Mana Cannon

"Mana Cannon" weaponry was devised in Forthena during the War of Threes by native weapons manufacturers (foremost among which was Lionel Nemead). In effect, Mana Cannons are crude magitek-like weapons, devised at both the small-arms and heavy weapons scale.

These weapons were produced largely in response to the looming threat of an Altenan invasion just prior to the start of the war.

History of Mana Cannon and Mana Power Technology

King Richard's Mandate

After a particularly daring instance of Altenan espionage, where an infiltrator had managed to penetrate deep into the Forthenan capital, it became clear to King Richard and his Court that war was imminent. The King thereafter charged Forthenan weaponmakers to come up with a way to fight off magically-capable soldiers. Lionel Nemead, who had already devised gunpowder-based explosives and firearms for the Forthenan army, was the one who had the idea of using magic minerals mined from the Dorien region in place of backfire-prone gunpowder.

Early Mana Cannons

The first Mana Cannons were simple projectile weapons, powered by a magilyte-driven propulsion unit -- similar in effect to a gravitic weapon, where a solid projectile is forced through a rifle barrel by a great amount of force, only rather than gravitic energy the propulsion is pure mana-force. These early Mana Cannons were scaled to infantry rifles and simple field guns, both of which were instrumental in defending Forthena from Altenan invasion.

Mana Powered Vehicles

As the war progressed, Forthena continued to innovate as it produced more and better Mana Cannon-based weaponry. Magilyte powered vehicles appeared for the first time among the Forthenan forces, like the GigaCrawler Armored Carrier, a troop transport (with proto-mecha design aspects) designed to traverse mountainous terrain, which was used to bring Alliance troops up the mountains to fight against the Naba'alians at the Second Battle of Laurent.

Other vehicles quickly followed. With the creation of the Dark Force Mana Cannon, artillery pieces grew to such a size that it became impractical to render them entirely stationary, and nearly impossible to expect men, chocobos or horses to haul them between defensive emplacements across the Forthenan Plateau. So instead, the Dark Force cannons were mounted on the Bulette Armored Artillery Vehicle, capable of repositioning to attack both land and aerial targets.

Battlesuits

After the Battle of the Purelands, Altena joined the Alliance. They brought with them their Golems, a much older Altenan brand of mixing magic with technology to produce weapons of war. The existing stock of Altenan Golems was added to the Alliance's arsenal, but Nemead and ther weapon makers saw potential in golem-making technology that could be applied to ongoing Forthenan innovations.

Borrowing from the golems, Lionel Nemead's Adytum Engines corporation produced Forthena's first infantry battlesuit, the Leonis Mobile Armor. By modern standards (and even by the earliest battlesuit standards in Tasnica and Esper), the Leonis was incredibly sparse and primitive. The pilot had almost no periphery vision while inside the suit, and the suit itself was little more than armor casing on legs with a dual-weapon mount on top. There were few comforts on the interior of the armor, and next to no supplemental defensive systems -- the pilot was literally turning cranks and working pedals to provide movement and aiming, and was pulling on pull-cords and chains to make the weapons fire. But the Leonis proved its worth during the Battle of Glass, when Forthena was attacked by the legions of Drakonis. When the Darkshine Knight's shadole infantry landed, they were armed with Mana Cannon rifles and heavy repeaters that would have made life miserable for the Forthenan defenders if they didn't have squads of Leonis-armored infantry to soak up the damage and return fire.

Airships

Airships were not entirely unknown before the advent of Mana power technology -- Naba'al was notorious throughout the War of Threes for its use of crude hot air balloon vehicles for the purposes of scouting and troop transport, and the Altenans had devised crude magic-powered flying ships (for the benefit of Altenan nobles who preferred to travel luxuriously). But it was the Forthenans who developed true magilyte powered prop-engines of the size and power necessary to sustain lift for an entire warship loaded down with Mana Cannon weaponry. It was these vehicles that first saw action during the Battle of Glass, where they were pitted against the fierce dragonkin who had pledged their loyalty to the Dragon Emperor Drakonis.

With these airships was a smaller vehicle, the Polaris Air Armor. The Polaris was basically a Leonis chassis, with a propeller engine bolted to the back and a pair of wings to help stabilize flight. The Polaris was a crude first step at creating an aerial fighter unit, and it was an effective (if costly) investment. More than half of all the combat losses among Polaris pilots are believed to have been due to accident, friendly fire or some other form of loss besides being taken down by the enemy. Still, those Polaris that did manage to defy gravity and stay in the fight did their job effectively: they skirmished against Drakonis' sky dragons and made a decent showing for it.

