Landships in Rifts...feasible?

[Pox]

I was just wondering if anyone thought the landships (amphibeous or not) had a place in/on Rifts Earth.

I know that the CS has some super-sized vehicles and the NGR has the Misfit...so there is some precedent for there being some, but is having a floating/flying/rolling fortress an idea worth pulling off or just asking for every bandit to take a shot at ya?

and if it is worth while...what rules would any of you use to build one? Extreme version of bot rules from SB1? Kit-bashed bot rules and Space station from DB6? or something else?

Now let it be known that I don't get/like the rules in AU:GG for ship creation due to them being over-complicated for my tastes.

I'd appreciate any thoughts.

[The Galactus Kid]

Yes. I totally see a place for them, as long as you have someone who can make and maintain them.

[drewkitty ~..~]

africa would be a good place for them to be populer.....

that reminds me I've see them before...some where..... maybe in a RT book

[Pox]

africa would be a good place for them to be populer.....

that reminds me I've see them before...some where..... maybe in a RT book

There was one in Robotech Book 7: New World Order...the modestly named "General Zhu" landship.

Don't think I haven't had my eye on that, but I really would prefer something that didn't look like a Jawa Sandcrawler...I've designed a landship before and it unintentionally turned out like that to my horror.

[Aramanthus]

I actually have some in my game. BUt they couldn't be posted here. Since they are based on something.

[Temporalmage]

You could extrapolate from the Galapagos Robot in South America also. That thing is HUGE!!!

[glitterboy2098]

totally feasible. heck, their feasible in real life too. just look at the Crawler-transporter for the shuttle, the Bagger 288 excavator, or all the freaking huge cargo trucks in use in open it mining. wouldn't be hard to just stick a cruiser on top of those motive systems.

it's just not very practical. their big, slow, expensive, have horrific ground pressure issues to solve, attract enemy fire like magnets (like all big stuff in a battlefield), and generally can be beaten by a fraction of their cost in conventional hardware.

that said, in Rifts a properly designed one might do well. between MDC materilas to deal with stresses and nuclear plants for motive system power, you could probably get a good rate of speed out of one (still, probably under 20mph). and ground pressure can be solved with really wide and long treads.

[Captain Shiva]

http://www.kitsune.addr.com/Rifts/Rifts ... _Train.htm How about this?

[DhAkael]

One name, two words.
'Bun-bun'
...Next

[Captain Shiva]

http://www.kitsune.addr.com/Rifts/Rifts-Earth-Vehicles/NG_Land_Train.htm How about this?

A very badly thought out concept.
That thing is going to need flat lands and/or roads just to get anywhere.
With most of the planet missing said roads and easy to navigate terrain the landship design will need some serious off road capability to be worth the investment and that design would have never gotten anywhere especially with NG's Big Bertha as an alternative.

How would you change it?

[Khanibal]

If cost is no object, look in DB:8 for the Wrath of God Destroyer. That should give you some ideas. Namely using hover/contra-gravity systems.

[glitterboy2098]

One name, two words.
'Bun-bun'
...Next

six words.

"For the Honor of the Regiment"



speaking of bun bun....let's rock, Posleen boy!"


and in regard to combat landships...and update

and of course, this isn't exactly new...LandKreuzer p.1000 Ratte. More... a bunch of good artwork

[DhAkael]

One name, two words.
'Bun-bun'
...Next

six words.

"For the Honor of the Regiment"



speaking of bun bun....let's rock, Posleen boy!"


and in regard to combat landships...and update

and of course, this isn't exactly new...LandKreuzer p.1000 Ratte. More... a bunch of good artwork

I wasn't gonna mention the Dinochrome Brigade, as that's a gimme

[taalismn]

Looking at some of the bigger Caterpillar dumpers, and getting ideas...

[Pox]

Thank you all for answering thus far...

A few years back I was tempted to flesh one of the many ships from the Gundam universe or something from this guy's stuff:

http://doc-evilonavich.deviantart.com/

Though I do wish he would do more than one dimension for his tech...he does scare the hell out of me with the sheer volume of weaponry he packs on his stuff.

