Introduction to Airships

The following guide details several components and parts crucial to an airship and how they all work. This guide won't list prices of resulting versions from years of development, just give a basic introduction to airships from the ground up. Please note, this document is a rather large read, and for the advanced players.

Airships are usually classified by certain design builds or specific construction techniques (Defender class, Eagle class, Pegasus class, Nemesis class), and this classification is done according to their primary (or secondary) mission profiles, which in turn determine the sizes, shapes, and systems of vessels in a particular category. A ship whose primary purpose is to map terrain and study areas for scientific research will have a different shape, and different systems, than one intended to escort merchantmen in times of conflict.

Before I go any further, let me first define the word "Systems". Airships use a cluster of crystals, imbued with spells specifically written for certain purposes. We call this overall cluster, with a specific purpose, a "System". A Communications System would be crystals all across an airship designed to help people communicate to other parts of the ship, via telepathic or voice carrying magic. A Life Support System would be crystals designed to provide air, control temperature, or inact barrier spells to prevent depressurization when an airship experiences a hull breach at a high altitude. The entire makeup of a system is done by two components. First the Quartz crystals with a spell infused into them, second the copper strands that connect the crystals and carry the magical pulses back and forth.

Example 1: Take 10 crystals, imbue them all with the "Message" spell. (AD&D Sorcerer, Level 1). Connect these crystals across several points of the ship. As a person touches a crystal, say in Engineering, he is, by thought, connected to the Bridge. The message crystal on the bridge glows, the officer there touching to activate it. What the Engineer speaks is carried, by the Message spell, to the Bridge and vice versa.

Example 2: Several parts of the airship have doors with "Arcane Lock" crystals on them. As a security breach occurs, say pirates boarding the ship, the security officer on the bridge signals a lockdown. All of the Arcane Lock crystals/spells activate, locking down all of the doors of the airship and containing the pirates.

Example 3: Crystals infused with "Daylight" spells are placed at certain sections of deck ceilings. They use power from the Main Core, and create internal lighting on the ship.

Each nation builds their own ships with different ideals. Damocles focuses on adaptability, while the Shadow Knights make airships focused on offense. A Damocles escort will have more advanced scientific and research systems than a comparative Shadow Knight vessel, but will not be as heavily armed. Nevertheless, airships are best used for the primary missions for which they were created.

Sometimes an Airship class gets redesignated as it ages. One good example of this is the Defender class, launched in 686 as an Explorer. In 693, Damocles redesignated the Defender as a Heavy Cruiser, causing the Defender to lose several of it's Explorer components as well as a crew reduction, and become more of a small combat ship. Sometimes this occurs when a nation builds a battleship class, and years down the road, more modern, capable ships cause the original battleship to no longer be superior opposed to new Cruisers or Frigates. Another example is the Norcon class, which started as a Battle Cruiser till Damocles redesignated it as an Explorer.

Within any given category of vessels, subcategories exist. In many cases, subcategories include Heavy, Light and Fast versions of the ship type.

Heavy vessels indicate a subtype which is more heavily armed and protected than the standard vessel of that category. Heavy subtypes often sacrifice a small amount of speed, maneuverability, or sensor capacity to compensate for the additional tactical systems.

Light vessels, conversely, are not as well armed or protected as standard vessels of that category. Instead, they typically possess more sophisticated peripheral systems, such as sensors or other scientific systems, and are intended for relatively specific mission profiles.

Fast vessels are similar to Light ones, but concentrate on speed and maneuverability (and sometimes on the capacity to perform long-range or extended missions). Those built for defense or tactical missions often have heavier weaponry than Light ships, however.

Explorers are the largest, most powerful, most versatile form of airships. While only a few nations field explorers, they are seen as flagships and greatly admired. As their classification indicates, their primary purpose is exploration. Because they can encounter virtually any situation (including many threatening ones) and because they often conduct multi-month/year missions far from Damocles airspace, they contain a wide variety of systems, including ones designed to ensure the comfort of the crew during extended assignments. They are also usually very heavily-armed. An Explorer class airship is usually placed on long term missions to map faraway lands, or conduct long explorations on other worlds. Sometimes these missions last for months or sometimes years. One example of an Explorer class would be the Damocles Defender class airship.

Battleships are large, powerful, heavily-armed ships which serve as the flagships of Fleet (and sometimes, entire governments). While their strong shields and potent weapons make them difficult to attack directly, their relative lack of maneuverability compared to a smaller ship is a weakness which an attacking force can sometimes exploit. Most battleships have emphasis on tactical and defensive weapons, as well as a wide variety of weapon types such as Pulse Cannons, Torpedoes and Bomb Hatches. However they are usually stripped of any effective scientific gear, given no probes, mediocre recreation and medical facilities, and allot of the crew has to sleep in barracks. Additional quarters are also found on battleships to that they may ferry their own fighting force or supplement invasion groups with additional troops. One example of a Battleship/Dreadnought class would be the Damocles Prometheus class airship.

Similar to Battleships, but smaller, Warships and Battle Cruisers usually work alongside a Battleship. They function as smaller, less diverse versions of Battleships, which are usually very large and powerful. One example of a Warship would be the Damocles Valcour class.

A Carrier, falling somewhere below the Battle Cruiser line, is a ship entirely devoted to carrying additional craft such as fighter craft or shuttlecraft. It usually has a high focus on the crew relaxation and point defense weaponry and very little focus on ship-ship combat effectiveness. A carrier very rarely works alone, usually in a Fleet, unless a mission states otherwise. An example of a carrier would be the Damocles Albatross class.

This classification, started by the Shadow Knights, is a floating castle or fortress with heavy defenses and allowed to serve as a mobile command point for operations. The Shadow Knights currently field three Skybase classes (Overseer, Goliath & Oppressor) however Damocles has fielded their own Skybase (Sentinel) with a focus on aiding remote airship operations instead of as a point of conquest. Skybases always have downrated engines, and less focus on maneuverability.

Cruisers are mid- to large-sized vessels which can be optimized for a wide variety of general or specialized mission profiles, from exploration, to interdiction, to tactical/defense. Although smaller than Explorers, they are easier and less expensive to produce, and therefore more of them have been built. In many ways, Cruisers form the backbone of several Fleets. The Cruiser is usually very versatile, but suffers from a "Jack of all Trades" problem in that it is not specialized for battle or other areas which require a ship best at one thing and one thing alone.

Exploratory Cruisers are, in essence, a junior version of an Explorer, similar in some ways to a Light Explorer. A Cruiser is usually found on missions that are too minor for an Explorer, Battleship or Warship, but require a more stronger presence than a Frigate can provide. An example of a Cruiser would be the Damocles Avenger class and the Pegasus class which qualifies as an Exploratory Cruiser.

A Frigate is a medium-sized vessel designed for military, escort, patrol and rapid response missions. Although typically smaller than Cruisers, some Heavy Frigates are in fact larger than some Cruiser categories. Most Frigates serve as hunter-killers, effective in ship-ship combat situations. Destroyers, also known as Heavy Frigates, are built entirely for military purposes with heavy armaments and defenses and are usually larger than a Frigate and serve as support craft in battle fleets.

Escorts are, as their name indicates, primarily intended to escort transports, cargo convoys and in some cases even larger airships. The standard escort is a small, but relatively heavily armed, vessel which combines good speed with sufficient offensive power to deter many threats. Depending upon the availability of Frigates, they may also assume some Frigate duties in addition to their standard low-risk escort and patrol functions.

Small, lightly armed airships with strong sensor packages, Scouts serve as the eyes and ears of most Fleets. Mostly used for observation of enemy forces or patrols of areas of scientific interest to determine if a more capable ship needs to be dispatched to the area.

Small craft, usually in the Size 1 or low end of Size 2, which are attached to either carriers or ships with suitable facilities. Cause of the small size of Fighters, they cannot equip most of the systems other airships can, nor are they very capable in battles against other capital ships. Due to this, Fighter & Shuttle Craft's systems will not be covered in here, and will be covered in a following segment.

This type of airship is given strong shielding and additional armoring and used to move key personnel and troops through extremely dangerous areas such as warzones. In peace time, they usually sit in docking paddocks, as they are only used to move troops or other equipment. Armored Transports in Damocles are used to move either Warhammer Tanks or Quartz Knights as well as ground troops.

Not every airship can be outfitted with it's own portal generator, therefore some nations which conduct large-scale airship deployment from world to world also use Portal Deployment Craft (PDC). A PDC is an Escort class airship, outfitted with a Portal Generator, strong armoring and additional power sources, and sent ahead to a portal destination. It then, on regular intervals, opens a portal point between two pre-determined locations.

Example: The Damocles Fleet wishes to deploy a Fleet of 15 airships to New Damocles. A PDC is sent in first, arriving at a point nearest to the Damocles base on New Damocles. The PDC then opens portals to allow the other ships to travel in, usually one at a time. When the entire Fleet is moved, the PDC then usually travels with the Fleet, or returns back to Damocles territory if it's no longer needed.

