Artifact armour mechanics

Jukashi

Jukashi

Four Thousand Club
So I've been toying with a few ideas for a new set of artifacts and whatnot, and the area I'm probably most iffy on is armour. Here are the mechanics for a suit I've been thinking of; tell me what you think of them. The main inspirations I'm drawing from are Halo and Metroid.


Deep Underground Solar Tactical Suit


Artifact 3


Repair 2


Beings capable of channeling essence may commit 5 motes to attune this armour; in an emergency, it can also be induced to run off its main battery, but the suit will drain quickly - see below. Human-sized DUST suits possess a hearthstone slot in the center of the chest, most of which are worked to resemble the symbol of the Dawn Caste.


The armour has the following features:


Sun Cylinder Damage Deflection Field: The DUST suit itself is somewhat more fragile than comparable artifact armours, consisting of a vegetative undersuit, crystalline panels and portions of magitech, mostly concentrated in the back and shoulders. It's protective virtue lies in the essence shield system, which runs off the Sun Cylinder, a crystalline essence battery. When powered, the shield absorbs damage; in addition to a soak of 8A/8L/8B and a hardness of 4, it also grants 5 -0 health levels. These health levels represent the Sun Cylinder's remaining power; if they run out, the shield disappears, and the suit's less beneficial physical soak is used. Running the suit solely off its own power drains one health level from the shields for every minute of operation. The shields become visible temporarily when they take damage, and their glow can betray their user's position.


Recharge Mode*: All is not lost should the suit lose power; by spending 2 motes (or expending a health level of shield power, if any remains), the user can induce the suit to enter a state where it can absorb sunlight for essence. However, this causes several of the crystalline plates to lift and angle themselves appropriately; not only does this require the deactivation of any remaining shielding, it compromises the suit's innate protective value (reducing all soaks to 2) and inhibits movement, inducing a -1 penalty to movement-based rolls. It also requires a source of sunlight; either the sun itself, a Solar anima at the 11-15 mote display level or a similar equivalent. If all these requirements are fulfilled, however, the suit's shields will regain the one health level every 5 minutes.


Personal Illumination Visor*: Negates all Awareness penalties from darkness.


Filtration Baffles*: +2 to Resistance against posion or all forms of disease (including wound infection); one-hour supply of fresh air (refilling the tank in fresh air takes one minute per five minutes of air added to the tank).


Modular: There are a number of secondary Artifacts which serve as upgrades specifically designed for the DUST suit. Each upgrade uses one particular kind of slot; every suit made possess 2 shoulder slots, 2 arm slots, 2 leg slots, and a back slot. Some Artifacts can also make use of the hearthstone slot in the chest.


Upkeep: Maintenance required every 150 hours of use; every 20 hours missed randomly disables one of the features marked with an asterisk or reduces the shield's capacity by 1 health level until proper maintenance is done.


Soak   Hardness   Mobility   Fatigue   Attune


4B/4B      2L/2B        -1            1             5m


Other Notes: This armour offers no magical material bonuses, owing to its composite construction. There is no First Age version of this suit, as it is a product of primarily non-human technology.


Sample Upgrades


Sun Cylinder: (Artifact 3) These crystalline batteries, twice the size of a man's fist and quite hefty, have a pale golden luminescance to them, like a midday sky overcast by clouds just barely thick enough not to be transparent. Capable of being used to power a variety of artifacts, they provide an additional 5 -0 health levels to the shields when fitted into one of the shoulder slots of a DUST suit.


Vegetative Musculature Enhancement: (Artifact 2) Fitted into the back slot of a DUST suit, this organic-looking assemblage of green jade and orichalcum induces the armour's vegetative undersuit to develop strength-enhancing exomuscular fibers. The wearer's ground speed is doubled, and they gain a +2 bonus to Strength for the purposes of Feats of Strength and dealing damage with attacks. It also sets the armour's fatigue value to 0. This upgrade reduces the suit's shield capacity by one health level so long as it is installed.


Impact Reinforcement: (Artifact 1) Incorporated into the arm slots of a DUST suit, this upgrade uses the armour's shield to add to the force of the user's punches, doubling all damage dealt by an unarmed attack for the purposes of calculating knockback or knockdown. By expending a health level's worth of shield energy, the user can project a single such attack up to 10 feet. Incorporated into the leg slots, this upgrade negates damage from falling so long as the user lands on their feet. By expending a health level's worth of shield energy, the wearer can also triple their jumping distance for a single leap.
 
