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...I tried to kind of reference the whole "in SPAAAACE!" thing with the title. Not sure it worked. Anywho...
In my spare time, I've decided to start making a campaign setting for the Pathfinder system that is largely based on Floating Continents and related tropes. The idea primarily arose as a way to give airships more inherent purpose than simply Rule of Cool and as a convenient and stylish way to get around the world. If the oceans are replaced with open sky, airships become the best method of transportation. While this is where the idea began, I definitely hope and intend for it to go well beyond this. What would a world suspended in the clouds be like?
Naturally, this will necessitate more robust rules for airship travel, construction, piloting, etc. The basic ideas are already starting to accrete like a new-born planet. Inspiration is being drawn primarily from settings like Eberron, Spelljammer, Final Fantasy (particularly FF XII's city of Bhujerba), Hayao Miyazaki's Howl's Moving Castle (and probably Castle in the Sky, but I haven't seen that one yet - it is on my too watch list this week, however), Allods Online, and Skies of Arcadia.
In terms of overall tone, while of course I aim to create as versatile a setting as possible, I intend for the default tone to hover somewhere between classic Final Fantasy and Miyazaki movies. A sense of idealism and wonder more than the gritty world of Eberron or the silliness of Spelljammer.(Let it be known that in spite of this, these are two of my favourite campaign settings throughout all of tabletop gaming.) Technologically, it will be somewhere between Golarion and Eberron but leaning more towards the Golarion end of things. The setting is at roughly the same level as Golarion, they just had to develop a little further along certain paths in order to thrive.
As for the floating continents themselves, the largest (and rarest) will probably max out at around the size of Australia or Europe - mostly just to support large seas and perhaps even an Underdark analogue. Maybe one that's comparable to Africa or South America in size. The majority of islands range between Ireland and Ireland plus Great Britain in size. All floating miles above the Mists which rumours say hides another inhospitable world full of terrible monsters. The main purpose of this is to provide an explanation for gravity's universal "down", and so that people who do fall off of skyships or continents don't just fall forever which would mean that they could always be rescued, providing one could find them. As for why the landmasses float... I haven't nailed that down yet, and wouldn't be against just handwaving it if I can't come up with something.
EDIT: A little bit of random info that I came across on Ravenloft suggests the Mists bit is probably a little too similar to ignore. It was just something I came up with to quickly solve the issue mentioned above, and I actually had more of Final Fantasy IX in mind when I did that. I suppose I'll come up with another solution to that problem... Note that aside from this, the only thing I actually know about Ravenloft is that it's a horror setting. I don't even really know the particulars of it's Mist so it might not be as similar as I think.
Another thing I intend to do with the airships is aim to have as much variety in their construction as Spelljammer (but more sensible shapes, of course) - sleek elven ships made of wood and powered by sails and arcane magic, sturdy dwarven ironclads that use bound fire elementals, and even ships made of bone that run on the trapped souls of the dead. On the other hand, I want to avoid adding in too many mechanics - particularly the kind that would require additions to character sheets. Aside from maybe adding a skill or two (probably Pilot, and nothing else if I can help it), I'd like the default character sheet to be able to record everything necessary for a character. I only mention this because quite a few settings (particularly fan-made ones) add numerous skills and mechanics that, in my opinion, just result in mucking things up.
So anyway, this is the basic outline of where I'm starting from. I haven't the foggiest notion of how to proceed from here (beyond probably making a map of the world - as much as one can be made for a world that consists of potentially wandering landmasses). Comments, suggestions, questions on anything are more than welcome.
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I concur!
Nothing in mind at the moment, but this is a brilliant start. Will drop by again if something jumps up. =D
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Get Bastion's Airships.
I was going to run a campaign with virtually the same description but smaller land masses, and still have a lot of the concepts in my head. Feel free to ask anything...I might be of help...or not. :p
Map the individual masses separately, and then play with their path of motion. It wouldn't be impossible to write a little program that tracked them...or even a spreadsheet. I would assume, as a rule, that the bigger ones were fairly stable in relation to each other, or you end up trying to explain how they still exist!
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I do have Airships, but the trouble with its system is that bigger ships are able to easily max out their speed while smaller ships have all the horsepower (griffin-power?) of a bicycle - indeed it's almost an inherent requirement since max speed is based solely on engine size, and larger ships need larger engines in order to accelerate at all. I find it counter-intuitive to have giant battleships and merchant galleons able to fly alongside a peregrine falcon while a smaller and, in theory, sleeker ship isn't even breaking the speed limit in a residential zone. It's nominally solved by larger ships accelerating more slowly, but larger ships can afford extra engines which makes it not only possible but laughably easy for a Colossal airship to accelerate faster than a smaller ship's maximum speed.
Now, all that said, I probably will use that book as a springboard for my own system, but I expect to make mine a little simpler, intuitive, and probably a bit more abstracted.
I can't recommend Razor Coast—Fire as She Bears! enough. It is what I am redoing my upcoming Spelljammer campaign on.
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I do have Airships, but the trouble with its system is that bigger ships are able to easily max out their speed while smaller ships have all the horsepower (griffin-power?) of a bicycle - indeed it's almost an inherent requirement since max speed is based solely on engine size, and larger ships need larger engines in order to accelerate at all. I find it counter-intuitive to have giant battleships and merchant galleons able to fly alongside a peregrine falcon while a smaller and, in theory, sleeker ship isn't even breaking the speed limit in a residential zone. It's nominally solved by larger ships accelerating more slowly, but larger ships can afford extra engines which makes it not only possible but laughably easy for a Colossal airship to accelerate faster than a smaller ship's maximum speed.
Now, all that said, I probably will use that book as a springboard for my own system, but I expect to make mine a little simpler, intuitive, and probably a bit more abstracted.
Cool. I'm with you there...it does have issues...but it's sooo good for inspiration. :)
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First, let me start by shamelessly pluggling my webcomic/ blog, relevant because I'm doing a series on worldbuilding there.
Hopefully that might give you some ideas for your next step.
Another source of inspiration would be the comic book Meridian, long since ended when CrossGen comics went under but the graphic novels might still be available.