The one drawback of the PDC is it's power consumption, and the chance it may portal into a hostile spot. Usually, the PDC opens a portal to a location, say on Hostka, and sends ahead an Avenger class Cruiser. The exit coordinates of this portal are stored by the PDC, and it sends in another airship till an airship, while a portal is open, signals back an all clear. Then the PDC heads over itself, and begins portalling in the rest of the Fleet. A PDC's Portal Generator Drive is installed for it's size. For example, if it had an Expedition class Portal Generator Drive, the SU cost would be for that ship size. However the power cost would be based on the size of the ship being portalled. It would cost more power for a PDC to portal in a Norcon as opposed to a Defender. Fighter craft usually are not portaled in, as they land on their own carriers and travel in with them.

Couriers and Surveyors are, in essence, highly specialized Scout and Explorer ships. Couriers, of course, are ships designed for high speeds which is used to transport important messages and personnel. Surveyors are used mainly for long term survey missions, such as to check for mining deposits, check an area for settlement, or assess an area for later study by a research ship.

These two ships are hardly part of the military arm, and are usually under the authority of scientific and medical divisions of a nation. Research/Lab ships (Also known as Science Ships) contain a wide variety of sensor packages, a high amount of labs, and are usually deployed to study areas of great interests such as new islands with unusual creatures, areas of odd disturbances, or assigned to experimental ships as they test out new weapons or means of propulsion. Medical ships are deployed on emergency situations, either due to great disasters, sicknesses, or attached to battle groups where large casualties are expected. Nearly all nations (with the exception of the Shadow Knights) avoid attacking medical ships even when they are in the line of fire.

Part of the recovery arm, these ships are used to salvage downed airships from their resting locations if they are found to be intact but incapable of flight. Tugs act to tow airships in flight, Repair ships ferry needed parts and supplies, while Salvage/Recovery Ships (Usually Repair and Recovery ships are one and the same) work to recover non-flight capable airships. Mostly, you will find one airship class with the ability of all four, with the exception of Tugs. Freighters/Cargo Carriers are simply as they sound, meant to ferry goods from one point to another.

The Structural Unit (SU) referred to is a rough term of room aboard an airship. This number refers to the room on an airship as well as it's overall structural integrity. The SU is a ship's Inventory Slots as well as it's "HP" or Hit Points. This represents how much damage a ship can incur before it is destroyed entirely (blown to little chunks). SUs do not have a predefined size or dimension. They're an abstraction; a way of representing how much of a hull's volume a particular system or item occupies. A single SU on one ship might contain more volume than one on another ship. Don't think of them as an absolute measure of volume; think of them as a handy tool which makes it easier for you to design airships. The text refers to systems "occupying" or "costing" a certain number of SUs. Also SUs serve as a game balance function. The more useful or valuable a system is, the more SUs it tends to cost.

For a power source, all airships have Cores, Auxiliary Crystals, Generators built into the Maneuvering Thrusters, Emergency Power Crystals and a Power Converter. Airship Cores have a rated output, for example say 300 power. Other systems cost power, occupying up the available output. For example, if the Victory fired two cannons taking up 100 power, then for that moment it only has 200 power available. Damage to the Cores reduces the amount of available output they have. In a crunch, some systems have to be shut down to handle emergency power needs.

Airships cost money, to keep it simple the price of stuff is listed in Silver. For Imperia: Dominions however, the prices are listed in Gold Units.

When I mention national builds, I am referring to this section. No nations build or design components alike, except where a nation was given it's technology from another, and has chosen not to make any innovations on it. The only difference is usually a small price increase as this nation has to pay a small royalty. This increase is usually very small, like 1-5% at the most.

All airship classes have a name, usually fitting in with the mood of the nation and the purpose of the airship. Damocles is more prone to use grand names such as Defender, Avenger, Pegasus while the Shadow Knights use threatening names as Talon, Fiend and Nemesis. Other nations, like Axius, may use names of historic mention such as the Drake or Marshall. As is tradition, the first ship of a class is usually named after that class such as D.I.S. Defender, D.I.S. Avenger and D.I.S. Pegasus and S.K.V. Nemesis.

Every ship has a Registry number and prefix, if done by their own nation or labeled by other nations. Damocles marks such ships as DCC (Damocles Commission Contract) 0678, 0800, 1201, 1542, 2098 and so forth. Following ships of a specific name are designated with letters like 0678-A (1st of the line), 0678-C (3rd of the line), 0678-E (5th of the line) and so forth and so on. Typically, only Damocles and nations who attained their airships from Damocles, follow this method. The Verax simply designate their ships with just numbers (No Prefix) however Damocles Intelligence has attached the prefix letters VAV (Verax Air Vessel) and SKC (Shadow Knight Commission) to ships they encounter. A ship is usually named according to it's nation, such as D.I.S. , S.K.V., V.I.A. and A.R.S. (Damocles Imperial Ship, Shadow Knight Vessel, Verax Imperial Airship and Axius Royal Ship respectfully)

Size	Length Range	Beam Range	Height Range	SUs
10	800-999 m	700-799 m	300-399 m	2,500-3,750
9	700-799 m	550-699 m	200-299 m	2,250-3,500
8	600-699 m	400-549 m	100-199 m	2,000-3,250
7	400-599 m	200-399 m	80-150 m	1,500-2,750
6	300-399 m	100-199 m	50-79 m	1,300-2,500
5	150-299 m	50-99 m	31-49 m	900-1,900
4	100-149 m	26-49 m	21-30 m	800-1,300
3	51-99 m	11-25 m	6-20 m	600-1,000
2	6-50 m	4-10 m	2-5 m	326-625
1	1-5 m	1-4 m	less than 2 m	Up to 325

All airships have their sizes determined first. It is advised you figure out the ship's dimensions in feet (or meters if you prefer) and the Plotmaster in charge shall assign to you your ship's SU Count. The overall sizes make a ship fall into a size category, extending from 1 to 10 (However there have been known to exist other, larger airships). If a ship exceeds Size 10, then the Plotmaster will use the extended chart to determine the airship's size and SU Count.

The table above indicates the ranges for the length (How far from front to rear) beam (Width) and height of a ship for each size category. If your ship has dimensions which fit into different categories, then you use the average result of those categories (For example, a Length of 10, a Beam of 7 and a Height of 2 would make the ship a 6). The SU is the room onboard a ship, and cannot be exceeded. To do so, would mean alterations to the ship frame itself, such as lengthening it, widening it or adding another deck. Normally this is an extremely costly process and takes time.

To determine how many decks are onboard a ship depends on if the ship is an Open or Closed Deck ship. We shall cover these two design types later, but for now leave you with the basic guideline of each deck occupies 3-5 meters of height. Some ships may be built smaller however depending on the race or it's type. On a ship of 50 meters in height (164 feet) built for humans, there are 15 decks. Each deck occupying 10.9 feet of height (Or 3.3 meters). However if this ship was built for dwarves instead, each deck would only be 7 feet in height (or 2.1336 meters). The dwarven built ship can, with a height of 50 meters, squeeze in 23 decks. Some ships may have smaller or larger decks, depending on their general purpose. Cargo carriers normally have larger decks.

How heavy is that ship? Well we measure it in metric tonnes and Airship Tonnage. Determining metric tonnes may be too hard, so let's give you the basic formula for Airship Tonnage.

Length (in feet) x Beam (in feet) x Height (in feet) divided by 1000 = Airship Tonnage

For example, the Defender class is 70 feet by 45 feet by 50 feet. Doing the math, that is 157,500. Dividing that by 1,000 and we get 157.5 Airship Tonnage. To determine real mass we use another formula.

Each Airship Tonnage is worth 28,500 pounds. Using the Defender, this puts the ship weighing in at 4,488,750 pounds. This is fully loaded. Additional cargo onboard or anything installed into a ship does not alter this weight. (With the exception of if the airship is carrying additional craft like shuttles or fighters). The Mass is important later in determining cargo room, as well as useful to know if another ship attempts to tow a ship using a Grappler. I won't even try to state an equation for figuring out metric tonnes. If you need that done, simply ask Zarak, and he will have the answer for you in a matter of seconds. For those curious about the Defender however, it's 4,488,750 pounds translates into about 1,675 Metric Tonnes.

