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A Sword Without a Hilt: A Song of Ice and Fire/D&D 3.5 Crossover

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Azel said:
1. The top speed is light-speed, assuming you are working in a vacuum and have infinite time for acceleration. I didn't calculate a maximum speed at sea-level atmospheric pressure, as I didn't have a good way to guess the cross-section and air-resistance coefficient for the thing. But it should be easily above Mach 1, probably over Mach 2 without issue. Anything above that get's a bit harder to gauge. With the compromise design, probably not faster, with proper aerodynamic design, we could go at Mach 6+. The speed I've given for perfect maneuverability is half the acceleration per round, so that value in ft/s * 2 / 6s = acceleration in ft./s².

2. Dogfights are a bit hard. The Launchers have only a reach of 200m, so the fighter would have to get that close to the target, but a steel launcher bolt would wreck a jet-fighter something fierce.

Return fire is harder to say. The armor should shrug off smaller air-to-air missiles like a Sidewinder without a hull breach, though repeated hits aren't looking good. Then again, targeting might be an issue as the Wyvern-Class has no heat signature. Radar lock-on would also be dicey, as the hull is lead-shielded.

3. The maneuverability would likely be lower then jet-aircraft at high speeds, since conservation of momentum is a much bigger problem. Then again, the anti-grav engine allows for maneuvers that are literally impossible in an aircraft. It would probably depend on the skill of the pilot and how well he can take the G-forces involved.
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"God damn! Did you see that?"

"He's on my tail... he's on my tail! He's on my--he's right in front of m..!"

"Are those solid steel projectiles? They hit like trucks!"

"We outrange them something fierce."

"They're shrugging off missiles like a flying tank!"

"Damn, he's good. Break off, Strider Two, let the Ace dance with him."

"I don't know how he's keeping up with those maneuvers. These things are using advanced technology and it's nearly impossible to keep track of them! Total radar shielding!"

"That's Belkan work for you. Stealth air superiority prototypes with janky ass weapons systems. Think they had to cut costs...?"

"Why is it always a Belkan conspiracy with you?"

"If it's a conspiracy, Belkans got their hands all over it."

Etc. Yeah, I can make this work.

What's your response on guided suicide drones standing in for missiles? Though that doesn't answer how to give them appreciable speed, they have to be able to outpace aircraft going at Mach 2 (meaning that our fighters move similarly fast as most modern fighters, with (somewhat?) poorer maneuverability, but they can also do things that are OCP like be where they shouldn't be, and they functionally behave like advanced stealth aircraft).

Guided missile systems of some sort would be nice. They can already probably bomb ground targets, right? Are their payloads good enough to damage armored vehicles? What about hardened targets?
 
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065tdsa said:
There's still ways to stop things from ever getting to where they did. Dark Magic, being unnatural corruption of the mind caused by the in built arbitrary consequences of committing certain acts with magic (and therefore the ultimate responsibility of a cruel entity of power, not unlike a divine-tier curse), is even more fair game for fixing with a magic sledgehammer than just regular PTSD.
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It's really nice that you think that. Given that I'm operating under DP's version of Heart's Ease, it should be clear that I disagree with you. And DP supports the idea that Black Magic cannot be Miracle-cured. Because it's so much more complicated than you seem willing to imply, and for all Miracle's power as a spell it doesn't make Viserys a God. Also allowing that would destroy a great source of conflict and tension in the story.
 
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065tdsa said:
There's still ways to stop things from ever getting to where they did. Dark Magic, being unnatural corruption of the mind caused by the in built arbitrary consequences of committing certain acts with magic (and therefore the ultimate responsibility of a cruel entity of power, not unlike a divine curse), is even more fair game for fixing with a magic sledgehammer than just regular PTSD.
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I am almost certain Lya could fix it. Possibly with Danny's help.

Ppffffbbbbblllll....

I'm beginning to think some of Dresden files issues arrive from the same place.

Namely that the mind, and the soul are not metaphysically distinct like they are in DnD.
 
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Snowfire said:
It's really nice that you think that. Given that I'm operating under DP's version of Heart's Ease, it should be clear that I disagree with you. And DP supports the idea that Black Magic cannot be Miracle-cured. Because it's so much more complicated than you seem willing to imply, and for all Miracle's power as a spell it doesn't make Viserys a God. Also allowing that would destroy a great source of conflict and tension in the story.
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How about you know, stopping her? With a real (as in, one we'd use on something we thought was actually dangerous) spell like polymorph or amber sarcophagus? Then Viserys would have all the time in the world to figure out the details of how to do it. Heart's Ease and it's capabilities are really not relevant to what enough Miracles with XP spent on them can do.