[Captain Shiva]

How would you change it?

Change the height and width, make it wider then it is tall, that lowers the vehicles center of gravity and makes it a far more stable platform for off road and amphibious travel/water fording, this also allows you to make a flatbed that could hold quite alot of cargo.

Place the track sections so they reach the front and rear of the vehicle bodies, not what that picture has and none of that skullhead motif nonsense inhibiting ground clearance seen on just about every CS ground vehicle.
You need ground clearance on your vehicles in the wilderness of Rifts Earth, Palladium itself has an extremely bad habit of making very unstable vehicles with very little ground clearance.
They say the roads pretty much dissapear a mile or so outside the cities and towns yet design many ground vehicles that can't operate anywhere but on decent roads.

IF the vehicle is going to be that frelling long then make the bodies have articulated sections, not what that contraption you linked has (see the Thundersword on page 163 of Mystic Russia for an articulated sectioned vehicle example and just one of many examples of the tracks being needlessly blocked in the front making it virtually useless off road).

Your point about the tracks and overall vehicle width is a valid one. The tracks should be extra wide, like mud tracks are for heavy equipment. I would make the cab section an entirely separate piece with no cargo trailer built in. And the tracks on the trailer sections should only have one single track, instead of two short ones, which will enable it to ride over obstacles without bottoming out, which would help with the ground clearance issue, as well. If you wanted, you could shorten the trailers to a real world length of 40' to 60'. I envision this as being like a real train with couplings at either end, so if you had to turn around, you could unhook the cab section, and go to the back, rehook, and continue in another direction. I also envisioned something like trade caravan routes on Rifts earth, thereby making overland travel and shipping a bit more plausible. I know the rulebook says differently, but what the heck are house rules for anyway? I think one trade route comes down from the upper pennisula of Michigan, shipping goods from Northern Gun and Wellington Industries to Merctown, perhaps, and other trade route coming from GAW to Merctown, making it an important trade hub. And of course caravans need guards, opening up adventuring possibilities. Why not follow the links back to Kitsune's homepage, and make him aware of your concerns regarding the design? He may revise it; he updates his site three or four times a year, making it one of the few active Palladium sites still around.

[Aramanthus]

Plus Taalismn created something like this over on his Paladin Steel Thread.

[taalismn]

Thank you all for answering thus far...

A few years back I was tempted to flesh one of the many ships from the Gundam universe or something from this guy's stuff:

http://doc-evilonavich.deviantart.com/

Though I do wish he would do more than one dimension for his tech...he does scare the hell out of me with the sheer volume of weaponry he packs on his stuff.

I wish I could SAVE more of the art from his site for more leisurely viewing later...

[taalismn]

Also. don't forget, New West I believe has the TW Land Trains or leyline trains...get creative with those...

I also had the Paladin Steel Walking Trucks able to link together in convoy chains, but they were hardly armed....and The Dromedary heavy hovercraft...(Think a slightly smaller version of the Saturn V Crawler on hoverpads carrying a sinfgle level motel complex on its back...)

[taalismn]

[

Have you used the "download button"?
I haven't found one of his yet I wasn't able to save with it..

Beyond the nineth or tenth of his drawings, his older stuff doesn't have that feature...so unless that's a a perk of being a paying subscriber(which I'm not; I'm just a sign-in member) that download button ain't appearing for me...

[glitterboy2098]

some neat examples of landships..

Assualt Destroyer from C&C: Red Alert 3

landship hovercarrier from Heavy Gear

[Khanibal]

Anyone got the old Robotech books? Either the Invid Invasion or the REF Guide had the stats for the Titan (I think, those books are in storage). Is that big enough for ya?

P.S. Personally I always though that 6 guys riding around in each of the tires was a lame idea.

[Pox]

some neat examples of landships..

