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shadow_archmagi
2009-05-02, 05:05 PM
Had a thought. Start with one movement spell of choice (Greater Floating Disk or Fly or ???). Add large armored shell with arrow slit. Put gnome inside. Give gnome wand of fireball.

While the image of a dozen floating metal spheres approaching the enemy village/citadel/adventurers and proceeding to blast them to pieces is Crazy Awesome, I have no idea if this is at all viable or sane.

Theoretically, the metal shell should offer total and complete protection from mundane weaponry, but I don't know how would hold up against sharpshooters and, worse, mages.

My initial calculations also say that an item Greater Floating Disk (SpC, cheaper than fly but also slower moving) will cost 64k. (Or possibly be worth 64k and cost 32k) without even adding in the metal and the gnome and the weaponry.

How to make this amazing/cost efficient/actually useful?

Zhalath
2009-05-02, 07:18 PM
Had a thought. Start with one movement spell of choice (Greater Floating Disk or Fly or ???). Add large armored shell with arrow slit. Put gnome inside. Give gnome wand of fireball.

While the image of a dozen floating metal spheres approaching the enemy village/citadel/adventurers and proceeding to blast them to pieces is Crazy Awesome, I have no idea if this is at all viable or sane.

Theoretically, the metal shell should offer total and complete protection from mundane weaponry, but I don't know how would hold up against sharpshooters and, worse, mages.

My initial calculations also say that an item Greater Floating Disk (SpC, cheaper than fly but also slower moving) will cost 64k. (Or possibly be worth 64k and cost 32k) without even adding in the metal and the gnome and the weaponry.

How to make this amazing/cost efficient/actually useful?

Well, to make it better, I'd use adamantine for the armor plating.

shadow_archmagi
2009-05-02, 07:26 PM
Well, to make it better, I'd use adamantine for the armor plating.

That'd bump the cost up quite a bit and provide relatively little benefit; it's unlikely they'll pierce multiple inches of iron easily.

I'm considering this device for my level 15 wizard/artificer, and having one or two around as guards/raiders.

Biffoniacus_Furiou
2009-05-02, 07:39 PM
Build a typical iron box with wheels, hatches, windows, etc. and cast Animate Object + Permanency on it. Now you have a tank that can move under its own power, follow commands as to where to move, and its movement wouldn't count against the occupants' actions. Give it an appropriately sized +1 Animated Tower Shield and it can use it to gain total cover from one direction each round, shifting that direction as needed to allow the occupants to fire. Put two Artificers inside with wands of Repair Damage and offensive spells and you're good to go.

Jack_Simth
2009-05-02, 07:59 PM
That'd bump the cost up quite a bit and provide relatively little benefit; it's unlikely they'll pierce multiple inches of iron easily.

I'm considering this device for my level 15 wizard/artificer, and having one or two around as guards/raiders.
Let's see...
You'll need:
1) A few castings of Wall of Iron
2) The Levitate spell
3) Some adamantine tools (drill, saw) (not used up in construction)
4) A lenient DM

Method:
Use the Wall of Iron spells to make a very large iron box, with an open floor.
Put some holes in the walls of the iron box (less than one square foot in any five-foot section - this is IMPORTANT)
Use some scrap from the Walls of Iron from earlier to fashion blocks for the holes you put in earlier (to deal with sharpshooters)
Enchant the box with the Levitate spell, so that it is effectively weightless.
Lift the box, get in it, pull it back down.

What do you have?
No Line of Effect to you from spells, but thanks to a nifty in the Fireball spell, you can still send fireballs at other people (just don't flub the touch attack roll against the gap!). The box is weightless, so you just walk along the ground, pushing it whatever way you wish to travel. If there's some sharpshooters about, you close up the windows (ideally, you want at least three people inside for this - one to ready an action to close the window after the fireball is shot through it, one to ready an action to shoot a fireball through the window when it is opened, and one to actually open the window - and with the way Readied Actions work, that's the order they need to be readied in, too).

overduegalaxy
2009-05-02, 08:03 PM
Had a thought. Start with one movement spell of choice (Greater Floating Disk or Fly or ???). Add large armored shell with arrow slit. Put gnome inside. Give gnome wand of fireball.

Sounds more like a Dalek than a tank.

Not that there's anything wrong with that.

BRC
2009-05-02, 08:14 PM
We did this once. Permenancy+ Animate Object on an Armored Carriage with a cannon on top (Setting had Gunpowder). Throw on a spiked ramming prow on the front, and you've got a tank that moves fast and can defend itself with slam attacks.
We just stuck the entire party in it. The best part was, it came with "Summon Door" at will!

herrhauptmann
2009-05-02, 08:24 PM
without even adding in the metal and the gnome and the weaponry.


Are you going to be launching gnomes at people? Or just the same gnome of returning over and over again?

shadow_archmagi
2009-05-02, 10:18 PM
Sounds more like a Dalek than a tank.


I was thinking more like the Tocalafane, really, but I figure "tank" is going to be more universally understood than dalek.



Launching gnomes?


