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View Full Version : D&D 5e/Next 5e Mythos - The Mechanikos Base Class



Xefas
2017-04-26, 04:11 PM
Links

General Mythos Rules + The Swordbearer Base Class (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?522575-5e-Mythos-General-Rules-Swordbearer-Base-Class)
The Cynosure Base Class (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?522905-5e-Mythos-The-Cynosure-Base-Class)
The Adversary Base Class (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?524003-5e-Mythos-The-Adversary)


The Mechanikos

The world is a bounty of resources for those who can see them, and the Mechanikos is he who exults in exploitation of the mundane and fantastic towards that most pure and divine act of Creation. In copper and iron and fire, they usher alien wonders into the sky and beneath the earth; their story is anachronism incarnate, the disrespectful violation of the stagnant, medieval world the gods have wrought.

To inherit the Mythos of Invention, one must be a builder of things in one capacity or another. The moment of ignition is a defiance of what the world considers reasonable - coalesced into a construction that blurs the line between technology and magic. The impossible is a goal, not a line.

An old clockmaker's heart is failing. As he considers that today might be the last birthday that he sees, his eyes shift slowly to his workbench and he begins to envy the perfect order of gears and springs that will run eternal with proper maintenance. If only he could trade his weak flesh for a mechanism of replaceable parts. If only. And then he begins to ponder why it could not be done.

An architect looks over the outlandish designs he'd scrawled in the fever that had nearly taken his life only days ago. He wonders if perhaps his right mind has not yet returned, because this series of apparatuses that would absorb, distill, and contain heat in the summer in order to warm the city in the winter - saving countless lives - it all seems perfectly, outrageously mad. But... doable.

They said it couldn't be done, but the glassblower proved them wrong. It was the dead of night outside, but daylight shone brightly in the little cottage. Bottling lightning - the fire of the gods! How impossible! And yet the proof hummed brightly on the table. One triumph felt incredible, but the humble craftsman felt humble no more, and the world beyond sprawled outward before him like a canvas waiting for paint.



Class Features
As a Mechanikos, you gain the following class features.

Hit Points
Hit Dice: 1d8 per Mechanikos level, +10d8
Hit Points at First Level: 60 + [(your Constitution modifier) x 11)]
Hit Points at Higher Levels: [5 + (your Constitution modifier)] per Mechanikos level after 1st

Proficiencies
Armor: All Armor, Shields
Weapons: Simple Weapons
Tools: One Artisan Tool and a second Artisan Tool, Gaming Set, or Musical Instrument of your choice

Saving Throws: Dexterity, Intelligence, Wisdom
Skills: Arcana, plus any three of your choice

Equipment
You start with the following equipment, in addition to the equipment granted by your background.

(a) a simple melee weapon of your choice or (b) a simple ranged weapon of your choice and 20 ammunition for it
(a) a set of armor of your choice and travelers clothes or (b) a small workshop that doubles as a living space and common clothes
(a) two sets of Artisan Tools of your choice or (b) one set of Artisan Tools of your choice and 50gp
(a) an equipment pack of your choice
(a) Arcanotech Tools and 200gp worth of Techscrap

Arcanotech Tools

This set of tools is a unique invention of characters possessing the Mechanikos class. Each character creates their own a little differently, but in general these are an array of strange implements that measure and make adjustments to esoteric forces that no one outside of another Mechanikos (or an Arcanotechnician, explained later in the class) would understand.

A Mechanikos requires a set of these tools in order to build their Arcanotech structures and devices. And, barring a special ability that says otherwise, they simply cannot do so without them. Constructing a new set requires using the Crafting downtime activity and 25gp of raw materials (usually taking 5 days). Only a Mechanikos has the intuition necessary to make them, and all members of the class are automatically proficient with them.


Techscrap

By spending some time shopping, a Mechanikos can accrue an innocuous pile of widgets, doodads, odds, and ends that look like nothing so much more than a bag of refuse to the common person. This stuff is abstracted as "Techscrap", and in any settlement larger than a village, a Mechanikos can usually convert just about any amount of gold pieces they would like into this nebulous junk. 100gp worth of Techscrap typically weighs about 5lbs.

Because of its seemingly garbage-like nature, selling Techscrap back to anyone other than another Mechanikos is usually a losing proposition. If anyone will take it at all, it will be at a significant loss.





Level
Proficiency Bonus
Features


1st
+4
The Maker's Resonance, Minor Invention, Major Invention Schematization, Major Invention Construction, Visionary Teacher Of The New Era


2nd
+4
Enlightenment From The Machine, Ability Score Improvement


3rd
+5
Think Fast


4th
+5
Enlightenment From The Machine (II)


5th
+5
Enlightenment From The Machine (III)


6th
+5
Enlightenment From The Machine (IV), Ability Score Improvement


7th
+6
Unimaginable Miracle-Assembling Brilliance


8th
+6
Enlightenment From The Machine (V)


9th
+6
Enlightenment From The Machine (VI), Ability Score Improvement


10th
+6
Prime Invention




Saving Throws
Unless otherwise noted, when one of a Mechanikos's abilities requires a saving throw, the DC is equal to 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Intelligence modifier.

The Maker's Resonance
At the end of a Long Rest, if you feel as if you have done one of the following since your last Long Rest, ask your fellows players and GM if they agree. If the majority do, gain one Inspiration. You may only gain one Inspiration in this way per Long Rest.

You used an invention to solve a problem in a clever way.
You helped a party member complete or progress a personal goal by being very smart or by using an invention.
You ranted like a brain-addled mad scientist, a bright-eyed visionary with hope for the future, or a cynical old man.
The ignorant masses lashed out at you for fear of your super-science, or something you invented was turned against you.
You found or experienced something that inspired you, and you created a Major Invention Schematic designed to use or interact with it.

When using your World-Shaping Demiurge Authority, you have dominion over engineering, machinery, tools, craftsmen, craftsmanship, and esoteric arcane power sources.

Minor Invention
Once, there was a boy who was stuck on the ground...

A Minor Invention is a relatively small device that inefficiently channels the cosmic forces that you work with, inevitably burning out its unstable components in short order. It is, however, still a miraculous feat of mythical engineering.

Building or modifying a Minor Invention takes about 1 hour, requires a functioning set of Arcanotech Tools, and can be completed as part of a Short or Long rest without extending the amount of time those rest activities require. Because of the exhausting mental effort required to cobble them together, a Mechanikos can not usually make more than (Intelligence modifier) Inventions between long rests - just ask a painter to sit down and churn out a half-dozen inspired, never-before-seen, genre-redefining masterpieces in a day and see how that works out (you can't force genius) - and a Minor Invention typically burns out after 12 hours of existence (or until you finish a long rest).

