Airships

[penguinreich]

Well I'm building a campaign and I'm toying with the idea of airships. But I'm having trouble designing them, so I'm listing different options I could take. So far I've narrowed it down to 2 methods of propulsion


Magic

Elemental binding
Some sort of levitation
psions
magic users
strange component (souls, gold)


Mechanical

Fuel based IE coal, a magical material
Uses the wind
balloon
creatures (dragons or griffins)



So now I'm wondering a few things. Which method of propulsion is best? Can you think of other types of propulsion? What's a good way for me to incorporate airships into my game? What have you done with Airships? Where could i go to learn about airships? Anything you have on airships would be great. Or pictures of airships.

I'm running a normal medieval game, with medium magic.

[Krimm_Blackleaf]

They have those in Eberron.

[triforcel]

There are already airships in the Eberron campaign setting. They use a combination of bound elementals and almost magical soarwood which is incredibly light and strong.

[penguinreich]

I know of the airships in Ebberon, I just don't especially like them. I'd like some other ideas.

[Gavin Sage]

Things I've seen airships in:

-Forgotten Realms: the nation of Haluraa is known for them. I believe Shining South (or some close version of that name) has a picture of them on it and some information. Magical constructs of some sort but I don't know how that varies from Eberron.

-The later Shannara books by Terry Brooks: These still have sails and are built more like sailing ships, they work via special materials that gather light direct that energy. How magical it is is a debatable thing, they need no mystic knowledge to use though.

-Final Fantasy Series: Wide variety but they are rarely that detailed. Most work via fantasy-tech or hyper advanced tech though. Can vary in prominence game to game. Always there though.

-The Vision of Escaflowne: Cool anime series, and the only fantasy mecha anime I care to know of. Airships in this case are built from or around floating rocks, and the mechanical portions are fueled by dragons' crystal hearts.

Checking any of these out might help with inspriation. If you are sticking to a fairly medieval setting then they either have to be outright mage constructions and thus rather rare, be extremely rare pieces of a lost civilization, or be constructed out of some sort of unique materials. The last allows them to be the most common as while the exotic materials are more or less magical, they don't require a mage's imput at any point.

[Fizban]

The AaEG prices zepplins and dirigibles, or you can slap a cloud keel on a normal sailing ship. Flying vehicles normally won't go for less than 40k, those of generous size are from 80-100k. They can fly in many ways as you have considered. The AaEG also presents a soarwhale, you can guess what it does.

Books to consult:
Arms and Equipment Guide
Stormwrack
Stronghold Builder's Guidebook

The AaEG and Stormwrack have information on vehicles, and both have enhancements to make sea vessels fly. The AaEG also has a (hugely expensive) enhancement to let a land vehicle fly when drawn by flying beasts. The SBG has rules for mobile strongholds, including levitating and flying. It suggests that levitating buildings could be propelled by sails.

[Thomar_of_Uointer]

Well I'm building a campaign and I'm toying with the idea of airships. But I'm having trouble designing them, so I'm listing different options I could take. So far I've narrowed it down to 2 methods of propulsion


Magic

Elemental binding
Some sort of levitation
psions
magic users
strange component (souls, gold)


Mechanical

Fuel based IE coal, a magical material
Uses the wind
balloon
creatures (dragons or griffins)



So now I'm wondering a few things. Which method of propulsion is best? Can you think of other types of propulsion? What's a good way for me to incorporate airships into my game? What have you done with Airships? Where could i go to learn about airships? Anything you have on airships would be great. Or pictures of airships.

I'm running a normal medieval game, with medium magic.

"Fuel" is a bit vague. You could have propellers, turbines, thrusters, some kind of mechanical oar, and so on. It would also be nice to see some examples, for instance, a ship built into/around a sky whale or other odd magical beast.

