Bannick Coiljaw

Role and Standing

Bannick Coiljaw is the current guildmaster of the Ashcoats. The Ashcoats design, test, and build tools, armor, and weapons for Odrun Fell. Their work supplies delvers, guards, caravan crews, and city labor. Bannick sets standards, approves designs, and signs off on recalls. He also assigns senior smiths to supervise key projects and sends inspectors to check field performance. He answers to the Council like the other guild leaders but runs day-to-day work inside the Ashcoats with strict control.

Background

Bannick was a Cudgel delver in his early years. He earned the name Coiljaw after a carrion-saw beetle tore off much of his lower face during a tunnel rescue. He forged a replacement jaw from chitin plates and steel wire with help from Ashcoat smiths. After a slow recovery, he left front-line delving and took permanent work in the guild workshops. He saw gear failures claim lives and focused on durability and clear maintenance steps. Over time, he advanced from line smith to foreman, then to design reviewer, and finally to guildmaster by vote of senior Ashcoat masters. He keeps his old Cudgel badge and uses it when he meets crews to discuss field problems.

Personality and Conduct

Bannick is direct. He speaks briefly and expects clear answers. He values effort, honesty, and results. He has little patience for showy designs that add risk, or for leaders who use people to score political points. Loyalty counts to him, but not blind loyalty; he wants people to follow rules that protect lives. He defends his workers in disputes if the facts support them. He disciplines his workers in public only when safety demands it. He prefers written reports to speeches and numbers to claims. He does not seek praise. He expects people to do their jobs.

Appearance and Health

Bannick is a broad, heavy-built human with many scars from delving and forge work. His lower jaw is a reinforced frame of chitin and steel plates fixed to bone with rivets and straps. The jaw emits a faint heat when he speaks due to minor runes that stabilize the fit. He keeps his hair short for safety. He usually wears a plain, fire-darkened apron over a thick tunic and heavy boots. He does not wear decorative items at work. He breathes with a slight click from the jaw. He can fight, but he does not seek combat duty.

Workshop Network

Under Bannick, the Ashcoats maintain three core workshop types:

Pattern Shops: draft designs, measure tolerances, and prepare jigs.
Heat and Plate Shops: smelt, cure, temper, and laminate chitin-steel composites.
Fit and Field Shops: assemble, test, repair, and pack gear for issue.

Pattern and Heat Shops operate near the Hilt for rapid feedback from delvers. Fit and Field Shops sit at key exits of the Spindle and in the Barrows to handle civilian work and caravan contracts. Each shop maintains a ledger of batches with dates, materials sources, responsible masters, and destination units.

Procurement and Materials

Main inputs include chitin plates from Barley harvest lines, tunnel resin binders, steel billets from scrap re-melt, and rune-inks from certified enchanters. Bannick enforces a “two-source rule” for every critical material. If one source fails, the line keeps moving with the second source while audits run. If both sources fail inspection, the line stops and the Cudgel is notified.

Design Principles

Bannick uses three rules for approval:

A tool must survive its rated load plus a margin.
A tool must fail safe when pushed past its limit.
A tool must be repairable in the field with standard parts.

If a prototype performs well but cannot be repaired with common parts in a tunnel, he rejects it or demands redesign. If a design needs a magical effect to work at all, he requires a non-magical fallback mode.

Testing and Recalls

Every new pattern runs through bench tests, drop tests, grit fouling, heat soak, cold soak, and wet exposure. Cudgel crews run live trials on low-risk routes with observers logging performance. Failures are cataloged and tagged. If a failure mode is severe or hard to detect in time, Bannick issues a stop-use order and recall. Recall notices go to the Cudgel, the Regent’s office, and the Promissory for market notice. The Ashcoats replace or repair recalled gear without charge when the user followed the manual. Bannick publishes a short fault bulletin for each recall with the cause and the fix.

Training and Apprentices

The Ashcoats run a four-year apprenticeship. Year one covers safety, tools, and basic material handling. Year two covers pattern reading, measurement, and simple assembly. Year three covers heat treatment, lamination, and tolerance control. Year four covers diagnostics, field repair, and inspection. Apprentices rotate shop types. A senior master signs off only if the apprentice can pass a live repair test under time limits with limited tools. Bannick also sponsors returning delvers who can no longer serve in tunnels to retrain as inspectors or fitters.