To build a Minor Invention requires 100gp worth of Techscrap. Once the Minor Invention expires, if you have Arcanotech Tools with you, you may make a proficient Intelligence check (DC 15). If you succeed, you manage to salvage 70% of the Techscrap used in its construction. If you fail by 4 or less, you manage to salvage 50%. If you fail by 5 or more, you only manage to salvage 30%. If you succeed by 5 or more, you salvage 90%. In the event that a Mechanikos happens upon the broken remnants of a Minor Invention somewhere, the DM may deem it viable to salvage in the same way.

When building a Minor Invention, you may build a weapon, a shield, or a gadget.

Weapon

You are proficient in your invented weapon and it deals 1d10 (slashing, piercing, bludgeoning; pick one) damage. If your invented weapon is two-handed, bump the die up a size. (The progression of dice is 1d12 - 1d10 - 1d8 - 1d6 - 1d4)

For each of the following things that are true, bump the die down a size, to a minimum of 1d4.

Anyone proficient in simple weapons is proficient with it. (The "Easy To Use" property)
It has the Finesse property.
It has the Reach property.
Its damage is considered the best of slashing, piercing, or bludgeoning.
It's a ranged weapon with the Ammunition property and a range of (80/320)
If it has the above modification that makes it a ranged weapon, its range is instead (150/600)

Now, add a special property to the weapon. Examples will follow the class, but are not comprehensive. Generally speaking, this extra property should be some physical feat of engineering that circumvents a narrow problem, provides a small benefit in a wide variety of situations, or a large benefit in a narrow field of situations. The DM should work with you to find a balance point, and may stipulate a single drawback or quirk the Invention has if necessary (making an Invention weirder is a small price to pay to see your vision realized in its full glory).


Shield

Your invented shield is, at its base, a shield like any other. It provides the normal +2 to Armor Class and anyone proficient with shields is proficient with it.

As with an invented weapon, you may add a special property to the shield with the same stipulations, and the DM make likewise add a drawback or quirk to it.

Gadget

A gadget can take many forms, but its function is one of the following:
It grants a significant bonus to a narrow purview of a Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence, or Wisdom skill.
It provides a new way to use a Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence, or Wisdom skill.
It does something similar, but not covered by an existing skill.

As with invented weapons and shields, examples will be given, but some balance will have to be done in play, and the DM is encouraged to find a flavorful drawback or quirk to add.

When you modify an existing Minor Invention, you keep its base functionality the same, but tweak it in a significant way, or a few minor ways to make it notably different. For example, if you've invented a metal crossbow that absorbs ambient heat from the air to generate and throw bolts of fire at your enemies, maybe you could modify it to absorb invisible particles charged with elemental electricity from the air and launch those as a stroke of lightning instead. Or perhaps you could modify the same fire-thrower to instead weaponize its absorption, providing nothing else but a large bonus when fighting Fire Elementals and similar creatures - a much narrower focus, but useful if you know what you're about to go up against.

Major Invention Schematization
...and who looked ever to the sky.

Whereas Minor Inventions compose a Mechanikos' everyday problem-solving kit, Major Inventions are enduring wonders that change the world. Sometimes in small ways, sometimes in large ways, sometimes in ways truly massive.

Before a Major Invention can be created, a schematic must be made.

The first step of creating a schematic is to vet the broad idea of the invention, in a general sense, to the rest of the gaming group and decide whether it's something that a Mechanikos should even be able to do (at least for now). There are times in a campaign when an orbital death ray is totally fine, and there are other times when such magnificence will only serve to steal the show from everyone else and run the game into the ground. At the same time, making crazy stuff is your primary schtick, so the group should be mindful that you deserve the spotlight too sometimes. Often, other party members will even be able to help in the process.

The second step is determining the future invention's Power and Scale. Power is a measure of how incredible the invention's function is, and Scale is how large an area or how many people it affects. You cannot draft a schematic for, or build, a Major Invention with a Power or Scale higher than your Intelligence modifier.

Power
P1: Something convenient. Potentially indirectly life-saving in an aggregate sense. Example: A machine that provides central heating in a temperate dwelling. A refrigerator. A lightbulb.

P2: Something life-saving from everyday maladies. Examples: A machine that inputs contaminated water and outputs pure water. A machine that disinfects wounds. A prosthetic leg about as good as a real one. A machine that can heat a tundra environment to something comfortable.

P3: Something miraculous that makes life possible where it otherwise wouldn't be. Examples: A machine that creates water in the desert. A machine that can combine the genetic material of any two humanoid creatures and produce a viable offspring. A machine that grows crops underground.

P4: Something that enhances or manipulates what is already there beyond what it could normally be. Examples: A powered exoskeleton. A firearm. A weather machine.

P5: Something that subverts natural or fundamental forces. A permanent gate to another plane of existence. A cage for souls. A dead-magic bomb.

Scale
S1: It's meant to affect one person. One refrigerator, one prosthetic leg, one firearm.

S2: It's meant to affect a small group. It changes the lives of a small village, a neighborhood, a mercenary band, etc.

S3: It's meant to affect thousands. A town, an army, etc.

S4: It's meant to affect hundreds of thousands. An entire city or city-state area.

S5: It's meant to affect an entire country (or more).

The third step is to pay for your hubris. Add the schematic's Power and Scale together. This is the future invention's Complexity. The DM can add up to (Complexity) Complications to the future invention, with your input to make sure they're thematic to your vision.

Some possible Internal Complications (not exhaustive):
Infrastructure: You need one or more other Major Inventions for this Major Invention to rely on. Example: Providing light-exuding machines to a city's population might require a central power source and relay stations to be set up around the city.

Materials: You need something rare and exotic to make your thing work, or you need a vast amount of something mundane to the point where the cost of the mundane material is not the prohibitive factor, but rather that it's troublesome to simply acquire that volume at all. Example: Your robot arm needs wires of a special refined mithril alloy to properly connect to your nervous system.

Maintenance: The invention is fragile and prone to breaking down even over the short term. If you're not around to maintain it, you're going to need to train and employ a certain number of Arcanotechnicians to work it for you in your absence. Example: Your power plant has a tendency to holocaustically meltdown if you, or a team of three Arcanotechnicians, aren't there to service its core regularly.

Unreliability: The invention always works. But sometimes it doesn't work in exactly the way you wanted it to. Example: Your giant robot achieves sapience and goes berserk if the wrong person tries to pilot it.

Weakness: The invention has a weakness that depowers, subverts, or destroys it, but is usually either easy but non-obvious, or obvious but very difficult. Example: Your orbital death ray has a small external exhaust port that leads directly to its solid-explodium energy core.

Some possible External Complications (not exhaustive):
Help: You're a genius, but you're not a genius at everything. You need to find someone with proper expertise to either aid in the construction of your invention, or just to help design the schematics. Example: This device that creates an invisible, necromantically resonant frequency that dilutes and dissolves pools of gathering negative energy so that corpses in the area cannot rise as undead and pre-existing undead are weakened requires a knowledge of the magical arts you do not possess. You require a high-level necromancer to work with every construction of the device, to tune its frequencies precisely, or else it won't function properly.