For fighting dark icky things deep down under Creation, actually. It's part of a few things that I'm thinking of based on the sub-setting I made for my tricerok article. So it's designed to be worn mostly by DKs or Solar Half-Castes.
 
Well, that's a lot of artifact dots for a DK or a half caste don't you think ???


I mean fighting leech gods, underpersons, or dark broods doesn't necessarily mean being overpowered like this... unless you're in for 3-4 sessions in exploration or fighting those things.


But I liked the DUST very much   :D
 
cyl said:
Well, that's a lot of artifact dots for a DK or a half caste don't you think ???
Click to expand...
Per 1st Ed. , DKs get double Artifact dots for vegetative/crystalline artifacts. And in this particular sub-setting of mine, the DKs and Half-Castes get triple dots.
 
I think it's well-balanced, Jukashi, and despite being custom-built for your setting I'm probably going to steal it.
 
With the whole charges on the shield and recharging routine it may be more complicated than I would use for any of my current games, but as a suit for 'spelunking' and fighting the dark critters that prowl the underside of Creation it definitely sounds cool.  I can see where it is at least partially inspired by the armor from Halo.


If the environment it is going to operate in is anything like real caves, an aid to climbing might make a good addition or module.  The jumping and falling modifications from the Impact Reinforcement module helps, but assumes that the person would have room for a good jump up or leap down or that they are not looking at a truly deep hole that they need to travel through.  A possibility might be something like climbing claws that could double as Tiger/Razor Claws if need be or a 'spider-walk' capability.
 
I think its cool and well balanced. However, as it stands theres nothing that makes it seem like its mainly for spelunking (name aside).
 
I think I can think up a suitable upgrade to make it more spelunk-worthy.


Adhesive Vine Bracer (Artifact 3): Fitted into an arm slot of a DUST suit, this green and black jade bracer combines with the armour's vegetative undersuit to produce what appears to be a comfortable but tough plant-based grip on the palm and fingers of that arm's glove. As it sets itself into the suit and gains the user's attunement, it becomes responsive to their thoughts; at will, the pad will open pores in its surface, revealing the sticky material within that will securely adhere the pad to any solid surface to which it is in contact. This strong grip will grant 3 extra successes to any rolls to climb, resist disarming or maintain a clinch, so long as they make use of it. The grip can also be released with a thought from the suit's wearer, and the pad returns to its normal state.


This is not all, however. Designed as an aid to climbing in the deep caves, the bracer has the ability to shoot out the pad on a long vine stored within it. This requires the expenditure of a mote of essence by the user. Thin, but with a high tensile strength, this vine can be induced to retract or unwind slowly and should be treated as having a Strength + Athletics total of 10 for the purposes of lifting and carrying. Some who use this upgrade also employ the function as a means of disarming enemies or pulling them into the range of an attack; in such a case, as with attempting to fasten it to a particular point for climbing purposes, an attack roll must be made using Dexterity + Thrown or Archery. Maximum range is 50 feet.
 
Spiderman, Spiderman, does whatever a Spider can, Spins a web any size, Catches thieves just like flies. LOOK OUT! Here comes the Spiderman.
 
My only question is, how necessary is this armor? Aside from its attatchments, why can't you just use, say, Gunzosha Armor to similar effect, without having to worry about your soak dropping significantly when not solar powered? It does have some benefits, but I don't see much advantage between the basic armor and Gunzosha armor outside of full dark vision, and the 5 extra health levels...while it loses out on the combat edges Gunzosha Armor would grant and has less reliable soak, in addition to not having the stealth abilities. I suppose against Dark Broods I'd rather have +2 to Attack, Damage and Parry Calculations with slightly higher and more reliable soak than have 5 extra health levels and have to recharge my armor at regular intervals to keep a slightly lower soak. Solar powered armor for going spelunking seems...somewhat of an oxymoron.
 
It makes sense in its setting, trust me. Basically, I made it as an exercise in how different technology would result in a different way of doing things.
 
LK, I think as Juk adds more mods, the benefit of this armor configuration will emerge as: versatility. The different 'slots' will make the armor a) customizable and b) basically a support system for a host of different artifacts that have a degree of synergy with each other.


Kind of like Alchemicals.
 
Also, you get the benefit of finding upgrades mysteriously scattered throughout ancient ruins and enemy installations.


That aspect I got from Metroid. ;)
 
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