skippy_the_witch
First Post
Kamikaze Midget said:
I found the Magic of Incarnum to be EXACTLY what I needed for a VERY important race in my Homebrew, humans. Mine is a psuedo post apocalyptic technomagic world where all of the base races either had to make some substantial changes or are extinct, most especially the humans. There are VERY few unchanged humans in my world, most of those being from inbred "aristocratic" families or slaves from the breeding pits of Technodemons. The humans in the Wild (the D&D with a Gamma World twist) changed to mostly become half-elves (the aboriginal elves are extinct, but had a plan to breed with humans and recreate there race, sorta like the Bene Gesserit of Dune), plane touched (aasimar and tieflings mostly...their ancestors bonded with dying outsiders, as the link to the astral and outer planes was severed by the apocalypse), dragon touched (sorcers gathered and saved by dragons and being bred by them for their own prophecy and reasons), and shifters (straight from eberron). With the "civilized" and high-technomagic Federation, the human survivors bred with a genetically/magically engineered race of slave super soldiers called Mesadans, and it is with these Mesadans that the MoI comes in.
During the "Golden Age" of the Ancients, when you had flying cars, mecha, robots (4th generation golems), etc (all of which the Federation's TM is a pale shadow of), there devoloped the various arcane sciences of genetic engineering. Much of this stayed completely within the biological sphere, creating everything from shifters, to anime style half-animals, to Dalkyr-like biological abominations and bio-tech symbiots. Except for the last, the only problem with all of these is that they tended to be VERY specialized, and so did not make good super soldiers, as a battle field has more in flux and chaos going on then almost anything else. Unless their specialty was specifically called for or needed, these creations tended to die as soon as the tactical situation changed. This was even true of the bio-tech users, who could change symbiots between missions, but if cut off from their bases, also effectively became specialists. Then came the developement of the technomagical nanite (I sometimes refer to them as "metaclorions" or whatever George called them just to mess with a player of mine who developes an interesting twitch when I use the term), which were not powered by arcane, divine, or psionic energies. Instead, these tiny constructs, now called "incarnites", seemed to be both technomagical machines and psuedo-biological at the same time, allowing them to somehow transcend their nature and tap into general "life-force", soul-energy, or even just "the Force" of the universe. Incarnites are not powered by any specific soul, living or dead, but by the overall soul-energy or life-force of everything, and since this Force cannot be destroyed or consumed, only altered, it became the perfect vehicle with which to allow the creation of a super soldier.
Modified from basic human stock, Mesadans entire physiology is designed to be enhanced by and work with the incarnates to create various effects. Like the darklings and azurans, the mesadans start with a racial point of essentia, that they can use to enhance their healing, boost their fortitude saves, and enhance their senses (low-light vision, eyesight [spot cks], and hearing [listen cks] only). Like antibodies, incarnites pass from a mother into the unborn child in the womb, but also perform changes while in the womb, or cause spontaneous abortions if unable to affect a repair or modification. Thus, birth defects of ANY sort are entirely unknown among mesadans, and their are no "half-breeds", as a mesadan mother ALWAYS produces a mesadan offspring or is infertile, depending upon the race of the father. Mesadan males are ONLY fertile with mesadan females, as their incarnites prevent them from impregnating any other type of females. Given that the apocalypse cut off most sources of divine magic and made the use of most forms of arcane magic rather dangerous (I adapted some Taint rules from Rokugan), but seemed not to affect the Incarnum powers, mesadans had an advantage over most of the other races, and thus were more likely to survive, especially during the early years. The fact that they were trained soldiers and that their command structure (at least on the tactical level) more or less remained intact also helped. Thus, the very small population of Mesadan Genessaries (genetically engineered Jannissaries...i.e. slave soldiers) interbred with the normal humans they saved, with the next generation becoming almost entirely mesadans.
