Building a ship in Airmen is perhaps reminiscent of building with Legos.

It is not easy without instructions, and it does not come natural right away. You must learn the pieces, how they connect, and their functionalities well before you can build in a natural way that is pertinent to Airmen. Because yes, anyone can build a ship, but not everyone can build a good ship.

My recommendation, as well as that of many experienced Lego and Airmen builders, is to firstly inspire yourself. You can easily do that by scraping Pinterest for airship ideas, or the workshop, to disassemble some and see how they tick. Then reading specific parts of the guide regarding the pieces you have available, helping you understand how best to incorporate them into your idea.

For the design, because Airmen has plenty of large components, you may approach it by building the ship in modules, and then joining them together. For example, you could start with the cockpit, followed by the engine room, weapon mounts, propeller pods and balloons. And then, once the majority of components is in position, the following steps and the shape of the ship will reveal itself naturally.

Don't be afraid to make mistakes and just keep building, the best airships are the ones that got revisited over and over, or the ones born from the most absurd ideas.

Let us begin with the basics, like, how big your ship will be?


Ship mass is determinative of what your strengths and weaknesses will be, regardless of build.

LIGHT SHIPS (0K/10K)
Light ships are fast, nimble and difficult to hit, making them perfect for quick scouting missions, cargo runs and boarding/sabotage attempts.
Light ships running under a faction are also invisible to enemy radar stations, making them perfect for quick territory grabs.

MEDIUM SHIPS (10K/20K)
Medium ships are the best of both worlds, plenty of resilience and firepower combined with maneuverability and speed, they can keep up with most light ships and size up to heavy ones.
These are also well suited for Mechalodon and Demon hunting, as they are able to maintain weapons on target with ease.

HEAVY SHIPS, (20K/30K)
Heavy ships have the highest firepower and resilience of any other class, at the expense of maneuverability and speed. They are good for any occasion, that are installations, sieges, pvp and combat missions.

Ultimately most of the game META revolves around medium ships, as these are twice as strong as any light, but only a third weaker than any heavy, and much nimbler. However, realistically you would want several ships of each class in order to cover a wide range of scenarios.

UNDERSTANDING BALLOONS

The balloons varieties, although most requiring being unlocked, are not directly upgrades to one another. Rather, they offer unique aesthetics and functionalities, each requiring it's own building technique.

Base your choice on your preference of speed, armour and compactness:

SPEED
Airships become slower and unwieldy the higher the mass and drag. Making use of regular balloons will maximize your airspeed and turn rate considerably due their relatively low drag. However they are large and easy targets, most often difficult to armor.

There are also three balloons which have built-in ballasts, however they all are less mass efficient than using the corresponding balloon and separate ballasting, as well as losing the extra HP some ballast bits may bring to the ship.

Generally regular balloons have the best mass efficiency and work great for creating open designs with classic airship style aesthetics.



ARMOR
Armoured balloons are the perfect choice for a tankier airship, coming equipped with damage reduction and plenty of comfortable attachment points for compartmentalization or reducing your overall part count.

These can be considered intermediate between Floatstone and Balloons, offering generally higher resilience at modest drag but heavy weight.

These are often employed as armor itself for the weaker interior components, or to keep the vessel armored where needed, without the need to cover the balloons.



COMPACTNESS
Float stone has several times the lift of a balloon at only a quarter of the size in most cases.
Making them the perfect choice to streamline down your ship to make more space for armour, components, or benefiting from the minimal buoyancy that allows your airship to also work as a submarine.

These are the preferred choice for advanced shipbuilding, as it allows for greater shaping freedom and control over your build.




Balancing the ship is not usually something you should worry about, as the game mechanics are more than forgiving. But do try to maintain some sort of consistency across the vessel, as too much lift concentrated in a single spot, might cause your ship to tilt unfavorably if it lost during combat.

Do keep an eye at the yellow line (center of lift) and the blue line (center of mass), as the latter may only be a single block above the other before rendering the vessel unstable. However these lines can also help you do specific tasks: For example a very low blue line means the vessel will resist tilting when rammed or magnetically repulsed. Meanwhile a yellow line very close to the unstability threshold will make the vessel maintain its current tilting much more efficiently, perfect for fixed weaponry builds.

Note: Roll Correctors work more efficiently the closer they are to the selected center of mass axis.


Ballasts can each lift approximately 450 masses, as every vertical thrust point corresponds around three mass points.
So, for optimal maneuverability it is recommended to have at least one ballast per 1,000 mass, this plenty sufficient to quickly ascend or descend during combat, sustain damaged balloons, or help lift any extra cargo.

However if you were to have 2.2 ballasts per 1,000 mass, your ship could fly even without any lift from balloons, which if used sparingly, can help reduce the amount of balloons needed, and/or drag, as you will read further below.

Placement of the ballasts is mostly done evenly across the ship to avoid unwanted tilting, however, if you wanted your ship to gently tilt up or down when ascending or descending, effectively helping said maneuver, you would want them mostly to the front. If instead, you wanted to pair the ballasts with a tilt module, you should place them mostly at both extremes for maximum efficiency.


