These are two chaos gunboats of a similar design. The Arcadian gunboat (link in my last post) is the basis for this design, though these were completely rebuilt. As long as the levitators remained intact, the captains and crews of the ship could go as far as scrapping the rest of the vessel and building a new one that met their needs better than the military version. It was common for mutineers and defecting captains alike to become marauders after absconding with gunboats built for imperial air forces, and these marauders were more like chaos war-bands than typical sky pirates.
The Red Jackal, or Lupulellus Rubeus, to use its actual name, is an Arcadian ship belonging to a group of notorious sky pirates. As the Arcadian Empire used flying gunboats as heavily armed patrol vessels, these airships were usually on their own. The crews got bored easily, and quite frequently, so did the captains. As the various anti-imperialist factions, chaos very much included, began spreading their messages, it didn't take long for Arcadian airship crews patrolling remote areas to decide that there were better things to do. They ended up removing the heavy weapons from their gunboats and selling them, using the money to buy lots of smaller weapons that were more suited to raiding. Whereas the original gunboat design was meant for attacking armoured ground targets, the Red Jackal was equipped to chase down other airships.
The twin 30mm autocannon turrets are still there, albeit in heavily altered form and mounted to the underside of the hull. These allow the gunboat to sweep the area below it, clearing the area around the marauders' intended target of anything short of armoured vehicles (and 30mm autocannons are quite effective at taking the lighter of those out as well).
The main weapons are mounted in the severely angled casemates at the bow and stern of the airship. These consist of four 63mm cannons and eight 42mm cannons. They don't have as wide a field of fire as the sponson guns on the military gunboat, and are instead intended to unleash a devastating barrage against both their targets and pursuers. The many machine guns on the main deck, the pilothouse deck, and the flying deck also help with that.
This is a close-up of the Red Jackal 's insignia. It is painted on a door which swings open...
...to reveal two more machine guns, which are used to clear the decks of airships before the sky pirates jump from the open door to the decks of their target. For this, they use "wing-packs," flapping mechanical wings strapped to their backs that are powered by a pressure tank charged with compressed air. I know, air compressors aren't exactly steampunk, but air compressors can be steam-powered. Sometimes compressed air is better (it's not as hot, for starters).
The White Spider, or Beliy Pa'uk, to use its actual name, has the same basic design as the Red Jackal, though with some unusual additions that give it some interesting advantages. Whereas the Red Jackal was built to be light and fast, the White Spider was built for high-altitude operations as well. The wings and airscrews allow the ship to cruise above cloud cover, dropping down upon unsuspecting prey - just like an actual spider.
The White Spider doesn't have such an obnoxiously bright colour scheme, mainly because its crew isn't quite as flamboyant. This ship doesn't have quite a widespread reputation, either, though it is considered a great threat by the Alexandrian Imperial Air Force, since the ship can carry enough sky pirates to overwhelm virtually any unsuspecting vessel that it attacks from above. Even flying triremes need to be careful of this one.
While heavily armed vessels could easily shred a mere gunboat, all the anti-aircraft guns in the world aren't of much use against a target that can close the distance faster than one can bring those guns to bear. Aerial missions of high importance must be on their guard; the crew of the White Spider isn't interested in raiding for profit as much as for state secrets, suggesting that they aren't in this business purely for themselves, as the crew of the Red Jackal seems to be.
You can just barely make out the white lines of the spider's web on the ship's insignia. If you haven't seen my previous post, there is also a tiny star of chaos on the spider's abdomen. Like the broadside doors on the Red Jackal, this door swings open, but it has a much more interesting surprise hidden inside.
The "spider's snare" is made up of twin harpoon launchers on each side. Though sky pirates with wing packs can launch themselves from the open door, they usually don't do so until the harpoons have been launched and the target is being drawn in with the powerful winches.
The "spider's fangs," meanwhile, are the ship's heaviest guns, 77mm rotating platforms with a seated gunner. If these look at all familiar, it is because they are the exact same 77mm guns used on the disappearing platforms of the black triremes. You can also see a clear view of the ship's name. I didn't give the Red Jackal a name decal, simply because I haven't come up with an Arcadian writing system yet.
Both of these gunboats are among the lightest of all glossarian airships, weighing about 500 tonnes each. They are also among the fastest, capable of 140 knots in level flight. The next airship I work on will probably be another big one, though I'd like to make a fully articulated virtual cyclogyro mechanism before the month is out, so I can't say what you'll see next.