No, the gnome pilots each one. Ideally, you get a swarm of about a dozen of these things.

herrhauptmann
2009-05-02, 11:43 PM
No, the gnome pilots each one. Ideally, you get a swarm of about a dozen of these things.
Yeah but think how much fun it would be to take down a cyclops because you critted and launched a gnome wearing spiked armor into his eye. (Reminds me of an episode of Trigun for some reason)

BobVosh
2009-05-03, 01:16 AM
Do the wall of iron trick above, and what I did for fun was have 4 phantom steeds pulling it like a fortress/chariot.

If price is an issue, resetting traps of Phantom Steed could be used, along with levitate.

RS14
2009-05-03, 02:09 AM
The problem with a magical tank (or ship-vs-ship combat, for that matter) is that it all but requires the DM to play a magic-item destroying game. If you're that well protected from attacks, they're going to need to target your tank.

That said, I'd prefer taking an ironclad ship (something like the CSS Virginia). Make it float inches off the ground, somehow (I believe the stronghold builder's guide has rules for this). Give it a bulldozer prow, magical ballistae, and a large running board around the sides so you can easily mount and dismount (and ride along with sword in hand) as it moves. Also turn deck-features into permanent animated objects with standing orders to bull-rush foes off the deck. It should also have a continual flame surrounded in mirrors, creating a spotlight. Not really quite like a tank, but awesome!

742
2009-05-03, 04:03 AM
remember the wind wall, to prevent archers, and the monk/rog levels for evasion. and not telling your DM about those, thats important too.

Fishy
2009-05-03, 04:18 AM
And then a third level druid ruins your day. (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/heatmetal.htm) Well, not really, but certainly makes life tough on the gnome commoner.

Yuki Akuma
2009-05-03, 05:23 AM
How to build a magical tank?

CL19th, Craft Wondrous Item, animate objects, continual flame, 8 ranks in Knowledge (architecture and Engineering), 45,000 gp, 3,600 XP (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/wondrousItems.htm#apparatusoftheCrab)

Although that's more a magical deep sea submersible.

bosssmiley
2009-05-03, 07:00 AM
How to build a magical tank?

CL19th, Craft Wondrous Item, animate objects, continual flame, 8 ranks in Knowledge (architecture and Engineering), 45,000 gp, 3,600 XP (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/wondrousItems.htm#apparatusoftheCrab)

Although that's more a magical deep sea submersible.

♪ Mecha-crab! mecha-crab!
Pseudo-Japanese gibberish... ♫ :smallbiggrin:

Dark Sun used giant carnivorous tortoises or undead monstrous beetle carapaces with fighting platforms and catapults on the back.

The Book of Wondrous Inventions ripped off H.G.Wells' "The Land Ironclads" and suggested that you take a large iron box, slap some force field/prismatic effects on it, use undead or golems as the motive force, and equip with multiple turrets with remotely-operated evocation staves. Then again this was the book that offered us steam castles, magic mecha, dragonfly copters, the oddwaddle centipede (ATV), the umber hulk TBM (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tunnel_boring_machine), and a massive organ gun simply called The Death Machine.

For Eberron you could probably make a quadrupedal Warforged Titan with evocation staves mounted on the head. Just watch out for guys in elemental air skiffs entangling the legs though... :smallwink:

Garian
2009-05-03, 10:10 AM
The problem is that is is to easy to defeat. Maybe not for the average small village, but any mid-level character could do it with relieve ease.

#1 rogue or monk with good reflex save gets close and prepares an action to do attack though the slit/door.

#2 dispel magic, and let the meat shield deal with the prone gnome trapped in a block of iron.

#3 you must take damage if a giant attacks the so called "tank".
If not, the hardness would be easy to overcome.

#4 Any ranged touch attack.

#5 Suggestion/charm person.

#6 block the arrow hole with something or cast color spray or obscuring mist, both 1st level sor/wiz spells.

Love the idea though.

shadow_archmagi
2009-05-03, 11:50 AM
#1 rogue or monk with good reflex save gets close and prepares an action to do attack though the slit/door.

#3 you must take damage if a giant attacks the so called "tank".
If not, the hardness would be easy to overcome.

#4 Any ranged touch attack.



They'll have a hard time hitting it while it's in the sky.

Hat-Trick
2009-05-30, 11:44 PM
There's a spell for that somewhere. Removes flight ability on target.

"Dude, your tank cratered."

Dervag
2009-05-31, 01:43 AM
In short:

Like real tanks, this would be a terrifying weapon to anyone not prepared to counter it, and relatively vulnerable to anyone who is prepared to counter it.

Obviously, the key is giving it effective defenses against magical attack- it needs something you keep you from dispelling the magic that makes it run, and something to stop low-level casters from disabling it with spells like Heat Metal. Having high level casters be able to take it down isn't the end of the universe; high level casters can kill almost anything.

J.Gellert
2009-05-31, 03:00 AM
Who needs tanks when you already have robots (http://www.unitedlegion.ru/gallery/data/media/12/iron_golem.jpg)?