The Open Hull design is similar to what you would see on a sailing ship. It uses the conventional deck designs, with the addition of other decks below as part of the airship itself. The top deck is wide open, where crew operate various engines or weapons. Above, we have an example of an Open Hull Design, the Defender class. The limitations this design is that the top deck becomes a weak point, as an enemy can strafe it and take out several of the crew. Also weather conditions or high speeds could disrupt a crew trying to operate vital equipment above. Also, for flight above 10,000 feet, the ship has to enter into a special mode (Called High Altitude Running). This mode, actually just a state of alert on an airship, is when the top deck is evacuated of all people, all equipment is locked down, and all hatches to the top deck are sealed. This allows an Open Hull Design airship to surpass 10,000 feet (Assuming it has capable engines) however any manual weapons located on top can no longer be operated. Also any damages occurred to systems located on the top can only be tended to when the ship has dropped below 10,000 feet. This design build dominated airship building in Damocles before 703 AD, and is still employed by nations either cause of budget issues or they have not yet perfected Closed Hull Technology. Another disadvantage is that the ship is unable to tilt more than 45 degrees, or risk crew falling off of the airship (Rigging for High Altitude Running however removes this risk). Also this ship has to pay for the "High Altitude Capability" feature, described later on. The last disadvantage is that this ship has less room and loses a small percentage of SUs. The advantages of Open Hull designs however are that the ship can use top deck weaponry such as ballista, Deck Guns and Catapults. These weapons are far cheaper, take up hardly any room, and do not cause a power drain on the Core. Open Hull ships can also choose not to include a Bridge, doing all commands from the top (Poop Deck) instead. While this creates a problem in crisis situations, this one choice alone usually shaves off half a million silver on the price of an airship. Also, Open Hull Deck airships automatically gain the "Water Tight Hull" ability, allowing it to set down in an ocean and float. (Whereas Closed Hull ships would sink). However sails and such cost extra. The last and final advantage is that Open Hull airships cost significantly less (Usually 15% less). While that may not seem like much, keep in mind that 15% of 10,000,000 silver is 1,500,000 silver, a rather nice discount. Many nations prefer to field Open Hull airships simply cause they are more affordable. Axius and Dantania follow this policy.

The Closed Hull design, started by Damocles after 703 AD after they realized how the Verax were able to use this as an advantage, is essentially an enclosed airship. Where the Open Hull airship had a wide open top deck, and you could have the wind blowing through your hair, this ship is entirely enclosed. The first disadvantage is that this ship is incapable of making a water landing if it loses all power. While it may be able to use Maneuvering Thrusters to remain hovering over the surface of the water, if the airship experiences a total power loss then it will crash into the water, and most of the crew will find themselves entombed in the airship. The final Disadvantage is that this ship costs more to build (Ranging from 5 to 10 percent more). Many nations are hesitant to use this, as sometimes this feature alone adds several millions of silver to an airship's price tag. The advantages of Closed Hull Design is first it's ability of High Altitude for free, the ability to tilt and flip at any angle, a small speed boost due to aerodynamics, and a slight increase in available SU.

It's in this area, how best a nation can build, where the Closed VS Open Hull Designs are shown.

If a ship is Open or Closed usually depends on the builder or designer. This choice is made by nations for military ships, and by the consumer for private ships.

The top (open) deck of an Open Hull Airship does not count in the Decks of an Airship. It is a free, but uncounted, deck. The main advantage of this open deck is that manual weapons can easily be placed to give the ship a firing arc of 360 degrees.

The outer hull consists of either riveted plates of metal, or sheets of wood attached to the primary skeletal structure. The outer hull is the "skin" of an Airship. You must buy the Outer and Inner hulls when building an airship, and cannot buy more than those two.

A ship's inner hull is attached to the secondary framework of the skeletal structure. It includes conduits for Mana/Magic Transfer and attachment points for various ship systems. This qualifies as the "bones" of the ship which give it it's shape.

Also known as an airship's armor. While airships primarily rely upon their shields for protection against outside attacks, hulls themselves provide a small amount of additional protection against attacks which penetrate shields. All national builds have a min/max limit for hulls. Minimal Limit means you get a certain amount of Resistance for free. Maximum Limit is how far you can increase that armor. For example, Damocles has a Minimal Limit of 2 and a Maximum Limit of 10. The Shadow Knights on the other hand have a Minimal Limit of 4 and a Maximum Limit of 20. This means SK Airships naturally build ships with stronger hulls.

Both the outer and inner hull provide resistance, which is bought separately for each hull. Normally the resistance is kept equal on both areas, but this is not always the case. Resistance however does not protect against many forms of hull stress which affect the entire vessel.

This technology, used by the Shadow Knight Empire, is essentially room on the ship used to shore up hull resistance. Room on the ship (SUs) are converted to a type of heavy armor, which can soak up damage like extra resistance but only till it is used up. Each point of damage the armor soaks reduces it's effectiveness by one point; when all of its points of protection are gone, the armor has been completely destroyed and must be replaced by an Engineer (Which can be done while on the field). Thereafter the ship only has it's normal resistance to protect it. Apply damage to any existing hull plating before applying it to normal Resistance.

Example: The Shadow Knight Airship Nemesis has Resistance 10 and 100 points of Hull Plating. It's hit by an attack which, after its shields are applied, causes it 200 points of damage. This damage hits the Hull Playing, which soaks up 100 points however uses up all of the Hull Plating. Any further attacks will not be soaked by Hull Plating. The remaining 100 points is then affected by the ship's Resistance of 10, leaving 90 points of damage to actually damage the ship. If the Nemesis is hit by a second blast, its hull plating no longer applies; it's gone until repaired/replaced.

As of this time, only the Shadow Knight Empire utilizes Hull Plating however that may change as other nations are finally taking notice of it's advantages. Only one Damocles Airship (The Marauder Class) utilizes Hull Plating.

As strong as it is, the hull cannot by itself withstand the stresses of sudden accelerations, quick drops or rises in altitudes, sharp turns and fast maneuvers, wind shears, or any other type of pressure or stresses above a certain threshold. Under these conditions, an Airship's Hull Reinforcement Generator (HRG) prevents it from collapsing. A HRG is a set of force field spells running through the hull which provides protection against hull stress. While these minor spells are not enough to aid a ship in battle, it is enough to hold a ship together. Under normal conditions, a ship only has to maintain its HRG at half normal protection to preserve it's structural integrity/ Increasing the strength is necessary under conditions of extreme pressure, including combat where rapid maneuvering stresses the hull, proximity to sudden gravity surges, use of a Transit Drive or moving through a storm. The HRG works to protect a ship against the effects of weather, such as storms, however they have their limits.

A HRG is required if a ship is to make use of portals or Telejump drives. The stresses on a hull, while in transit of a portal, could damage part of the ship as well as tear off parts of the hull. The sudden teleport of a Telejump could also literally shake a ship to pieces. If a ship does not have a HRG (Or a working one for that matter) then it can only make the transits but with extreme risks.

Some airships carry an auxiliary (or backup) HRG generator system. This generator is usually half strength and half cost of the main one, but draws power all the same as it is constantly kept active. However a ship in a crisis could turn off the backup HRG to use the power it normally draws.

Damocles Fleet wishes to deploy a Fleet of 15 airships to New Damocles. A PDC is sent in first, arriving at a point nearest to the Damocles base on New Damocles. The PDC then opens portals to allow the other ships to travel in, usually one at a time. When the entire Fleet is moved, the PDC then usually travels with the Fleet, or returns back to Damocles territory if it's no longer needed.

All airships have landing gears in one form or the other (With the exception of those airships just too big to land or never meant to land like a Skybase). These gears either take the form of Landing Legs for Capital ships and Wheels for Fighters/Shuttles. A ship normally lifts off slowly and gradually in a vertical manner using it's Maneuvering Thrusters, but ships without them must rely on the landing gears and their propulsion engines for a take off (Example: The SK Weevil class Shuttle). If the Landing Gears are damaged in some way, the airship must repair them before setting down on the ground. In all landing and take off situations, the HRG is heavily depended on. Landing Gears also use power when in use. This feature can be used on Open and Closed Hull ships.

This feature is either a mounted ram of a reinforced hull built to do extra damage when ramming a target. A ship with this ability is considered two Size categories larger for purposes of calculating ramming damage. This feature can be used on Open and Closed Hull ships.

A sensor-reflective hull is not stealth, but prevents the interior of a ship from being scanned with sensors. The ship itself can be detected, however any attempts to determine what the ship has in it's hold, who's on board, how it's internal systems are configured, or using sensors to get an accurate lock on people, objects or use sensors to determine floor plans will fail regardless of proximity. A ship cannot have both an energy sheath or a sensor reflective hull, and this is a Closed Hull feature only.

An energy sheath is a special type of hull which, thanks to its materials and shape, makes detecting the ship with long-range sensors (but not lateral sensors) very difficult. An energy sheath makes the chance, on a 2d6, of detecting such a ship a 13 with long-range sensors. Only when the ship has closed to within lateral sensor range (Which is below the lowest range of a long range sensors and usually within half a mile or 2,640 feet.). This method is used as a type of stealth, as opposed to a Cloaking Device, but is not fool proof. A ship however can reset it's sensor sensitivity levels to detect a ship with a sheath, requiring an hour of work, but only if the sheath's composition is known. (Meaning there is a 1 out of 10 chance they will find the right composition. 1 out of 4 if they know what type of nation or ship class. Insured if they have detailed sensor records regarding this ship). A ship cannot have both an energy sheath or a sensor reflective hull, and this is a Closed Hull feature only.

This ability gives a ship the equipment needed to surpass 10,000 feet. Closed Hull ships get this ability for free, with no cost in SU or Money. An Open Hull Ship has to purchase this ability separately, costing money and room but not power. When an Open Hull ship is to surpass 10,000 feet, it must rig for this by sealing off the top open deck. Any ship without this cannot exceed 10,000 feet regardless if engines can. Usually a ship without this ability, trying to pass 10,000 feet, will experience hull ruptures due to pressure changes.

