Space:1889/Spelljammer conversion

A transcript of a lecture given to the Seekers, Bralian Chapter, 5043 OC.

        The echoes of the prelecture gossiping could still be heard in the
hall as the wizened old human moved before the podium to introduce that
night's speaker.  He cleared his throat noisily, then began in a magically
amplified voice.  "Our speaker this eve is an elf of impeccable lineage,
hailing from the noble planet Oerth in Greyspace.  An experienced
spelljamming captain,  scholar,  and archaeologist he has been responsible
for the recovery of many historical artifacts which might otherwise have
been lost to the dust of time.  His exploits as an adventurer need no
listing,  and his romantic affairs, well,  politeness demands silence." A
pause for polite laughter,  "While some might consider his methods
questionable, none can doubt his knowledge.  Tonight he will speak on a
previously unknown sphere, Sol Space.  It is with great pleasure that I
introduce the Captain of the good ship HANALI'S SWORD,  Elrohir Amroth."
        The applause was restrained as the handsome, silver-haired elven
captain moved to the podium.  Shaking the hand of the red-robed old man who
had introduced him, he gracefully slid into place.  "Master Akanis is too
kind.  I shall endeavor to live up to his expectations.  I am afraid,
however, that the circumstances of my discovery, and the strange
characteristics of the wildspace within that sphere prevented me from
making a thorough exploration.  My lecture shall therefore be somewhat
anecdotal,  and my findings taken with a grain of salt."
        "Last year I was forced by circumstances to take passage aboard a
tramp tradesman,  bound for Heartspace,  my own vessel being otherwise
occupied.  Our voyage had been very uneventful,  even boring,  until a
neogi mindspider appeared as if from nowhere out of the Flow.  The
tradesman was severely outclassed,  and the captain wisely decided to
attempt to evade the neogi.  For days we played a deadly cat and mouse game
through the flow,  able to stay just out of weapons range but never able to
break away far enough to reach spelljamming speed.  Finally,  exhausted and
afraid,  we came upon an unknown crystal sphere.  Our navigator had no idea
where we were,  we had left the philogiston river of the Arcane Inner Flow
soon after encountering the deathspider.  After a short conference with
myself and the officers,  the captain determined that entering this sphere
was our best bet for survival."
        "Our entrance was, unfortunately,  spectacular.  Immediately upon
entering the sphere all gravity ceased,  and our air envelope  disappeared
instantly into the void around us.  The crew died to a man,  I alone was
saved due to a _Neckless of Adaption_ that I habitually wear.  The
deathspider was unaware of what occured to us, and followed us through.
Again,  the air left their vessel instantly and everyone aboard was
killed."
        "I was now in rather sticky place,  but I tried to make the best of
it.  I am unable to use most helms,  not being skilled in the Art,  but the
tradesman had a backup furnace helm, and there was a stash of magical
scrolls in the captain's cabin.  Making use of the ship's planetary locator
I set a course for the fourth planet out,  which appeared to be a size "E"
earth body.  I hoped this planet would have a breathable atmosphere.  The
journey was incredibly tense.  My neckless could only support me for 7
days,  luckily several of the captain's scrolls were _Wall of Fog_ spells.
While jamming the vessel I constructed a crude airtight tent around the
helm,  which I then filled with a _Wall of Fog_,  this provided sufficient
air to allow me to let the neckless rejuvenate for a day.  I would then put
it back on and continue the journey.  The constant weightlessness made me
somewhat nauseous at first,  but I eventually acclimatized.  I noticed a
very peculiar thing concerning magic in this sphere,  spells that would
normally take simply a minute or so to cast from the scroll now required
several minutes.  Along with the complete lack of gravity this made for a
very strange sphere indeed."
        "Eventually,  after 30 days or so and having passed through an
extensive asteroid belt (sadly, none of the asteroids I encountered had an
air envelope)  I reached the fourth planet out.  It was a reddish planet,
and I could see no large bodies of water.  It did, however, have an
atmosphere.  I carefully guided the tradesman down and was happy to
discover the air was quite breathable.  My landing was far less graceful
then I had hoped, the tradesman was destroyed,  though fortunately the helm
survived.  The world I had landed on was desert-like, with great canals dug
by an ancient civilization which drew the water from the polar ice caps and
distributed it throughout the world.  Within a few days of my landing I was
discovered by a wandering band of natives."
         At this point Elrohir motioned to a gnome sitting quietly at the
side of the stage, a moment later an image of a tall, red haired humanoid
with golden brown skin.  He was dressed in animal skins and carried a
vicious two-handed sword and an arquebus of some sort.  "This band,  who I
later found were called Hill Martians (and the planet itself was "Mars"),
were willing to help me to a city called Syrtis Major.  The cities on the
planet were inhabited by a second race,  Canal Martians." A more civilized
appearing version of the first figure appeared,  with less hair and pale
yellow skin.  "I found that the nations of the third planet, Earth were
engaged in invading and colonizing Mars,  these inhabitants appeared to be
fair standard humans, though they were very advanced technologically,
using many tinker gnome like inventions."
        "I was happy to discover that the language most common among these
humans was understandable by anyone who speaks common, though there were
many dialects and they called the language "English".  By judicious use of
disguise I was able to pass as a human,  and I soon obtained work with a
"scientist" or sage among the humans,  one Basil Renford.  It was from this
gentleman that I learned the basics of the sphere.  Gravity within this
place is produced by all bodies,  but is in direct proportion to the size
of the body,  the larger the body the greater the force.  Only the planets
were large enough to hold an atmosphere, or produce standard gravity (even
then there were variations, Martian gravity was slighty less then
standard).  Magic was virtually unknown within the sphere,  though some
witchdoctors and shamans among the savages practiced some of the lesser
arts. It was, at any rate very unreliable, as my own experiements with my
dwindling scroll supply indicated.  Even the priests had no access to
spells."
        "The humans practiced a secular religion they called "science",
they created great technological works, even managing to overcome the
difficulties of space travel in their sphere by utilizing special
propellers which pushed against the ethereal plane.  These vessel where
very slow, only moving at one fifth of standard spelljamming speed, and
they were powered by huge solar boilers.  This effectively limited them to
travel inside the asteroid shell, so they explored the inner four planets.
Their speed was slow,  but their weaponry awesome.  They had develop
smokepowder weapons far beyond those of the giff or gnomes.  Indeed,  I
witnessed gunnes which were capable of destroying vessels the size of
Armadas with a single shot.  On Mars itself a peculiar tree's wood had
anti-gravity properties, allowing it and objects composed of it to
levitate.  Great fleets of skyships sailed the Martian skies,  struggling
for control of the planets resources.  The Earthmen had imported their
technology, their vessels had metal skins over the wood,  the Canal
Martians, whose technological level was similar to the more advanced
spelljamming races were completely outclassed, lacking magic to even the
odds.  It is fortunate indeed that the nature of the sphere keeps those
warlike humans contained."
        "My employer,  Mr Renford,  was engaged in the construction of an
etherflyer (their name for space vessels) designed specifically for the
exploration of the asteroid belt.  It didn't take me long to realize that
this vessel, if equipped with the furnace helm I had hidden near the site
of my earlier wreck,  would be capable of helping out of the sphere.  When
the internal compartments and air tanks had been completed,  but the solar
boiler itself not yet installed, I stole the device, leaving a small
fortune in gems with the good Mr Renford as recompense.  I was able,  with
effort, to install the furnace helm, and eventually to leave the sphere."
        "I am not the most skilled of philogiston navigators, I'm afraid I
do not have the spheres exact location.  Considering the hostile nature of
magic and the nature within the sphere, I wouldn't recommend further
travel.  Based off of my findings the Imperial Elven Navy has declared it a
Forbidden Sphere.  I think we can all do with out these Earthmen gaining
spelljamming technology.  A few elven mages have attempted planar travel to
the region,  but they either returned unsuccessfully or have not returned
at all."
        With a polite nod to the scattered applause the elf stepped from
the podium, bowed to Master Akanis, and left the hall, his gnomish
companion trailing quietly behind.