Drag meanwhile, is calculated by the sum of each balloon’s lift ( or 80% of mass if higher) and multiplied by the drag coefficient. This is used to determine what % of forward and turn speed is lost to simulate wind resistance.

However, speed reduction from drag is nonlinear and affects bigger amounts of drag more heavily than smaller ones.

Ex: Best and worst speeds achievable via balloons per ship class [(10k = 13.05 / 12.32) (20k = 10.26 / 8.71) (30k = 8.34 / 6.95)

From these we can deduce that having more than needed lift, even with low drag balloons, may be more detrimental than having just the right amount of lift with higher drag balloons. This is where the chart below comes in hand, helping you out finding the right balloon combinations for your mass.

However, you may take this a step further and have lift way below mass, as less drag will positively affect your turn rate, but not your airspeed, even if the blackboard says otherwise. This is because the ballasting will take directly from your top speed pool to compensate for the lack of lift.

Drag also behaves differently for balloons and buoyancy parts, as the latter will further slow down the ship up to 30% based on how much of the part is submerged!

A useful chart to compare different balloon types


Fun fact:

Did you know that the fastest balloon ship achievable is with an Armored Small Balloon Cap? even though it has a higher coefficient, it has less overall drag than other balloons!

There are plenty of misconceptions regarding the correct use of propellers and rudders to increase ones top and turn speeds, and I will break each and one of those.

Firstly, understand that a ship's top speed is affected by three factors: total mass, total drag, and total thrust. But, if you wanted to know the speed you would be able to achieve before building a ship, simply place down separately the balloons you intend to use and a few propellers. As mass only affects your total thrust required to reach said speed.

There is however a way to reach faster top speeds by using sails, as these can bypass the speed cap, even though it will not show on the blackboard. But it is usually negligible and only works when fully powered by the wind.

Or

By building faux airplanes using the stabilizers (triangular fixed rudders), which when placed horizontally, and in quantity, will oppose falling and wont drain your top speed pool to keep airborne, as ballasts would do. However planes are rarely as good as airships, as the game is not geared towards them.

Also

Your ship flies slightly faster when following another vessel less than 500 m away, this effect maximizes within 200 m where you will reach the pursuit speed as per the black board.


Secondly, propeller placement does not affect in any way your turn speed, whether they are close or far from the body. The only things that can affect your turn speed are rudders, drag and mass distribution.

Mass distribution plays an equally important role as the others, sometimes to an even higher degree!

Here is an example of two same mass, same lift, same drag airships:



Can you imagine the shorter and thicker airship has more than twice the turn speed of the other?

This can be achieved by condensing most of the weight closer to the Center of Mass, either having the heaviest components on it, or creating a narrower tower-like ship. And while this would not make a difference on the longer ship that has few deadspots, it does make a difference for the one that is using a partly fixed weapon setup.

However, you may further increase your turn speed by using a clever maneuver in combination with plenty of ballasts and a tilt module. This is done by fully pitching the ship upwards and turning in the desired direction, now as the ship falls to the side, the ballasts will try to straighten the ship to pitch it upwards, effectively increasing drastically your turn speed. This is quite useful during combat if you are getting out-turned by a nimbler ship, or you have been ambushed.

When added, rudders change the turning behavior of your vessel, which instead of slowing down a set of propellers, will keep them at full speed and use the rudders to turn. Which in the best case scenario will always be faster than just a propeller turn, but if too few are added, like for aesthetic in case of Dragoon Tails, it may cause your vessel to have a less than desired turn-speed.

And while there is no rule of thumb for the amount of rudders needed, there are some general guidelines to get the most out of them, for example:

Rudders work best when the vessel is at full speed, and placed as further as possible from the center of mass and in the direction of travel, as ones placed on or directly to the sides of the CoM it, will have little to no effect.

If you are unsure whether your rudders are sufficient, simply deploy the ship and run some tests, as there is a hard cap on the maximum turn force rudders can apply to a ship. And remember to always place rudders vertically and in either direction of travel, or they will not function at all. If you think you placed one incorrectly, simply look at the hinges.

Between rudders there is little to no difference, except the square ones having more HP and built in stabilization, which quickly straightens a vessel after a turn, same as the stabilizer, however not a rudder per se.

You may further optimize a turn by repeatedly pressing W meanwhile holding A or D for tighter turns, as this engages the propeller turn along with the rudder turn, which works because the propellers do not immediately lose spin. However it only works on vessels which turn force by rudder is greater than propeller turn.


When placing propellers, keep in mind a few guidelines to help you out achieve the best results:

Any propeller placed on either direction of travel, will always move the vessel at full speed forwards, and half that backwards.

By mounting propellers vertically or sideways you may use them to change your altitude or heading. Neither is recommended though, since ballasts and rudders respectively will achieve the same more weight and pressure efficiently.

Use the Extra Stats button on the bottom right of your hangar UI. There you will find your thrust cap required to reach top speed. This is useful to know whether you need more, less or different propellers for your ship, as the thrust cap is directly determined by your mass.

Placing propellers closest to the line of symmetry can be advantageous, as if some are lost during combat, they will generate less turning force to counteract. And, they will also provide more torque for a faster turn acceleration.

Sails are a not so often used, useful addition to any vessel, they provide extra speed above the speed cap shown, and they also provide even thrust wherever they are placed, making them extra useful to limp back for repairs, as well as because AI turrets will not target them.