Labor: The construction of your invention requires a large amount of skilled or unskilled labor to complete in any reasonable timeframe. Example: Your sword factory is, in fact, a big-ass factory, and you're going to need a lot of people just to lay bricks and pour cement for your fancy machines to have a place to work.

Mundane Attention: There are people interested in the kind of thing that you're planning on making, and their interest will be inconvenient to you. Example: A peasant sees you toast an orc with your new flamethrower. He tells the local magistrate. The magistrate tells the baron, the baron tells the count, the count tells the duke, the duke tells the king. Now the king wants flamethrowers for his army and he's prepared to send his army to get some.

Supernatural Attention: Your creation is so glorious that folk beyond the mortal plane have taken notice. Example: Bel, Lord of Avernus looks down on your world and sees a city of mortals with heated jacuzzis. He begins to wonder why he's still bathing like some chump in a tub and demands that his infernal agents discover the mind behind this invention so they can be acquired and made to do some home renovations in Hell. Hilarity and suffering ensues.

Consequence: The invention works, but has an unintended side effect. Example: An automated logging operation doesn't last forever. Eventually it will deforest the entire area it was designed to operate in. Some people consider this a bad thing.

The fourth step is to make a weird description of what your invention actually looks like and how it does what it does. Your power is derived from the Mythos of the Maker, whose legend requires function over form. It favors gears, pistons, vacuum tubes, wires, tubes, pipes hoses, coils arcing with electricity, valves, chains, and other things, and it despises beautiful flourishes and artistic considerations.

It is neither technology nor magic, but should resemble both. It cannot make a modern, realistic gun. It cannot make a wand of scorching rays. But it can make a metal crossbow with a gear crank that takes an attached cannister with a fire elemental bound inside and, when fired, shaves a disk of the elemental's essence from it with an internal rune-inscribed blade, and then launches the screaming, whirling blade of pure fire at its target. It cannot make a coal power plant or a perpetual motion device, but it can make a reactor that siphons the very soul of the planet from its core and converts it into safe, usable energy.

This description should incorporate all of the invention's Complications such that they make sense.

Major Invention Construction
One day, he built an amazing machine to soar above the clouds...

Once you have the schematic for a Major Invention, you may construct it as a downtime activity. The base cost of materials and construction time is determined by the invention's Power.

Base Cost and Time
P1: 100gp and 5 days
P2: 200gp and 20 days
P3: 400gp and 60 days
P4: 800gp and 120 days
P5: 1,600gp and 240 days

Then the base cost and construction time is multiplied based on the invention's Scale.

Scale Multiplier
S1: Cost x1, Time x1
S2: Cost x10, Time x2
S3: Cost x100, Time x5
S4: Cost x1000, Time x8
S5: Cost x5000, Time x12

Visionary Teacher Of The New Era
...but the fire of the sun threatened to turn his wonder to ash.

When you serve as someone's instructor while they use the Training downtime activity rules, you divide the amount of time it takes for them to learn a language or tool proficiency that you have by (your Intelligence modifier, minimum 1). If you organize a structured class of multiple students to teach simultaneously, you may train up to (your Intelligence modifier x 10) students at a time.

Furthermore, when you teach someone to be proficient with Arcanotech Tools, they become a certified Arcanotechnician. This allows them to be useful for the Maintenance Complication that many Major Inventions have.


Enlightenment From The Machine
So he let it.

Choose one of the following three abilities to acquire. Each time you gain this class feature, you may pick a different ability. The same ability may be chosen multiple times.

Spark of Genius
Choose one Intelligence skill. If you're not proficient with it, you become proficient. If you are already proficient, you become an expert and add double your proficiency bonus on checks made with it. If you are already an expert, you may not pick the skill again.

Brilliance-Integrating Compulsion
You are struck with a mad impulse to modify yourself. The next time you take a long rest, you build a Minor Invention and permanently add it to your body. Your body is strangely accepting of this modification, as if its obsolete flesh and bone were eager to be discarded for something better. You are not injured by this otherwise grisly act. The integrated Minor Invention does not burn out like others of its kind and does not count against the limit you can make in a day.

The Flesh Is Weak
You come to an odd realization, and perhaps a shift in perspective. Your mind and soul are what you are, and what you are is something more than human. Your body is human - wrong and grotesque - and it ties you to a flawed existence. Each time you take this ability, you unlock the next of the following Machine Body tiers. Once you've unlocked a given tier, you must consume 100gp worth of metal Techscrap. Your body will process it and begin converting itself to a higher existence. Expect to vomit any obsoleted organic components shortly after. Because the Mythos of Invention anchors these changes to your soul, they become metaphysically as much a part of you as anything else - so, for example, a True Resurrection spell would restore you to life with all of your Machine Body intact.

Machine Body Tiers
Tier 1: A few of your internal organs have been replaced with superior mechanical components. You have Advantage on saving throws versus disease and poison.
Tier 2: Your major internal organs, other than your brain, have all been converted to machinery. You can no longer eat, drink, or breathe, and are immune to disease and poison (the condition and the damage).
Tier 3: You are a machine with an organic brain and a meat casing around it. You do not bleed, you are immune to fatigue, and you have darkvision out to 120ft. Your Strength and Constitution increase by 1.
Tier 4: A metal carapace bursts from your useless organic husk and you emerge a perfect being. You are a Construct. You have Resistance to psychic damage, as well as non-magical slashing, piercing, and bludgeoning damage. You are immune to the paralyzed and petrified conditions and your need to sleep is replaced by a "powered down" cycle that functions much the same, save that your senses remain active and aware. Your new shell need not look like your old self, but it must exhibit the aesthetic legend of the Maker, just as your Major Inventions do.


Think Fast
Once per long rest, you may create or modify a Minor Invention as a bonus action, rather than taking an hour.


Unimaginable Miracle-Assembling Brilliance
"I have taken flight." he said.

Choose one of the following three abilities to acquire.

A New Dawn From The Dust
The Titans rose an age of glory from conceptual nothing - how much more fortunate are you, that you have rocks and twigs to bang together? When you construct a Major Invention, its final cost in gold pieces is reduced by 20%.

Productive Hurricane Mien
The whole of your schema is emblazoned on your mind, and your thoughts race faster than your hands can cope with. How frustrating the separation of the self and the world is, that your perfect designs cannot just spring fully-formed from your brow. When you construct a Major Invention, its final construction time is reduced by 20%.

Diligent Flaw-Eliminating Eye
In the paradigm of 'fast, cheap, or good', you excel in the last even over other supernal craftsmen. Among miracle workers, your work is still yet more miraculous. When you construct a Major Invention, negate one of its Complications of your choice.