Work With Other Guilds

Cudgel: Bannick meets Cudgel quartermasters weekly for failure reports. He schedules refresh kits for line crews based on route risk. He adjusts stock when the Threadspire shows new collapse patterns or hostile nest changes.
Barleys: He negotiates plate thickness, resin grade, and harvest timing. He pushes for predictable batches over experimental yields. He allows trials only on non-critical tools until data is stable.
Promissory: He requires clear contract terms that match real lead times and service limits. He refuses penalty clauses that would push unsafe rush jobs. He supports open price lists for standard items to limit fraud.
Regent’s Office: He submits monthly safety reports and recall summaries. He cooperates with spot checks and accepts sanctions if audits find false logs. He keeps his meetings with the Regent factual and brief.

Politics and Council Stance

Bannick avoids speeches at Council unless safety is involved. When he speaks, he brings test data, batch numbers, and casualty links. He will block votes that force untested patterns into service. He rejects efforts to cut inspection in exchange for higher output. He does not endorse candidates publicly. He respects Captain Orin Vellak for staying with the Hilt and speaking plainly about risks. He keeps a neutral tone with the Promissory and the Barleys even when he disagrees with them.

Standard Product Lines

Cudgel Line Gear: hooks, anchors, line throwers, piton sets, ward housings, lantern cages.
Armor: chitin-steel laminar sets in light, standard, and heavy ratings with modular plates.
Weapons: spears, axes, hammers, and short blades rated for chitin cutting and bone cracking.
Shields: ribbed chitin-steel shields with replaceable edge caps and central sight slots.
Repair Kits: rivets, pins, resin cartridges, gasket rings, and torque keys in sealed packs.

Each line has a revision code. Crews sign for issue, with lot numbers recorded for traceability.

Field Manuals and Support

The Ashcoats print simple manuals with clear diagrams and step lists. Common issues have one-page fixes. Each manual has a red page that lists stop-use signs. Fit and Field Shops accept walk-in repairs and trade broken parts for discounted replacements if damage is beyond repair. For urgent cases after breaches or collapses, the Ashcoats deploy mobile repair carts to the Hilt staging yards.

Discipline and Safety Culture

Bannick enforces strict safety steps: eye shields, gloves, lock-outs on presses, and clean vents. He halts lines if ventilation drops below set flow. He fires anyone who falsifies an inspection log. He suspends anyone who skips a lock-out and caused or nearly caused harm. He posts accident counts by shop door, updates them daily, and ties bonuses to reductions in repeat faults.

Relationship With Workers

Bannick learns the names of each master and foreman. He visits every shop floor at least monthly. He speaks to apprentices during inspections to confirm they understand steps. He invites workers to submit improvement notes. Good notes become bonuses and pattern updates. He does not accept excuses for poor work, but he funds new tools when a process is at fault. He orders extra rest breaks during heat waves and extends shifts only for safety work.

Approach to Magic

Bannick treats enchantments as support. He approves runes and bindings that increase repair windows, resist corrosion, or stabilize joints. He rejects effects that make gear impossible to service without a specialist. He requires every enchanted item to operate at reduced performance if the magic fails. He audits rune sources twice per year.

Security and Theft Prevention

The Ashcoats stamp unique lot marks and hidden alignment pins into major parts. This limits counterfeit swaps. Bannick shares counterfeit alerts with the Cudgel and the Promissory. He pays informants for tips that lead to seizure of fakes. He also keeps a small internal guard to check wagons leaving shops. First offenses get fines and job loss; repeat offenses go to the Council Courts.

Bannick in a Crisis

In breaches, collapses, or riots, Bannick sets up a triage repair point near the Hilt muster. He assigns masters to armor repairs and juniors to carry parts. He gives priority to Cudgel units moving civilians and to crews sealing breaches. He documents shortages and requests escorts for resupply. He pauses non-critical production until the emergency ends.

View on the City

Bannick believes the city survives when tools work and crews return. He views political victories as empty if gear fails. He supports fair pay for dangerous work, steady food lines, and strict tunnel rules. He opposes harvesting at Odrun’s Head and other high-risk zones without strong containment plans and independent oversight. He accepts slower progress if it lowers deaths.