Magdrives enable you to fast-travel across the map, useful to quickly complete deliveries, escape danger, or intercept an enemy ship.

A magdrive requires 30 seconds to fully charge, during which time it will consume 2,000 pressure seconds, for a total of 60,000 pressure, the equivalent of one and a half small wells. After that they will not consume any pressure, and can effectively be used underwater quite safely.

While charging up, your ship will be slowed down to a quarter of its speed, and will be locked into the angle of attack at the moment of activation. Once rolling, any sudden turns or stops caused by the environment, or any damage sustained by firearms or cannons will disable the magdrive into cooldown. The cooldown, whether disabled by force or command, will be of 5 minutes, and 2.30 if disabled by command during chargeup. However ascending, descending or strafing is perfectly acceptable during a magdrive, hence, if you were to place them sideways, you could use your propellers to strafe and correct your heading.

Each magdrive supports a mass of up to 12,500 before slowing down, however the top speed reached will be different between light and heavy vessels, as a 10k may only reach speeds of around 19, and a 30k at most 17.5. Furthermore, surpassing the supported mass has only a gradual effect on top speed, as a 30k vessel with two magdrives will top at 16, and 14 with a single one.

Magdrives are also useful to limp back for repairs, were most of your propellers taken out. Or even more creatively, used to brute force a walker through the air by aiming them at 45".

If you are unsure whether you placed a magdrive correctly, locate the golden teeth on the rim, those will indicate the direction of travel.

Here is a a handy propeller chart to compare values:
(Eff = Thrust / Mass) (Cons = Draw / Thrust) (Res = HP / Thrust)


Note: Although a Single Short Propeller is more weight efficient for its thrust, compared to a Heavy Short Propeller, you might need a whole (or more) less propellers by using a bunch of the latter! Make sure to keep an eye on your Extra Stats, and mix and match propellers to optimize your build!

Firepower is the cost of placing a weapon on a ship, and it is directly influenced by your available mass. The more mass, the more firepower available, which you would preferably use to full extent. Keeping in mind that as mass is lost during combat, and dips below firepower, will slowly disable any weapons as the gap between the two increases, always lowest firepower weapons first.

That is also why boarding is better achieved after the target has been damaged to some extent, in hopes that any APATs and auto turrets have been partially or totally disabled.

Remember also that firepower is not a good indicator of the strength of a weapon, but merely a way to balance weapons across ships.

Some weapons, like minelayers, behemoths, broadsiders and harpoons have a firepower discount if placed according to their in-game description. Read carefully to have an edge in combat!

Other weapons have a Firepower Scaling tag, a special tag that diminishes the accuracy of such weapons the more Firepower Scaling weapons are added. This is easily countered by employing preciser weaponry, or mixing your setup with some weapons without such a tag, like automatic turrets, missiles, mines and so on.

And lastly, most AoE weapons that are not specialized for penetration, are affected by Blast Occlusion. This tag, although not shown in-game descriptions, makes such weapons not able to damage parts that are hidden from the explosion by other parts, even when within the blast radius. For all weapons affected by this tag, feel free to check out the Weapon Spreadsheet below.


To better understand the best weapon setup for your vessel, you must understand that not one weapon is best for everything. Some weapons shine where others fail, and vice-versa due their projectile type, traverse, resilience, range, precision and so on.

We can then mainly divide weapons by type and projectile used.


SEMI-ADJUSTABLES ( Blast, Antique, Heavy Gattling )

These weapons have limited traverse and usually are short ranged. They work especially well when mounted up front, en masse, paired with a tilt module. But they can also be used as a broadsider weapon thanks to their firepower cost reduction of 420 when used simmetrically.

ADJUSTABLES (Lance, Quad, Bone, Flak )

Adjustable type cannons are long ranged weapons with full horizontal and good vertical traverse.
They are prized for their versatility and resilience, especially when tripod mounted.

BUNKERS ( Type I, Type II, Type III )

Bunker type cannons are long ranged weapons with full horizontal and average vertical traverse. They are prized for their concentrated firepower, quick traverse and easy placement. But they tend to be rather fragile and easy targets.

BEHEMOTHS ( Gattling, Flak, Magnetic Beam )

Behemoth type cannons are long ranged weapons with one full axis of rotation, with the other being very restricted. They are prized for their concentrated firepower, high resilience and single firepower discount placement. But they have a very slow traverse, are difficult to build with and are very easy targets.

NAVAL GUNS ( Battery, Heavy Battery, Ultra Battery, Drum, Heavy Drum )

Battery type cannons are short ranged weapons with full horizontal and nearly full vertical traverse.
They are prized for their low profile, fast and high vertical traverse, and a small AOE perfect for shredding hull and armor alike. But they generally lack precision, range and resilience.

The Drum version has a discount of 1100 and 1800 respectively when placed in a broadsider configuration, and although otherwise identical to the Batteries and make for a great wall placement gun with high resilience, they lack the signature exceptional traverse.