Prime Invention
"I will burn in the sky before I ever touch ground again."

After accumulating countless lessons from the many wonders you've constructed, your mind and soul have become primed to enact their magnum opus. This singular piece of technology will go unsurpassed for all time, and will stand as a monument to your greatness for all the world to see.

In terms of material cost and construction time, building your Prime Invention is equivalent to building a Power 5, Scale 5 Major Invention (without the bonus from Unimaginable Miracle-Assembling Brilliance), but its true Power and Scale surpass even those. It's effective Complexity is 12.

A Prime Invention can affect, alter, uplift, protect, or threaten on a planetary scale. An orbital space station (with weapons arrays), a psionic nexus that grants world-wide empathic telepathy, a control tower that can open and close army-sized teleportation gates anywhere in the world, etc. The artifice of gods pales before you.

Xefas
2017-04-26, 04:12 PM
(I'm still going to be adding example inventions for a while.)

Example Minor Inventions

Weapons

Chainsword
In the general shape of a sword, this machine has a chain of serrated teeth along its killing edge attached to a ramshackle motor affixed where a crossguard should be. A basket-hilt-like handguard is built in for safety. The motor has three small pistons that protrude from its side, which oscillate enthusiastically when in operation.

Damage: 1d12 Slashing
Properties: Two-Handed
Special: As an action, a wielder can operate the chainsword's ripcord, stirring its motor to life (psychotic laughter unnecessary, but encouraged) for 5 rounds. An active chainsword ignores 2 points of Armor Class provided by a worn set of armor, and each successful attack made against someone wearing a set of armor damages that armor. Each time a set of armor is damaged in this way, it provides 1 less Armor Class until repaired. If a set of armor is reduced to providing no bonus Armor Class, or is damaged four times, it is broken completely and falls off its wearer.

Example Modification: With alterations to the chassis upon which the machinery is attached, a Chainsword might become a Chainfist. It loses the Two-Handed property, but gains the Finesse and Easy To Use properties. It deals 1d6 Slashing, Piercing, or Bludgeoning damage (whichever is best). A second hand is still required to operate its ripcord, but this can be done while wearing a shield.

Flamelauncher
A wooden crossbow stock piled high with a hodgepodge of metal scraps, the main distinguishing features are its twisted funnel apparatus that bends over the wielder's shoulder, attached to a set of accordion-style pumping mechanisms, ending in a long metal barrel at the front. Over the course of a few seconds after the priming dongle is properly dongled (a free action), the weapon absorbs enough ambient fire-aspect elemental essence (heat) to fire a single bolt of blazing flame from its front. A little bulb over the barrel lights up when a shot is primed.

Damage: 1d10 Fire
Properties: Ranged (80/320), Two-Handed
Special: The flamelauncher loses the standard Ammunition property and deals fire damage, but can only be fired once per round and does not function in ambient temperatures of 32 degrees or lower. If a shot is primed but not discharged in the same round, when it is finally launching the base damage is doubled to 2d10. However, if a shot is primed by not discharged within 1 minute, the flamelauncher explodes in a 5ft-radius blast of flame that deals 2d10 damage (Dexterity save negates).

Example Modification: With a few tweaks to the weapon's energy consumption node, it can be made to run on the ambient particles produced when air and earth essence conflict with one another; atmospheric electricity. This causes the Flamelauncher to become a Zapgun, which deals Lightning damage instead of Fire. Instead of not working in cold temperatures, it only works on things that are electrically conductive (which most creatures are).

Telescopic Pike
What appears outwardly as a simple pewter flask is actually a deadly weapon. With a twist of the cap, gears spring forth from a slot on the side and begin whirring. In moments, the segments of two long metal poles extend from either end of the flask and fit into one another, the upper of which produces a thin, razor-sharp blade from its inner workings with a satisfying 'shnickt' sound.

Damage: 1d8 Slashing
Properties: Reach, Two-Handed, Easy To Use
Special: A bonus action transforms the pike between its flask and weapon forms. In its flask form, you can sneak it by most guards searching your person without a roll. Especially suspicious or incredulous security personnel may still require a Sleight of Hand or Deception check just to make sure, but you gain Advantage on such rolls.

Example Modification: By re-kajiggering the telescoping mechanism, you discard the pike's transformative ability, but allow its wielder to spend a Bonus Action to give it an extra 5ft of Reach until the beginning of their next turn.

Shields

Heat Deflector
Built to resemble a large target shield, the Heat Deflector is covered in layers of a shiny, semi-reflective metal, and has an inward-facing ruff of angular plates around its edge. A blocky, whirring gizmo just above the arm-straps on the opposite side uses the shield's array to project invisible, elementally resonant waves that smooth and deflect incoming fire and heat.

Special: The wielder has Advantage on saving throws against fire and heat based effects.

Spotlight Shield
No torch? No problem. The Spotlight Shield is a heavy heater shield affixed with a ring of lenses around its outer edge, treated with alchemically distilled positive energy and elemental fire to create self-luminescence.

Special: The ambient light of the Spotlight Shield is like a torch, shedding bright light in a 20ft radius. However, whichever way the shield is pointed, it produces a 100ft cone of bright light in that direction. As an action, its wielder can sweep the shield right-to-left, turning that cone into a hemisphere until the beginning of their next turn.

Box Fan
This shield is a clunky square-shaped cage of metal containing two slanted blades set opposite one another on a rotating axle. A switch next to the arm straps leads to entwined wiring that has been alchemically treated to act as a conduit for elemental air essences. When activated, a charge of elemental energy causes the blades to begin spinning swiftly, expelling a strong wind from the front of the shield.

Special: When the shield's activator switch is flipped as a bonus action, the fan comes to life for 5 rounds. While active, a strong wind repulses all gas and vapor (such as from a Fog Cloud spell) within 10ft of the wielder, snuffing out small unprotected flames, and negating gas attacks (such as a Green Dragon's breath weapon) in the same radius. Medium or smaller creatures treat spaces adjacent to the wielder as difficult terrain. However, the fan is noisy and the wielder must constantly fight the chaotic push and pull of the machinery and its winds; while active, the wielder is always considered to be moving in difficult terrain and they have Disadvantage on checks to hear things.

Gadgets

Mystic Spectrum Goggles
Clunky, sweaty, heavy, and uncomfortable, Mystic Spectrum Goggles are a metal box with a strap that fits around the wearer's head. The front of the box is a semi-transparent lens, and its sides bristle with switches, dials, and protruding gears. When properly calibrated, the goggles allow their wearer to perceive the presence of magic as a kind of orangish-purple glow around the environment.

