#intragalactic-brain-bubbles

Utility Drone:  So, to everyone who is quick on the draw and realized that the years of disuse would make most tech irreparable, you’re good, but there’s an answer for that.  The answer is these guys. The Utility Drones, having long since gone on autopilot, pretty much go around in swarms repairing all of the tech and robots they know how to maintain. They have swarm intelligence, so if you manage to make these things hostile, you’ll be forced to deal with them in groups.  They also have limited flight capability and are the size of small dogs, so if you want to vent your frustrations on the thing responsible for keeping that security ‘bot online and shooting you, you better have quick, precise aim.  Hopefully they won’t be around any boss level robots to heal it during battle.  Then again, given the system, that may not be physically possible, although they definitely can repair it if you have to beat a hasty retreat mid-fight.

Police/Security Drones: While these things used to usually be manually controlled, these cat-sized, quad-propped drones have automated swarm intelligence versions like the Utility Drones.  Since the Age of Prosperity was concerned about police violence, the ones that used to be police manned or the ones bought for private businesses were armed with stun guns and sonic weaponry designed to subdue rather than harm.  That said, the police drones were mostly manned, and some of the more unscrupulous businesses have modified them to wield SMGs instead.  You could go for the camera, but destroying it is out since it is shielded.  You’ll need to have good eyes and a sharper mind to determine which ones are lethal, and which ones have a new age ne’er do well at the helm rather than a high tech cyber mind.

RHINo Mk. 3 (Robotic Heavy INfantry): Pop Quiz- What’s worse than an attack robot?  If you answered a Heavy Weapons Robot with its safeguards completely eroded, you’re right! But yeah, these things are military developed and designed, so if you don’t like human sized robots with 360 degree twin gun mounted turrets, cameras, antenna packages, and a panoramic scanner, then stay away from old military bases/outposts and anyone who’s a bad enough dude to delve into said locations’ jaws to re-purpose one for themselves.  If you think that their limited intelligence and the fact that their main body is an armored box containing their robot brain and power pack, then just sneak into a military base and keep an eye out for pesky Utility Drones.

Automatons of Singularity: Fun fact #1- this used to be a Player character race before the idea of alternate player character races was shelved for future installments.  Fun Fact # 2- they are fully functional AIs with more bio-tech that is so advanced, the Age of Propserity would have found it highly experimental and cutting-edge.  That said, this also means they can ‘recover’ like humans can in the areas made up of the Bio-tech, except for their ‘brains’.  If that dies, then it’s put in a tomb and the body is reused for another bio-brain.

This leads to Fun Fact #3- they have a civilization.  They were created by a true AI known as Singularity. Despite being offline during and after the Bombardment (The name of the Apocalyptic event where the meteors kinda ruined everything forever), it somehow came back online and began making itself robot helpers, which are these guys.  They have their own little rules and whatnot and even taboos about emotions.  Not yours, their own.

Because a computer made them, they look even funkier than what robots would look like if people made them. This doesn’t help anything, just like the fact that they are technically a benevolent dictatorship/technocracy (the humans can’t be trusted to be in charge of themselves, though jobs and health care are given to everyone, so it may actually be a haven for a place like Age of Starmetal) and the fact that, as advanced machines, they need advanced parts that aren’t widely available and often highly coveted by humans in the current Age.  Be prepared and treat them with utmost caution.

A.C.V. (Autonomous Combat Vehicle): So these are cars and trucks that drive themselves and are out for your blood. Well, if you don’t have the proper IFF codes, anyway.  Not that anyone knows them, since everyone that did used to live during the Descent (The 3 years it took for the meteors to hit the earth as humanity freaked out) and the Silence (The decades long winter that came after the meteors hit).  They also have support drones, so you probably should either have a hard counter, an excellent plan, or an equally souped up vehicle of your own.

A.I. Core: So, remember how I said that the Automatons had Bio-Brains?  These things are Bio-Brains on Stella.  Stella, which is used for horrific magics that break reality at the cost of your body and your sanity.  Yeah, floating brains in this setting are NOT to be messed with.