ROCKET PODS ( Rocket Pod, Heavy Rocket Pod, Guided Rocket Pod, Heavy Guided Rocket Pod)

Rocket pods type cannons are short ranged weapons with full horizontal and great vertical traverse.
They are prized for their high DPS large blast radius and inverse fall-off. But they generally lack precision, range, resilience and cause minimal damage up close.

AUTO TURRETS ( Single, Double, Ball Single, Ball Double )

Single, and Ball type cannons are short ranged weapons with full horizontal and great vertical traverse.
They come in all varieties, each suited best for something, and they are prized for their general high precision, fast traverse, component auto targeting and as general boarding and drone defense. But the two barreled versions lack projectile convergence, oftentime missing a narrower target, and depending on the type chosen, each will have their own strength and weaknesses.

Double Auto Turrets can be used in a broadsider configuration for a 1350 firepower discount, but are more akin to semi-adjustables and will often misfire.

FIXED WEAPONS ( Heavy Cannon, Torpedo Launcher )

Fixed Weapons are long ranged cannon with some of the highest DPS outputs, with the only requirement of aiming with the ship.

To use them efficiently with a tilt module, try and build your ship center of mass as close as possible to the center of lift or viceversa.

Torpedoes work underwater and do consistent damage at most ranges, meanwhile Heavy Cannons work with an inverse damage fall-off, best used only on ships that can keep distance.

DEPLOYERS ( Deployer, Minelayer )

Deployers are great for area control as well as brawling if applied correctly.

Mine Layers have a 3000 discount when a single instance is placed on a ship, making them a good addition to any ship able to use them. Double tapping the firegroup destroys all active mines, resetting the magazine to 5.

Meanwhile Turret Deployers have better firepower cost per turret than having just the turret themselves. They although have a 45 seconds turret re-deploy rate, are limited to three per deployer and are easily destroyed by simply ramming them over, and have a limited range of 400m from the ship before self destructing.

MISSILES ( Pigeon Missile, Shard Launcher )

Unwieldy, heavy and low damage, these weapons are usually not recommended as your primary source of damage.

Used effectively either by light kiting ships, submarines or any ship capable of engaging terrain as cover, being mindful that any overly close quarter confrontation will render them unusable.

They shine as boarding tools when built in certain configurations, outperforming dragoons in speed and numbers.

(You can find more on this topic in the "Weapon Spreadsheet and EXTRAS" section, along with Rams, APATs and Harpoons)

Even though weapons look and behave wildly differently, they can be grossly divided in projectile types to understand their general purpose. This way you may be able to effectively diversify your arsenal to cover a wider range of scenarios, or strengthen it towards a specific tactic.

AoE + , AoE , AoE -
Refers to explosive ammo, and whether it has a large ( + ) or a small ( - ) blast radius

Reg + , Reg , Reg -
Refers to regular ammo, and whether it has strong ( + ) or no ( - ) AP qualities.

Pen + , Pen , Pen -
Refers to penetrating ammo, and whether it has deep ( + ) or minimal ( - ) penetration depth.

AoE+ and AoE are great at hitting multiple components or parts, weakening the effectiveness of autohammer repairs. They however suffer from generally low accuracy and Blast Occlusion

AoE- and Reg have great armor shredding capabilities to punch holes through ships and generally perform well in all occasions.

Pen and Pen+ are great at bypassing thick armoring for precise sniping purposes, however they generally deal less damage than others and are slow reloading.

Reg- and Pen- are better suited against single unshielded components, like propellers, balloons or weapons due their generally fast reload and/or accuracy.

Here is a handy table with all weapons and their projectile type.



If you opt for fully rotating weapons, consider where to place them to maximize available traverse and to cover any possible blind spots.

Here is a list of common weapon layouts, but weapons may as well be placed on any preferred axis or orientation for different results:

Broadfront Gunner:
This arrangement gives great forward, rear and diagonal firing capabilities if un-obstructed, limiting though lateral targeting.
This arrangement works well for heavily front armored ships and head on approaches.


Slantside Gunner:
This arrangement gives forward, rear and side firing capabilities if un-obstructed, limiting though diagonal targeting.
This arrangement is not common, but works quite well for head on approaches and target orbiting.


Broadside Gunner:
This arrangement gives lateral and diagonal firing capabilities if un-obstructed, limiting though forward and rear targeting.
This arrangement works well for ships with plenty of cannons and target orbiting.


Superfiring Front Gunner:
These guns are raised one behind the other, giving forward, diagonal and lateral firing capabilities, limiting though rear targeting.
This arrangement works well in all situations and greatly limits blind spots.


WEAPON SPACING

As important as the weapon arrangement, is also the weapon spacing. As clearly spacing the guns from one another drastically increases firing arcs and reduces the chances of multiple weapons getting caught in the line of fire, either yours or the enemy's.

Here is an example of a mixed weapon arrangement with enough weapon spacing to allow near frontal firing capacity:



From the reference above, you can see that the ship is able to reduce the aspect angle and present the more reinforced nose towards the enemy, which would not be the case if the frontal weapons were clustered together.

The Superfiring arrangement at the rear also allows for continued fire on the enemy ship, or preemptively take out any incoming drones or boarders. Which would not be possible in a broadsider configuration due the lack of spacing and the general shape of the ship.

