Showing posts with label Armor. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Armor. Show all posts

Saturday, September 14, 2019

Science Fiction - 000 Armor

This evening I read Population of Loss and was struck by the character Signalman.

He is a sort of mystical entity in a steampunk world. That is epic.

The image to left is a rendition of suit of armor from a reoccurring dream I used to have in the mid-1990s. While I believe my dream was trying to represent a version of me inside a high tech suit, all of my recollections of it are colored by a demented sort of dream-logic, which can seem a bit mystical.

Being from a dream, the suit does not have a name, but for the purpose of this post, I will call it the 000 Armor.

There are three tanks on this armor. The two tanks on the back of the armor contain a substance which is much colder than absolute zero. It shouldn't make sense, but mathematically, that substance should be hotter than hell while the area around it is intensely cold. To regulate that power, the small tank on the front contains an anti-matter reactor. It doesn't provide power to the suit, it keeps the irrationally cold meta-material in check. That work provides the power to the suit, mostly as an afterthought. The wearer's eyes are closed because he is frozen. Only his brain is working at incredible speeds due the cryogenic coursing through him.   

Being frozen, moving fingers are impossible, so the hands are protected by a pair of cestus-like weapons. The wearer cannot "see" light, but the suit is pouring in data from all across the em-spectrum. Moving in a traditional sense isn't really possible. The suit shambles like a zombie when it has to, but it's main motive power is provided by the super cold, meta-material. The suit possesses a property of non-locality. It simply shifts from one place to another. It can't sit idle, it tends to shift from place to place like the disruption of circular waves on a pond by a second rock. Seemingly random, but not really.

The suit's energy needs are met by the differential of temperature between it and the environment and this is moderated by the anti-matter reactor. Its meant for space but on the surface of a planet, it is barely balanced for basic operations. There is an area of alternating bands of temperature which has tendency of destroying everything around it. Plus, the suit is dumping hard radiation into the environment. Most things which come into close proximity to the 000 Armor are vaporized and rain down as an ash-like material over a vast area.

The suit takes moments to put on, but requires an incredible amount of technology to remove. The process takes weeks and is often fatal. While it can handle air, it has great difficultly when contacting solids, vapors and most especially, liquids. Falling in a body of water can drain the entire suit in short order, killing the occupant.

Should the suit start to fail, the operator can open their eyes. Ominously, the 000 Armor's heads up display will show a series of recordings, usually by loved ones, urging the user to fight to stay alive. You would think that this messages would be a digital and wholly fictional creation, but they are not. The operator is required to attend the recordings, so they understand that they must fight or die in these circumstances. 

The suit is tasked with fighting large robotic entities. Picture a city bus standing on its tail and mounted on top of very large tank in place of the turret. These robots have all manor of lasers, grenades, machine guns and missiles, which can wreck a city block or aircraft carrier in moments. It has 2 dozen missiles which are very peculiar in operation. They lay flat inside the main body and are forced out the top of the robot, at any angle. Picture a vertical launch tube on a submarine that can project a missile in any direction from straight up to completely flat. The robot has a small dead zone around it where the missiles cannot strike. Perhaps 40 meters around. The secondary weapons guard this area.

These weapons are all ineffective against the mobility that the suit provides.

The robot entity contains and carries a massive swarm of locust-like drones, which are supposed to collect data and repair damage. They also provide the motive force for the missile launchers.

It turns out that simply ramming the 000 Armor with drones is more effective than any of the robot's  weapons. In the image, you can see that the armor has been knocked around a bit by the drone swarm. The main reason is the swam can cover an area larger than the suit's non-locality function.

Friday, April 19, 2019

52 Weeks of Magic - 16 of 52 - Defender's Boss

The Defender's Boss is an unusual magic item. When found, it is approximately 4 inches around. It has an image of a lion painted on it and has a loop on the back as if it belongs on a chain or necklace. If worn in this fashion, it will improve the wear's AC by 1. If the wearer is a fighting type (ranger, paladin, cleric, etc.) who can normally use a shield, the Defender's Boss can be willed to grow to a maximum of 4 feet in size and it will act as a +1 shield. This is in addition the previous benefit of 1, for a total of two.

If the boss is used correctly and placed in the center of a shield, it will fuse to it and that shield will now be +3 and always magical. The shield will have the same ability to grow or shirnk as a the boss does.

If the shield is destroyed either by magic or a massive force, the Boss in entitled to it's own saving throw and if it succeeds, it will pop off the destroyed shield and be ready for use again in one day. If a smith or armorer attempts to remove it, it will respond to their desires and come off in their hands. No tools required nor will it lose it's powers.  

If this device is used by an assassin class character, it will not confer the bonus to AC for mere possession nor will it operate as a normal shield. When an assassin attempts to use it as a shield, it will grow to a full five feet in diameter forcing them to hold it with both hands or drop it. If held in this fashion, it will provide cover AND a +2 to AC. While recalcitrant to use by assassins, it will shrink or grow on command. 

If the boss is rammed into an opening smaller than it's diameter when fully deployed, the shield will squirm so that the boss is facing the character. If the shield is destroyed trying to expand, the boss will fall off the holder's hands. It does not want to be lost. Doing this will cause the item to lose it's magic for 7 days. 

If the lion symbol is painted over, any damage to the shield or boss will cause the paint to blow off, reveling the lion. 

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21 22 23Whispering Wings24
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Now, the commercial. I have a little book called Zero to Hero: Uncommon Commoners, over at DrivethruRPG. I am obviously thinking of writing another and Gnolls might be the subject. Please let me know what you think in the comments.