Greetings! I have been lurking on these forums for a couple years now and never had anything to post about, but I figured since I'm about to run an Eberron campaign I ought to bring my question to the community on this forum.
My basic question is this:
The Warforged were emancipated by the Treaty of Thronehold, which I can fully understand, but what of their more dimwitted forbears the Warforged Titans? It doesn't seem to make much sense to me that they would also be emancipated, seeing as how they could very well be a danger to many people given their limited capacity for understanding. Were many of them built before the Warforged proper were constructed? And if so, what happened to those which were not destroyed during the war?
This also leads me to a similar question having to do with constructs in general on Eberron (Khorvaire specifically, since I don't know much about the other continents aside from a who-lives-there and their relationship to Khorvaire sort of knowledge). I was wondering, with such a high degree of magical industry (I know it's not quite industry proper, but I couldn't think of a better word to describe it), wouldn't it have been normal during the Last War for the 5 Nations to have used constructs extensively in their armies, even before the Warforged were created?
Concerning magical industry (I would call it that), no, constructs were not, by and large, used. They were simply too expensive to deploy in the mass quantities that would be needed. In Forge of War, it mentions that something like a dozen Warforged, if not more, could be produced for the same cost as a Shield Guardian. Furthermore, due to the sentience of the Warforged, they are better soldiers. You can send a squad of Warforged to guard a bridge, and they will guard it, until a huge enemy force comes. Then, they will either withdraw, sabotage the bridge and withdraw, or withdraw and conduct intelligence-gathering operations to ascertain the probable size, intent, and composition of enemy forces.
A construct, on the other hand, would guard the bridge....and then get overwhelmed by that enemy force. Also probably wouldn't get word back to the main friendly force as to the bunch of bad guys, either.
Concerning 'forged Titans, I doubt they would have been emancipated, simply because I don't think they are truly sapient. Sentient, self-aware, sure, but sapient? No. Warforged proper are, though.
That's what I suspected, and that leads me to the other part of the question; were many of the titans built, and do any of the 5 Nations (likely; I know there may not be any literature on this) still have any in their possession? Would they have been dismantled?
Concerning magical industry (I would call it that), no, constructs were not, by and large, used. They were simply too expensive to deploy in the mass quantities that would be needed. In Forge of War, it mentions that something like a dozen Warforged, if not more, could be produced for the same cost as a Shield Guardian. Furthermore, due to the sentience of the Warforged, they are better soldiers. You can send a squad of Warforged to guard a bridge, and they will guard it, until a huge enemy force comes. Then, they will either withdraw, sabotage the bridge and withdraw, or withdraw and conduct intelligence-gathering operations to ascertain the probable size, intent, and composition of enemy forces.
A construct, on the other hand, would guard the bridge....and then get overwhelmed by that enemy force. Also probably wouldn't get word back to the main friendly force as to the bunch of bad guys, either.
I suppose, then, that the overall concept of using significant quantities of constructs is sound, it's just that the logistics of it in Eberron don't work well enough for it to be practical. I would think, though, that under different circumstances it would work well (if you had the capacity for spamming cheap constructs at the enemy). I am wondering why it was felt that it was needed to make the warforged truly sapient. Without getting into the philosophy of intelligence, doing the things you described does not require sapience to accomplish. Something along the lines of the intelligence of the Warforged Titans would be more than sufficient, if human commanders are present to give orders. A truly sapient construct (like the Warforged proper) is far more capable of handling things that humans once did (even strategy and command!), and so I'd think they'd be used in that way rather than as foot soldiers.
That's only because I'm assuming that it's more difficult to make a sapient construct than something a little less intelligent (like the 'forged Titans).
Edit: Actually, I could see something as intelligent as the Warforged proper being used for special operations or any operations requiring more intelligence than simply "take that hill". Now that you've stated how cheap the Warforged were, I am wondering exactly how many Warforged existed as a percentage of the total armed forces participating in the war.
That's what I suspected, and that leads me to the other part of the question; were many of the titans built, and do any of the 5 Nations (likely; I know there may not be any literature on this) still have any in their possession? Would they have been dismantled?
Any remaining Warforged Titans are hiding in previously undiscovered dungeons waiting to ambush PCs of course!
Any remaining Warforged Titans are hiding in previously undiscovered dungeons waiting to ambush PCs of course!
Sshh! I want my players to discover that the hard way.
Furthermore, due to the sentience of the Warforged, they are better soldiers. You can send a squad of Warforged to guard a bridge, and they will guard it, until a huge enemy force comes. Then, they will either withdraw, sabotage the bridge and withdraw, or withdraw and conduct intelligence-gathering operations to ascertain the probable size, intent, and composition of enemy forces.
A construct, on the other hand, would guard the bridge....and then get overwhelmed by that enemy force. Also probably wouldn't get word back to the main friendly force as to the bunch of bad guys, either.
I had another thought about this point. The problem with this sort of thinking, and discounting simpler constructs altogether, is that people often take an "all or nothing" position. If the constructs can't do everything that a soldier can do, then they are useless.
Except this position overlooks some very clever ways that one could use dumb constructs to at least supplement their forces (this provides, of course, that the cost issue is resolved; I for one always assumed that simpler, less intelligent constructs would actually have been cheaper than the 'forged because of their simplicity). Try not to think of constructs as soldiers, but rather as smart weapons. They don't need to fulfill as sophisticated a function as you described above (such duties would obviously be assigned to people or warforged proper). You could use them in an assault, to go up the ladders first, or put them in front of your troops in the line of battle to soften up the enemy before the real fighting begins, any number of uses can be found for non-intelligent constructs that would have dramatic effects on the battlefield. A construct doesn't have to defeat a squad of soldiers; it only has to inflict enough casualties so that they are weak when your main force comes in.