Special: As an action, the wearer of Mystic Spectrum Goggles can activate or deactivate them. While active, they can see the presence of magical things just by looking at them. Additionally, with continuous tunings of the goggles' machinery, they can pick up and follow residual trails of magic left by spells when they are cast. This allows the wearer to use the Investigation or Survival skills to track the caster of a spell from the location of one of their cast spells just as a hunter might use Survival to track an animal through the woods. However, because it makes the real world look hazier and less distinct, a character wearing the Mystic Spectrum Goggles has Disadvantage on all checks involving sight while they are active.

Rocket Boots
These knee-high sabatons have a several-inch-tall metal platform to them, slightly elevating the wearer's height. On the bottom of each are two grated vents and, concealed within their innards, arcane batteries compacted with fire essence are directed to expel a brief, usually safe, blast of energy through these opening. These blasts propel the wearer and, with practice, can be used for superior movement around the workshop or the battlefield.

Special: With a shift of weight and wiggling of the toes, the Rocket Boots can be activated as a free action, granting the wearer a flying speed of 30ft until the end of their turn. If the wearer is not on a solid surface (or hanging onto something) when their turn ends, they begin falling. Using this ability while the wearer is already falling from a great height at the start of their turn allows them to slow themselves to a safe velocity.


Example Major Inventions

Infrastructure

Automated Mining Facility
Power: 2 Scale: 3
Material Cost: 20,000gp Construction Time: 100 Days
The majority of this tremendous structure is a network of scaffolding that is constructed over a location known to possess valuable ore. An adjustable, rotatable shaft tipped with an immense, runic, spherical apparatus moves along the scaffolding like a railway, aimed downward towards the ground. When activated from a control booth (safely adjacent to the actual mining site), this apparatus uses stored earth-aspected elemental energy to project a colossal augur-like hurricane of terrestrial destruction. The shaft it is attached to then plunges the apparatus into the ground, where the storm thrashes dirt and stone to a fine size, then launches it in geysers up to the surface. A pseudo-sapient targeting mechanism interlaced with a bound Earth Elemental separates valuable ores in the storm and instead draws them inward and up the inner workings of the shaft to a large, easily retrieved holding container.

A single Automated Mining Facility produces about 1,500gp of ore in market value per week.

Complications
Consequence: The earthen detritus spewed forth by the facility will eventually build up around it and may cause problems unless some means to haul it elsewhere is devised. A facility on the side of a mountain won't have a problem with build-up, but whatever lives down the mountain might.
Labor: Twenty skilled workers are necessary to complete the scaffolding and storage units in a reasonable time. If you must hire them, this will cost roughly 40gp a day for the duration.
Maintenance: An Arcanotechnician must be present every day of the week to keep the mine running smoothly.
Materials: Constructing the facility's central mechanism requires a bound Earth Elemental.
Mundane Attention: Something this big and obvious, and obviously profitable, is just begging to be taxed, or seized, by whatever locals powers that be. Miners and mining guilds may also be unhappy that you've potentially taken their jerbs.

Gaea Reactor
Power: 1 Scale: 4
Material Cost: 100,000gp Construction Time: 80 Days
A ten-story metal tower humming with power, its skin broken by countless pipes, tubes, pistons, and exhaust vents belching vapor and blue-white fire. The bulk of its marvels lay hidden underground criss-crossed with a network of service corridors. Here, parasitic machinery tap a fire, water, and earth leyline, funneling their energies towards a central chamber. Here, they mix with an air leyline tapped by equipment at the apex of the tower, and a wound is formed in the mystical strata of the planet itself. Out flows the lifeblood of the Omphalos, a dangerous and potent substance called Gaea. Burned in the tower's furnaces, this Gaea provides abundant, clean power for any kind of Arcanotechnical device one could imagine; enough to power an entire city's worth of inventions simultaneously.

Complications
Consequence: On a small scale, the planet produces enough Gaea to seemingly not be an issue. However, once it is being used to meet the power demands of a city-size or near-city-sized population with multiple household inventions that require power, the world will begin to die around it. A wasteland will form devoid of attachment to the elements and incapable of sustaining life, spread by a mile or miles a year, or more, depending on usage.
Maintenance: A staff of three Arcanotechnicians must be present at the reactor 24 hours a day or else risk an elemental rupture. (Therefore, nine Arcanotechnicians would make three comfortable 8-hour shifts. Although, more demanding hours could be instituted in a pinch.)
Materials: The machinery in the reactor's central chamber, which maintains the Gaean wound and prevents its closure, must be tipped with four spikes of iron, each infused with one of the four elements on that element's respective inner plane. Such iron is exceedingly rare in the mortal realm, but relatively common in the markets of those planes.
Supernatural Attention: Once there is evidence that the reactor is causing ecological damage, Druids and other nature-inclined folk will have an interest in it.
Weakness: The machinery in the reactor's central chamber, which converges the four ley-energies to create a Gaean wound, is extremely delicate and its work is volatile. A few rounds of smashing things with a club would cause the reactor's imminent explosion.

Rechargeable Gaea Battery
Power: 1 Scale: 1
Material Cost: 100gp Construction Time: 5 Days
This fist-sized, cylindrical canister is matte grey, save for the clear strip down one side that shows bright-white energy swirling within, and the two copper prongs protruding from one end. When socketed into an invention that requires power, this battery can keep it running for roughly a month. Because its payload is pressurized Gaea energy, it can power any sort of machine, regardless of what sort of elemental resonance would normally be required, although especially large contraptions might need a bigger power source. After running dry, an Arcanotechnician can refill it at a station in the basement of a Gaea Reactor via a short, (relatively) simple process.

Complications
Infrastructure: Technically, creating the battery itself does not require a source of safely tapped Gaea, but filling it up the first time obviously does.
Weakness: When not socketed into anything, the battery is vulnerable to explosive decompression when damaged (most equipment that requires one, such as Power Armor, has some kind of plating to protect it once inserted). A Gaea Battery that takes 5 points of damage explodes, dealing 1d10 radiant damage in a 5ft radius, with a DC 10 Dexterity saving throw to negate. If a creature is holding the battery when it is damaged, the DC is 15 instead.

Sympathetic Gaea Battery
Power: 1 Scale: 2
Material Cost: 1,000gp Construction Time: 10 Days
This battery functions just as a Rechargeable Gaea Battery (see above) with one difference. It does not need to be recharged; thanks to a sympathetic spiritual link inscribed on the inner walls of the battery, mirrored by a similar mystic inscription somewhere inside of a Gaea Reactor, a small, continuous feed of energy travels invisibly through a non-standard spacial dimension directly from the power plant to the battery, perpetually (effectively) topping it off. The two notable downsides are that this Sympathetic Battery must be constructed inside of the reactor to which it is linked, and that it will completely cease to function if the reactor is shut down or destroyed.


