Argonth's Elementals - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

Argonth's Elementals

Post/Author/DateTime Post
#1
jastermereel
Sep 29, 2010 7:30:58
Just a quick question regarding the floating fortress, and about bound elementals generally.

I was reading Forge of War recently and I came across the section on the floating fortresses, and it said that Argonth has three bound elementals; an air elemental, a fire elemental, and an earth elemental. My question regarding this specific area is what in the hell does the earth elemental do on a flying fortress??

And this brings me to my more general question. What exactly do the elementals do to their respective vehicles? Do air and fire elementals only provide propulsion, or do they also provide (additional) lift for airships? And what the hell do earth elementals do to elemental land carts? I know this is meant to be handwaved, but I'm on a "develop new magical technology for Eberron" kick and thus I wanted to get a sense for how they are imagined to provide the "power" to elemental vehicles.

Thanks for any input on this; I am quite fascinated by the whole concept of bound elementals.
#2
zeropoint
Sep 29, 2010 9:15:44 This answer is based purely on my own interpretation of the setting, so bear that in mind.

Bound elementals usually provide propulsion in my games, with some ancillary effects that enhance the vehicle they are bound to as appropriate. For instance, airships are naturally and magically buoyant, so the bound elemental simply provides forward motive force under most circumstances. If the bound elemental is a fire elemental, it also powers an on-board furnace which is used to run my personal version of the airship's engineering systems, but I won't get into that as it is all homebrew.

If, however, the airship gets damaged, then its buoyancy will be compromised and it will start to fall. In those cases the ship has to maintain a certain forward velocity to provide enough lift to compensate for the lost buoyancy, or risk crashing. If the damage is very bad, the ship will be forced to angle itself at an incline, in order to use the elemental's propulsive force directly simply to keep the ship aloft. So in large aerial battles in my games, you can tell when an enemy airship is extremely damaged because it will begin to list, with the bow pointing up and the stern sinking.

Similarly, water elementals provide motive force for elemental galleons, lightning elementals provide propulsion for the lightning rail and so on. If any of those elementals were to fail or be released, the vehicle would be stationary (though you could still sail the galleon normally), but the lightning rail for instance would still be repulsed by the conducting stones and an undamaged airship would be adrift but still aloft.

The earth elemental in the flying fortress is an interesting case. My instinct is to say that the air elemental provides the lift to keep the fortress flying, the fire elemental provides the force to move it around, and the earth elemental provides extra strength to the stone and metal that make up the fortress, to resist possible attacks and to shore up against the massive forces that would be present in a structure of that size that isn't anchored to anything solid.

I know that sort of violates the rules I just posited for other elemental vehicles, but the flying fortress is a special case. And since stone isn't naturally buoyant or able to resist those kinds of forces, it makes sense that magic of some kind would be needed to fill in the gaps.

In the end bound elementals are applied phlebotinum for your campaign world; have a set of rules for how they generally work, and don't be afraid to bend those same rules to fit any cool ideas you have. Just have a reasonable sounding explanation for each exception (ready for the inevitable arcana check) and your players will never worry about it.
#3
durskut
Sep 29, 2010 15:18:22 I generally agree with ZeroPoint above. The Argonth's bow would likely break from its stern at the thin section in the middle if it was left alone. Flying buttresses would help, but from what I understand they only provide lift. I think the earth elemental is there to ensure this and other potential break points stay together.

Additionally/Alternatively the earth elemental could be a automatic repair device. Set the station down and the earth elemental can be commanded to glide through earth and gather/shape stone which is battle damaged. The crew could then secure the replacement with mortar or whatnot. Lastly, the earth elemental could be there to move earth! I think it's mentioned the Argonth is capable of landing, so the elemental could clear a smooth landing site. Or if the station would need to move through a narrow pass the elemental could clear a path wide enough to fit through.

On airships, I imagine fire and air elementals provide both additional lift and thrust. In my mind's eye, soarwood on its own only provides enough lift to keep itself aloft. If any non-soarwood weight is added the soarwood will sink. On an airship this means any non-soarwood components/cargo/personel must be kept aloft by the elemental.

On land carts, I imagine the elemental reduces the coefficient of friction between the cart and the ground to zero. That means it is not extra tiring to whatever is propelling it and any bumps or such would not affect the trip. For instance, if you had a horse pulling it, the horse would only have to change the speed and direction of the cart. The horse would not have to spend any effort on the cart to sustain its speed or overcome roadway conditions.

#4
jastermereel
Sep 29, 2010 21:51:20 I generally had the same idea about fire and air elementals providing both lift and thrust, and I had never thought of the earth elemental as an kind of automated repair system, as well as the other uses you mentioned. That all sounds awesome.