(Warning: I'm a military historian, so I kinda....wrote a lot.)
I quickly paged through Forge of War, and I looked at the Cannith and Warforged chapters. I couldn't find exactly what I was looking for, but I *believe* one of the Eberron books stated that 368 Titans were constructed, but only 74 survived the war. No breakdown by nation, of course. However, the great thing about being a DM is that numbers like that are always subject to revision. Sharn doesn't have 200,000 people; it just has "crowded." There aren't just 74 Titans left over; there are "enough for a megalomaniac to pose a significant threat to the world."
Concerning command, that is it entirely. Titans still required human handlers, like golems, but their advantage was that they could adapt to circumstances far more readily than golems could. Similarly, Warforged being truly sapient devolves command to a lower, and thus more flexible, level. In the example of, "take that hill", Warforged proper can, by using their individual judgement, decide the specific tactic to utalize; fire-and-movement, frontal assault, infiltration, envelopment, and so on. Furthermore, in their "upbringing", they were "raised" to be soldiers, and thus, trained how to fight not only as individuals, but also as a unit.
A unit of 'forged, thus, is more capable than a unit of conscripts. A "green" unit of 'forged are trained about as well as most units that have "seen the elephant" and experienced combat. Logistically, they don't need to be fed, and their wounded, since they probably won't bleed out, can be taken care of by organic assets, rather than having to be sent to rear area hospitals.
That training bears special notice here. As I said earlier, a unit of 'forged can pick the tactic they will use to "take that hill," rather than relying on extremely blunt tactics or needing an officer above their unit to give them their plan, which may or may not take all the strengths and weaknesses of the 'forged into account. Again, the Warforged can "take that hill" using whatever tactics they think will work, but when they have taken that hill, and are defending it, their intelligence allows them to still contribute to the battle. A 'forged on sentry duty may notice an exposed enemy flank, relay it to his CO, who will then, seeing an opportunity, order a quick sally on the exposed flank. A unit that lacks the intelligence of the warforged, though, will not be able to pull this off.
The last thing is, though, that Warforged don't need low-level officers, which means that those guys who would be commanding Warforged units now command other units. Officers are always in short supply, so a unit of 'forged that has their own LT allows the LT that would otherwise command those warforged to command another unit. Combine this with the lowered logistical footprint of Warforged for bonus points. As Warforged are concentrated in larger and larger units, this effect becomes far more profound. If we take the rough Brelish TO&E on page 49 of Forges of War, it gives us three squads (each lead by a Sergeant, and NCOs are always short in war too) to the platoon, four platoons to the company, and three companies to the regiment. In terms of officers, that gives us a Colonel (commanding the regiment), three Majors (commanding the companies), 12 Captains (commanding the platoons), and 36 Sergeants (commanding the squads). This totals 52 Officers and NCOs, which could represent a significant drain on the pool of Officers and NCOs of an army. A Warforged unit, though, will need none of them, because the officers and NCOs come with the unit. Furthermore, the 'Forged officers, even the brand-spanking-new ones, are not cherries. They are trained as well as their "men" in their duties. Competent, professional officers are one of the things that allows an army to succeed, and Warforged units, by their very nature, have those. Armies raised by the Nations may or may not have competent officers and NCOs simply by the very nature of their mobilization system and training systems. Warforged units, though, will be adequately led and commanded by their own. Once they go outside 'forged units, things might get a bit dicey, but remember, Aundair did promote a Warforged to the rank of General.
Now, even if the Brelish regiment is a bit light on manpower, also consider the logistical needs of feeding that regiment. A case of 12 cans of Campbell's Chunky Soup weighs, according to this Amazon.com page, 14.2 pounds. Let us assume that all these Brelish soldiers would need is three cans of soup a day. Assuming my math is right, the 52 Officers and NCOs lead a total of 360 grunts, giving the regiment a strength of 412 officers, NCOs, and enlisted (see what I mean about the regiment being light? 412 men is a lightweight battalion). Nevertheless, every day, these 412 men would require (412 x 3) 1,236 cans of soup to feed them. This corresponds to (1,236 / 12) 103 cases of soup each day, with a total weight of (103 x 14.2) 1,462.6 pounds. So, for a SINGLE DAY'S worth of rations, a regiment (admittedly one that is too small due to the writer's lack of knowledge) requires practically three-quarters of a ton of food that is magically nourishing. To keep them fed for 30 days, they need more than 21 tons of soup. This is, of course, in addition to repair materials, mail, ammunition resupply, and all the other stuff that a fighting force needs.
Just by virtue of not eating, Warforged take 21 tons per month off the logistical network. Plus, they are trained, battle-hardened, and capable of intelligent independent action. Given the mass numbers of them, the Nations could put them exactly where they need them to: on the front lines. Special operations don't win wars or battles. They help a hell of a lot, sure, but pitched battles are, by and large, what does it. Warforged, by their innate experience, efficient organic command, and small logistical footprint, contribute a great deal to winning those pitched battles.
As for how many warforged were created, I can't tell you. I tried to calculate once, but irritatingly enough, the numbers in the ECS didn't always stipulate 'forged. If you want a quick-and-dirty number, "Lots, but not enough to significantly outnumber any race."
edit after your above post: Oh, I'm not disagreeing with you on the utility of constructs. The simple fact is that living constructs are more flexible and adaptable, which is really really important given the nature of the battlefield. I'll let other people talk now, though. I need to take a shower.