Assualt Destroyer from C&C: Red Alert 3

landship hovercarrier from Heavy Gear

I fell in love with the Vigilence (and the Southern landship in the one book) when I first saw her.

If the book was actually mine that had her and her deckplans and the photocopies I made were not complete ass...I would have been happy years ago.

What I thought about doing so I can use Rifts rules and not just wing it...is to use one of Doc-Evilwhatever's modular landship designs and treat each section like a small-sized spacestation from DB6 with making adjustments for things like sensors and such.

Would anyone consider that crazy or "illegal" (by that I mean you wouldn't allow it at your table)

[Aramanthus]

Actually that Titan from Robotech was in the Sentinel's book.

Here is another Anime which had Landships.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Wars
http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B00008K777.01.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

That is the one which influenced mine.

And in the OLd Robotech book called Strike Force had a version of a landship.

[taalismn]

The Anime Neo-Genesis Gaiarth also featured desert landships, including one that carried an entire town around in it...
As well as another, that was essentially a roaming evil robot factory...

[drewkitty ~..~]

the other PB canon land ship is also in one of the RT books, the Titan.

[Razzinold]

From a play perspective a landship like a CTX-54 firestorm mobile fortress sounds really cool. Basically like a Gundam Whitebase cruiser that can't leave atmosphere or fly more than a 1000 feet high. Unfortunately, as noted by others, unless you handwavium them into existence, there aren't many civilizations that can put one out there. CS yes, NGR sure, Atlantis most definitely. In North America, I suppose Naruni could field one, but given the current state of affairs, moving such a large scale weapon into the arena would open them up to retribution.

In part I think is because rifts earth suffers from the low population problem. It only has small population clusters capable of high tech construction on such a scale. Still, it'd be kinda cool to have one or two land battleships cruising around the New West or something.

Funny you mention population, I think a cool idea would be this. What if a town or city (you could make it pre-rifts or not) actually lived in the land ship. Kinda like the vault dwellers in fallout, or that alien race in mass effect that live on space ships and all work and live on the ships.

You could have it so all of the population live on the land ship, they could be stationary or move around once the regions resources are used up. Everyone could help maintain it and pass down from generation to generation, of course people would have to marry outside of the land ship and bring them in or after a while they would all be inbred as hell, lol

[Aramanthus]

It would make an interesting way to exist in the wilderness of POst Rifts America.

[GundamChief]

I have used such vehicles in my games, most of my inspiration comes from reading "Bolo" novels and from time to time playing "Ogre" from Steve Jackson Games. http://www.sjgames.com/ogre/

Nothing gets the Coalition off thier butts faster then one (or in my games case six) 30,000 ton, Tatical Nuclear shell/Missile throwing, psychotically programed, and overkillingly violent cybertank rushing towards Chi-Town. When I did this the only ones who were happy after the Coalition managed to succeed (at great cost) in destroying the monster tanks were (besides those who already hated them) those who need large trenches for...stuff

[Pox]

My problem really isn't external inspiration that I need...I have plenty of ships to look at as hull.

It is breathing life into it while staying within the confines of the Palladium rules that I am asking for really.

any thoughts on that?

These are some of what I'm thinking about...some of them.

http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b168/ ... dship1.jpg

(I shortened this one by taking out one of the logistics modules and the back end piece. I'm also very tempted to get rid of that awkward looking cannon on the front drive section)

and the other:

http://i19.photobucket.com/albums/b168/ ... yClass.png

(this is more in line with what I originally had in mind since it can possibly be thought of submersible and then come on land as a hover/CG type vehicle)

[taalismn]

the second one kinda makes me think of a pre-Rifts ocean liner(or fortified mobile aquatic community) becoming the basis of a nomadic community...

Phillip Reave's series 'Mortal Engines' has entire cities that crawl across a post-apocalyptic landscape, acting like giant predators by devouring smaller cities, recycling them into needed materials...like a communal whale slaying, the citizens take part in processing the haul...disidents are chucked out to fend for themselves on the stripmined open wastes...