A water tight hull, an ability assumed for and free on all Closed Hull design airships (For some nations, but the SK don't build Water Tight Hull airships). This ability allows a ship to be able to land in and float on water. Closed Hull Airships paying for this ability have to pay far more, as this enables a Closed Hull airship to float in water if it lands. Ships without this ability will, as they hit the ocean surface, begin to take on water at the rate of 30 SU a round (5 seconds). Meaning a ship of 600 SU in size will sink below the water surface in 1 minute, 40 seconds.

This ability can only be purchased on an Open Hull design airship, that has Water Tight Hull ability as well. This causes an airship to deploy masts and sails, which can provide either a boost in speed or allow a ship to maneuver of it's own power by the wind, assuming it's moving in the same direction as the wind. This part is actually more of an Axius-favored technology, also preferred by Dantania so more information will be included regarding this specific technology in the Axius Airship Guide.

This ability, which is immensely expensive, and very rarely used, allows for a ship to actually enter and travel beyond an atmosphere without strain to the HRG. For an Airship to be Space Capable however, it must be meet a long list of requirements. This will be covered in a later document.

A ship doesn't run itself, and you need a good crew to operate the airships, man the landing parties and make the sacrifices necessary to complete the missions. Each nation treats and accommodates it's crew in different ways.

Airships are rated for Crew/Passengers/Evac. "Crew" represents the ship's normal crew complement; this number may fluctuate based on the type of mission being performed. Due to the systems onboard, a ship could be operated with a skeleton crew of 10% however this is only for a short period and usually in non-crisis conditions. "Passengers" represents the standard number of passengers which the ship can comfortably carry; this number is in addition to the crew and usually occupies any spare quarters the airship may have onboard. "Evac" represents the maximum number of persons which can be carried on the ship in an emergency situation; this number includes the Passengers, but does not include the crew. Typically it takes days to load the full Evac complement onto the ship.

Crew/Passengers/Evac does not cost SUs or power in and of itself. However, as indicated below, the quarters, life support systems, and other systems needed for shipboard personnel do cost SUs and Power.

The amount of crew, and each field they are listed into, varies from ship type to ship type as well as nation to nation. We won't detail this here, but we will go into more detail on this in each nation's specific page.

The SU Cost, Power Cost and Silver cost of quarters varies from nation to nation, however there are commonly shared types.

*Barracks*	Barracks are the lowest in the chain of crew accommodations. Barracks are made to house 60 crewmembers (usually) with bunks in ranks of three, with three or more racks per barracks. Male and female crewmembers usually bunk together.
*Spartan*	Featuring the barest of accommodations, they have two bunks per room instead of beds and usually lack the basic creature comforts such as additional rooms. They usually house between 2 to 4 people in one, depending on nation.
*Basic*	Minimal standard accommodations. Typically suited for one, maybe two, people and are filled by enlisted personnel and the lowest ranking officers with the least seniority.
*Expanded*	These quarters are larger and often more luxurious. Usually used by groups of people (Such as married crewmembers), families, mid-ranking officers and the like.
*Luxury*	These are the top of the line quarters. Large, multiple room suites with lots of amenities. This category includes most senior officers' quarters, special diplomatic and VIP quarters and the like.
*Ultimax Containment Unit*	Not exactly a quarter, but this is used to store Ultimaxes either for duty or merely storage. They are usually expensive and take up allot of power, but can hold several Ultimax Units.

Environmental systems is a broad term covering the life support systems and relayed technology which make it possible for people to live aboard an airship. These systems cover basic temperature settings, air supply, internal air pressure, and protection from poisonous gases or toxins that could enter. These systems are essential on an airship, but more and more essential on Closed Hull Airships above anything else. This keeps closed compartments from being thin on air.

Basic life support is the standard environmental systems which is found on an airship. They cover all the things listed above, as well as monitor internal temperature and adjust it when a ship is entering either a cold or hot area, adjust to pressure changes as a ship climbs in altitude, and other things that may affect the internal air. If basic life support is cut off, reserve and/or emergency systems activate.

In crisis situations, when the ship is damaged or Power runs low, a ship's commander may shut off standard life support to some parts of the ship, thus conversing power. To do this, determine what percentage of the ship's habitable space (maximum of 50%) has its life support shut off. Then reduce the Power cost of the basic life support by that percentage.

In addition to the primary basic life support, some airships carry a reserve or secondary life support system. It functions at 50% of the primary system's capacity for up to 24 hours, at which time it requires twice as much time as it was used to recharge. It also uses up power, but only when it's active. In most cases, this system remains inactive till needed.

Only the overly cautious equip this, but some nations make this required equipment. If the primary and reserve both fail, then this system kicks in. This system is normally only valid for the amount of hours equal to a ship's size, providing just that much more air and conditions suitable for living. Normally Emergency Life support systems are used to give a crew enough time to evacuate an airship. The power systems for this are independent of other ship's power systems and, in a pinch, the crew can drain the emergency life support power and use it for other systems. This would require a roll of 5 on a 2d6 by the Engineer, and if it works would provide the ship a one-time boost of power equal to Size x 6. For example, a Size 3 airship can drain it's Emergency Power and gain 18 Power, which goes directly to the Core and renders Emergency Life Support useless. This power has to be replaced later for the Emergency Life Support to work. Failure means that the attempted power drain fails and the Emergency Life Support's power is totally disabled and must be restored later.

Airships carry a lot of consumables such as food, water, repair parts and tools such as smithing supplies and other items needed to maintain an airship. Storing this material pending use requires a significant amount of space. For an SU Cost of 2 x Size, an Airship carries enough consumables for up to one year of normal operations from a home port. Each increase in the multiplier (3 x Size, 4 x Size, and so on) adds up to another year's worth of consumables. Therefore, for a Class 7 Ship to hold a Year of Consumables would cost 14 SU, for Two Year's would be 21 and for Three Year's would be 28 SU. Half a Year would be 1 x Size and a Quarter of a year .5 x Size. Normally a Ship has, built into it (But this depends on nation-nation build) a chamber set aside for one Year of Consumables, which includes weaponry, items for repairing parts of the ship, and anything needed for basic life. Sometimes situations can drain an airship's Consumables Level however, and the Plotmaster usually warns of this situation. Most Consumables are usually given by the nation which an airship is hired out too, however civilian craft can purchase such items for a fee.

Surplus supplies are handled using Cargo Space. Say an Airship, Size 3, loads up with the standard one year's supplies (6 SU). They decide however that they want two more year's of supplies. The airship has an open cargo hold of 10 SU. So we take the SU Cost of three year's of supplies (4 x Size) and subtract the amount of one year (6 SU). So, 12 - 6 leaves 6. That 6 SU occupies 6 of the 10 SU in the cargo hold.

To process the Consumables into Food for a crew, a Galley is required. Also the cost of Consumables changes if the airship has a Food Creation System (FCS) onboard.

A Galley is quite simply a kitchen or kitchens needed to turn Consumables into food for the crew. This section usually doesn't take up much room, and is rather cheap. Also it never requires any power, or creates any drain. However this is a required item.

A very new advance, this uses a complex set of "Create Food and Water" spells, set with a selected menu, to create food. Ships equipped with this are able to take advantage of the ability to pack in less Consumables (as indicated in a table above) and this usually saves room. The Food Creation System (FCS) is set up in various spots across the airship, providing crewmembers with the food and items they requested. Normally these are found in recreational areas, and all Expanded and Luxury quarters. Power cost can be rather high however, dependent on nation. The FCS is usually expensive however. Also new and improved FCS's are under development and better versions can be obtained, with a better selection of food and better quality of nutrition and taste. However they are still no replacement for real food and only supplement a ship's supplies.

This describes all items made by recreating systems, such as some FCS Units or Industrial Fabricators. First off, the items made by these devices are made by weak creation spells and magics and are not perfect or even comparable to the real thing. These devices also suffer from various drawbacks. First, they can only produce objects stored in the ship's Archive Crystal. If an object or food is not in the crystal, then it cannot be produced. Second, the larger the item, the greater the energy expendature. Thus, some items are produced one part at a time, instead of all at once which can be time consuming. Also, overly complex items cannot be made. This includes minerals, metals, chemicals, anything alive or organic (With the exception of the food made by an FCS, and even then it's rather bland to the real thing. A Ham made by an FCS would taste like very basic meat, lacking the taste, spices, or moistness of a real ham), or anything overly complex. While a Bow could be made, a Spellfire or Crossbow cannot be. Some objects also exist beyond the ability of a Fabricator to recreate, such as gunpowder, Quartz, Gold, Silver, and the Fabricator is mostly used to create tools, arrow shafts, string, and basic items used. It is, in no way, depended upon, and normally items come out of Consumables. Also, and the most important part, items made by an FCS and Industrial Fabricators are magic in nature, and anti-magic will cause them to vaporize. This is why people never use the Fabricators to make food or water. While the FCS has found a way around this, using strong Permeancy spells, the food it makes is just barely nutritious and just barely tasty. A Cook with fresh supplies, in a Galley, can make far better food. Any crew that eats from an FCS alone, for over 3 months, will begin to weaken and show signs of malnutrition.

