Belial_the_Leveler
2014-09-19, 05:42 AM
Before its destruction in the Second Age, the Aeon Empire was well known for its combination of magic and mechanical principles to reach unparalleled heights of technical and social acheivement. One of its greatest accomplishments was exceeding the limits of Erebus' gravity well and the subsequent exploration and control of much of the Hadean system. Faced with the extreme relative movements between such locations making permanent portals unreliable and instantaneous magical travel lethal, the intense magical auras and highly hostile natives of the Hadean system opposing conventional magical means, they developed a simple answer: cheap, manned space flight.
The Aeon Starwalker, a one-man craft with limited capacity, was the earliest such attempt. It was little more than a teardrop-shaped hull of hardened, magically treated transdimensional iron with a coating of Riverine at the front, in total less than fifteen feet long. The hull was enchanted in the same way as a large-variety carpet of flying, offering hovering and maneuverability. The cockpit was glamered into invisibility so that it would be see-through and still offer protection and the pilot's seat was "trapped" with a magical trigger of "Find the Path" so that the pilot would be capable of reaching his destination without extensive training in geography or astrogation. Pilots were also given amulets of adaptation to wear so that neither vacuum nor poisonous atmospheres would be an issue. But the core that made the craft capable of fast spaceflight was a well-known staple of Aeon technomancy; the spring gate. A pair of ring gates in a stable frame with a powerful spring and hook assembly extending through one and out the other in such a way that both ends of the spring would pull the same end of the frame, violating conservation of energy and momentum and providing a source of sustained impulse wihtout expenditures. Depending on the quality of the spring and frame, up to a hundred tons of force could be provided, giving the half-ton craft up to 200g sustained acceleration. A magically augmented or nonhuman pilot with 45 strength was capable of controlling the craft under such conditions - less hardy individuals were limited to lower accelerations. In standard atmosphere, the Aeon Starwalker was capable of speeds around Mach 15, capped by atmospheric friction. In space it had no subjective limit, with the objective limit being the speed of light. Thanks to its riverine coating, it had no fear of micrometeoric collisions and thanks to its pathfinding, it could avoid larger obstacles.
Sadly, this wondrous acheivement would be often employed during the Final War as a weapon, nonliving or controlled pilots guiding their craft into C-fractional collisions with inhabited areas, events that along with the use of sunfire warheads would destroy the empire utterly a few centuries after its creation.
Cost:
30.000 hull, 40.000 ring-gates, 60.000 flight enchantment, 9.000 amulet of adaptation, 60.000 trap seat of pathfinding, 1.000 glamered hull plating. Cost of crazy high-level pilot not included.
The Aeon Starwalker, a one-man craft with limited capacity, was the earliest such attempt. It was little more than a teardrop-shaped hull of hardened, magically treated transdimensional iron with a coating of Riverine at the front, in total less than fifteen feet long. The hull was enchanted in the same way as a large-variety carpet of flying, offering hovering and maneuverability. The cockpit was glamered into invisibility so that it would be see-through and still offer protection and the pilot's seat was "trapped" with a magical trigger of "Find the Path" so that the pilot would be capable of reaching his destination without extensive training in geography or astrogation. Pilots were also given amulets of adaptation to wear so that neither vacuum nor poisonous atmospheres would be an issue. But the core that made the craft capable of fast spaceflight was a well-known staple of Aeon technomancy; the spring gate. A pair of ring gates in a stable frame with a powerful spring and hook assembly extending through one and out the other in such a way that both ends of the spring would pull the same end of the frame, violating conservation of energy and momentum and providing a source of sustained impulse wihtout expenditures. Depending on the quality of the spring and frame, up to a hundred tons of force could be provided, giving the half-ton craft up to 200g sustained acceleration. A magically augmented or nonhuman pilot with 45 strength was capable of controlling the craft under such conditions - less hardy individuals were limited to lower accelerations. In standard atmosphere, the Aeon Starwalker was capable of speeds around Mach 15, capped by atmospheric friction. In space it had no subjective limit, with the objective limit being the speed of light. Thanks to its riverine coating, it had no fear of micrometeoric collisions and thanks to its pathfinding, it could avoid larger obstacles.
Sadly, this wondrous acheivement would be often employed during the Final War as a weapon, nonliving or controlled pilots guiding their craft into C-fractional collisions with inhabited areas, events that along with the use of sunfire warheads would destroy the empire utterly a few centuries after its creation.
Cost:
30.000 hull, 40.000 ring-gates, 60.000 flight enchantment, 9.000 amulet of adaptation, 60.000 trap seat of pathfinding, 1.000 glamered hull plating. Cost of crazy high-level pilot not included.