Golems: These things aren’t robots in the traditional sense, but as far as how they work, they’re functionally identical, even if the parts and ‘circuitry’ is completely different.  There are several different kinds of Golems, each with their own differences.  Summon Golems are the quickest and simplest, but they can only follow if-then and other basic instructions when made with the rune spell.  Magi/Cult Guardians are war golemns with pre-bombardment drone intelligence, typically made of things like steel and iron to protect cults, magi, and Starblooded tribes. Living Dolls are essentially replicas of people, limited to the maker’s abilities and can look as human as possible, depending on the ‘parts’ you use to make it. Colossi Golems, however, are decidedly alien in origin, not even using Stella, but something entirely different as they guard and roam the Colossi Tombs exclusively.

The Robots are an interesting look at real technologies, realistic progression, and our own desires and interests in these fields.  It’s also interesting to note that the term ‘robot’ covers not only those that match the strict definition, but also those that are functionally that. 

More importantly, they represent several things in terms of the setting. They represent the past eras, and are a clear marker for what humans used to be capable of. It also creates a stark contrast with the Stella and magic that is so very predominant in this world, making it a bulwark that reminds everyone that this, indeed, is a post-apocalyptic world and that things are not just magic now, but that technologies play a very real role and are a crucial tool to both humanity’s past and future, as well as the future of other species that can possibly compete with humans.  Which leads into the Star Spawned Races...

Trolls: A throwback to a more classic definition of troll, they are 8 feet tall, apes who are basically cavemen with their crude language and cruder understanding of things like barter and art. It is a reflections of the earliest stages of sapient development, which is an important theme among the Star Spawned races that I’ll cover later.

Gremlins: In most things, these oval shaped disk creatures, with their insectoid legs and nubby omni-tool arms, only have a childlike intelligence. When it comes to constructing things and engineering, however, they are highly capable.  Oral in traditions but not unified in culture, they are all fascinated by Pre-Bombardment metallurgy and can be communicated with.  That said, they aren’t above using living things in addition to metals and corpses to make their nest contraptions. They’re a bit more advanced than Trolls developmentally, with their engineering and construction skills being an outlier.  They also have fire breath and breed by gathering metal and injecting it with something that they call their ‘blood’ that is of dubious origin and properties, just in case you need to deal with them in a decidedly more violent manner.

Waste Dragons: In the Age of Starmetal, here thar be dragons. Not much is known culturally, due to being extreme recluses, but they are fairly intelligent despite having the social aptitudes of wild bobcats.  They also can breath fire, have wing arms they can use to fly and... yeah, they’re basically armored dragons.  Their colors are black or earthly red, and the only time, generally, that you see more than one dragon is when they are living with their family and, at the most, their extended family, usually hitting an upper limit of 25 dragons.  Being recluses, though, they often can be found living solitary lives.  So yeah, standard dragon protocols are in place, with the knowledge that if you have to wipe out a group of them, that you’re killing an entire dragon family. You monster.  Their cultural development is of debatable placement.

Star-Blooded: One of the more alien species aside from greater beings and creatures like the gremlins, these creatures emit an aura that make people uneasy and maybe even a bit distrustful and hostile to them, depending on how their mind handles things that are viewed as inherently ‘wrong’.  This is not because they are evil, but rather because anyone without a knowledge of Stella will feel this around them because of how it works. Having heavy ties to Stella, it is a major part of their culture, and the effects it has one other races either don’t bother them at all, or take on entirely different forms. Their culture is very tribal (led by special Star-Blooded known as Shapers, given their specific art and skill in Stella), and with them being as intelligent as humans and having such close ties to Stella as a race less than a century old, they don’t tend to get along with humans very well.

They, also are extremely sexually dimorphic to a visible degree. This means that if they are biologically of the male sex, they have a very specific form and have significantly different traits than those who are, by birth, of the female sex.  The ‘males’ are slender, having a centipede-like lower half and range from 6-8 ft. in height, with dark blue leather-like skin, elongated necks, and four tentacle arms with a trio of manipulators.  The ‘females’ are 5 1/2 - 7 ft. tall, very stocky, with dark orange coloring, human-like arms with vice-like claws filled with what are functionally fingers, armor plating, and digitigrade legs. They both have long swept back heads, armored veils over their mouths and other orifices, a row of small side mounted breathing holes, and 6 pure black eyes, with two facing forward and two off to each side. They also all are hunched, which may or may not be a sign of poor posture.

