[Raven Bloodmoon]

For those of you who have not been following the progress of our interstellar magic, you can get some background on the topic here.

The obect of this thread is to completely flesh out a starship capable of interstellar travel. It must accomodate Medium characters and is the size of a Tarrasque. And the last bit of information: It is a golem people live in.

Here is what we have so far.

HDMS Tarrasque 99% Complete.
Colossal Construct
Ultralight Scoutship

Hit Dice: 30d10 (155 hp average)
Speed: 6,000 ft.
Armor Class: 24 (-8 size, +22 natural)
Initiative: -9 (-8 size, -1 Dexterity)
Attack/Grapple: +22/+30
Attack: Disintigration Rays +22 ranged
Full Attack: 2 Disintigration Rays +22 ranged
Special Qualities: Construct trains, Damage Reduction 15/adamantine
Saves: Fort -, Ref 9, Will 10
Abilities: Str 10, Dex 9, Con -, Int -, Wis 11, Cha 1
Skills: None
Feats: None
CR: ?? (RUN!!! )

The HDMS Tarrasque is 80 feet long, 40 feet wide and 24 feet tall.

Hull: Steel; bulkheads provide protection against unwanted breaches.

Deflector Screen: Wall of Force effect surrounding vessel
Air Purifiers: Purify Air effect every 4 hours
Sustinence: Create Food & Water devices
Water Faucets/Cooling: Create Water devices
Illumination: Sunlight lightbulbs

Weapons: Disintegration rays.

Interstellar Propulsion: teleport spell on steroids. GP Cost of a single charge = Volume of the ship * 0.09. The XP Cost of a charge is 1/25 the GP Cost.

Power Source: Magic (500 gp to Woe for it still being a golem!)

Repairs: Repair Spooks

Short-Distance Locomotion: Fly

Artificial Gravity: Permanent create gravity spell

Control Mechanism: Telepathic link via special chair. Illusory displays for crew.

Sensors: Scry.

[WoeTheSinner]

You can read the basic premisce of this creation here

I recomend scanning though the thread to get some good ideas for what is trying to be done. To spice it up a little I will offer 500gp prizes per idea for the initiator of every idea that ends up being incorporated into the final creation.

I'm very excited about this

-Woe

[Lyinginbedmon]

Given the harsh environment of space, let's start by deciding on the hull. I'd say it would have to be of at least Adamantine, and it being airtight would probably mean it's reinforced, equalling:

AC 25 w/ damage reduction 10/--

As for additional fuel when not in jumping mode, you could try mixing Adamantine with Mithral to create an ore that is like super-coal. Plus the necessity of both materials would create a new mining source for the mass of unemployed, and would keep the PCs on their toes with space travel when their fuel could run out at any point

[Axel]

No, let's throw a navigational deflector on board instead. Some item or other that projects a shield around the ship deflecting incoming debris. Could be a built in ability or one of the many seperate items that need installation. Nothing fancy, a Wall of Force should do it. The hull wouldn't need to be anything more special than that of the space shuttle. It just needs to be thick enough to prevent pressure loss.

[Raven Bloodmoon]

I agree that adamantine will be needed. Making something airtight is not too much of a worry. Between one character who is obsessed with fire and another obsessed with electricity, I think the seems will be welded just fine.

Now here are the initial concerns with living in space as I see them:
[*]Vacuum sucks - No air means that you will suffocate. Explosive depression will damage your lungs and possiblely knock you unconscious from the shock.
[*]Vacuum is cold - It is cold as can be in vacuum. Literally. It is absolute zero except where there happens to be about 3 hydrogen atoms per cubic meter. This will inflict massive cold damage. (Note that some materials would be strengthened by this. Think of mercury, which would be a solid at these temperatures)
[*]Radiation Kills - I have found a decent system to accomodate radiation. Suffice to say that one minute in space will damage you 1d6 radiation damage and force you to make a Fortitude save or contract "radiation sickness" which is an extremely nasty collection of permanent ability damage and debilitating conditions.

This is the part my players call [CHAIR]-literature. Do you think that adamantine shields against radiation? Because that would solve one problem. Our welder-sorc can solve the issue of vacuum sucking, and our pyro can keep the place a little too warm for comfort. Once we have this, we'll have a liveable starship.

[Lyinginbedmon]

I've always throught that keeping an additional layer under the hull (As was so with the Great Eastern, short lived as she was) made from a different material, such as copper or (I've always assumed) Adamantine would prevent radiation from passing through.