So what if a fully sentient and sapient Titan would appear? That would cause a stir and discussion and might even call into question the rest of the Titans. In effect they could have a spokesman.
What if sapient Titans were discovered imprisoned? Would House Cannith be forced to free them? Where would they live? There may even be one particularly bloodthirsty one hidden in a deep cell of Dreadhold. Could he be charged for war crimes?
I love military history, organizational structure, logistics, etc... and I love even more extrapolating the bizarre effects on warfare and society that some fantasy weapon systems can create. I totally agree with everything you said about the Warforged and their inherent superiority to normal soldiers as well as non-sentient constructs. The type of forces I envisioned would have Warforged as the main fighting force; since they count as real soldiers in my book rather than the equivalent of a guided missile with feet and melee weapons, which is how I envisioned non-sentient constructs being used.
My main argument (which I guess wasn't really an argument per se, but rather an observation made in disbelief) was the bit about Warforged being cheaper to create than non-sentient constructs. It just strikes me as very much an artificial dampening of capabilities to say that a more complex weapon system is simpler to create than a less complex weapon system; it flies in the face of reason, as it were.
The way I envisioned warfare on Khorvaire (specifically) being waged would involve (before the invention of the Warforged and their cousins the 'forged Titans) large numbers of normal troops arrayed in a conventional battle order (there really wouldn't be very many spellcasters as primary combat troops, simply because of their expense and rarity; they'd be in important support roles), with even larger numbers of non-sentient constructs being used the way an artillery barrage might occur in real life during WWI. You throw tons of these constructs at the enemy, trying to inflict as many casualties as you can on them to "soften them up". One of two things happen: A) The enemy can't sustain the casualties being inflicted, and their force is broken by the onslaught of dumb-brute constructs, or B) The attacking force runs out of constructs and the main phase of the battle begins.
I suppose, for this to work, you'd have to be able to output very large numbers of these essentially "disposable" constructs, with the occasional titanic war golem capable of battering down fortress walls. The question, for me, comes down to productive capacity. If warfare were conducted in this manner, I think victory in a long war would come down to whoever had golem superiority, as it were. At least, that's how I'd run it.
Perhaps I could project this into the future for my plans to re-ignite the Last War. Such a method would be rather revolutionary, I think.
Edit- Further Thoughts:
As an expansion of this idea, I'd say I came up with an even better one, which is more in line with the "disposable construct" concept I'm describing. Sure, you could build tons of cheap golems to fight in melee against an opponent, but considering their disposable nature, you could just go for broke and make them suicide golems (with explosives built into them). Then they come much closer to the guided missile or artillery barrage ideal I had before. Even a very small, fast golem with minimal armor protection designed to explode once it reaches it's target would be ridiculously effective en masse.
I think that better illustrates the concept I'm going for, so you see that the type of operations I imagine them carrying out would be far closer to the types of operations carried out by modern robots, not science fiction robot warriors who are just-as-good or better than human soldiers. Like I said, smart weapon not artificial soldier. The Warforged and the constructs I'm thinking of definitely occupy completely different roles in the military force of a nation. Warforged Titans occupy a middle ground (and I like my gigantic smasher brute to be only semi-intelligent, since his only job is to smash and follow orders).
Speaking of Forge of War, I just came across the Warforged Raptor (one of the weirdest things) which were created not long after the Titans. In the "Warforged Raptor Lore" it says House Cannith was contemplating creating sentient (sapient) versions and rumors suggest a few were created. It wouldn't be a stretch to say they tried the same thing with Titans.
So what if a fully sentient and sapient Titan would appear? That would cause a stir and discussion and might even call into question the rest of the Titans. In effect they could have a spokesman.
What if sapient Titans were discovered imprisoned? Would House Cannith be forced to free them? Where would they live? There may even be one particularly bloodthirsty one hidden in a deep cell of Dreadhold. Could he be charged for war crimes?
I think a sapient 'forged Titan would be a terrifying concept. Me likey
So what if a fully sentient and sapient Titan would appear? That would cause a stir and discussion and might even call into question the rest of the Titans. In effect they could have a spokesman.
Taking my above suggestion, I guess it'd be a curiosity like an intelligent talking dog.
Not too amazing in a magical world, might give the papers something to talk about and hey, maybe you can train it as an architect and beat it's war-elephant-killing axe into a stone chisel.
But unless the others show a similar spark of social ability they're stuck doing heavy lifting until the next war begins.
This is another question I have. Were the Creation Forges ordered destroyed because the Warforged represented the possibility of an insane arms race between the remaining Nations? I guess I can't really think of any other reason. I am of the opinion that even barely sentient war constructs like the Titans are a game changer in comparison to more traditional weapons in a premodern setting, and so fully sentient war constructs would be even more unbalancing to the continent's stability. Is there any literature dealing with the effects the Warforged had on the way wars were fought, considering they were invented some 30 years before the end of the war? Is that enough time for them to have a dramatic effect on the battlefield? Were they only being produced in large numbers near the very end of the war, and therefore their full advantages were unable to be realized?
With regards to the warforged being excellent soldiers with the potential for autonomour decision making and warfighting, I agree, but there is another wrinkle to consider. What about the 'forged commanding officers (the fleshy ones)?
I mean, here are a bunch of metal soldiers your country bought from Cannith. They are big, trained for war, and exhibit a degree of self-awareness and intelligence that you have never seen in a construct, and probably find unsettling. They don't eat, don't sleep, and exist pretty much solely to fight. On top of that, you know that Cannith is selling these same troops to your enemies.