[Stormcrow]

I think a zepplin is the most mechanically sound idea for a medieval setting, I thought maybe as far as propulsion goes you could have rowers in the bottom of the ship with oars that end in sort of... mini sails. They could pull the ship through the air. Back row while landing... just a thought. :)

[Callix]

If you want a propulsion method for zeppelins, try an elemental bound into a spring to wind it, and a big propellor. You can disengage it to stop, and steer with a rudder. I realise this looks a lot like the WoW goblin zeppelins, but oh well.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

World of Warcraft series has zepplins as well, which makes a certain sort of sense, when you think about it.

Mechanically, it's not too difficult to make a zepplin... a huge effin bag of gas, and a sailboat (sans sails and masts) to go under it, with some sort of propulsion unit. Oh, it has it's challenges, such as where to get your lighter-than-air gas and how to keep the bag from leaking, and how to get it to move on the vertical as well as horizontal axis.

Thing is, Zepplins are HUGE. The gas-bag over a zepplin is around five TIMES the size of the boat it's attached to. That means you're gonna need a LOT of place to land the bugger.

It's also extremely vulnerable to attack. It's a big bag of gas floating in the sky. We're talking Colossal sized here. It's not moving very fast either. So it's basically a sitting target floating a hundred feet or so in the air. One fireball and the thing is dead. Heck, one fire arrow and the thing is dead. Gas-bags are notoriously easy to pop or catch on fire (Hindenburg). And once the gas bag is gone, the whole thing crashes to the ground.

This means it is not going to be a vehicle used in war, at least not on the front lines. Maybe in supply trains and so forth. It also means it's not going to be used in hostile areas, but stick to well-traveled, and protected, lanes. Generally, that means inside civilized lands.

[D Knight]

why not use both. i had a Wingedfolk that had a collosial flying base that had both types because if some one knocked out 1 there is still the other to keep it moveing or floting. needless to say it was a great investment and always had my enemys on the run. plus magic squars of fireball which is where a wizard stands on it and allowedto cast fireball like its going out of style then every few squars it would be a recharge square.

P.S. i am not that old

[Joltz]

I'd say that the way you include airships should be based on your preference and how available you want airships to be.

There's the straight magic method where ships are powered by bound elementals or wondrous items like people have already mentioned. I find this method effective, but a bit bland.

On the mechanical side is the possibility of using lighter-than-air gas to make a ship float then propelling it using any number of methods. It's true to life and doesn't require the introduction of much technology to the campaign. I'd expect that this would also make airships less expensive (and therefore more commonly used)

My favorite is probably the "special material" option, like the airships from Escaflowne that use a nonmagical but highly unusual substance to provide lift. It's a perfectly feasible explanation that doesn't have real world tie-ins for players to exploit (I doubt that any mechanics you find for zeppelins would be perfect). This lets you as DM determine the mechanics of flight as well as the availability. I also like the versatility in designs that this offers (you're not forced to have a gigantic gas bag or something). It lets you make really cool looking ships.

One last note on the flying creatures option. Most creatures are either too small or too independent to carry large numbers of passengers aloft on a regular basis, but there were stats for flying whales in one sourcebook (ELH?). All I remember is that I read it in a book I was borrowing from someone. I think the fluff described them as being capable of airship-like capacities.

[Callix]

One solution for the "How do the zeppelins land" problem is to not make them land. Have them pull up alongside a tower and roll out a gangway, then the people descend the stairs. Again, a shameless WoW lift.

[Nerd-o-rama]

It's also extremely vulnerable to attack. It's a big bag of gas floating in the sky. We're talking Colossal sized here. It's not moving very fast either. So it's basically a sitting target floating a hundred feet or so in the air. One fireball and the thing is dead. Heck, one fire arrow and the thing is dead. Gas-bags are notoriously easy to pop or catch on fire (Hindenburg). And once the gas bag is gone, the whole thing crashes to the ground.
Just a small caveat: while many lighter-than-air gases are flammable, especially Hydrogen, as was used in the Hindenburg, there are plenty of non-flammable gases that work just as well, particularly Helium. This is why zeppelins are feasible as transportation, just not very practical speed- or cost-wise. And yes, they're still slow and easily holed, I'll give you that. They're better used for long-range transit than warfare, although as support craft to naval patrols, they're not terrible.