And Viserys already is fucking with the Mantles which are both way more serious and more likely to see him be opposed than one warlock's mind/soul. Compared to Mab's personal displeasure (or even personal mild annoyance), this whole trip is a side project.
 
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TotallyNotEvil said:
I'm just raising an eyebrow at them somehow manifesting an SLA/Su effect inside an AMF.

I mean, Invoke Magic is a ninth level spell, and even then it's sharply limited. That's how hard it is to cast in an AMF.
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Merged metaphysics. Just as D&D casters can do some things that DF magic users would consider impossible, it goes the other way in places, too.

See the AMF as skintight Circles around everything in its area of effect. But that doesn't remove the ability of a DF Wizard to use the power they've gathered before the Circle went up ala Small Favour. It just stops them from projecting magic beyond themselves.
 
Crake said:
that doesn't answer how to give them appreciable speed, they have to be able to outpace aircraft going at Mach 2 (meaning that our fighters move similarly fast as most modern fighters, with (somewhat?) poorer maneuverability, but they can also do things that are OCP like be where they shouldn't be, and they functionally behave like advanced stealth aircraft.
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Biggest problem besides range is that their acceleration is tiny.

OTOH, literally an inch of tank armor on the lightest fighter.

Super high top speeds take forever to reach and there are a shitton of problems when you start to go real fast inside an atmosphere.
 
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Note how Viserys could have ended that encounter in numerous ways, as you pointed out, but decided to instead kill her? In a pretty unambiguously lethal way, too. He had so many options but felt the need to sword her to death.

I am going to guess that he saw something that convinced him she needed to die in the same way he watched a cultist pray to her Gods for redemption, looked her in the eye and cut her down to fuel a blood magic ritual.

He's a cold son of a bitch in a certain way, while also being an idealist.

Tl;Dr: Viserys' impetus towards saving people is that their relative worth to the world outweighs any harm they could end up doing to it incidentally. He's not a crusader, he's a ruler. Sometimes he's right there with you, making you feel important, and the moment you convince him you're just a senseless casualty in part of a cruel system, he'll cut you down and already be moving on to fixing the environment which allowed you to form, perhaps mourning you, but not stopping for a moment.
 
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Crake said:
What's your response on guided suicide drones standing in for missiles? Though that doesn't answer how to give them appreciable speed, they have to be able to outpace aircraft going at Mach 2 (meaning that our fighters move similarly fast as most modern fighters, with (somewhat?) poorer maneuverability, but they can also do things that are OCP like be where they shouldn't be, and they functionally behave like advanced stealth aircraft.

Guided missile systems of some sort would be nice. They can already probably bomb ground targets, right? Are their payloads good enough to damage armored vehicles? What about hardened targets?
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The suicide construct would be neat against ground targets, especially tanks and buildings, as they could fly to vulnerable spots, but they would be hilariously too slow to catch another fighter. I was mulling over that myself, but I didn't find anything so far. Except... *ruffles through old posts*

Hey, @Goldfish, you brought up this spell ages ago: Farstrike – d20PFSRD
We should look into researching the magic-cannons we nicked from the Efreeti and using that spell for them. If we can build a weapon that uses this spell and consumes wand charges like the Efreeti cannons, we might have a good new armament for long ranges.

Against ground-targets, large charges of Explosive Packs should work decently against most things, but not tanks or hardened buildings.


However, I still have the idea for a heavier fighter, named Manticore Class. That one would be armed with 2 steam cannons, which are basically tank cannons. They would do decently even at long ranges and against hardened targets, though hitting a fighter craft in a dog-fight would be one hell of a shot to make with those things as they would be fixed to the structure and you would need to turn the whole fighter to aim them.
 
Crake said:
Note how Viserys could have ended that encounter in numerous ways, as you pointed out, but decided to instead kill her? In a pretty unambiguously lethal way, too. He had so many options but felt the need to sword her to death.
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Something else to note is that Viserys is operating under a promise to act within the Laws whilst learning about why they're enforced - hence no BP, Smokey Confinement, etc. And he tried Black Tentacles as a capture technique, only for Kathy to effectively throw a GDM counterspell back and turn the spell into a flashbang.
 
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TotallyNotEvil said:
Biggest problem besides range is that their acceleration is tiny.

OTOH, literally an inch of tank armor on the lightest fighter.

Super high top speeds take forever to reach and there are a shitton of problems when you start to go real fast inside an atmosphere.
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It's nearly 9m/s² acceleration, so far from shabby. Not quite jet standards, but the vectoring makes that power a lot more versatile.

