D&D 4E Sci-fi 4e Reskin

[Garthanos]

a presentient bard has a cybernetic link into a really large computer which is constantly trying to predict the future base on the sensory input provided by all of these bards... sometimes it works very well indeed.

If it was more primal than arcane the same could be a hive mind function... The link could be a gene therapy construct.. the mind could be an alien instead of a computer multiclass warlock?

 

[JoeNotCharles]

Even if you're not using the entire Dune setting, one specific idea might help a lot with adaptation: the idea that personal shields are so advanced that they stop most forms of ranged attacks, but there's some loophole that lets melee weapons in. Or at least, any ranged weapon that can get through the personal shield is complex enough that it takes special training to use.

Here's an idea:

Biorhythm Pulse Shield

This common personal shield generates a field that repels weapon and energy fire. Because it is not possible to completely encase the wearer, the shield's protected area ripples with pseudorandom patterns synchronized with the wearer's body movements. It is possible, but very difficult, to penetrate the shield by timing a shot perfectly. There are many specialized techniques, all difficult to master, to defeat the shield's random pattern generation; one of the more common is to close to melee range, as shields in close proximity will influence each other.

 

[Garthanos]

personal shields that dont interfere much with movement = light magical armor
those whose fields create too mch inertia... are heavy magical armor ;-)

Even better they could both be summoned magic armor.

 

[Cwheeler]

Bard: Bards use cybernetic implants tap into the ragged remains of the Datasphere, gathering information and using it to manipulate what is left of the nanite web. Bards describe their interaction with technology as a an artistic process, relying on equal parts instinct and understanding.

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For a moment, I considered going through the PHB and giving a possible descriptor for all the various armor & weapon enchantments, but in reality, I just don't have the time to do so.

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Magic items become "Advanced Items"

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Advanced items from the Eberron Players Guide:

Embeded Components: Embedded components become cybernetic implants, and are accessable by more than just warforged (cybrids).

But how to grant access... Should it be a pureley aesthetic consideration, should cybernetic implants cost slightly more, or should they require a feat to use?

If the feat solution is used, then it could be given out for free to certain classes.

Symbiots, Grafts & Parasites: These follow the same rules as Cybernetic implants, but a character can not use both cybernetics and organics. If a feat is required to commune & use symbiotes, then it should be given for free to all primal classes.

Some Symiotes are sentient. For this, use the inteligent item rules from Dragon (I think that's where they where printed).

Some Cybernetic Implants or Advanced items (magic items) contain basic AI programs. Again, use the rules from Dragon.


Dragonshards: Re-theme as Power Cells, and use them to imbue weapons with various properties.

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Races

Races are divided into Species, which include Alien, Fayen, Goblinoids and Humanoids.


Humanoids:
Several of the races that are found in the galaxy are so similar that scientists have stipulated that they must come from a single progenitor genestock. Nonetheless, they have evolved distinct customs and cultures, and have managed to maintain their genetic diversity even when living side-by-side.

These races include Elves, Dwarves, Orcs Humans and Halflings, Half-elves and Half-Orcs.

Fayens:
The Fayen peoples appear strange and unearthly. They inhabit the strange places between dimensions, and their cities often exist in folds of reality that cannot be perceived by humanoid eyes.

Fayens include Eladrin and Gnomes.

Aliens: Alien cultures are diverse and varied, and stem from various worlds and places in the galaxy. There is no unifying factor to the alien cultures - each stands in it's own right.

Aliens include Dragonborn, Dopplegangers, Gith, Goliaths, Koblolds and Teilflings.

Golbinoids: Similar in some ways to the humanoids, the goblinoid species can probably all be traced back to a single progenitor race. They vary greatly in appearance and behavior, and form a variety of civilizations and cultures.

Goblinoids include Bugbears, Goblins and Hobgoblins.


Other Races: There are some races that do not fit in the above categories.

Cybrids (warforged): the origins of the cybrid race are lost in the depths of antiquity. They are self-maintaining constructs with a psudo-biological makeup. No new cybrids have been made for centuries, and the method of their creation is lost. They are, however, occasionally found in an unactivated state stashed in remote locations.

Deva: Devas Remain a mystery. Some believe that they are manifestations of a cosmic or divine energy, others that they are physical extensions of the universe it's self, or even creations of the self-aware remnants of the Datasphere and the Nannite web.

Kalashtar: Kalashtar descended from the same stock as humanoids, but become members of a distinctly different race when they discovered and melded with parasitic psionic entities known as the Quori. They maintain majestic crystalline cities in the remote corners of the galaxy, and wield impressive psionic powers.

