Cannon

Cannon: Cannons are crafted of metal—some are cast in one piece, others welded with iron bands—and mounted either in the ground or on wooden frames. Cannons use black powder to propel their projectiles with great force. A cannon has a misfire range of 1 (20 feet). Cannons have a hardness of 10 and 70 hit points.

WEAPONS	# PER GUN DECK	COST	DMG DICE	CRIT	RANGE	POWDER	WEIGHT	SIZE	RELOAD TIME	CREW REQ.
Cannon, 3 pounder	12	500gp	3	x3	140ft	1ib	800ib	Large	1 full-round action	2
Cannon, 6 pounder	6	1000gp	4	x3	180ft	2ib	2000lb	Large	1 full-round action	3
Cannon, 9 pounder	4	1500gp	5	x3	220ft	3ib	2500lb	Huge	1 full-round action	4
Cannon, 12 pounder	3	2000gp	6	x3	260ft	4ib	3000lb	Huge	2 full-round action	5
Cannon, 24 pounder	1	4000gp	7	x3	300ft	8lb	5000lb	Gargantuan	2 full-round action	6
Cannon, 32 pounder	1	6000gp	8	x3	340ft	10lb	5600lb	Gargantuan	2 full-round action	7
Cannon, 48 pounder	1/2	12000gp	9	x3	380ft	12lb	8000lb	Colossal	2 full-round action	8
Cannon, 68 pounder	1/2	15000gp	10	x3	420ft	14lb	9000ib	Colossal	3 full-round action	9

Cannon: The cannon presented in the table above are standard “longs.” Larger cannons pack a bigger punch, but require more space, powder, and crew to operate. Assuming an entire Hull Location is dedicated to the cannons — called a “gun deck” in naval parlance — you can fit up to 12 3-lb. guns in one Hull Location, 6 6-lb. guns, 4 9-lb. guns, or 3 12-lb. guns. If you’re interested in using the larger guns, a single Hull Location can accommodate a single 24- or 32-lb. gun. If your Hull Location was designed with two decks, each 10 feet high, you can double these numbers if you want to dedicate the entire Location to your guns. For example, if your Location has 2 decks and you want both to be gun decks, you could fit a total of eight 9-pound guns in that Location — four on each deck.
The largest guns — the 48-lb. and 68-lb. cannon — require two Hull Locations each. Note that these largest cannons were most often used on land, to defend forts and towns, rather than aboard a ship. These Hull Locations must be adjacent to one another; that is, you cannot stack two Hull Locations vertically and use both to house these super-sized guns.
The damage a cannon inflicts is the number of its damage dice times the damage of the ammunition. For example a cannonball inflicts d10 points of damage. A cannonball shot from a 9-pounder inflicts 5d10 points of damage.

AMMUNITION	COST	DAMAGE*1	WEIGHT	TYPE	SPECIAL
Powder	15gp	-	1 lb.	-	-
Ball	20gp	d10	2 ib	B	Splinter
Grapeshot	10gp	d4	3 ib	B, P,	Reflex save required; half range and only 5 increments
Chain Shot	30gp	d4	6 ib	B, S,	Negates dodge bonus on Rigging Locations; half range and only 5 increments

*1 The damage listed is the base damage. Apply the number of damage dice for the cannon being used.
Ball: This ammunition is a solid ball of iron. If the cannonball hits a Location, roll and applies damage normally. In addition, flying splinters inflict 1 point of damage per damage dice rolled on any crew in that Location (DC 15 Reflex save for half). Example: A 9-pounder that deals 5d10 points of damage inflicts 5 points of splintering damage to the crew in a Location who fail their saving throws and 2 points of splintering damage to those who successfully save. Damage from splinters is piercing damage, regardless of what material the Location is built from.
Grapeshot: This ammunition is a canister containing hundreds of small iron pellets, designed to kill and injure the crew rather than damage a ship. Grapeshot deals damage to any creature in one Location (Reflex DC 10 + damage dice rolled halves damage) but does no damage to the Location itself. Grapeshot can only be fired up to a distance of five range increments, rather than the usual ten, due to the nature of the shot. Example: A 12-pounder that fires grapeshot deals 6d4 points of damage to all creatures in one Location and would require a DC 16 Reflex saving throw. When firing grapeshot, the targeted Location must be at least partially exposed (open-air, portholes, etc.). The shot must beat the AC of the Location in order to affect the creatures in that Location. Failure to beat the AC indicates the shot didn’t penetrate a ship’s defenses.
Chain shot: This ammunition consists of two balls joined by a chain or telescoping bar, designed to destroy Rigging Locations. Chain shot ignores any dodge bonus to AC when targeting a Rigging Location. It has no effect against Hull Locations. Due to the lack of aerodynamics, chain shot can only be fired up to a distance of five range increments.
Powder: Generally, this highly flammable substance is needed to fire ammunition from a cannon. The larger the cannon, the more powder it requires. the touchhole of a cannon, in which case the explosion to fire the weapon is instantaneous). A gunpowder explosion inflicts 5d8 points of fire damage if at least a quarter-pound of powder is present; each full pound of gunpowder present increases the damage caused by 1. For example, 20 pounds of gunpowder causes an explosion that inflicts 5d8+20 points of damage. The blast has a radius of 5 feet per 5 pounds of powder (rounded down) to a maximum radius of 200 feet. For example, the same 20-pound explosion has a blast radius of 20 feet. Any creature caught in the blast area may attempt a Reflex saving throw with a DC equal to 15 +1 per 5 pounds of powder (A DC 19 save for our example blast) for half damage.

Item type

Weapon, Ranged