Does that mean his real name is Asheth Stark, or is it Tony Magnus? 
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A little system im working to representthe lack of standart materials and construction pratices on cryx jacks, a small table that adjusts DEF and ARM
Cryx Jacks Material adjustments table
When a character acquires a cryx made jack, they use a myriad of materials some better some worse, to represent that, whenever a new cryx jack from the factory is awarded to the characters roll 2D6 and modify its DEF and ARM accordingly
| Result | Name | DEF modifier | ARM modifier |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | Horrible materials | -1 | -1 |
| 3 | Brittle materials | 0 | -1 |
| 4 | Heavy materials | -1 | 0 |
| 5 | Bulky materials | -1 | +1 |
| 6-8 | Average materials | 0 | 0 |
| 9 | Lithe materials | +1 | -1 |
| 10 | Hard materials | 0 | +1 |
| 11 | Light materials | +1 | 0 |
| 12 | Superior materials | +1 | +1 |
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Thatās a really sweet idea! Just makes me wonder, though, why this should only be limited to DEF and ARM modifiers (for example, a DEF modifier would come from an improvement to SPD, AGL or PER (indicating an unusual and possibly experimental or accidentally modified cortex), while an ARM modifier could come from a direct change to the 'jackās ARM bonus or its PHY (granted, PHY isnāt rolled often for 'jacks, but it can still become necessary, so all 'jacks have a PHY stat).
Just a further thought - I wouldnāt break out this table too much, as it could easily lead to very strange and cumbersome results once 'jacks have to get repaired or have parts replaced (see the Ship of Theseus problem for how this could play out). But it could be neat for a unique 'jack that the group might wish to put extra effort into procuring the right materials and parts for.
Iāv made it imited to DEF and ARM for being the two most relevant stats in combat, but it could have an optinal of multiple tables to change other stats
You could have two sets of tables - one table that determines which (if any) materials are different, and then tables for different subsets, e.g.
| 2d6 results | Idiosyncrasy |
|---|---|
| 2-7 | None |
| 8-9 | Chassis |
| 10 | Weapon system (roll randomly to determine affected weapons system if multiple weapons systems are present) |
| 11 | Cortex |
| 12 | Roll twice on this table, re-rolling further results of 12 (This may lead to no idiosyncrasies) |
(This table is intentionally skewed towards no idiosyncrasies, as Toruk would probably wish the bonejacks and helljacks to be uniform in order to be able to create functioning supply lines - this table just allows for occasional freaks - well, worse freaks - to have slipped through the gaps.)
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i will need to take care or it will end up looking like old scholl D&D full of tables, now i got the idea of creating a table for weapons, chaging attack modifier and POW
God dammit
Good thing cryxian logistical supply workers probably donāt need sleep
If the parts that arrive at the front lines donāt fit theyāll soon rest in peace anyway. Itās not about lack of sleep, itās about resources, time needed to make adaptations on the fly and readiness.
Iām reminded of something that was stated somewhere in the genius (hah) webcomic Girl Genius - the reason mad inventors took off so dramatically after the Industrial Revolution was the much easier availability of mass-produced, standardised parts for their inventions, when before they had to put a lot of their work into just making all the fitting and matching sets of gears, screws, nuts and bolts they needed to hold their machines together.
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yeah i know, that was a dumb joke,.
thats really important, and needs to be taken care
Thats what necrotechs are for, speaking of necrotech i might be working on the necrotech career, and a new race makano wight(what necrotechs and necrosurgeons are), and iron lich vessels, and body modifications for bothā¦ i have a lot of work to doā¦
My personal advice would be winging it, and giving players something fun that fits the needs of your story - if things look too easy or you want them to feel the pressure or get angry at a crooked mechanik, maybe only make sub-par parts available to them. If the players deserve a great reward, give them something better than average. In either case, +1 penalties and bonuses are quite effective in the game (And you could also include other interesting traits, like useful or silly cortex personalities and quirks, unusually efficient or leaking boilers, the ability to use a power attack or perform an action without spending focus, and so on).
I agree itās important to stay consistent, but as a GM you can wing a lot without the players ever noticing. The real challenge is making something that the players could use and balance it reasonably well enoughā¦
Good adivice, i remember once whem my players got the nomad, it had the quirk of being pcky with its name, did it change anything other tahan we wasting time with sugestions until the dice said yes, no but it was fun
So cryxian cortices(?) i made two of them, some notes, cryx jacks are stated to be more animalistic than mainland steamjacks so i made the decision to reduce the INT by 1 and increse the PER by 1, this does give cryxian jacks a better defense but since they are more fragile and hit with less power, and in the system im creating they stats may be unreliable (DEF, ARM, MAT RAT and POW) and acquireing one is completely dependent on the GM, and in more how do i put it less violent missions on the mainland they are a liability, i fell its ok
Necros class cortex
Cost: never for sale (20 infamy to requisition one)
The necros class cortex is the standard, if that word can be used for cryx technology, used on the nightmare empire, nearly equivalent to an aurum class of the mainland,except it develops at a faster pace, and is far more aggressive than the mainland steamjack cortices. The necros class uses necromancy on its making therefore is frown upon on civilized lands.