Game Information:
        I feel S:1889 is best used sparingly in crossovers, perhaps a
vessel like a Locust class gunship is sucked through a vortex into standard
wildspace and the crew have no way to return home.  Or, a group of SJers is
stranded within the sphere.  I have tried to make interaction as difficult
as possible,  yet not impossible.  Remember that S:1889 physics, not SJ
physics, reigns within Solspace.
        System wise there are two good ways to handle things.  If you have
access to S:1889 rules simply converting back and forth between the two
using the Polyhedron articles would work fine.  Another idea would be to
use the Ravenloft:Masque of the Red Death Rules.  This works best in many
ways, since it allows a small bit of magic yet maintains the emphasis on
science.  (Masque of the Red Death is set in the same period as S:1889,
w/o the space traveling aspects).  If you simply want to add a few S:1889
ships and weapons to your game as oddities conversion works best.
        Even if you don't like the concepts of S:1889 the Martian clouships
make excellent spelljammer designs, and the Martians themselves are a nice
new race to add to your game.  Mars itself could be droped whole into any
Sphere, and interesting alternate might be Solspace 5000 years ago, when
the Earth was still completely barbaric yet the Canal Martian culture (and
use of liftwood to power their vessels) was essentially the same as it was
just prior to the first Earth landing (by Thomas Edison) in the 1800s
(Earth Calender).
        The web sites below have the best collections of S:1889 stuff.
They include descriptions of Martian cities, fiction, gifs and jpegs of
painted S:1889 miniatures,  scenarios,  Mac programs, and deckplans (the
last very useful for designing new, odd SJers even if you aren't interested
otherwise.
Anyone interested in converting S:1889->SJ should contact me for more info.

Victorian Space Index:
www.reference.org/victorian_space/victorian_space_index.htm

Robert Prior's Ships' Plans
http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Nebula/9135/space1889.html

Space 1889 at Don Mills:
http://www.interlog.com/~dmci104/GamingClub/Space1889/space1889.html

Sky Galleons of Mars:
http://www.facstaff.bucknell.edu/boeke/SGoM.html

The Heliograph Unofficial Space:1889 WWW Site
http://www.heliograph.com/space-1889/index.html

Space 1889 Links
http://www.bucknell.edu/~boeke/1889.html

Space Vermin's Space: 1889 Campaign
http://www.ultranet.com/~eclipse/SV/S1889/SV1889.html

Victorian Science Fantasy PBEM RPG
http://www2.southwind.net/~phoenyx/space89/index.html