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Night10194 posted:It's kinda hilarious to me that the writers finally had to admit 'Okay, fine, these guys can die after all in some circumstances.' because the I think they should have just leaned into it. Call them Storm Ghosts that go back to the Box to reform after Chaos Pac-Man eats them. Yes. I am old.
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Dec 11, 2021 03:49
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There are actually Lightning Gheists, who are Stormcast souls that have been tortured by Chaos (or whatever other imprisonment) entirely too thoroughly and have gone berserk and broken containment to go on shrieking, unstoppable magic rampages.
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Dec 11, 2021 11:30
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Silver lining is that it mostly happens inside of Chaos controlled regions.
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Dec 11, 2021 14:17
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Halloween Jack posted:As a matter of fact, you can't enchant a weapon with Human Register without Attuning it first! So pick the type of Kin you hate most, and then get another enchantment so it can't hurt humans.  How did "magical WARPAC engineering" became my thing, I do not know. *does CHAROPS to get a MiG-21 into Monsterhearts*
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Dec 11, 2021 16:51
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MonsterEnvy posted:That would be a rifle. Realmstone rifle. Anything that helps own that loving nerd Archaon. Maybe get ultra-antimagic knife, Morrati's Vinted Coat, and Goblin Sky Party Vagon for an assassination mission. You can't, in game, make WHFB continue from pre-retcon ending of Grimgor headbutting Archie, so that's the next best thing, killing the Armfull Success. Icon posted:some powers have more than one AoE, leads to a lot of second guessing at the table and a surprising amount of friendly fire. I made a macro for my Dragon Age mage to fireball himself if surrounded, I'm OK with friendly fire  quote:Of course actually getting deep enough into enemy territory and escaping afterwards can make a hell of a campaign. Purple Sun Varranspire from orbit, let Nagash sort them out  The sun is the one spell that has an unimpeachably good model, so that's even more reason to use it. Tsilkani posted:I feel like trying to do the whole timeline is a fool's errand; you're better off going real big picture, then picking a faction and doing their history, noting where it ties into the big picture, and then repeating. Infinity RPG having the whole dumb history of the setting up front is a dogshit choice, it's all stuff only the Spanish weeb who wrote it would love. Just introduce the main factions as if for a wargame, give us a picture of life on the ground in your post-scarcity personal Cortana-run UBI (seriously), and then outline the current hotspots that working for Bureau Thots would bring us. Stop confusing my girlfriend with dumb FTL mechanics and Corporate Wars written with the believability of a 2012 YouTube animated map video HERE'S HOW WW3 WOULD HAPPEN???. JcDent fucked around with this message at 18:04 on Dec 11, 2021 |
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Dec 11, 2021 17:07
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 Buck Rogers XXVc: The 25th Century No Humans Allowed Animal Gennies: "It was a skrool school?" "A skrool school, Jerry! A school of skrool!"  A Skrool is a barracuda/piranha hybrid, a carnivorous fish around 3 to 4 feet that appears in schools that can reach up to 200 individuals, or a sphere 100 feet in diameter. These monsters were created for one purpose, to patrol the Pacificus laboratory on the island of En-We-To in Earth’s Pacific Ocean. These are the only monsters in the book designed to work entirely as a swarm. The number of skrool in a school (and the name is kinda weird) is 5d20 + 100, and while their hit die is listed as 1d6 per individual, it’s stated in the writeup that every point of damage inflicted on a school kills or incapacitates one fish, so maybe the 1d6 is only if you somehow encounter a single one. Skrool can attack one individual 1d10 times in a round, up to 4d10 for a group of four characters or above; you roll the total and divide the number as evenly as you can. They have a THAC0 of 16 and do 1d4 damage per hit, which needless to say adds up. They have an AC of 8 so they’re not necessarily trivial to get rid of either, and they will fight to the last, even feeding on wounded/dead skrool in the midst of the frenzy. They’re not 100% helpless on land either, though they only have a THAC0 of 19, can only move 90 feet in a round (remember rounds are 10 minutes), and only 1d4 can attack at a time- they’ll try to drag their prey back into the water should this happen, though it doesn’t say how long it is before suffocation is a problem. Much like giant sharks, skrool can sense vibrations in the water and use that to hunt. When not hunting they tend to stay at least 100 feet below the surface, though not much further below. Like just about every predator gennie the skrool have been successful well beyond their intended role and are now a major force in the Pacific ocean, though they are also preyed upon by larger fish, as well as Delphs and their fellow En-We-To creations, the Sharcs.  Swamp Hornets were engineered on Venus to feed on carrion in the lowlands, and miraculously this has not spiraled out of control just yet. Like they’ll attack people who get to close to their hives, but by the standards of this book that’s entirely acceptable. Each hornet ranges from 6 to 12 feet in length, though they never actually stop growing during their lifespan so people have claimed to see hornets larger than three feet. An individual hornet has 3d6 hp, an Armor Class of 6, and a THAC0 of 20. Their sting does 1d6 damage and also injects venom which causes a burning sensation, giving affected characters -1 to attacks and -5% to skill checks for the duration of the combat. (Desert Runners are immune.) Their big danger, again, is numbers- their number appearing is 6d6, and if the characters are near a hive, forget about it, the hornets will just keep coming no matter how many they kill. This can really be a problem if a character is downed or killed by the hornets, because they will then drag them back to the nest, making rescue difficult. Up to six hornets can attack a single character in a combat round. Swamp hornet hives can be found in the lowlands and even on the sides of the planet’s mountains, up to 20,000 feet. They attack anyone coming within 100 feet of their hive, until they have retreated 500 feet or more. Beyond that they feed on dead plants and animals, and are preyed upon by acid frogs. Much like bees, and characters in Jacques Demy films, they communicate through dance.  