Shifters: Many believe that the shifters come from humanoid gene-stock, and where genetically modified to live on savage worlds. The Shifters, however, maintain that they evolved as an entirely separate species.

There are many other races that could be used, but these should do for now.

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Biorhythm Pulse Shield

This common personal shield generates a field that repels weapon and energy fire. Because it is not possible to completely encase the wearer, the shield's protected area ripples with pseudorandom patterns synchronized with the wearer's body movements. It is possible, but very difficult, to penetrate the shield by timing a shot perfectly. There are many specialized techniques, all difficult to master, to defeat the shield's random pattern generation; one of the more common is to close to melee range, as shields in close proximity will influence each other.

To me, this seems like a bit of a bandaid to try and explain away D&D's focus on close combat, and sits a little strangely with me.

It also runs the risk of nerfing characters with a reliance on ranged powers

I'd rather just theme the world as having more to do with mele combat, and maybe include some chatracter options from Amethyst when it comes out.

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A quick note on technology: This setting can easily blend feudal and future technologies to give it a rich theme. At low levels, PC's may well be wearing plate, scale or leather armor, and upgrade to Kevlar, Powered armor and Forcefeilds when they have the money.

 

[Garthanos]

Bard: Bards use cybernetic implants tap into the ragged remains of the Datasphere, gathering information and using it to manipulate what is left of the nanite web. Bards describe their interaction with technology as a an artistic process, relying on equal parts instinct and understanding.

Yup - the character type that I had with this was called a Techno-mage - they tend to present what they do as though it were really old fashioned magic.. intimidating those who susceptable to superstitions and hiding how there magic really works

In your story they dont want people to know exactly how much of the Datasphere and its nanite tendrils are still webbed throughout all parts of the galaxy... so they obsfucate...

 

[Garthanos]

Some individuals linked to the Datashpere might be naturals getting random feedback at times... they might be built as deva --- or at least with the deva history and past life like memories.

 

[Cwheeler]

A few more Notes

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DataMarks

These Strange symbols are conferred by the semi-sentient remnants of the Datasphere and the Nannite Web. No one is certain of their purpose, but rumors are abound of plots, plans and prophecies, and no one is sure if the bearers of the marks are instigators of these plans or merely pawns.

They appear as shimmering blue circuit-board patterns on the skins of their bearers.

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Rituals are replaced by Procedures.

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Other Arcane Classes:
Artificer: The artificer is a master of technological gadgetry. They are able to construct and enhance weapons and armor, and create small, robotic servants for use in the battlefield.

Swordmage: Swordmages use advanced cybernetics to channel different energies and forces through their weapons. By the end of their advancement, they are often more robotic than living.

 

[Garthanos]

I would emphasize the use of dimension warping technology for the swordmages... teleportation and sheilds... not armor.

 

[JoeNotCharles]

Another idea is Battletech 4E: outside your mechs, your characters have few powers and abilities (hell, use a different RPG altogether for this scale) but when you climb into a giant war robot, you get your 4E abilities. The "class" now makes more sense since the machine is actually manufactured like this, it's not just skills picked up over your career. Multiclassing means heavily modifying your mech with parts from another class. Standard weapons and armour are equipment upgrades; magic is poorly understood alien tech.

The "dying" status indicates that the pilot is injured and unconscious, but they can be brought back by activating the mech's built-in medkit and injecting them with stimulants. This explains how a mech can go from "almost out of the fight" to "working perfectly" in a round.

Defender-class mechs put most of their power output towards shielding and weapons that pack a punch up-close, but trade off the ability to make long-range attacks
Striker-class mechs focus on maneuverability or long-range weapons, with most of their energy going towards engines and jump jets or towards advanced stabilization platforms for a long-range weapon platform
Leader-class mechs are combat support and include advanced comm packages and the ability to remote-pilot other mechs
Controller-class mechs carry lots of missiles, including experimental small-scale Genesis bombs

Engineers divide the mech power sources into 4 classes, although it's possible to adapt certain upgrades to other power sources:

"Martial" mechs are built on classical engineering principles but at a larger scale. They don't have as many exotic capabilities, but they're considered more reliable. The best engineers can push the envelope of design to make them do things that should only be possible with exotic technology.

"Arcane" mechs (an engineering in-joke based on the complexity of the design) are upgraded with advanced technology, mostly reverse-engineered from aliens. Although the specs are always better than Martial mechs, there's a high tendency to break down.

