Liftwood model for space 1889

[VonAkers]

Hi Guys
I am in the middle of a  biggish Space 1889 project at the moment.
I like to get a few one off signature  features per project.
Now I seem to remember someone did a superb model of Lift wood trees , I just cant find the picture.
The Liftwood trees were is memory serves , sort of embeded  /growing in tied down  floating bits of earth , with roots protruding etc .
Anyone remember these models??
Your help would be appreciated.
Cheers 

[StoneMtnMinis]

The Liftwood tree "farm" sounds really interesting.  Hopefully someone will have the link and post it.

[Hobby Services]

I don't recall seeing it, but I also don't think that's how liftwood works.  The antigrav properties help with seed dispersal, and require some poorly-understood mix of minerals in their soil to manifest.  IIRC adult trees are rooted normally, only the seeds float - the lift effect depends the orientation of the ground to the wood (which is why you drop like a rock if you lose trim and can't recover fast enough).  An upright tree doesn't float because the angle is wrong, although presumably one that falls/gets knocked over would float off - or maybe they right themselves with the lift effect?  I don't remember anything being said about that, but that would be a very strong evolutionary advantage, since tree-toppling storms would be less dangerous by far.

[ecwcaptain]

I ran a S1889 scenario at a past Cold Wars convention in the US - called "France Needs Liftwood" - which was also published in Wargames Illustrated mag. The scenario was a French raid on a liftwood grove, so I needed to make some trees.

The basic tree I used was simply a Gray-white trunk, but no foliage. Though the only drawing I have seen of them, had them as brown with a green-ish tuft-ends at the end of the various thick branches (almost like a type of cactus), with a flower in the middle of the green tuft.

That said, since the scenario was for the French to go after a highly-prized and rare type of liftwood (which was at least 2x better than the regular type), I also made some of these special liftwood trees. These had red leaves.

See the attached photo, from a game I ran last night, which has a very high rocky terrain piece in the left background, on which are trees with the red leaves. Maybe this will give you some inspiration. 

Enjoy,
Bob

[ecwcaptain]

Sorry, for some reason, the photo came in upside down!!!

[tin shed gamer]

The mythology/law has lift wood trees having no lift properties in tree form.
But a good halfway house to having floating trees and staying within the mythos.
Would to do something similar to ecwcaptain's only on several rocks of different heights(which could have a couple of ledges/platforms for figures) and have your trees joined by tendrils in a similar fashion to a spider plant. Or think strawberry plant meets Amazon jungle on a mountain.Or even think of it as a mini Ghost archipelago table.in a single scenery piece.
That should give you the exotic feel of a lift wood grotto/plantation and a useable 'hillfort' for a high Martian defense.

[Cacique Caribe]

I can definitely see how self-levitating trees could be a problem.



Hmm.  If one were to fashion a hefty spear out of this liftwood stuff, and add fletching to it (and perhaps an explosive “counterweight”), could you then simply release it at the right moment and then just watch as it flies upwards, picks up speed and pierces through a passing ship?

So, instead of wagons full of soldiers ...





Just wondering.

I can already imagine an entire mobile battery of upward-pointing spears, perhaps on some trigger release mechanism and all of them carried about on some sort of heavy wagons. 

You could also release nets, hooks, barbed wire or strings of incendiary canisters that way, couldn’t you, as long as they were all fitted with liftwood “floatation”?



One end would be anchored to boulders.

[ecwcaptain]

BTW, I found the one (and only to my knowledge) place that shows what a liftwood tree would look like. The following like has a nice site for reference, but the drawing of liftwood is, I believe, unofficial.

http://www.ourworlds.net/space-1889/mars/liftwood.html

A couple years back, when I was putting together my France Needs Liftwood scenario, and looking to model liftwood trees, I asked Frank Chadwick what they looked like, and the answer was that they were never really described. So, it's left to one's imagination. 

Anyway, there is also a reference to three different specials of liftwood trees, and this appears in the Liftwood Conspiracy S1889 module.