Warfare

Ruin-Class Power Armor
Power: 4 Scale: 1
Material Cost: 58,000gp Construction Time: 120 days
This eight-foot-tall suit of primarily glossy-black metal is far too heavy for even the strongest humans to move around in, and far too bulky for even supernaturally mighty wearers to maneuver effectively enough for any task. Its every piece is connected, fitted together as a whole, and when worn would cover every inch of its wearer. Its helm is formed in a demonic likeness, with long, angular lens-slits, a mouth molded into long, sharpened teeth, and two large, curved ram horns. It's stylized with overly large pauldrons, and its joints are made intentionally sharp and angular. A mass of gears and pistons protrudes from its back, rising up and spreading out like a mantle behind its shoulders. Its black color is accented with gold paint at the edges, and its weakest points are reinforced with priceless sheets of adamantine.

Features
Armor: This invention functions as a suit of Full Plate.
Sealed: As a bonus action, the wearer of this Power Armor can activate a feature that seals the suit entirely and connects an internal air supply, or deactivate the same feature. The air supply lasts for about an hour of total use, after which is must be replaced by an Arcanotechnician.
Adamantine: Critical hits scored against the armor's wearer become normal hits.
Powered Servos: The wearer of Ruin-Class Power Armor has an effective Strength of 24, or their own, whichever is higher. They also have Advantage on Athletics checks.
Targeting Systems: The helm of this armor improves its wearer's visual acuity, giving them Advantage on Perception checks relating to sight.

Complications
Infrastructure: This invention is a largely worthless hunk of metal without a power source designed to interface with it. It requires a Fire or Earth resonant power source.
Maintenance: Not just any blacksmith can repair a suit of Power Armor after a rough battle. It will occasionally need to be serviced by an Arcanotechnician or else systems will begin failing.
Materials: This invention has a higher material cost than usual, owing to the significant quantities of rare materials, such as adamantine, mithril, and alchemically treated metals, that are necessary to make its machinery compact enough for a humanoid wearer.

Martyr-Class Power Armor
Power: 4 Scale: 1
Material Cost: 20,000gp Construction Time: 120 days
This Large-size carapace of clunky, rotating limbs and whirring gears is vaguely humanoid, blood-red in color, too broad, poorly proportioned, and without a head. Its torso is constructed with an open hatch into its odd fuselage chamber, resembling a cross between a casket and a hospital bed. A small or medium humanoid corpse that has been dead no longer than three days may be placed into the fuselage, after which the hatch closes and can no longer be unsealed. Fed on distilled positive energy, the corpse's soul is dragged back to it, and held in a twisted pseudolife, partially inhabiting its half-revived body, and partially inhabiting the armor itself. The visual and auditory sensors on the front of the armor become the soul's eyes and ears, the commands its mind would normally give its body's musculature is transferred directly to the armor's motorized limbs, and its voice is projected through a speaker to the outside world.

Features
Armor: This invention functions as a suit of Full Plate.
Large Chassis: The wearer's size becomes Large, their Strength becomes 20, and their Dexterity becomes 8. They have a movement speed of 20ft. Their hands are not dexterous enough to wield a weapon, but their unarmed attacks deal 2d8 bludgeoning damage. When they successful Shove a target, they have the option to push them up to 15ft rather than 5ft. If the wearer would have fewer than 40 maximum hit points, their maximum hit point total becomes 40 until such time that they can raise their normal total above this.
Metal Husk: The wearer becomes a Construct. They are immune to Poison damage and the Poisoned, Petrified, and Paralyzed conditions, plus all disease and fatigue. They can heal hit points naturally, and through normal healing spells and abilities, up to half of their maximum, representing the restoration of morale and focus, and the reduction of mental weariness. After this point, they must be repaired by an Arcanotechnician or spells that restore lost hit points to objects and Constructs.
Personal Flame Projectors: As an action, the wearer can project fire from openings in the armor's palms. This produces two 15ft cones which can be aimed at the wearer's discretion and deal 2d8 fire damage. A Dexterity saving throw negates the damage, although a medium or smaller creature grappled by the wearer takes half damage on a successful save. If a creature is in both overlapping cones, they make one save, but take damage from both cones.
Sustenance: The wearer no longer needs to eat, sleep, or breathe (and cannot do these things). They also do not age. If removed from the armor, they will instantly die.

Complications
Infrastructure: This invention requires a Fire or Earth resonant power source. Otherwise, it will power down, leaving the wearer comatose inside of it until the power is restored. The positive energy matrices that anchor the wearer's soul to the armor will persist potentially indefinitely, not allowing them to pass on for centuries or more.
Maintenance: Not just any blacksmith can repair a suit of Power Armor after a rough battle. It will occasionally need to be serviced by an Arcanotechnician or else systems will begin failing.
Materials: This invention has a higher material cost than usual, owing to the significant quantities of rare materials required to create the soul-anchoring fuselage and the many components that interface with it.
Help: If you are not proficient in Medicine, you must have someone who does have that proficiency present for the armor's creation, to consult on the subject of how to perfectly interface the inorganic components of the soul-anchoring fuselage to the future wearer's organic components.
Unreliability: Each month the wearer remains inside the armor, they must make a Charisma saving throw. On a failed save, they develop an Indefinite Madness (DMG pg260), a Long-Term Madness that lasts indefinitely, or a similar psychological condition; the exact effect is chosen by the DM. Once they have developed a condition, they no longer need to make saves. If a condition is cured, the wearer need not make any more saves for 2d4 months afterward, at which point they must start resisting the pull of their mecha-dysmorphia yet again. Some creatures, at the DM's discretion, may not be subject to this Complication - creatures who are so utterly inhuman that never touching, tasting, or smelling again, never interacting with other people as anything but a giant metal monster, never looking or moving like your soul knows you should look and move, would bother them. Like a Modron. Or maybe a Gnome. Even a demon will miss the smell of gore and the warm splash of orphan blood on their face after a time.

Tetra Skyship
Power: 3 Scale: 2
Material Cost: 4,000gp Construction Time: 120 days
Unlike the unsophisticated model of dirigible airships, a proper skyship is held aloft by an elemental engine, which leaves it much less vulnerable to attack and more reliable in operation. A Tetra is a small, flat ship built only to accommodate a maximum of eight medium or small-sized humanoids and their personal equipment in a shared living quarter, plus up to 500lbs of storage (roughly enough to store food and water for eight people for a month), dispensing with amenities (even for the captain) to maximize cost and spacial efficiency. Built sturdy (100hp, 15 AC, Damage Threshold 10), but easy to handle, a Tetra may be crewed by as few as two trained shipmen. Using its collapsible sails, a Tetra can operate at a zippy 10mph if the wind is not against it. With a proper elemental battery (Fire or Air aspected) socketed into its engine, and its sails stowed, it can maintain 20mph under nearly any conditions. A Tetra is not designed for weapons to be mounted on it.