Special rules: a steamjack with this cortex gains +1 MAT and +1 RAT and the abilities of two weapon fighting and ambidextrous from the skilled archetype, additionally the necros class uses the cryxian behavior table instead of the conventional table, this character gains a betterment for each 20 experience points when bonded to a warcaster or iron lich instead of 25.
A steamjack with a necros class cortex can be controlled by a warcaster, iron lich or jack marshal normally.
| INT | 1 |
|---|---|
| PER | 3 |
Draconis class cortex
Cost: never for sale (500 infamy to requisition one)
A legend amongst necrotechs, its existence is even disputed by some, incredibly rare and powerful mechanical brains, used only by the most trusted lieutenants of the lich lords if even them can get access to those legendary feats of necromekanica rumored to be able to store and use souls of the slain, this cortex uses necromancy being caught with one carries heavy sentences.
Special rules: a steamjack with this cortex gains +3 MAT and +1 RAT and the abilities of two weapon fighting and ambidextrous from the skilled archetype, the draconis class cortex can hold up to three souls, at the start of this character activation it may use up to three souls token to gain a focus per soul spent, this model gains a soul token every time a living character is destroyed within 2ā of the steamjack with this cortex, additionally the draconis class uses the cryxian behavior table instead of the conventional table, this character gains a betterment for each 20 experience points when bonded to a warcaster or iron lich instead of 25.
A steamjack with a necros class cortex can be controlled by a warcaster, iron lich or jack marshal normally.
| INT | 2 |
|---|---|
| PER | 4 |
Cryx imprint table
| 2D6+ARC | Imprint |
|---|---|
| 7 or less | Berserker: when this steamjack destroys an character it must make an extra attack against a target on its melee range. |
| 8 | Uncontrollable aggression: this steamjack can run or charge without spending focus, this character must run or charge each activation if able. |
| 9 | Nimble: when this steamjack finishes an activation where it did not fail a charge or run it may move up to 5ā if its a light or 3ā if its a heavy. |
| 10 | Retaliator: once per round when this steamjack suffers damage from an attack he may immediately make an attack against that targetā¦ |
| 11 | Hyper aggressive: when this steamjack suffers damage it may advance up to 2ā in the direction of the damage and make an attack. |
| 12 | Counter charge: once per round when a character moves or is placed within 5ā of this steamjack it may charge immediately that character |
| 13 | Counter blast: once per round when a character moves or is placed within 5ā of this steamjack it may make a ranged attack against that character |
| 14 | Counter Slam: once per turn when a character moves or is placed within 5ā of this steamjack it may immediately slam that character |
| 15 | Prey: at the start of the combat this steamjack choses an enemy, he receives +2 to attack and damage rolls against that target, if that target dies you may choose a new one. |
| 16 | Stubborn: this steamjack ignores crippled systrems. |
| 17+ | Soul channeler: if a living character is destroyed within 5ā of this steamjack its controller may gain its soul token as long as the jack is in its control range. |
The full rules proposal for warcaster armour upgrades can be found in the Gearbooks II PDF.
Mindshadow Override
[Warcaster Armour Upgrade]
Cost: 300 gc
Effect: While a suit of warcaster armour fitted with a mindshadow override is running at full steam, steamjacks in the warcasterās battlegroup do not suffer backlash or become autonomous when the warcaster is rendered unconscious (see IKRPG, p. 324, for backlash rules), but continue to enact their warcasterās will as long as the warcaster remains alive (i.e. the steamjacks will act with as much intelligence and tactical awareness as if the warcaster was still conscious ā in game terms, the warcasterās player keeps directing their steamjacks, which keep activating on the initiative result initially rolled for the warcaster).
If the suit of warcaster armour becomes unpowered or set to run at low steam while the warcaster is still unconscious, or if the warcaster dies, all steamjacks in their battlegroup immediately suffer backlash as normal.
Steamjacks still cannot be allocated focus or get powered up by being in the Control Area of a warcaster of at least Veteran level while the warcaster is unsconscious, but they can receive focus from other sources normally (e.g. the Power Booster spell in IKRPG, p. 242).
Power Requirement: 2
Installation: Installing a mindshadow override requires one hour of labour followed by a successful INT+Mechanikal Engineering roll against a target number of 14.
Fabrication: The material cost of the mindshadow overrideās parts is 50 gc. It takes two weeks to construct the device. Fabricating a mindshadow override requires the Inscribe Formulae ability as well as a successful INT+Mechanikal Engineering roll against a target number of 14.
