionist, having bought a shipyard and planning to use the ships he will build there to colonize an island - thus, houses and castles - he own and to start a commercial shipping network.

So, what I'd really need is a fairly reliable system, that a least looks realistic, to determine time needed to build castles, houses and ships.

Just to have a rough idea, because I don't know anything about this argument.

[Christopher]

Re: Building times

 

Thank you for your help, and to the others too, but actually I don't have a list.

My PC's are just in that phase in which straight adventuring is making way to the responsibilities of managing dominions, cities, families and so on. One of them, especially, has went full fledged expansionist, having bought a shipyard and planning to use the ships he will build there to colonize an island - thus, houses and castles - he own and to start a commercial shipping network.

So, what I'd really need is a fairly reliable system, that a least looks realistic, to determine time needed to build castles, houses and ships.

Just to have a rough idea, because I don't know anything about this argument.

Any game from the Anno-Series could work

[Martin2]

Re: Building times

 

Thank you for your help, and to the others too, but actually I don't have a list.

My PC's are just in that phase in which straight adventuring is making way to the responsibilities of managing dominions, cities, families and so on. One of them, especially, has went full fledged expansionist, having bought a shipyard and planning to use the ships he will build there to colonize an island - thus, houses and castles - he own and to start a commercial shipping network.

So, what I'd really need is a fairly reliable system, that a least looks realistic, to determine time needed to build castles, houses and ships.

Just to have a rough idea, because I don't know anything about this argument.

 

Do you want to go in that direction?

 

Does the player intend to have this all running as the rest of the group is adventuring? If so he will probbaly have to remove that character from the game and do boring number crunching activities for the both of you.

 

You could hand wave the specifics and just come up with a time frame for the amount of money he puts into it. Early buisnesses do not make money and just absorb money until it gets to a certain point.

 

So take he wants to start building ships. Say in the first year he builds 1-2 basic ships and this costs the value of the ship to buy (due to investments in equipment building it making contracts for future supplies). The next year he can increase it and the costy comes down to 50% of the value of the ships etc. But he will need to plough in a lot of money and not see any profit for a long time.

 

These sort of things don't come along quickly and its more fun making money by adventuring.

 

Handwave it and take lots of money off him and in a year or so of game time tell him the basics of how many ships he has and make a skill roll and base this on if he had a good few years or bad.

 

Roleplay the exploring on the ship and run the game that way and just keep taking the money off him and generalise the rest.

[Manic Typist]

Re: Building times

 

Do you want to go in that direction?

 

Does the player intend to have this all running as the rest of the group is adventuring? If so he will probbaly have to remove that character from the game and do boring number crunching activities for the both of you.

 

You could hand wave the specifics and just come up with a time frame for the amount of money he puts into it. Early buisnesses do not make money and just absorb money until it gets to a certain point.

 

So take he wants to start building ships. Say in the first year he builds 1-2 basic ships and this costs the value of the ship to buy (due to investments in equipment building it making contracts for future supplies). The next year he can increase it and the costy comes down to 50% of the value of the ships etc. But he will need to plough in a lot of money and not see any profit for a long time.

 

These sort of things don't come along quickly and its more fun making money by adventuring.

 

....not necessarily.

 

You could have a LOT of fun with this, as long as you make sure you don't let it steal the spotlight of the campaign. You could even devote a season or a few campaign arcs to it, or at the very least intertwining with it.

[lifo]

Re: Building times

 

You could have a LOT of fun with this' date=' as long as you make sure you don't let it steal the spotlight of the campaign. You could even devote a season or a few campaign arcs to it, or at the very least intertwining with it.[/quote']

Yes. That is the kind of direction I would like to take.

It is also quite fun to play all the rivalry, subterfuge and diplomacy that occur when you start mingling in the big league, where just being the one who bashes the most may not be enough to thrive, or survive. Luckily I already dodged the bullet of having my campaign transformed in a sort of fantasy managerial game (Simfief! ), but I still need some kind of system or standard for "building things times". I prefer not to improvise, 'cause I don't like when things turn out unrealistic (like a bigger castle that later will result cheaper and faster to build for no reason whatsoever aside the fact that I didn't remember the ratio behind the previous decision).

[Bolon]

Re: Building times

 

I was into something like this with a Harn game. We developed an inn with a number of small businesses connected. There is the Kingmaker scenarios in Pathfinder that work for your characters to create a small fiefdom. In both situations, there is a lot of politicial intrigue but that is used to create leads for adventures in a more political ring. You could also get involved in things like bandits, roaming monsters, spies, immigrants, gypsy thieves, favours for other fiefdoms, trade interruptions, guilds, finding resources, protection of miners, farmers, loggers and resource hunters, caravan or trade routes. Alliances with others via guilds or business relationships could provide allies in adventures to help their business.

 

Our merchant ended up becoming an NPC due to how much separate time he would be away from the party but he was run by a player who was not regular. It actually worked out that he would return to play so the character would return to be involved with the party to solve one of his problems or something he encountered. It was nice that way but most of it was just rolls of skill to increase or decrease investment with details to work as modifiers. A few rolls and all would be done. There was also the adventure that was a reaction to a big loss or incident that the GM would make sure had a nice reward on the other end so the party didn't feel like the merchant was just getting screwed to rob our bank accounts. Our characters did quickly evolve into all NPC but it was a fun ending for cherished characters.

[LordGhee]

Re: Building times

 

If I remember, the early D and D books had pages of stuff on build timesm and the Early chivarly and sorcery stuff.

 

both gleamed from medevil sources. No ideal where my stuff is boxed will look.

 

Lord Ghee