[Stormcrow]

I don't mind the lighter than air materials point or maybe an alchemical treatment to the good that requires expensive components but I believe they should be slow and if at all possible man propelled. Making their advantage over the faster horses the fact they ignore terrain.

On the point of flying creatures I've allways been partial to a Roc or other enormous flying creature carrying a transport underneath it. It's faster, it can land. And best of all. Its ridiculously hard to set up :P.

[Triaxx]

I pulled some bits from everywhere when I had to create the 'tech' behind my airships.

For levitation they're held up by living crystals, which were originally found in another dimension, but are now grown near the shipyards. When fully mature, they break away from the ground, and float in the air. Magical or mechanical energy can be used to cause them to ascend or descend, and they can also generate propulsive energy, but it's very expensive magically. It's typically use only in small fighters, or for delicate manuevering.

For propulsion, the ships are solar-steam hybrid, using standard crystals, or gems to refract, and focus light to heat the boiler. In windy areas, they have sails that can be erected. When in lower wind areas, or if moving into docks, usually carved into cliff faces, or built in natural draws and valleys, the masts can be lowered, and stowed to reduce the profile of the ship.

They can also land on water, and sail the same way regular ships do, or use the turbines to propel themselves. The turbines are long shafts built into the sides of the ship, with grates on the ends to prevent fish, and birds from entering and damaging the blades. This does make them ponderous to rise out of the water, even if the bow is lifted first, since there's water in the turbines. It's a very impressive spray though.

The biggest ships weigh in at around 2,000 tons, with a massive crystal matrix run through out to keep it from breaking apart. The ships are typically made of hardwoods, treated to be harder to burn. Arrows are the weapon of choice if the crew is on deck, but if not, most are armed with either cannons, or Wizards.

[penguinreich]

Alright, I'm liking the magical material thing. That's do-able for my campaign, a lot more so than a dirigible. I'd kind of like the airships to do some combat, so really volatile explosive materials are out. If you guys can think up a type of material i could use that would be great. If you have more info on the ships from the Shannara books that would also be very helpful. Thank you all for posting. I hope other people have gotten ideas from this like I have.

[Triaxx]

I used the crystals, so you can actually have airship combat. At it's smallest level, it's like fighting from flying mounts, being able to use bows, lances, and swords. There are two and four person fighters which allow passengers to use magic without having to make a piloting, and concentration check to cast.

From there they get bigger, starting at seven to eight man Corvettes, all the way up to 1,000 ton battleships, armed with several decks of cannons. Beyond that are the epic class 'Great Airships', using the same classes as their lesser counterparts, but up to twice as large and heavily armed. Cannons are interchangeable with wizards.

Some ships also use catapults and even Trebuchet's as weapons. They are difficult to stat out though. I tend to fight them as massive creatures, applying HD per ton. So a 12-ton corvette stats out at 12d6(72 max). Where a great battleship stats out at 2000d12 (24000 max). So a great battleship can shred a corvette, but can also be swarmed under.

Corvette's have 16 total cannons, 18 if you use bow cannons. 8 guns face port, 8 starboard. You can fire up to eight guns as a standard action, or all sixteen, each side firing in it's respective direction, as a full attack. Reloading takes a full turn. So they fire, skip a turn, and then can fire again.

A Great Battleship on the other hand, has 100 cannons, 30 to each side, 10 across the bow, 20 to the stern, and the rest in rotating mounts. Similar firing rules, though the rotating guns can be reloaded for firing the following round.

