Hey everyone.

A couple of years ago, when we wrote The Book of the Graces, it was partly from a general frustration that there were no decent sky battle rules or systems in D&D.

We made a start with Raptors, but an amazing Kickstarter written by a father and son team in Bristol have perfected it. Reading the Sky Zephyr starter ruleset is gutting personally, because it contains every brilliant idea I NEVER THOUGHT OF!

Well, we all have to swallow a little pride for the greater good don't we? I'm going to tell you the five reasons why you need to back and own this Kickstarter, the first of which is that it contains an air battle and manoeuvre system that is basically superior to anything that currently exists in D&D 5E.

The team at Bodhi and the Dude (who we will hopefully soon be having a chat with) said:

"Existing systems were all either too crunchy, too simple, too slow or too overwhelming. Our mission was clear: build a dynamic, fun, simple, strategic and highly adjustable system to tailor vehicle combat for all DM and PC combat appetites.

 If you're also looking for the sweet spot in vehicle combat in settings that have Airships (Eberron, etc.) Spaceships (Spelljammer, etc), Naval Vessels (Ghost of Saltmarsh, etc.), or Land Vehicles (Descent into Avernus, etc.) check out sky zephyrs."

Build Your Own Airship

This is one of my favourite bits about Zephyr. You can create airships that range in size between tiny gliders and vast behemoth zeppelins, each build following a structure (foundation, propulsion, confrontation, recreation), and each addition to the ship (sails, cannons etc) has a resultant cost. Max out on fighting and expect for other parts of the vessel to be harder to steer or propel.

Your Crew

Far too often in supplemental D&D systems, castle retainers, ships crew, thieves guild underlings turn into drones that just do what you tell them (dull, dull and more dull). In Zephyr, the rules system for airship crews is more developed. Hiring, commanding, maintaining morale and levelling up the aircrew are important tasks which give great opportunities for role playing and the development of NPCs under the control of the players.

Air Zones

This is one of my favourite innovations. There are four different altitudes your airship can fly at (Terran Zone, Sky Congestion, Zephyr Median Zone, Trade Wind, Wind Sheer). Each contains a variety of features and threats, from sky congestion and pollution to terrifying beasts lurking in the clouds.

The contains a host of new skyfaring features, mounts, magic and monsters. It also contains a versatile system for combat and movement.

The Kickstarter hit its goals in under four hours and has gone from strength to strength since then. Bodhi and the Dude are a promising design studio and I hope we'll see a lot more from them in the future.

If you want to back the Kickstarter you can do so here:

Back Zephyr Here