Although, from the entry in the 4e ECG I got the impression that elemental land carts are horse(or any other animal)less, and that's part of the reason why they are considered so bizarre. Honestly, the first image that came to mind when I read the entry was an automobile, however distasteful that might sound to any medieval purists who might be lurking in the shadows here on the Eberron forums.

My working assumption was that each elemental provided buoyancy and movement within it's natural medium, with fire providing the addition of heat that can be use in all sorts of ways (forgive me for implying perhaps the addition of steampower on this) as well as even more buoyancy in the air (since hot air rises). I also like the fact that Argonth's elementals are not bound to rings surrounding the structure, but are rather contained within in a sort of reactor setup. I always thought there was no reason for those big rings other than that perhaps it was cheaper to build that way. I imagine no military vessel would be construct in such a manner, since the struts would be incredibly vulnerable in combat.
#5
zeropoint
Sep 30, 2010 9:11:47
I imagine no military vessel would be construct in such a manner, since the struts would be incredibly vulnerable in combat.

The elemental ring is so iconic to Eberron airships that I've decided that making one is the only way to use a bound elemental for propulsion. Floating fortresses are large enough that the ring may actually be entirely contained within the structure, forming something like your reactor core, albeit a dispersed one. It would make a good target for sabotagers, that is for certain . . .

Using the fire elemental for heat is something I do in my games, as well, but of course I don't know of any canon support for that idea.

I've never used landcarts, and so don't have much to say about them, unfortunately.
#6
RedRider
Oct 02, 2010 4:59:55 Having the earth elemental clear a landing site for the fortress is pretty cool, but you could do a couple of other things too:

-The elemental allows the foot of the fortress to move through earth, allowing for fine adustment of it's landing site and ground-based movement.
-Helps hide the passage of the fortress by restoring terrain where it has landed or passed over.
-Once landed, the earth elemental can build tactical earthworks such as trenches, crude walls and flat roads for soldiers to travel on.
-On board, the elemental provides some land capable of growing some food for soldiers. Not much, but enough to extend it's resupply period by a day or so.
-Takes care of the soldier's waste matter through composting.
-Assists in certain industrial processes within the fortress, such as mixing concrete for repairs, sharpening weapons by abrasive minerals or sandblasting walls.
-Combined with the air and fire elementals, can produce dust clouds and magma as weapons.

