Wednesday, November 19, 2014

D&D 5E: Gear Maidens of Pergerron

One more time for the Gear Maidens. Here's my rough D&D 5th edition interpretation of them, at least until the DMG arrives shortly and provides more precise monster design rules. And yes, this means I am currently running or conspiring to run some D&D 5E games in Pergerron.



Gear Maidens
Medium Humanoid Construct, chaotic neutral (usually)
Armor Class:      18 (natural; equivalent to plate)
Hit Points:          40 (6D8+12)
Speed:  30 feet 
STR 16 (+3), DEX 10 (0), CON 17 (+3), INT 13 (+1); WIS 9 (-1), CHA 11 (0)                 
Saves:                   Constitution +5
Immunities: poison, necrotic, mind-affecting spells and enchantments
Resistances: cold (plus reduces movement by 20 feet for one round), bludgeoning, slashing or piercing weapons that are not magical
Senses:                passive perception 13
Languages:         usually an ancient dialect (old Saric) plus common
Challenge:          CR 4 (1,100 XP)
Terrain:                                any ruins
Special: lightning damage heals
Construct: does not breath, eat or sleep.

Actions:
Multiattack: Gear maidens are equipped with two retractable blade arms. They may make up to four attacks (two with each blade). 

Retractable Blade Arms; melee weapon attack; +6  to hit, one target, 1D8+4 damage each.  Special: critical attack on a 19-20.

Gear maidens are an unusual construct sometimes found in the ancient ruins of Pergerron. Each gear maiden has the appearance of a suit of armor or a mannequin made to look like a woman comprised of complex clockwork moving parts. Most of the gear maidens appear to be one of three types: jackal-headed, elvish-looking, and on rare occasion smooth, featureless faces with a mirror of silver where eyes, nose and mouth would be located.

Gear maidens may have served some other purpose in the ancient past, constructs designed for amusement, or to serve as guards perhaps. Today they are relics which haunt the ancient ruins, acting erratically and without purpose. When a gear maiden (or group of such) is encountered roll to see what their pattern of behavior is (D10):

1-4 - the gear maidens function as if the ruin around them is still alive; they prop skeletal remains up on chairs, serving them empty platters of food while serving long-dried bottles of wine. They will grow antagonistic to anyone who tries to point out the absurdity of their actions or the deathly nature of those they "serve."

5-7 - the gear maidens are mad, and appear to have suffered some sort of mania, which they may call "malfunctioning" to those who can prompt them to speak coherently. These are deadly, usually attacking randomly before fleeing, only to circle back later and strike again.

8-9 - some may be found which are coherent, usually hunting for parts. These gear maidens salvage relics of lore and preserve them, as if enshrining the lost civilizations of old Sar and other empires of the past. They are not above cutting down maddened versions of their own to salvage parts to repair themselves.

10 - Occasionally a cunning and vengeful gear maiden will be found. These are the deadliest, for they remember the fall of the old empires, and the destruction of those they served. They will seek to hunt down and exterminate all humans and demi-humans they come across, and will do so with great cunning and relish.

Aside from the retractable blades (about as long as a short sword, but much sharper) gear maidens have the traits of other constructs, and are immune to any gaseous or poison attacks, as well as any attacks that affect life force (negative energy draining, for example). They are also immune to mind-affecting spells, for their magical artificial brains cannot comprehend or react to the magical influence of the mind. Lighting damage heals them. Cold damage deals 1/2 damage to them but they are slowed to a Speed of 10 feet for 1 round after being subject to the cold-damaging attack (until the end of their next turn).


An entrepreneurial fighter with some weapon smithing skills could extract the arm blades of a destroyed gear maiden to find that they will make enchanted short swords of amazing quality (+1 short swords which crit on a 19-20).

8 comments:

  1. 'one target per blade', this is an odd phrase to me. Are you suggesting that they can't swing both blades at one target? What would stop them from doing this?

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    1. Yeah I messed up the proper 5E nomenclature....corrected it. The attack will read against one target, but the multiattack option will explain that the gear maiden makes two attacks against one or two targets.

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    2. from what I noticed they don't even clarify that much. I normally just see, (it can do x amount of attacks). Which leaves me to believe that if you nock down goon...I mean PC #1 you can use the next few attacks on PC #2.

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    3. Hmmm let me dig out the monster manual....okay. I suppose the easiest rewording would be :The Gear Maiden makes two attacks with its blade arms."

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    4. Now you have me thinking....I've changed it (again!) this time to reflect what fits better with my original intention as well as make them deal more "appropriate" levels of potential damage. See what you think...

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    5. Possible 4d8+16 points of damage with increased chance for critical hit would at least leave 1 of 4 people dead in my group of players if not a TPK at 4th level (assuming no magic weapons as 5e wants us to do). I would keep it at 2 attacks if I were you and maybe add in a rechargeable that equates to an extra attack, or raise the CR by 1-2. I wanna say that at level 6 some classes gain things that act like magical weapons. Just some on the cuff guesstimating here from my side of course.

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    6. Distinctly possible...or possibly it needs tweaking for higher level. Have you experienced the "four hobgoblin" conundrum yet? Those guys are walking TPK events. Either way we'll have the DMG out by end of the week so I can tweak the stats from there.

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