How do you know that Cannith never gave these things a switch to change their loyalties to the highest bidder? Or to use them for the house's own nefarious purposes? The 'forged are capable of operating independently, but do you really want them occupying a critical position if you're not sure whether you can completely trust them? How do you know if the 'forged would obey an order to fight more of their own in combat? Can you be completely sure that they will never malfunction and start mistakenly attacking your own troops?
That's not even getting into the tension of whether these constructs are able to completely replace flesh and blood soldiers. Many officers would abhor that idea, and may do anything they can to minimize the role and performance of the warforged under their command to avoid such an eventuality.
My 2 cents, as usual.
With regards to the warforged being excellent soldiers with the potential for autonomour decision making and warfighting, I agree, but there is another wrinkle to consider. What about the 'forged commanding officers (the fleshy ones)?
I mean, here are a bunch of metal soldiers your country bought from Cannith. They are big, trained for war, and exhibit a degree of self-awareness and intelligence that you have never seen in a construct, and probably find unsettling. They don't eat, don't sleep, and exist pretty much solely to fight. On top of that, you know that Cannith is selling these same troops to your enemies.
How do you know that Cannith never gave these things a switch to change their loyalties to the highest bidder? Or to use them for the house's own nefarious purposes? The 'forged are capable of operating independently, but do you really want them occupying a critical position if you're not sure whether you can completely trust them? How do you know if the 'forged would obey an order to fight more of their own in combat? Can you be completely sure that they will never malfunction and start mistakenly attacking your own troops?
That's not even getting into the tension of whether these constructs are able to completely replace flesh and blood soldiers. Many officers would abhor that idea, and may do anything they can to minimize the role and performance of the warforged under their command to avoid such an eventuality.
My 2 cents, as usual.
These are all very valid concerns in the beginning, but they obviously wouldn't have much bearing on whether Warforged were actually used (since we know they were). That just highlights some of the many extra tensions surrounding warforged that would contribute toward discrimination. Might make for some nice anecdotes about experiences during the war, but I think most of those concerns would have been alleviated in the three decades that warforged existed on the battlefields. Remember, 30 years is a long time during a war. In that time, those officers who first experienced the warforged presence on the battlefield are now (if they have survived) senior officers and generals, and their current commanders have always known a war with warforged.
As to whether these were actual occurrences at any point, I'd have to say probably not if warforged were continued in the arsenals of the 5 Nations, or else their use would have ceased long before the end of the war. That kind of reliability is part of the reason they would have been successful in the first place. They would have to have been able to destroy other warforged, and Cannith couldn't have done the switcheroo that you suggest more than once before everyone ceased using warforged. That would just be bad business. In fact, if anything, that would have been a selling point in Cannith's competition with House Deneith's and House Tharashk's own mercenary packages. Warforged will not refuse to fight because of clan loyalties. Goblins or Orcs might.
Yeah, I meant that those suspicions are just that: suspicions. It clearly never happened, or at least not that anyone knows of. But while 30 years is a long time, when it comes to prejudice and mistrust, it can be no time at all. We only have to look at the real world to see that.
I think this would be especially prevalent among the wider population, who didn't fight with warforged and knows them mostly through stories. They were made by house Cannith right? The house that makes all of the war machines and sells them to the highest bidder? I've heard some dark stories about those people. Think they are smarter than anyone else. I've even heard that they had something to do with the Day of Mourning! How are we supposed to let war machines that they constructed near our children?
Even in a normally laid back country like Breland, I can see a popular movement against integration with the warforged, and against allowing warforged to hold office or rank in the military. Prejudice reinforces prejudice, and all you need is enough people willing to believe the stories for them to propagate.
Anyway, sorry to derail the thread.
EDIT: I think some of the commanders who were most opposed to the use of warforged to replace regular soldiers might be feeling rather justified these days, vis a vis the Lord of Blades and his ilk. Their worst nightmare must be a revolution of the war machines they saw in action against their enemies.
In the "Warforged Raptor Lore" it says House Cannith was contemplating creating sentient (sapient) versions and rumors suggest a few were created. It wouldn't be a stretch to say they tried the same thing with Titans.
In the Inquisitives novel The Darkwood Mask, I established that one of Cannith's hidden/secret forgeholds was located in Karrnath. Known as the Orphanage among house members, its precise goal was to make smarter warforged titans. Sure, they could produce regular warforged, but their real work was in not giving up on the titans' potential.
Here's part of the prologue.
Rejkar One [the name given to this titan] stares at me as I work, aventurine eyes uncomprehending. Over the last eight hours, I have watched their translucency increase and an almost imperceptible green light grow from within. Both are indicative of the sentience struggling to take hold within the artificial mind.
I labor to give the titan more.
I clean the shallow runes along the ocular cavities with a small brush. Between the gaps in its mask, I touch the darkwood fibers to test their resilience. These I have already dusted with trace amounts of ground Irian crystal. Routine maintenance is vital at this stage.
I feel strangely outside myself this day, somewhat detached as I explore this moment. Perhaps it is simply the importance of what I am doing and the perspective it gives me. I hear the shivering roar of the forge behind the titan, but I have learned to mute the distraction. We all have. Today the forgemaster and his team have halted their usual work to produce a lot of thirty standard units. The demands of the world outside have increased, the need for more manpower dire.
Granted, in the story, working to increase the warforged mind (be it titan or latter generation 'forged) has deadly consequences. 