Then again, we could easily increase the acceleration by loading more mercury into the thing.
 
Snowfire said:
Maybe, but that would be using a scalpel. Not a sledgehammer. The sledgehammer just makes things worse. It's why we don't use them in delicate reconstructive surgeries :V
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Cancer on the other hand, often demands a more general approach. And given the potential for Dark Magic damaging a person is built into the human soul, this is really more like that.
 
Azel said:
The suicide construct would be neat against ground targets, especially tanks and buildings, as they could fly to vulnerable spots, but they would be hilariously too slow to catch another fighter. I was mulling over that myself, but I didn't find anything so far. Except... *ruffles through old posts*

Hey, @Goldfish, you brought up this spell ages ago: Farstrike – d20PFSRD
We should look into researching the magic-cannons we nicked from the Efreeti and using that spell for them. If we can build a weapon that uses this spell and consumes wand charges like the Efreeti cannons, we might have a good new armament for long ranges.

Against ground-targets, large charges of Explosive Packs should work decently against most things, but not tanks or hardened buildings.


However, I still have the idea for a heavier fighter, named Manticore Class. That one would be armed with 2 steam cannons, which are basically tank cannons. They would do decently even at long ranges and against hardened targets, though hitting a fighter craft in a dog-fight would be one hell of a shot to make with those things as they would be fixed to the structure and you would need to turn the whole fighter to aim them.
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So the Manticore is more of a Gunship or maybe an A10 if that (perhaps with some air to air capabilities similar to the Warthog?)

And the Wyvern is more like a traditional fightercraft.

Farstrike seems good, so basically their short range option is heavy steel projectile launchers (literal knife fighting ranges, but they hit so hard that it means you don't want to get close to one) and they can swat you out of the sky if you're not careful with the lightning projection cannon?

This means that their main disadvantage is they take time to get up to speed, they have notably poorer maneuverability (meaning less skilled pilots have fewer options, but conversely the most skilled have more options than modern jet fighters it isn't even funny).

Oh, and they're ARMORED LIKE TANKS.

They have limited ground options still though. Maybe a niche bomber design is in the cards?
 
065tdsa said:
Cancer on the other hand, often demands a more general approach. And given the potential for Dark Magic damaging a person is built into the human soul, this is really more like that.
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Um, no. Not really. Cancer requires specifically targeted force. And equivocating Black Magic to Cancer continues to utterly miss the point of what it really is.

...it's 3am. I need to stop replying. More in the morning, folks.
 
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Crake said:
So the Manticore is more of a Gunship or maybe an A10 if that (perhaps with some air to air capabilities similar to the Warthog?)

And the Wyvern is more like a traditional fightercraft.

Farstrike seems good, so basically their short range option is heavy steel projectile launchers (literal knife fighting ranges, but they hit so hard that it means you don't want to get close to one) and they can swat you out of the sky if you're not careful with the lightning projection cannon?

This means that their main disadvantage is they take time to get up to speed, they have notably poorer maneuverability (meaning less skilled pilots have fewer options, but conversely the most skilled have more options than modern jet fighters it isn't even funny).

Oh, and they're ARMORED LIKE TANKS.

They have limited ground options still though. Maybe a niche bomber design is in the cards?
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The issue is not bomb capacity, but projectiles. We simply don't have any notion of high-penetration kinetic bombs as there exists literally nothing on Planetos that would need them. Also, lack of good explosives.

For hardened targets, let the Manticore strafe it.
 
Azel said:
The issue is not bomb capacity, but projectiles. We simply don't have any notion of high-penetration kinetic bombs as there exists literally nothing on Planetos that would need them. Also, lack of good explosives.

For hardened targets, let the Manticore strafe it.
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That seems fair, but optionally, they would have Battleship and Gunboat (Moonchaser sized) support, would they have direct bombardment weapons capable of knocking down a hardened target?

I'm not talking penetration for enclosed bunkers, since we just don't have the need for that kind of firepower (yet), but stuff like steel and concrete structures and of course armored vehicles.
 
Snowfire said:
Maybe, but that would be using a scalpel. Not a sledgehammer. The sledgehammer just makes things worse. It's why we don't use them in delicate reconstructive surgeries :V
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:V

For real though that would require quite a bit of doing.

Especially since grandmaster level soul surgeons don't grow on trees...

...

Most people suggesting magic solutions seem to be forgetting the AMF. Which...

Given the severe risk her magic posed was a good move, though Viserys found out far to late she could still use internal energy that way.

I also realized, rather cheezily. That there actually is a spell designed for this situation. It's just forbidden salt magic!!!