The Resolute(at least that's what I think it's called), the community landship from NeoGenesis Gaiarth, is a former military landship turned neutral port-of-call...its leader/queen/mayor is actually the cyborg former commander of the landship, who now runs the place as a benevolent matriacrh, while quietly running the ship through her implanted datafeeds...so that's one model of leadership...

[GundamChief]

If it is breathing life into it that you need, then you don't have to look no furthur then Robotech. Same premise, a giant vehicle that due to events beyond one's control (Rifts earth is vicious as is space) people basically turned it from a machine made purley for battle to something of a home.

Another one to look at is Battlestar Galactica (old or new), again same idea only instead of one ship it's a fleet. However despite that they were the last of humanity they stuck togeather and formed a community. It has its own internal problems just like any other city does, it has criminal elements (black market, assassinations, theft, etc) as well as political problems with differing views in a stressfull situation (in thier case, very stressfull). You also have spies, sabotures, enemies from outside (demons, monsters, C.S., Etc) to deal with as well.

The vehicles your pictures show are in my opinion...fine if the city is small. The second one could probably fit a few thousand people in it and if you want to go with the "small cofine of humanity" then it works. If you are like me and like going grand however, then you need to think bigger and a little more complex. Just as an example of what mean, imagine if Chi-Town had pre-rifts anti-gravitational technology that lifts and moves the entire city. Of course if that would be too difficult, then use the Ticonderoga from Rifts: Underseas as a basis.

[glitterboy2098]

i think the biggest problem with putting landships into rifts is who to give them to? after all, most of the major known powers already have a defined vehicular asthetic that usually precludes landship use, and most of the places left to put a non-canon power are not the sort of places you'd want to use massive land vehicles. the few that do have terrain for it usually don't have any reason for a group to actually invest in landships as opposed to conventional vehicles.

[Aramanthus]

Very interesting pics! Thank you for sharing them. This has had some very interesting ideas. Some of which I'll use in the future.

[Captain Shiva]

i think the biggest problem with putting landships into rifts is who to give them to? after all, most of the major known powers already have a defined vehicular asthetic that usually precludes landship use, and most of the places left to put a non-canon power are not the sort of places you'd want to use massive land vehicles. the few that do have terrain for it usually don't have any reason for a group to actually invest in landships as opposed to conventional vehicles.

One group that I could see using such a vehicle is the First Apocalyptic Cavalry from New West. I always got a kind of Road Warrior vibe from them.

[MikelAmroni]

I'd think a Landship would work (just cracked open my old copy of Mindwerks and found that Misfit, nice ship). From a 'how would it survive?' perspective, I think a good idea is to apply considerations like the Mercenary build guidelines, with a Landship serving effectively as a Mercenary 'company town'.

A landship would need to be able to take care of itself, with its own fabrication abilities or advanced salvage abilities to manage repairs and ongoing supply needs. It would do best in a 'low magic' zone, a state with minimal ley lines and nexus points, or at very least a region where supernatural based threats are low. I say this because the logistics of protecting versus supernatural effects is a whole nother ball game from protecting versus conventional attacks. Bandits in power armor beating down on your doors trying to get in is different than vampires doing the same, or gargoyles or mages or demons.

Again I think I'm looking at the New West, or at least states that have wide open landscapes, regions more or less free of significant terrain obstacles. Even if it was a 'hover' type with an altitude of a thousand feet or so, i figure keeping to a region where its easy to see threats coming is better. Sure you might be able to hover over that forest, but do you really want to? What's hiding in that forest? What's going to be shooting at your belly?

Going back to self-sufficiency, at least in terms of mechanic related stuff it would need to be more or less self-sufficient, or some network of friendly tech-capable hubs be present. You're not going to be able to pull your landship into a CS depot and go "Fix us up" or even an NG one. You'd represent too big a threat and too big a temptation.

