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Message: <blockquote data-quote="thenightgaunt" data-source="post: 5524762" data-attributes="member: 6673567">I've run alot of Spelljammer and even wrote a lot of fan stuff for Realmspace. But that was all 2nd Ed.Here's my advice for running it 3.5 ed.  1. Get a copy of the Hackmaster book "Hackjammer". It's the hackmaster Spelljammer book and they fixed a ton of the flaws in the system in that one. It's still 2nd ed-ish, but you can convert. The bigger issues fixed were the game breakers like costs and availability and ease of access to planets. For instance, at the default costs engines (helms) are too much. Pirates can take out 1 merchant ship, sell the engine and then live like kings off the $$ for the rest of their lives. So it makes Helms cheaper and provides alt types of helms.  2. Be a REAL GM. None of this mamby pamby letting the players rules lawyer it crap. If you can't look your players in the face and say "I don't care what the book says, that makes no damned sense, so I'm making a GM call on that one" then you shouldn't be running Spelljammer. It's broken. That's the long and the short of it. The core rules were broken, the Spider Moons 3rd ed stuff was broken. It's all broken. So as a GM you've got to run this like it's your own custom world with your own custom rules. You can't let your players rules lawyer or walk all over you.  3. Play it HARSH. Spelljammer's a harsh setting. Dumb players can end up with their ships out of fresh air and their characters all dead. Don't make it easy on them. No decanters of endless water or infinite air from the start. Maybe as great items and rewards, but that's it. Also, this is a setting where if you smart off to npcs, you will die. Fleets of elves, Neogi, Mind Flayers and Beholders fly about the lanes, and they can all kick PC ass, and they all have friends who would hunt down their killers.  4. Non-magical helms can't leave planets bigger than type A. Because type A's have flat gravity planes and you can just drift off the edge and bam, youre now in zero-g. So a sailboat can literally fly off the edge of the world. On anything bigger, a nonmagical engine will just push you along the surface as the gravity on those worlds is the classic towards the center of the sphere type, and in that case a sailing ship cannot fly off of the surface of the water and take to the sky.  5. No really, grab a copy of Hackjammer. For the planetary entry rules alone it's worth it. Basically a flying ship makes world dominition easy. Unless you have a dragon flame the ship and after a while the players get pissed at that. So, when entering a planet, ships HAVE to make a saving throw or they take a hit (wood boat + Jet stream = aw crap). Same when leaving a planet. That way they aren't easily ruinning campaign worlds.</blockquote>

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