So I did a bit of extra busywork over the past week so that I could slip in some time to shoot the handgonne! I will be away from the computer next week SO it was a now or never thing and I wanna talk about the results as I thought it was really interesting


But first here is the link to the videos of the gonne being shot!

https://bsky.app/profile/thehobopat...../3lmibevfpkc2v

I couldn't get roundballs for the .75 calibre gonne so instead I shot it like a shotgun with shot, as its a smoothbore it worked wonderfully in that. I spent a fair bit of time out in the desert firing it with 100 grains of black powder per shot. I had 3 types of shot

.45 calibre lead roundballs I fired as shot, they performed strangely the worse! but did hit with a lot of energy

.32 calibre lead roundballs I fired as shot, functionally a sort of 000 buck. They performed overall the best.

and .25 calibre clay roundballs that weren't too bad! Unexpectedly solid in terms of their power and spread

Again these were always loaded in with 100 grains of black powders, with a patch over the powder and over the shot.

I fired at targets at 30 meters, alas I did not have a pattern board so instead it was a variety of small cans and bottles that I was able to bring with me. But its accuracy at 30 meters was better than I had anticipated. I missed the first shot, but every shot thereafter was blowing up cans and bottles. Likewise even the clay shot was more than enough to transfer a lot of force.
Aiming was not too bad as long as I had it on my shoulder, though not stellar either. The recoil was also far more manageable than what I had anticipated, even with 100 grains of black powder. Overall it exceeded my expectations for shootability and accuracy.

It is also admittingly a bit clunky, but not so much so as to make it exceedingly difficult to use.


You may notice the weird ignition though

As the wind was too much for my matchcord, which kept getting blown out in the wind. I turned to an electronic candle lighter which... worked very well! As soon as the electric arc hit the powder it ignited.

Now drekir don't have electric lighters, but they do have access to methods of ignition that are a lot more convenient and tolerant to outside conditions than burning rope. Things like Fire/elemental chert or boiling/shocking bronze could be comparable in the sense that they can be safely stored away while the user loads, and don't require nearly as much care as a burning rope or piece of tinder. something I'll touch on shortly.

Will say felt weird using an electronic candle lighter to fire a 14th century firearm though. But again it worked well enough!

As for how this relates to the lore of the DragonScape

Guns do get an early start in the dragonscape, appearing in small pockets as early as the middle awakening. But they wouldn't really spread until after the Awakening, during the onset of the broader "Quiet Age". Such weapons mostly were made by specific, industrious metalwroking tribes and chiefdoms, with industrial bases that would then spread outwards through trade into other communities.

While gonnes are pretty clunky in our timeline, thanks to the easy access to elementized chert and metal, they aren't really that difficult to use in the DragonScape. Pieces of stone or metal that exude electric or thermal energy can be easily contained and handled, and would likely be able to reliably ignite and fire such handcannons without much of the fuss, inconsistency, or trickiness that burning pieces of rope or tinder requires.

when you can just keep a rod of perpetually electrified bronze in a rubber sheath, wrapped in a rubber handle, its very easy to simply store while the user loads, pull out when they're ready to fire and shove it into the touchhole of such gonnes. This magically nice convenience on its own in my opinion would make these a lot more plausible for a broader range of uses then the niche application of our own history. Perhaps even in things like hunting! Reliable ignition is really the only thing holding back such weapons and with that out of the way, I have a feeling they could really get popular.

Of course, the limitation is the complexity of manufacture. Drek and orm guns would have to be made of bronze, and the degree of pretty complicated bronze casting, shaping, polishing and tooling needed to make a complete gun would limit who could make them. Even if they are just a tube, getting that much bronze into a mold large enough to make a useful gonne is easier said than done for most draconic communities.

Though be it some industrious tribal groups that make them, or small chiefdoms using them to arm their warriors, they would certainly spread through trade and exchange over time. They wouldn't be universal but I do imagine a lot of dragons would know of them, and a good number would have them. But even amongst groups that have them, a den of 30 drekir may only have 1-3 guns, So they would never really become more common than the broader number of other weapons employed for hunting and warfare.

For hunting I could see them used for hunting wyrms, small fast animals, etc. in which they may be employees as shotgonnes, shooting shot to try and hit small moving targets. But there is nothing to say that village or culture of drekir wouldn't use guns for larger game. As while the range and accuracy are not comparable to modern guns, they can still definitely hit things at a distance and hit them with a lot of force.

I wouldn't push em past 40 meters though. It's a short, smoothbore barrel, not a melee weapon by any means but definitely not the sort of weapon to hit game from over a 100 meters away.

Anywho yeah, be well!