Used sometimes in addition to a Galley, but not with an FCS, the Food Delivery System will teleport in requested food orders from the Galley to lounge areas or certain quarters. While this does not expend power, it does have a high power demand.

This category covers the wide range of blacksmithing, mining, creating of tools, spare parts and objects from the use of raw materials or power. What can be made depends on the material at hand. A blacksmith can only work on swords and a hull if the supply of iron and such is present. However a Fabrication can work as a mundane "Create Object" spell however it has limitation. Overly complex items, metals and magic items elude it. However improved models are able to create more complex, and larger objects. The Industrial Fabricators are not on all ships, or even used by all nations, however they can be extremely useful for ships either on long term or long range assignments and unable to request additional goods.

Additional Power demand is a 1 power per pounds of the objects made. Objects are also magical in nature, any anti-magic spell or surge will utterly destroy the object. A 10 pound Miner's Pick takes, with a Mark I, 1 power per round operation and 10 power to create. If the Pick was hit with an Anti-Magic spell, it would vaporize.

An Industrial Fabrication Device with a Permanency Spell added in is currently being developed and more information on this will be revealed in upcoming updates.

A Mining Processing Facility enables a ship, provided it allocates enough men to the task, to process ore, smelt ore and shape the metal down into bars. A ship however must have engineers and crewmen work to construct a mine, and people focused into mining. A ship scans a suitable area of 2 square miles, a through search requiring one week with standard sensors, 3 days with specialized sensors and science stations. Chance to find the ore is also dependent on the ship sensors and specialization equipment present. After an ore deposit has been found, a shaft is dug out (Taking sometimes around 30 days with standard picks) and the veins found are mined. The normal digging size is 7 feet tall by 6 feet wide by 100 feet deep for the primary shaft. Digging is normally done with a Miner's Pick (30 silver, 10 pounds). However improved mining tools could be crafted to improve dig time if the ship's crew was intelligent enough. Two workers dig in a shaft/vein in rotating 8 hour shifts, so average production with picks is 180 cubic feet a day. An initial shaft can be dug out in 38 days. After that 1-10 veins of various quality are found, the same amount of workers assigned to each shaft. For every miner working, 3 people are required to labor and assist the miner. For each ore vein found, 8 miners and 24 laborers assigned. One Engineer must supervise the operation. A 20 foot segment of ore vein can be mined out in just over 7 days, producing 210,000 pounds of rock to be processed by the Ship Smelter. Daily Production by the same 8 man team is 27,000 pounds of rock a day. The SU Cost for the Smelter includes the entire Mining Processing Facility. Capacity listed is how much pounds of rock each Furnace can handle in a day. Additional Furnaces can be purchased at 20,000 silver each. A limit of Ten being per each Smelter. Additional Smelter Facilities can be purchased however. Cargo Teleporters are usually used to teleport up the rock to the Smelting Facility. Finished Metals are then sold for 80% of their value.

For Gemstones, no smelting occurs. They are stored instead, and a Gemcutter has to work to finish them for sale value. Gemstones in their uncut form are worth only a quarter of their true value. The exception of this however is Quartz, which can be used in their true form.

All but the smallest of airships have medical facilities and medical staffs devoted to preserving the health and well being of a crew. The Medical Facilities listed here include beds, health monitors, containment areas, morgues, patient wards, a surgical area, offices, medical labs, herb growing facilities, observation and rest areas and various other magical devices and chambers designed to aid the Chief Medical Officer/Doctor. The extent and quality of an airship's medical systems and personnel is determined by its Medical rating. The higher the rating, the more extensive and sophisticated its facilities and the better trained and more experienced its personnel are likely to be. The amount a ship's medical bay can handle, is really dependent on national build, but on average, one Medical Officer can handle 5 patients, therefore, a ship with 31 Medical Officers can handle 155 patients assuming it had a Medical Rating of 10. For each rating below 10, reduce the total patient load by 10%. Therefore, if that ship had a medical rating of 5, it could only handle 78 patients using all of it's medical personnel. This is the basic number for Damocles, with some nations either higher or lower. While Axius could handle 6 per Medical Officer, the Shadow Knights could only handle 3 per Officer. If a ship's wounded exceeds the maximum patient load they can handle, then the excess wounded risk very much turning into killed/deceased.

The table below shows the Damocles Medical Chart, but it is being shown to explain a few of the fields. Rating refers to the Medical Rating level, SUs as in how much Size Units it takes up, CMO Skill Level is the basic skill of a Chief Medical Officer, while Personnel is that of the basic Nurses/Assistants. Bonus are any Bonuses that apply to work done by the Doctors and Nurses there, EMK is Emergency Medical Kit, and signifies how much of the ship is equipped with these devices. EMU is Emergency Medical Ultimax, Cost is the cost in silver and Year Available is when the nation (Damocles in this instance) reached this Medical Level.

A ship can have more than one Medical Bay, and this is usually the case on Medical Ships. Any additional medical bays only increase the patient load it can take by a percentage equal to the total of the extra bays. For example, the same ship from before with 31 Medics, has a Level 7 Medical Facility, allowing it to handle 109 patients. In addition, it has a Level 5 Medical Bay, and two Level 2 Medical Bays. Therefore we add (5 + 2 + 2) 90% to the patient capacity, bringing it up to 207.

This feature is a Damocles-only feature, and will be better explained in that Airship Guide.

It's easy for crewmembers to become bored, distracted or demoralized during long airship voyages. To help keep them mentally and physically alert and active, airships have recreational facilities. These can range from gyms, to lounges or even simulation chambers. What facilities are available, is dependent on the national build and design. Every airship has a Recreation rating from 1 to 10. The higher the number, the more lavish and luxurious the facilities are. Recreation systems cost power, as well as silver. Also while some airships have "required" recreation levels, going above or below them will affect crew performance however some nations in a constant state of war usually shirk recreational facilities in exchange for more room aboard an airship. This makes a ship good in the short term, however it's prone to crew burn outs, drops in morale, requiring more crew rotations and downtime. Various nations have their own additions to Recreational Facilities.

Battle Pits are only found on Shadow Knight airships, while Combat Practice Areas can be found on Verax, Shadow Knight (and a few Damocles) airships. Battle Pits are large arenas, bloodsport, where crew members sometimes compete either for some helping of recent spoils, for a woman or for a rank/position. Combat Practice Areas are sparring chambers.

Another luxury on Shadow Knight airships, several women are kept onboard either as hired help or slaves, to keep the crewmembers "entertained" and cater to their every whim. Sometimes, to add in "more stock" a Shadow Knight airship will raid a town of it's females (and sometimes males).

Found on Damocles and Verax Airships (715 for Damocles, 700 for Verax), A Simulation Chamber uses illusion magics to let a crewmember relax, engage in fun activities, or training exercises.

Airship Recreational Facilities, before the Simulation Chambers, were far cheaper and required less power. Cause of this, Damocles and the Verax sometimes only place these devices on their larger capital ships.

No one has time to walk from one end of the airship, also sometimes you need to reach certain areas fast. The Personnel Transportation System includes Stairwells, Ladders and Access Crawlways. Stairwell and Ladders are used to move from deck to deck, while Access Crawlways help a person reach systems buried deep in the ship's infrastructure. These small crawlways are big enough for a full grown human adult to have to crawl through, and hardly make for speedy travel. They are used only for internal repairs and maintenance.

As of 710 AD for Damocles, 695 for Verax, Airships also incorporated Lifts into the Airship Personnel Transportation System. These small chambers carry half a dozen people to other parts of the ship swiftly, however are expensive, take up more room and also demand more power. Normally, they are only used on airships of Size 5 or above.

Before 695 AD, the Fire Suppression System consisted of alarms to detect fires, and the placement of nearby wall-mounted crystals that would expel water. Between 695 and 710 AD, the systems improved and were able to fire water down from above. After 710 AD, designs were made to use force fields to contain the spread of fire as well as seal of chambers and lower the temperature down to handle overly strong fires that crewmen could not reach.

A very simple concept to grasp, Cargo Holds are the freight and storage bays for an airship. Sometimes airships are designed as freighters, placing heavy emphasis on Cargo Holds. You decide how much SU to set aside for Cargo Holds, then the storage capacity is calculated based on several numbers. First an airship's tonnage has to be determined, to do that you take Length X Width X Height (In Feet). For a ship of 190 x 47.5 x 60 we have 541,500. We then divide by 1,000 to determine an Airship's Tonnage. This brings us to 541.5. To determine the ship's weight, we take the Tonnage times 28,500. This brings it to 15,432,750 pounds. Now, to determine the value of each SU in weight, simply divide that number by a ship's available (How much it can possibly have) SU. Oh and I recommend a calculator for all of this, preferably Windows Calculator. This airship has 784 SU Available so the final result is 19,684 and a whole lot of numbers afterwards. To make it simple, we say each SU is worth 19,685 pounds. Now, 30 SU was set aside for Cargo space so 19,685 x 30 = 590,550 pounds. We then divide by 2000 to determine Tons and we find this airship has a maximum cargo capacity of just under 295 Tons. You can fill up this cargo space with whatever you care to provided you have the space for it.

