I know psionics don't really belong in Splicers, but I like them, so here they are.
House Aesir is a blank slate I need to try to fill in sometime soon. It's been an empty file on my computer for two years, the poor thing. I'll probably add some more bio-enhancements specifically for Psychosynthetic Host Armor later.
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Over a decade ago on a mission to retrieve DNA samples from a newly observed saurian species introduced into one of the Nature Preserves by Gaia, a pair of Dreadguards from House Aesir witnessed a strange phenomenon. With their prey in sight they prepared to subdue the beast, but it was spooked by a clap of thunder on a cloudless night. Harsh blue light surrounded them, turning the forest into an eerie combination of ethereally illuminated landscape dotted with pools of impenetrable shadow. Hundreds of feet above the startled Dreadguards, hovering in mid-air, appeared to a be "hole". Curiousity nearly drove the team to investigate further, but fearing the Machine had been alerted by the other wordly display, they prepared to retreat. The spaceship that then blasted through the "hole" in the air and crashed into a copse of gigantic ferns was too strange to be ignored. Careful, but very, very hurried investigation led the pair to make a startling discovery. The craft had a pilot. An injured and unconscious, but human pilot.
Her name is Maria Santorim, and she was once a pilot in the service of the Consortium of Civilized Worlds. Still alive and as happy as any human can be on the accursed planet her ship had the audacity to crash land on, Maria did much more than provide the Splicers with knowledge that the human race has spread throughout the cosmos, in empires so great the Machine could never hope to eliminate their species as it may wish. You see, Maria is a psychic, one powerfully gifted with psionic ability, and she had no qualms with sharing her DNA with the Librarians of House Aesir.
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Mind Knight O.C.C.
Mind Knights are the first humans native to their planet to possess psychic abilities. Selected as candidates for the Mind Knight program as children, the young Splicers had their DNA altered by the Engineers of House Aesir, adding gene sequences found in the human psychic Maria Santorim. None of the children were harmed by the treatments, the Librarians and Engineers are exceptionally skilled, but relatively few of the children developed more than rudimentary psychic abilities. Of the two thousand children who participated, roughly 10% gained Master level psychic potential, a further 15% developed into Major psychics, and the remaining 75% gained Minor psychic abilities. Despite the unrealized hope of turning their entire population into an army of unstoppable psychics, the program has shown such success that all children no more than nine years old, the maximum age the DNA treatments can be safely administered, whose parents consent, have been entered into the Santorim Program.
The first of these children are reaching full maturity, the time when they will be expected to join the Resistance to fight for the survival of their species. They are more than ready to meet the challenge, equipped, not only with their own specially developed Host Armor and bio-weapons designed to maximize their psychic potential, but also with years of hands on instruction from Maria Santorim in the use of their burgeoning powers. Though, it is certain the Mind Knights will be of great assistance combating the Machine, they are likely to be most valuable against House Aesir's human enemies, rival Houses who would see a stronger House fall rather than attempt to grow strong themselves. Experiments have shown that pilots in Host Armor are no less susceptible to psionic influence than an unarmored human and that War Mounts and other Bio-Tech creatures are even less able to resist, their minds no more able to resist psionic influence than any other animal.
Special Mind Knight O.C.C. Powers
1. Psionic Powers: At first level the Mind Knight selects a total of ten powers from the minor Healing, Physical, and Sensitive psionic categories as well as four Super Psionic powers(any except Psi-Sword or Mind Wipe which cannot be selected until third level). At each new level of experience, the Mind Knight can select two powers from any of the minor psionic categories or one Super Psionic power.
2. I.S.P. Base: 2D6x10 +M.E. attribute number. +12 I.S.P. for each additional level of experience. I.S.P. is recovered at a rate of 2 per hour of sleep or 12 per hour of meditation.
3. Saving Throw Versus Psionic Attack: As a Master Psychic, the Mind Knight needs only a 10 or higher to save vs psionic attacks.
4. O.C.C. Bonuses: +2D4+2 M.E., +1D4 I.Q., M.A., & P.E., +3 initiative, +1 strike, +2 pull punch, +2 disarm, +4 vs possession, +2 to save vs all forms of mind control, and +3 to save vs Horror Factor.
Alignment: Any, but the majority are Principled(35%), Scrupulous(30%), Unprincipled(15%), or Anarchist(5%). Evil Mind Knights are uncommon, but not unheard of; Aberrant(10%) Miscreant & Diabolic(5%).
Attribute Requirements: None, though the first children selected to for the program all possessed I.Q. & M.E. of 14 or higher. A Mind Knight must be at least a Master Psychic. High I.Q. & M.E. are especially helpful, but not mandatory.
Base S.D.C.: 30, plus any from physical skills.