Actually one would be an awesome focus for a vampire hunting campaign, if properly designed. The judicious use of crosses, spotlights with crosses on them, heck fixed light with crosses painted on them, would be sufficient to keep them worse of the buggers out of the way. I would actually say defeating non-tech enemies would actually be easier than tech using ones. tech using enemies tend to use mini-missiles and missiles a lot more, which are infinitely more damaging to larger areas of the ship than the single claw of a greater demon. Sure fireballs and big area of effect type stuff is going to suck, but lets face it, if you're doing a vampire hunting campaign, it doesn't really work without technowizardry (which means magical countermeasures). In fact I could see a fire and brimstone preacher having come across an old US Army transport in the West somewhere, and gathering a whole bunch of folks together to go fight the vampires on their own turf. Load up with TW Stuff from Arzno, tech from Bandito arms, and maybe an ex-Reid's Ranger or two as good tactician/advisor (or perhaps someone who used to be in the Arzno army), and, voila, you have the basis for a vampire hunting expedition into Mexico. Make sure its amphibious, and give it some good recon capabilities (helicopters, flying power armor, flying allies), and you've got a good basis for a campaign.

You'd have to have a sizeable contingent of miners and salvage experts, so you could resupply, and it could use some basic mini-factories to make ammo and spare parts. There are a lot of ifs and maybes that go with this, and like I said, it has to be properly designed. Origin of the beast could be a NEMA experiement in amphibious warfare. Tow it to the battlezone, and then drive it onto the beach, and support your people from the front. Resupply would have been a key concern, but figure they decided to have ammo and spare part production on site, to facilitate a protracted war where air superiority had not been established. After the first one came in over budget (nearly twice what was quoted) and late (by five years), they decided to just park it where it had been developed (Utah? Southern Colorado? Arizona? Not Nevada, or else Bandito Arms would have it already), and mothball it. Maybe they brought it out to play once or twice, especially after the Rifts, but in the end it cost too much to keep going. Painting crosses everywhere is a simple enough thing, and putting cross covers on all the exterior and most of the interior lights.

[glitterboy2098]

i think the biggest problem with putting landships into rifts is who to give them to? after all, most of the major known powers already have a defined vehicular asthetic that usually precludes landship use, and most of the places left to put a non-canon power are not the sort of places you'd want to use massive land vehicles. the few that do have terrain for it usually don't have any reason for a group to actually invest in landships as opposed to conventional vehicles.

One group that I could see using such a vehicle is the First Apocalyptic Cavalry from New West. I always got a kind of Road Warrior vibe from them.

to be honest, i disagree. landships, as in massive land vehicles the size of naval vessels, really aren't part of the road warrior asthetic.

now, land trains (Semi-trucks towing 3+ trailers), would possibly fit into a road warrior asthetic. but those are a different thing entirely.


this site probably illustrates the differance ideally. it's a lego brick battle between a landship (the PARV "post apocalyptic research vehicle") and a band of Road-Warrior asthetic bandits..
this brickshelf gallery has more images of the lego P.A.R.V., which is a fairly good landship type vehicle, and one i could easily see having a spiritual cousin in rifts. (maybe built by northern Gun?)
more images
even more

main site with details

[MikelAmroni]

So lets start defining what is and is not a landship then.

A train (even one not tied to a track) is not a landship. A landship should bring to mind a massive hovercraft or naval vessel. (check)
A landship should be a mobile base, able to launch and recover vehicles of a variety of configurations.
A landship should be able to defend itself at least as well as any base of the same size or smaller, realizing they trade off some protection for mobility.
A landship should be VERY space conscious, and able to sleep and statio its full crew, as well as all assigned vehicles.

A configuration that might work would be the psuedo aircraft carrier, much like the one mentioned in Robotech.
A hovercraft configuration has promise, but the sheer size of the jets would be a nightmare, and easy to sabotage.
A "tank" configuration makes the most sense, though it has limits based on the length of the track (you wouldn't want one the length of your vehicle, because you would end up with your landship teetering on the brink of some terrain feature, and coming down hard and making for some serious issues.
A wheeled configuration also makes sense, but its not as universal as a tank tread, and has similar issues.
A walking configuration has its own issues, and would need to be gyro balanced to make it even semi stable. It could be done, though it would cost more than just making it a tank or wheeled configuration.
The last kind, which is really missing the point of a "landship" would be a flying platform.