Ultimately this is to show that you may easily overcome any shape or space restrictions by simply changing the weapon arrangement or spacing across your vessel, furthermore increasing continuous firing capacity.

For in depth weapon stats, descriptions and comparisons please make use of the weapon chart guide provided:

https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3405866224

Do read the footnotes that explain the meaning of the extra stats.


APATs
To defend your ship against boarders it's recommended to install Anti-Personnel Auto Turrets (APAT). Their effective shooting range is 10m, but their effective targeting range is 15m, meaning they will start shooting even if they cannot hit you.

APATs are very quick, killing without problems a free-falling airmen before they reach ground, but they cannot hit targets slightly too below them, or dead atop, or aboard a dragoon.

Consider that as a ship loses mass during battle and dips below firepower, APATs will be the first weapons disabled since they have the lowest firepower cost.

Automatic weaponry targeting "weapons" might more often target an APAT if closer and a clear line of sight is present, this is due preference of attacking first any component with the lowest HP.

HARPOONS
Harpoons are useful for a myriad of applications, whether you are trying to complete rescue or capture contract, secure the ship to the ground, tow a battle damaged friend or immobilize an enemy ship.

The first fixed harpoon is always firepower cost free and each harpoon can tow 8000 masses before snapping.

RAMS
Rams come in two varieties, either blades or wedges and they greatly differ from one another.

Bladed rams will do the most damage when slicing/sliding against and object, meanwhile wedge rams will do the most damage only when hitting something directly.

All rams will do max damage when reaching the ship's max speed, that is either by propulsion or rotation, as long as the damage vectors mentioned above are respected.

Rams do 3000 damage at most each, meaning you might need to chain different rams in a single attack for full damage.

Bladed rams are a good alternative to wheels due their extremely low friction on ground.

BOARDING MISSILES

Shard Silos and Pigeon Missiles are often neglected, but can used to successfully board an enemy vessel by climbing on the missile during firing, making for a fast and expendable dragoon substitute.

Here are two apparatuses that can be built to board the missiles successfully:

Pigeon Missile:
Place the pigeon missile on a Beam Mount and add four Hull Trim Outer Corners on top in a square fashion.
Now, falling inbetween the hull trims will directly place your character on top of the missile, but works only when the ship is nearly stationary.



Shard Silo:

Place the Shard Silo horizontally, and Hull Halves in front of and as close as possible to the projectile's path (shown by the golden teeth on the Silo)

Now standing on the hull halves will have your character placed on top of the projectile, and works when the ship is moving and rotating.



HARDPOINTS
All ship weapons provide extra hit points to all connected parts equal to one third of the weapon's hit points. The maximum is 2,000 hp after addition. Thus, balloons and most engines do not benefit from this, but hull, glass, beams and helms do.

A good building tip is to build your design around your pressure requirements and not vice-versa, with enough redundancy to sustain the ship during combat. To do this simply place down in the hangar all the planned components, to get a general idea of what your pressure draw might look like.

If possible keep your maximum draw well below 100%, as this one only shows the consumption for active firing and propulsion, ignoring all other components.

Otherwise a general rule of thumb is:

3000+ for light ships / 5000-6000+ for medium ships / 8000+ for a heavy ship

Whenever possible make use of wells to mitigate any overdraw, and group your components separately so you may be able to keep fighting by disabling things like autohammers. And if you are undecided whether you should place another well or engine, the engine is always the better choice, as wells lose plenty of stored pressure when damaged, which during combat you are not likely to replenish.

Here is a table of most engines values (Box engine types have identical values):
Efficiency = (Pressure / Mass) , Resilience per Pressure = (P x HP) / W²


To simplify what engines to use, you can think of them as interior and exterior engines.

Exterior engines, like Flasks, Large and propellers, are most often not worth the extra mass it requires to cover them, and instead behave quite well as exterior armor due their relatively high HP

Interior engines, like Boxes, Small and Medium, are easy to hide within the ship, and therefore easy to armor.

Ultimately, for best results you would want to diversify engine types, trying to fill up any available spaces without overcrowding everything in a single area, where they could all be taken out at once.

WELLS

Pressure Wells should be mandatory for every ship design, they allow for your engines to be overdrawn without losing pressure to your components, allow your ship to be temporarily submerged without drowning and generally being useful in any combat scenario or even be a target itself.

A large pressure well holds 400,000 pressure, meanwhile a small one only 40,000, which can be consumed or refilled at any rate.
Keeping in mind they will lose pressure quickly when damaged, and will not fill up entirely until repaired.

EXTRAS

During building, try to maintain engine exhausts as out of the way as possible from the helm line of sight, as they will obfuscate your view easily when overdrawn, or creating a dense cloud if destroyed.

Destroyed wells and engines release a cloud that temporarily blinds AI targeting in that area, try using this to your advantage if possible.


HOW TO READ THE BLACKBOARD

The blackboard in the build menu comes in hand, showing your total pressure (from the combined pressure of your engines), your max draw (from your active weapon and propeller/ballast consumption), your utility (from things like autohammers, modules, magdrives etc..), Other (?) , your well time (currently semi-broken, calculated from only your max draw, you need to add 40 seconds to every minute you see on the board) and finally your group draws (showing you what each group active on your helm will consume).

