I'd like the idea a little more IF it was more blatantly technological.

Well, instead of surfboards it could be a different breed of Algontherine. Rather than one that bonds with a Manse, these Algontherine bond with enchanted Great Robes. By raising the hood on these Algontherine Robes, it activates an invisibile, personal field around the wearer that allows them to travel through aetherspace without a ship.

As you learned how to harness the powers of the Algontherine Robes, you could learn to do all the things mentioned in the above skillset.

And so then the formations would be similar to the stuff mentioned in the histories, what with the Elders making shields around themselves and then flying in formations to further channel their power and stuff. It seems like the Divine could teach something like that to mortals. Maybe Elostian could tinker with Algontherine-Breeding to develop it?

I'm not as fond of the surfing imagery, but there is definitely room for a smaller, faster, cheaper, and more fragile aethership than even the one room sloops. Perhaps most importantly, it would permit direct integration of aetherspace into Newton.

I am not sure about making another specialization, with people unfortunately thin on the ground for the three existing.

Rather, what I would recommend is integrating it with existing specializations. Aethersurfing functions (you'll pardon me if I hope the flavor and metaphor are refined before implementation, but to follow the topic's phrasing for the moment) would be gained just as present skills are.

Aethercraft
Channel - no change.
Aethercraft - covering both chair and movement while surfing
Empath - covering both grid and healing while surfing
Battle - covering both turret and fighting while surfing
Armada - covering both armada and the basic ability to form a formation.
Interlink - no change.
Targeting - no change, but would apply to aethersurfing offense.
Ram - no change. I do not believe boarding parties are viable with module permissions as they are.
Siphon - Covering both siphon and the general aetherboard in-flight power draw.
Modules - no change.
Scoop -no change, though there ought to be something interesting for aethersurfers to do with dust. Ideas?
Trade - no change.
Transverse - covering both ship and aetherboard transversals.
Master - specialization prerequisite.

Each specialization would then have formations suited to it - Formations dealing with increased movement would be in commander, likely with the analogues for ships, formations for increased damage or affliction in combateer, and formations for increased healing in empath. Each specialization would also grant an appropriate unique benefit - faster balance on appropriate actions, at the least.

Add a ship improvement to permit in-flight departures and returns.

I would be happy to see aetherboards be able to damage ships - a swarm of stinging flies, trying to avoid being swatted out of the aether by the vastly heavier armament of a ship. Aetherhunting on boards should also be a much trickier matter without the hull of a ship, and not viable without groups or great skill. On the other hand, if you've ever wanted to go hand-to-hand with a dragon, you could now do that.

My preferred metaphor would be aetherplanes as opposed to the aetherships.

I like this Idea it sounds like fun. what would a aetherboard look like though?

I like the idea, but there are some problems with it clashing with Aetherships I would like to see the boards bond with ships, maybe launch out of the rams head to scout or board another ship when weakened. I cannot think of a use for these that one room aetherships can't do. since the skills aren't much differnt from the Aethercraft maybe just toss an extra skill in there and add a few in the other specializations

They are a breed of algontherine....did anyone actually read my post?

And, for what its worth, if aethersurfing was released, I would buy credits just to learn the skill.

Psh if you came up with the skill, I hope you learn it

This is a revamp of the Aethersurfing skill, to a specialization of Aethercraft called just ‘Surfing’. I lost the formations, planesurfing abilites, and a few others, changed a few, and added three completely new ones, including new trans ability.

*The aetherplex of every city and commune has an aetherdeck with two pods, a psychic pod, and a smaller pod for temporary storage.
*Every aetherways portal has a deck with a pod for temporary storage.

*You can buy an aetherband that you wear on your head at the Surf Shop near the aetherplex. This is an artifact, i.e. it resets to your inventory and only you can use it. Price should be in gold, and in line with other aetherstuff, though I dunno what the exact price should be.
*The Surf Shop also sells deck modules for use on aetherships, and other cool surfing artifacts (though I can’t think of any except aethershades that increase line of sight at the moment)

There are two kinds of aetherboard.
*The first is one connected to an aethership’s deck module. By locking into a deck module, you will be transported to the ships aetherdeck, and be connected to the ships channel. You can then launch the ships aetherboard (or your own if present, see below), which will telepathically connect to you and cover you in a protective suit.
*The second is a personal aetherboard obtained by bonding to a psychic pod of aetherboards, using an aetherband. This can initally be launched from the deck on which the pod is located, and later be launched from the last place you landed it at.

Clarifications:
*Aetherboards are small algonthines that live in pods for safety. Some also live as parasites inside larger algonthines.
*A aetherboard’s speed is equivalent to a one room ship. There are skills to make you move faster, however.
*You can surf ‘safely’ on all planes. However, surfing in flux may cause you to be tossed around in random directions, and surfing in shift and tempest will cause you to be tossed and battered, taking damage to your aetherboard’s health.
*Powercosmic – Power is obtained relative to the speed at which you travel. Standing around will do nothing. Using slipslide etc, will boost power faster. Power is also obtained faster in more dangerous terrains, lowest in slipstream, higher in flux, higher in shift and highest in tempest.
*All powercosts are taken from your personal power supply.


