Ethership Power Core

Sorry I forgot to add this at the end of my last email. I found it
originally on the WOTC Planescape boards, but have lost the credits and
author. Anyway, it is a really good 3.5 writeup of the Ethership Power Core
from the old Planescape supplement for the Ethereal.
A quick comment on Planescape and Spelljammer: PS has always included the SJ
cosmology of crytal shells, phlogiston, etc. In all planar maps that include
the Prime Material. the spheres are clearly labeled and shown. I tend to
blend the two extensively in my own game because I really view them as a
macro-setting.
Anyway, without further ado, I present you with......

  EtherShip Power Core: Common knowledge is that a person moves in the Deep
Ethereal by the power of their mind, vaguely similar to the Astral. Fact is,
while the Astral is a place where nothing is anywhere, in the Ether
everything is in the same place. This is a lot less abstract than the
Astral, and therefore the power of the mind doesn't bend perceived space
around as well in the ether -- therefore you are still limited by your
normal pace, though you can let some of your essence boil away to move
faster. In the end, this amounts to a variable amount of time you have to
move between certain locations as you bend your mind to moving you, though
because most people tend to think in terms of literal maps, eventually even
something moving like the Body Luminous can move on "beyond" any reasonable
travel time, because it's out beyond the mental map.
This turned out to be a big problem in the construction of etherships. Fact
is, minds can't work together very well to bend the ether around, and a
single mind in its own body can't move something as big as a ship -- or the
sorts and size of cargo that a ship would be needed to move on any other
plane. The "traditional" methods of spelljamming and actually sailing the
currents of the Waveless Sea didn't work, either.

Some bright berk, a wizard that the Etherfarers like to claim as a sort of
proto-Etherfarer, figured out how to do it, though. You make the ship the
mind's body. Drawing on knowledge of the creation of golems, where an
elemental spirit is bound in the artificial body, he called an elemental
spirit and bound it into a matrix made up of gems and silver, and bound that
to the ship. With the ship as the spirit's body, and through proper coaxing
(which later became "standardized" ethership controls) the wizard was able
to propel his ship through the Deep. He wasn't a stingy berk, either; he
shared this knowledge around with others, though some say he came to regret
it when the baatezu started using etherships powered by trapped ghosts,
larvae, and souls.

Even though the ship has a mind to direct it, stabilized ether sails are
still needed to help sail the Waveless Sea. Nobody's quite sure why, though
some suspect that it's a matter of the ship needing to be partially of the
ether to be able to move as fast as some of them can without shredding at
high speeds like living beings do when moving faster than their own normal
pace. It is noted that ethersailing is actually rather slower than moving on
one's own when it comes to hurrying to a specific spot, but ships are the
only guaranteed way to stay together and bring lots of stuff along.

Ethership power core
Most ethership power cores are based upon the original design, that of a
single or several gems with a special silver mount, within which an
elemental spirit has been bound. The process is akin to that required to
animate a golem. It weighs about 1 pound and is the size of a human fist.

Caster Level: 12th; Prerequisites: Craft Wondrous Item, geas/quest, summon
monster VI; Market Price: 12,500 gp.


Baatezu ethership power core
Not ones to do something simply when they can do it in the most depraved
fashion possible, the baatezu have taken the principle of binding a
non-sentient elemental spirit and turned it towards evil. The core looks
similar to a normal ethership core, though it is made of gold instead of
silver and the gem seems to have a faint reddish glow no matter what it
originally was. In fact, the gem holds a bound soul, sometimes a trapped
ghost but most often that of a mortal too foolish to not deal with the
baatezu, or a larva or lemure that was chosen at random.

Caster Level: 9th; Prerequisites: Craft Wondrous Item, magic jar, creator
must be an evil outsider; Market Price: 8,000 gp (not normally available to
be bought).




George "Loki," Williams
New Orleans Music Reviews http://www.neworleansbands.net
Planescape: Planewalker.Com The Official Planescape Site Section Mgr for
Snail Outfitters http://www.planewalker.com/snail/index.php
Spelljammer: Beyond The Moons, The Official Spelljammer Site Contributing
Artist/Developer http://spelljammer.org/
Spelljammer:  Into The Void (Coming Soon) Columnist
http://intothevoid.spelljammer.org/


----- Original Message -----
From: "Dreamer" <dreamer@??????.?????.??.uk>
To: <SPELLJAMMER-L@??????.???????.com>
Sent: Thursday, April 14, 2005 4:23 AM
Subject: Re: [SPELLJAMMER] Planar Structure and Cosmology - Planejammer?


> In <URL:news:local.spelljam> on Wed 13 Apr, George "Loki" Williams wrote:
> > > Maybe you could have 'shadow barges', parallel to spelljammers,
> > > that travel through the Plane of Shadow, rather than the
> > > Phlogiston?
> > >
> > > What would be really interesting would be a mechanism which
> > > allowed you to travel through both, or maybe even all the
> > > 'transitive planes', such as the Ethereal, Astral, Shadow and
> > > Phlogiston.
> > >
> > > Would this go some way towards satisfying the needs of the
> > > Planejammer project?
> >
> > There are already parallels existent. There are references to Etherships
on
> > the Ethereal, as well as SJ style ships that sail the skies of the Abyss
in
> > several Planescape products. (Look for a conversion of the Ethership
Power
> > Core at the end of this email). In the Planejammer stuff I am working on
> > there are different means of propulsion needed on different planes.
Helms
> > work on the Prime and astral according to the write up on Crosswinds
Keep
> > (search the WOTC site for it), There are Astral sails and bound
elemental
> > spirits powering the Githyanki astral ships in Incursion (Dragon/Dungeon
> > Magazine back issues- Githyanki Invasion of the Prime), Etherships use
bound
> > elementals, etc.
> >
> > The trick is not so much traveling while in the transitive planes (and I
> > think they all should be fair game), but transposing the ship from one
to
> > the next. Other than portals from the flow into a sphere you rarely will
> > find a planar gate large enough for a ship.
>
> Creating a planar gate is a one-off process, if you cannot find
> one that already exists, to take you where you want to go. That
> sounds like casting a spell with a relatively short duration to
> me. And, it is probably just a two dimensional effect, an area
> you move your vessel through, like entering a mirror.
>
> Actually travelling within a plane needs some sort of big
> three-dimensional effect, that covers the whole vessel, and this
> must have a long duration, typically a permanent enchantment.
>
> While opening the planar gate may be difficult, you could argue
> that moving the vessel around is pretty difficult as well, and
> might even be harder, under certain circumstances.
>
>
> > Keep ideas coming as I am tightening up my Planejammer notes and the
> > Metalspace sphere I was working on before Mardi Gras and hope to have
> > them posted within the week.
>
> Ethership Power Core?
>
>
> > George "Loki," Williams
> > New Orleans Music Reviews http://www.neworleansbands.net
> > Planescape: Planewalker.Com The Official Planescape Site Section Mgr for
> > Snail Outfitters http://www.planewalker.com/snail/index.php
> > Spelljammer: Beyond The Moons, The Official Spelljammer Site
Contributing
> > Artist/Developer http://spelljammer.org/
> > Spelljammer:  Into The Void (Coming Soon) Columnist
> > http://intothevoid.spelljammer.org/
>
> --
> Dreamer
> dreamer@??????.?????.??.uk
> http://www.romsys.demon.co.uk/
>
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