So personally, I find the idea of some smarter warforged titans to be an excellent hook for adventures.
Yeah, I meant that those suspicions are just that: suspicions. It clearly never happened, or at least not that anyone knows of. But while 30 years is a long time, when it comes to prejudice and mistrust, it can be no time at all. We only have to look at the real world to see that.
I don't dispute this at all. I've always thought that the Warforged had a hard time in normal life. Even the most liberal and understanding of people would be uncomfortable around them, if only because of their purpose as war machines.
I think this would be especially prevalent among the wider population, who didn't fight with warforged and knows them mostly through stories. They were made by house Cannith right? The house that makes all of the war machines and sells them to the highest bidder? I've heard some dark stories about those people. Think they are smarter than anyone else. I've even heard that they had something to do with the Day of Mourning! How are we supposed to let war machines that they constructed near our children?
I'm going to use that later.
Even in a normally laid back country like Breland, I can see a popular movement against integration with the warforged, and against allowing warforged to hold office or rank in the military. Prejudice reinforces prejudice, and all you need is enough people willing to believe the stories for them to propagate.Anyway, sorry to derail the thread.
EDIT: I think some of the commanders who were most opposed to the use of warforged to replace regular soldiers might be feeling rather justified these days, vis a vis the Lord of Blades and his ilk. Their worst nightmare must be a revolution of the war machines they saw in action against their enemies
That's not too far from what I plan on having. I was going to have a warforged insurgency going on in Breland coming from the Mournland, both directed by the Lord of Blades and by groups of warforged inspired by his example.
Not to digress, but:In the "Warforged Raptor Lore" it says House Cannith was contemplating creating sentient (sapient) versions and rumors suggest a few were created. It wouldn't be a stretch to say they tried the same thing with Titans.
In the Inquisitives novel The Darkwood Mask, I established that one of Cannith's hidden/secret forgeholds was located in Karrnath. Known as the Orphanage among house members, its precise goal was to make smarter warforged titans. Sure, they could produce regular warforged, but their real work was in not giving up on the titans' potential.
Here's part of the prologue.Rejkar One [the name given to this titan] stares at me as I work, aventurine eyes uncomprehending. Over the last eight hours, I have watched their translucency increase and an almost imperceptible green light grow from within. Both are indicative of the sentience struggling to take hold within the artificial mind.
I labor to give the titan more.
I clean the shallow runes along the ocular cavities with a small brush. Between the gaps in its mask, I touch the darkwood fibers to test their resilience. These I have already dusted with trace amounts of ground Irian crystal. Routine maintenance is vital at this stage.I feel strangely outside myself this day, somewhat detached as I explore this moment. Perhaps it is simply the importance of what I am doing and the perspective it gives me. I hear the shivering roar of the forge behind the titan, but I have learned to mute the distraction. We all have. Today the forgemaster and his team have halted their usual work to produce a lot of thirty standard units. The demands of the world outside have increased, the need for more manpower dire.
Granted, in the story, working to increase the warforged mind (be it titan or latter generation 'forged) has deadly consequences.
So personally, I find the idea of some smarter warforged titans to be an excellent hook for adventures.
I guess I've always been an outsider on this issue (and I'm not really debating the utility of such scenarios as story hooks), but I've always thought that having sapient constructs wouldn't be as popular or as effective as war machines as having merely sentient constructs.
I know this flies against conventional wisdom, but being interested as I am in military robotics (and don't start throwing around semantic arguments about modern technology vs "magic"; a construct is a construct is a construct, no matter how you make them) I've always had it in my head that people often confuse the terms sapience and sentience. Sapience is wisdom, or evaluative intelligence like human beings possess, the capacity to form moral judgements and second order desires. Sentience is just the ability to feel or perceive (forgive my foray into the philosophy of artificial intelligence for a moment).
You don't want a soldier who forms moral judgements or is capable of introspection; you want a soldier you follows orders strictly, and has the capacity to adapt to changing circumstances and to think tactically. Neither of the latter two qualities require sapience, strictly. Hell, that kind of autonomy in a construct soldier can be a liability, as they may begin to object to the orders they've been given (as one example). This ability for machines to outwit human beings in tactical scenarios has been demonstrated repeatedly in our own world through Chess matches. Basically, so long as the construct has the right amount of information about the battlefield (Chess is a perfect information scenario), he should be able to be just as tactically proficient as any human soldier (given the same information; this is a big qualifier so think about it before anyone jumps down my throat).
So, the whole idea of building the Warforged proper as fully sapient beings seems to indicate to me that they were not originally designed with warfare in mind (and I believe I even read this somewhere official; correct me if I'm wrong). I'm not sure how intelligent the 'forged Titans are said to be, so I can't speak to that specifically, but a straight-up dumb machine made specifically for solving tactical problems would be more than capable, even preferable (to me) for war.
I'm sure this'll spark either a huge debate about machine intelligence, or a flame war of some kind. I guess I just wanted to throw this out there anyway.
Heh, I don't know about a flame war, and without even getting into your actual argument , I can see that discussion happening somewhere high up in a military command, or within Cannith itself. The argument doesn't even need to be right, it just needs to be plausible enough that your PCs buy that someone, somewhere, decided to make an army of minblessly obedient constructs because of it.
You know, I can even see the LoBster speaking this line. Why should the warforged be made in the mortal races' image? What do they need individuality and feelings for? Has it ever helped them? Do the rest of the races let them live as sentient, free, respected beings amongst them? Has the presence of individuality brought peace or happiness to them? Perhaps it's time to shed individuality and be reforged into a single race, with a single purpose and a single will. He could be using the Mournland as a base of operations for birthing this new race.