"Divine" mechs contain technology received as gifts from the Progenitors, a highly advanced alien race which occasionally chooses to "uplift" younger species for its own bizarre reasons. "Divine" technology is completely opaque to engineers, but modular enough to slot into an existing mech design easily and rarely if ever fails. Many pilots and engineers don't trust it, but it's so useful that many others grudgingly accept it or even prefer to work with it.

"Primal" mechs are a new design, built from the ground up around a biological power source known as Protoculture. One of the more common effects is the ability of a mech to transform from a humanoid shape to that of a jet or tank.

There are rumours of "Psionic" mechs on the drawing boards, which contain amplification helmets allowing the pilot to project their own mental abilities across the battlefield.

Some common classes of mechs:

"Fighter" class mechs are one of the oldest and most reliable in use, and the exemplar of the defender role. With heavy armour and powerful short-range guns, they excel at getting up close to enemy mechs and locking down their position. They've recently been augmented with a new design codenamed "Battlerage" that redirects the power-plant output to temporary shields with every attack.

"Ranger" class mechs are a versatile scouting platform, with designs emphasizing mobility and others built around a state-of-the-art long-range sniper rifle. A new design codenamed "Beastmaster" features on-board drones.

"Rogue" class mechs are incredibly maneuverable and built for precision strikes.

"Warlord" class mechs are a standard officer's mech, with advanced tactical overviews and a medical monitor on each subordinate's mech. They have the ability to remote-activate subordinate's weapons and medkits.

"Wizard" class mechs are the standard weapons platform for experimental technologies, including everything from missiles that do incredible blast damage, to terrain-deforming effects, to holographic generators, to self-assembline nanite drones.

"Swordmage" class mechs are built around a teleportation and dimensional warp system.

"Sorceror" class mechs have the most cutting-edge advanced weaponry, which is also often the most unreliable. (The old engineer's joke that it works "depending on the phase of the moon" almost seems to hold true for some of these.)

"Warlock" class mechs have weaponry adapted from specific alien races.

"Bard" class mechs are Warlord-class mechs augmented with experimental technology (including one configuration that includes a quantum computer to predict battlefield conditions in advance!)

And so on...

 

[Cwheeler]

That is F#%&ing awesome.

Very different to the world that I was building but awesome nonetheless.

I like the suggestion of using a different ruleset for the characters outside the mechs. If the size difference wasn't too great between to two, (say, if the mech's where large, or , at the most, huge), you could actually use 3rd-ed based rules for the characters outside of the mechs. d20 Modern would probably be the best fit.

The rational here is that they would still be able to interact, and possibly even fight each other, but there would be a distinct and noticeable difference in power between the two.

Characters on the ground would have less hit points, deal less damage, and would not have healing surges or regular powers. With the right equipment and tactics, they could probably deal with a mech, but not easily.

It could also be interesting to increase mech-size with tier.
Heroic Mechs would be Large
Paragon Mechs would be Huge
Epic Mechs would be Gargantuan

This scaling would only really come into play in the human-scale part of the game.

It could easily be reversed though:

Large Mech scale: 4 medium creatures can fit in one square.
Huge Mech scale: 9 medium creatures can fit in one square
Gargantuan Mech scale: 16 medium creatures can fit in one square.


At these larger scales, mech powers that target a creature can target a square instead.

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A few modifications would sill be have to made to allow the two combat systems to dovetail more smoothly. (whether you'll use grab or gapple, five foot steps or slides, etc)

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Skills:

Skills would have to be streamlined a little (Trained/untrained rather than ranks, Using perception rather than spot, Listen & search, etc.)

The Mechs and the pilots each have different sets of skills.

Skill Synergy: If a mech is piloted by someone with overlapping skills, then the mech gets +2 to each skill that the pilot is also trained in.

(This means that some people are well-suited to their mechs)

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Hit Points:

Mechs and pilots have separate hit point totals.

Pilots gain half their Hit dice type per level.

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Levels:

A simple system to allow d20 Modern characters to get to 30th level would be needed.

This could easily be an extension of the existing tables, and the focus in Modern on multicalssing would work well with this.

Both the mechs and the pilots would need to gain experience and level up at the same rates.

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A note on Bio-Mechs:

Rather than seeing these as transformers, I’d see them as much more similar to the Evas from Neon Genesis: They are biological, they are alive, and are sometimes barely restrained by their technological shackles

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Should this stuff be forked into a new thread?