In it, there was an element in the soil of the floating islands that allowed them to, well, float and trees grown on the islands absorbed it as they grew and became naturally buoyant. This allows for flying ships and islands without having to justify extra magic. And allows other uses of the element, making islands heavy with it sought after for mining. But if islands are too heavily exploited they fall.
I agree with EldonG that smaller islands should likely move. Larger islands might be stationary but smaller ones might shift and flow on air currents, making trade routes hazardous and unreliable and also allowing for undiscovered islands, lost islands, and the like.
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First, let me start by shamelessly pluggling my webcomic/ blog, relevant because I'm doing a series on worldbuilding there.
Hopefully that might give you some ideas for your next step.Another source of inspiration would be the comic book Meridian, long since ended when CrossGen comics went under but the graphic novels might still be available.
In it, there was an element in the soil of the floating islands that allowed them to, well, float and trees grown on the islands absorbed it as they grew and became naturally buoyant. This allows for flying ships and islands without having to justify extra magic. And allows other uses of the element, making islands heavy with it sought after for mining. But if islands are too heavily exploited they fall.I agree with EldonG that smaller islands should likely move. Larger islands might be stationary but smaller ones might shift and flow on air currents, making trade routes hazardous and unreliable and also allowing for undiscovered islands, lost islands, and the like.
Much appreciated! I've got a couple articles on world-building bookmarked, myself, but more is always appreciated. Especially since most of those are aimed at general world-building or novel-writing. The other problem is that those few that do focus more on tabletop gaming seem to be aimed more at building worlds for a specific campaign, solely for that GM's use. When I've finished this project, perhaps I'll write a series on making general use campaign settings in the vein of Eberron, Faerun, and Golarion... But that's a project for another day. :p
The element in the soil idea is an interesting idea, and I had been thinking of something along those lines. However, while it could be interesting to use it to draw parallels to real world natural gas shortages, I'd rather not have to deal with falling landmasses as much as possible. If I was going for a more Eberron or Golarion like setting, perhaps. Of course, I could just come up with a way of having it be a renewable resource...
I think I probably will have wandering islands after all. It does bring in many interesting possibilities like you mentioned. My biggest concern was what happens when landmasses run into each other, but I could probably more or less equate that to earthquakes. I also liked the idea of having some landmasses linked together with bridges, but moving islands could actually make that more interesting. Bridges could easily exist if supported by sturdy cables, and moving islands could cut down on their use, so there aren't too many of them. Just a few here and there connecting a close landmasses.
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Naturally, this will necessitate more robust rules for airship travel, construction, piloting, etc. The basic ideas are already starting to accrete like a new-born planet.
You could just use the standard Pathfinder vehicle rules:
http://www.d20pfsrd.com/equipment---final/vehiclesSkull & Shackles also has some boat combat rules.
It's easy enough to handwave that whatever is keeping things flying is capped at a certain altitude band, and it's exceedingly tricky to fly above and below, so it functions very much like ocean travel and combat with the penalties for falling being that much worse.
As for the floating continents themselves, the largest (and rarest) will probably max out at around the size of Australia or Europe - mostly just to support large seas and perhaps even an Underdark analogue.
You likely don't need it to be much larger than western Europe or half of Australia. You can fit a lot of land and kingdoms into a space that large. Unless you want dozens of dungeon crawls and a half-dozen underground empires, you don't need that much darklands. Keep in mind, even if the largest island is only the size of France, if it's deep enough you have room for four or five Frances stacked atop each other. That's a lot of room.
And seas are likely irrelevant with the sky boats. You want the focus to be on the sky ships, so don't worry about too many large land masses.
All floating miles above the Mists which rumours say hides another inhospitable world full of terrible monsters. The main purpose of this is to provide an explanation for gravity's universal "down", and so that people who do fall off of skyships or continents don't just fall forever which would mean that they could always be rescued, providing one could find them.
Possible options could be a ragged destroyed surface of magma and toxic gas after half the surface of the planet was wrenched into the sky.
Or it could be all water below with any land of sufficient mass floating up.Another thing I intend to do with the airships is aim to have as much variety in their construction as Spelljammer (but more sensible shapes, of course) - sleek elven ships made of wood and powered by sails and arcane magic, sturdy dwarven ironclads that use bound fire elementals, and even ships made of bone that run on the trapped souls of the dead.
Cool ideas.
Much of that can be handled by minor ship tweaks and some reflavouring.And a lot of that can come with time. It's pretty easy to add new ships after the fact.
On the other hand, I want to avoid adding in too many mechanics - particularly the kind that would require additions to character sheets. Aside from maybe adding a skill or two (probably Pilot, and nothing else if I can help it)
Profession (pilot) or Profession(sailor) can handle much of the load. If you want to get technical you can break down jobs on the ship into a couple sub-professions (Helmsman, Navigator, Riggings, etc).
So anyway, this is the basic outline of where I'm starting from. I haven't the foggiest notion of how to proceed from here (beyond probably making a map of the world - as much as one can be made for a world that consists of potentially wandering landmasses). Comments, suggestions, questions on anything are more than welcome.
There are a few routes you can take.
You can start by thinking of what mechanical elements you want. Such as races you want to include and exclude. Are there still gnomes and orcs? Something like the sylph might be more common. Tengus might be fun. How are races different from the standard world.
What classes are common. Are there gunslingers? What monsters have major roles in the world?
Alternatively, you can think of how the world works. How do people eat? Where do they get grains, fruit, and meat? Where do they get clothing?
Who has power in the world, and what factions are there? Are there nations or trading houses?
I ran something similar a few years ago, though it was based off of Book I from the Death Gate Cycle series. The larger land masses would actually float above each other, and the day/night cycle was based on when one island floated above another to block out the sun.
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Much appreciated! I've got a couple articles on world-building bookmarked, myself, but more is always appreciated. Especially since most of those are aimed at general world-building or novel-writing. The other problem is that those few that do focus more on tabletop gaming seem to be aimed more at building worlds for a specific campaign, solely for that GM's use. When I've finished this project, perhaps I'll write a series on making general use campaign settings in the vein of Eberron, Faerun, and Golarion... But that's a project for another day. :p
My blog series is slowly evolving into something I might re-edit into a PDF book. There's enough content there. Hopefully it has enough advice for both personal and general use worlds.
