Transportation
From SteelStorm
Contents |
Armors/Transportation
Traditional Mounts
Surprisingly, transportation in Legend remains, at least in certain sectors, largely unchanged. Apparently, many adventurers felt that new technologies took away from the spirit of exploration and being close to nature, and many still prefer to take to their quests either on foot, or with the support of an animal mount, be it by porse (a strange hybrid native to Legend, a sort of mix between a quarterhorse and a wild boar), pack-beast (a sort of of large, stout-legged canine), or dragon (a sort of bizarre lizard with wings, which, contrary to popular accounts, does not actually breathe fire, or even usually fly - but does manage to posess many rows of sharp, crystalline teeth). Some, but certainly not all, adventurers decry the new techological modes of transportation for being too inhuman - after all, it's hard to get attached to a metal contrivance, and such things (generally) have no long-trained instincts to assist you in battle.
Air/Ground Transport
On the other hand, many adventurers have embraced the new technologies, and civilians have embraced them even more. Especially in the areas of commerce, the new vehicles have taken the world by storm, allowing for much easier transport of goods. Primarily steam- or magical-energy-powered, these vehicles are usually driven on fabricated metal-link tracks to negotiate Legend's varied terrain, although purpose-built commerce vehicles with 10 to 12 wheels on metal-spring suspensions regularly traverse Legend's slowly-developing network of roads and paths wide enough to accomodate them.
However, Legend's extensively varied terrain, much of it still undeveloped, drove the need for more diverse types of vehicles.
So far, only under the expenditure of massive amounts of magical energy, has flight been achieved. While there are a few "winged" armors that have shown some limited success in short flights, they have been largely impractical for traveling large distances. And, as many of the dragons in Legend are primarily ground-based, flight has never been seen as a top priority. However, people are still experimenting, in the hopes that some day flying machines will be feasible for all - at the moment, though, they are able to lift off only under the efforts of the strongest of mages, who in general prefer to use other, more efficient forms of magical travel.
While the tracked vehicles have seen some successes, they are still unsuitable for many types of terrain, terrain that requires a more flexible mode of transportation.
Mechs
Since the discovery of a cache of Precip technology dating to well before the Great Cataclysm, humans have been experimenting with powered armor for quite some time, although for many years, this was limited to simple modifications done to the massive metal frames of the Precip "Exos" Armor, a magically-powered device that walked on eight metal legs that extended from the upright armored base. However, a number of years ago, a more intense interest was taken in this mode of transportation, as it promised to be the solution to many of the problems encountered by other vehicles. Being humans, of course, two-legged versions proliferated, although 4-, 6-, and even 10-legged versions still see much use for traversing especially rough or unstable terrain.
Around 20 years ago, the development of this type of walking power armor split into two camps - the "massives" and the "exoskeletons." The massives were new styles of power armor, based off of human-exclusive inventions, and in many cases were significantly larger than the original Precip models. These devices sported heavy armor, as well as significant integrated weaponry. However, the downside was that the armor was comparatively slow, and much less agile. The other confound was that it ran through its power source, either a modified steam engine or units of concentrated magic energy, relatively quickly, and the units often went into the field with considerable stores of energy attached to their backs. The drawback to this, of course, was that unless the energy cells were locked behind a shielded compartment, if they were hit during battle, they had a habit of violently exploding and rendering the armor inoperable.
On the other end were the "Exos" models, essentially metal shells that sealed around the wearer (as opposed to the piloting compartments deep within the interiors of the larger armors). Despite the smaller form, these units were available with a range of armor, and many of them also had spare power to generate energy-force shielding for short periods of time. While not as heavily armed, the devices allowed for a decent range of armor, and were also agile enough to use either conventional handheld weapons or built-in combat systems. The built-in motors and hydraulics in these systems allowed their wearers to travel almost effortlessly, and gave them significant boosts in speed and maneuvering. Most of these types of armors stuck with the multi-legged, almost spider-like configuration of the original precip armors, rather than the 2 to 6 legs of the larger armors.
As technology advanced, a third type of powered armor emerged - "true exoskeleton" armor, or power-armor features built around a set of human-wearable armor. Far smaller than any of the other types of armor, true-exoskeleton armor allows for the greatest maneuverability, and the lightest weight - which means that it can run on comparatively small amounts of energy (in fact, some mages have armor of this type that runs entirely off of a small drain on their internal energy stores). This also means that true-exoskeleton armors can be much more easily stored and transported. The downside is that, because of their small size, they are unable to navigate extreme terrain features that the massives - simply by virtue of their huge legs - can handle with ease, and are comparatively lighter armored - also, because they are augmenting instead of enclosing the wearer, they can only be made to travel as fast as the wearer's legs are capable of moving. Additionally, direct damage to them has a higher chance of injuring the wearer, as some models do not provide complete, all-around armor. True-exoskeleton models are generally fitted to the wearer (or, in some cases, grafted onto a suit of existing traditional armor), and are usually of the 2-legged variety.
Sea Transportation
One final note is on sea trasportation. To traverse oceans, new ships have been developed, that rely on energy propulsion instead of wind power (although some have banks of windmills on their decks to power them). Many of these ships are driven by an ingenious system, based on concepts of magiscience, that use water-wheels to move water through conduits in the vessel's hull like a jet, propelling it forward. These vessels allow for exploration of a variety of other lands, previously little explored as the older breed of ships had the unpleasant tendency to break apart and capsize in the more turbulent areas of Legend's oceans. Also, as a very recent development, craft that are able to travel under the surface have surfaced, so to speak, largely relics from old Precip enclaves that somehow floated to the surface. As these types of ships have only just been created, exploration of lands beyond the main continent of Legend have only just begun.