We stay on Venus for our next animal, the official First Genetically Engineered Life Form, the beloved Venusian Mud Turtle. Lookit this guy. I like him. The Venusian mud turtle was also engineered for Venus’ lowlands, based on the Galapagos Island tortoise (which I guess makes it not really a turtle but who cares), and they were designed to waddle slowly along the lowlands and feed on plants and small animals. They range from 6 inches to 6 feet in diameter, and can weigh up to 1,000 lbs. I don’t know why you’d ever want to get into a fight with one of these placid little dudes, but should it happen, mud turtles range from 3-20d8 hit points, and their size also determines their THAC0 (starting at 20 and going down to 13 for the largest) and damage (starting at 1d8 and going to 4d4.) All mud turtles have an AC of -1, and they’ve got pretty strong saves except for a -3 vs. Paralysis/Stun/Fall. They’ve got a pretty wicked special attack on top of things. If the turtle rolls a natural 20 for its attack (remember there are no crits in this game), and deals at least half of the maximum possible damage, they have successfully snapped through and severed a limb/appendage. Yep these little fellows can take your arm or foot off, causing 1d4 additional damage per round until the wound is treated (and also you now have to alter your wardrobe.) On top of this, on any successful strike the turtle can just clamp on and do its damage every round automatically until forced to let go. (There is no mechanic for forcing them to let go.) So yeah, you just leave these guys be. They’re solitary feeders, they’re often found near others of their kind but they all ignore each other unless it’s mating season, in which case the males do very slow nonlethal fights to attract the attention of the womenfolk. The species only has two major drawbacks. One is that they’re incapable of living outside the lowlands; that’s where their food is, and if forced out they die in 1d4 hours (which seems quick as starvation goes.) The other is that male turtles sometimes eat their own species’ eggs, so females have to lay them in secluded locations. Martian business-types consider mud turtle eggs a delicacy and will pay large amounts of money for them, so I guess that’s one reason why people get sent into their hunting grounds and come back missing limbs. Seriously these guys rule. If they really existed I’d watch YT videos of them for hours on end. They’re also unique in having their origins in a tie-in novel, Hammer of Mars. The next two entries are both viruses, the GAV Virus and TVS Virus. They both get the 2e Invisible Stalker treatment (no picture), and their data sheet is mostly N/A because, well, they would be. Both of these viruses were engineered to specifically affect gennies, and both were created by Theo Jameson. Remember him? The guy who looks like a New Wave artist.  The GAV Virus was backed by the New United Nations Firm, a group that’s very anti-gennie. They hired Jameson to create a virus that could affect all gennies on all worlds, and while Jameson wasn’t necessarily anti-gennie, he took the money and did his work. The GAV (Genetic Altering Virus) works in an interesting (if poorly described) way. Basically it gets into the bloodstream and “locates” sections of DNA that have been altered, consuming more of the original DNA and back-splicing the altered DNA in its place. For 75% of infected, this means they “regress” towards whatever animal genotype was introduced, so a Desert Runner becomes more catlike, delphs become more like dolphins (or possibly seals), etc.- it’s not clear how this works (if at all) on the slightly altered humans like Venusians or Lunarians, or the precise interactions for some of the animal gennies like Alchemcats (which are just smart cats), or weird cases like the Cadrites or Sidhe or Ringers… it’s a very vague process, like you get the idea behind it but you’d need more space than they have to really flesh out the details. Anyway the virus can be transmitted through touch, kissing, blood, ingestion, etc. (the text says “its most powerful mode of transmission is by merely sharing the same air” so I guess there’s some airborne variants?) It takes around 4d4 for it to spread through the bloodstream, after that the Gennie needs to roll a Constitution check once a week or else revert some degree closer to the animal within (again, this is extremely vague.) The character also makes a system shock check at a “progressive -1 penalty” (How often? We don’t know) in order to survive the process, so it can be lethal but isn’t necessarily. After 9 weeks the virus stops altering the gennie’s DNA but they’re still carrying the virus and can potentially infect any gennie they come into contact with. There is, thankfully, one cure. If an infected ever has to make a save vs. radiation (or is in a situation where they would have to), the virus dies. Jameson designed it with a complete vulnerability to radiation as a safeguard in case it got out of hand. There is no indication as yet that the N.U.N. have unleashed or used the virus, so presumably this is something the Referee can use however they see fit. The TVS Virus actually came first, though. Backed by the Sixth Reich Firm (not listed in the book either, but I have a few ideas), Jameson created a virus to infect the terrine gennies on Earth. The terrines have immune systems which produce antibodies very quickly, so Jameson created a virus which feeds on antibodies, basically crippling the terrine’s immune system, rendering them vulnerable to everything from pneumonia to the common cold. The virus affects 90% of terrines and has a 10% chance of attacking a non-terrine gennie, but has no effect whatsoever on unaltered humans. Like the GAV virus, TVS (it stands for Terrine Viral Syndrome) can be transmitted through blood, ingestion, saliva, even breathing the same air of someone infected. It runs its course in 4d12 days; once a week the terrine rolls a Constitution check with failure meaning it contracts pneumonia, and if they make all saves they get pneumonia (or something like it) at the end of 4d12 days anyway, after which they must make a system shock roll at a progressive -1 penalty every day to survive. The only known cure for this is a total blood transfusion and that only works 50% of the time. The Sixth Reich Firm has used this virus to wipe out the terrine population of Budaporg, but there’s no indication of it spreading further from there. It may be inactive for now. This is a pretty nasty piece of work, the terrines are almost always the bad guys but, well, so is anyone calling themselves a Reich. And this was 1992 so the virus being an autoimmune disease has some dark parallels as well. Like it’s not offensive (to me anyway) but it is odd.  