Common Skills: Standard
O.C.C. Skill Programs: Basic Military(+15%), Host Pilot(20%), and any one Skill Program of choice(except Medical Doctor or War Mount Rider).
Elective Skills: Select four Elective Skills from the following list at first level. Plus select another one Elective Skill at levels 4, 8, and 12. All new skills start at level one proficiency.
-Communications: Any(+10%)
-Domestic: Any.
-Espionage: Any(+5).
-Medical: First Aid, or Paramedic only.
-Military: Any(+5%).
-Physical: Any.
-Rogue: Any(+10%).
-Science: Advanced Mathematics or Astronomy & Navigation only.
-Technical: Any(+5%).
-Transportation: Any.
-Wilderness: Any.
-W.P.s: Any.
Secondary Skills: The character gets to select two Secondary Skills at level one and one additional at levels 3, 6, 9, and 12. Secondary Skills are additional areas of knowledge starting without any special O.C.C. bonuses.
Mind Knight Host Armor: The Mind Knight is one of the lucky few gifted with a Host Armor, the Bio-Tech equivalent of living power armor. What's more, this suit of living armor has been specially designed to compliment the Mind Knight's psionic powers.
-Step One: Standard and unchanged; the basic Host Armor.
-Step Two: Mind Knight Host Armor always has a Psychosynthetic Metabolism.
-Step Three: Available Bio-Energy points for the Mind Knight is the M.E.(x2) + P.E. +2D4x10+20. Each level of advancement, starting with level two, the Mind Knight gains an additional 2D6+6 Bio-E to add to the capabilities of his current Host Armor. Bio-E can be spent as soon as it is acquired to saved and combined with the points from subsequent levels of experience. If the Mind Knight's Host Armor is destroyed, he will be bonded to a fresh Psychosynthetic Host Armor, but it will have none of the previous suits Bio-Enhancements and starts with first level Bio-E.
-Step Four: Biological Enhancements and Weapons. Selections can be made from any of the categories. Mind Knights understandably tend to favor using the relatively few Bio-Enhancement options developed specifically for their class of Host Armors.
Standard Equipment: Military fatigues, a couple sets of dress clothing, survival knife, utility belt, first-aid kit(with 1D4 Slap Patches), Face Wrap(gas mask), tinted goggles, hatchet, one light and one heavy Bio-Weapon of choice, and one weapon for each WP with appropriate ammunition, tent, knapsack, backpack, two water skins, emergency food rations(2 weeks), personal items, and a Mega-Horse for transportation.
Money: Has 2D6x100 credits worth of precious metals or trade items, as well as 1D6x100 credits
The Upside: You have psychic powers! You may be able to move matter with a thought, start a fire with a glance, or read the minds of your fellow Resistance members. The currently low numbers of Mind Knights make you a precious commodity not to be wasted and your innate power gives you a certain level of authority not normally possessed by the relative rookie that you are.
The Downside: You have psychic powers! Though your official class designation is quite benign, you are much more commonly known as a Mindfreak(or just freak) by your fellow Resistance members. People instinctively fear what they cannot understand, and you had better believe people don't understand what you can do with your mind. Many more people fear you than respect you and this attitude is likely to remain prevalent for many years to come.
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Psychosynthetic Metabolism: The Host Armor feeds on the mental energy generated by its psychic pilot. The armor requires a relatively steady daily supply of ISP, quickly reaching starvation, then death if deprived for even a few short days.
-Feeding: The Host Armor requires 3D6 ISP per day, which it automatically siphons from its pilot. This ISP must be provided by the pilot of the Host Armor and cannot be donated by anyone else, even another psychic pilot. Failure to feed within 24 hours is not immediately fatal, but does bring about starvation and weakness. An ISP starved suit operates with it's running speed, attacks per melee, and combat bonuses all reduced by 50%. A Psychosynthetic Host Armor can survive up to three days without sustenance, but each day of deprivation requires an increasingly greater amount of ISP to restore the suit to full health. After one day of starvation, the Host Armor requires 1D4x10+10 ISP to sate its hunger, after two days it increases to 1D6x10+10 ISP, and on its last day, the suit must be gorged on 2D4x10+20 ISP. After 72 hours without feeding, the Host Armor will die.
-Sleep Requirements: As a psychosynthetic organism, the Host Armor does not require sleep or rest, but its pilot does.
-Color: Virtually any color is possible, though there is a tendency towards deep greens, blues, and purples. No matter what color it may be, a Psychosynthetic Host Armor has fine networks of bio-crystals growing in a vein-like lattice up and down its limbs and torso. The slightly luminescent bio-crystals converge at the suit's spine, disappearing into its neck near the base of the skull. If removed from the Host Armor, these crystals instantly become inert, losing their eerie glow, then soon experience bio-meltdown, turning into an unusable organic sludge.
