Constructs

[bradley.m.morto]

Hello! I'm looking to make a ship that needs a crew and I don't want to deal with free will or having to provide food or anything like that. Are there any medium size constructs that I could make with the craft construct feat? If so, what rulebook would they be in? Oh, and I could use Eberron rules for this if necessary.

[Flickerdart]

It's not really going to be worth it - the list of constructs gives 1250gp as the price of the cheapest, crappiest Tiny robot, and that doesn't even include the fat stack of cash you need to cough up to make it intelligent.

If you want a subservient crew that doesn't need food, undead are the much better option. Pick out ones that don't have cravings for flesh or blood, such as Necropolitans, and then just rebuke them or something.

[bradley.m.morto]

Oh, I should have mentioned that this was for epic level. Money isn't an issue.

[Flickerdart]

At epic levels you could just build a construct ship that can serve as its own crew!

[bradley.m.morto]

How? What book is that in?

[Bronk]

Nimblewrights are medium constructs from MM2

You could animate a ship using 'animate object' and use permanency on it. You could then repair the entire ship at once using the various arcane 'repair' spells.

You could use a ship made from a living thing, maybe an elsewhale from the Planar Handbook, or an elf spelljammer ship that is a living space tree (Dungeon 92 / Polyhedron 151) and awaken it. This has the advantage of allowing you to use cure and heal spells on your ship instead of repairing it section by section.

There are also some old spelljammer magic items that give you a ghost crew.

I thought there was a magic figurehead in 3.5 that would animate the ship, but I can't find it...

[ShurikVch]

If you have CL high enough, you may just hit the ship with Minor Servitor spell - it will be animated and friendly to you; spell is permanent; ship will get 3d6 Int and 1d3 Cha; 1 cubic foot per caster level; 1 HD for each cubic foot

[Rubik]

Find or create an undead appropriate to the ship, rebuke it using a trusted cleric, and cast Haunt Shift. Force it to haunt the ship.

Very cheap and very effective.

[Segev]

Haunt Shfit is so, SO much fun.

[heavyfuel]

How? What book is that in?

It's not in any book, but surely it can be done with the right combination of spell seeds.