Autohammers will extend your combat survivability considerably, and must be used correctly as to avoid them turning detrimental.

These repair 100 HP per part up to four parts away from themselves, repairing only one component per time every 2 seconds, which starts that part repair cooldown of 2 seconds. Making the addition of more autohammers for the same ship section not always beneficiary.

Armoring or protecting your autohammers is paramount, as they do not self repair and will not be repaired by other autohammers.

CONSUMPTION

Each auto hammer consumes 200 pressure when active but not repairing, this increasing to 800 when actively repairing. In perspective, 10 autohammers will deplete a large well within 48 seconds.

This risking to overdraw your engines if you consume your pressure wells too quickly, working against you especially if not placed in their own action group.

Consider they hold up to 40 scrap pieces, which they consume at a rate of one per two seconds, meaning they will likely run out within 80 seconds of an engagement if not refilled. But this being viable only if accompanied by crew, as they take time to reload. A good tip is to always keep a scrap frame close to your autohammers.

PLACEMENT

By mounting them onto parts with lots of connections, you can minimize the number of auto hammers necessary, but also waste repairs on non essential components. Controlling autohammer bleed is important to avoid wasting precious repairs during combat. Keeping in mind that it will always repair the piece closest to itself first and foremost.

Pieces like rigging, 3x1 hull, 3x2 cargo cages, large synth plates and other long pieces with lots of connection points work in favor of extending your autohammer coverage, but keeping in mind that all lifting parts consume up to three repair distances, meanwhile beam mounts consume no distance at all.

CREW COMPARTMENTS

Space comes at a premium when building out your ship, any extra space within could have been used to fit more engines or components. Therefore I recommend leaving the crew compartments for last, as once you have built out your ship, it will be easier to envision a space you could modify into a crew compartment, without sacrificing functionality.

Luckily enough, your crew can squeeze, crawl and grapple around your nightmarish interiors without much of an issue, and the worse they are, the worse it will be for any boarders as well!

However, consider that extremely tight spaces without alternatives for crossing, could be blocked off entirely if the ship is tilted in an awkward position due battle damage or environment.

Consider therefore, to place next to respawn chambers the most important tools, like a grapple and a defense weapon, to quickly clear the path of any obstacles or boarders. And place the respawn chamber themselves in away you could reach your bridge as fast as possible in case of death by enemy artillery or blade, as even a few seconds could make the difference between someone taking control of your ship or further damaging it.

Generally for smaller ships two respawn chambers should suffice, but for larger vessels you want to aim around six or more, as they are inexpensive and they will be targeted by boarders, or even destroyed during combat. This applies also to important cabinets, as having multiple ones in different parts of the ship will come in handy.

Making use of APATs to protect said compartments is also beneficial, as they are more difficult to spot within the ship, and will not change allegiance even if the ship is claimed. Giving you the chance to fight back with the higher ground.

BRIDGES and HELMS

As ships become bigger and more armored, bridges tend to remain relatively the same in terms of resilience. This is mostly due to glass being relatively fragile compared to the surrounding blocks, and its difficulty to armor without compromising view.
This oftentimes spells the end of many larger vessels, as experienced combatants will try to disable any available helms instead of fighting through all the armor to disable the ship.

If possible, make use of all three available helms in different parts of your ship, each with its own autohammer coverage and essentials nearby, worrying little about possible sabotage as your ship cannot be claimed while you are piloting it.

Keeping a lever helm in the mix can be useful if your ship has suffered extensive battle damage, with either asymmetrical propulsion or lack of lift, you can fine tune inputs to straighten the ship enough to reach repairs.

Otherwise the addition of a control station can turn handy if all your helms have been taken out and your ship is equipped with manned weapons.

READING THE HELM

Being able to read the helm is essential to understand what your vessel is capable of, or its situation during combat. Lets begin with:

The central large inner pointer indicates your airspeed, with each marking being 1 m/s.

The smaller inner pointer indicates then turn rate, each marking indicating 4.8 degrees per second. A ship with a turn speed of one marking would make a full turn in 75 seconds. A turn speed of 12 (one full revolution) would mean a full turn in 6.25 seconds.

The outer pointer shows the direction of incoming wind, though this is only relevant for sailing ships.

The left tubular gauge indicates your current pressure consumption, with the fixed marker being your max production. If you use wells you will often see your gauge at max, as they are being replenished. If it is beyond the marker, it means your ship is consuming much more than it is producing.

The four right indicator lights show your active group, and if present, a movable marker indicating which group you can activate with your "fire" button.

Pressing Q will open your AI targeting preferences, which can also be used against you if your ship gets claimed.

PROTECTING YOUR HELM

A strong cockpit will protect you and your helm from artillery and sabotage, and meanwhile autohammers will extend the life of the helm and surrounding glass, you can try different techniques to strengthen it further.

Here are a few helm types you can try:

High HP Cockpits
Weapons have high HP and give directly connected parts increased durability, making quite easy to shield your helm with weapons in front or around it, or directly connecting your helm to one, like to bunker cannons.

Sunken Helm
Sinking your helm one space below the window line will streamline your cockpit and make sniping attempts unlikely even with breached windows. This however limits your viewing field considerably.