Complications
Infrastructure: To reach its maximum speed, a Tetra requires an elemental battery to be socketed into its engine.
Materials: To construct the elemental engine that makes a skyship possible, bound air elementals must be available during the construction. For such a small ship, its engine only needs one.
Help: Unless you're a trained shipwright, you will need to hire one for the duration of the construction.
Maintenance: An Arcanotechnician must service the engine monthly, or after an event of strenuous use (such as a battle). Else, things may begin to go awry.
Mundane Attention: Flying ships are cool. If you go around showing yours off in a world where no one has them, expect other people to want one. Specifically, expect them to want yours.


Amenities


Body Mods

Composite Replacement Limb
Power: 2 Scale: 1
Material Cost: 200gp Construction Time: 20 Days
This obviously artificial-looking arm or leg is layered, with living wood alchemically treated to connect to its host's vital essence flows forming most of its intricate internal structure, and a thin metal casing to protect it from external harm. So far as it matters, the limb has a Strength of 8 and a Dexterity of 8; tasks requiring both a replacement limb and a person's natural body uses the lower of their own ability score or these numbers. Because of its pseudo-living nature, the host's natural healing, as well as magical healing cast on the host, is transferred to the limb and may repair it as if it were fully organic.

Complications
Unreliability: Once a host has had a replacement limb attached to them, there is a period where they must acclimate to using it. They have Disadvantage on all checks involving the replacement limb for [10 - (Constitution modifier x 2)] days.
Surgery: Safely attaching a replacement limb requires that someone proficient in Medicine be present for the operation. The operation takes 2d4 hours (halved if the character providing the Medicine proficiency somehow applies double their proficiency bonus to Medicine rolls) and is extremely painful, usually inflicting enough physical harm to the patient that they are left at 1 hit point by the end.

Xefas
2017-04-26, 04:28 PM
So, specific things I'm looking for critique/suggestions on/for in regards to the Mechanikos (but feel free to comment on whatever you'd like):

Is the flavor evocative enough to inspire character concepts while reading it?
Does the flavor reflect a demigodlike/fairytalehero-esque character?
Can the flavor support a variety of distinct character concepts?
Are mechanical effects properly explained and easily understood?
After a campaign of play and inventions, will two Mechanikos feel different in what they've done and can do?
Does the Mechanikos' playstyle sound appealing? They're intended to acquire seed money via early adventuring and making small gadgets to help people and/or sell out. Then, with a nice chunk of cash (and the help of their party members) acquire some land and start exploiting its resources with automated mines, quarries, lumber mills, smelters, etc. Then they take that mineral wealth and set up their own ridiculous city-sized pocket of Magipunk inside of Greyhawk or the Forgotten Realms or wherever. Along the way, their inventions create adventure opportunities and cause problems, which invest the other players, and those same inventions empower and aid the players helping the Mechanikos.

Ziegander
2017-04-27, 06:30 PM
I missed this one. Very interested, but I won't have the time to give it a proper review until sometime Saturday or Sunday. I have a long journey ahead of me.

Xefas
2017-04-27, 10:59 PM
I missed this one. Very interested, but I won't have the time to give it a proper review until sometime Saturday or Sunday. I have a long journey ahead of me.

Glad to know it's at least being looked at. I figure the class is a little intimidating at first - it's sort of Wacky Homebrew: The Class, which is liable to put some creative strain on GMs and players who aren't used to that sort of thing - so I was worried it would just get ignored by the forum entirely.

So, I eagerly await your opinion.

A note to lurkers: I added a few more example inventions; two kinds of batteries, an airship, and a basic prosthetic limb.

ImperatorV
2017-04-27, 11:14 PM
This is going to take a few reads to be able to grasp all of it, but I like what I see so far. Those Prime Inventions are going to have a lot of complications though, it'd probably be a 5 level long campaign just to get it up and running! I guess the DM could just be nice and not slap you with the full 12.

Xefas
2017-04-27, 11:47 PM
Those Prime Inventions are going to have a lot of complications though, it'd probably be a 5 level long campaign just to get it up and running! I guess the DM could just be nice and not slap you with the full 12.

Just think of it as giving your party something to do at max level while they wait for me to write the Expert Rules (11-20) :smalltongue:.

It's the Mythos end game! Plot the downfall of gods! Conquer the world! Turn the elven race into the Protoss with a planetary telepathy array!

Norngremlin
2017-04-28, 12:17 AM
Shouldn't Ruin-Class Powered Armor be Power 4, rather than 5? It doesn't seem to be "subverting natural or fundamental forces", and a powered exoskeleton is one of the Power 4 examples.

Xefas
2017-04-28, 12:35 AM
Shouldn't Ruin-Class Powered Armor be Power 4, rather than 5? It doesn't seem to be "subverting natural or fundamental forces", and a powered exoskeleton is one of the Power 4 examples.

You're absolutely correct. I've amended it.

spwack
2017-04-28, 12:10 PM
This seems like something that would benefit from examples for Minor/Major/Prime inventions. Obviously those are being added currently, but I still feel like having several dozen would make things a lot more comfortable (?) for both player and DM. On the flip side, it could result in a list of "these are the things you can do, and no further." which wouldn't be fun at all. In much the same way a certain Teramach ability ends with 'extrapolate as necessary', good solid caveats are needed, in my opinion.

Ziegander
2017-04-28, 07:48 PM
Just finished having a look (I had an 8 hour wait at the airport), definitely enjoying this one much more than the Cynosure (not that it was bad, just a bit too God-Emperor for my style). I don't have any suggestions or concerns at the moment, this is pretty damn good as is, and I want to build Nikola Tesla with a machine body and lightning arm cannons.

Xefas
2017-04-29, 11:27 PM
I made a modification to the Visionary Teacher Of The New Era ability, allowing the Mechanikos to teach classes of many students at a time. I also added a... I'm going to keep calling them sutras, even though I'm not Buddhist (or Hindu or Jainist) and I don't know if sutras have structural rules (like a poetic meter) or if they're just meant to be a pithy thought-provoking statement broken into lines that are easy to remember (which is what I'm hoping they are).


This seems like something that would benefit from examples for Minor/Major/Prime inventions. Obviously those are being added currently, but I still feel like having several dozen would make things a lot more comfortable (?) for both player and DM. On the flip side, it could result in a list of "these are the things you can do, and no further." which wouldn't be fun at all. In much the same way a certain Teramach ability ends with 'extrapolate as necessary', good solid caveats are needed, in my opinion.

I would like to eventually get a few dozen examples together. Another non-Gaea power plant (with batteries), some more resource gatherers, magitech equivalents to some modern conveniences, another class or two of power armor, another skyship or two, maybe a monorail (monorail!), and some organ replacements.

Any ideas for something you'd like to see?