In a Post apocolyptic setting, with magic, we have the addition of a second type, the levitating "landship." It counts as a landship because it cannot achieve any worthwhile altitude, barely enough to overcome a large forest (and certain older ones not even then).

Then you would arm it much like a naval vessel or small base.

Thoughts?

Edit: BTW that lego PARV is just awesome. Insanely awesome.

[Aramanthus]

I agree that Lego beast was awesome! I think the modified school was was an interestin addition. Thank you for the links GB2098.

My own were special naval vessels/ hovercraft.

[glitterboy2098]

MikelAmroni has a good start on the criteria, but here's the version i typically use.

To be called a landship, the vehicle has to meet the following Criteria

1.) has to be a single vehicle. not a train or segmented collection of vehicles.
2.) has to mass over 100 tons.
3.) has to fill a role comparable to Wet navy Vessels. either a mobile base for personell and smaller vehicles, a combat unit possessing firepower comparable to a wet navy vessel of similar size, or a cargo carrier devoting a substantial portion of it's mass to cargo.
4.) has to be manned. ideally with living space set aside for its crew. AI and automation can be utilized, but cannot be the main controllers of the vehicle.
5.) has to be a land vehicle. wheeled, tracked, or hover (hover should not exceed a few hundred feet above ground height) cannot rely on wings or helicopter blades for main motive and lifting force. nor can it be limited to water use only.
6.) has to be a cross country vehicle. cannot be restricted to motion apon prepared surfaces, be they rails, tarmacs, or roads.
7.) is not a robot vehicle. cannot rely on legs for motive action, nor possess extensive humanoid or animal form.



#7 is there because i do not consider a giant torso, head and arms bolted to a massive tank chassis to be a land ship. thats more of a super robot. #4 is there largely because if it's run entirely by computer, it's basically a big drone. i'm still debating cybernetic control. is the wrath of God destroyer a landship, or just a really atypical cyborg?
#2 seperates landships from tanks, since tanks usually mass under 100 tons. and #3 is just to provide more variation to the designs, so we can have both land carriers and land battleships....


some examples of landships in existing palladium source material, based on the above criteria.
NGR misfit [WB5] (actually 5 landships combined to make one super-landship...)
NGR big APC (name?). [WB5] (huge, mobile base (PA and the minitank)...over 100 tons, IIRC.)
NGR mobile repair vehicle [WB5] (big mobile base.)
GMU Titan [robotech II: The sentinels]
Zhu's landcarrier [robotech: new world order]
TGE (name?) planetary assualt tank. [Phase World] (massive grav-tank...)


on rifts earth, the issue, as i pointed out earlier, is "who can build them?" and "would they?" many of the places with the technology to build them either have no reason to, or are in terrain where doing so provides little benefit. Japan for example probably doesn't have landships. they could build them, but the islands are way too rugged and forested for them ot be very useful. the NGR can build them, and as pointed out in the list above, has, but they aren't all that useful against gargoyles. the Cs has no need (why when they have flying equivilents like the DHT and firestorm?), and the south american nations have bad terrain for such vehicles. and the russian warlords don't have the facilities.

i could see the austrialian tech-cities making them for expiditions into the outback, the new sovietski for operation in the steppe, and i could see Northern Gun making small landships for sale. thats about all i can think of.

[MikelAmroni]

The CS might manufacture some for securing Lone Star and expanding their western borders.

No, I've got to agree with GB2098 here, the CS would just use the Firestorm and DHTs, it creates a much more mobile base that can't be pinned down (the CS military likes its mobility), and when it comes to actual bases, they prefer to go underground and have minimal upwards vulnerability. It's safer and gives them greater staying power. A landship would pretty much go against everything they have done to date.