The escape pods, made standard on all ships after 687 AD, are simple 4-seat launch pods seating 4 human-sized people in a rather tight cramped space (2 seats of 2 facing each other in a very small circular pod). The Pod is equipped with Levitation and Flight Spells to extend beyond regular usage, and has enough air and food to last 30 person-days. On loading and launch, they propel away from the ship in a sudden burst of 150 mph, sustainable for 10 seconds (Which gets the Pod 2200 feet away from the ship in that time), which declines down a mile a second to the cruise speed of 7 mph. It has enough energy to sustain itself at this speed for 24 hours, giving it a range of 168 miles. It has no defensive or offensive systems, and just a basic shipboard compass and limited communication gear. After 24 hours of transit, engine power will fade, and the Pod will have enough magic to keep itself in the air for just 3 more hours, at which point it will of either landed or falls to it's doom. It's too heavy to float in water, so crews evacuating must find land immediately. A ship normally has a number of Pods equal to it's Size +1 x 20. (A Size 3 would have 80 Pods, able to hold 320 people)

The above information is mainly for Damocles airships, with other nations who design their own pods having different capabilities. Escape Pods are required mainly by Safety Laws governing several nations concerning airships. Any Civilian or Commercial airship without sufficient escape pods (Size +1 x 20 Pods) is usually deemed unsafe and fined if entering Damocles airspace. However some nation and lands either have looser laws, or no laws at all. The Shadow Knights don't enforce Escape Pods that much, and Terangoth simply doesn't care.

For an airship to go anywhere, it needs engines be them Propellers or Mana Thrusters. It has to be able to go where it needs to be.

Mana Propulsion are essentially engines in charge of forward momentum. The Mana Propulsion system comes in three parts; The Power Core (To be covered later), the Engines and the MIS. The Power Core generates the energy needed for an airship and it's various power systems. The Engines are responsibile for momentum and the MIS (Mana Injector System) allows for sustained maximum speed. The Engines come in either Propellors, Mana Thrusters, Hybrid or VTOL Types.

	Propellers: The oldest and cheapest type, Propeller engines have charged crystals that control the rotation speed of large metallic blades. This requires very little power, thereby making Propeller engines very cheap and energy efficient. This is the most popular and traditional engine style, however it is not as able as Mana Thrusters in speed and altitude. This is the first type of engines ever made, and people usually pick them to cut down costs.
	Mana Thrust: This engine type expels raw mana in a type of propellant, increasing the ship's overall speed and altitude capabilities. Mana Thrusters are also generally more quiet, and deemed to be modern designs as opposed to the old Propeller engines. However Mana Thrust Engines require more power, more room and are much more expensive. They are generally better armored than Propeller engines and able to withstand more damage.
	Hybrid: The Hybrid design actually came before Mana Thrusters, even though this engine type incorporates both Propeller and Mana Thrust engine designs. This is a good medium ground for Propeller and Mana Thrust in terms of speed, cost and power demand. The Hybrid system came about just before the First War, when Thrusters were in their infancy stage and Damocles was still producing Propeller based engines. So the Hybrid format was designed which uses Propellers for Altitude and Thrusters for speed.
	VTOL: Vertical Take Off and Landing Engines are meant to replace entirely Maneuvering Thrusters, allowing for better speed and enhanced energy production. Currently, these engines are still in the early stages and used mostly for small airships. They are generally more expensive but allow a ship to maneuver at a speed equal to it's propulsion speed. They are a recent development, first appearing on the Shadowrunner Mark 2 (Which was later named the Aveon class) and is now featured in the Shadowskimmer Shuttle.

Engine Speeds are measured in Standard, Sustainable and Maximum velocities. Standard is the speed at which an airship commonly cruises at. Sustainable is the highest speed it can maintain without stressing the ship or its engines. Maximum velocity is the highest speed it can attain. The cost of the speed is dependent on engine type and national build. The Standard speed is usually a set percentage below Sustainable and the Maximum is usually a set percentage above Sustainable. However these percentages are dependent upon national builds.

When you mount engines onto an airship, it's mass and size plays a part in it's overall speed. This doesn't cover engines specially designed for fighters and shuttles however and this covers Speed and Altitude.

The ability of an engine's speed or altitude can be reduced or increased, either to cut down on cost or to increase the overall ability of a ship. These packages cost SU and silver for increases and reduce SU and silver for decreases and is dependent on national builds.

The Mana Injector System (MIS) allows an airship to maintain maximum speed for a set duration of time. Surpassing this time risks damage to the engines and airship itself. After an airship has traveled so many hours or time at maximum speed, it must wait double that time for the engines to cool down. However some are working on a way to reduce this cool down time. The MIS functions by sending pulses of energy into the engines themselves, to maintain a steady flow of power by the way of a complex set of crystals spell-coded to act as power holders and receivers and senders.

While the Mana Propulsion System controls a ship's forward momentum and controls it's maximum possible altitude, the Maneuvering Thrusters are in charge of ship hovering, side to side movement and up and down movement. The only difference between this and VTOL Engines is that VTOL is Propulsion and Maneuvering Thrusters integrated together as one system. If a ship has VTOL, then there is no need to purchase Maneuvering Thrusters. These Thrusters are used for all movements that are not straight lines or 0-Plane.

A 0-Plane is when the ship travels in a straight line with no altitude shifts whatsoever. At this mode, Maneuvering Thrusters draw no power and are at rest state. However they still generate power.

A 15-Degree Plane is the ship either climbing or dropping at an angle of 15 degrees. This is the safest angle possible for Propeller or Hybrid based engine systems.

This is the safe range for Mana-based engines (Not Hybrids) but is the first danger range for Propeller and Hybrid based engines. Any airship with this steep drop, that has Prop or Hybrid engines, has a 1 in 6 chance of an Engine stall possibility. If the 1 comes up, then roll a 1d100. If the number is less than your maximum thruster velocity (For example, a .5 means a 50 on a 1d100) then the Engines are able to find a way to compensate, however the Maneuvering Thrusters could start to undergo minor stress. If the number is greater, then the Maneuvering Thrusters will stall. If the number is greater than 95, then both Propulsion Engines and Thrusters stall and the Engineer will have to try and restart it, then Helm will have to attempt a dive recovery. A roll below a 5 however means the airship is able to gain a speed boost of Maneuvering Thruster (Standard) added to their own Propulsion for this maneuver. The airship will keep plummeting at the speed it was descending at till it hits the ground.

At this level of descent, a Mana Thruster is suspectable to the same rules as listed above for the Propeller/Hybrid Engines. The Propeller/Hybrids however would suffer a stall, with the same roll of a 1d100. Only anything below the Maximum Thruster velocity means only the Thrusters stall. Anything above means both engines stall. A 95 and above means the stresses are so intense, a feedback occurs within the primary Core.

At this sharp angle, a Stall is immeneint. Roll as stated above for an Engine Stall, just apply it to Mana Thruster Engines. To recover from a dive, the Manuevering Thrusters must be engaged and the Helm officer has to attempt to level off the nose. This requires consectuive rolls of 8 and above on a 2d6, any bonuses from flight systems applying. However this requires the Manuevering Thrusters to operate at maximum speed, which risks damage.

Thruster Velocity has two figures (For example, .25/.3). The first figure is a ship's Sustainable Velocity, in this case being 25% of the ship's Cruise Velocity. For our example, we will keep it simple and assume this ship's cruise velocity is 100 mph. So therefore, this ship's maximum velocity by thrusters would be 25 miles per hour or 183 feet per round (5 seconds). For Velocity, the Thruster Velocity is the percentage of your ship's Maximum Speed. For example, if an airship has a maximum speed of 160 mph, and has a Class 4 set of Maneuvering thrusters, then it can move at .6/.8 (60%/80%) with the first number being safe sustainable and the second being maximum. (96 mph/128). Assuming it travels at the maximum sustainable (.6/60%/96 mph) for maneuvering, then it is using up 6 Power. These engines are used for all movement that is not forward or backwards related (Such as the ship turning around, tilting on it's side, making a very steep climb or dive, hovering or moving up and down or from side to side). Sometimes the Mana Propulsion and Thrusters are used together (Such as the ship executing a sharp 180 turn, or making a very steep dive) at which point it moves at it's maximum thruster velocity. If however the thrusters are pushed above that speed, they will suffer damage as well as expend additional power.

Maneuvering Thrusters can run at the Cruise velocity constantly, however for Maximum Speed, they can only run for a number of rounds equal to a tenth of the speed they are moving at. An airship with a Maneuvering Thruster Maximum speed of 100 miles per hour can maintain this for ten rounds. Any round beyond that, the Thrusters will suffer 1d4 damage and the hull suffers 1d10 damage per round.

Maximum Speed is also used for 180 or overly sharp turns, however this movement only occurs for a round, two at the very most.