Contact with the Core

Alter-Mana's discovery by Guardia in the year 32 WR would bring about even more changes for Mana Cannon technology. Esperian, Tasnican and Guardian innovations were insinuated into what was available, and for the Forthenans and their allies this meant a rapid increase in the pace at which new and better technology and armament were made available.

Today, in the modern armed forces of Alter-Mana, the Six Great Nations use a mixture of technologies as part of their mechanized armories. By far the majority of Alter-Manan arms today are descendents of the original Mana Cannon weapons (with improvements and design traits from the Core incorporated into them), but some nations also incorporate foreign-made weapons into their arsenals (the Forthenans, for example, have several pieces of Guardian and Tasnican weaponry as part of their compliment, while the Naba'alians and Laurentians have borrowed extensively from the Esperians).

Mana Cannon Smallarms

Saint Beam Rifles/Pistols

The Saint Beam series of Mana Cannon weaponry is the most basic Alter-Manan smallarm form of weaponized mana magic. Saint Beams became the weapon of choice late in the War of Threes, as their holy-elemental alignment proved especially effective against Belgar's undead soldiers. Unlike other elemental types, there isn't much that resists the holy-elemental attribute, so Saint Beams continue to be used heavily by Alter-Manan ground forces to this day.

SBX2 Infantry Rifle

The Excalibur 2 Saint Beam Rifle is the second generation of improved Mana Cannon armament employed by the Forthenan Army. Its standard setting is for single-pulse shot, though it is also capable of being set for sustained beam fire. The SBX2 can hold a sustained beam for 30 seconds, requiring thereafter a 5 second cooldown before discharging again.

The Excalibur 2 is noteworthy because it employs a Holy Light grenade option. The grenades themselves are simply packets of mana, rather than physical grenades, that explode on contact. The grenades do not arc toward their targets; rather, they fly in a straight line until they strike something, out to a distance of 100 yards (whereupon the mana binding the grenade together dissipates harmlessly). The rifle's grenade option has a separate power source from the main beam weapon, ensuring that the energy used for grenades does not sap away at a soldier's primary mode of attack.

SBP Estoc Heavy Blaster

Standard issue among Forthena's forces is the Estoc heavy blaster: a simple, elegant semi-automatic single-pulse energy weapon designed for close range missile fire.

SBR Shamshir Light Repeater

The Shamshir is a large, tripod-mounted anti-infantry gun that rapidly fires multiple single-pulse shots of Saint Beam energy. The Shamshir's tripod is designed to dig in and give the wielder support against the weapon's heavy recoil, and yet also undeploy and fold-up with ease to allow the rapid re-configuration or retreat of Shamshir gunning placements.

Shamshir repeaters are also wielded in-hand by Forthenan battlesuited soldiers, who do not require a tripod to support the weapon.

Mana Cannon Solid Projectile Rifles

SPR Strelet 4

The Strelet 4 is a direct-line descendent of the original needle rifles made by the Forthenans. They've been long phased out of use by the Forthenan army, but are sometimes found in the hands of private owners or other nations on Alter-Mana. It is not automatic, but has excellent range and is sometimes employed as a sniper weapon.

Mana Cannon Solid Projectile Automatic Rifle (MC-SPAR)

The SPAR is most commonly seen among the Naba'alian infantry, who tend to prefer solid projectile weapons to the energy weapons favored by the Forthenans. Naba'al-made SPAR rifles are typically modified to accept Esperian ammo cartridges, as the SPAR is used as a supplement to existing stockpiles of Esperian arms.

Mana Cannon Explosive Projectiles

Holy Light Handgrenades

Often called simply Holy Handgrenades, these devices are similar in function and payload to the grenade option of the SBX2 rifle. Unlike the SBX2's grenades, Holy Handgrenades must be activated and then thrown before they detonate.

Cutter SSM

A small anti-personnel rocket launcher, this weapon was initially designed by the Naba'alians. The Cutter has stabilizers that run the length of the projectile, all of which are are bladed, and are intended to wedge into their target (be it infantry power armor or the side of a vehicle) before the missile explodes. The Cutter is somewhat outdated and crude compared to other weapons in the Alter-Manan arsenal, but Naba'al still produces and deploys these weapons with its forces.