What kind of geographic features would hinder lighter-than-air flight, like phlogiston-filled dirigibles?
1. Volcanoes.
2. High winds.
3. ???
Remember, this is for foolhardy PCs!
The elevation needed to cross mountains could be too much for the altitude limit of the craft. Extreme cold might cause phlogiston to condense to a liquid. A static build up can be catastrophic, particulaly during tie off on landing (Hindenburg).
What kind of geographic features would hinder lighter-than-air flight, like phlogiston-filled dirigibles?
1. Volcanoes.
2. High winds.
3. ???Remember, this is for foolhardy PCs!
Anything other than calm weather is pretty much a disaster in waiting for LTA flight, even for zeppelins a lot more modern than what your PC's will have access to.
Well, the point of origin is a floating city about 12 miles over a floating continent, so....
The shock thing might work. The party has a brontomancer and a Tempest cleric, plus some typically incautious players (swashbuckler and warlock), for added chaos.
Dragons might be a bit intense. Maybe bow and fire arrows from pterodactyl back?
Well, the point of origin is a floating city about 12 miles over a floating continent, so....
The shock thing might work. The party has a brontomancer and a Tempest cleric, plus some typically incautious players (swashbuckler and warlock), for added chaos.
Dragons might be a bit intense. Maybe bow and fire arrows from pterodactyl back?
You do understand that 12 miles is equivalent to about 60,000 feet of altitude?
You do understand that 12 miles is equivalent to about 60,000 feet of altitude?Well, the point of origin is a floating city about 12 miles over a floating continent, so....
The shock thing might work. The party has a brontomancer and a Tempest cleric, plus some typically incautious players (swashbuckler and warlock), for added chaos.
Dragons might be a bit intense. Maybe bow and fire arrows from pterodactyl back?
Seeing as it is a floating city OVER a floating continent I'm pretty sure we are WAY out of conventional earth atmosphere issues.
If cities and continents float, maybe other things do to? Seeds, random rocks, maybe a flock of birds or giant insects to inflict birdstrike on whatever the LTA uses for engines. Possibly combine those so passing too close to a floating rock might have a tree spray spiky seeds at you, or birds/insects/flying eels lunge out at the intruder.
Clouds. These can conceal rocks etc., or they might be hazardous in and of themselves if they're made of something dangerous like ballooning spiders or fast-growing fungal spores.
You could steal an idea from Eberron and have manifest zones where some plane or another is influencing the material plane. As they approach their goal the lights dim and go out, then whispers are heard on the wind...
Or there's mundane weather. Lightning storms, sleet melting as it hits the phlogiston envelope then refreezing into long icicles on anything cooler, hail the size of chicken eggs, fog which cuts visibility, if they don't have someone with create water then just nice fine and clear skies for an extended period.
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AIR PIRATES!
The swashbuckler IS an AIR PIRATE! :-D
Yeah, it's a bit of an unusual homebrew campaign. Continents float in the air, but everything else falls. Basically, I have a very weak (quasi-magical) anti-gravity force that is only significant with very massive objects. The anti-gravity force repels the continents from the planet, and the continents from each other. It also keeps the continents aligned North/South, so when they DO get too close together and nudge each other, they "automatically" re-align to maintain North/South.
I like the idea of phlogiston-hungry floating vermin. Like swarms of floating jellyfish-squids. Phloggyfish?
At very high altitudes, the major factors are going to be (a) much colder ambient temperature; and (b) reduced oxygen in the air. Altitude sickness would be a very real issue in a non-pressurized dirigible.
Not particularly 'exciting' as an environmental hurdle, however. But you might use the opportunity to factor those elements into the sort of beings which live in or frequent the area. Perhaps air mephits and/or elementals, or other similar entities are attracted to those sorts of areas, and though non-hostile, their presence could cause some issues in terms of their effect on the wind conditions, etc.
For example, maybe a group of frolicking young {insert native, sentient non-hostile creature type} are playing havoc with the winds and weather, and while the party could probably kill them or drive them off, who is really the intruder here...?
The anti-gravity force also acts on the atmosphere, pretty much eliminating the different air pressures due to altitude.
Air travel in general is supposed to be easy, but I have a "Lost Continent" area I want to have the PCs explore via jungle and glacier, not from the comfort of their dirigible.