Open Helm
Usually a bridge is easily identifiable from the surrounding windows, therefore a windowless helm hidden amongst other components, will make the helm indistinguishable at distance.
But this makes it very susceptible to battle damage and boarding attempts, especially during a rematch.

Double Windows
Doubling down on windows is never a bad idea given you have the space, try placing some extra windows in the possible direction of incoming fire.




The example above uses a mix of techniques for best results. The extra glass protects the main cockpit from direct hits and blinding. The sunken helms protect themselves and the pilot if the glass is breached due the armor rising to the sides. The Bunker turret (High HP component) protects and hides the rear open helm, which can be used if the main cockpit has been disabled. Now, killing the cockpit is none more appetizing than either going after the engines or guns.

However the most easy to implement, and most often sufficient technique, is simply using the Sunken Helms.

Note:
Consider that small window pieces have higher HP than bigger ones when placed equally, this is due to the frame bits that reinforce them. This can be used to increase your cockpit's resilience, but it will be much more difficult to autohammer and will heavily impact your part count.

Armoring your vessel is an integral part of the building process, rather than just something additional to be done later.

This is because there are many facets to armoring, like: redundancy, structural integrity, mass efficiency, and the protection of critical components, to name a few. Anything that enhances your ship’s survivability can be considered part of the armoring process.

To start out, do not overdo with Wooden Hulls, use them mostly to build out your main structure (skeleton) from which you will expand your build. As these are a solid choice for structural integrity, but quickly becoming inefficient due their comparable high weight to other components.

Whenever possible, aim to harmonize components in a way that can both build and shield your ship: such as balloons, armor skinning, riggings, hull roots, cargo cages, glass, engines, and more.
As some of these have special functions, like Blast Resistance, Damage Reduction or Blast Occlusion protection.

Blast Resistant pieces for example, reduce the effectiveness of AoE weapons by reducing the total damage of all components with this tag caught in the blast radius.

Damage Reduction components, receive reduced damage based on a projectiles Armor Penetration quality.

Blast Occlusion is a characteristic shared by most non penetrating AoE weaponry, where if there is no un-obstructed path to an object from the point of impact, the part will not be damaged by the AoE even if within it.

Your end goal is to strike a balance where the majority of critical components are equally protected, helping avoid unintended weak spots and maximizing battle capacity to its fullest.


• Which side of my ship will face the enemy the most? And which one the least?
(Save on mass where you are less likely to be hit, and double down where is needed most)

• If my structure is breached in a spot, will that compromise the majority of critical components?
(You might want to consider compartmentalization, extra armor or being able to quickly show a fresh face by turning your ship)

• Does my structure have a weakspot that if taken out might cripple a large portion of the ship?
(see how many pieces you can remove before a section collapses, and try increasing connection points between components and your main structure)

• Does my armor make it more difficult for the enemy to know where to land critical hits?
(Armor can both hide critical components from enemy view AND/OR direct enemy fire towards a specific spot, use it to your advantage)


Synth armor is so unique that it requires its own section, as of all components that you can use to shield your ship, this remains the better choice, due its generally high HP, low weight, blast resistance and damage reduction.

But it does not stop there, as if used properly it also helps reducing mass and (obviously) increase the resilience of an area.

To do this, use wood paneling as a structure to support your Synth Armor and whenever possible swapping Hull Planks for lighter pieces like hull triangle long, hull half, hull ridge or switching slanted hulls for slanted windows.

LIKE SO:




Use Regular Hull when you want to save on part count and have a solid structure to attach your components to, that is resistant to crippling. For extra resilience at the cost of more mass, you can use Reinforced Hull as blast occluded weapons will not be able to damage the hull underneath, and for a light and yet better than hull choice you can use either of the Light Reinforced Hulls.

The example ships below demonstrate the above topics.



These examples are focused around the use of Synth Armor, but as mentioned before anything can be your armor as long as it increases battle longevity.

On the workshop you may find ships built out of armored balloons, armor skinnings or even entirely out of engines!!

Most if not all ships benefit from having some cargo space, but how much space do you need, and how much can your ship comfortably lift?

As a general rule, you would want to have cargo capacities that are multiples of 16, as delivery type missions can only be of 16, 32 and 64. So there is generally no benefit from having inbetween numbers, if not to carry a few sporadic parcels you may find from hidden caches.

For starter or generally small vessels, anywhere from 16, 32 or 64 is sufficient for general outpost and fort contracts.

For combat oriented vessels, a 64 cargo capacity is a minimum for faction deliveries, smuggling or collecting cargo from downed vessels.

For cargo ships, a capacity of 192 is optimal. Allowing to fill up on the most profitable or biggest deliveries with ease.

If you are unsure whether your ship is capable to lift a full load, check your middle blackboard for CARGO MASS and if adding it to your total mass does not exceed lift, you will be fine. But if it does, you can use a ballast for every 450 mass over lift to keep airborne, but you will need either a continuous input, a lever helm or an altitude stabilizer.

If you want in-depth details, you should know that every parcel loaded on your ship will increase its mass by 30, if using conventional parcels racks, and only by 10 if using floatstone racks.