New Aethercraft Skill
Surf – Basic use of an aetherboard and deck module


Aethercraft Specialization - Surfer
Aetherboard (Master) – Superior abilities on an aetherboard.
Podbond (8P) – Bond yourself to a pod.
Trail – Follow a ship or surfer without permission.
Evade (1P) – Give uncool trailers the slip.
Slipslide – Speed through the slipstream.
Bogey (3P) – Mess with turret targeting.
Powercosmic – Surfing ain't just for fun, man.
Fluxride – Ride the waves of flux with style.
Hail – Speak to an aethership's empath.
Sideshift – Ride the waves of shift with skill.
Tunnelride (3P) – Teleport randomly though a vortex.
Hullslide (6P) – Set monsters on an aethership.
Slipglide – None can match your speed in the slipstream.
Powerrush – Feel the power of the vortex.
Stormchaser – Surf the tempest with greater skill.
Fusion (10P) –Teleport to a flashpoint or mothership.
Invade (Trans) (10) – Take over a damaged module.


Aethercraft Details:
Surf
Syntax: BOARD LAUNCH
BOARD LAND |DECK
BOARD SURF |RIFT
BOARD REPAIR HULL
Basic use of an aetherboard. Note that landing at your pod or on your deck will cause all power to be channed into your nexus or the ship. You can link to your board to drain its reserves into yours. You can repair damage to your board’s hull.

Surfer Details:
Aetherboard
You will recover balance more quickly from using board commands

Podbond
Syntax: PODBOND
PODT
Power: 8 (any)
You can bond yourself to the psychic pod on the deck you are standing on. You can only bond to the common psychic pod on the aetherplex aetherdeck or the psychic pod of your city or commune. Whilst surfing, you can also speak on the aetherwave channel connected to your pod.

Trail & Evade
Same as Commander. Evade also slows down trailing monsters.

Slipslide
Syntax: BOARD SURF <1-3>
Whilst in slipstream environment you can travel up to three rooms in a direction at one.

BOGEY
Syntax: BOARD BOGEY
Power: 3 (any)
Using your size, you begin to surf past a ship’s turrets, throwing off their tracking systems and causing them to miss more often.

Powercosmic
Syntax: BOARD POWER
BOARD LINK|UNLINK
As you surf, your board's power slowly increases. This is more efficient when slipsliding, fluxriding or slipgliding, and even more efficent when surfing through tempests. You can check your board’s reserves at any time, and even drain from your board into your personal reserves.

Fluxride
Syntax: BOARD SURF <1-3>
Whilst in flux environment you can travel up to three rooms in a direction at one. You are also less likely to be tossed whilst surfing in flux.

Hail
Same as Channels in Empathy

Sideshift
Reduces your chance to be tossed or battered whilst in shift environment.

Tunnelride
Same as Tunnel in Commander

Hullslide
Syntax: BOARD HULLSLIDE
Power: 3 (any)
Sliding across a ship’s hull and keeping it between you and trailers for a few moments, will cause all monsters tracking you to attack that ship.

Slipglide
Syntax: BOARD SURF <1-6>
Whilst in slipstream environment you can travel up to six rooms in a direction at one.

Powerrush
Tunneling has a chance to greatly increase your board's reserves.

Stormchaser
Reduces your chance to be tossed or battered whilst in tempest environment.

Fusion
Same as Fusion in Commander, Can only be used to teleport to your board’s ship, or one of the ship’s flashpoints.

Invade
Syntax: BOARD MODULES
BOARD INVADE
Power: 10 (any)
You can psychically link yourself to a 75% damaged ship, and sense the status of all its modules. If any of the specific modules are damaged below 50%, you can invade the module for 10 power, locking out its occupant, and taking over the module for a set time. Whilst invading a module you can use its module commands. (ie you can steer ships, change power output to modules, fire turrets) When the time runs out, or the ship implodes, you will be ejected and returned to your board.

I agree with several others in saying the surfboard imagery is a little off to me. Aetherships have a companion in Prime Lusternia, there are ships in the sea. Surfboards? I dunno, maybe I missed them in Arysia.

I also think, if Estarra already finds the concept interesting (which is great) its possible interest could be gauged in a similar fashion to aetherships. When they were initially released they had little value. Hunting aether baddies? Sure, but not a lot of experience and no gold. Aetherbubbles? Fun but tough to get to and limited in number. Drawing power for the city? Helpful but there are easier ways (at least in my opinion). So originally the concept was cool but had little use. Later, a lot of people said they liked the idea but wanted more (at the town hall meeting particularly, if memory serves). So what happened? We got aetherspace commerce, aethercraft specializations, more xp from aether baddies, and construct/colossi combat in nexus worlds. Now aethercraft is worth a lot more. Something similar to this could be done for aethersurfing, although there probably should be less value to this skill as it will likely cost less to invest in an aethersurf board (or whatever).

That does still leave the supposed issue of if enough will do it to begin with to justify coding it.

ive never been in the aetherspace before, but it sounds quite interesting, and if it had this skill i would certainly check it out.

one thought, if you were an aether surfer surfing on up to an enemy ship, wouldn't you be canon fodder?

Yes.

so that would kinda suck, but in groups, the canon wouldn't be able to hit everyone, so the idea still lives

I think it changed from being a tiny surfboard to being a ship that is in idea smaller then what a one room ship would be. It would most likly hold a small shield. enough to get a party to a ship to board. A raiding party while a ship battle is going on could change things around. The added risk of the ship crashing while the raiding party is on it would just be for sadistic giggles.

*start transmission*



{Reading you loud and clear, Cap'n!}

{This is one small step for mortal, one giant leap for mortalkind}



{Thank you, Cap'n}

{I'm continuing onwards to see the limits of my reach}





{...}

{... Oh Fcuk}

{Aaaaaaaaaaah! *glomp* *swallow*}



*end transmission*

I believe the dracnari in Toronada is a surfer, actually.

You know, I'm seriously beginning to doubt anyone actually read any of my posts...

+5 points for me.