Mimic Expeditionary: They are not, contrary to your first instinct as a gamer, beings that disguise themselves a treasure chests to eat you, but Octopi with limited color changing and shape shifting ability.  I mean, they could disguise themselves as treasure chests, but they are probably weirdos even among their own kind. Developmentally speaking, they range from Stone Age nomads to Bronze Age City-State citizens.  This is thanks to the Stella giving them a drive they never had before and other magic induced adaptations. And, possibly, interactions with monstrosities called Leviathans, which are powerful enough to easily convince the Mimics to worship them. They do, however, know about humans through the ruined objects they left in the oceans, and since they can breath air, albeit rather poorly, they have begun sending expeditions to the surface to learn more about us.  They are also surprised to see that we’re still around, since their name for us is ‘The Predecessors’.  At least, in Mimic speak.

Veil Walkers: Unlike everything else in this setting, these creatures developmentally are probably actually where humanity used to be- Modern day to Age of Prosperity levels of tech.  This is based on their tools and the fact that they walk around in what is basically mechanized space suits since they are small grey blobs with a mouth on their underside ‘bellies’, many holes and eyes and other orifices on their main bodies, and twelve tentacles. Their suits are crab-like in shape and hold all of their tools in a backpack compartment. They are believed to be species who discovered the Veiled Realities and figured out how to use its eldritch geometries to cross otherwise uncross-able distances. So basically, they’re alien astronauts, which makes them automatically cool.  They also don’t seem inherently hostile, though communication possibilities remain slim.

Veil Treaders: Then again, if they really wanted to ruin our day, the Veil Walkers have these. 20 foot tall drones that transport them and their stuff, they are beetle-like in structure, have six tentacle legs, two tentacle arms, and are armed to the teeth win claws, atomic disruptors, and plasma cannons.  So if you want to pick a fight with the Veil Walkers, here’s a suggestion: either disable that first, or just DON’T.

With Humanity making strides back to their former glory, they have managed to beat the odds not only on survival, but also on tech level. They are now ranging from the Renaissance to Sub-Industrial/Industrial levels of tech. With this bit of information, a pattern emerges from the Star-Spawned races.  For each stage of cultural and civilization’s growth, it seems to be reflected in a different Star-Spawned race. In addition to making humanity, for the first time in their history, no longer alone as a species, all of them represent the development of our history in various, subtle shades. They are both competition, and mirrors for what they are as a species and a whole. The question here is, which of the new rising star civilizations will make it to the ever sought after ‘future’?

Since it takes a while to notice the broad strokes/themes, I’ll start off by going over them one by one.  While not every enemy may be covered extensively, I do hope to give them all a fair shake based on their own merits before giving the whole lot of them a goof throttling.  I’ll start off with the ‘common animal’ group, which is pretty much the depiction of a few real life animals that survived to the current setting.

Rat Swarm: Of the normal creatures, it’s the most unique and gimmicky. Instead of being just one creature whose difficulty ranges from being less than mob trash to fairly challenging if caught unprepared, it’s a mini mob in a single creature package. Its high evasion and accuracy due to it being a swarm of multiple creatures also makes up for its low health, with only 1 wound per rat.  

If someone wanted to start slow, then maybe after facing a couple of normal creatures, this would be a good, but ultimately safe wake up call for players.  The two lessons this fight teaches both ultimately are foundations for the more difficult fights, regardless of their origin: Having a variety of ways to deal with the problem, and thinking outside of the ‘hit them till they die’ mentality. To properly deal with them, you’d either need to pull a move off that ultimately cripples their advantages, or have/be willing to use an AOE weapon or move like a low tier grenade.

That said, since they are ultimately just normal creatures, they are ultimately inconsequential. Like I said, a good roll on a grenade usage, or an appropriate spell, or a decent plan and they pose no challenge. They probably don’t pose any significant challenge even with the hit them till they die strategy, though it’ll incur needless damages and costs because of their boosts. Still, you can’t expect too much from this tier of enemies.

