(updated O8.15."12)
Patent 01: La Carabine Culassiere
Rifled barrels greatly increase both range and accuracy, but so far the necessity to ram the bullet down them drastically reduces the rate of fire. Thus rifles are currently restricted to skirmishers. With the finalization of a simple breech-loading mechanism, Monte-Cristan engineers obtained a rifled carbine that can be shot as fast as any musket, but with range and precision more than doubled. Such a shoulder weapon can be used
en masse by close order infantry shooting volleys: your troops will decimate and break the enemy lines long before they could retaliate; no cavalry charge will survive their massed fire.
Note:
Our engineers and gunsmiths are developing a greatly improved version using the interrupted screw developed for our heaviest revolutionary quick-firing cannons (below). Given it will combine elements from different current proposals, when functional it will be covered by a separate patent.
Marshal Maurice de Saxe, a very good friend of the Presipality, 
designed extremely advanced quick-fire breech-loading systems
for his revolutionary musket
and amusette. While he granted us permission to manufacture these 
and the accompanying cavalry mousqueton for our own defense, we are sworn to secrecy until he himself publish the detailed plans of the mechanisms.
Patent 02: L’Ejacule-Mitraille Leger
A breech-loaded Amusette, with 6 cartridges in a revolving magazine (*
not* a
revolting magazine!). The full cycle of this ingenious mechanism is obtained by merely turning the crank. A light, handy, yet devastating weapon.
Artist's view of an Ejacule-mitraille leger on a field carriage. Such would provide mobile light troops
with a drastically incrased fire power. With the crew mounted, it could follow and support dragoons a
nd large bodies of cavalry.
Note:
Our engineers and gunsmiths are developing a *
handgun*
using a similar removable cylinder (with traditional butt and firelock, it will look like this 'dreamed' futuristic design). Given it will integrate various other innovative designs if will be covered by a separate patent.
Patent 03: L’Ejacule-Mitraille Moyen
A multibarelled, and thus heavier, version of the previous weapon. No crank, an astute mechanism uses the recoil to rotate both the magazine and the set of barrels. You can choose between an increased rate of fire or a prolonged volley.
Patent 04: L’Ejacule-Mitraille Lourd
Heavier bullets, longer barrels, faster fire. Such piece is fully equivalent to a 12pdr. gun shooting canister every 3 seconds! Currently under developpment.
This Patent using the innovations protected by Patent 03, their simultaneous acquisition is compulsory.
The next illustration shows an earlier, more cumbersome version with slower fire but larger bore.
The corresponding Patent will be offered for half his latest bid to the 2nd higher bidder as a consolation prize.
This early prototype (right) delivered a tremendous amount of fire (96 musket barrels!) but in a very short salvo, so dispersion was insufficient -besides, each barrel had to be reloaded individually.
The last illustration shows the origin of this project: :
Da Vinci's drawing and the (very improved) prototype built by Monte-Cristan engineers.
The corresponding Patent will be offered for one third of his latest bid to the 3rd higher bidder as a consolation prize.
This other Da Vinci's design was abandoned: the (fixed) dispersion imposed by the 'goose foot' pattern was often excessive and part of the salvo was wasted.
This
ingenious foreign improvement of the traditional organ gun suffered from being a mouth-loader.
Patent 05: Le Canon Naval Raccourci Surpuissant (CNRS)
Mouth loaded, since the recoil anyway pushes the piece back into the ship’s hull. At the cost of a slight reduction of range and accuracy, unimportant for a broadside piece, a gun of a given bore shoots cannonballs or grapeshots twice the normal weight. Thus a frigate can replace her 12pdr. with 24pdr., her 16pdr. with 32pdr. while keeping her displacement, velocity and manoeuvrability unchanged. A Ship of the Line can receive 64pdr. or even 72pdr. in her lower battery: such a Warship would dread naught from any existing fleet.
Patent 06: Le Canon-Obusier Nettoyeur (CON)
A special howitzer devised to shoot canister at a high rate of fire, either from the barrel’s mouth or as a spherical case exploding in the middle of the enemy troops.
A simple, rustic mouth-loader.
.
A
Monte-Cristan Lady, touring Eastern Europe (under the assumed name
Nikmoncha Susslapinosouzoff) to admire old Orthodox churches, heard that a Major Country that will not be named is currently devising a similar weapon (but without the capacity to shoot special anti-personal shells, only traditional caseshot). Obviously a clumsy and incomplete copy of our invention:
Investigateurs are currently searching for the source of the leak.
Patent 07: Le Canon-Obusier Carabine Culassier
Actually a whole family of pieces from 2pdr. to 48pdr.
Breech loading allows not only a far higher rate of fire, but also the barrel to be rifled, greatly increasing both range and accuracy. Without any exggeration, this innovative pattern of artilley piece will be more than equivalent to at least 2 ordinary guns of the next larger bore. Special optional ammunitions are also developped for this entirely new type of cannon, such as the Obus Ogival: a shell of sorts, filled with sharpened metal bits intermixed with black powder. Set to explode just above the head of the enemy, this new shell wil be more efficient than a cannonball against any non-enfilated target in the open. Another type of shell, the
Obus de Penetration Perforante (modele
OQ), has a very thick head of the hardest steel, to break through any wall, fortification or ship hull.