-Special Senses: None, per se, but the Host Armor's bond with its pilot doubles the range of any Sensitive psychic powers he may employ.
-Psychic Efficiency: For reasons unknown, excessive amounts of mental energy are required to activate psychic powers on the Splicers' planet, levels far in excess of what should be necessary. To help relieve this potentially crippling handicap, the Psychosynthetic Host Armor's bio-crystal matrices have been developed to collect and amplify every scrap of ISP expended by their pilots. This reduces the cost of activating psionic powers by 50%, but really only returns the ISP costs to their standard levels due to the mysterious planetary dampening field.
-Psionic Bond: The Host Armor is considered one with its psychic pilot. Psionic powers that carry designators such as "Self" or specific weight allotments beyond the psychic will operate as if the Host Armor was truthfully just another part of the pilot.
-Bonus Bio-E Points: 0 additional Bio-E points.
-Bite Damage: Not applicable, the Host Armor has no mouth, just small vents to breathe through.
-Bonuses: +1 attack per melee, +3 initiative, +2 strike, +2 parry, +4 dodge, +2 pull punch, +4 roll with punch/fall/impact
-Penalties: Due to the bio-crystals that grow on the Host Armor's outer surface, it has a -20% penalty to Prowl, Camouflage, and Hide.
-Prerequisite: To use a Host Armor with this metabolism, the pilot must be a Master psychic.
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An alternative to giving the psychic Mind Knight access to potentially unbalancing Host Armor. Thanks to demos606 for the recommendation that led to this creation.
For reasons unknown to the Librarians and Engineers who attempted to craft a Host Armor variant for use by their growing crop of psychic children, Master level psychics of the calibre of Maria Santorim and the small percentage of children gifted with such potential by the Santorim Project, are unable to form a neurological bond with the complex bio-engineered nervous systems of Host Armors or War Mounts. To balance this handicap a new type of Living Armor was created, one that falls far short of a Host Armor, but simultaneously exceeds the capabilities of other Living Armor designs.
Bio-Crystal Living Armor(Medium): Nearly seventy-five percent of this living armor is composed of a self-replicating bio-crystal matrix engineered to focus the mental energies of(reduces I.S.P. cost of psionic powers by 50%) and to psychically bond with its wearer. This psychic bond makes the wearer one with his armor, extending the effects of psionic powers that would normally affect only the psychic using them to the armor itself(i.e. Impervious to Fire, Resist Damage, etc).
-M.D.C. By Location: Main Body: 2D6x10+40, Arms & Legs: 1D6x10+20, Head: 1D6x10+40, Psychic Force Field: 3D6x10, Light Psi-Bolt Projector(Chest or Forehead): 1D4x10+25
-Initial Bio-Enhancements: The Living Armor of a Mind Knight comes pre-enhanced a basic Psychic Force Field and a Light Psi-Bolt Projector. They may be enhanced using Bio-E as the Mind Knight wishes.
-Weight: 25 pounds.
-Armor Regeneration: 4D6 M.D.C. per minute, and destroyed section will regenerate in 12 hours.
-Excellent Mobility: -5% penalty applies to such skills as Prowl, Climb, Swimming, Acrobatics, and Gymnastics; no penalties to running and flying speed.
-Penalties: The bio-luminescent crystals comprising the armor make concealment difficult. This results in a -15% penalty to Prowl, Hide, and Camouflage.
-Feeding: The Bio-Crystal Living Armor, like other varieties of Living Armor, requires periodic nutrient baths(normally every 1D6+3 days) to remain healthy. However, because such a small portion of the armor is organic in the traditional sense, the time between feedings is dramatically extended(4D6+12 days). The bio-crystals of the armor require a different form of sustenance. For every day the Bio-Crystal Living Armor is not immersed in a nutrient bath it must be fed 3D6 I.S.P. by a human psychic.
-Trade Value: Varies greatly. Worth 30,000 credits to a House Aesir psychic, but only 5,000 credits to anyone else(psionic bio-enhancements will not function without psychic control and feeding is impossible for non-psychics).
-Bio-E: Mind Knights recieve their M.E. attribute number plus 5D10+50 points of Bio-E to enhance their armor.
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Psychic Force Field: A psionic variant of the standard Bio-Force Field, this bio-enhancement is available only to Psychosynthetic Host Armors and their psychic pilots.
-MDC of the Psychic Force Field: 3d6x10 MDC is standard, but the MDC can be increased by spending more Bio-E on it, up to a maximum of 300 MDC.
-Penalty: If the MDC of the Psychic Force Field is depleted, it cannot be reactivated again for 12 hours unless the pilot expends 1 ISP per 10 MDC of the force field. As long as the Psychic Force Field's MDC has not been depleted, it regenerates lost MDC at a rate of 1 MDC per minute(60 per hour). Instead of waiting for damage to the force field to recover naturally, the pilot may choose to spend ISP to forcefully recharge its MDC at a cost of 1 ISP per 10 MDC.
