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I've created a massive, 360ft / 120ft / 120ft warship. The actual model is 3 ft long. In it, I placed underwater ballistic on the decks that would be under the water line of the vessels. The question is: if they open the gun port door, what spell would be triggered to prevent water from rushing in that would also allow bolts to fire out?
I'm drawing a blank on what spell could do that.
Air Bubble.
By using piercing weapons (he mentioned bolts)
You could also use torpedo tubes btw, use magic to propel the missile instead of keeping water out
Rather than keeping water out, why not make the room accessible only from above the waterline, and have a permanent water breathing spell in the area? Then the balista is already in water, and you don't care about opening the port.
Or you could skip the spell and crew it with water breathing types.
Another thought: brilliant balista. You don't need a port, but it won't damage the enemy ship, only it's people.
/cevah
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Air bubble is probably what I need. The ship has over 2k UW ballistea in it, so brilliant weapons would be super expensive. There's living quarters nearby too, so flooding the lower decks isn't smart as it removes a layer of protection. Additionally, by flooding, creatures and swarms in the water could go through the gun ports and get at the gun crew, who would be disadvantaged in the water.
Due to the size and maneuverability of the ship, torpedoes are not a good option: no guidance systems exist yet, and aiming would be hard. Though, the ship does have 10 submersibles with 2 torpedoes each :). Good thoughts though!
How on earth are you fitting 2000 balista underwater?
You could have 72 per side as they are only 5 ft accross, but then you have literally no wood in a strip on the side of the ship.
It would be reasonable to assume the following:
WBWBWB
W=Wood of boat. B=Ballista.
You are looking at 36 balista that way.
If we assume all 120ft of depth is below water.
BWB
WWW
BWB
That would be a reasonable lay out.
120ft of depth gives us 12 Balista
36*12= 432
432 on each long side
12*12 on each short side = 144
+432*2+144*2=1152
Still a huge amount but not 2000.
They also each cost 500gp.
500*1152= 576 000 GP
The things you can do with that much gold...
But, your boat would have to be MONSTROUSLY heavy to submerge that much boat.
It displaces this much water in cubic meters.
36.576*36.576*109.728=146794.532732928
That is 146 kilo tons
For reference
"Panamax and New Panamax
As the name suggests, Panamax and New Panamax ships are travelling through the Panama Canal. They strictly follow the size regulations set by the Panama Canal Authority, as the entry and exit points of the Canal are narrow.A Panamax vessel can't be longer than 294,13 m (965 ft), wider than 32,31 m (106 ft) and her draught can't be more than 12,04 m (39.5 ft). These vessels have an average capacity of 65,000 DWT , and are primarily used in transporting coal, crude oil and petroleum products. They operate in the Caribbean and Latin American regions."
Your ship would need to be laden with some seriously seriously heavy cargo, and would be incredibly slow under sail
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I apologize, I gave estimates.
I have 531 UW ballistea, 1168 cannons, and about 300 other special things. The ship is 44 inches by 12 inches, with each 5ft square equal to .234 inches.
While the largest deck, there are about 14 floors.
About the size of an aircraft carrier. I had to put the project down for about 6 months and mixed up my numbers between total siege and just ballistea.
EDIT: there is a blueprint with each thing placed. Room isn't an issue. Just needed an anti water effect. Thanks for the maths though!
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I've done the numbers on crew and everything else, placed places for eating, sleeping, bathrooms, armories, storages places, etc... I've calculated displacement and waterline, placed siege equipment appropiately etc. I've gotnit, don't worry.
It's a ship to house a demigod anyways, and it's made of steel reinforced ice, with the equivalent of liquid nitrogen running in pipes that gives the ship regeneration.
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Yes, the cost is in millions of gold. This is not for a player, this is for a demi-god level character (who was, at one time, a player... but thats a long story).
However... This all assumes that the character in question is buying everything. A cannon is 6000 gold, but what if he made the cannon itself? That's 2000 gold in raw materials. What if he had a supply of such materials from a cheap labor force? Or an extremely powerful friend who is also on the levels of demi-god?
Once you have the raw materials, the only cost is really time. I'm using rules from the dungeon builders guide from 3.5, so we can treat the ship as a stronghold. Now add in the lyre of building, a high performance skill, some constructs, and a way to be immortal or sleep through construction.
= One massive ship.
There are tons of other factors going into this, but the cost is only *kinda* relevant (just a useful number to tell my friends).
I'll post a link to the google drive at some time for all to see. I wanna finish making the 3d model though (I just got the floorplans printed, 2 years in the making and I'm almost done!)
In the Stronghold Builder's Guide is the formula and price for having an airy-water room and similar place specific enchantments.
/cevah
This ship with holes in its hull below the waterline will need to take into account Dispel Magic.
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Here's a link to the designs I made:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B09K3JmqNZeVY0h5MGFyVFRwU3M?usp=sha ring
It may be easier to download them to view them. If you have gimp, you can view them in proper order. The PDFs are just what I could fit to reduce printing costs, and so the levels may be out of order. This mostly follows the 3e stronghold builders guide.
I don't like the idea of water running into the weapon port, as that could affect aim, so the reverse effect decanters are out (I also have no real space to put them. Torpedo ports are also out, I've already planned for, and drawn the ballistae. Creating bulbs along the bottom would make the ship's speed suffer too :(.
As for personnel, the ship is run as much as possible by constructs. People are used to aim the weapons, but loading/arming is handled by other non-creature means.
If you are enchanting the port rings there are a large number of spells that can work as the base spell, it wouldn't be the first magic item where the base spell is only tangentially linked to the effect.
such as:
Tiny hut
Wall of force - one way.
Dimension door (link opposite portals so they have to be opened together, effectively the water from one side is pushing against the water from the other, so no movement)