Using modified logistics for cannons, with d20 Modern as a basis originally, we were doing diameter in inches d20 for damage. So a six inch gun does 6d20 damage, max 120. Then the rounds could be enchanted, or equipped with spells that go off on impact, or after a one round penetration delay. Fireball outside, damages crew. Fireball inside, damages whole ship.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Just a small caveat: while many lighter-than-air gases are flammable, especially Hydrogen, as was used in the Hindenburg, there are plenty of non-flammable gases that work just as well, particularly Helium. This is why zeppelins are feasible as transportation, just not very practical speed- or cost-wise. And yes, they're still slow and easily holed, I'll give you that. They're better used for long-range transit than warfare, although as support craft to naval patrols, they're not terrible.

Careful, you're getting close to killing catgirls with that...

And really, it doesn't matter if the gas is flamable or not. The GAS BAG is. Burn a hole in the bag, and you'll eventually deflate it to the point where it will no longer be lighter than air and crash. Heck, enough regular arrows and it'll start deflating, assuming it doesn't pop like a balloon. Granted, a flamable lighter than air gas makes things ever so much more... explosive...

Sorry to... *snerk* burst your bubble...

[Fizban]

Amendment to my earlier post: it seems the cloudkeel costs four times that of the "flying chariot" enhancement. Go figure.

As for zeppelins: the AaEG treats them as wind powered vehicles, with animated propellers for steering. The balloon is described as using hot air for lift, and being segmented to prevent easy destruction (it has 200hp, and counts as rigging, meaning that damaging it will slow the vehicle but not down it until it's completely destroyed).

Official vehicle rules treat them most like terrain, that takes a double move each round at the direction of the helmsman. Directing the ship takes a full-round action from the helmsman and a standard action from each of the crewman require to operate it. Ships are divided into 10' segments with hp and hardness based on the thickness and material. Destroying a quarter or so of the ships sections will sink the ship automatically, and holing any number will start calling for profession (sailor) checks from the helmsman/master to keep the ship afloat. Ground vehicles use the flight maneuverability chart, and sea/large air vehicles use a similar chart at a much larger scale to account for their size.

Also note that spellcasters are required to make concentration checks on any vehicle or mount that moves while there casting (which will typically be any vehicle they're riding, a mount could take only a single move to avoid the check though).

That's just a barebones outline, but the rules are in non-OGC books, so that's probably all I can get away with. The main points I wanted known are the maneuverability, ship sections, and actions for the crew. Of course, no one has to use this, but I figure it's a good starting point.

Edit: Dang Triaxx, there must a ton of magic in those things. Your guns fire incredibly fast and the ships must be enormous to fit that many guns. Heck, the most anything in Stormwrack can mount is 8, most can only pull 4-6, and the light cannons only fire 1/minute. Ballistae can fire 1/2 rounds but they don't deal squat.

Edit2: well for materials, darkwood only weighs half as much as normal wood, mithral cannons would be expensive but could save on weight there. The soarwood used in Ebberon airships has been portrayed as both lighter than air and 1/2 the weight of wood, two sources contradicting each other. The only qualities that really matter are weight and strength, the main players would be wood, darkwood, mithral, and adamantine, standing for cheap, light, kinda light, and strong respectively.

Edit3: upon checking things, the light bombards in Stormwrack actually fire 1/6 rounds, and a mithral cannon would cost 250,000gp, not feasible.

[KingGolem]

I have airships in my campaign, though they are still a little bit flimsy. They're essentially a single cabin with a single deck, encased in a shaped wooden shell to make them as aerodynamic as possible. There is no such thing as "soarwood" in my campaign, so airships have to be made out of lightweight pine (balsa is too weak and too far away). Furthermore, they have ribbed sails along the bottom, top, and sides of the vessel, which can be manipulated by pulling levers attached to cables that slightly twist and turn the sails, thus allowing steering in three-dimensions. Due to their frailty and small size (about the size of a railroad car), they are usually only used to carry passengers and light freight.