The Whitefang legitimately confuses me. It’s a dark horse contender for “weirdest gennie in the book” and this is a book that contains deadly wheat and birds that live on the surface of Mercury. The whitefang was built to be a pack animal, and based primarily on elephant genes, but was given the head and keen senses of a wolf, and also it’s venomous, with glands from a pit viper. The idea was to have a pack animal with built in defense mechanisms. This is possibly the worst idea ever. If bad things happened to the creator of the Proto, I can only imagine the people who made this guy were packed into a rocketship, blasted into high orbit, thrown out of an airlock and told to swim home. So we have this… thing, which naturally turned out to be way too hard to domesticate and is now top of the Martian food chain. 12 feet long, 1,000+ lbs., scaly hide and beady eyes. A whitefang has an AC of 3, 8d10 hit points, a THAC0 of 13, and its bite does 1d12 damage + poison. The venom doesn’t kill, but notably weakens characters- failing a save vs. poison means you get a -4 to attacks and a 50% penalty to your movement speed for the next 1-6 hours. The whitefang is kinda slow itself, so it uses the venom to slow its prey and then stalk after them. A whitefang’s aggressiveness depends on where you find it; if they’re in a place like the Caloris Wildlands with lots of vegetation, they’re not too much of a problem since they’re omnivorous and can just eat plants rather than risk hunting anything that might fight back. Out in the desert, however, food is scarcer and they’ll go after anything they find. Desert runners do hunt them for meat, but everyone else thinks whitefang flesh is too greasy and gamey. RAM still grants a lot of hunting permits for them though, and would be entirely happy for this species to be driven to extinction. However, their numbers have been growing as of late. Finally, the last entry. I give you, the Woolsheep.  The woolsheep is a fairly simple creation. Leonard Bronsk of Moscorg took the sheep genome, and tinkered with it to give it a more efficient digestive system. 35% of the woolsheep’s dietary intake goes to muscle growth, and 30% to wool production. The result is a much bigger and fluffier sheep. Despite the name they were primarily designed for meat production, to address food shortages ravaging the Earth at the time; the sheep’s food consumption is reduced by 8%, which goes a long way in times of famine. Woolsheep are large and placid and stupid. You could engage one in combat, but why I have no idea. They’ve got 3d6 hp, AC of 6 (actually pretty robust), and a THAC0 of 20; they can bite for 1d2 damage and butt opponents for 1d4 and that’s it. Most woolsheep deaths outside of the slaughterhouse come from being frightened by something and having a heart attack. When startled, a herd will tend to run in a circle. In other words, they are sheep. Woolsheep are almost entirely indigenous to Earth, but there are rumors of them being successfully introduced on other worlds. The book closes out with two blank Gennie information sheets, and an ad for The Genesis Web, a tie-in novel by C. M. Brennan. Given how late this was in the game’s life I went and checked, and not only did The Genesis Web hit stores, so did it its advertised sequel, Nomads of the Sky. That was probably it, though. Final Thoughts on No Humans Allowed There’s a reason I made sure to do this book when I did. It really is a superb resource for the game, downright indispensable (I say as I see Amazon listing one copy for $300, shiver me timbers.) Indeed it’s curious that it took this long for them to do a bestiary, and of course by then the writing had to be on the wall. Is it perfect? No. Many, many times I found weird mechanical discrepancies in the monster listings, where they’ll say it works one way and then do it another, on top of which you often have stuff where the Referee has to make up the details. Again this is just a hunch, but I feel that as the line was clearly not doing what TSR had hoped, they received less support and the last products may have been kinda rushed out. That having been said, AD&D’s own editorial control was little better, especially as the Nineties went on. This may simply have been the standard. But as I’ve said many times, the mechanics are not really why we’re here. No Humans Allowed fleshes out the world of the Buck Rogers XXVc game through one of its most important elements, and consistently keeps up the weird balance of “vaguely plausible science” and “space opera weirdness” that makes it great. It’s a setting where a government will use genetically engineered wheat to slowly starve a rival planet, but also where the spaceports of Mercury are plagued by giant flesheating birds. Lizardmen shoot down silicone-built manta rays and people have to watch out for maneating crystal flowers. And under it all there are these wonderful substories of corporate intrigue and genetic engineers spending billions of credits on projects that inevitably turn on them. Good, good times. So I will break here for the holidays, and while I haven’t quite decided which of the game’s supplements (that I own) I’ll go over next, I’m leaning towards Mars in the 25th Century, though there's also David "Zeb" Cook's Luna. But I'll let that sit for a while. Maxwell Lord fucked around with this message at 18:52 on Dec 11, 2021 |
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Dec 11, 2021 18:43
