#nanocyte

(art by Aberiu on DeviantArt)

(As an aside before we start, it is so hard to find good art of characters with symbiotic nanites that aren’t just super soldiers or wearing shapeshifting armor. So we’re stuck with art of a lightning gun because it’s tangentially related.)

Nanites and nanotechnology in general is, by all accounts, very, very small. It’s literally in the name.

And while collectively nanites can do many wondrous things, the fact that they’re so small means that applying mass times acceleration, or force… is not usually one of their strong suits.

But much like how ants overcome obstacles by working together, nanites can overcome this hurdle, and not just express great force, but manipulate it.

Today’s subject revolves around nanites that are specialized in doing just that. Whether they’re equipped with microthrusters, able to project magnetic fields that allow them to move and act more strongly as a collective unit, or some more esoteric process, nanites with the redirection faculty are good at two things, expressing surprising force on their surroundings, and redirecting other forces through them. The collective AI intelligence of these machines naturally is very good at on the fly calculations to do so.

As we’ll soon see, the result has shocking control over their opponents and of firing lines, so let’s take a look at how they achieve that!

At the start, these nanocytes can direct their nanite cloud to target a foe within or adjacent to it, causing their attacks to be subtlely guided towards that target, stabilizing the path of bullets, weapons, and energy blasts. This could be creating a mirrored tunnel for a laser weapon, gently pushing bullets and melee weapons back on course, or any number of a myriad of ways.

The cloud can instead be directed to exert surprising force on a foe within, pushing them around or tripping them.

As they master redirecting their attacks, even cover is reduced, and with a surge they can even bend the path of a ranged attack or line around cover or to catch different foes using the cloud alongside one of their nanite-created weapons.

On a more defensive note, their nanites can punish attackers by redirecting some of the force of a successful attack against them into projecting spikes or projectiles of nanomaterials back out at the perpetrator.

Finally, true masters are able to push multiple foes at once, though it is tricky to do so unless they spend a surge.

What we end up with is a nanocyte that blends ranged combat maneuvers with the ability to be especially accurate against foes stuck in their nanite cloud by ignoring concealment, reducing cover, and whatnot. Naturally, you should build for ranged combat and combat maneuvers as a result. As a fun aside, being able to spend a surge to bend their shots can make line weapons especially effective for them. Definitely worth considering, but otherwise your strategy here is to set up your cloud and a gear array weapon and keep foes trapped in the cloud to set up a kill box where you can hammer them with attacks and manipulate them with maneuvers.

With the complex math required to push foes and redirect weapons with trillions of tiny nanites, there is definitely a heavily analytical side to this option, though how much of that is the character and how much they rely on the nanites for such things can vary a lot by the character.

Reluctantly accepting the nickname “Dr. Haze”, Doctor Iklu Whiteblossom is one of the foremost experts on nanomachine-assisted ecological repair, and the tiny raxilite is no slouch when space pirates or rival corporations come calling looking for a quick buck off his research, as he is a crack shot with his plasma pistol, made more so by nanite assistance.

Cruel and exploitative, Captain Rekksha has taken to using a powerful dawn beetle core-diver as the primary muscle of her pirate crew, letting it rip into enemy vessels before her crew move in to mop up. If the beast ever needs prodding in the right direction, she uses her nanites to carefully redirect her stun gun to send painful shots in the proper motivating direction.

Commission for Kapooki (Twitter)!

This is my first in the series of Starfinder characters I will probably never get to play in Society.

In the Starfinder setting, androids have numerous nanites traveling through their bodies the same way cells do in ours. They can be enhanced through various feats and even used as healing items, but the most notable nanite related piece of lore is the Nanocyte class. This class is infused, perhaps infested, with a sentient cloud of nanites that can form into weapons, encase it in a concealing sheathe, or transform into weapons temporarily.

Exactly

(Render of the Service Weapon as it appears in its Grip form in the game Control by Remedy Studios)

There’s a lot of fun things about the nanocyte class, and there are just so many fun ways to use nanites in and out of combat.

Perhaps one of their most offensive abilities is the ability to create weapons from their symbiotic nanites, giving them powerful tools of destruction they can never truly be disarmed of.

For today’s entry, however, we’ll be looking at a variant of the nanocyte that specializes in destruction using such created weapons. They might provide advanced targeting to pinpoint the most lethal areas of a target’s body, or they might reshape the weapon on the micro-scale to be even more lethal , or even sacrifice droves of their components to enhance the damage in other ways.

