Tinkerer rules/ideas?

[Mellack]

Will the DMG have any rules for what can be done with the tinkerer feature of gnomes? Right now it seems to be a fun fluff power, but not really of much practical use. Does anyone know if they have plans to release rules for how to build bigger things? Do you have cool ideas of how to use the current toys in some neat way? I am hoping other people can be more creative than myself and give me some suggestions.

[MadGrady]

At the moment, the feature appears to be more of a pure fluff/RP aspect to the race. However, a lot of people are asking for some form of class/subclass/PrC that involves this aspect (artificer, alchemist, etc), so I would actually hope to see something more fleshed out in the future.

As for fun ideas, these things could easily be used for distraction purposes. Need to distract some goblins from a doorway? Send your little wind-up toy screaming down the hall. When they run after it, open the door without trouble.

Later on, they could even be used as frameworks for illusions. Disguise other maybe?

[Mellack]

I had thought of using the toy as a lure, but it doesn't seem to work very well as that. Since it goes a random direction and only at a move of 5', it does not move very far away from where you set it.

[MadGrady]

Forgot about that rule for that (Im away from book).

I guess you could always use it to bring the goblins to you lol :smallbiggrin:

[Joe the Rat]

I'm working on something for this in our home game, so this is definitely an interest point for me. And I'm desperate for ideas.

We're doing Tinkerer as a Gnome-only Rogue Subclass - so we can get into serious mechanical madness with more weight than over-use of a single racial feature as justification. Structurally, I'm considering setting it up as a "clockwork artificer trickster", using the arcane trickster as a start point. But making Gear with spell-like limitations may be too gamey for folks.

For a general "tinkering," a good start point would be to look at "improved" trinkets - setting a DC to tinker together or design* more potent versions of the starter toys (a faster/louder windup Osquip, a mechanical bird, a clockwork frog with a timer, etc.), and increasing with the complexity and/or game impact of the device (a flask that opens/breaks on a timer, a pilot light for your flaming bolts/arrows, quick-loading crossbows (the old "box on top" repeaters), spring-powered quick-loading crossbows, 30-foot 10-foot poles, self-poisoning daggers, Spring/Steam-powered vehicles, etc, get progressively more difficult (and time consuming) to implement. 10 for simpler stuff, and go up from there. Time and cost of materials is the other piece to sort out.


* I generally like the idea of taking the time to blueprint a device providing you a bonus on later construction (advantage or outright success), but I want to keep the the idea of the tinker fiddling around with pieces to create unique devices in play, and being able to on-the-fly kitbash one-shot gadgets to a desired effect (aka MacGyvering).

[MadGrady]

I'm working on something for this in our home game, so this is definitely an interest point for me. And I'm desperate for ideas.

We're doing Tinkerer as a Gnome-only Rogue Subclass - so we can get into serious mechanical madness with more weight than over-use of a single racial feature as justification. Structurally, I'm considering setting it up as a "clockwork artificer trickster", using the arcane trickster as a start point. But making Gear with spell-like limitations may be too gamey for folks.

For a general "tinkering," a good start point would be to look at "improved" trinkets - setting a DC to tinker together or design* more potent versions of the starter toys (a faster/louder windup Osquip, a mechanical bird, a clockwork frog with a timer, etc.), and increasing with the complexity and/or game impact of the device (a flask that opens/breaks on a timer, a pilot light for your flaming bolts/arrows, quick-loading crossbows (the old "box on top" repeaters), spring-powered quick-loading crossbows, 30-foot 10-foot poles, self-poisoning daggers, Spring/Steam-powered vehicles, etc, get progressively more difficult (and time consuming) to implement. 10 for simpler stuff, and go up from there. Time and cost of materials is the other piece to sort out.


* I generally like the idea of taking the time to blueprint a device providing you a bonus on later construction (advantage or outright success), but I want to keep the the idea of the tinker fiddling around with pieces to create unique devices in play, and being able to on-the-fly kitbash one-shot gadgets to a desired effect (aka MacGyvering).

I'm just spitballin here for you, so take what you like, and leave what you don't :smallbiggrin:

What if you refluffed magic to be mechanical technology. Your "components" are the actual devices themselves that you create (using material costs and such just as listed in spells). And your somatic components are your quick moves to put the thing together. Idea being that this tinkerer carries around a bag of partially constructed devices. When he "casts a spell" he puts a few pieces together and let's it go.

Fireball then becomes this little smoking bomb-omb thing from super mario. Etc.

Just a thought about something you could use quickly without having to come up with a whole new class.

Of course coming up with a whole new class is fun too :smallbiggrin:

[MadGrady]

You could even use the "wild magic" sorcerer bloodline for options where the devices malfunction.

Or, since a lot of those options won't make sense for the refluff, you could always make a new chart of malfunctions that the player has to roll on if he meets certain conditions.

[Joe the Rat]

Quick and dirty is my usual MO, and Device-as-component (kinda nice how that parallels with commonly used contraptions = focus) would be my backup plan (I've got a worldbuilder with a need to "do things differently" to appease and the actual player of said tinkerer to consider as well). Given the near-magical nature of some of the existing gnomish wonders (an umbrella that, when you open it, provides a complete shingled roof over your head, and suddenly weighs a couple hundred pounds), it wouldn't be *that* much of a stretch.

Wild-magic-like malfunctions are a necessity, though some effects really ought to be device dependent. Maybe. (It's a fire extinguisher! How can it explode into a fireball?!) Totally going to leave flumphs on the list through. "Your clockwork [whatever] makes a sad whirring noise and stops. A flying psychic jellyfish shows up to watch."



Now, for generic tinkering... If I were a rock gnome, I'd start by trying to combine devices - so your wind-up frog or music box could be wound up, and set on a timer before it starts making noise. Or rig things to triggers, so your zippo lights when a trip-line is tripped, burning away a rope or lighting a pool of oil.

Combining magic and mechanics: Cast light on your frog, wind it up, and send it down the darkened hallway.

[MadGrady]

A flying psychic jellyfish shows up to watch."

This would be my favorite moment in any game