Keeping easy and quick access to your cargo racks is important for quickly transferring parcels. For example, placing them somewhere easily accessible from the ground, or placed in a way that you can comfortably stand near or atop, and use your grapple gun to retrieve said parcels will save you time. If this is not possible, the use of pneumatic tubing and hatches is possible, but generally not worth it due the resulting extra mass and part count. If you feel creative you can even use regular cargo racks as inverted flooring, which you can easily access from standing on the rear.

Additionally, if your parcel racks get blown off during a delivery, rebuilding your ship at a friendly factory will restock them, making not necessary to hide your parcel racks inside your ship or start a new delivery.

Dragoons are a must for every vessel, either for boarding enemy ships, quick scouting or even saving a sinking vessel.

Bear in mind that all of them are relatively fragile, even the armored dragoons have less hit points than the long hull plate they are probably standing on.

Thus, I recommend to house them in a hangar aboard your ship with hatches leading outside, these though do not need to be opened as the dragoons do not interact with them.

Since dragoons float, they can effectively be used to lift a sunken ship given they get caught in the ship frame, but each one can only lift up to 300 non-buoyant masses.

Emergency brakes can be activated by leaving the dragoon seat, this will make an otherwise unavoidable crash unlikely, and if inevitable, you will not explode along with the dragoon.

The regular dragoon is the fastest, but all dragons can be useful.
The armored ones can be repaired mid-flight, the harpoon can be used to turn and push a propeller dead ship, smoke can be used to indicate targets or obfuscate someone's view, transport are great for airdropping airmen to locations, conduct self repair or shooting, cargo ones are perfect for loading or carrying extra cargo.

Consider that autohammers currently will not repair dragoons but only the launcher, so keep some hammers and scrap nearby for you or crew members for a quick repair after every use.

Having extra dragoon landing pads can come in handy to add any dragoons you may find across the Archipelago (currently broken) or have a friendly captain board your ship with ease.

For more info on dragoons, check out our DRAGOON guide: https://gtm.steamproxy.vip/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3329846194

Here is a list of fun facts and extras that didn't make it to the original guide:

• The center of lift is automatically moved 6 blocks closer to the center of mass.
  
  
• You get an extra 100 HP for 4 seconds once spawned in.
  
  
• Roll correctors are stronger the closer to the center of mass they are placed. Placing some on a floating seavessel will make it go faster.
  
  
• Horizontally placed stabilizers can be used to make wings for aircrafts, these although do not work as true wings, but more as a parachute. Aircrafts are generally much faster than airships due their lack of drag from balloons, but they are very fragile and are difficult to build and handle. For good maneuverability and climb rate, you can go use a stabilizer for every 150 mass.
  
  
• Placing legs on an otherwise cumbersome airship, can be used to turn quicker by using the ground to your advantage.
  
  
• With enough ballasts and a tilt module, you can backflip your ship.
  
  
• Helms have a 30 blocks range to all weapons, be careful where you place your your cockpit and weapons!
  
  
• Propellers placed closer to the symmetry line have a faster turn acceleration.
  
  
• Hands, hammers, binoculars and so on all deal the same damage, but butting with a weapon is faster than all of these.
  
  
• You can use grappling hooks underwater as a mean to deal a finishing blow to an Airman since guns won't work.
  
  
• You can place a tracking Shard from the Shard Turret on a dragoon.
  
  
• You can use Scorpion dragoons as a mean to carry and airdrop Walker Dragoons.
  
  
• You can place boarding charges on pigeon missiles and shard silos.
  
  
• You can repair pigeon missiles and shard silos while riding them.
  
  
• Pigeon Missiles will immediately explode if hit dead center of the head.
  
  
• If you are building a train or connecting ships with connectors, consider taking control of all other helms once, this will signal the ships that they are under your ownership and will release full power and controls to you.
  
  
• Walkers can easily fly with the addition of magdrives and enough tilt to counteract gravity.
  
  
• Ball turrets take less space than regular auto turrets, use them inbetween autoturrets to save space.
  
  
• Floatstone shards are weirdly shaped, if they seem to not fit, rotate them until they do.
  
  
• You can use triangular synth pieces to cover odd 1x1 angles and spaces on your ship.
  
  
• Trim pieces connect with eachother when within the same cubic space, even if they are not directly touching, use these or slabs to build complex connection points or above slanted synth armor.
  
  
• You can use the synthetisers in the desert to kill worms.
  
  
• The quickest way to increase your bounty is to invest in Bunker Turrets at outposts and blow them up with boarding charges.
  
  
• If unsure between the walker leg types, consider this:
  Mecha legs are the fastest of legs and have lateral stabilisation to round up battle damage.
  Spider legs have the best climbing ability, turn the fastest and are easier to place.
  Tracks have high resilience and better grip than wheels.
  Wheels are the fastest of all land propulsion.
  
  
• Powered wheels cause more drag than un-powered ones, find the balance between these for good acceleration and high top speeds.
  
  
• Gyroscopic Turret Stabilizers are a super useful addition to any crewing ship, but they do not need to be next to the turret itself, they can be safely placed within the ship itself.

If you know more fun facts, please write them in the comments!

Special thanks to the members of the Airmen Factions Server and Zakdorn that made all of this possible.

Our official discord link: https://discord.gg/sn55DzqXpj