Really, the difference comes down to content and coverage. General use worlds just have to fill in those extra few blanks while also providing adventure hooks and story seeds.
The element in the soil idea is an interesting idea, and I had been thinking of something along those lines. However, while it could be interesting to use it to draw parallels to real world natural gas shortages, I'd rather not have to deal with falling landmasses as much as possible. If I was going for a more Eberron or Golarion like setting, perhaps. Of course, I could just come up with a way of having it be a renewable resource...
You can have the potential for resource shortages without actually playing that story. It's a potential story hook to use or ignore as you (or a GM using your world) sees fit.
It could also be a regenerating thing. Like Spice in Dune. There's a microbe in the soil that makes everything fly and while you can over mine an island until it sinks below the clouds (or standard altitude) it will eventually rise back up.
I think I probably will have wandering islands after all. It does bring in many interesting possibilities like you mentioned. My biggest concern was what happens when landmasses run into each other, but I could probably more or less equate that to earthquakes. I also liked the idea of having some landmasses linked together with bridges, but moving islands could actually make that more interesting. Bridges could easily exist if supported by sturdy cables, and moving islands could cut down on their use, so there aren't too many of them. Just a few here and there connecting a close landmasses.
Landslams (or something) would be a pretty serious hazard, but rare. Given you're higher than the surface and have less land mass, if the planet is the size of the Earth there's going to be a lot of negative space. More than likely land masses will just bounce off each other or have grazing hits. Direct collisions would be rare but terrifying (mostly for anyone on the smaller island).
Islands would likely float following air currents. Large ones would move slowly but smaller ones would move more swiftly. But they might slow and change directions if they drift too far north or south.
I imagine the jet stream would be major trade routes. Islands might pay big money to magic users to keep their island close to those.
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It's easy enough to handwave that whatever is keeping things flying is capped at a certain altitude band, and it's exceedingly tricky to fly above and below, so it functions very much like ocean travel and combat with the penalties for falling being that much worse.
But then you might as well be on the ocean. It probably will be treacherous to go too high or low, but some vertical movement will be allowed. Of course, the danger of dumping the crew off the ship would mean most ship-to-ship combat takes place on the same plane, but there's the option of bombing and all sorts of interesting manoeuvres that a 3rd dimension opens up.
You likely don't need it to be much larger than western Europe or half of Australia. You can fit a lot of land and kingdoms into a space that large. Unless you want dozens of dungeon crawls and a half-dozen underground empires, you don't need that much darklands. Keep in mind, even if the largest island is only the size of France, if it's deep enough you have room for four or five Frances stacked atop each other. That's a lot of room.
And seas are likely irrelevant with the sky boats. You want the focus to be on the sky ships, so don't worry about too many large land masses.
A good point. I'm hesitant to give up sizeable bodies of water though, just because - and I am aware this can be a bad thing - I like to keep as many options open as possible.
Possible options could be a ragged destroyed surface of magma and toxic gas after half the surface of the planet was wrenched into the sky.
Or it could be all water below with any land of sufficient mass floating up.
Part of the reason I went with the mist idea was to give the impression of sky all around. Simply making the mist toxic could work, and I'd considered the giant ocean idea, but I thought it might be good to keep the possibility of adventuring down below open, perhaps for higher level characters. Of course, see my compulsive need to keep options open, above. This is probably one of those instances where it's more definitively a bad thing.
I'm starting to think that I'll make this setting a replacement for and combination of the four elemental Inner Planes in the standard cosmology. This could easily explain the floating landmasses (air and earth), let them have magma inside and possibly even volcanic activity, and of course water has no problem fitting in with the first two, magic or no. Perhaps the planet proper far below is a chaotic amalgam of the four somewhat like Limbo. This starts to give me ideas for how to fit in the cosmology...
An idea I had about how your continents are floating and why the mists are there.
You could say that the continents are littered with pylons that draw raw elemental energy from the Plane of Air and create enough "magical bouncy" as it where to allow the continents to float. Similarly, you could simply say that the airship engines are basically the same thing except on a much smaller scale, and thus allow the airships themselves to fly by riding their own personal "magical bouncy".
The million dollar question is why do these pylons exist in the first place? Where did they come from and who built them? Well, you could simply tell the players that most of the information has simply been lost to time and what data they do have simply isn't complete enough to build a full picture. Personally, I would have the data be enough to give them clues that they could pursue should they choose to do so and see where they go with them from their. In reality, I would have it be as a result of a Planar Incursion. Say Demons from the Abyss finally broke through and established a hold within the Material plane on that world. It started out similar to the World Wound from Golarion where a few nations fell, but the combined effort of the most powerful kingdoms in the world managed to hold them in check and contain them. The pylons where then created in secret by an organized alliance of several of these nation in the effort to secure their continued existence should their containment efforts fail. When they inevitably did fail these kingdoms activated these pylons and took to the upper atmosphere while their allies around them fell to the demon hordes. These kingdoms then created the mists below their continents as powerful wards to keep the invading demon armies out and protect their kingdoms from further incursion. Thus establishing the world as it exists today.
You could run with it and have the Demons actually planning to simply drag the whole world into the Abyss after decades of trying to break the barrier and give the party the incentive and opportunity to find out the truth and try and stop them (could be similar to the Worldwound incursion AP), or they can completely ignore it and run it as a Skull and Shackles game with air pirates instead of sea pirates, or maybe one of the kings of old tries to make a return to power in a Rise of the Runelords type of game.
Actually, I think I may just use all this for myself as well. Sounds like a fun game *toots own horn*.
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And a general reply to everything else, thanks for the ideas and commentary. I'm finding it all extremely helpful.
Concerning focusing on mechanics or fluff to start with, I was thinking a similar thing. While my initial reaction was to have a fairly standard distribution of races, it would probably be better - and certainly more interesting - to shake things up, now that you mention it. All the standard races will be there, but probably rarer than usual with other races (connecting to my previous comment about the elemental planes) like sylphs, ifrit, and oreads filling in.