Incarnites allow a mesadan to manipulate the incarnum and essentia pretty much as the mechanics of MoI list, but without all the alignment garbage. Instead of oversized video game glowing stupid looking soulmelds, the soulmelds of a mesadan have a more subtle and techno look, much like the magical effects from the Red Star comic and like products. For example, a soulmeld that enhanced attack rolls might combine a glow around the appropriate body part (especially if bound to the chakra) and a Heads-Up-Display like image which showed best way to strike through opponents defenses. The same would also be true for a soulmeld that did damage, except the HUD in that case would flash vulnerable places of where to strike. One wierdness of this is that both the slight glow of the enhanced body part and the HUD are actually visible to all that look closely (but are NOT bright enough to affect stealth rolls or the like, as the HUD is barely visible and the glow can be hidden under clothing/armor). Those soulmelds that give direct AC bonuses would appear as a brighter field when hit, especially if they also give any sort of DR. Since I really like the HUD aspect, even a soulmeld like this would probably have some sort of counter in the corner measuring the force of the hits, current "shield" strength, etc. Basically, most soulmeld would cause the appropriate body part of glow (maybe with some sort of secondary visual cue) and a minor HUD visualization. Those soulmelds that have energy effects would do that same thing with the glow, thus a pair of lightning gauntlets would cause a mesadans hands to glow with crackling lightning, especially when bound to the hand chakra. The important thing to remember is that these types of soulmelds are NEVER actual physical objects as such, even if they have a physical effect, such as deflecting blows or allowing flight. Thus, a mesadan incarnate's "crystal helm" does not get in the way of him wearing a regular armored helmet if he wishes, or even a completely contained powered armor suit, since the "helm" is completely insubstantial. Since the mechanics say that a soulmeld cannot be sundered or destroyed except by specific attacks or magic, there is no reason for them to be actual objects.
For the purpose of those soul melds that actually have a different power depending upon the alignment of the incarnate, I have simply stripped out the alignment of this and changed it so that any incarnate can create any of these soulmelds, but all of his current souldmelds must match. The new types are as follows:
Chaos --> Fractal
Evil --> Destructive
Good --> Defensive
Law --> Offensive
From the incarnate class, I removed all alignment restrictions and made the following minor changes:
*replace Detect Opposition with Detect Incarnum
*Soulmeld choices and restrictions are no longer alignment based (why should an evil incarnate not be able to create a pair of Armguards of Disruption if a good cleric can cast evil spells with no real mechanical penalty, and vice versa).
*Do not have the "aura" special ability at all. Incarnates radiant their alignment no more or no less then anybody else. On the other hand, they do show up to a Detect Magic check in much the same way as they would have to a Detect Law/Chaos/Evil/Good.
*The mechanical basics of the Incarnum Radiance special ability remains the same, BUT the incarnate is able to CHOOSE which aura to radiate (renamed as above) each day when he creates his soulmelds. Once chosen, the aura CANNOT be changed until he again reshapes his soulmelds (basically, daily). This choice may limit what soulmelds he can have and how these soulmelds perform. Thus, an incarnate that chooses a Defensive Incarnum Aura will also only be able to use Incarnate Avatar soulmeld as if he was a "good" incarnate.
*Share Incarnum Radiance can be done with ALL allies, regardless of alignment.
*True Incarnation still changes the character to an outsider, but with no particular alignment descriptor. Also, while your natural and weapon attacks are not treated as aligned, instead they are henceforth treated as magical for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction.
The only real change I needed to make in soulmelds were as followed:
*Incarnate Avatar matches the descriptor of the chosen Incarnate Aura, thus a Fractal Incarnate Aura means that the Incarnate Avatar would grant the "chaos" abilities.
*Lammasu Mantle is no longer an incarnate soulmeld, only available to totemists (never understood why this one was permitted in the first place).
*Necrocarnum soulmelds are only available to those with the Necrocarnum Acolyte feat.
*Incarnate Weapon soulmeld is no longer based on alignment, and thus, cannot overcome those types of damage reduction. Instead, it is treated as a magic weapon (much like a soulknife's mindblade) for purposes of overcoming damage reduction. Also, the incarnate can shape it into any one handed melee weapon he wishes, BUT he will only know the shape of one weapon plus one per every five manifestor levels. Thus, a 10th level incarnate would be able to create three different types of Incarnate Weapon soulmelds. When the Incarnate Weapon soulmeld is bound to the arm chakra, the stunning power may be used against any legitimate target, not just those with an alignment opposed to the incarnate's.
*Soulspark Familiar soulmeld is the ONLY soulmeld that remains alignment based, but this is because it is a piece of the incarnates actual soul, much like a psion's psicrystal.
Because I needed zealot orders of incarnum users, I left the soulborn pretty much as written, at least mechanically. As has already been stated many times, the totemist is fine as is, and so I made no change, except for flavor, for these are the barbaric descendants of mesadans and like incarnum races left on their own in the Wild. The stresses and supernatural forces of the apocalypse also opened up to totemist to other barbaric races and tribes.
Like I said, I was beating my head against the wall trying to come up with some sort of magical nanite enhanced super soldiers who could do many physical and magical things without being so specialized, and MoI mechanics fit perfectly, with VERY little modification.
skippy
GM of The Cursed Earth Campaign
), but so far I've only had a Totemist in play so far (which was played by me). I'm with many of the posters that liked the mechanics, but didn't like the flavor. I had to tweak it a bit to better fit in with the world we dungeon crawl in, but beyond that I enjoy the character. There's just not too many others wanting to jump on the bandwagon.