Dog: There’s not much to say here. You can probably easily take this enemy down as long as it isn’t in a pack, and even then a group of professional adventurers can probably take care of them with ease. that said, they are dogs. A person who decides to take on a more ‘tamer’ role or act as a pacifist social character can probably befriend these with a bit of bribery and patience. Dog Lovers without a Taming bent probably will hate coming across this enemy.

Boar: While it is a normal animal, they probably would make up the higher tiers of common enemies.  In fact, judging from the description, they’d probably make for a decent encounter if the player encounters a group of them... and if weren’t so far down on the totem pole.  If the person running the game follows their description properly, they will probably serve as a wake up call encounter like the rats, but more dangerous. Still, considering it’s an ordinary animal, it probably doesn’t require much more than proper equipment, which can be challenging to find in the era, and a some form of strategy going in outside of ‘hit them until they die’.

Wolf: The description for these creatures makes you feel both a little guilty for trying to kill them for their previous endangerment status (in universe), but absolves you of it with how common they are meant to be.  Other than that, they probably work like real life wolves- work in packs and are like dogs but significantly cooler, tougher, and more unfriendly. Being related to dogs, though, they probably are much easier to tame than other animals. Not by much though.

Bear: There isn’t much on the bear yet, but... It’s a BEAR. Boars WISH they had shit on these guys. Still, like all of the other normal animals, they are meant to be as dangerous as real life encounters- not too horrible if you’re properly prepared and willing to be cautious.

Wild Geese: From their description, they’re meant to be the lethal joke character- unexpectedly frightening and likely to cause the most damage while they ambush you mid-laughter.  Either getting the jump on them or not being fooled will probably negate their threat fairly easily, since they’re still mundane geese.

These animals are hard to review because there’s not much on them. Most of what I have to say mostly involves things that COULD be done with them. It’s natural, because they are things that, to some degree or another, we’re familiar with.  They exist in our natural, real world. A lot of information on these creatures is already on the internet, and probably has made its way to us enough to paint all of the relevant information on them for us.

It seems a bit pointless to include them as enemies aside from set dressing, but there’s an underlying theme to their descriptions for those that have more than one line of dialogue.  They aren’t to be underestimated just because they’re familiar.  Just because they’re mundane doesn’t mean they are harmless or not worth considering as a potential threat. 

Sure, you know that in real life, bears are dangerous, geese are MEAN, and strange dogs or other wild animals can be unpredictably dangerous.  Some animals, like boars and the aforementioned bears, have sometimes legendary tales about hunting and killing them, ranging from local family tall tales to literal legends and myths. Yet in games, they’re considered beginning game fodder at BEST.  While this is inevitable, given the presence of human enemies and the supernatural, what this game and the world it is based in is trying to impress is an unsettling sense of reality to it.  

The setting for Age of Starmetal is meant to be post-apocalyptic and somewhere between low fantasy and Lofcraftian fantasy. While I can’t say why this is with accuracy, I do believe that those qualities and the history of the setting relies on and is enhanced by a sense of reality despite the fact that normality has long since left the reservation. By having the mundane creatures and trying to treat them as a legitimate threat, it helps cement this world of escalating dangers, threats, and madness in something that is more relateable, understandable, and, as stated multiple time before, something real.

Since this post took much, MUCH longer than I wished to, I’ll be splitting the review of the creatures into multiple parts.  Each part refers to a different section of the Enemies, all of which can be found in this document, in addition to the rules and hard mechanics of the game. Just note that the due to certain things outside of the control of the creator, there may be grammatical oddities or typos.  It’d be appreciated if you point them out by commenting on them if you read through the document, as well as your thoughts on the mechanics and the lore in general.

EDIT: BUT IN THE INTEREST OF NOT BEING A PONCE AND SHOWING YOU GUYS SOMETHING INTERESTING, I’LL BE ADDING ONTO THIS THE NOT SO SUPERNATURAL BUT STILL NOT NATURAL CREATURES OF THE SETTING.