And back to the "how do they float" thing, it may be a little arrogant, and definitely getting ahead of myself, but I've already started thinking of a few sidebars that would go in a book - on the other hand, it's efficient since most of these alternate ideas I come up with while trying to decide how to go about doing things. Rather than scrapping them entirely, holding on to share thoughts on why I went one way rather than another or how something might be done differently. Anyway, this particular comment was raised because that would be the perfect kind of thing to put in a sidebar, whether they float because of a special element in the soil, or microbes, and whether that ability can be lost or gained, etc.
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Some ideas taking inspiration from Escaflowne: Levistone!
Levistone can form the base or lower strata of the islands. Levistone has an "at rest" buoyancy or float at 1 atmosphere, so all you need for a ship is a raft strapped to a couple of large rocks and a sail!
Imagine a horde of goblin raiders riding the air currents on boulders they caught with a net!
The primary islands can all float near the same height for ease of mapping. "Asteroid fields" of free levistone can make effective obstacles cutting off sections of the map. That and the dangerous creatures that tend to nest in such areas.
Levistone can be made into an alloy if you know how, so advanced nations can have "Ironclads of the Sky" in their fleets.
Also levistone sinks when heated and rises when chilled allowing for some exploration at different heights!
Icy ruins can exist at extreme heights, while fiery domains lay at dangerous depths.
*****
A world in the sky would definitely be an interesting setting to play. I might have use this idea should I ever run a homebrew.
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If falling off a skyship/"shoreline" is really inescapable death, then you'll need ways that the people of this world have devised to prevent it. Feather Fall won't work, since it just slows the rate at which you approach your death. Perhaps in this world, Feather Fall is actually Feather Float and it makes you sort of hover like the landmasses do, and you could hope someone throws you a rope before the spell wears off? What, if anything, is at the "skyshore" of these worlds? They can't possibly all be fenced off.
You want to avoid adding more new mechanics than necessary, but you can't avoid the fact that you're incentivising players to put more focus on the Fly skill. Perhaps the Ride skill for smaller, personal aircraft, and the Climb skill as well, for tethers that anchor people to a landmass/airship as they rappel back and forth?
Your players will definitely give preference to classes that have a means of flying. Arcane casters, druids, summoners with flying eidolons, etc. It wouldn't be that hard to houserule some new class abilities. Perhaps the monk's High Jump/Slow Fall could be replaced with Long Jump/Hover? Pick a decent-sized flying animal to serve as a common mount in this world, and Cavaliers, Rangers, and Paladins are all set. Gives Rogues a talent to let them throw a grappling hook as an immediate action?
Wingsuits would be a good addition-- perhaps wearing them would allow people to leap from one nearby landmass/airship to another? I can see rogues wearing them and calling it leather armor, while monks would wear lighter canvas wingsuits. Spellcasters would more likely wear parachutes, leaving their hands free to cast "Updraft" or "Zephyr" spells. Those with good Handle Animal checks might use a device similar to a dogsled, but with flying animals pulling it. Fighters and the more athletically-inclined might ride pedal-copter devices or ornithopters.
And as for "the Mists", I'm picturing something like the atmosphere of Venus. On the surface, there's a layer of gas that's so thick, the pressure alone would kill a person even before they had a chance to suffocate. Above that, there's sulfuric acid rain that can't even penetrate the lower level before it's re-boiled by the tremendous pressure. Perhaps these landmasses are actually floating on top of that superdense poison gas?
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If falling off a skyship/"shoreline" is really inescapable death, then you'll need ways that the people of this world have devised to prevent it. Feather Fall won't work, since it just slows the rate at which you approach your death. Perhaps in this world, Feather Fall is actually Feather Float and it makes you sort of hover like the landmasses do, and you could hope someone throws you a rope before the spell wears off? What, if anything, is at the "skyshore" of these worlds? They can't possibly all be fenced off.
A good point. Edges will almost invariably be rocky cliffs (dirt simply can't hold itself together as well), though there could be dirt/sand/etc. close or even right up to the edge.
If I were to go with a more Spelljammer-like setting, then I'd stick my tongue firmly into my cheek and make the air close to the "shore" of floating landmasses "swimmable". You know, like a real ocean. But this is going to be a bit more serious than that. Bungee-jumping will surely be a favourite pasttime, though...Anyway, fences, small walls, and other bulwarks will surely be built around coastal cities and towns. I'll give the matter some thought, but while most people would be smart enough to just stay away from edges whenever they can help it, I can't in good conscience prevent kids from having some fun around the edge if I can help it. Perhaps I'll add some sort of food that can temporarily make one buoyant...
You want to avoid adding more new mechanics than necessary, but you can't avoid the fact that you're incentivising players to put more focus on the Fly skill. Perhaps the Ride skill for smaller, personal aircraft, and the Climb skill as well, for tethers that anchor people to a landmass/airship as they rappel back and forth?
Your players will definitely give preference to classes that have a means of flying. Arcane casters, druids, summoners with flying eidolons, etc. It wouldn't be that hard to houserule some new class abilities. Perhaps the monk's High Jump/Slow Fall could be replaced with Long Jump/Hover? Pick a decent-sized flying animal to serve as a common mount in this world, and Cavaliers, Rangers, and Paladins are all set. Gives Rogues a talent to let them throw a grappling hook as an immediate action?
These sorts of things aren't really what I meant by "new mechanics". These could easily be solved by creating new archetypes and other similar, established methods. What I meant by avoiding new mechanics was more "fundamental" rules from additional skills to a new magic system. I fully expect and intend to add new feats, spells, and so on.
Those with good Handle Animal checks might use a device similar to a dogsled, but with flying animals pulling it.
It's funny because one of my early ideas was trying to figure out how one could have a sort of air-chariot. I'm not sure I'd segregate the classes so much, if I could help it, but there are several good ideas there. Of course, there's also a variety of magical items that already exist. Most are prohibitively expensive, but mundane alternatives and perhaps lesser or charged equivalents could help bring these options into a more affordable range. Also, like EldonG mentioned, there are a number of flying mounts, and I intend to add to that number.