Regards,
Bob

[Tas]

Chief,
maybe not quite what you are looking for, but an interesting take on harvested and floating lift wood, ready for transport



Not mine but from here:
http://ilivewithcats.blogspot.com/2012/08/men-are-from-mars.html

[VonAkers]

Guys
Thank you for the very valuable replies...you are all Awesome..thanks
I didn't know that there were so many "closet" Space 1889 gamers out there ...!!!
I shall endeavour to update you all on the rapidly maturing Project .
Cheers

[Hobby Services]

I can't speak for anyone else, but I was a huge GDW fan in general and Space: 1889 was my first exposure to Victorian scifi in gaming.  I'd read plenty of novels but never tried gaming the genre.  So, yeah, it's a nostalgia gold mine and a lasting memory for me.

Probably doesn't hurt that I bought all the adventure modules for the game at 89 cents apiece when the FLGS threw the lot of them in their sale bin. 

[Hobby Services]

Sorry, for some reason, the photo came in upside down!!!

You clearly need to hire a better trimsman, sir. 

[Hobby Services]

Hmm.  If one were to fashion a hefty spear out of this liftwood stuff, and add fletching to it (and perhaps an explosive “counterweight”), could you then simply release it at the right moment and then just watch as it flies upwards, picks up speed and pierces through a passing ship?

The lifting property is based on orientation of the wood grain, or the tubules that the sap's running in, or somesuch, so crafting vertical antigrav spears is pretty close to impossible.  OTOH, taking a plank or raft of liftwood and attaching explosives works fine, and that's pretty much what tether mines are.

You could also release nets, hooks, barbed wire or strings of incendiary canisters that way, couldn’t you, as long as they were all fitted with liftwood “floatation”?

Yep.  Prettty sure the "aerial net" thing was mentioned in an adventure as some sort of hunting tool (for birds) and I wouldn't be surprised if High Martians (who can fly themselves) didn't use them in warfare and as home defenses against other flyers.

One end would be anchored to boulders.

If you've got the balance between liftwood and payload right you shouldn't need a real anchor, just tie-offs to keep the array in place in case of wind.  Shooting for neutral buoyancy is what you're after, liftwood's rare and expensive and you don't want to waste it, especially since the "lift" eventually fades.

[ecwcaptain]

Correction to my earlier post.

It's not the Liftwood Conspiracy module that details the three types of liftwood, but there is an article in one of the three/four pdf issues of the Transactions of the Royal Martian Geographical Society (Heliograph). If you do not have these, they are recommended, even though they were mostly aimed at the RPG S1889 game, but there are some other useful bits therein.

Below is the info on the three liftwood species I have from the article, and which I included in my WI magazine scenario (which I recommend).

"There are a few species of liftwood, with L. aeria being the most common form; a broad-leafed species first reported by Thomas Edison on his return from Mars. The physical properties of L. aeria are used as the standard by which other liftwoods are judged. Mature plants produce wood that is usable for approximately 10 years. While the L. arabia is distributed sparsely through the Arabia, Meroe, and Tempe mountains. It is a smaller tree, but the trunks are generally knot-free and give a good yield of usable wood – up to a third more than L. aeria for a given volume of logs. Lifting power is roughly 1.5 times that of L. aeria, and the service life is longer; it is usable for approximately 12 years after harvesting.

Seerdiik is an extremely rare, dense liftwood with straight grain and very powerful antigravity effects. A piece of seerdiik will lift approximately twice the load of a similar volume of common liftwood (L. aeria species). It is claimed to retain its lift for 20-30 Martian years, far longer than other liftwood species. The source of seerdiik remains unknown, however unreliable reports say that it is a dwarf hybrid species cultivated by select High Martian tribes."

Enjoy,
Bob

[The_Beast]

Hmm.  If one were to fashion a hefty spear out of this liftwood stuff...

One of the issues is that, if you 'block' gravity, you don't shoot up at the same rate. You haven't reversed gravity, you've just allowed the inertia of your velocity on a rotating surface to 'throw you off.'

It's not fast, by the way. I looked it up, once upon, and you 'float' remarkably slowly, and I think I found it was even slower off of Mars surface. AND, that decreases as you get away from the equator. At the poles, the effect, if any noticeable, would be to set you spinning, which it doesn't. Much. ;->=

Originally, I was trying to gauge Chadwick's suggestion that flying ships would turn off gravity, then back on to glide and build up speed before starting the cycle again. I think I figured out that you'd be unable to build enough speed to counter a stiff breeze.

My handwavium became 'Martian kites use wind shear at laminar boundries...' and decide to make 'em with sails above and below, pointed in different directions.

Sorry, don't have my original research.

Doug