The power source for them is a type of whitish-yellow crystal called "liftstone," which is mined from massive floating mountains. This liftstone is semi-magical, and when in large enough proportions, it can lift these massive floating mountains. When the crystals are mined out of the floating mountains (careful not to remove too much, otherwise the mountain will come crashing down) then they are ground up into a fine grit and used as the fuel for the engine. The engine consists of a furnace that the ground crystal is placed in, which causes the crystal to vaporize into a superheated, ultra-light gas which is pumped through the bottom half of the hull by a pair of massive bellows, which makes the ship light enough to fly. Some of this gas is jetted out of the stern of the ship which provides significant thrust to move the ship forward.

Despite the majority of the fragile airships, the military of the country that invented the airships (called Oropas, by the way, which actually ISN'T the gnomeland) also learned to harness the floating mountains in other ways. Massive liftstone engines (similar to the ones on the ships, but since the mountain is naturally buoyant, these are nearly identical to jet engines of our world) were bolted to the sides of the mountains, and pivoted to control where the mountain was pushed. The mountains were then carved out into castles and fitted with weapons, effectivley creating massive flying-fortresses.

Additionally, this technology is threatened by nearby countries; specifically Nomestran (the real gnomeland) and Zaubereaux (magocratic nation based heavily on Thay from the Faerun campaign setting and Nazi Germany), who have both attempted to magically generate a substitute for genuine liftstone, but with explosively disasterous results. Nomestran has even gone as far as attempted to sneak into Oropas to steal (via short-range teleportation) one of the floating mountains around the edge of Oropas. The way they are trying to do is to expand a natural limestone cave system underneath the mountains that separate Nomestran and Oropas, and (since it's flooded with water, used for drinking water by both nations) pilot a gnomish submersible loaded down with gnomish conjurers (experts in teleportation) to the other side of the mountains and teleport one of the uninhabited mountains under cover of night. The reason why they're going under the mountains is because the Oropasians rule the skies, and a team of wizards hiking across the mountains would certainly be spotted.

Here's the origin of the liftstone crystals, if you care to read it:
A really really long time ago, the deities had stopped fighting and decided who would create the Grand Material; they were the four elemental deities and all of the deities who would later become deities representing different terrains, and The Green Man, a god dedicated to nature in general. Pokranibro, one of the gods chosen to craft the Grand Material, crafted the mountains from several of the hairs from his mighty stone beard. Rasuda, the goddess of Elemental Air who created the wind was jealous of the granduer of Pokranibro's mountains, when her contribution to Grand Material was invisible. In order to make up for this, she simply "modified" Pokranibro's creation. She placed part of herself into some of his mountains, which instantly crystalized into the surrounding earth. These crystals were the liftstones, which being lighter than air and in great enough number caused the mountains to shake loose from their foundations and form the floating mountains that exist today (in only one specific region, which is now a flat, level forest area ringed by normal mountains; it used to be entirely mountains but the mountains in the center all floated up). And now, the crystals are mined out and used to power the airships.

:smallsigh: Phew, that was a long post. I hope you can use this in your campaign setting. And by the way, my favorite example of airships in other media is the video game (originally for dreamcast but then re-done for gamecube) Skies of Arcadia. Look it up on Wikipedia, I'm tired of typing. :smallannoyed:

[Poppatomus]

If you're still looking for ideas, I've got the nucleus of one here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=49067) with the relevant text reproduced below.

The Spidaren Airship


Hardness: 20
HP: 550 (400+150 for the sails)
Size: Colossal (75ft. by 20 ft.)
Movement: fly 100 ft (20 sq.; see text)

A Spidaren airship is a bizzare construct. Built of ichor and webbing, the ship does not so much sail through the air as ooze through it. From the exterior it looks like a shifting cloud of veils, with its seemingly haphazerdly placed sails whipping in every direction. So strange looking is the ship that any creature within 400 ft that can see the Spidaren airship must make a DC 18 will save or be fascinated for 10 rounds.