The trick is to find a balance between "so deadly you might as well stay home" and "why even bother with the airships?"
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If falling off a skyship/"shoreline" is really inescapable death, then you'll need ways that the people of this world have devised to prevent it. Feather Fall won't work, since it just slows the rate at which you approach your death. Perhaps in this world, Feather Fall is actually Feather Float and it makes you sort of hover like the landmasses do, and you could hope someone throws you a rope before the spell wears off? What, if anything, is at the "skyshore" of these worlds? They can't possibly all be fenced off.
People might wear lifejackets with some ore/element/wood when aboard ships, so they float if knocked overboard.
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As an aside, anyone got an idea for a name? ^^' Of course, the world will have its own (and I'm working on that), but I'm thinking I'd rather give the setting its own name (like Faerun/Toril is Forgotten Realms, Athas is Dark Sun, Rokugan and Legend of the Five Rings, etc.)
Perhaps Airborn/Airborne? Or Airborn/e _____? *shrug* Skysea?
As an aside, anyone got an idea for a name? ^^' Of course, the world will have its own (and I'm working on that), but I'm thinking I'd rather give the setting its own name (like Faerun/Toril is Forgotten Realms, Athas is Dark Sun, Rokugan and Legend of the Five Rings, etc.)
Perhaps Airborn/Airborne? Or Airborn/e _____? *shrug* Skysea?
Skysea is probably the best you listed here. I am terrible with names myself, but I'll see if I can think of something interesting.
Soaring Swords?
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The Zephyr Islands.
The trick is to find a balance between "so deadly you might as well stay home" and "why even bother with the airships?"
I'd say pedal-copters, air-chariots, and DaVinci-esque parachutes would all fulfill those requirements. Pedal-copters require you to be able to pedal for long periods of time or only use them for short trips, air-chariots require faith in domesticated animals, and parachutes only take you where the wind is blowing, unless you can change the direction of the wind.
Your average commoner probably doesn't want to risk himself to any of these methods, but any adventurer worth his salt would have the courage and the talent to use one of them.
Look for some pictures of real-world personal aircrafts, both those in use today and those that didn't work. See if you can come up with some ideas.
Are you saying your flying ships can't overfly a landmass?
Here's some inspiration for you.
http://www.ineffableaether.com/
In the old days, 'aether' was what they called the substance between worlds. "Swords of the Aether" would be about the treks between the sky islands.
If your ships can't overfly, and must approach along a gravity plane, that makes for more interesting mechanics...they literally have to sail off the edge of the world to fly. I would guess that rivers flowing off the sides of the continents become zero-gravity seas, that eventually evaporate and are sucked back over the continent as rain. The ships would 'take off' once they've reached the skysea, and head into the aether. The 'skysea' would surround the islands, and poor ships would navigate around it, or rivers between the various islands, with the aether on all sides.
You could use this without the flying aspect easily, just by having them sail along flowing rivers through space between the sky islands.
Undiscovered rivers and branches to new realms would be great events of note.
==Aelryinth
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Are you saying your flying ships can't overfly a landmass?
If your ships can't overfly, and must approach along a gravity plane, that makes for more interesting mechanics...they literally have to sail off the edge of the world to fly. I would guess that rivers flowing off the sides of the continents become zero-gravity seas, that eventually evaporate and are sucked back over the continent as rain. The ships would 'take off' once they've reached the skysea, and head into the aether. The 'skysea' would surround the islands, and poor ships would navigate around it, or rivers between the various islands, with the aether on all sides.
You could use this without the flying aspect easily, just by having them sail along flowing rivers through space between the sky islands.
Undiscovered rivers and branches to new realms would be great events of note.
An interesting idea that I may steal bits and pieces from however, I want it to actually be an atmosphere, not space. Even in the middle of nowhere, gravity will be pulling down, which was one of the reasons I had for having a planet somewhere down there. I just didn't want people to be living down there, else where would be the fun in that? :p
However, you do bring up a point that I've been trying to solve: I want there to be significance in having "coastal" cities. I want ships to dock in harbours that are as level with the city proper as real world naval harbours are. On the other hand, I don't want to restrict ships to flying on a single plane. The problem lies in the fact that if ships can fly in all three dimensions, then why would they dock right over the infinite depths of open air as opposed to spires rising over the much closer and less deadly land?
One solution I thought of is, pulling from one of the other suggestions someone made, having the planet far below be covered in incredibly hot lava. This could create universal updraughts that aid in the buoyancy of... well, everything. Of course, landmasses would block these updraughts and so ships wouldn't be able to completely support themselves when flying over land, and so start to slowly sink. And by slowly, I'm going to estimate a couple hundred feet per minute.
Of course, there is then the question of why doesn't the lava cool like it normally would when exposed to air and no longer under so much pressure. I may use my "world is essentially the elemental planes" idea to explain this. That part is just where elemental fire is more focused. Perhaps water too, in order to mirror the earth-air duality of the main world, and to explain - in a Greek physics kind of way - why it's lava and not, say, plasma like a small star or something... Or go ahead and make it a star. I'm pretty sure I read about one sci-fi book that did something like that.
I was building a skyworld like this myself for a campaign. It was actually a gas giant in a solar system where every planet was connected by warpgates, but none of them work anymore so none of the inhabitants on one planet know about the others. Also explains why similar races live on each. An ancient race used each planet as a sort of science experiment. The gas giant had massive floating continents, even sporting two debris rings and a handful of moons (nighttime was sure to be fantastic).
The continents were held aloft by a giant arcane-powered machine that was the planet's core. This machine was what actually kept the continents in a fixed position with one another. They did move, as the machine controlled a tectonic movement algorithm for the continents. Smaller islands moved more freely, but as for the larger land masses, everyone pretty much knew 'this continent is due east of here'. Navigation was about as easy (difficult?) as normal seagoing trips could be. Rogue islands, however, were always a nautical hazard akin to icebergs.