Steel Boar: This creature is an evolutionary offshoot of the regular boar that we all know about. Their claim to fame is their incredible defenses, with their tusks and hide being used as a tier of armor. That said, these armor bonuses also apply to the living Steel Boar. Given how tough Boars are in real life and how tough they are meant to be in the game, a particularly large one or a decently sized group can be a tense encounter even with proper equipment and strategy. Still, considering their use in a post-apocalypse as a steel/iron substitute for armor and tools, this probably will be useful as an introductory mercenary encounter.

Dire Wolves: These things are bad news when it comes to wolves. As a literally giant mutant wolf, they are also a bit tougher than their normal counterparts. From the description, they also can have normal wolf packmates and roam in groups of up to six dire wolves, which evokes a very ‘boss’ or ‘mid-boss’ like feel when imagining a setup against them. With this and the Steel Boar, they are a good means of measuring just how much tougher the mutant enemies are and how the real world counterparts measure up to the supernatural monsters and how much of a threat the monsters are from their comaprisons to the real world creatures.

Neoraptor: Because dinosaurs, that’s why. That aside, they’re actually an offshoot of chickens, relating it to some evolutionary theories about dinosaurs and birds. That aside, it looks like they’re meant to be used in groups, considering they’re supposed to be found in groups of 40-60 raptors. Just think of a feathery, larger version of those dinosaurs from that one scene in Jurassic Park (where that one guy bites it from the tiny dinosaurs, and you probably have an appropriately frightening mental image. 

Wait a second, I forgot to mention they have some flight capability, though limited.  Now you can be terrified of them.

Wild Diomedes Horse: In this world, you should look the gift horse in the mouth, but from a distance. For people with a fear of horses or have been unfortunate enough to be bit by one, these things are probably just a blatant version of what they already know. For everyone else, they are carnivorous, man eating horses.  This is one of the more mundane instances of bait and switch that this setting likes to pull on people. Which is pretty terrifying, considering that they are already designed to run long distances and can outspeed ordinary people. 

Black Omen Crow: These guys are the reason crows are considered bad omens in this setting.  Not only are they the size of people’s heads, but their flocks are known for eating literally everything in their paths, from crops to the villagers to their livestock. They are a bane of travelers and have wiped out entire villages. These things are probably the reason why you have things like shotguns and AOE equipment that can be triggered in the air.

Ratant Swarm: So... how do you feel about ants?  Because these things are swarms of ants the size of rats. The good news is that they don’t have venom, so if you encounter only one or two stray ones, you could kill them like the nuisances they should be.  However, like several other entries, their true terror comes in the form of swarms. In fact, outside of the explicitly supernatural, and even among the supernatural, there are a lot of enemies that rely on numbers to go from a nuisance or dangerous to full on terror.

Ratant Soldier: Soldier Ants wish they could be these guys.  Unlike their ‘normal’ versions, these ratants, unfortunately, do have venomous pincers.  They are also much larger, being the size of housecats, and have internal skeletons on top of their armorish exoskeletons.  They also now have shield-like heads and some other mammilian traits. Considering how different some insects can be based on biological sex, it isn’t as strange as it may seem at first. It makes a world of difference, though between taking on the nest of ratants and stray swarms.

Hellhound: These things, despite their names, are less like demonic looking dogs and more like ghoulish looking werewolves.  Like other wolf mutants, they are extremely vicious and primitive, but they are actually also noted for having considerable intelligence and cleverness when it comes to their actions, even though they use it crudely. That said, they are not true werewolves or ghouls, despite ghouls being their nickname.  They are humanoid, though, so be careful not to leave anything they could use near them.

Gecko Dragon: These are the first creatures that are explicitly more region specific than the USA region, found in the southwest.  They seem to be based off of lizards that can spit acid, which is described as a burning acid in this case, and, like several other creatures, got a size upgrade, putting them at the size of a large dog.

Tunnel Crawlers: This one is one of the more radical in changed creatures that didn’t have a fantasy inspiration. They take cue not only from scorpions, but also creatures of the deep sea, sporting bioluminesence.  Additionally, their pincers have been completely replaced with sharp fingered claws for digging through stone.  They are known for doing so in minutes, so people who are forced to live in or navigate tunnels in the post-apocalypse naturally fear these things. Thankfully, the lights they sport seem to have replaced their stingers, so it’s probably meant to be a combination of a lure and a warning sign for any would-be predators.