*Dramatic thunder clap*

Atonement :: d20srd.org

Behold! The horror!!!

 
Crake said:
I'm not talking penetration for enclosed bunkers, since we just don't have the need for that kind of firepower (yet), but stuff like steel and concrete structures and of course armored vehicles
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Steam cannons should manage it, yeah.

And it's far easier to teleport/greater blink inside a super hardened bunker with your superhuman killing machines, aka adventurers, than play to the bunker's strenghts and try to bombard it.
 
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Crake said:
That seems fair, but optionally, they would have Battleship and Gunboat (Moonchaser sized) support, would they have direct bombardment weapons capable of knocking down a hardened target?

I'm not talking penetration for enclosed bunkers, since we just don't have the need for that kind of firepower (yet), but stuff like steel and concrete structures and of course armored vehicles.
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Steam cannons can crack those. The MBT might be a bit difficult, but a good hit, especially from above, should do the trick. But use APFSDS ammo for those, as explosives are a waste of time. Might be a good moment to use Adamantine tipped shells at that.

Or load up shells with Disintegrate. Pricey, but say goodbye to the front half of your tank if it hits.

Edit: Unless with armored vehicle you mean something like a Humvee or a Bradley. Those would most certainly not look that great after a steam cannon hit.
 
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Now I just need to figure out why an Imperial Taskforce is playing with the silly primitives. :V

I'm thinking "peacekeeping mission". With the underlying plot of an Inquisitor helping some Belkan terrorists (...it's what they do, okay?!) start a massive world war and then coming in seemingly to help deescalate things... all while leasing their services to those most desperate and further fueling the conflict until most advanced defense capabilities are shot.

Of course the plot ends with a tunnel run of some kind (through a top secret Imperial Weapons system designed with the help of some Belkan scientists attempting to fuse superscience with magi-tech?) and an ambiguous ending.

I'm mostly joking. Maybe. About some of that.
 
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The 'absolute effects' is where it's at. Disintegrate is particularly nice when it comes to modern warfare.

Doesn't matter if it's Obdurium, if it has infinite hardness and HP. That's a 3 meter cube turned into a handful of dust.

Hell, that's a 3 meter hole in your utterly impenetrable force shield.
 
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@Azel, how many small aircraft can a battleship's hanger capacity take on?

Should we consider a carrier variant if they are supposed to be specced to carry ground troops? WW2 proved that having lots of aircraft that can be yanked around the globe to which theater they are needed most is where it's at.
 
Crake said:
Of course the plot ends with a tunnel run of some kind (through a top secret Imperial Weapons system designed with the help of some Belkan scientists attempting to fuse superscience with magi-tech?) and an ambiguous ending.
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You know, TNE did pitch the idea of storing god-joice in crystals to me by PM.

So go on. Make it a full Death Star.
Crake said:
@Azel, how many small aircraft can a battleship's hanger capacity take on?

Should we consider a carrier variant if they are supposed to be specced to carry ground troops? WW2 proved that having lots of aircraft that can be yanked around the globe to which theater they are needed most is where it's at.
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I haven't updated the Moonchaser or the Dauntless with hangar capacity at. The Moonchaser would probably get enough space for 4 Wyverns. For the Dauntless, I was thinkg 2x wings of 4 Wyverns and 1 Manticore each.

No dedicated carrier planned yet though.
 
Also, I averaged dice for the "plasma bolt" Firestrike cannon. It does on average 25 damage per hit, compared to a missile launcher in d20 Modern's 35 (I believe).

Which still means that they should likely really hurt an enemy fighter, and they still have to hit, so of course modern fighters have some advantages when it comes to weapons practical capabilities.

Of course the fact that the Imperium can just dust a MBT with one well placed shell changes the name of the game somewhat, they can only produce so many Disintegrate shells, though they can produce functionally an endless supply of APFSDS steel projectiles launched from steam cannons, which as was stated could still put the hurt on even tanks.

And Strangereal nations can mass produce cruise missiles and air-to-air missiles, so really, this is just a conflux of capabilities making for really confusing and tense warfare.
 
Azel said:
You know, TNE did pitch the idea of storing god-joice in crystals to me by PM.

So go on. Make it a full Death Star.

I haven't updated the Moonchaser or the Dauntless with hangar capacity at. The Moonchaser would probably get enough space for 4 Wyverns. For the Dauntless, I was thinkg 2x wings of 4 Wyverns and 1 Manticore each.

No dedicated carrier planned yet though.
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In theory, how much air capacity could a carrier hold? You said a Dauntless could hold up basically two flights or so? (Odd configuration, but works)
 
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