Another aspect was that between the continents, and below them, was a thicker atmosphere. Airships could not go below this line of very dense atmosphere (they would actually be rather buoyant on it). Airships could still travel upwards of 500 feet total above the 'sea level', but that was it.
Air-breathing life could not survive in it without special equipment, and anyone that happened to fall into it slowly sank toward the center of the planet. This think atmosphere was essentially treated as water, complete with unique lifeforms evolved to survive in it. This allowed for airships to dock at coastal cities. Also, the airships were equipped with sails below to harness the magical energies of this thick atmosphere. Most airships used the currents in this atmosphere for travel, unless the airship was equipped with an expensive arcane engine for propulsion.
As for races, I have created a few that are unique to a world like this. One is based off the elves from Allods Online, that I call Glimmerwing Elves. (Elf-sized fairies, essentially). Dwarves are master airship builders, with an expertise on ancient technology used in the construction and powering of airships and other devices. Also, can't have a sky-world like this without a humanoid dragon-type race.
If you like these ideas, let me know.
Humanoid birds are another one of the races I have.
You don't have to think of it as cheating. If you want, I could provide you with some ideas and whatnot. I've had much of this stuff stored up in my head for at least a decade, and it's going nowhere. I would LOVE to have my ideas published, but I don't have the time or resources for that. Besides, a lot of my ideas tend to be rehashed established stuff.
BTW, Silent Saturn, the Zephyr Islands sounds like a perfect name for a floating archipelago.
Oh, and if you want to help me out even, I can't think of a name for that super-thick atmosphere 'water' in my world, any ideas?
Dot. Love this thread.
Also check out:
*Nausicaa comic (I know you referenced Miyazaki but the comic of Nausicaa rocks even more than the movie)
*Neotopia comic
* Companions of the Firmament LINK PF compatible rules and other stuff for flying beastriders, aerial combat etc - the link is just the kickstarter, looks like they still haven't gone to print yet (as of their last update), but I'm eagerly awaiting the release....
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Okay so I believe I now have the basics of the geography pinned down. Most landmasses range from Ireland to Ukraine in size, but appear in just about any size from a small chair to Australia. They are held aloft by a combination of a super-buoyant material that is the by-product of a micro-organism and the incredible updraughts created from the world's molten "core".
The core is shrouded by a thick fog created by the instantly vaporized rain and water that falls off of the landmasses. This fog ranges between several hundred and about a thousand feet thick, and lies around 2000 ft below the "surface" (it occurs to me that I need to formalize what's called what, soon... there are a number of things that don't quite equate).
I will take a moment here to note that I am fully aware that I have already broken a couple dozen rules of physics even beyond the floating landmasses bit. I also take this moment to remind you that this is exactly what fantasy is for. :p As far as I'm concerned as long as it sounds reasonable enough before you start analysing how the laws of physics - at least those beyond the basics learned in middle or high school - would really apply to the situation, it's good enough. In any story, internal consistency and believability is (to varying degrees) more important than realism.
Wind currents cause the landmasses to drift similarly to our continents, albeit at a swifter pace. Larger landmasses are minimally affected by this drift and don't move more than a few centimetres a year, while smaller ones may move around half the wind speed around it or more.
Finally, landmasses are all at roughly the same altitude due to the buoyant micro-organism by-product mentioned earlier. Regardless of an island's mass, it rarely goes significantly higher or lower than other landmasses due to a fairly uniform distribution, and because the by-product doesn't have infinite lifting power - this is the altitude at which it reaches neutral buoyancy between the gravity, air pressure, and updraughts. And absolutely finally, this by-product (which needs a name... A/ether? Aër?) can and is absorbed by various living organism, most notably certain trees, the wood of which is often used to construct airships.
Questions? Comments?
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Part 2: Climate
For the larger and more stationary landmasses, climate will be fairly similar to Earth. There isn't much room for large seas and oceans, will would probably have an effect on many things, but there are plenty of large lakes, rivers, and other bodies of water dotting the landscape. Additionally, the planet as a whole could have about as much water as Earth, it's just more commonly in the form of water vapour.
As for more migratory islands, weather could change drastically in a short period of time. An air current that pushes an island from the poles to the equator and back again could actually cause "seasons" to run backwards or skip each other. This would necessitate plant life that has sturdier or more malleable growth since it would be more unreliable whether spring will be followed by warmer weather or more snow. But we'll get to flora and fauna later.
The next step, I think, is to determine what races populate the world, how their distributed, and a basic outline of the world's history. During this step, I'll also start working on a general world map, and roughing out some political boundaries.
Speaking of a map, as someone mentioned, migrating landmasses would be difficult to map... with our mapping techniques. For those who have the time, resources, and magical ability or technological prowess, something similar to an orrery would probably be used. However, for those who can't - and before their invention - paper maps could still be used. Larger and more stable landmasses can be charted normally, but instead of charting the position of moving ones, major wind currents and jetstreams would be charted with the understanding that smaller islands tend to follow them. Larger ones that still move probably have "orbits" after a fashion and those could also be charted instead. From as far back as the 2nd millenium B.C. tables called "ephemerides" were used to chart the position of stellar objects, and a variation would certainly not be unexpected to chart the positions and projected paths of migratory islands.
P.S., Part 1.5: Cosmology (or Speaking of Orreries)
To assist with the justification of crazy physics, the Material Plane coincides with the four Elemental Planes. In this setting, there is no Plane of Fire/Earth/Water/Air, because the Material Plane is that plane as well. The specifics of this will get hashed out when I get around to working on the cosmology, but for now the guidelines are that outsiders normally native to those planes are native to this one instead, and that elemental magic draws from and isolates those energies from the world itself rather than tapping in to a different plane. At least, this is my plan for now. When I get around to fleshing out the planes I may change my mind.
I had somewhat similar idea for a setting called Middlesky - the inhabited area was in the middle between Higher Sky, where elemental Air grew too thin to sustain life and gave up to Aether/Void, and Lower Sky, where elemental Air was growing too dense and infused with particles of elemental water. There were streams of elemental water (either in form of actual stream of water or in the form of stream of mist and thick clouds) flowing between isles of earth providing water and replenishing liquid that fell down. There were also similar streams of fire and earth (much rarer) and streams of denser and quickly flowing elemental air that were used as dangerous but faster travel routes.