Comments welcome, as usual.
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I think we need some guidelines as to the exchange value of infamy at this point?
As a matter of fact, I see nothing wrong with Scharde folk simply using coin from the continent a lot of the times - it keeps everything on an even keel (hah), allows for cleaner trades, and will even be useful for undead who donāt eat, but can give the coin to their underlings to acquire things from the mainland for them much more easily (after all, stealing and pillaging tends to tip mainlanders off to nefarious activities much more easily than buying things).
So perhaps a favour/infamy system should be relegated to things that have no price on them instead (e.g. acquiring undead servants, magical items, and the services of troops, ships, and workshops)? Even if Scharde folk paid in coin, the flavour would still be uniquely Cryxian, with coins coming from all countries and eras, and showing corrosion and other evidence of the modes of their acquisition.
In short, keep things simple and straightforward. An economy based on barter and favours can just make the game bog down into negotiations and bartering rather than actual adventures (Iāve been there in a different game system, and after an entire session had been spent on such a thing, I told my players I never wanted to do that again, and they very, very gladly agreed).
Good point i will work on that
Infamy would be used for warjacks mekanica and magical gear initially, for exemple , and infamy is not a currency its a score, it just tell the GM when the players did enough to the nighmare empire, that it would be granted the acess to those acess, but other items would be bought with coin(including warjack repairs and services)
(My own emphasis added).
Are you sure that the game really benefits from including a resource with exact numerical values that just runs parallel to simple money? As a friend of mine always says, āDoes this add to the game?ā
Personally, Iād leave a āfavour currencyā vague. In games like WH40K: Rogue Trader, money is represented by an abstract value, but the game doesnāt even use a system that actually counts coin besides that. In other games that I run, favours are commonly exchanged, but have hardly ever been tallied, and eventually simply have built to a somewhat vague sense of mutual obligation and loyalty that is still very effective in propelling the campaign forward.
Am i sure, no, but iām not sure of virtualy anything, because of things too long and personal to get into here i live in crippling doubt.
But the system feel right to the setting and helpfull to the GM
Rocktman suit
Cost: 340 Gc
SPD modifier: -1
DEF modifier: -3*
ARM modifier: +6
Description: a lightweight armor with an integrated gas mask and an cutting edge āGoshawkā rocket pack.
Fielded exclusively by rocketmen, the Goshawk rocket pack is a leap forward in the fields of mechanika and alchemy. Variable emitters mounted on the pack allow for vectored thrust, while irising apertures in the emitters let the wearer vary the force the pack emits at a cost of total flight time. The fuel reservoir contains compressed live water, an inert fluid that can be broken down into multiple volatile compounds. One of the advantages of this fuel source is that it provides an immense amount of thrust without commensurate heat output. Earlier models used fuel sources somewhat similar to the Protectorateās refined Menothās Fury, but those designs proved prone to explosion and also produced such extreme temperatures that test pilots attempting to use them suffered extensive and often fatal burns.
Rules: this armor includes a gas mask.
While this armor has a goshawk rocket pack a character can use a fast action and a live water charge to take off flight, a model wich took off flight gains the flying ability, its movement becomes 7ā and its DEF modifier becomes -1 until the start of its next activation.
A model cannot take off flight while mounted or carrying a light or heavy artillery weaponā¦
The rocket pack can carry 10 live water charges at a time.
10 live water charges cost 15 Gc.
This armor is typically made to accommodate a human anatomy, although some suits made for the dwarven anatomy had been fabricated.
A goshawk rocket pack costs 200 Gc.
When a character suffers 5 or more points of damage roll a 2D6 and apply the result.
| 2 | Critical explosion: the goshawk rocket pack explodes and every model within 2ā of you suffer a Pow 12 cold damage roll |
|---|---|
| 3 | Fuel jet stream: you lose D3+2 live water charges and make a spray attack with Pow 12 cold damage type against the direction of the attack at RAT 6 |
| 4-5 | Fuel leak: the Goshawk rocket pack loses D3 live water charges |
| 6-8 | Nothing happens |
| 9-10 | Stream compromised: the movement of the character while in flight becomes 5ā until fixed(mechanical engineering 13) |
| 11 | Damaged goshawk: the goshawk is damaged and unusable until fixed(mechanical engineering 15) |
| 12 | Destroyed Goshawk: the goshawk rocket pack is destroyed |
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Golden crucible Heavy-trooper armor
Cost:380Gc
SPD modifier:-2
DEF modifier:-3
ARM modifier: +9
Description:
Rules: This armor has a integrated gas mask
This armor grants immunity fire and immunity corrosion.
While wearing this armor a character gains +4 ARM against ranged attacks and free strikes.