Of course, this line of thinking could lead to the conclusion that the titans were the superior weapon as well, or any of the other ideas floating around this thread.
Heh, I don't know about a flame war,
I guess I'm just used to a different kind of forum. Some people are very dedicated to the idea that machines cannot replace men in any way.
and without even getting into your actual argument , I can see that discussion happening somewhere high up in a military command, or within Cannith itself. The argument doesn't even need to be right, it just needs to be plausible enough that your PCs buy that someone, somewhere, decided to make an army of minblessly obedient constructs because of it.
It absolutely would, as it would in a real world military. If you're going to replace soldiers with machines, you replace them with machines, not with machines that act like soldiers. It's as simple as that. Other than the logistical advantages of machines over men, the primary advantage is their perfect discipline. Sapience is an impediment to perfect discipline.
You know, I can even see the LoBster speaking this line. Why should the warforged be made in the mortal races' image? What do they need individuality and feelings for? Has it ever helped them? Do the rest of the races let them live as sentient, free, respected beings amongst them? Has the presence of individuality brought peace or happiness to them? Perhaps it's time to shed individuality and be reforged into a single race, with a single purpose and a single will. He could be using the Mournland as a base of operations for birthing this new race.
I'm not sure if he'd take this line (unless his goal was actually selfish and he just wanted a mindless army of constructs vis-a-vis his "enemy"). Mostly because the lack of sapience means that the warforged can no longer feel that an injustice has been committed against them.
Of course, this line of thinking could lead to the conclusion that the titans were the superior weapon as well, or any of the other ideas floating around this thread
I'm fairly certain that if the war to restart, because of characters like the Lord of Blades, the Titans would definitely be seen as the superior war machine for exactly the reasons I've stated.
However, I think you're right about the Warforged not originally being created as the perfect soldiers. I believe the man responsible for the "modern" warforged was actually excoriated from his house (Merrix d'Cannith, Baron of Cannith South, is his grandson, I think). I think it was mentioned that he was specifically looking for sapience (or "sentience" being misued to mean sapience). Not to mention that in the novels, Merrix himself constructed, in secret, rather... specifically sapient models...
As for whether or not machines can develop sapience in RL, that is a whole other discussion and one that has little place on these boards ;) It is a fantasy game. Everything can happen we want to happen ;)
Now, for the benefits of warforged, we have no idea how much their upkeep costs ;) How easy are they to repair? How often do the wooden and metal parts need to be replaced? The books don't pay much attention to it, but in 4E upkeep is handwaved for all races since it is not part of the usual game. But if you ran a Dark Sun game, and you would allow a warforged, wouldn't you implement some kind of upkeep similarly difficult to acquire water and food?
Of course, famous SF writers also write books fill with stories about situations in which sapience actually is a good thing even for soldiers. For example, empathy might be a hindrance in a fight, but at the same time, it is a great boon tactically and strategetically. Similarly, fighting to the death for an apparent lost cause might look odd from a logical point view, but sometimes that fanatism gives an unpredicted edge or has unpredictable long term concequences. And of course, there are ample of examples in stories where using your own morale judgement lead to much better results. Of course, for each good example, there is a story that proves that sapience for soldiers is a bad thing ;) So while I have no problems with accepting that sentient machines might be a good thing from a military perspective, I feel that you also need sapient ones.
The problem with this whole argument (and I'm in an argumentative mood, so don't mistake this for hostility) is that you're thinking of machines as soldiers, when they are not. A war golem, animated siege machine, etc... are all weapons of war, not warriors. They are used by soldiers; they don't replace them. Saying that a construct is a soldier is akin to saying that a soldier's weapon replaces his bare hands. It doesn't replace them; it augments them. All war constructs do (in my view) is push the job of the soldier from the tactical sphere to the operational or strategic spheres. It frees him from worrying about combat and allows him to decide bigger questions, in the same way that an autonomous MULE (a real device being developed by the US Army; it's an unmanned ground vehicle meant to carry a unit's gear) frees the soldier from having to worry about carrying 120lbs of equipment.
And this brings me to why I think building sapient constructs is a poor plan, or at least a waste of resources. When you build a sapient machine, you aren't building a machine at all; you're creating life. In such a circumstance, the Warforged (in this example) are little more than slave soldiers, and you ultimately cannot trust slave soldiers. They will either turn on you, or develop moral objections, or become psychologically exhausted from fighting. Yes, the Warforged are physically incapable of exhaustion, but that won't stop them from questioning the reasons why they fight. I would rather have tens of thousands of dumb, barely sentient, unbelievably strong, 10 foot tall monsters who are only capable of understanding the basics of "Go to that wall over there and smash it down" than building full replacement soldiers; I don't want another species making my complex moral or policy decisions for my people because war is fundamentally a social interaction. Dumb constructs are indisputably not people. If I need those complicated decisions on the battlefield, well, then I guess there is still a place for real soldiers in war.
Oh, and to those of you who think that the level of intelligence of a person is necessary to win battles, it isn't. Overwhelming force, if directed in a strategically, or operationally, intelligent manner will always defeat tactical brilliance over the long haul. And maybe that's what this difference in opinion comes down to. I always approach war in it's most extreme form, where a nation's industrial capacity is thrown into the fight, where all bets are off and there are no rules. In such a situation, construct spamming would win. The outcome of the war would come down to who can produce them more quickly and who directs them toward the better targets.
