Airships


 * "Over there, take cover in the ship! If we don't attract their attention, we might be able to wait it out!" Airship.jpg
 * - Nepajistema, shortly before accidentally flying a Grand Imperium Arcarnum airship out of Razor's Edge. A less than subtle exit.

General
Airships are a strange oddity brought about by the subtle arcane and divine magics of Varia, and are for the most part simply ships that one day began to fly. Although there are conflicting ideas on how airships are: Airships are relatively uncommon, though not so rare that they are not used freely, or for profit. The Sellederre Empire, for example, uses them frequently for trade, while The Grand Imperium Arcarnum is known to harbour at least a handful of airworthy vessels.
 * 1) Held in the air
 * 2) Raised into the air in the first place

The origins of these airborne ships are unclear, though some of the older captains report having seen a black robed figure shortly before their vessel took to the air.

Moving
Airships appear to retain the same speed and manoeuvrability that they had in water, with the only major exceptions being the ability to alter altitudes. Most ships seem equally capable of altering altitudes, though a separate wheel or device is required in order to control the new dimension of direction.

Fighting
As airships are often on different horizontal planes, airborne warfare is somewhat difficult and has currently been contained solely to pirate skirmishes. Adjustable cannons, or a reversion to older siege weaponry such as catapults are used in some instances, which alterations to flight pitch with stationary weapons are used by other captains. Finally, some captains who intend to firmly remain in the air have adapted their ships so as to install downward facing weaponry. Although mostly for show, these weapons can be quite useful as an unpleasant surprise.

Recent Developments
Since ships first took to the sky, scholars have attempted to replicate the conditions required to make more ships fly. Until recently, these attempts had been met with absolute failure. Over the last couple of years, however, The Grand Imperium Arcarnum have apparently made a series of promising advances, and moves have been made to incorporate these new, and supposedly improved, airships into the imperial musketeer forces.