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Age of Sigmar: Stormcast Eternals (3rd Edition Update Sigmarambulating We've gotten some slight retcons about how the Stormcast command structure works. Basically, at the top, there's still Sigmar, but between Sigmar and the Stormhosts are now the greatest champions of the Stormcast, demigod figures like Celeastant-Prime and the huntress Yndrasta. Below them are the Stormhost Lords-Commander, and each Stormhost only ever has one. The duty of the Lord-Commander is to epitomize their Stormhost's nature, serve the will of Sigmar and coordinate the strategy of the entire host. MNany spend much of their time in Azyr on desk duty, but it has become increasingly common for the Lords-Commander to take to the field personally. Under them is the Command Echelon, the Stormhost Lords. While many are leadership figures in the field, others are more reclusive, meant for specialized tasks and rarely seen in battle unless their talents are necessary. Still, no Stormcast is a noncombatant, and they are well versed in how to fight and lead when needed. Uusally, they lead specialist groups - the Chambers. Most Hosts are still divided into Chambers, multiple strike forces meant to focus on different strengths and work as independent armies under the same banner that can operate with minimal oversight. They can range from hundreds of members to mere tens, depending on the tactical role of the Chamber and the needs of the sityation - a Warrior Chamber of infantry will usually be bigger than the dragon-riders of the Extremis Chambers, for example. Most Chambers currently operate at lower than their nominal strength, thanks to the rise in casualties among the Stormcast. Chambers are subdivided further into Conclaves, each made up of three to nine Retinues, which are small squadrons that use specific gear and tactics; there's been a massive expansion in what kinds of Retinues can exist since Grungni got back and started inventing new weapons. Little has changed about the Conclave descriptions, and we get the note that membership in a Conclave isn't permanent - a Stormcast can be transferred (or promoted, for that matter). However, this usually happens after a Reforging, when a Stormcast is remade to greater or at least different strength. To ensure that they're right for the job, every Reforged Stormcast used to obey Sigmar's Eighth Law and return to the Gladitorium to prove their skill before they can go back to the field. However, as combat has intensified, the Eighth Law has rather fallen by the wayside, as has a lot of the recovery time that came with it. Because they are forced back into the field so quickly now, Stormcast are more likely to retain serious trauma from the Reforging and their experiences of death. Stormcast almost never mention the Eighth Law any more, in the belief that expressing doubt will harm morale even further. The Vanguard Chambers have been expanded recently, changed from military scouts and spies into something more. They are often distant even from other Stormcast and rarely attend meetings unless the situation is really bad. Few spend much time in Azyr or the Free Cities, preferring to live in the wilderness. They range from brutal hunters to swift light cavalry teams, managing the Gryph-chargers that move on winds of aether, as well as managing the snipers that support the main forces. Their current work is only partially military scouting, which used to be hteir main duty. Instead, many are tasked to seek out places of magical power. While they aren't wizards, they are deeply in tune with the natural world, and their work has allowed many potential Free City sites to be identified. Where they go, the Dawnbringers usually end up following, aided in their work by astral compasses - powerful artifacts that trace the ley lines of the world. They tend to be extremely aggressive, and many Vanguard Chambers are also now dedicated to fighting the orruks, particularly the Kruleboyz, whose expertise often is the same as their own. Little has changed about the Sacrosanct Chambers - they're still wizards and they still work to fight daemons and ghosts and to fix the flaws of the Reforging process. However, now that Grungni's back, many of them have sought training or advice from him. They understand that Grungni's creations in some way interact with their wielder's courage and fortitude, and they want to learn more of what the duardin god has mastered of the soul. Unfortunately, muhc of their time has to be spent fighting the spread of the ruinstorms. They believe that if they can come to understand how these magical storms stop souls from traveling, they might be able to use that knowledge to ward souls agains the dangers of the Anvil. Of course, that means getting up close and personal with Chaos energy, and a small contingent of Stormcast mages have taken to wearing black robes and armor marked with the sigils of those who have chosen death, deliberately seeking out ruinstorms even though they know it will probably end in their final destruction. They hope that enough of them will survive to bring back usable knowledge and finally achieve their goals. The Extremis Chamber has had the biggest changes. While many of the Dracothion Guard still ride the Stardrakes and Dracoths that descend from Dracothion, they have added to their ranks the Stormdrake Guard, who partner with the Draconith. While Dracoths and Stardrakes are sapient beings and quite intelligent, they never formed a civilization as humans understood it. They are were draconic beings that live in the mountains and hate Chaos but largely prefer to live near the stars, away from people and on their own, as their ancestor does. The Draconith are different. They, too, descend from the Godbeast Dracothion, but they did not seek to stay with their ancestor in the high mountains. The first Draconith were far more interested in exploring the world, and their study of celestial magic was to help them colonize new lands. They did not live in Azyr, for the most part, either. Rather, long before Sigmar came to the Realms, the Draconith had settled into Ghur, with their capital the mountain city Vexothskol. They fought many foes, and they were terrors of the Thunderscorn, whom Dracothion hates...but when they went up against the Dorgrukh demigod Kragnos, they failed. While Dracothion, the Draconith and the Seraphon eventually came together to seal Kragnos under Twinhorn Peak, it was not until almost all of the dragons had been killed, their cities destroyed and their way of life ruined. Lord Kroak agreed to protect their surviving eggs in the Seraphon temple-fleets, for he foresaw a time when they would need to return. The Seraphon raised the hatchlings on the legends of their people, teaching them their history, their ancient culture and the story of how their people fell to Kragnos. Most Draconith now are from those eggs - young, by the standards of dragons. They despise Kragnos more than any other being, along with anyone that serves him. However, they als tend not to get along very well with the Dracoths and Stardrakes they fight alongside. Many of the Draconith believe their cousins should have aided them rather than remaining isolated in the mountains of Azyr. For their part, the Dracoths and Stardrakes tend to believe it's good their more terrestrial cousins are back, but they believe the Draconith are too aggressive and warlike, and if they are not careful, they will doom themselves again by picking the wrong fights. The two groups of dragons tend to argue a lot when they meet, and both prefer the company of the Stormcast to each other. We get entirely new writeups for the playable subfactions, too!  