Patent 08: Le Canon de 7 Lieues (en Culassier)
Sir Issac Newton demonstrated that a high trajectory increases the range of a gun, with a maximun at an angle of ca. 45° (air resistance complicates the computation). Anyway, the brittleness of trunnions, and mainly of wooden carriages, has up to now restricted really high trajectories to bombs shot with a very low initial velocity. Besides, a mouth-loader would have to be lowered after each shot for reloading, then to be raised against at the appropriate angle.
Reliable breech-loading mechanisms (cf. Patent 07) do away with the later problem, while new metallurgy makes adamantine steel available for barrels, trunnions and even carriages.
Monte-Cristan engineers are confident that with the new steel alloys currently perfected, a breech-loaded rifled howitzer-gun large enough to reach a maximum range of 7 leagues (just like the step of the fabled ogre’s boots) will soon be operational. The ogival shell, filled with new explosives, will have a penetrating head of durasteel. It will break through the hull of any warship or the stonework of any casemate, to explode *inside* with devastating effect.
Since the target will generally be out of direct view, a system of fire control (e.g. from airboats –cf. Patents 19 & 20– associated with a chain of heliographs (included in Patent 20) for really long range fire, will be required for full effectiveness.
This Patent using the innovations protected by Patent 07, their simultaneous acquisition is compulsory.
Note:
the adaptation of such 'percussion fuses'
to smaller shells
-even rockets heads
and hand-
and blunderbuss-thrown grenades-
is currently underway: this series of animated paintings shows, among other marvels of military engineering, how lethal all explosive missiles will become with such contact detonators.
Patent 09: Armes Liees a la Chimie Offensive Naphtique (AL’CON)
Not only had Monte-Cristan chemists deciphered the recipe of the Greek Fire as recorded by
the Arabs in the early Middle-Ages, but advanced protocols of purification of the components provide a mixture with greatly improved properties.
A portable Ejacule-Feu Gregeois is under field trials, but Greek Fire can also be used in incendiary shells, bombs dropped from airboats (cf. Patents 19 & 20), and of course hand grenades.
In the way of hand grenades, Prof. Mairdocu-Machmizkol developed the Chinese
bombe à étrons ('shit bomb')
described in the
Huolongjing: the Patent for a
stunning nausea-gas one will be included in this set. The recipe was copied out by
Agrippine de Percheron, a young Monte-Cristan Lady of
great natural curiosity when visiting the Chinese Court (some say as
Soeur Maria Enculina del Rosario, in the dress of a
Holy Sister of the Order of St Jezebel
(see comment), other say wearing a false beard and masquerading as
Pia Iesus Meyawalpa, a Portuguese Jesuit). Without revealing too much, sulfur-enriched gunpowder is mixed with naphta and dried feces (cat’s best, pig’s good but human can do). While the military value of the
bombe à étrons is limited, if the container of the explosive / flammable mixture is of 'soft' material (modelling clay, hard wax...) wrapped in cloth the device is of great potential to disperse mobs and suppress riots; anyway during the course of the study a variant of the Basque
chistera was developed to throw hand grenades at longer ranges.
A Note On Rockets
The use of rockets as weapons is well known by Powers with interests in India and China. Equally known are their limitations, specially regarding accuracy. Monte-Cristan engineers nevertheless evaluated them –all required documents having been brought from China by the inquisitive Lady mentioned above. After a series of experiments, they reached the conclusion that rockets may be valuable weapons only if used massively, to saturate a target and pin the enemy under a terrifying shower of fire. They noticed that the demoralizing effect is greatly enhanced by fastening a whistle to the warhead, and determined the best model. Nonetheless it is their founded opinion that several other new weapon systems are generally more efficient. Yet , the extremely low weight of multiple rocket launchers is interesting when bulk is not a worry. Thus, they designed a Fire Support variant of the landing boat (Patent 13) filled with rocket launchers to be fired almost simultaneously: any opposition will be paralyzed. To counter the risk of chain explosion, each launcher works as a crude 1-shot
springal, the actual firing being delayed until the missile is at a safe distance. The initial speed increases the accuracy of the system, which paradoxically could have been a drawback here; computations and reduced scale experiments demonstrated that dispersion remains quite sufficient for a saturation system.
The same system of delayed rockets shot by some kind of springal / crossbow would be specially adapted to the armement of aircrafts, being far lighter than guns. But we are trying to adapt it also to
cavalry. A 1-shot springal strapped under the belly of the horse would shot a delayed rocket a little before the impact of a charge. Also not to frighten the charging horses, the 'howling banshee' whistle attached to it would be unstoppered by the firing of the rocket. The explosive head would be loaded with fireworks spreading laterally. Two difficulties: a secure yet easy trigger, and how to assess the optimal timing, so that the target is still in full disorder when the charge hits, but the charging horses are not deterred.
Seemingly a foreign country is considering batteries of simple rocket launchers for land warfare: our experts are sceptical, except as a substitute for traditional artillery in *very* difficult terrain, where neither guns larger than an Amusette nor mortars heavier than the very light Coheorn could follow the infantry -specially in hills and mountains, rockets allowing indirect, even counterslope, fire.