All Thrusters Generate power. You can buy additional thrusters, but they do nothing for speed or actual maneuvering, just add more power. They generate and hold power almost like an additional core, and regenerate power but only at an immensely slow pace. While in standard operation, they regenerate 1 Power every ten minutes. The only way to speed this up is for an airship to speed this up is to shut down the Maneuvering Thrusters. Regeneration then turns to 1 Power every Round (5 seconds). However this cannot be used to aid in Core recharging, but Power can be diverted. However once power has been diverted to the Core, it cannot be done again for another five hours and renders the Thrusters ineffective based on the percentage they were drained. Thrusters only work at full cruise speed if they contain full power. So normally, a ship only diverts Power to the Core when the situation demands additional power. This additional source of power is normally refered to as "Secondary Power". Instead of being tapped/diverted to Core, the power can also be used to run systems that use but don't expend power.

Docking Thrusters are much more scaled down versions of the Maneuvering Thrusters, capable of only moving a ship at the top speed of 2.5 miles per hour. It is also capable of movement where the most delicate of control is required, but is a tasking job on the helm officer, having to score a 3 on a 2d6 roll. These are used mainly to guide a ship into a paddock or a delicate docking situation.

An item used by ships in dire emergencies, the Acceleration Boosters increase maximum speed for forward propulsion by a factor of 20%, however expend 5 power per round while in use. Also this lowers effectiveness of the MIS, as each round of use taxes the Engines so much they feel they have traveled ten minutes worth in the span of five seconds. Therefore, if an MIS has a duration of four hours, six rounds of travel (5 seconds each) with the Boosters will lower that duration to three hours. It also will of expended 30 Power.

The Airship Power Core is the source of primary power aboard an airship. All airships usually have at least one, sometimes more if room allows.

Airship Cores come in several types, but before we cover the types we will get down to the basics. First off, Cores store power which is either used or expended by systems. Used means it is occupied, but not removed from the total power a Core has.

An Airship Power Core is essentially a large Quartz crystal, contained and confined, and charged with mana (Raw Magical Energy) in the form of a giant battery. Mana is either used (Run through systems requiring the flow of magic to operate. Borrowed) or expended (expelled or used up and is no longer there. Consumed) by systems.

Central Core: This Core type is a large Quartz, or sometimes several Quartz grafted together (MagiTech Mages have a spell allowing them to merge crystals into larger crystals), encased in a metallic and glass chamber and located within the center of an Engineering Deck/Section of an Airship. It acts as a generator, containing a set amount of available power for airship systems. This is the cheapest Core type, also the safest. Any fractures or damage to it are easy to repair, but this Core has a tendency to run hot. Any fractures on the outer casing would expel heated mana. This is the easiest Core to repair, startup, and maintain. Any damage only fractures, and doesn't cause a breach or detonation of the Core. The real damage lies in the heat that exists between the frame casing and the crystal, and core ejection is done so the Core and vent off this heated mana and steam safely outside of the ship. However there is no real room for improving performance besides standard modifications to make it a top of the line version of it's model. However disrupting the power of one of these cores is nearly impossible. This is the basic no frills Core of the pack.

Reaction Chamber Core: This is a Central Core, with a cluster of six to eight smaller crystals in a ring around it. Energy bounces back and forth, giving it a greatly increased storage of energy. However this is an expensive model, and prone to very devastating damage when it suffers a breach. It requires alot of room, as well as skilled engineers to operate and maintain. Modifications can be done temporally to give a boost, such as altering the flow of power between the crystals however any mistakes are unforgiving. It is housed in a similar containment casing as the Central Core, however any breaks will release a strong stream of raw mana, and if not contained could result in a detonation that will destroy the ship.

Pos/Neg Core: This Core is an entirely different design. Two large shards of Quartz are placed into a large containment casing, one at the top and one at the bottom. Positive energy flows upwards and Negative energy flows downwards and collide, creating a reaction of power which is caught by crystals in the center and relayed to where they need to be. The Core can have it's reaction rate increased, but with strain on the core itself. Any casing fracture spews either Positive or Negative energy out which can have a side effect on the crew.

A Core has a range of available power, dependent on model and design. For this example, we shall use a Damocles Class 6, containing 300 Power.

This power is usually allocated to various systems, and for this example we shall list various systems in our example ship and the power they use. The blue bar will always represent the total power you have from a system.

The orange bar will represent "System Use" or power used by basic systems, however not by Tactical or Propulsion. Now let's get down to Propulsion, assuming the airship is moving at it's Cruise Velocity. Under Available Power, the first number will represent used, the second always representing available.

The purple bar will always represent Propulsion. In this event, the airship has it's maneuvering thrusters set and charged at cruising speed and is also running it's main engines at cruise velocity. The ship will soon encounter an enemy, and thus proceeds to battle stations as it's shields raise.

Other systems usually fall into the above categories. If it's not a Tactical System, like Torpedo Launchers or Charge-Holding Cannons, then it will fall into the orange System Use bar. If it's a Transit Drive, or something that deals with propulsion, it will fall into the purple Propulsion bar. Any additional power sources that boost the ship are represented below.

We add a third number, listing available power. The Additional Power never factors in, unless in matters of dire emergency. An Airship depends entirely on it's Core. Now, this Airship is bearing frontal cannons, three pulse cannons, capable of firing twice a round and for 80 damage each. However this power demand occupies 8 power per shot. So we assume the ship fires all three guns, in a full salvo. This causes a noticeable drop in available power.

As stated above, the Maneuvering Thrusters generate energy. This power is classified as Additional Power.

Auxiliary Battery Crystals are simply additional sources of power, however they are used to maintain systems instead of for any action that expends power. The crew holds them in reserve for use in emergency or crisis situations, rather than using it at all times. Most ships have at least one auxiliary power generator. These can also be used to replace damaged or spent power generator crystals in the maneuvering thrusters. This requires an hour of work. In an emergency situation, power from the Auxiliary Battery Crystals can be dumped into the Core, depleting the Crystals entirely. However they will have to later be replenished by a Power Converter.

In addition to auxiliary power, airships have a small reserve of emergency power for use in crisis situations or when other power systems are disabled. The system contains a set of quartz batteries, containing a charge of energy that is never expended or used for something that would expend the power. An airship normally has just one emergency power system.

Power from the Core and other sources is routed throughout the ship by the Mana Flow System (MFS) which is a network of crystals and primitive copper strands and sometimes glass tubes. The MFS is needed to maintain power flow to all parts of the ship and any damage to it will decrease the ability of the MFS to supply power as needed to the systems that require it. An airship's MFS is assumed to be able to handle the power flow to run all systems at up to maximum efficiency without difficulty. But when there's a need to transfer more power (for example to increase the damage a Pulse Cannon does, boost the strength of the shields, or feed more energy to the sensors to punch through interference) the MFS may not be able to handle the demands placed on it. Therefore the MFS is purchased along with an option to increase the ability of it's power flow (+10, +20 and so on and so forth). The quality and efficiency of an MFS determine how much power an airship can transfer each round.

The MFS also determines how much power can be flowed into the Core from sources such as Refueling Ships, Additional Power sources and so on and so forth. With no real benefits added, the default flow is 1 Power per Round (5 seconds). At this rate it would take a Refueling ship 25 minutes to transfer 300 Power into an Airship's depleted Core. If an airship has a different rate, such as +10 or +50 then that is how much power such an airship can take into it's Core from an external or additional source. MFS enhancements are not a major item, but they can be crucial in a pinch.

The largest category of systems on an airship fall under the heading of operations systems. They include flight control, sensors, archive crystals, and many other systems related to the daily command and operation of the airship.

The concept of a bridge (the control center of an airship) is not a new concept. It was started by the Victory tests of the Defender class and it was determined that airships with bridges function much more efficiently and give the crew better abilities, options and enable an airship to do far more. However many see the high costs of a bridge to be far more than what they would like or feel what is justifiable for the added abilities so many airships run in a "Bridgeless" function. In this function, the rear aft deck of a ship (known as the poop deck) is the control center of the airship. The limitations of this are immense, however this has been known to lower an airship's cost by well over a million silver. This works best for open deck airships, and those that don't have so many advanced systems onboard. Several still build in this fashion, however such airships they build are deemed expendable. The Captain commands from the deck, yelling out the orders. Compliance is dependent on the ability of the crew to actually hear him yell, and none of the departments are centralized as they are on a bridge. Helm is ran by the steering wheel atop the poop deck, and by the crew manning the engines. Tactical is ran by a Weapon Master who yells his orders to all weapon stations atop the deck. Other systems are either in the rear section under the poop deck or down in other parts of the airship. Orders are usually relayed by runners, or by use of the ship communications system. This normally increases the crew requirement on a ship, however some airships are very easily able to manage as the amount of people normally needed to run and repair a bridge are instead free and able to do other tasks. Cost is greatly decreased, as is the ability for those to target or capture the bridge and therefore take over all of the airship.

