Re: Boy am I sick of Voyager...

On Fri, 14 July 1995, Michael Sandy <mehawk@????.org> wrote an article about
deep-sphere exploring. He said :

> Forget catapults, give me a forward firing
> trebuchet! ....

>Imagine a gigantic two hulled boat, where the weight from the trebuchet
>falls between them, and the arm of the trebuchet is pulled down to the
>catwalks between the two hulls.  The action of the trebuchet is very smooth
>compared to catapults, and can fire _really_ heavy objects.  A well
contructed
>trebuchet is on earth more accurate than a catapult because it doesn't rip
>apart its mounting.
>
>A catapult is also designed more for a parabola than a ballista.  A
trebuchet
>could probably be tricked up to fire anywhere straight ahead to straight
>up, simply by adjusting what angle the sling holding the projectile is
>released.

He also mentioned that a trebuchet is better then a ballista.
If you look in one of the books in the Spelljammer Boxed Set, you find that a
trebuchet is either a heavy catapult or ballista. I can't remeber which it
is.

Apart from that, the basic ideas of the exploration fleet is very well
thought out. A Decanter of Endless Water can also be used on the Garden ship
to provide fresh running water when needed and moved to different ships if
needed. However, I have found an idea that is useful.

On each ship, have a Decanter of Endless Water in an easily accessible place
that can be used to put out any fires. Ships with Greek Fire projectors
should have one near each projector and near the main oil supplies.

Wicket of Endor,
Ewok Druid/Jedi Knight
Michael Reilly (zz_michael_reilly@???????.????.???.au)