-Duration: Indefinite; as long as the pilot is conscious, the force field can remain in place.
-Bio-E Cost: 35 points(3d6x10 MDC). The Psychic Force Field's MDC can be increased by 20 MDC per every additional 5 Bio-E points spent.
-Prerequisite: The Host Armor must be Psychosynthetic.
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Light Psi-Bolt Projector: Similar in basic concept to the Bio-Energy Expulsion Vent, the Psi-Bolt Projector uses the mental energy of the pilot instead of that of his physical body. The organic bio-crystals that grow on the surface of the Host Armor serve as a base for a projector, with a single crystal expanding, its structure altering to gather and focus the mental energy of its pilot into deadly bolts of psionic force. Crystals that become projectors double in size(approx. equal to a robin's egg) and take on a multi-faceted appearance as if they were cut by a professional jeweler and polished to perfection.
-MDC of the Projector: 1d4x10+25
-Mega-Damage: 3d10 MD +bonus MD equal to the ME attribute value of the human pilot.
-Special: Living targets(including Host Armors with their pilots, War Mounts linked to an Outrider, etc.) struck by a psi-bolt must save vs psionics or suffer a -1 penalty to all combat actions and melee attacks for 1D4 melee rounds. Penalties from multiple strikes are not cumulative, but duration is.
-Rate of Fire: Each bolt counts as one melee attack/action. Cannot fire volleys or simultaneous bolts at the same target.
-Maximum Effective Range: 2000 feet.
-Payload: Effectively Unlimited. However, the pilot may only fire a number of psi-bolts per minute equal to their ME attribute without expending additional mental energy. Each psi-bolt fired within a minute that bypasses their ME costs 1 ISP.
-Bonus: +3 aimed strike.
-Bio-E Cost: 10
-Prerequisite: Psychosynthetic Host Armor.
Medium Psi-Bolt Projector: Undergoing further augmentation, the crystal that has become a Psi-Bolt Projector changes yet again. Root-like extensions grow from the edge of the crystal, appearing to have burrowed beneath the Host Armor's skin. This does no damage to the Host Armor, but provides the crystal with a greater focusing capacity by increasing its linkage with the pilot.
-MDC of the Projector: +2D6+4 MDC
-Mega-Damage: 5d10 MD +bonus MD equal to the ME attribute value of the human pilot.
-Special: Living targets(including Host Armors with their pilots, War Mounts linked to an Outrider, etc.) struck by a psi-bolt must save vs psionics or suffer a -2 penalty to all combat actions and melee attacks for 1D6 melee rounds. Penalties from multiple strikes are not cumulative, but duration is.
-Rate of Fire: Each bolt counts as one melee attack/action. Cannot fire volleys or simultaneous bolts at the same target.
-Maximum Effective Range: 3000 feet.
-Payload: Effectively Unlimited. However, the pilot may only fire a number of psi-bolts per minute equal to their ME attribute without expending additional mental energy. Each psi-bolt fired within a minute that bypasses their ME costs 2 ISP.
-Bonus: +3 aimed strike.
-Bio-E Cost: 15
-Prerequisite: Psychosynthetic Host Armor and a Light Psi-Bolt Projector which is replaced by the Medium Psi-Bolt Projector.
Heavy Psi-Bolt Projector: Like a blooming flower, the crystalline projector literally blossoms. The jeweled facets of the crystal expand and gain the ability to open a series of small petal-like protrusions that serve to further intensify the power of the psionic energy bolts it generates. Each time the projector fires a psi-bolt, the crystal petals rapidly open into proper alignment for firing then close an instant later.
-MDC of the Projector: +2D8+6 MDC
-Mega-Damage: 8d10 MD +bonus MD equal to the ME attribute value of the human pilot.
-Special: Living targets(including Host Armors with their pilots, War Mounts linked to an Outrider, etc.) struck by a psi-bolt must save vs psionics or suffer a -3 penalty to all combat actions and melee attacks for 2D4 melee rounds. Penalties from multiple strikes are not cumulative, but duration is.
-Rate of Fire: Each bolt counts as one melee attack/action. Cannot fire volleys or simultaneous bolts at the same target.
-Maximum Effective Range: 4000 feet.
-Payload: Effectively Unlimited. However, the pilot may only fire a number of psi-bolts per minute equal to their ME attribute without expending additional mental energy. Each psi-bolt fired within a minute that bypasses their ME costs 4 ISP.
-Bonus: +3 aimed strike.
-Bio-E Cost: 25
-Prerequisite: Psychosynthetic Host Armor and a Medium Psi-Bolt Projector which is replaced by the Heavy Psi-Bolt Projector.