Within the structure is a core of sturdier strands with the same storage space and general characteristics as a Keelboat. Movement within this structure requires constant climb or escape artist checks at DC 15 to avoid immobilization. Any spidaren within the structure knows the exact location of all other creatures within the airship.

Actually running the ship requires manipulating a complex pully-like systems of strands. Maintaining speed and manueverability requires five successful DC 15 use rope checks every round, as many as 15 creatures may attempt to make checks to reach this number. These checks are a full round action. If less then 5 make the save then speed is reduced by 20 ft for each failure, to a minimum of 5 ft, that minimum is in the last direction the ship moved. For ever additional success the ship gains an additional 10 ft of movement (max 500 ft.). Non-Spidaren take a -5 penalty on these rolls. A person may also make a profession (sailing) check in place of use rope, also at a -5 penalty. These penalties cease to apply if a creature has been onboard more than one year.

Creatures may also, at their individual discretion, attempt to make more difficult checks to either increase the speed or decrease the chance of failure. Every five points added to the DC counts as 1/2 of an additional successful attempt. (So the ship could conievably be manned by two Spidaren rolling DC 30 checks, equivalent to 2.5 successes each.) In the case of disagreement as to direction among those making the checks, the direction with the higher number of successes takes precedence.

Even without successes the ship can stay aloft indefinetly, as long as it is above 50 ft. This owes to the presence of large, specially contructed airbladders built into the ships design itself, making it almost lighter than air.

Within the structure are usually 1d10 small and 1d4 medium monstrous spiders, in addition to innumerable normal spiders of various types, all of which the Spidaren treat as pets. Any non-spidaren creature within the ship is nauseated as though within a swarm. If the spidaren consider the creature to be hostile, it must make a DC 14 Fort save every round or take 2 points of damage from the bites of the mundane spiders. The presence of these creatures also enables the ship to repair itself, healing 5 points of damage every round. The spidaren themselves may sacrafice a useage of Gossamer obstacle to repair the ship for a number of HP equal to a use rope check made by the Spidaren. This ability requires 2 full rounds.

The ship is all-weather, though it must stay above 50 ft. or it loses the ability to stay aloft. Relaunching the ship requires hurricane force winds and a full crew of 10, at least one of which must be a spidaren. The base DC for this check is 25. Though its materials are otherwise treated to be equivalent to wood, the ship's sails are unadulterated webbing and are thus vulnerable to fire. If the sails are destroyed, the ship immediatly plummets towards the ground.

The Ship has no inbuilt weapons, however, as a free action it may extend or retract strands of non-adhesive webbing from a height of up to 800 ft. down to the ground. These strands require a DC 20 use rope check or a DC 25 climb check to scale for any non-spidarens. Spidarens may climb these ropes as though moving over unobstructed ground and do not require a check, even if carrying a heavy load (though that may effect their speed). Additionally, a spidaren may safely descend these ropes at 5 times their normal speed as a move equivalent action.

The strands retract and extrend at a rate of 200 ft. per round. The DC for holding on to the strands while being retracted is the same as for scaling the strand normally. Any creature that successfully holds on to the strand to the point of retraction finds itself inside the Spidaren ship.

[Fizban]

Can you tell I like this topic?

If one is allowed to apply the mobility upgrades from the Stronghold Builders Guidebook to a ship, you can do one cheap. Take a Pinnace from Stormwrack (a 40 foot long by 10 foot wide ship, with a cargo capacity of 30 tons and a speed of 30'x wind modifier) and enchant it with the flying mobility, you get a floating ship for 20,000gp. Technically it would have to float at a fixed height, but if the DM was allowing this in the first place, there's no reason not to allow it to sail up and down (at a nautical maneuverability equivalent of course).

For small one or two man fighters, effigy creatures should suffice. Pick your favorite flying mount (hippogriff, pegusai, etc.) and build an effigy of it. Each will likely cost around 20,000gp as well.

