(06-09-2015, 02:25 PM)TheLastCandle Wrote: That hasn't been my takeaway from the thread. I see people treating them as being about as dangerous as a Thaumaturge throwing fire and calling down lightning. The only thing making them potentially more dangerous than your token renegade mage is accessibility - which may or may not be an issue, depending on the lore behind the specific firearms machinists will be using.
Well, what we know so far is that machinists will be trained at Skysteel manufactuory, an Ishgardian weapons producer inspired (either loosely or directly, we've yet to see) by the work of Cid Garlond to create new weapons for the war against the Dravanians. Already we're beginning to see Ishgardians use powder-based siege and artillery heavily.
Considering their goal is waging war more efficiently, I feel it's safe to assume reproducibility and accessibility are major factors in design. What would be the point if they're developing esoteric things only highly trained specialists can use? Given that cannons are already becoming very commonplace, personal firearms will probably become relatively available soon.
That said, I think much of a machinist's personal arsenal (such as their turrets and special barrels/ammo) will be the realm of the highly experimental and prone to backfire and failure. It is prototype and not ready for public use. It may have flaws only one who built it could compensate for or perhaps it's prone to breakdown and needs constant maintenance. They're things only a trained individual can make effective at this point in time, for whatever reason.
It depends, but I do see common firearms and explosives becoming more available, because the cutting edge (see above) is already working on trying to advance that technology beyond its current capacity. Personally, I'm very interested in seeing how this industrial shift influences the very rigidly feudal Ishgardian society.