No matter the exact method, not only do these nanocytes become especially lethal against their targets, but they can use their methodology to spread the harm to other targets as well, becoming nanomachine-enhanced engines of destruction.

The weapons these warriors create are built to let nothing stop them, penetrating hard materials and even altering to accept a little extra charge (or nanite surge) to become more damaging, the latter by imbuing nanites into the projectiles or striking area for extra damage.

The nanites can even sacrifice themselves to imbue the weapon with other types of damage, superheating themselves or chilling for fire or cold, or overloading for electricity.

Whether they are left behind by a melee weapon or are carried to the target at range, these nanocytes can discharge such nanites that they spray out from the wound, carrying the form of damage to a nearby target to spread destruction, though it is naturally lighter than the initial impact.

Additionally, the guidance of their nanites makes them more accurate when attacking repeatedly.

Later on, their sprays of nanites can spread further and with an expenditure of nanites can be used repeatedly in the same onslaught of attacks.

Naturally, a nanocyte with this faculty is going to primarily be using their gear array to create weapons, as all of their faculty abilities center around such weapons. They typically only would use their sheath array when out of combat for the protective benefits and the cloud when avoidance is more important than fighting. As such, their knacks are going to be mostly made up of those that enhance their weapons or otherwise make them more effective combatants, such as heavy armor edge, material alterations, split manifestation, eldritch upgrade, heavy weapon edge, and so on. In either case, you can build them as either melee or ranged attackers with ease, or perhaps split your focus.

With their destructive abilities, the nanites bonded to these nanocytes almost certainly had an origin in combat, meant to enhance the performance of both the host and their equipment. Of course, even if that is true, the character might not have been the intended recipient. In such a case, the nanites might simply be continuing their function, or they might have adapted such combat potential as a solution for keeping their host alive and safe in a hostile environment.

Seeking information about a former client, the party singles out a xulgath member of a mercenary company who is known for being a drunken partyer. Getting him to talk should be easy, but if he discovers the ruse he’ll prove to be a dangerous combatant, his intoxication doing nothing to hamper the nanites in his body.

Rumor has it that a magitech-focused corporation is developing a method of creating hybrid magitech nanites able to enhance the host with magically-empowered attacks. In order to do so, they’ve been studying stolen aeon stone network constructs to see how each component coordinates with the others. However, they don’t realize the risk when one collection gets free and attempts to merge with the others to create a powerful distress signal relay.

(art by Tyxerus on DeviantArt)

 The nanocyte class, while relatively new, is perhaps the very pinnacle of technological integration with your character, but what if you want a little hybrid magitech blended in as well?

Much like the biotech nanocyte that I did on my Patreon last year, Galactic Magic gave us a taste of how nanomachines and magic could be blend together.

Honestly, the idea of nanites that can be used to channel magic is a great idea, a perfect example of technomagic in action. A nearly invisible force coming together to make something incredible happen, and that’s just the nanites being nanites, to say nothing of them casting actual spells!

Such nanomachines may differ a bit physically from their normal counterparts as well, such as clumping together to form fly-like swarm bodies when manifesting as a cloud, or displaying silvery runes all over their sheath array, to say nothing of the shapes of runes appearing around them as the nanomachines gather in the new array for this variation.

 Essentially, these mystical nanocytes trade the ability to form weapons and augments (and the number of minor objects they can form) with their nanomachines, but in exchange they gain access to a very limited selection of spells, which eventually tops off at two cantrips, two 1st, 2nd, and 3rd level spells, and one 4th level spell known. The cantrips can be cast a few times a day, but they gain only one spell slot per day, which grows in level as they do (though they can cast any variable-level spell using this slot without learning the higher level versions, so that’s nice). However, they can get around this by expending nanite surges to create another spell slot with a potency equal to the number of surges spent to create it, though they have to rest for a few minutes before they can do so again.

The resulting nanocyte is definitely not a full-on spellcaster. You’re better off cross-classing or reflavoring the imagery of a technomancer if that is what you want, but if you’re not interested in using nanotech weapons at all in your build and would like to have an arsenal of spells instead, this class feature might be for you. Obviously you should avoid the obliteration faculty since it’s outright unusable to you, but dealing damage with the infestation faculty or being more tanky with other faculties if fine too, relying on the cloud array to avoid attacks and the sheath for protection, and switching to the spell array when you need to make use of your spells. As for which spells to take, obviously spells that have variable level are a good choice, such as junk sword, but also consider spells that buff yourself, or provide answers for dealing with foes that a nanocyte might have trouble with on their own, such as lots of swarming enemies that a explosive blast would take care of, and so on.