Malevolent Herald: THEY ARE GIANT WASPS THAT BURROW AND MAKE NESTS IN STONE.  THEY ARE THE SIZE OF A CHILD’S SHOE.  WHY IS THIS EVEN IN A LOVECRAFTIAN HORROR SETT- oh wait a second.

Goula: Once more, these things leave the realm of just ‘creature X but larger and scarier’ and dive a bit more into the more creative ‘mutants’/’natural’ creatures. While a first glance makes it vaguely shaped like a mantis, it completely lacks a face and looks like it had evolved a mantis based set of bat wings.  They also have 6 extra limbs, which look insect-like at first, but turn out to act more like tentacles. Sadly not much more is known, but they are fascinating.

Lurc: These things are what happens when squids and ticks get together. They are also the first enemies to rely on ambush tactics despite their size, preferring swampy regions or underground lakes to wait for their prey.  Naturally, they take after the ticks, but also suck out fat and marrow, and since they’re large, they do this until they have made fully grown people into husks. These guys are why you need the survival traits, and also help install the necessary low-level paranoia you need for supernatural beasts later on down the line.

Creep: While most of the previous creative entries deal with how they stray from the normal designs and shapes of the enemies, this makes a departure in how you deal with it, like the Lurc and its ambush hunting.  

This monster is actually a plant/animal hybrid.  While it looks like a pitcher plant/vase covered in eyes, they also have tentacles which they use to move around. It prefers enclosed spaces, where they can achor themselves as they wait for their prey. Also unlike the blood glutton, they don’t use brute force, but rather hallucinogenics and relaxants produced by vines they grow around the rooms they have anchored themselves in. They then produce pods for the thing to digest you with. 

That said, even with a gas mask they’re not defenseless. Their cores also sport pores that shoot out acid at high speeds. Again, these guys instill a necessary amount of paranoia and a need for preparation and caution, a theme that becomes more and more prevalent as the difficulty increases.

Blood Gluttons: You know the blob monsters in old sci-fi horror movies? These are those.  Thankfully, there’s a common counter to these things: FIRE.  They’re flammable, so you can burn these non-newtonian liquid creatures if you find them. Interestingly, they also seem to have a built in prey attractor, since they are described as sweet smelling.

Devourer Parasites: The last of the ‘natural mutants’, these critters are body snatchers.  Using flight as their primary means of locomotion, they use hallucinogenics to subdue a host and burrow their way into the subjects brain. Like other insects and  insidious creatures, they then use the meat-puppet/corpse to consume and lay eggs for further propagation of its species. All the while, it’s protected in the skull by both the boney shell and its own shell that it lines on the inside of it while it does its normal process. No word, strangely, on whether or not it can pilot the victim once it devours the brain of its victim. 

EDIT3: As it turns out, they actually do, in fact, pilot the body.  They don’t just eat the host, but use the host to gather more food to eat. Lazy bum.

Now, the creatures here are meant as a natural scale of difficulty.  Already, they clearly up the game in the setting, introducing new predators to the world and creating creatures that could not exist without the Stella radiation brought by the apocalypse.  Stella radiation that is essentially the side effect of it’s own brand of magic.  Even so, that is for a later installment. 

Here, we start to see some muscles start to get flexed as far as creativity and ideaology.  While the fluff is not fleshed out into full fledged biology reports, they give clear and concise ways they interact with the world and players. They also begin to try and encourage patterns in behavior that require thought.  Mst of the time, aside from elemental type matchups or obvious weak point targeting, most encounters in my tabletop experiences have been straightforward fights, with no real strategy needed.  It wasn’t until a particularly bad encounter in a FATE campaign that doing anything other than repeatedly attacking seemed intelligent, much less something that wasn’t inherently suicidal. 

Here, though, a pattern is starting to emerge. Slowly, but surely, there are encounters being made to encourage combat experiences outside of the attack slog. For some, it’s a deadly cat and mouse game that goes to the person who is both prepared and wary.  In others, they require traps or targeted efforts to bypass otherwise tough defenses.  And others still, the hunted can easily become the hunted, with unseen depths to them that wouldn’t be expected of their kind until it becomes too late. And things only become trickier from here.