Piloting and Maneuverability
Spelljamming
The act of flying a ship through Wildspace is colloquially known as Spelljamming. The recipe is simple; take one object of at least one Tonnage in size, attach a spelljamming helm or some other method of propulsion, feed it, and off you go.Of course it's a little more complicated than that; sure you can spelljam a bolder but you'll find it is not a smooth ride nor all that agile of a craft. This is why most people use ships of some sort. They're familiar, large enough to create a sizable Air Envelope, and comfortable enough to live on for months at a time. Bigger ships offer more comfort and options, but you'll need to hire more crew to help you manage maneuvering. Then there's the issue of propulsion, an area that is a near monopoly of the Arcane. While there are some alchemical methods of getting around inside the Spheres, they are only useful over short distances due to their slow speeds. Sails, and Oars are actual used to help steer a vehicle while spelljamming, not push it forward.
Piloting
The most common form of propulsion that is used is the Spelljamming Helm. To pilot a craft using a Spelljamming helm is an activity that requires spell casting ability, Helms require spell slots to power them. A caster can sit on the helm and take the Link to Helm action to connect themselves to the ship and assume the role of Pilot. Once connected they can take any action with the Pilot tag that is available to them from either their vehicle or their helm. The most important of these is Feed the Helm, where the pilot gives a portion of their daily magic to propel the ship forward. One spell can propel a helm for up to 12 hours. Once fed you can cruise through wildspace covering over 100 million miles in a day; that is until you comes across an object of at least 10 tonnage, then you will automatically drop into Tactical Movement.Tactical Movement
Tactical movement is where most encounter modes such as ship to ship combat are done. It is plotted out on a hex grid where each cell is a 100ft. As gravity is relative to each ship and there is no real frame of reference for "up" all movement is treated as two dimensional. Each ship will take up one Hex, even if it's longer than 100ft. Basic flying around the grids does not usually require a Piloting check, but reckless actions like pushing your speed or ramming do. A Piloting check is a skill roll using the skill that corresponds to the magic tradition of the pilot, against a standard DC for the level of the vehicle (contingent on GM adjustment). Failing a piloting check on a reckless maneuver will cause the ship to go Uncontrolled. An uncontrolled ship continues to move a number of hexes = to its current base speed points value in a strait line each turn, until it's pilot uses the Take Control action.Piloting a Spelljammer in tactical mode is a team sport, as the pilot can really only go forward, the rest of the crew handles making the ship turn. There are two main statistics for tactical movement, Speed and Maneuverability; Speed is a derivative of your propulsion system, Maneuverability is based off of how agile your ship is.
Speed
Helms can be purchased in a variety of speed potential (see Helm article), but it is the spell you feed the helm that determines your actual speed you use when taking the Jam action. It's common practice for pilots to begin their shift feeding the helm a cantrip for cruising around, then when needed feed the helm a higher level spell if combat happens. If at any time you are unlinked from your helm, your ship will go uncontrolled, but you will not need to feed the helm again if you re-link. If someone else links to the helm they will have to feed it a spell of their own to pilot the ship.
Spell Rank to Speed
| Speed Points | Spell rank required to reach it |
|---|---|
| 1 | Cantrip |
| 2 | 1st |
| 3 | 3rd |
| 4 | 5th |
| 5 | 7th |
| 6 | 9th |
Maneuverability Rank
| Maneuverability Rank | Turn |
|---|---|
| Perfect | 0* |
| Good | 1 |
| Average | 2 |
| Poor | 3 |
| Clumsy | 4 |
| Ungainly | 5 |
Maneuverability
Each ship on the map has a Facing that points at one side of the hex, and when the pilot moves the ship they can advance the ship along that facing. To turn, a ship needs to advance a number of hexes equal to the turn value before it can change one face on it's hex. Ships with Perfect maneuverability can change 2 faces for each hex they move, and can change facing before they move.Many crew actions can increase or decrease a ships maneuverability rating temporarily. These circumstance bonuses and can only increase rank to Perfect, but circumstance penalties that push past Ungainly impose a +1 to Turn for every rating under Ungainly.
Landing and Towing
Landing
All ships can enter the gravity well of a planetary body, but most are too big to actually land. This is probably the one area where adapted groundling ships are better than their space-born cousins. Any grounding craft can land on whatever their traditional travel medium was, and a number of the smaller space-born craft can land on solid ground (see description of each ship hull for details). Inside a gravity well a ship that is airborne is limited to tactical movement and while this speed can outstrip even the fastest of natural fliers; to make it from the surface to out past the gravity well can take days of travel. Any ship that is landed or grounded needs to take a number of Lift Off activities based off of the size of the hull to get in the air before they can start to jam.For the most part the civil authorities of the groundling nations frown upon a flying ship just touching down in their harbor, and require captains to land past the horizon line and sail in under normal means. Ports such as Waterdeep and Calimshan have been known to confiscate the ships of offending captains.
Towing
Towing another ship is a common practice is wildspace; be it a captured Hull or just a Barge for extra cargo or air capacity. A ship can tow another ship of its size or smaller at a speed rating of -2 (to minimum speed of 1) and two maneuverability categories lower.
Definitions
Cruising Speed
When a Spelljamming craft is not near any other Gravity creating object; it is capable of going tremendous speeds covering over 100 million miles a day. A pilot will need to drop out of this speed to make any sharp turns or take any navigational sightings. Ships automatically drop out of cruising speed if they come upon an object of at least 10 TonnageFacing
Choose one side of the hex, this is the ships facing. Ships taking the Jam action head in this direction until they take one of the actions that change the facing of the ship.Speed Points
Granted by your propulsion system. Points are spent during the Drive action to move or to turn. Points cannot be banked and any points not spent during the drive action are lost.Tactical Movement
Slower movement where sharper turns are allowed. Plotted out on a hex grid. It is the setting for ship combat.Uncontrolled
A vehicle that is uncontrolled moves its Speed in a straight line along its most recent heading, drifting up to 1 facing at the GM’s discretion. It remains uncontrolled until the Pilot uses the Take Control actionBehind the Curtain
Power sources
came from the original 2e material.2e helms would take all of a pilots daily spell slots, that was too restrictive. Helms came in 2 varieties, both were too expensive to be used in low level campaigns. Looked into existing Home Brew, found a suggestion to give the helm 2 traits, Lift and Speed. Took this. Workshopped the spell cost on Discord, landed on the spell rank = actual speed points given and the helm having a maximum speed capacity.
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