The Yamato

The Yamato is quite a bit bigger than a typical spelljammer galleon but is not “a mile long” as was indicated in some earlier notes for the campaign.  It is about the size of an aircraft carrier – about 1000 feet long, 250 feet wide, with six decks as well as a forecastle and a sterncastle.  Large sections of deck/hull space are dedicated to the four wasp ships that dock with the Yamato and that serve as shuttles and escorts.

Yamato’s Role in the Campaign

The Yamato is essentially a floating hometown, not a ship that should really become part of the action very often.  It is more plot device than player resource.  As the campaign progresses, we will explore the possibility of creating bastions either in parts of the ship or using the basion rules to describe the PC’s own spelljammer vessel. 

The Crew of the Yamato

The Yamato has a crew of about 25 bridge crew who handle the Speljammer Helm and other controls of the ship, 100 to manage the weapons, and another 50 in other service roles.  In addition to the 175 members of the crew, there are roughly 500 civilians on board the Yamato – families of some of the crew, refugees and guests, and so on. 

There’s a small Giff contingent on board – mercenaries hired to command the cannons of the gun deck and provide muskets and pistols to the ship’s crew.  Gunpowder weapons are only (technically) available to the crew -- civilians don’t typically have access to them. 

Armaments

The Giff mercs have brought cannon to the Yamato. There are three great guns, two batteries of cannon, and ballistae as well.  Of course, the greatest weapon on the ship is Yamato’s Breath Weapon Gun, which takes massive amounts of arcane power but creates a devastating blast in a cone in front of Yamato, enough to cripple or destroy most smaller ships caught in its blast. 

• The Breath Weapon Gun (special)
• 2,000 foot cone, hits for 20d6 fire damage and 20d6 force damage, DC 20 dex save for half.
  Firing the Breath Weapon Gun drains the power of the Yamato’s Astral Dragon Drive, leaving it unable to travel at Spelljammer speeds until the Hoardforge can be restarted (see below)

• 3x Giff Great Guns (4 crew) (smaller than the giant cannon of the Giff bombard ships, they have a range of 300/600, are +6 to hit, and do 6d10 bludgeoning damage on a hit)
• 12 x Ballistae (2/bank, six banks) (3 crew each)
• 20x Cannon (5/side) (5 crew each)

Unlike most spelljammers, the Yamato’s facing does matter, and it can only bring to bear either a broadside (half of the cannon or ballistae) or the Breath Weapon gun.  The Giff Great Guns are on rotating platforms that turn, so they can fire with either broadside.  The stern of the Yamato has only two banks of ballistae that can choose to fire in that direction. 

Propulsion

The Yamato travels through the astral sea thanks to the Spelljammer Helm used by Admiral Akita and his officers, as well as the power of the Hoardforge, the arcane energy well at the heart of the ship.

In wildspace, the Yamato relies on a combination of sails (better speed) and magical propulsion (slow, but not dependent upon astral/solar wind) to keep the ship moving.  A ship the size of Yamato can move very fast but turns very slowly, so it often is dependent upon its smaller craft to protect it from enemies.

Important Areas of the Ship

• The Giff Armory
• The Temple
• Command Center
• The Gun Deck
• The Refugee Holds
• Stores
• Galley
• The Library
• The Forge Deck
• The Flight Deck

The Hoardforge Drive

The Hoardforge drive is the heart of the Yamato.  It is what allows the ship to move at Spelljammer speeds in astral space. Its fuel is a nod to the greed of dragons – it requires magic items that are broken down/sacrificed to the forge, where they are broken down into residiuum which powers the drive. 

The amount of time that the drive is powered depends upon the rarity of the item sacrificed (as a rough indicator of magical power).

• Common – 1 hour
• Uncommon – 1 day
• Rare – 5 days
• Very rare – 20 days
• Legendary – 100 days

The use of the Breath Weapon Gun drains this power completely, and it doesn’t matter what type of item was used to provide power – so more valuable items tend to be used only when things are quiet, and the chief artificer likes to keep several common or uncommon items on hand to power the ship during a battle.  The ritual to absorb an item and convert it to fuel takes one minute per rarity level of the item (Common = 1 minute, Legendary = 5 minutes).

Crafting items specifically for the Hoardforge drive is possible, but ingredients are a persistent problem, and the pace at which the items are needed is greater than they can be created – a team of a dozen artificers might be necessary to keep up with the production of uncommon items to provide daily fuel. 

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Design Note

Because magic items are required to power the ship, and the PCs are part of the effort to source those items, it will be important during the campaign to provide the party with some extra magic item loot so that they have some to give up -- and ideally some tough choices to make about what to keep and what to turn over for fuel.

Yamato on the Yamato

The spirit of the dead astral dragon Yamato is very much a part of the experience of the Yamato. This voice can be heard in specific locations of the ship – the temple, the captain’s chapel, and the Hoardforge drive chambers. Yamato provides mystical guidance to the ship through Admiral Akita, the high priest, and the chief engineer. 

Design Notes

The Yamato will largely be a location in this campaign, and is a plot point rather than a combat resource. It's a massive ship, by Spelljammer standards. The masts for the sails are nearly 20' in diameter, and the masts tower four hundred feet above the ship's deck.

Later in the campaign, the PCs may have the option to become the Yamato's bridge crew, or even commanders, but by then they will have reached a power level that will make that feel appropriate.

What are the Sails for?

So, in astral space, the sails are part of the circulatory system of the ship, working to keep the air in the upper parts of the bubble circulating with the air on and inside the ship.

In a wildspace system, the sails can also work as solar sails to provide propulsion for a ship based on the various currents, the presence of a star in a solar system, or other sources of energy.

On a planet, they can catch the wind, and the ship can sail.

And they look cool.