[Joltz]

lol. Now I wanna homebrew some airships for the campaign setting I made...

Someone mentioned Skies of Arcadia. I liked those ships too. I don't remember much about the mechanics of flight in that game though. Maybe I should play it through again to get inspiration.

[Triaxx]

There's quite a bit of 'ambient magic' within the world. I took ideas from both Mercedes Lackey, and Robert Aspirin, so I have pools of magical energy both in the air, and in the ground.

I described a middle ground cargo airship, middle being an objective word, with the Corvette, and Great battleship as extremes, as six hundred feet wide, and twelve hundred feet long. It's also three stories tall, and weighs around 600 tons empty. I've forgotten the exact stats for the crystals, but the average size will hold around 40 tons in the air. Magical propulsion is only used on fighters, or when no other option is available. The cargo ship I just described is an eight master while under sail.

Besides, the Great Airships are pretty rare, used mainly as Capital Ships for the two biggest bullies on the block, and the bigger house fleets. A lot of combat takes place using wizards, and such unleashing magical attacks.

When combatting on fighters, I noted that it would probably be exceptionally difficult to pilot, cast, and aim all at the same time. This takes into account that there are foot controls, so single man fighter's with Wizards driving have to make a pilot check, or end up standing still for a turn, a concentration check to be sure they actually can cast the spell, and hope it works. Magic Missile is a favorite combat choice for airborne casters.

The cannons are actually based on traditional naval guns, which get thrown back each time they fire, so they can be reloaded. The rotating guns on the deck of the great airship are never more than 2", so are used to chase off boarders. Because they spin, they can fire, and then be swung around to load.

[Fizban]

I'm not really sure what the throwback effect has to do with it. The "early cannons" presented in stormwrack have several steps to reload: swab barrel, load power and wad, load shot, tamp shot, aim, and fire.

Except, this is where I get confused, so maybe you can help me. In the individual weapon descriptions, it lists the actions and checks required to load and prep the weapon. As written, one person alone can fire the light bombard once every six rounds, taking five full round actions to get it ready then the one to fire. But the weapon table lists it as requiring 4 crew members to operate. Assuming it can fire in the same round that it's aimed, 4 people should be able to fire every other round. On the first one would swab, one load power, one load shot, and one tamp the shot, then on the next one would aim and fire.

Now, if we assume that this slowdown is because they all aid another to ensure that that checks will work, it would make sense, but the +6 bonus from 3 people aiding isn't enough to guarantee that all the checks succeed, unless they can take 10 (in which case there's only one check that needs aid, and they could still fire every other round because there's four people).

Sorry for the minor thread jack, but anyone got an idea?

[Triaxx]

I meant as opposed to more modern guns, which are breach loaders. In fact, these guns fire, and throw themselves back on rails into the interior. The loading takes around a minute, and then they have to be pushed back into place to fire again. In theory, you could have them reloaded and firing in a minutes time, but with such vast numbers firing, it'd take forever to roll anything, even with a computer aid. Between enchantment tweaks, and range increment losses, plus crew knowledge (gunnery) checks, I've seen full broadsides miss completely.

On the other side, these are all unrifled, short barrel guns, so the range increment is at 100' and falls very sharply from there, since it is a big iron or stone ball. Iron has double the penalty for range increments, stone has triple.

---

For the reloading, I simplified it a bit by treating the crew as a whole unit, and making the aid checks inherent in the rolls. A single roll swabs, and powder tamps the gun. A second wads and loads the gun, and a third tamps it, and inserts the fuse. Then there's a strength check depending on gun size required to ram the gun back into place. But since the unit has a combined strength score, they've never failed a check. Finally there's an attack roll, with a critical miss completely destroying the gun, and doing damage to the unit that serviced it.

