Boarding Rigs are a thing; ethersilk arrangements that fly using the same mechanics as an airship's web and are used by Marines to fly onto enemy ships for boarding assaults. The Auroran Marines used them to land in the ventilation shafts of Albion when they were first infiltrating. Given that ethersilk needs an electric charge to be used for propulsion, this implies that there are power crystals small enough to be used on mass-produced personal gear.

I think the biggest impediment to any radical developments in ether crystal engineering, actually, is that Etherealists are all crazy. Based on what we see of Folly using her powers, and Grimm's description of how they work, the crystals are solidified containers for the same pathways that the Etherealists use to do things. I would guess it's entirely possible that the crystals are artificial recreations of the power used by the Etheralists, like how Silimatic technology is the same thing as the magic Occulators use via their Lenses.

If this is the case, then the reason that most crystals decay over time might be the same effect that causes SAN loss in humans. The fact that core crystals don't would imply that there's something fundamentally different about them.

On to the next idurr:

Ripple fire is clearly effective, but it depends on precise timing by the gun crews and having each gun be able to strike the same point on the enemy vessel's Shroud. Furthermore, at close ranges, the spacing of the guns on the hull would impose a mechanical limit on the efficiency of the technique. 'Simple' geometry indicates that two rays, each drawn from a separate starting point to intersect with a target point on a given surface will not have the same incident angle; the greater the separation of the origin points relative to the distance to target, the greater the difference.

This becomes important when, as the number of guns fired increases, so does the depth of the hole bored in the enemy shroud; the greater the depth, the closer the incident angles must be for each shot to impact near the bottom of the penetration. An increasingly minor error could result in a shot striking the side of the hole and its effect being largely wasted.

Now, because improving the gun crews is beyond the scope of his discussion, the obvious solution is to use a better gun. In this context, better means bigger, and bigger means rotary cannon.

Or revolver cannon. Which one used depends on where the limiting factor on a gun's rate of fire appears; the cannon crystal or the barrel of weapons crystals. Grimm's mention of 'firing the cannon until their copper barrels melted' would suggest that the barrel is the limiting factor, as it is in real life. Fun fact; standard procedure for modern soldiers carrying the Squad Automatic Weapon is to carry several replacement barrels and, if engaged in a prolonged firefight of sufficient intensity, discard and replace the barrel of the weapon.

This solution is a bit different. Based on the same basic principle of Richard Jordan Gatling's original invention, in this device, an array of six cannon barrels and crystal assemblies are rotated in sequence past a single cannon crystal built into a water-cooled housing, possibly with a capacitor bank, if such a thing is both helpful and procurable, though the power demand would likely be about the same as a standard broadside volley.

In any case, this arrangement allows six (or more) shots to be fired in very quick succession, almost certainly faster than multiple gun crews operating with linted communication could manage with the requite accuracy, and each shot would be fired along an identical vector relative to the ship.

The largest problem is that the rotation mechanism, heat sinks, and active cooling system needed for a longer burst together most likely preclude mounting in a normal turret; to use a weapon big enough to be worthwhile, it would be best built directly into the prow of the vessel, similar to the Nova Cannon used by the Imperium of Man, though with a more sheltered internal mounting. The problem with this is that aiming the airship itself to target a distant enemy may be excessively difficult.

The first use that comes to mind is mounting such a gun on a medium-weight cruiser; large enough to mount a system of worthwhile size without undue difficultly, but agile enough to aim the gun with the speed and protection to prowl the battlespace and properly threaten enemy vessels. You could use it either as a flanker, striking an enemy capital ship from an unexpected angle while it trades fire with your own battleships, counting on its shroud being sufficiently stressed to allow the hunter to deal a telling blow, or as a Beta Strike, using it's mobility (superior compared to a battleship) to hang back and be able to quickly move to a critical point with enough firepower to matter.

As a final note, the comment about Revolver Cannons above would be if the cannon crystal imposes the key limit on fire rate; multiple cannon crystals would be rotated into position to fire through a single water-cooled barrel. It was investigated for use on fighter aircraft, but has fallen out of favor as barrel heating has become a more difficult than automatic mechanical reloading.

That's basic enough that I think they would have already done it if it were so simple. As far as I can tell, the Lift Crystals, when powered, move against the direction of the local gravity field. I have no idea if they're actually responding to gravity or something completely different, but that's the hard part of an airship; propulsion is a lot easier than suspension.

Well, part of the uncertainly is that we know lift crystals make ships go up, and that there is a limit on height, somewhere below ten miles for almost anything, but we don't know the causes of either; is it gravity manipulation? Repulsion? Ninja conjuration?