The Hammers of Sigmar, AKA the Golden Ones, the First to the Fray and Sigmar's Champions, are the image most people have in their mind when they think of Stormcast. They were the first Stormhost to exist and the first to fight Chaos, going up against the Goretide in Aqshy durin the Storm of Sigmar. They also led the defence of Glymmsforge against the Legion of Grief and more recently headed up the campaign that prevented the Kruleboyz from poisoning the lands of Thondia in Ghur. At any given point in time, it's likely that at least one unit of Hammers is in combat somewhere, and they're rarely seen among the Free Cities as a result, which gives them a greater mystique amongst most mortals. The Hammers have more resources at their call than any other Stormhost, largely due to their size. Hammerhal Aqsha may be their headquarters, but they are believed to have more Stormkeeps across the Realms than any other host, and certainly they've taken part in the defense of more Dawnbringer Crusades than any other. When not fighting, they spend most of their time drilling and training, so that they can always live up to their reputation as the first and greatest. They have the largest Extremis Chamber of any Stormhost as well, for the children of Dracothion tend to love them deeply and agree with their view of no rest until the war is won. The Hammers claim they have never retreated from an enemy, though they freely admit that they have lost battles and died doing it. They are said to fear nothing except failure to accomplish Sigmar's goals, and that they are Sigmar's favorites definitely means they feel a greater sense of responsibility. They take every failure very personally, because they know that the Free Peoples see them as protective angels and demigods, and they are willing to give up vast numbers of their own lives if it means they beat the odds and ensure that hope continues for civilians. Pretty much ever single member of the Stormhost has died at least twice, and they tend not to take Reforging especially well. Many fear they are losing all touch with their own humanity, and even the Hammers have no idea what place they could serve in a world where their ultimate victory is achieved.  The Hallowed Knights are also called the Faithful, the Silver Saviours, and the Soul Guardians. They are fanatics when it comes to the worship of Sigmar - though that doesn't mean they're aggressive by nature. Most are not. They also are not the most strategically gifted of the Stormcast. Rather, their fervor and the love that most mortals have them both come from the same place: most of their members were, in life, not warriors - they were teachers, healers and priests. They are the fourth Stormhost to be forged, and they were chosen for their faith, not their strength of arms. That Sigmar could give them far easier than teaching warriors how to be saviors. The Hallowed Knights pray prayers of warding as they march into battle, and they are deeply resistant to magic and Chaos power. While they are often beaten and scarred, they never give in to pain or anger, enduring because they have faith that Sigmar has a plan, and that they are part of that plan, ensuring that all people will have a better future. They are natural martyrs, sworn to die to protect the lives of others. Their motto, the first oath they swear, is simple: Much is asked of those to whom much is given. Their focus as a Stormhost is to cleanse corruption from the land, particularly in Ghyran, where they work closely with the Sylvaneth. Their faith and determination are such that more than one of them has survived trips into the Garden of Nurgle without harm, much to Nurgle's rage. Of all Stormcast, they are often the most willing to work with outsiders, particularly the Free Peoples they protect and the Sylvaneth that have grown to respect them. The obsession the Hallowed Knights have with humility and purity is driven in by what they do in their free time - primarily, prayer and study of scripture. Many were scholars in life, and they have a great love for studying theology even now, as well as praying and living as monastically as possible. Some outsiders believe that their obsession with purity is perhaps dangerous, though, as they seek to become legendary warrior-saints who are utterly immune to corruption and whose souls burn with white fire. This means many of them carry reliquaries that lock away Chaos relics, hoping that their own purity can cleanse the tainted tools and render them safe for others. It is unclear if this is possible or if it will end up tarnishing the holy souls of the Knights. Recently, some of their number have claimed to hear Sigmar speaking to them directly, ordering them to do things that have no obvious strategic purpose. Some believe these voices are hallucinations, but the fact that the Hallowed Knights that follow these orders often end up discovering evil conspiracies or villainous plots and then foiling them suggests that actually, maybe Sigmar is doing this. (For some reason no one has checked with Sigmar personally about this.) Next time: The Celestial Vindicators, the Anvils of the Heldenhammer, and more
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Dec 11, 2021 23:04
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Maxwell Lord posted:
Thanks for doing this book, I've really enjoyed a vision into a very 90s transhumanism. It reminds me a little bit of the Expanse, where there's an aesthetic desire to look like hard SF, but then goofy poo poo inevitably happens because that's what the authors secretly want and doing orbital transfer calculations accurately to appeal to a vanishingly small population of nerds who will always check your work gets old real real fast. These last two are great because they're almost perfect summations of the two schools of thought the book seems to present: one is a ludicrously dangerous and obvious mistake emerging from an obviously terrible idea ("what if oxen were also rattlesnakes AND timber wolves") and the other is a militantly unfanciful massive mutton created out of a completely logical thought process that makes economic and historical sense. And both have combat statblocks. Natch.