 While some may multiclass or take archetypes to further enhance their magical ability, we can wonder about what sort of relationship these characters might have with magic and their nanites. If their infection with their symbiotic nanites was accidental, might they be baffled by the abilities they demonstrate. Others might have deliberately infected themselves to gain magical power that they simply couldn’t acquire by training, or been infected by others to test them. Others might have already been nanocytes, but consuming material from a technomagical object, or being blasted by some form of hybrid tech might have induced a strange changes in their capabilities.

  The wandering espraksa mercenary Iqoo is well known for adapting to any situation, and also for her silvery-white nanobots that swarm like a blizzard around her in battle. More interestingly, they is able to use them for magic, typically favoring extreme cold. She declines, however, to explain where she got them, only that she acquired them on her many travels.

 It should be obvious, but the world of Angor, with it’s strangely inconsistent gravity, is not a natural world, but actually an ancient construction filled with all sorts of wonders left over from it’s makers, including hybrid tech nanites. However, to find these remains, one must weather the biosphere and the planet itself, for if the territorial herd beasts don’t crush you, the sudden bouts of extreme gravity might.

(art by Dionisis Milonas on Artstation)

 We’re back again with another nanocyte faculty, and while previously we talked about one that specialized in taking apart and putting their host back together, today we’re focusing on perhaps one of the most common fears about nanomachines in media.

I speak of course of stories about nanomachines becoming “gray goo”, consuming all in their path to make more of themselves. While these nanites never quite get out of control like that, they do have a special knack for infesting foes and devouring them from within (or at least causing as much damage as possible before running out of power or being fought off by the target’s immune system).

Like an artificial disease or a plague of insects too small to swat, these nanites can be a terrifying unstoppable force in the right circumstances.

The end result is a nanocyte that focuses mostly on the cloud array, but there’s a little something for the other two arrays as well.

 With a surge of power from their reserves, these nanocytes can command nanites in their cloud of sheath to enter a destructive, hungry state, turning on those that are engulfed in the cloud or whom make physical contact with the sheath. The more powerful the nanocyte, the more harm they cause, though thankfully, they can always designate certain creatures as non-targets to avoid harming their friends.

Later on, their nanites are persistent little devils, clinging and burrowing into their prey even after they’ve left the main colony, though they deal much less damage.

Normally, foes that avoid the nanites suffer no damage, but eventually they become so aggressive and toxic that they always deal at least some damage.

Their consumption becomes painful as well, debilitating foes even as they are consumed. Heck, some even hitch a ride on weapons formed from nanites to potentially inflict pain and nausea on a particularly grievous injury.

At their maximum potential, these nanites truly function like an intelligent disease, able to consume sometimes without an expenditure, and able to launch themselves to other targets within sight, spreading the harm.

This expression of the host’s nanites is definitely combat oriented, specifically for use with the cloud array with a minor in the sheath array. The former is good if you favor battlefield control, while the other might be good for playing a tanky build. I personally recommend a build where most of your knacks keep you slipping in and out of your nanite cloud, and/or those that bolster the sheath array to actually be worth it. Your gear array weapons should be long-distance options mostly, since you’ll be mostly using them at a distance and favoring the other two arrays when you get up close (though there is something to be said about having a nauseating melee weapon once you get the ability to make multiple arrays at once.

 The inherent destructive nature of these nanite scream “weapon”, but that need not be the case. Remember that there are a lot of ways to become a host to a nanite colony. While some were certainly weapons, and might have been implanted into them, other infestation nanites might have evolved beyond their original purpose, like waste disposal or material assembly. Certainly, their ability to break down other matter is impressive, but much like the nanocyte themselves, need not necessarily want to be focused entirely on destruction, which might have been why they sought out such a bond with a host to begin with.

  Three days ago, a cave-in at Brakkir Mine trapped several miners underground. A rescue attempt was made, but few dared to hope. However, they did eventually find a survivor. The young dwarven woman was quiet about what had happened down there, but it became increasingly clear that she had survived thanks to the mining nanites she had somehow merged with, which were originally used to burrow into rock to pinpoint ores.

 The day the golem invaders came, none were able to stand up to them, the nanotech golems devastating all in great, teeming swarms. However, one day a young man discovered a malfunctioning cluster of nanites, and bonded with them, and began forming a resistance. If successful, they may yet discover who or what sent them.