It does take a few seconds to aim the gun, even when firing at a target the size of a ship. This is complicated by the motion of the ocean, or air in this case. The british naval gunners were experts at this, as evidenced while they battled the Spanish Armada.

Additionally, the rules may be using fused guns, as opposed to touched powder guns. The former has a fuse that burns and is not an exact science. The latter uses a burning rope on a stick to ignite the powder directly. It's faster, but I believe it requires an extra step, to prime the touch hole.

[penguinreich]

I'm not sure what your asking, can you rephrase the question. Thanks for all your participation Triaxx, and all the rest of you of course.

[Citizen Joe]

I think you need to answer three basic questions:
1) Lift.
Earthdawn uses wood bonded with bit of elemental air to allow it to float (LTA building materials). Also it uses the concept that since it LOOKS like a boat it acts like a boat in the air. They also have giant stone flying fortresses that use raw magical brute force to keep them in the air (Akin to using levitation spells large scale). Another option is for some flying creature to carry it (like bound elementals or rocs). Propellers for lift or lift wing system so energy has to be constantly spent to keep in the air. LTA gasbags also work.

2) Propulsion.
Towed by flying creatures (Horse and wagon). Sails or oars (like a boat). Propellers or jet thrust?

3) Durability.
When wrecked, what happens to the wreckage, does it float or crash to the ground? Is the lift system vulnerable? What about the propulsion system? Does armour affect its carrying capacity?

[Daracaex]

In the game Skies of Arcadia (Dreamcast and Gamecube), the entire game took place in a world of the skies. Every island and continent was floating. The world had several moons that stayed above different regions and every once in a while, chunks of the moons would break off and fell into Arcadia. These were moonstones. They had to be found and purified, but once they were, they could be used to power the airships. I like this method a lot and I shamelessly admit stealing the concept for my own world.

[Triaxx]

In the Japan only release, Bahamut Lagoon, the world was built on a similar principle, but the airships were incredibly large, on par with the islands they were moving between.

[penguinreich]

I think I want my airships to correspond to the size of normal ships, and depending on the fuel i think i want them to be able to land on water, but most likely not land.

I've begun to toy with the idea of runes in my game, making them work like binary in a way. So maybe the hull of the ship is covered in flashing runes, each about a square inch. So the runes would control height, but the ship would be propelled by maybe three masts with sails in a semi-triangle array , which are brought in with the top one when the ship land.

Any comments with this system?

[Joltz]

hmmm. Ships made from wood that's given the power to float in the air due to permanent magic tied to runes drawn on it. I like it. It makes flying ships look very different from normal ships. It also sounds like it would be expensive and time consuming to make them.

Are the runes drawn on the ship once it's completed, or are they added to the wood even before it's assembled? Do they provide magical lift, or do they change the properties of the wood itself? I like the idea of a wizard taking some random boat and spending a week (or possibly much more) scribbling all over the outside. When he's finished, the magic suddenly takes hold and the ship begins floating gently.

Your idea sounds just as cool as the other stuff that's been brought up so far. It has pretty good flavor too. Much more interesting than a simple cloud keel.

[Triaxx]

If you're going with that, I suggest checking out 'The Death Gate cycle' by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman. One of the characters has a ship which works on that principle, but only after being modified from a seperate principle.

If your ships are only water landing, then something to consider is how do the occupants embark, and disembark? Ropes? Ladders? Or do the ships dock to piers extended from castle ramparts? I've used all of them as well as an additional thought.

I added 'Sweep Boats' which are much like long boats, with a single crystal mounted in the bottom. These are flat bottomed, so they can land on the deck of the big ships without tipping. One boat holds 8 people, and a pilot, or one pilot, one horse, and the handler.

Using your rune system, they could simply be left out of the sides, and have the rules written that it only gives it enough power to lift off with only one occupant, with more it descends gracefully, instead of plummeting like a dead duck.

[Matthew]

Have you considered looking at Spell Jammer for some inspiration?