[Fantasy] Air Marines

[Kalzazz]

So, suppose that a fantasy setting has airships (imagine for instance they are like sailing ships or rowed ships that just happen to be airborne, rather than lighter than air craft)

Suplose also then that wandering monsters, winged dark elves, other airships, and Jupiter getting annoyed at Neptune's ships intruding on his domain etc are all possible threats hapless airships face

Presumably then we should have Air Marines aboard ships

Any ideas on what these folks would be like? Assume TL 4

[Phantasm]

TL4 airships... I'm going to assume magic.

I'd expect them to carry swords for boarding and repelling boarding, and rifles - wheellock or flintlock - for assisting in shooting at targets on the enemy ship prior to boarding. These would be separate from the gunnery crews manning the cannons, but I wouldn't put it past a few of them to man pintle-mounted wall guns on the railings.

I'd probably expect one or two combat mages to be part of the crew.

[jason taylor]

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

So, suppose that a fantasy setting has airships (imagine for instance they are like sailing ships or rowed ships that just happen to be airborne, rather than lighter than air craft)

Suplose also then that wandering monsters, winged dark elves, other airships, and Jupiter getting annoyed at Neptune's ships intruding on his domain etc are all possible threats hapless airships face

Presumably then we should have Air Marines aboard ships

Any ideas on what these folks would be like? Assume TL 4

Perhaps a combination of paratroops and air police? The two duties I can see are landing in hostile territory and guarding bases and anchored airships. As well as rousting drunkards perhaps.

[Kalzazz]

Either magic or setting feature yeah

[Icelander]

Is military technology closer to early TL4, i.e. around 1450-1500 in our history, or late TL4, i.e. 1650-1750 in our history?

In other words, do we have extremely heavy yet not very effective great guns, clumsy arquebuses and early calivers, with armoured knights or the equivalent still the most formiddable force on the battlefield, or do we have decent cannon, useful muskets, sleek fusils and plentiful pirate pistols, with armour mostly relegated to showy cavalry units?

[McAllister]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Is military technology closer to early TL4, i.e. around 1450-1500 in our history, or late TL4, i.e. 1650-1750 in our history?

In other words, do we have extremely heavy yet not very effective great guns, clumsy arquebuses and early calivers, with armoured knights or the equivalent still the most formiddable force on the battlefield, or do we have decent cannon, useful muskets, sleek fusils and plentiful pirate pistols, with armour mostly relegated to showy cavalry units?

Wandering monsters tend to have armor whether it's in vogue (or realistic to fly with) or not, so I'd plan for armor.

Do the marines have the ability to leave the airship while it's airborne in some fashion other than falling to their certain deaths? Are they expecting to fix a rope to an enemy airship and climb it to take the fight to their decks? Or are they expecting to stay on and defend their ship, and they have no plans to leave while it's in flight?

If you were to say "Well, McAllister, you tell me," I'd think they'd stay on the ship. Pirates would want to board unarmed vessels, but I would think that two airships of war would expect to resolve their differences before they got to the range where launching hooks can be expected to help.

I would want the marines to have much more access to the exterior of the hull than one has of a ship in water. If gargoyles have figured out where in my ship I keep food and they've latched onto the hull, trying to claw their way in, I'm going to want to sent a team to go drive them off from outside rather than waiting for them to put a hole in my ship. Is this accomplished with extensive scaffolding? Do they jump off the side of the ship in rope harnesses and shoot at whatever's on the hull until it decides to go away (dangerous, if gargoyles are smart enough to target the ropes)? Can the ship project a zone around it that lets people fly independently?

Also, mandatory Religious Ritual training for marines, and in fact for everyone in the ship. ******-off Neptune is NOT A JOKE. If you want your marines to come back when the mission is over instead of going on an odyssey, make sure they are all prepared to sincerely and adeptly beg the local deity to forgive their trespasses, and spend hundreds of dollars on nice liquor for libations. I expect the mindset to be "if we lose all the food we could forage, but if we lose the offerings we will be struck out of the sky by lightning at a whim; pilfering punishable by death, and then we bring your remains home so you can be resurrected and killed again at leisure."

[Kalzazz]

More mature TL 4 for firearms, some TL 5 stuff is available but is the product of master alchemists and smiths and rare

Flying mounts are available, and debateably better for personal transport and communications, but except for the hugest ones can't compare with airdhips at moving men and materials

Jupiter accepts flying mounts much better than he accepts carpets and airships etc, so a griffin rider won't be running nearly the risk of fluke storms and wandering monsters an airship will

Armor is extremely common among wealthy adventurers and nobles and such (who tend to be the people who can afford flying mounts), otherwise people are more likely to have a cheap helm and breastplate or no armor at all

Dragons in the setting tend to be very unhappy at the notion of being beasts of burden, and will not tolerate encumbrance beyond 'no encumbrance' or carry anything they perceive as cargo etc

[sir_pudding]

Early marine infantry was primarily responsible for leading shore and boarding parties of sailors, because ships couldn't afford to have large contigents of dedicated assault troops who did no other useful work. That is likely to be the case here.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by McAllister

Wandering monsters tend to have armor whether it's in vogue (or realistic to fly with) or not, so I'd plan for armor.

Sure, but do I get access to 18th century cannon, muskets and pistols to plan for armour with? Or is it only extremely heavy and clumsy 15th century stuff, the first of which was barely more useful than harsh language for shooting down nimble flying foes?

[McAllister]

Dragons seem like another case of "the best weapon against dragons is getting on a megaphone, saying that its scales are so beautiful you feel the need to thank its revered ancestors for their excellent life choices, and offering it whatever you think it wants." If you asked me to put together a dedicated dragon-hunting airship, that'd be one thing, but I'd expect generalists to get out of the way.

What's the viability of stabling flying mounts on the ship? Because "send out a handful of griffin-riders with lances or rifles" seems like a nice answer to gargoyles trying to claw their way into your foodstuffs. Or elves. I'm actually envisioning the airship version of aircraft carriers, at this point... seems like a reasonably attractive option.

I agree with sir_pudding that marines will be both a small percentage of the ship's hands, and frequently lead the rest of the crew in some manner of assault. Other than giving them a bit of Leadership, though, I'm not sure what to do with the fact.

I like the smoothbore flintlock carbine or the rifled breechloading carbine. They're light, accurate, and don't take a full minute to reload. The smoothbore wins in weight, damage (particularly wounding modifier) and a bit in cost, and the skill is more broadly applicable; the rifle loads in a quarter the time. Given the circumstances, I think I prefer the smoothbore with a bayonet for anyone who'll be on a griffin, as I can't imagine reloading on one of those. For shipboard use, a mix of carbines for aimed shots at smaller targets and wall guns or cannon for larger ones seems pretty good. A 1/2D of 65 seems really restrictive, except what are you going to hit with -8 from range and Acc 3? And if the answer is "something massive," wouldn't you rather shoot at it with a bigger gun?

I see the marines preferring thrusting weapons, because they might be fighting in confined spaces and the mounted ones can use the slam damage of their mount.