Armed Holdings

[Bhurano]

Hi there,

ok, so once again two questions cropped up during a little chit-chat with a friend.

He asked if he could arm his holding with bristling weapons. I figured since he has his steamdriven airship and he knows that he will traverse dangerous terrain it seems reasonable.

I figured, since the ship is bought with reputation, the whole armament should be handled as a room. So he would loose the space of 1 room for his ship, but gain an approbiate collection of viable weapons for his ship. Since it is a holding I thought that buying the weapons he want, doesn't seem right. Does that seem reasonable? Or how do you handle armed holdings?

Thanks for the help.

[Sletchman]

Fortifications + Guards upgrades does it pretty easily.

Fortifications: Require checks to get past - so in game say that it's skill checks to evade / avoid the weapons attached to the holding.  Not necessary, but makes it that much harder to get into the holding - which is always good.

Guards: A number of standard NPCs of XP value equal to Rep invested.  30 Rep gets you Animated Melee Weapons (page 254), if you want something better, pay more Rep.

[Antilles]

I'm assuming you're talking about cannons and such? If so, yeah, I'd be a bit leery about letting them buy a full compliment of say, light cannons for the price of a room (10 reputation). At the same time I'm sympathetic to the fact that buying them with silver will get ridiculously expensive ridiculously fast..

[Rhishisikk]

Bhurano,

Could you elaborate, please?  Does he wants bombs he can drop with impunity, flaming dragons roosting in a launch bay, or mountain-crushers?  

I wouldn't worry about it; if an armed airship starts flying around, local rulers will start defending their holdings, even if it isn't hostile (just in case).  Example:  In a steampunk Hand of Doom scenario some years back, the final battle at Brindol took a sad turn as the dragon auxiliaries discovered that steel nets could be weighted, bundled up, and "cast" from catapults.  Didn't stop the larger ones, but planning on being a bully from the air doesn't seem so cool after all that falling damage behind enemy lines...

[Sheena-Tiger]

@Rhishisikk

i am not the owner of the holding... i could never get one that huge with my choice of path... i know quite well what he aims towards.

it clearly is cannons, like for a fight in midair... or if needed attacking less mobile targets. at best he might look for some kind of drop-weapons to attack targets below the ship
he tends to stay quite relistic in that matter, so a band of dragons as protectors will be out of the question and considering our scenario... an army of lightning and fire throwing mages too

[Bhurano]

Hi there,

my buddy over there got it right. Currently the steamdriven airship is unarmed. He has 2 of the max. 3 guard compliments aboard. Just the people he needs to run a ship. I even allowed - since for now they haven't aquired that much reputation - to buy his current reputation debt off with regard to the guards aboard. No need for me to spoil the fun for my group with an airship that goes nowhere.

Most of the ship is driven with steam and electricity, but the cannons should have been arcanotech/magitech (whatever you want to call them). I figured that gouts of flame and lightning a far superior to cannonballs up high in the air. Also you don't want to piss of the lord in the land underneath, just because you defending yourself against adventurous dragons. In general at least any major power and many of the lesser are prepared to deal with aerial intruders, if those try to be pesky. It just comes with the setting -> crapsack world with steampunk and magitech up to the gills.

@Sletchman

His ship has fortifications, but a bristling broadside in a ship-to-ship-fight aren't where I see fortifications, especially if I want to play a raid on his ship out in some detail. His fortifications are that the ship can fly and you need to gain access (challenge 1), you need the resolve to put the elemental/demon creature that is holding the ship afloat under your will (challenge 2) and you need to find the hidden masterkey (challenge 3) to unlock the steering wheel.

@Antilles

The whole buying them with silver thing is what I tend to avoid. You are on the other hand absolutely right that 10 Reputation not that much. I would probably go the way and start with 50 Reputation for a light armament, 80 for a middle armament and probably 100+ for the major league stuff. I tend to be generous with reputation for several reasons.

@Rhishisikk

I like your idea of carpet-bombing and launchable dragons. Nice thing with the nets in your scenario... clever and deadly...

@Sheena-Tiger

just aquire more influence in the high houses of magic and he can even buy a band of arcane warriors as a mercenary crew ready to kick even dragon ass.