As for your titan example, while I agree with you it is only up to a point. The problem lies in directing those forces with due strategy and operational intelligent manner. The more direction required, the easier it is for the enemy to disrupt said direction and the bigger the effect of that disruption will be. As for the long haul, only when the direct consequences of loosing in the short term does not significantly hurt your side to produce those things more quickly or your ability to direct them to the right target (whether directly by the loss of facilities and people or indirectly by a loss of willingness of the people at home to support the cause).
Having said that, I agree that sapience was an unintended side effect. I am sure Cannith aimed for sentience. It would also not surprise me that they only learned much later that warforged were actually sapient.
Whether or not I was thinking that machines would replace the soldiers is besides the point, it was you who hinted so when you said that "If you're going to replace soldiers with machines, you replace them with machines, not with machines that act like soldiers." If you on the other hand are arguing that if you are not replacing them, but using sentient machines as additional tools for soldiers to use, then we are definitely in agreement
I suppose I spoke too loosely when I made this statement, but by "replacing soldiers" (in the context of that specific sentence) I meant tactically, or putting the robots between the men and the enemy. In that sense, yes, they replace soldiers. But I feel those soldier's minds can be put to better use at higher levels of decision-making, and I feel as though any national military (since the militaries of the Five Nations are such) would see the advantage of sophisticated proxies between their men and the enemy.
Mind you, while the move "I, Robot" is only loosely based on Aasimov's work, one of Aasimov's short stories does describe a robot causing the death of a president since letting him live would cost thousends of lives. A sentient creature could very well come to the conclusion the war is wrong and needs to be stopped, so you need either fail saves or less intelligence, like your war titans or else you still have the risk of an uprising.
First, I want to say that the kind of decision-making you just cited isn't an example of sentience, but still sapience. There isn't a sliding scale of intelligence between sentience and sapience; they are qualitatively different. Sentience is the possession of first-order desires, which usually reside in the moment and are limited to the most sophisticated animal urges (hunger, desire for sex, aggression, and so on). Sapience is the possession of second-order desires, which is related to long-term thinking and moral evaluations (most prominently in our ability to evaluate and judge our own first-order desires). A machine capable of reasoning "this man's life could endanger the lives of many others" isn't exhibiting sentience; it's exhibiting sapience. The conclusion that "war is wrong" is a sapient thought. So, simple sentience is all you need to keep a war construct compliant.
And this touches on another thought I've been having, and that is the mistaken belief held by some people that sophisticated tactical decision-making is the province of sapience; it is not. The straightforward steps required to "take that hill", or "assess the enemy's strengths" are not things that require sapience because there is no moral question involved (except arguably in the second example when the definition of "enemy" is required; obviously such a command would be difficult for a sentient machine to follow). Basically, sentient thought could easily cover the "when", the "where", and the "how", but not the "why". And the "why" is exactly what you don't want in beings that are meant to exhibit complete and unwavering discipline.
As for your titan example, while I agree with you it is only up to a point. The problem lies in directing those forces with due strategy and operational intelligent manner. The more direction required, the easier it is for the enemy to disrupt said direction and the bigger the effect of that disruption will be. As for the long haul, only when the direct consequences of loosing in the short term does not significantly hurt your side to produce those things more quickly or your ability to direct them to the right target (whether directly by the loss of facilities and people or indirectly by a loss of willingness of the people at home to support the cause).
I completely understand what you're saying here, and you're correct; pushing the decision-making higher up makes for an extremely pyramidal command structure, one that is incredibly vulnerable to decapitation strikes (the US military's whole wartime strategy has revolved around the decapitation strike for quite some time precisely because the Soviet military model was one in which command authority is highly centralized, and many countries we might possibly fight use this model).
While this is an obvious vulnerability, it does not eliminate the usefulness of a highly centralized command authority. It's merely a vulnerability that needs to be taken into account by strategic planners. It's a give-and-take situation; high levels of centralization makes for the ability to efficiently deliver crushing force to your operational targets, while high levels of decentralization gives your fighting force far more flexibility of action. Generally, high degrees of centralization makes for better attacking forces and high degrees of decentralization makes for better defensive forces (the US military's own dominance in this regard comes from the fact that the opponents they fight are almost universally less powerful than they are, technologically, and in training and tactical doctrine). So, while it is a valid criticism, it does not invalidate the whole premise. It only creates a debate regarding exactly how centralized or decentralized such forces ought to be. An example of a decentralized command structure among a construct army would place human officers in charge of smaller units, depending on exactly how flexible you want to be.
Having said that, I agree that sapience was an unintended side effect. I am sure Cannith aimed for sentience. It would also not surprise me that they only learned much later that warforged were actually sapient.
This seems to be the general consensus.
As I said before, this whole discussion of mine regarding sapient vs sentient war constructs isn't really a crack at the setting, it's more of an in-universe criticism that might be leveled, and which I have never seen advocated before.
[And this touches on another thought I've been having, and that is the mistaken belief held by some people that sophisticated tactical decision-making is the province of sapience; it is not.
Maybe, although to be honest, I wonder whether or not you are going to develop sapience at one point or another once you reach a certain level of sophisticated intellect, especially if you add the ability to logical deduct to sapience. After all, how do you think a highly intelligent sepient machine would react if you give it the generic command to protect humans (which is the basic command in Aasimov's robot stories that causes the problem)? Or how would a sentient creature with a sense of self-preservation not develop long range plans for self-preservation if that it is intelligent enough to think that far ahead (and even a chess computer can think ahead a lot of steps). That though would be a rather philosophical debate, and I doubt we can answer that either way until we either meet other intelligent races or create an AI of a similar reasoning level as the human mind ;) It certainly has little to do with Eberron ;)
Maybe, although to be honest, I wonder whether or not you are going to develop sapience at one point or another once you reach a certain level of sophisticated intellect, especially if you add the ability to logical deduct to sapience.
