In your setting which race do you foresee having the will and the drive to build the first powered flying machine?
>>46790671
Humans, duh.
>>46790733
Yeah but why? Why not dwarves or gnomes or some other stereotypical "good with mechanical tinkering" race?
>>46790760
Those races live underground.
>>46790671
I'd put my money on the dwarves. their technology is not much moore advanced then that of humans or elves, but they do like to work with it. Also, they live in a mountain range, so flight might be more useful and even easier to achieve (a downwards slope can give you some speed) then for those living on flat ground.
Then again, they are fantasy Switserland, so they could only fly during business hours.
>>46790671
Honestly? Humans. Dwarves and gnomes while good with tinkering spend their whole life underground and i'd imagine would be fairly nervous through acquired agoraphobia let alone comfortable with attempting to actually fly. elves would still be stuck in their own backwards society as usual making zero progress towards anything.
At best humans would come up with the idea and employ the smart races to help make it a reality while the elves would just be lazy asses using the invention after the fact.
>>46790671
Gnomes build the first one. Or, several do. A lot of them in fact, each on their own or with peer assistance. Afterwards, the ones that succeed and survive check it off their 400 year long bucket list that looks like it was written by frat boy Da Vinci and move on to the next thing.
Humans might make it useful, eventually, but they could also just use a magic item or spell.
>>46790671
Magically powered? Humans.
Non-magically powered? Catpeople.
>>46791100
>mountains
>easy flight
Anon, mountain ranges have strong winds and unpredictable weather. Whatever advantage downward slopes get you is lost over the difficulty of finding suitable places for landing.
Mountains are the worst place to be for a plane using civilization.
And if you are referring to helicopters, they are harder to develop than planes and even more vulnerable to unforeseen strong winds during takeoff/landing.
>>46791100
Downward slopes can help a plane which would normally require a long runway to take off, and make landing much harder than normal. They are just a poor substitute to a long runway, a necessary evil for places wich lack large even stretches of terrain. Your argument is invalid.
>>46791212
This.
>routinely fly over the rockies
>only person who doesn't panic when the plane drops 30 feet due to upward pressure form upsweeping winds on the mountain face ruing the wings aerodynamics
>this happens about 19/20 times and everytime people act like the whole damn planes about to fucking explode while i just gotta make sure nothing nearby is open and full of liquids
Honestly if it was in anything but modern high flyers mountains would be pure death traps.
Maybe this drive to invent things could actually be what makes humans stand out from the other races in fantasy setting rather than "DUR humans are versatile."
Imagine if some avian race fly overhead:
>elf: well good for him, that's what nature intended
>dorf: what kind of faggot zips around in the sky instead of having his feet on good, solid ground
>human: that looks like fun, imma build me a machine that lets me do that too
The snow elves are too primitive and stubborn to invent anything that isn't purely magical. The slothmen don't need to since they can just tame a large flying creature. The lizardmen have their dragon overlords and their wyrven mounts. The crabmen are terrified of leaving their walking cities and their hermit crab farmers are too dumb to invent them. The dwarves take 1000 years to get any invention approved. The 80's robots are too busy fucking and rocking out to do anything. The insect empire already has flying races and dragonfly mounts. Honestly it's a tie between the octopi and the skaven. The skaven are typical skaven and while being good with their nuclear tech they'll probably kill the guy making it before he can finish. The octopi are fully capable of inventing anything...if they didn't dry out after 10 minutes of being out of water...and if they didn't have tentacles for hands...and if their current land mechs have terrible fine motor skills. Don't expect any planes for awhile
None. Things that high up are easy targets for monsters.
>>46790671
Orcs invented the first blimps and used them mostly for cartography.
Mechanical wings were from a creative Elf, inspired from watching birds fly.
It was a Dwarf Mechanic and Human Wizard duo who had a knack for making golems that drew up the plans for the first plane but the thing itself wasn't made for over two centuries till a young nymph who had dreams of riding a dragon happened along a copy of the plans and realised she could make it with some assistance.
History remembers the mechanic and alchemist who made the engine but young, non-human girl who made the frame, stiched the wings and ultimately flew it has been as forgotten as the names of the first orcs to stand above the clouds or that one elf who followed a sea eagle on it's morning hunt.
>>46790671
Goblin did it first, mostly by throwinggoblinoff a cliff and improving the design.