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Dec 11, 2021 23:56
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Mors Rattus posted:Age of Sigmar: Stormcast Eternals (3rd Edition Update I don’t think this is a retcon. The Lord Commanders have been stated to exist since the start we just never had a model for one. Though Gardus has been encouraged to become the Hallowed Knights Lord commander.
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Dec 12, 2021 00:03
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Space scientists: What if we made a cow that could murder us all? And also a sheep except it was BIGGER and FLUFFIER? I love this poo poo.
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Dec 12, 2021 00:04
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Poor Celestial Warbringers, they got hit hard in AoS 3.0.
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Dec 12, 2021 00:24
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PurpleXVI posted:Space scientists: What if we made a cow that could murder us all? And also a sheep except it was BIGGER and FLUFFIER? I assume the scientist that was going to make the woolsheep able to murder us all got shoved into a locker.
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Dec 12, 2021 00:50
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The Lone Badger posted:I assume the scientist that was going to make the woolsheep able to murder us all got shoved into a locker. Now here speaks someone who's never seen Black Sheep. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4gn9JZCN-A
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Dec 12, 2021 02:41
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DigitalRaven posted:Now here speaks someone who's never seen Black Sheep. Or the other Black Sheep https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0gEDUDmZkyc
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Dec 12, 2021 03:26
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quote:maybe Sigmar is doing this Well, at least it's not an obvious Tzeench plot as it would be in 40k. Could br Malerion, could be Morathi, could be [character introduced for 4th edition starter box]. Buck Rodgers stuff is amazing, pity about the system, would play it in a heartbeat.
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Dec 12, 2021 06:45
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A bit like, but that writeup of a Task Force VALKYRIE group going on a CoC adventure dealing with that incel cult and ending up with a goat mysteriously wandering around the base made me think that they're probably going to just adopt it as a pet.
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Dec 12, 2021 10:01
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You can't say that without providing a link. I mean, technically you can because you did, but you really shouldn't.
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Dec 12, 2021 18:19
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Pretty sure it was earlier itt. vvv: Thanks! Ghost Leviathan fucked around with this message at 06:06 on Dec 13, 2021 |
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Dec 12, 2021 18:22
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Here's the post in question.
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Dec 12, 2021 19:08
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spider bethlehem posted:Thanks for doing this book, I've really enjoyed a vision into a very 90s transhumanism. It reminds me a little bit of the Expanse, where there's an aesthetic desire to look like hard SF, but then goofy poo poo inevitably happens because that's what the authors secretly want and doing orbital transfer calculations accurately to appeal to a vanishingly small population of nerds who will always check your work gets old real real fast. Honestly I think it's pretty sweet that the only thing people want from a sheep in the distant twisted future is more sheep.
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Dec 13, 2021 07:42
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Glazius posted:Honestly I think it's pretty sweet that the only thing people want from a sheep in the distant twisted future is more sheep. It is a good sheep.
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Dec 13, 2021 13:51
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"they called me mad" speech, but your nefarious goal is a bigger sheep, while "they" in question are people trying to splice cobra venom-spitting genes into a wallaby
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Dec 13, 2021 13:57
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If there's one thing that running games over the years has taught me it's that characters will adopt any animal they can.
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Dec 13, 2021 14:13
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 Where should we assault from? Comrade fluffkins? Baaa? The front, of course! they'll never see us coming!
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Dec 13, 2021 14:41
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P. sure the write up suggests that the sheep would do archer cavalry circles and circle-strafing 
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Dec 13, 2021 14:59
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Maxwell Lord posted:The number of skrool in a school (and the name is kinda weird) is 5d20 + 100, and while their hit die is listed as 1d6 per individual, it’s stated in the writeup that every point of damage inflicted on a school kills or incapacitates one fish, so maybe the 1d6 is only if you somehow encounter a single one. Thanks for doing this book! It's sad that for whatever reason, XXVC doesn't have the same kind of fan community that Star Frontiers enjoys. I wish it had had its own system more in line with other stuff going on at TSR outside the AD&D sphere.
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Dec 13, 2021 15:38
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Halloween Jack posted:Strange. Didn't D&D have rules for swarm creatures at this point? I don't think D&D ever got official swarm/mob rules at least until... 4th ed or something. Prior to that, a Swarm wasn't just "X small things." It was "we statted out a swarm as one very specific huge creature," so there was little space for on-the-fly statting up a Swarm of Orcs or a Swarm of Bookworms or whatever if it wasn't already pre-statted.
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Dec 13, 2021 16:00
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3.5 had swarm and mob rules. AD&D sometimes had swarm of X as a distinct monster entry but each of them had unique rules that were never reused for other swarms.