Islands were much smaller than yours, however, with largest being a few miles long. Instead "landmasses" were areas where many islands congregated circling each other on complex orbits.
The Storm Hawk cartoon series could be helpful here: http://stormhawks.ytv.com/
The terras aren't exactly floating islands, but they're pretty similar.
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Are you saying your flying ships can't overfly a landmass?
If your ships can't overfly, and must approach along a gravity plane, that makes for more interesting mechanics...they literally have to sail off the edge of the world to fly. I would guess that rivers flowing off the sides of the continents become zero-gravity seas, that eventually evaporate and are sucked back over the continent as rain. The ships would 'take off' once they've reached the skysea, and head into the aether. The 'skysea' would surround the islands, and poor ships would navigate around it, or rivers between the various islands, with the aether on all sides.
You could use this without the flying aspect easily, just by having them sail along flowing rivers through space between the sky islands.
Undiscovered rivers and branches to new realms would be great events of note.
An interesting idea that I may steal bits and pieces from however, I want it to actually be an atmosphere, not space. Even in the middle of nowhere, gravity will be pulling down, which was one of the reasons I had for having a planet somewhere down there. I just didn't want people to be living down there, else where would be the fun in that? :p
However, you do bring up a point that I've been trying to solve: I want there to be significance in having "coastal" cities. I want ships to dock in harbours that are as level with the city proper as real world naval harbours are. On the other hand, I don't want to restrict ships to flying on a single plane. The problem lies in the fact that if ships can fly in all three dimensions, then why would they dock right over the infinite depths of open air as opposed to spires rising over the much closer and less deadly land?
One solution I thought of is, pulling from one of the other suggestions someone made, having the planet far below be covered in incredibly hot lava. This could create universal updraughts that aid in the buoyancy of... well, everything. Of course, landmasses would block...
What I was doing with my surface world down below was making it horrific wastelands...mid-to-high level stuff...active volcanoes...regular earthquakes...dinosaurs...horrible chaotic monsters...radioactive wastes with mutants...lots of fun for levels 8+ for short periods...
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Okay so I believe I now have the basics of the geography pinned down. Most landmasses range from Ireland to Ukraine in size, but appear in just about any size from a small chair to Australia. They are held aloft by a combination of a super-buoyant material that is the by-product of a micro-organism and the incredible updraughts created from the world's molten "core".
The core is shrouded by a thick fog created by the instantly vaporized rain and water that falls off of the landmasses. This fog ranges between several hundred and about a thousand feet thick, and lies around 2000 ft below the "surface" (it occurs to me that I need to formalize what's called what, soon... there are a number of things that don't quite equate).
I will take a moment here to note that I am fully aware that I have already broken a couple dozen rules of physics even beyond the floating landmasses bit. I also take this moment to remind you that this is exactly what fantasy is for. :p As far as I'm concerned as long as it sounds reasonable enough before you start analysing how the laws of physics - at least those beyond the basics learned in middle or high school - would really apply to the situation, it's good enough. In any story, internal consistency and believability is (to varying degrees) more important than realism.Wind currents cause the landmasses to drift similarly to our continents, albeit at a swifter pace. Larger landmasses are minimally affected by this drift and don't move more than a few centimetres a year, while smaller ones may move around half the wind speed around it or more.
Finally, landmasses are all at roughly the same altitude due to the buoyant micro-organism by-product mentioned earlier. Regardless of an island's mass, it rarely goes significantly higher or lower than other landmasses due to a fairly uniform distribution, and because the by-product doesn't have infinite lifting power - this is the altitude at which it reaches neutral buoyancy between the gravity, air...
Looks pretty sweet, so far. :)
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One of the advantages of likening my idea so far to the Elemental Planes. The core would clearly be analogous to the Plane of Fire, and one could easily adapt it to that. I probably won't be saying much about it other than that it's the core and that it's just a giant lake of lava.
Fridge logic will surely kick in for those who think about it and realize that the lava - especially with a fog over it - would have to cool off and solidify at least some of the time, which would allow landmasses to form, at least for a little while.
But all of that would probably only be addressed in a sidebar or something since I'd like to keep things up in the air (pardon the pun, though I mean it literally) as much as possible.
I'd also like to take a moment to remind/clarify that I intend to have a stronger fantasy aesthetic than steampunk when it comes to airships. I picture your average or typical airship to look more like a typical wooden naval ship, but (aside from the obvious bit - being in the air) with a couple extra sails off the sides/below or propellors. Even though some steampunk technology will probably be used to power many kinds of airships, I want a steampunk aesthetic to be the exception rather than the norm. Of course, I've mentioned a couple of times, I intend to have all sorts of crazy airship designs. ^_^
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Will playing a flying race be an option, here? This is something that should be addressed...it's a very tempting thing, and the utility is amazing...
There will definitely be an avian-based humanoid race, however I'll have to look and think some things over before I decide whether or not it will be able to actually fly - at least at first level. Of course, these are just balance concerns. At the moment - not having looked over such things, yet, so don't hold me to it - I'm predicting that the default race ability will just be gliding. A feat will allow access to true flight, later.
This is the only new race I currently have in mind, but I kind of want to add in another one or two if I can come up with a suitable idea. Since I'm talking about it, one last note on races and I've said all I've settled on so far: while the standard races (dwarves, halflings, etc.) will definitely still exist, they won't be as common as most settings. Replacing them will be the elemental humanoids - ifrit, sylphs, oreads, and undines. I'm still deciding on the distribution of other races, but at the moment I'm thinking half-orcs (alongside humans, naturally) will be an exception to the rarer standard races bit. Also, I will be keeping the basics of Golarion's re-imaginings for the standard races. What can I say? I think they're brilliant.
Vanara! Monkey/ape-race on flying ships is a must!
Or flying monkeys of some sort.
For the aesthetic, just concentrate on the sails.
A two master ship drops the sails to each side when flying.
A Three-master drops two masts 60 degrees to each side when taking off.
A four-master would form an 'x', and be the largest of vessels, probably a 'Ship of the Cross' or somesuch.