The true brains of the airship, the bridge is the central nexus of all command and control operations for an airship. While expensive, it allows an airship to do far more than originally envisioned. Here the captain holds sway, directing the course and actions of the vessel. From the bridge, he and his senior officers can, if they need to, control every system on the airship. Bridges don't cost any real power that causes any impact on any systems. Because of its importance, the bridge is able to act as an emergency spot in case of the failure of all life support. They have built in generators able to maintain people inside of the bridge for 72 hours. The major sections of the bridge includes the captain's chair, viewscreen, duty stations, captain's ready room and conference chambers. Not all airships have these, also the type of duty stations is dependent on the airship and nation. For example, Expedition Fleet airships maintained a station for the ship's Alledhryn (Supply Hunter/Battle Mage) while First War era airships removed this officer entirely and replaced the spot with a secondary tactical station. Shadow Knight airships maintain a Political Officer, while Carriers maintain a Flight Ops Officer. Any spare unassigned stations are made into Auxiliary Stations, that can be altered to in a matter of minutes, run the function of any other station as either a replacement primary or secondary.

Also known as the Command Station, this is where a captain normally sits. Some governments may opt to remove this, and some airships aren't considered important enough to have such a seat (IE: The Damocles Excalibur class). Also in addition there may be a second or third seat designated for the 1st Officer and any other officer deemed important for ship operations. It directly faces the viewscreen (or front) of the bridge. The armrests may include miniature, simplified displays which allow the captain to override any ship system.

Each ship's bridge is arranged a little differently from the bridge of another airship class. However most of them include the following duty stations. Each one can be altered for various types of tasks and functions by the various quartz buttons and glass displays that make them up. They are ran by the quartz buttons, programmed with simple magics to respond to touch, and use illusion and image magics to make images and information appear on glass panels.

Occupying most of the wall in front of the captain's chair, the viewscreen is nothing more than a large set of glass panels, with crystals to the side of them to project images from various sources.

These two chambers are more for administrative purposes than anything else. The Ready Room is the Captain's personal office, while the Conference Room is a meeting place for the senior staff or for special guests.

Sometimes an airship has a second bridge, in the event of the loss of one bridge. Also airships with bridge separation have an additional bridge for each "sub-section" of the airship. For example, a Norcon class would have a Primary Bridge and one Auxiliary Bridge cause it separates into two craft entirely. The Auxiliary Bridge is smaller than a standard bridge and has the basic duty stations (Engineering, Flight Control, Operations) but also carries an enhanced Tactical station. This is cause a ship only uses the Auxiliary bridge in a combat situation. In some chases it also has several unique stations such as Defense Communications, Defense Systems Engineering, Technology Assessment, System Control and Engagement Damage Intelligence. The cost of an Auxiliary Bridge also includes either a dedicated lift or a dedicated access crawlway running between the main bridge and each auxiliary control room.

This is a free unit, however it's availability is dependent entirely on the nation. This acts as an emergency control room, but not a bridge and usually resembles a square chamber with controls for basic ship helm controls, engineering and sensor information as well as two auxiliary stations. This chamber is used only in the event that an airship has lost all of it's bridges/auxiliary bridges and is the final way to maintain control on an airship and to get it out of a situation. However it has no tactical abilities whatsoever.

Only a rare few nations have pursued this technology. In essence, this allows an airship to separate into different sections. The purpose of this depends entirely on the airship, and airships with this system built in are actually designed as two airships, and then their figures merged. This ability also allows for an airship to reintegrate the separated parts into the whole, provided those parts are intact. In the event of a Norcon class, it's bridge deck can separate from the airship. If the bridge section gets destroyed, then a new one is simply built and placed on. If however the primary section gets destroyed, then usually the ship is considered lost and an entirely new ship is built.

Regarded more as a last ditch weapon, is the concept of the Detachable Warhead. This is a small section of the ship which detaches from the main body of the ship and can move under it's own power. It is laden with one to six torpedoes and is designed to explode upon impact with an enemy airship. It can be remotely steered from it's launching ship, however there is room for a pilot but that is regarded as a kamikaze mission. The warhead possess docking thrusters, and sometimes Acceleration Boosters. Typically this item is built into a pre-designed "notch" of the airship and sometimes around the forward end of it. After the warhead is used, engineering crews can install another one at a shipyard. Use of the warhead does not change the "parent" vessel's size or other characteristics, but the SUs that the warhead taken up are considered unusable till an airship has reached the proper repair facility.

The Archive/Informational Access Crystal (or commonly referred to as the Archive crystal) acts as the library and database for all airships. It controls virtually every function of the airship in some way. It regulates the power flow in the Mana Propulsion systems, operates the sensors, and helps the Tactical officer accurately fire the weapons. Without a working archive crystal and it's system, an airship virtually shuts down. The degree of an Archive Crystal's "Sentience" varies from nation to nation and airship to airship. While some can only respond to keyed commands, the more advanced ones can actually understand and respond to ordinary speech. In the lowest degrees, they can only respond however to basic keyed in commands at control stations and are not capable of any real "thought" or problem-solving abilities. The Archive Crystal monitors anything and everything going on at the ship from everyone's location based on their PCLs, any ship emergencies, or other situations. The Archive Crystal cannot operate the ship, just inform needed people of an emergency. It can operate the airship, but just in routine tasks such as basic flight from point A to B. It lacks complex thought, and can only make decisions and information based on it's magical programming. For example, unless told to do so, the Archive Crystal will not alert anyone that a crewmen has left the ship or raise shields when detecting a hostile foe. Information is stored on small SCIM Crystals, which can be inserted and removed at specific panels on the airship but the removal of one could cause operating problems for the airship (Example: Such as removing the SCIM that controls ship targeting). Around 100 SCIMs are usually loaded into a Command Module, which several are found all over the ship. The Archive Crystal itself, and primary modules, usually ranges from 20 to 100 meters tall and 10-15 meters in Diameter which holds hundreds of modules around it, all containing a hundred SCIMs each. Rearranging the SCIMs or installing new ones with specialized programming can interfere with, alter, or sometimes enhance Archive crystal operation. Each Crystal Core is able to handle the computational and information storage needs of an Airship. Damocles regulations require any ship over above Size 4 to have a minimum of two Archive Crystals. Ships of class 8 need to have at least three. Not all ships follow this mandate, but it's required. Those ships with less than the required number of Archive crystals suffer "processing lag" and limited information and are incapable of handling science missions. Those ships exceeding the minimum requirement have quicker and smarter systems and are able to have more information at their fingertips. All Archive Crystals have a set amount of storage, which is rated as SCIMs or Single Crystal Information Module

A SCIM is a unit of storage, in this case like modern day computers have bytes, Megabytes and Gigabytes, magical energy in Imperia, when stored in a crystal is rated as a SCIM. For example, a dozen text books usually take up one SCIM. Complex programs take up several SCIMs, as do Maps, Operating programs and other "software" which is really magical coding needed to make an airship function. An airship's Archive Crystal's total storage can easily be figured out by the following formula.

Price of Archive Crystal Core \ 10 = # of SCIM Storage.
Example: The Norcon class Explorer has Archive crystals for a total value of 280,000 silver. Divided by 10, this means it has a total storage of 28,000 SCIMs.

SCIM Storage never really becomes an issue, as Airships constantly transmit surplus information to Information Storage Facilities set into Damocles territory. Private or Civilian Airships normally keep their SCIM Load levels down to 50%, as generally 40% is required for basic operating information for the airship itself. This is one area of airships you don't really need to worry about or focus on.

Some airships, due to their mission profiles, need very efficient or powerful archive crystals. Upratings mean basic packages to improve information processing time, it's own "intelligence" level and how much information it can store. These are only done on Science ships, Medical ships and Survey craft.

Basic Life Support Table
Power per Round	Crew + Evac
1	1-2
2	3-8
3	9-32
4	33-64
5	65-125
6	126-250
7	251-500
8	501-1,000
9	1,001-2,000
10	2,001-4,000
11	4,001-8,000
12	8,001-16,001
13	16,001-32,000
...and so on

Consumables SU Cost Table
	With FCS	Without FCS	Example Airship: Size 3. SU Cost With/Without
One Year	1 x Size	2 x Size	3/6
Two Years	2 x Size	3 x Size	6/9
Three Years	3 x Size	4 x Size	9/12
Four Years	4 x Size	5 x Size	12/15

Rating	SUs	CMO Skill Level	Personnel Skill Level	Bonus	EMK Availability	EMU Availability	Cost	Year Available
1	5	2	1	0	5%	No	15,000	679
2	10	3	1	0	10%	No	30,000	685
3	15	3	2	0	20%	No	45,000	687
4	20	4	2	0	30%	No	60,000	691
5	25	4	2	+1	40%	Yes (Mark II)	75,000	696
6	30	5	3	+1	50%	Yes (Mark III)	90,000	705
7	35	5	3	+2	60%	Yes (Mark IV)	105,000	710
8	40	6	4	+3	70%	Yes (Mark V)	120,000	719

Speed/Altitude Alterations
Size	Change
Size 1	+5%
Size 2-3	No Change
Size 4	-5%
Size 5	-10%
Size: 6	-15%
Size 7	-18%
Size 8	-20%
Size 9	-25%
Size 10	-30%

Open Hull Design (The Defender Class)	Closed Hull Design (The Prometheus Class)