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Dec 13, 2021 16:23
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Third Edition had swarm rules, and I had to yell at the DM that (ab)used them that if you fail the check to avoid being nauseated by the swarm, you can still take a move action. Loved the writeup of No Humans Allowed! Any plans to do Hardware, the gear supplement for XXVc? There's no loving way I'm allowing anyone I run that game for access to graser weapons ever.
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Dec 13, 2021 17:14
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Night10194 posted:It is a good sheep. It's the best sheep... until someone decides to make a "better" one that's bigger, fluffier and with like Komodo dragon and wolverine genes or something.
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Dec 13, 2021 17:29
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Everyone posted:It's the best sheep... until someone decides to make a "better" one that's bigger, fluffier and with like Komodo dragon and wolverine genes or something. What if we make the wool strands monomolecular?
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Dec 14, 2021 11:23
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Terrible Opinions posted:AD&D sometimes had swarm of X as a distinct monster entry but each of them had unique rules that were never reused for other swarms.
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Dec 14, 2021 15:15
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The Lone Badger posted:What if we make the wool strands monomolecular? There you go. That's some proper RAM thinking there. Pretty much you have to assume that the head of RAM was basically Cave Johnson.
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Dec 14, 2021 16:37
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Age of Sigmar: Stormcast Eternals (3rd Edition Update Angry Jerks  The Celestial Vindicators are also called the Vengeful, the Hate-Fuelled and the Hurricane of Blades. As you might expect, they are not happy people, especially because every single member of the Stormhost is a person who has suffered terribly at the hands of Chaos. In life, they begged Sigmar for the chance to gain vengeance for what is done to them. When they were taken at the instant of death to become Stormcast in the sixth-forged host, they were given that chance. However, each would-be Vindicator must undergo a terrible trial before the others will accept them: the Sturmdrang Gate, a raging portal of dark fire. The Vindicators refuse to speak of it, or even tell other Stormcast where in Azyr it is. All that's known is that anyone who tries to pass through it with a burning care of deadly rage will be immolated and never return. Those who survive are permitted to join the Vindicators, for they possess the sheer rage and fury to do so. (They are, at least, warned before trying...but this is not a good method to get mentally healthy people.) The Celestial Vindicators operate on a combat doctrine that rejects all subtlety in favor of total obliteration. They are aggressive, violent and fast, moving across the field in a burning storm to destroy the foe at any cost. Anything in their way will be destroyed - even allies, if they try to slow the Vindicators down. The Vindicators are relatively unique among Stormcast in that their favorite weapon is the sword, not the hammer. They see swords as the perfect vessel of righteous anger, and many worship the Father of Blades alongside Sigmar - a spirit that is said to have been born from the souls of the twelve duardin runeswords once made for Sigmar, in the time before even the Age of Myth. Some rumors even speak of Vindicators who deliberately look for the most hopeless battles they can find, solely so they can inflict as much pain as possible against Chaos or some other group they hate before they die and are Reforged, as they see Reforging as a path to becoming the ultimate inhuman weapon. The rage of the Vindicators rolls off their body in the form of heat, and it's said that their infuriated glare can melt copper. They are known for their war-songs, which have spread even to the people of Vindicarum, who sing them as prayers to Sigmar. The Vindicators have been given the duty of freeing Chamon from Tzeentch by any means necessary, and they believe that the recent near-loss of Vindicarum to the forces of Be'lakor is proof that they simply have not become the perfect vessels of rage that would do the job. Rather than learn anything from their defeats and infamy, they have decided that they just aren't mad enough yet and need to become even madder. Their base is the Stormkeep Venger, a dark iron shadow hulking over Vindicarum, and they range out over most of the Spiral Crux.  The Anvils of the Heldenhammer are also called the Ancients, the Sepulchral Sons and They Who Claim Death. They are dark and brooding sorts, for they are all far older than most Stormcast. Their souls were not taken from those who died in the Age of Chaos when the Reforgings began - each was already long dead by that time. They were the greatest heroes of hte many underworlds. Their sudden vanishing meant many of these underworlds fell to Nagash's assaults or to the attacks of Chaos, and Nagash is extremely upset about it still. He takes the theft of souls as an insult to him personally...and many of the dead are also quite resentful over losing their protectors and heroes. Many of the Anvils did not wish to go back to endless battle, though few resent Sigmar for asking them to do it. They actually are quite thankful for Sigmar and the Reforging, for these protect them from Nagash reclaiming them. They no longer needed to fear the lord of the dead, and they could study and revere death in a way that was more worthy. They consider themselves Sigmar's chosen soul guardians, meant to protect people not only in their lives but after them. They preserve the memory of ancient death gods whom Nagash imprisoned or devoured, honoring them in the catacombs of their Stormkeeps. The greatest of these gods is Morrda, who remains widely worshipped in the Shyishan city of Lethis, where the Anvils are based. Indeed, many ranking anvils actually lead cults to Morrda, seeking ways to save the dead from Nagash. When they fight, the Anvils use strategies they mastered long centuries ago and have spent the intervening time perfecting. They are some of the best formation fighters in all of the Stormhosts, for their massive experience makes them masters of exploiting any advantage the foe offers them. They are serene in battle, for they understand death and do not fear it. Their armor is often adorned with bone relics and skulls, and their Reforgings tend to make their bodies more corpsen, their eyes sinking and their voices becoming croaking whispers. The mere sight of them can strike fear into living foes, but their greatest enemies are the undead, and particularly the Ossiarch Bonereaoers. The idea of the Ossiarch necrotopia is offensive to the Anvils on every level, an ideal of death oppressing the living rather than comforting them. It is a perversion against everything the Anvils believe. Both groups are so disciplined that fights between them are often entirely silent except for barked commands and the clash of weapons and spells.  