On Axel's note about shields, a wall of force stops absolutely everything, including things you'd want to exit, like biological waste materials.

Now, if you put them all into magitach devices that could be turned on and off, effectively creating a 'shield generator', you could use it to defend parts of the ship you wanted and leave the parts you don't so you can conserve power for the Feerique Cannons (Mention them later)

[Raven Bloodmoon]

Depending on the cost of the deflector, that would certainly trim the construction cost. And protect against a certain chaotic twin's evil undead space pirates.

Can you work up the cost on that? Wall of Force at will. I already expect this to cost an arm, a leg, a kidney, and part of a liver. Anything to trim the project would help.

[Axel]

Conservation of matter: recycle biological wastes into usable food through inputs of magical energy. Or whatever. Or just use the teleporter to dump them outside the navigational deflector. Or establish a one-way permeable shield. Let things out but not in. Drop the deflector screen when you need something to enter.

Now, as far as radiation is concerned, we need to look back at physics. Alpha particles are harmless and can be stopped by a piece of paper. Beta particles are equally harmless even though they can pass through paper. Let's look at something that actually causes harm: gamma rays. Now, gamma rays can be stopped by a block of concrete. I think we can assume without knowing anything about it that something called "adamantite" will be at least as strong as concrete. Radiation is no concern. If you're really worried line the outside with lead.
Actually the whole point of a vaccuum is that there's almost nothing there, that includes radiation. It won't be much of a concern until you get near a star.

[Lyinginbedmon]

And given the multitude of stars actually out there, it should be a pretty common concern. One thing I wouldn't mind knowing is how the PCs actually know that there is a total vacuum up there, or even what radiation is?

[Rintaran]

Actually, I would think that adamantine would be an alloy (and not a base metal), lead being one of the main metals required to make it. That would easily handle your radiation problem without having to add extra weight to the hull.

Now, this ship is originally built in an environment with air right? So there's already air in the HMDS Tarrasque. You're going to want to add an item that automatically casts purify air every, lets say, four hours. And you're going to want several of these things. An alternative to this would be to have an area that is, in essence, an arboretum or a garden. Plants convert carbon dioxide into oxygen, so that'll help keep the air fresh. And, since we have an onboard garden, we have a source of vegetables. Now, to ensure that the plants continue to grow, set up a sprinkler & UV system - aka a device that creates water and is piped around the ship first as a coolant, and then dropped onto the plant in the garden. For the UV, would a Sunlight spell with a 12-hour duration, renewed every 24 hours, work for that?

[Raven Bloodmoon]

Heh...I think trial and error is going to be your answer. Personally, I'm not telling them it's there unless they find a good way to get it out of me. As far as radiation and vacuum are concerned, I don't know that there are any divinations that would take note of those conditions, as they've never been a problem before. By the way, what do you think of having stars be self-contained, self-stabalizing portals to a plane of positive energy and black holes are similar portals but to the a plane of negative energy? I have not reconciled how a star goes nova and turns into a black hole yet. Perhaps demons are involved.

Anyway, back to topic: If they can figure out that the stars are portals to a positive energy plane, they may be able to study the effects of positive energy and deduce that they will want shielding. As for vacuum, I hope the first astronaught doesn't need air.

[Lyinginbedmon]

They could use Empirical Observation to deduce that the atmosphere in space is 'hazardous' at least, and that could help them work on a way to avoid entering it.

As for the Feerique Cannons, they're the same weapons that are primarily used in Grimdolf's Citadel, and they are a combination between fired ammunition and magical explosive. They have a range increment of 150 ft., and deal 10d10 points of bludgeoning damage plus 10d10 points of non-specific energy damage to everything in a 30 ft. radius of where they hit. If you alter the ammunition slightly, they could be very effective in space combat, but good luck getting your hands on the design specs.

[Raven Bloodmoon]

Scrubbers, ya
Shielding, ya
Create Water Sprinklers/Fauscets, ya
Sunlight Lightbulbs, ya
Garden, not so sure. Doubt that it would provide enough replenishment to work for six people. Also, it would take up a lot of space and space is at a premium. For food, I'd suggest a Create Food & Water item.

By the way, I'll start working on costs for all these little gizmos as we create them.

[Lyinginbedmon]

The Dead-Nicks Headquarters has a garden-esque system that grows enough food for all 6 of them as long as they have water, perhaps that could help?

[Raven Bloodmoon]

Would it fit inside a tarrasque and leave enough room for the other stuff the ship needs to function? I am REALLY trying to avoid using extradimensional space, here.