Logical deduction is related to sentience, not sapience. Sentience means literally the capacity to sense, and then to adjust one's behavior based upon that sensory input. It's a matter of data and calculation. A wolfpack performs logical deductions at the unconscious level when it is hunting prey all the time. Wolves are certainly, unquestionably sentient; whether they are also sapient is a subject for debate. The point is, whether they are sapient has no bearing on their capacity to solve tactical problems.
Sapience is related to meaning, significance, and moral content. How to best solve a tactical problem has nothing to do with sapience. How best to defeat one's enemy does. This is why computers are so good at tactical games and aren't as good at games involving higher levels of strategy, such as Go, where the best location to place your pieces often relies on which parts of the board are considered more "important" in a given phase of the game. Since a computer cannot grasp the concept of "importance", no computer has been built that can perform beyond the intermediate skill level in that game (because of the enormous number of possible moves in any single turn of Go; look it up if you disbelieve me).
After all, how do you think a highly intelligent sepient machine would react if you give it the generic command to protect humans (which is the basic command in Aasimov's robot stories that causes the problem)?
It wouldn't understand the command if it were sentient. It would require more specific data to solve the problem, meaning it needs numbers. Battlefield efficiency is all about numbers; space, timing, force applied, and so on. If it were sapient, on the other hand, then it would require some moral framework (and by "moral" I mean it would need some value system with which to judge possible courses of action) to develop a plan. Since "protect humans" is very vague, the machine's (actually, I argue that if it's sapient it is no longer a machine but a person) conclusion could be as varied as anybody.
Or how would a sentient creature with a sense of self-preservation not develop long range plans for self-preservation if that it is intelligent enough to think that far ahead (and even a chess computer can think ahead a lot of steps).
Long range thinking is no problem at all for sentient thought. It's just a matter of having the appropriate data and calculating many "steps" ahead. As I said, non-sapient animals think in this way a lot. Haven't you ever seen squirrels gathering up nuts for the winter? This doesn't require them to think "it would be good to have food over the winter so that I do not starve", all it requires them to do is have the impulse to store food, and then their sentient brains can calculate the best way to gather and store it. A computer is easily capable of performing the same feat.
That though would be a rather philosophical debate, and I doubt we can answer that either way until we either meet other intelligent races or create an AI of a similar reasoning level as the human mind ;) It certainly has little to do with Eberron ;)
It is certainly a very philosophical debate, and it's good that you recognize that, since many people reduce their argument to "if we just build more powerful calculation machines, we'll eventually reproduce sapient thought" (while neglecting to define exactly what constitutes "more powerful" in the context of value judgements). I believe, however, that it has plenty to do with Eberron since there is an entire race of sapient constructs in the setting that form one of it's centerpieces.
I really don't know about computers being better at strategy games than humans.
I specifically claimed that computers are inferior to humans in strategy games, hence my example of Go (which is far more strategic than Chess, which is a tactical game). Perhaps my posts were too long to bother reading them all; I don't think we're in disagreement here.
The only advantages they have are in micromanagement and in.....well, cheating. By and large, the only way I've seen computers winning is through attrition. Maneuver is almost always nonexistant. At levels higher than the tactical, computers still don't seem to have the same sort of capabilities as humans. All they can do is....micromanage.
First, micromanagement is basically the hallmark of tactical games so far as I'm concerned. Deciding what goes where and exactly when is the most basic tactical situation. So, yes, computers are only good at micromanagement... but tactical games are exercises in micromanagement.
I'm not sure what you mean by "cheating". By definition, a computer cannot make decisions outside of the rules of the game. I, personally, have never observed a computer "cheating" in any tactical game. If by "cheating" you mean the computer having perfect information in Real Time Strategy games, then that isn't cheating; it's an unfair advantage that the designers have given to the computer over the player (I'll have you note that AI in such games are nowhere near the best tactical AI; they are deliberately designed to make mistakes and calculate slowly so that the player still has fun playing the game).
Also, attrition is a completely valid tactical decision if you can afford it. The major advantage of most computers over humans is their endurance. You can in fact win battles through pure attrition. It has happened numerous times throughout history. We perceive attrition as a negative thing precisely because we use other humans to fight our battles for us, and so there are social ramifications for the losses taken. A computer doesn't care about social ramifications (this is where sapient thought comes in), it only tries to achieve it's objective.
However, it is certainly not true that maneuver is absent in all tactical algorithms. The game of Chess is nearly all maneuver, and computers are perfectly capable of anticipating and then outmaneuvering even Grandmaster chess players. They've displayed this capacity repeatedly. True, Chess isn't representative of an actual battlefield, but the difference (to a computer algorithm) is one of information; on a real battlefield it's (almost) impossible to have perfect information about all of the variables, but this really is a matter of intelligence gathering and computational power only. Given the right amount of information, and a powerful enough processor, a computer is more than capable of outmaneuvering even the best humans in tactical situations.
I think it's important here to point out that the problem with this whole discussion (and I don't think I've recognized it earlier in the thread) is that the difference between the tactical and the strategic is extremely vague.
Ah, no, I misread. My apologies, nevermind.
That's fine. I tend to write too much, and the more there is the easier it is for my point to get lost in the noise.