The Knights Excelsior are also known as the Holy Destroyers, the White Executioners, and the Annihilators All. They're assholes! They're huge assholes! They are obsessively focused on the total destruction of those they deem evil, purging them and leaving only smoke and ruin behind. They are entirely possessed of a black-and-white view of the world. That which is good must be protected, and that which is evil must be destroyed - and it's very easy to be evil. They are the most likely of any Stormhost to purge mortals for dissent, though they do not enjoy doing so...but they also don't feel bad about it, so don't think for a moment they're even slightly nice people. They consider the idea of mercy to be a weakness to be torn out, and corruption a threat that must be ended whenever possible. The Knights Excelsior do not believe in things like individuality or dissent, especially internally. Unity in all things, particularly belief and thought, is vital to them. Their leader is the first of their number, the Shining Lord, and his teachings are what all of them focus around. He argues that if even one link in a chain is weak, the entire chain will break. Thus, he emphasizes group training and obedience to the group over personal heroism. He believes all emotion should be removed from the Stormcast, though the Knights rarely live up to this ideal and many still feel ambition and drive to excel. They are infamously destructive, smashing anything in their path in gleaming white armor. The Knights are based out of Excelsis, which has suffered horribly recently. Their main fortress, the Consecralium, was nearly destroyed, and many of those who fell defending it are still being Reforged. The Knights refuse to accept any responsibility for what happened, despite fighting a two-front battle - on the walls against Kragnos and in the streets against Slaaneshi cults - when they could have waited to attack the Slaaneshi forces. They argue that they could not wait, for all of those were enemies and all deserved to die. Those who remain are either desperately trying to hold onto what they protected or have gone out on a blazing campaign across Ghur to burn out all threats to the Dawnbringers. The local Freeguild would prefer they left, though - especially if the recent rumors are true. The soldiers whisper that when the Knights Excelsior fight, they call forth lone warriors, clad in the white armor of the Stormhost but with lightning spilling out of every joint. These Thunderous Ones, as they have been nicknamed, might just be Reforged Stormcast - or they might be an experiment by the Shining Lord to create a more perfect weapon, or they might be something else. Whatever they are, they have no mercy and they do not stop while any foe on the field still lives. Next time: The Celestial Warbringers, the Tempest Lords and the Astral Templars Mors Rattus fucked around with this message at 21:19 on Dec 14, 2021 |
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Dec 14, 2021 18:40
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Good to see Age of Sigmar's disappeared up its own rear end in a top hat with the fascists-are-good-guys-really poo poo that poisoned 40k.
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Dec 14, 2021 21:05
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Cythereal posted:Good to see Age of Sigmar's disappeared up its own rear end in a top hat with the fascists-are-good-guys-really poo poo that poisoned 40k. I mean, literally the opposite? The Stormcast fascists are the ones who gently caress up constantly, whom no one likes, and who suffered the heaviest losses due to mistakes of their own making, and now are doubling down on them. They are not presented as "good guys" so much as "these are the rear end in a top hat Stormcast." e: like I'm not really editorializing, the book is very clear that these dudes are assholes who are doubling down on bad ideas and are terrifying the actual people around them, while the ones that aren't fascists are actually focused on things like 'protect people.' A fair criticism might be that they're all kind of imperialists tho.
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Dec 14, 2021 21:13
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Yeah, this two are outliers - if there is an rear end in a top hat in other stormhost he is either singular case or has his brain broken due to reforging. This is opposite of 40k when you have to luck with a microscope for a decentish dude
Covermeinsunshine fucked around with this message at 22:02 on Dec 14, 2021 |
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Dec 14, 2021 21:16
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Mors Rattus posted:I mean, literally the opposite? The Stormcast fascists are the ones who gently caress up constantly, whom no one likes, and who suffered the heaviest losses due to mistakes of their own making, and now are doubling down on them. They are not presented as "good guys" so much as "these are the rear end in a top hat Stormcast."
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Dec 15, 2021 03:07
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Do their commanders or peers do anything about them, though? Or just kinda go 'well those guys suck I guess' and then leave them to do their thing?
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Dec 15, 2021 04:22
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Night10194 posted:Do their commanders or peers do anything about them, though? Or just kinda go 'well those guys suck I guess' and then leave them to do their thing? Presumably, that's where PC Stormcast come in? Unlike your Hams stuff, Mors Rattus's write-ups of Age of Sigmar haven't sold me on playing or running the game. It's not because Age of Sigmar comes off as "40K with less lasers." It doesn't. Unlike 40K in Age of Sigmar you clearly do not have to be some kind of murderous, fascist religious fanatic to be a "good guy." However, it does come off as just this huge, nebulous... space that doesn't really seem connected to much in the way of actions or consequences. Like, who cares if you beat Nagash's supervampire thingie. He's got like 40 more waiting in the wings. Yes, Storm-fascists did awful poo poo that cost them (and cost them because they were beings fascists), but it doesn't seem like they'll be otherwise disbanded or called to account by Sigmar because the game wants them to remain as a possible player-character background, I guess.
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Dec 15, 2021 04:36
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