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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Scotley" data-source="post: 2353634" data-attributes="member: 11520">The ship 'Retribution', formerly known as the 'Trident' is not a big ship. It is 75' long and 25' wide. The quarterdeck covers the rear 20'  or so of the ship. The wheel is here along with a ballista. The main deck is just over 50' long and holds the ships single mast. Below the quarterdeck is the captain's cabin a small ward room/officers mess and 3 very small officer's cabins. Below that is the larder, galley and a small arms locker and a small cabin normally used by the steward, but most recently home to 4 halfling freedom fighters. Two more small cabins on this level serve as the cabin of the ship's healer, while the other room has a stout lock and can be used as a sick room or brig. The two rooms currently contain fresh water barrels and extra fishing gear that would normally be kept in the hold. The galley is largely empty as the ship has been only making day or two day voyages. No significant provisions or meal prep equipment is aboard. Below this is a short bilge deck with the bilge, ballast, the stearing gear and a storage locker for the extra sails, rigging and rope. There is a new storm sail in excellent condition here along with plenty of line and rigging. MW Carpenter's tools and a small supply of repair materials including a few hundred gold's worth of quality timber is here. The hold is below the main deck and takes up the middle third of the ship. It is two decks deep. Mountings exist to put in a second floor, but appearently the flooring was discarded in favor of the Sahaugin's live well. There are doors in the deck in front of and behind the mast, so the hold could also be split into two compartments. There is no forecastle. At the front of the ship a light catapult is concealed with nets, empty casks and a tarp. Below the main deck and forward of the hold are two crew cabins. Each is accessed by a ladder and would make comfortable quarters for 6 men each, though 8 could reside here. You might do some hot bunking for up to 12 in each side, but dozen sea chests would leave little space. Additionally, the crew must eat here or on deck, there is no dinning space other than the officer's mess. A third ladder leads to one small cabin for a bosun as well as an even smaller cabin that could serve a midshipman or two and there is a storage locker for spare ancors and other gear here as well. The ship is built and rigged for speed despite its fishing boat pretentions. The mast is set with two yards to either side. The lower sails are wide, but not as high as might be expected. By running only this shorter wide sails and perhaps a bowspirit the ship would have a low profile making it hard to detect at a distance. With the higher sails in place as well speed should be impressive. Normal crew would be 12 men, a bosun, either a masterchief or midshipman, a steward, a healer, the captain, 3 to 6 other officers or passengers, and a couple of cooks as well as a cabin boy who would sleep in the galley/larder areas. You could easily bring the crew up to 16 by putting 8 in each crew area. You could split the hold in half and add another 8 crew or fighting men. If you plan to take so many on a voyage of more than a week or perhaps two you would need to devote a considerable portion of the remaining hold to food and water. Some food and water would need to be stored on deck even with only a 12 to 16 man crew. For a short mission say no more than a week you could fill three quarters of the hold with men as well as 12 in each crew cabin. The rest of the hold would be needed for food and crew possessions. That would give you a complement of perhaps as many as 42 men plus officers and support staff (galley workers and cabin boys), but it would be very crowded, especially with armor and extra weapons aboard. The decks would be fully laden with supplies and water as well.</blockquote>

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