That gives you a mechanical feel and a sail feel.
As for gravity and the falling property, just rule that only objects of a certain size 'activate' gravity, the rest are subject to the natural buoyancy that permeates all things. Gravity is always the same direction, but once you leave the gravity zone of an object, you'll just bounce and float like any other object. Without wings, you're helpless, and likely well below the gravity plane of any solid land mass with a higher infusion rate, but someone could still 'dive down' and rescue you, probably by lowering ropes to you and hauling you in.
==Aelryinth
Vanara! Monkey/ape-race on flying ships is a must!
Or flying monkeys of some sort.
Vanara weren't on my list of races for my world, but the Hadozee (humanoid ape/flying squirrel hybrid) from the 3.5 D&D Stormwrack supplement were.
As for airship designs, I always personally liked the Wraith from the cartoon Pirates of Dark Water. In fact, the whole crew of the Wraith would be an excellent crew of NPCs, especially Niddler the monkey-bird.
Come to think of it... I'm going to go stat them out for my campaign world.
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Vanara! Monkey/ape-race on flying ships is a must!
Or flying monkeys of some sort.
Brilliant! In fact, now that you've mentioned it, for some reason it makes sense to me that vanara are the master airship-building race. Perhaps not the biggest or fastest, but the best general purpose. And definitely the first.
...Really not sure why this makes so much sense to me... But I like the idea, so it doesn't even need to make sense. :p
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However, you do bring up a point that I've been trying to solve: I want there to be significance in having "coastal" cities. I want ships to dock in harbours that are as level with the city proper as real world naval harbours are. On the other hand, I don't want to restrict ships to flying on a single plane. The problem lies in the fact that if ships can fly in all three dimensions, then why would they dock right over the infinite depths of open air as opposed to spires rising over the much closer and less deadly land?
Natural updrafts or cooling wind might pull ships up or down.
But by having sails on the sides of the boat, you could also say skilled pilots can go above or below "the threshold". But this might require constant effort and adjustment, fighting against the changing pressure, wind, and buoyancy. Once you stop actively moving, you gradually return to the baseline altitude.Short arcs or changes of height of a few dozen feet might not be hard (and likely easier for smaller vessels) but it gets exponentially harder.
Speaking of a map, as someone mentioned, migrating landmasses would be difficult to map... with our mapping techniques. For those who have the time, resources, and magical ability or technological prowess, something similar to an orrery would probably be used. However, for those who can't - and before their invention - paper maps could still be used. Larger and more stable landmasses can be charted normally, but instead of charting the position of moving ones, major wind currents and jetstreams would be charted with the understanding that smaller islands tend to follow them. Larger ones that still move probably have "orbits" after a fashion and those could also be charted instead.
High altitude air currents - on average - are pretty steady in the middle latitudes. They either flow East or West. East around the tropic zones, West around the temperate zones, and East again over the Artics.
Large skylands in the middle of bands would likely be pretty consistent and anything around the equator would be really stable.
Smaller islands would gradually drift North or South and then be pushed in the opposite direction, doing a long and irregular figure-eight pattern.
This actually makes for an interesting design for nation building and civilization. You have the stable equatorial band where charts are accurate and there's little drift. Trade is reliable. People can feel safe investing in the time needed to lash together skylands into webs of floating islands.
But the farther North or South you sail the less reliable charts become, the harder large islands become to find. Its less safe but there's a greater chance of undiscovered islands and resources.
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Speaking of a map, as someone mentioned, migrating landmasses would be difficult to map... with our mapping techniques. For those who have the time, resources, and magical ability or technological prowess, something similar to an orrery would probably be used. However, for those who can't - and before their invention - paper maps could still be used. Larger and more stable landmasses can be charted normally, but instead of charting the position of moving ones, major wind currents and jetstreams would be charted with the understanding that smaller islands tend to follow them. Larger ones that still move probably have "orbits" after a fashion and those could also be charted instead.High altitude air currents - on average - are pretty steady in the middle latitudes. They either flow East or West. East around the tropic zones, West around the temperate zones, and East again over the Artics.
Large skylands in the middle of bands would likely be pretty consistent and anything around the equator would be really stable.
Smaller islands would gradually drift North or South and then be pushed in the opposite direction, doing a long and irregular figure-eight pattern.
This actually makes for an interesting design for nation building and civilization. You have the stable equatorial band where charts are accurate and there's little drift. Trade is reliable. People can feel safe investing in the time needed to lash together skylands into webs of floating islands.
But the farther North or South you sail the less reliable charts become, the harder large islands become to find. Its less safe but there's a greater chance of undiscovered islands and resources.
Thanks, you seem to know a fair bit about climatology. Study it, or just scrounge around due to the topic?
Anyway, I know the basics of real world air currents (at least, as much as diagram in high school science book shows), but I'd imagine that large landmasses could easily disrupt and alter the flow, much like what happens with ocean currents. Of course, I could easily be wrong - I'm something of a polyglot; know about a lot of topics, but generally just cursory knowledge of most. They are buoyant and don't have anything rooting them, but mass does become increasingly hard to move when you pile more of it together. Especially when one plays a little hard-and-fast with physics like I am for this setting.
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In developmental news, in this setting, ifrits, sylphs, etc. are more specifically descended from their associated genies (default, they can be descended from pretty much any elemental). The genies were one of the earlier rulers of the world, but have since (for as of yet undetermined reasons) been reduced to a shadow of their former glory, making way for the "lesser" races.
The most common of the existing races (as in, not including new ones that I will be creating for the setting) are - roughly in order from most populous to least - humans, suli, vanara, ifrits/oreads/sylphs/undines, catfolk, and goblins. Half-orcs and tengu may fit somewhere in there (otherwise going alongside dwarves, elves, etc. as uncommon, but not at all rare races) and hobgoblins trail somewhere behind the geniekin (because ifrit/oread/etc. takes a bit too long). Vanara invented airships and hobgoblins were bred to be efreeti slaves (explaining their unusually regimented nature for a goblinoid), but beyond that I'm still working.
Comments? Suggestions?