Any of them could have side utilities, but there is a key barrier to experimentation here; unlike the thermal crystals used in the... the jet needs a snazzy name. Anyway, the lift crystals big enough to loft an airship, and to an even greater extent the power core crystals, are not simply expensive, but the supply is inelastic; no matter how much you're willing to pay for one, there might not be any on the market at any price, with the same being true of the limited number of new production 'slots'.

This means that getting crystals to experiment on, or getting a manufacturer (e.g. the Lancasters) to produce an experimental crystal that might not even do anything would be very hard, probably even more so than getting the Admiralty to fund an experimental ship; worst case, the key crystals can be re-mounted in a conventional hull. The lost growth vat time is irretrievable if the experiment fails*, and you'd need to convince the manufacturing spire that gambling on the experiment had a greater potential to benefit their spire despite the risk of failure than the sure benefit of another cruiser or merchantman.

I did notice that; they acted as if wood (and paper) was an amazingly rare material, but one you retrieve soil, you can grow wood with it indefinitely; given how dangerous the Surface is, I'm not sure where any metal is coming from.

In any case, a wooden ship can still be built very strong; the song 'Heart of Oak' actually refers to the oak heartwood that was used in the construction of the Warships of the the Royal Navy during the Age of Sail; it could take a beating. In fact, taken together with the lack of explosive shells, defeating a warship often didn't mean sinking her; a ship was usually taken out of a fight when mast and rigging damages and crew losses precluded further maneuvering or firing, not when it was sunk.

Unless you caught on fire. Then you were screwed.

AND ANOTHER THING!

Shrouds. We know they require an allocation of power from he lift crystal, but to my knowledge, we've never seen a Shroud Projector. I've got some ideas regarding the use of the ship's shrouds, though that will probably have to wait.

So, on my second pass through Areonaut's Windlass, I've been keeping a particular eye out for mentions of the nuts and bolts of Etheric Engineering, and I think I have a few ideas for new systems that could be devised using the capabilities we see, with the caveat that a lot of it requires at least an early 20th Century understanding of various physical principles, and I'm less sure of where Spire Albion stacks up on the more background science.

First, the Jet Engine. Sort of thing.

It would be intended more for airships (active lift) than areoplanes (aerodynamic lift), but it would provided a number of advantages over steam props; other than the obvious increased thrust, it would be entirely etheric in nature, removing the need for a steam turbine (which is heavy and has moving parts vulnerable to iron rot), as well as the assorted gearboxes, driveshafts, and such.

So, a jet engine works by drawing in external air via the forward intake using the compressor (that's the fan(s) at the front), which creates a higher internal air pressure, and thus elevated air density. It also raises the temperature of the air (as per Gay-Lussac's Law), which assists in fuel combustion in a conventional jet. That's undesirable here, so inducing a cooling system around the compressor would be ideal.

Then, in place of the combustion chamber, weapons-type crystals modified to continuously produce heat when activated are arranged to enormously increase the premature, and thus the pressure, of the air moving through the chamber; as in a normal jet engine, the shape of the chamber (narrow, high-pressure inlets, and a comparatively clear outflow, along with the action of the compressor) ensures that the elevated pressure forces the heated gas through the turbine powering the compressor and out of the jet nozzle, generating thrust.

The main internal material of the engine would probably be ceramic; steel isn't an option, copper and brass are too vulnerable to heat, and there is no evidence that titanium or tungsten alloys could be prepared in the volumes necessary. In any case, a thermal ceramic would be excellent for the combustion chamber, as the primary strain is thermal rather than mechanical; if possible, gunmetal would be best for the mechanical parts where ceramic is unacceptable; partially the turbine and compressor.

Based on the assumption that gauntlets and long rifles contain no power cores (simply the weapons crystal) and that the large cannons are explicitly stated to operate on the same general principal, I am fairly confidant that this drive system would impose no demand on the ship's power core crystal; in fact, a design could intentionally include an overpowered turbine driving an electrical generator; providing the airship with more power for her Web or Shroud at the cost of jet output.

The speed provided would not be on par with a jet airplane for a number of reasons; at present, not knowing the drag characteristics of a typical airship preclude commentary on top speed, and without mass values (I don't recall any, but if anyone recalls a discussion of airship weight -in absolute terms, not relative to other airships-, please let me know) acceleration estimates are impossible. I don't know if you could match the main web with only jet propulsion (endurance also becomes a problem; the web is much more mechanically simple and thus less effected by wear), but the idea is that you don't have to. Given that warship design is dominated by three constants (You guns are less powerful and accurate than they need to be, your ship is too fragile, and you need more engine power) every bit helps.

If I'm forgetting something, made a flaw in analysis, or you think I'm stupid; by all means, leave a comment and descibe the problem to improve future concepts.

Next time: Ripple Fire at the O.K. Corral