Firefly Reaver ship in D&D - what's it look like?

[varden]

Short version: need your help describing a Firefly/Serenity-Reaver-type ocean-going vessel that would work in our D&D game.

Longer version: I’m currently running a SereniFly-based human rogue in our Pyramid of Shadows game. I’ll be DMing King of the Trollhaunt Warrens next, and my character has to bow out.

I thought it’d be cool if he returned one last time to help the remaining PCs with a waterborne combat. He gets a Reaver ship to chase his Dragonfly-class sailboat into the combat the PCs are fighting, just like the climax of Serenity.

The bad guys have to stop fighting the PCs and take on the Reavers.

What should the Reavers’ ship be like?

 

[Nagol]

Ever see Mad Max?

The reaver ships look like a spaceship version of the gang's cars.

Unsightly welds and poor repair jobs that look like could vent atmosphere at any momemt coupled with gruesome trophies and discolorations that may have be from creatures originally.

 

[Ryujin]

It could be based on literally any seaworthy vessel, since The Reavers scavenge whatever they capture and then modify it. Lots of red paint or blood on it. Lot's of sharp pointy protrusions. Gang planks lining both sides, rigged to set using counter weights and with barbed spikes that are intended to plunge through opposing ships' decks (wouldn't want them getting away). Ballista launched harpoons with heavy ropes attached, used both to reel in fleeing ships or spear members of their crews. Sails in tatters and appear barely functional, though the ship is quite fast.

 

[varden]

Love it!

I had been thinking about a steampunk-lite motif, maybe the ship has some boiler belching out black smoke.

 

[Ryujin]

Love it!

I had been thinking about a steampunk-lite motif, maybe the ship has some boiler belching out black smoke.

Lots of black smoke is a given, even if it's just coming from the vats that render human fat into lamp oil.

 

[jonesy]

Sails in tatters and appear barely functional, though the ship is quite fast.

I don't think the sails would be in tatters. The ships in Firefly were fitted with no regard for safety. Imagine what a sailing ship would look like if all anyone cared about was speed and damage to the enemy, and safety hadn't even occurred to them. Extra sails fitted sideways or at an angle, tied together with chainlink.

 

[Ryujin]

I don't think the sails would be in tatters. The ships in Firefly were fitted with no regard for safety. Imagine what a sailing ship would look like if all anyone cared about was speed and damage to the enemy, and safety hadn't even occurred to them. Extra sails fitted sideways or at an angle, tied together with chainlink.

I just figured that they would tack upwind of the target and then toss out a huge balloon sail, to run them at ramming speed into it. The survivors would board.

 

[varden]

Lots of black smoke is a given, even if it's just coming from the vats that render human fat into lamp oil.

I think the victims are fuel, maybe for a boiler, some kind of low tech propulsion. It really needs the black smoke.

 

[Stormonu]

I figure it would look something like the Flying Dutchman from the Pirates of the Caribbean movies.

 

[nijineko]

don't forget to decorate tastefully with corpses.