I want to modify an airship.

[the_brazenburn]

My character has an airship.
He recently saved the life of a gnomish scientist/tinkerer.
The gnome is going to help us put all sorts of badass modifications on our airship.

What sort of stuff do you think I should do with it? I'm playing Storm King's Thunder, if it matters.

I'm thinking acid sprayers.

[Qworp]

My character has an airship.
He recently saved the life of a gnomish scientist/tinkerer.
The gnome is going to help us put all sorts of badass modifications on our airship.

What sort of stuff do you think I should do with it? I'm playing Storm King's Thunder, if it matters.

I'm thinking acid sprayers.

Acid Sprayers would be nice but how about More Airships?

[The Jack]

Cannons and redundancies.

[Unoriginal]

My character has an airship.
He recently saved the life of a gnomish scientist/tinkerer.
The gnome is going to help us put all sorts of badass modifications on our airship.

What sort of stuff do you think I should do with it? I'm playing Storm King's Thunder, if it matters.

I'm thinking acid sprayers.

My advice is that you need things that are as efficient as possible, aka which are the more useful while being the smallest/lightest possible.

What are the options available? Only weapons, or also stuff to make the ship sturdier or faster?

[Ivor_The_Mad]

They are currently at Deadstone and the airship is smashed on the ground. The cultists are still alive and are camping in the reck. The supplies that they have available are basic unless they head to a town. They have the help of the stone giants.

[SirGraystone]

Use the heat of the furnace to create steam powered guns.

Parachutes, always great on a flying ship if you can't fly.

Using harpoon with a chain or rope in the steam gun, with a steam power winch to pulls creature you caught back to the ship.

[solidork]

The main thing I would want is some sort of cloaking device. Maybe an illusion projector that makes the ship look like a cloud?

[Vogie]

I'd use the boat mechanics that they released in an UA... with a caveat.

I'd also include Wisdom, Intelligence and Charisma scores, to reflect the skills of the crew of the ship.

You pick up some real meatheads, and your crew will have high strength (for boarding and cargo), but low everything else. You pick up a couple professional airship sailors (?), and that may increase the ships dexterity (AC and ability to maneuver) and wisdom (increased perception). A Good captain boosts wisdom and charisma (morale) while a bad one may actually decrease it; a good shipwright will keep the constitution (HP of ship & crew, endurance of the ship and ease of repair) and intelligence high, or increase the AC of the ship, et cetera.

Investing XP and gold in your airship also allows your party to shore up their weaknesses - a party with no wisdom casters may dump funds into hiring a medic for the boat, giving bonuses to Medicine checks while onboard, or even providing healing for the party. Rescuing an old wizard and having him "join the crew" may give bonuses to Arcana checks and give your "crew" the ability to cast things like Identify for the party, or cast illusions on the ship, like Solidork suggested.

That'll also be a great way to keep all of the communal stuff that is on the ship in one spot rather than split across a myriad of character sheets, and stops your DM from having to keep track of individual crew members.

[Marywn]

If you don't encounter Sky Pirates, Suggest it to the dm.

YOU CAN'T HAVE A FLYING SHIP WITHOUT SKY PIRATES!

[Mr.Spastic]

Bombs... yup, that's about it.

No, but seriously, if you plan on using this in combat, having some large scale weapons that you can walk around with can be very helpful. I would suggest things like cannons and bombs and ballistas for long ranged powerful damage.

[Laserlight]

Having had a couple of fights on airships while in SKT: something with more range. Hitting the dragon from 30ft is all well and good, but hitting him at 500ft is better.

Not that we were actually able to do that. A couple of Rings of Featherfall would, in retrospect, have been nice to have.