I could see Bandito Arms coming up with a landship for sale in the Colorado Baronies and the rest of the New West. Not a fighting variant, but as a massive cargo carrier and roaming business front. It wouldn't be as big as, say, a NG landship, but it would be pretty massive. It would be relatively well armed, but a CS Attack force of similar weight would overpower them.

[glitterboy2098]

actually in my own version of the Colorado baronies, i have them using large hydrogen filled TW augmented rigid airships for trade with places like arzno and stormspire.

massive TW "steampunk" landships might be interesting though...

[MikelAmroni]

actually in my own version of the Colorado baronies, i have them using large hydrogen filled TW augmented rigid airships for trade with places like arzno and stormspire.

massive TW "steampunk" landships might be interesting though...

In that vein, I will throw out two more Landship makers, although they would be TW based, and that is the two you mentioned. Arzno and Stormspire could both manage a TW version, either a levitating version, or more interestingly, one that actually "sailed" through the earth by using harnessed earth elementals.

[Pepsi Jedi]

While I personally think these things would make for slow moving targets in rifts earth....

Think they might work well against an enemy that's entrenched and lacks mobility. Say...

The BUGS up north? This landship thing is going to be the center of your army or what ever that's funding it. You're not going to send one out with out signifigant support, and it'd probably be a lot cheeper to just build a base most times instead of one of these, except when a base could be targeted and taken out easily by overwelming forces. Like one of the Xit hives.

But a movable base up in the Hivelands might be useful... might just be hovered above and blasted to crap, but I'd see it work alot better aginst the Xit's than Vampires who's master vampires would figure out how to disable the drive train or something toot sweet.

I also say that if you're minimum is 100tons.. Hovor shouldn't be allowed with tech. (( Magic? Sure, but not tech)) So make it wheeled or tracked.

[Aramanthus]

Actually in one game called Renegade Legion both the TOG and the Renegades had a few grav tanks that were either just at or right below 400 ton mark. But they were not landships.

I have another idea, but it's not an officially know power in canon games. But my own power can build them.

[abtex]

Some of those may be part LandShips
http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=142746
http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=140471

[glitterboy2098]

I also say that if you're minimum is 100tons.. Hovor shouldn't be allowed with tech. (( Magic? Sure, but not tech)) So make it wheeled or tracked.

you'd think, but in a setting where groups like the CS can get bricks like the DHT or firestorm fortress to fly, using vectored thrust for hovering doesn't seem much of a stretch. and as i linked to earlier in the thread, some setting use hover landships. the only distinction i've made was wether the ship routinely flies (which would make it an airship), or if it usually stays just off the ground.

as for the 100ton minimum....this is to provide plenty of variety for landships, as well as to include many of the victorian fiction and early post-WW1 proposals. most of which were dubbed "landships", despite being what we would now call heavy or super-heavy tanks.

Actually in one game called Renegade Legion both the TOG and the Renegades had a few grav tanks that were either just at or right below 400 ton mark. But they were not landships.

the criteria i developed was basically "this, this, and this all have vehicles they call landships, and this this and this all have similar vehicles. what do these all have in common?" after working out those criteria, it became apparent there were many "landship scaled vehicles" in settings, although they usually were not called such. 400 ton tanks certainly could be considered landships, even if the setting has developed it's own terms for such things.

Some of those may be part LandShips
http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=142746
http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=140471

those have some excellent examples of landship style vehicles. along with many excellent giant mecha.

[MikelAmroni]

Some of those may be part LandShips
http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=142746

maieth's, Mutley's, and Ryan DeMita's are all perfect examples of landships, IMO, and Jim Hatama's would be a perfect example of a landship class walker robot vehicle.

[glitterboy2098]

i'd like to retract my statements about the firestorm fortress not being a landship by my definition. seems i was under the impression it could fly like the DHS, not just hover 400 feet off the ground....


so, it looksl iek the CS does have landships.

[MikelAmroni]

And so proves that in Rifts landships can use hover technology, or at least a vector thrust version of it.