Goodman Games

So, I am reading up on the various classes / equipment / ect in my new Etherscope book and I realized I need to ask this question. My wife wants to play, which is cool. However, she wants to play a robot. Or as close to a robot as she can get.

I had the idea however, since the tech level is not high enough for true AI, to have her character be a human brain inside a robot body. However, I have no idea how to make this work and if its even possible.

Basically, it would be enough cybernautics that she would be more machine then person obviously. I had the idea that maybe an EXTREMELY wealthy family had a child who was terminally ill, and had a doctor perform this radical procedure that took the brain of the child and placed it into this shell.

But I still have no idea how to explain it / make it work or if its even feasible.

That tech level isn't something we envisioned for the world but go for it, some great roleplaying opportunities. I was a big fan of Grant Morrisons take on how Robot Man's sense of self and his humanity was affected by such a process in Doom Patrol. Be good as a Eugenics League unique experiment, plenty of plot hooks that way, some goood for her some not so good, nothing comes without a price in Etherscope Mechanically, it would be a bit unbalanced to start a character with complete body replacement in cybenaughtic equivalents, though possible between the rulebook and Upload: Etherpunk. Alternatively, adapt the robot rules in D20 Future if you can get access to them, not sure if there's an SRD, which are balanced too standard D20 modern characters and will therefore work well with Etherscope balance. Another alternative is to persuade her to build up through Enginaught/Cybernaught and max those CPP feats. This could be linked to a degenerative disease necessitating constant body part replacement, another cool plot/character hook. Now I'm thinking about the old Avengers, TV show, cybernaught stories, scenario idea coming on I suspect Hope this helps.

It sounds like something that would be cool, but with the cybernaughtics RAW, it's not really possible to make a character at 1st level who would have a completely cybernaughtic body.

But I say don't let that stop you!

But my first question is: are you playing this game with anyone else but your wife?

If so, allowing one character to do this is going to open up doors to other players wanting to do the same! If not, then who else is going to care?

Maybe a new racial type? I don't know, at work and don't have the books with me atm to look over or that much time to work on thoughts (took me over 45 min or so just to type this reply lol).

It's an interesting premise...

Thus far no one else cares.

I am figuring that having a body like this would have penalities like no con score (its not a living creature) and having maybe the standard D20 rules for Constructs applied to it.

I could also rig up the Warforged Rules from Eberron to work... in fact that might work out 0_0

Just having the creation be Ether powered.

I 'm running an Eberron game right now, so yeah, I can see where a Warforged adaptation as a living construct could fit very well.

Lemme know how that works out!

Sounds good to me
I do not have Eberron nor d20 Future
But being a long time Champions fan and fan of The Frankenstein's Monster as well I like this idea and were I running the game would figure something out.

Perhaps a Clockwork type concept, Ether powered.

Hmmm, so take the core stats for a construct, 1 HD of course per the Modern SRD. Likely Enginaught class and get a scope point. Define the intelligence as a AI like massive program running in the scope. So essentially a AI in a Clockwork type body. So as the character gets EP, adds on Experience, gets more HD, etc.

My first thoughts.

tadk wrote:Sounds good to me
I do not have Eberron nor d20 Future
But being a long time Champions fan and fan of The Frankenstein's Monster as well I like this idea and were I running the game would figure something out.

Perhaps a Clockwork type concept, Ether powered.

Hmmm, so take the core stats for a construct, 1 HD of course per the Modern SRD. Likely Enginaught class and get a scope point. Define the intelligence as a AI like massive program running in the scope. So essentially a AI in a Clockwork type body. So as the character gets EP, adds on Experience, gets more HD, etc.

My first thoughts.

Ok I havent gotten that far in so what the devil is a scope point, and what is EP?

Scope Point being one method of entering the Ether
EP = Experience Points

My take on this would be to make a new cyber option - cyber body - that was available to starting characters if they took all the possibly available cyber options on one app. This would then include a stack of starting bonuses and penalties appropriate to the situation, yet leave room available for upgrading with further apps as the character develops.

I'll put some ideas together and post a suggestion here later.

Cheerio for now,

Ben

Okay, here's how I'd do it:

New cybernaughtic app: Cybernaughtic body replacement

Cost: 7 (you need two major cybernaughtic app feats and the enginaught talent to get it at first level, the second feat is available to proletariat)
Tolerance: 10
Minimum Con: 19
Size: n/a
Effects:
Your entire body has been replaced by a cybernaughtic human-form body. You gain +10 hp and immunities to energy drain and ability drain targetting Str, Dex and Con. You are immune to diseases and poisons, unless these affect your nervous system, and (in the case of poisons) are able to penetrate your body and attack to your nervous system (-4 to hit and must overcome double hardness based on App grade to do so with contact or injected poisons, inhaled work as normal as you still have to get oxygen to your brain somehow). As your body needs much less oxygen to work on you can hold your breath for 4x your constitution score in rounds before you must make con checks. Further apps can be added as upgrades, and some upgrades can be added without adding the basic app, where appropriate (e.g. you can get the additional power upgrade of the cybernaughtic arm without having to get the arm itself - you;ve already got two cybernaughtic arms). Such upgrades count as having 2 less tolerance for teh purposes of doing so. You do not need to eat or drink, but must sleep and suffer mind-based effects as normal. Your physical ability scores determine the effectiveness of your machine body, but you gain a +2 bonus to strength but a -2 penalty to dexterity on top of normal modifiers. You cannot be healed by Knowledge (medicine) and do not recover hit points naturally. You can, however, be repaired in the same manner as a construct (DC 30, 1 hour, repairs 1d10 hp). You do not make death and dying rolls and are destroyed if you ever get to 0 hp (this sounds a bit nasty - maybe make it a DC 40 repair roll - although they do have 10 bonus hp, so maybe not... any thoughts?)

I think thats about all for now, I'l leave it up here fore people to cogitate on and suggest alterations and by the end of teh discussion you might have something workable...

Cheerio,

Ben

Thanks so far.

Tadk's idea is closer to what my wife would like but I am curious on how to make it work exactly...

Hrmmmm

Like Nigel, I'm a big fan of what Grant Morrison did with Robot-Man in his brilliant Doom Patrol revamp. As for how to get there....

I'm intrigued by tadk's idea. Instead of having your wife's character transformed into a robot, you could say that her character's mind somehow becomes trapped in Etherspace, her living body is killed, and someone develops an ether-powered clockwork creation to house her intelligence (or "soul"). So, as tadk described, she'd be the equivalent of an intelligent, self-aware, emotional program housed in a mobile, clockwork construct, subject to the advantages and disadvantages of being a construct.

I am trying to figure out how to balance her, stat wise.

Her Mental Stats would be based on the fact that she is a program..

While her Physical Stats would be based on her metal body.

So her Int and Wis would be fairly easy to figure out.

Her Str and Dex are based on the body...

Con is nonexistant as Constructs have no Con Score.

Cha is giving me some problems as well.

Also, how to work out classes/HD.