Confining a player into a creative box is, of course, a potential hazard. But I like to think that the players to whom this class most appeals will also be the kind to disregard currency, acquire courtesans the preconceived and push onward towards their own vision. The kind of person who asks "Why wouldn't I want a battery of robotic tentacles grafted to my spinal column? Why wouldn't I inject my granddaughter with a nanobot swarm that can reconfigure her into a car in times of emergency? Why wouldn't I add cells taken from the space-cthulhu that crashed into the planet into my super-soldier-growing vats?"


I want to build Nikola Tesla with a machine body and lightning arm cannons.

Or this.

Gideon Falcon
2017-04-30, 12:11 AM
Do you plan on giving any examples of Prime Inventions?

Norngremlin
2017-04-30, 02:22 AM
Any ideas for something you'd like to see?
Giant Robots! (In particular, I'd prefer if they were genuinely huge. "At least the size of Mazinger Z or a Gundam" (~18-20 meters) huge. I am so sick of RPGs trying to pass off a slightly oversized suit of powered armor as a giant robot.)

Xefas
2017-04-30, 03:56 AM
Alright, I've added one more invention tonight: Martyr-Class Power Armor. Now I'm off to bed.


Do you plan on giving any examples of Prime Inventions?

Yes.


Giant Robots! (In particular, I'd prefer if they were genuinely huge. "At least the size of Mazinger Z or a Gundam" (~18-20 meters) huge. I am so sick of RPGs trying to pass off a slightly oversized suit of powered armor as a giant robot.)

Maybe.

Norngremlin
2017-04-30, 04:28 AM
Oh yeah, since I meant to say so earlier, but forgot, I'd just like to say that sutra is pretty rad. (As are all the example inventions. And the entire class, for that matter.)

Ziegander
2017-04-30, 10:15 AM
Why wouldn't I add cells taken from the space-cthulhu that crashed into the planet into my super-soldier-growing vats?"

Summon the horde. Wake the Beast. Reference to Jonathan Hickman's Secret Warriors?

ImperatorV
2017-04-30, 12:12 PM
Giant Robots! (In particular, I'd prefer if they were genuinely huge. "At least the size of Mazinger Z or a Gundam" (~18-20 meters) huge. I am so sick of RPGs trying to pass off a slightly oversized suit of powered armor as a giant robot.)

Power 5 scale 5 could cover this I think (power 5 because something so huge would be very unnatural, scale 5 as you could probably take over a nation with one). The hard part would be stating it. Not sure I'd want to deal with that.

...I could definitely see a campaign where a Mechanikos builds a giant robot to fight the Tarrasque.

roko10
2017-04-30, 12:44 PM
I'd think that it would be more a P4 (I mean, the square-cube law is already dead and buried considering giants are a thing, and those are most definitely natural) S2 thing for lower-end mecha like Scopedogs, and P4 S3-S4 for something akin to Gundams. I mean, you probably can't conquer the world with a singular Real Robot like the RX-78 or a Veritech. Heck even S1 might be appropriate considering the Powered Armors are S1 and most RR's are basically like powered armor.

On the other hand, something like Mazinger or Getter Robo would definitely be P5 S5. And then we go into stuff like the Gurren Lagann and Turn A which would definitely be P6 S6 if not more.

Inevitability
2017-05-01, 08:02 AM
Xefas: you're truly a limitless source of awesome material. Now to convince my DM to allow this.

Shurz
2017-05-02, 09:58 AM
so, to put his into perspective, a S4 would be like one of the Pyramids of Giza but the Lighthouse of Alexandria would be a S5 ?
Unless of course worshipping the Pyramid or the entity it represents is for a religion or cult represented in more than the country it resides in?

How would you classify the old wonders of the world - or any of the modern ones for that to provide some examples?

Would you differentiate between religious and economical effect?

Xefas
2017-05-02, 04:31 PM
Summon the horde. Wake the Beast. Reference to Jonathan Hickman's Secret Warriors?

Never read Secret Warriors. It's actually my one-sentence plot synopsis for Final Fantasy 7. =P


so, to put his into perspective, a S4 would be like one of the Pyramids of Giza but the Lighthouse of Alexandria would be a S5 ?
Unless of course worshipping the Pyramid or the entity it represents is for a religion or cult represented in more than the country it resides in?

How would you classify the old wonders of the world - or any of the modern ones for that to provide some examples?

Would you differentiate between religious and economical effect?

A Mechanikos isn't the right person to build the Pyramids of Giza, I don't think. There will be another crafting class, based on the brother of the Maker, who makes things that are beautiful and awe-inspiring - things with artistic and religious significance. Like, the Mechanikos could make a machine in the shape of a pyramid, but the pyramid would have to be kind of gnarly looking and gearpunky, and it would have to do something, like channel geomantic energy to control the weather or transform into an enormous tank. The Mechanikos is just too neurotically Rick to make something with a primary purpose of being a fancy coffin.

The Anthols of Design (name pending) cleave the other way. They don't make things that do stuff. They make experiences, and one such experience could be a monument so breathtaking that it captures the hearts of a nation and solidifies in their mind the divinity of their ruler.

The Lighthouse of Alexandria, if it had an occult lens array that could focus its light into a ship-destroying fire beam in times of need, could be built by a Mechanikos. Maybe I'll add that to the pile of example inventions to write.

VoodooPaladin
2017-05-02, 11:47 PM
A Mechanikos isn't the right person to build the Pyramids of Giza, I don't think.

Just to chime in: if I read this right, could a Mechanikos could make a Might and Magic pyramid (i.e. a giant mummy factory)? A monumental stone shell that pulls in Negative energy and contains it within a nigh-unbreakable Earth-aligned crystalline matrix, vast sequences of runes and hieroglyphs that form elaborate guide-wire networks for innumerable Positive energy-resonant preserved organs within a series of canopic chamber complexes, and as many bodies as can be fit underground just marinating in hermetically-sealed boxes used to regulate life/death mixtures until the soul can be recalled via controlled Astral destabilization?

What I'm trying to ask is: is the Maker's Mythos okay with religious and philosophical imagery, provided the spirit of such things is first violated in a fashion aligned with its own ideals of Progress and Innovation?

Xefas
2017-05-03, 12:22 AM
Just to chime in: if I read this right, could a Mechanikos could make a Might and Magic pyramid (i.e. a giant mummy factory)? A monumental stone shell that pulls in Negative energy and contains it within a nigh-unbreakable Earth-aligned crystalline matrix, vast sequences of runes and hieroglyphs that form elaborate guide-wire networks for innumerable Positive energy-resonant preserved organs within a series of canopic chamber complexes, and as many bodies as can be fit underground just marinating in hermetically-sealed boxes used to regulate life/death mixtures until the soul can be recalled via controlled Astral destabilization?

What I'm trying to ask is: is the Maker's Mythos okay with religious and philosophical imagery, provided the spirit of such things is first violated in a fashion aligned with its own ideals of Progress and Innovation?

Yes to everything.