Perhaps as an element for the next fortress:
-Can sink the entire fortress underground for (slow) subterrainean travel and enhanced fortification.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 jastermereel Sep 29, 2010 7:30:58	Just a quick question regarding the floating fortress, and about bound elementals generally. I was reading Forge of War recently and I came across the section on the floating fortresses, and it said that Argonth has three bound elementals; an air elemental, a fire elemental, and an earth elemental. My question regarding this specific area is what in the hell does the earth elemental do on a flying fortress?? And this brings me to my more general question. What exactly do the elementals do to their respective vehicles? Do air and fire elementals only provide propulsion, or do they also provide (additional) lift for airships? And what the hell do earth elementals do to elemental land carts? I know this is meant to be handwaved, but I'm on a "develop new magical technology for Eberron" kick and thus I wanted to get a sense for how they are imagined to provide the "power" to elemental vehicles. Thanks for any input on this; I am quite fascinated by the whole concept of bound elementals.
#2 zeropoint Sep 29, 2010 9:15:44	This answer is based purely on my own interpretation of the setting, so bear that in mind. Bound elementals usually provide propulsion in my games, with some ancillary effects that enhance the vehicle they are bound to as appropriate. For instance, airships are naturally and magically buoyant, so the bound elemental simply provides forward motive force under most circumstances. If the bound elemental is a fire elemental, it also powers an on-board furnace which is used to run my personal version of the airship's engineering systems, but I won't get into that as it is all homebrew. If, however, the airship gets damaged, then its buoyancy will be compromised and it will start to fall. In those cases the ship has to maintain a certain forward velocity to provide enough lift to compensate for the lost buoyancy, or risk crashing. If the damage is very bad, the ship will be forced to angle itself at an incline, in order to use the elemental's propulsive force directly simply to keep the ship aloft. So in large aerial battles in my games, you can tell when an enemy airship is extremely damaged because it will begin to list, with the bow pointing up and the stern sinking. Similarly, water elementals provide motive force for elemental galleons, lightning elementals provide propulsion for the lightning rail and so on. If any of those elementals were to fail or be released, the vehicle would be stationary (though you could still sail the galleon normally), but the lightning rail for instance would still be repulsed by the conducting stones and an undamaged airship would be adrift but still aloft. The earth elemental in the flying fortress is an interesting case. My instinct is to say that the air elemental provides the lift to keep the fortress flying, the fire elemental provides the force to move it around, and the earth elemental provides extra strength to the stone and metal that make up the fortress, to resist possible attacks and to shore up against the massive forces that would be present in a structure of that size that isn't anchored to anything solid. I know that sort of violates the rules I just posited for other elemental vehicles, but the flying fortress is a special case. And since stone isn't naturally buoyant or able to resist those kinds of forces, it makes sense that magic of some kind would be needed to fill in the gaps. In the end bound elementals are applied phlebotinum for your campaign world; have a set of rules for how they generally work, and don't be afraid to bend those same rules to fit any cool ideas you have. Just have a reasonable sounding explanation for each exception (ready for the inevitable arcana check) and your players will never worry about it.
#3 durskut Sep 29, 2010 15:18:22	I generally agree with ZeroPoint above. The Argonth's bow would likely break from its stern at the thin section in the middle if it was left alone. Flying buttresses would help, but from what I understand they only provide lift. I think the earth elemental is there to ensure this and other potential break points stay together. Additionally/Alternatively the earth elemental could be a automatic repair device. Set the station down and the earth elemental can be commanded to glide through earth and gather/shape stone which is battle damaged. The crew could then secure the replacement with mortar or whatnot. Lastly, the earth elemental could be there to move earth! I think it's mentioned the Argonth is capable of landing, so the elemental could clear a smooth landing site. Or if the station would need to move through a narrow pass the elemental could clear a path wide enough to fit through. On airships, I imagine fire and air elementals provide both additional lift and thrust. In my mind's eye, soarwood on its own only provides enough lift to keep itself aloft. If any non-soarwood weight is added the soarwood will sink. On an airship this means any non-soarwood components/cargo/personel must be kept aloft by the elemental. On land carts, I imagine the elemental reduces the coefficient of friction between the cart and the ground to zero. That means it is not extra tiring to whatever is propelling it and any bumps or such would not affect the trip. For instance, if you had a horse pulling it, the horse would only have to change the speed and direction of the cart. The horse would not have to spend any effort on the cart to sustain its speed or overcome roadway conditions.
#4 jastermereel Sep 29, 2010 21:51:20	I generally had the same idea about fire and air elementals providing both lift and thrust, and I had never thought of the earth elemental as an kind of automated repair system, as well as the other uses you mentioned. That all sounds awesome. Although, from the entry in the 4e ECG I got the impression that elemental land carts are horse(or any other animal)less, and that's part of the reason why they are considered so bizarre. Honestly, the first image that came to mind when I read the entry was an automobile, however distasteful that might sound to any medieval purists who might be lurking in the shadows here on the Eberron forums. My working assumption was that each elemental provided buoyancy and movement within it's natural medium, with fire providing the addition of heat that can be use in all sorts of ways (forgive me for implying perhaps the addition of steampower on this) as well as even more buoyancy in the air (since hot air rises). I also like the fact that Argonth's elementals are not bound to rings surrounding the structure, but are rather contained within in a sort of reactor setup. I always thought there was no reason for those big rings other than that perhaps it was cheaper to build that way. I imagine no military vessel would be construct in such a manner, since the struts would be incredibly vulnerable in combat.
#5 zeropoint Sep 30, 2010 9:11:47	I imagine no military vessel would be construct in such a manner, since the struts would be incredibly vulnerable in combat. The elemental ring is so iconic to Eberron airships that I've decided that making one is the only way to use a bound elemental for propulsion. Floating fortresses are large enough that the ring may actually be entirely contained within the structure, forming something like your reactor core, albeit a dispersed one. It would make a good target for sabotagers, that is for certain . . . Using the fire elemental for heat is something I do in my games, as well, but of course I don't know of any canon support for that idea. I've never used landcarts, and so don't have much to say about them, unfortunately.
#6 RedRider Oct 02, 2010 4:59:55	Having the earth elemental clear a landing site for the fortress is pretty cool, but you could do a couple of other things too: -The elemental allows the foot of the fortress to move through earth, allowing for fine adustment of it's landing site and ground-based movement. -Helps hide the passage of the fortress by restoring terrain where it has landed or passed over. -Once landed, the earth elemental can build tactical earthworks such as trenches, crude walls and flat roads for soldiers to travel on. -On board, the elemental provides some land capable of growing some food for soldiers. Not much, but enough to extend it's resupply period by a day or so. -Takes care of the soldier's waste matter through composting. -Assists in certain industrial processes within the fortress, such as mixing concrete for repairs, sharpening weapons by abrasive minerals or sandblasting walls. -Combined with the air and fire elementals, can produce dust clouds and magma as weapons. Perhaps as an element for the next fortress: -Can sink the entire fortress underground for (slow) subterrainean travel and enhanced fortification.