Nanobot Cloud

[Rebar]

I'm putting my players up against a cloud of nanomachines. (Anybody read Michael Crichton's* Prey?) The nanomachines are von Neumann devices (they build copies of themselves. If left long enough, they will strip a planet's landscape or even an asteroid of all its metals to build more of themselves, and eventually, some as-yet un-specified destruction machine.)

 

They are atomic scale and invisible, except as a cloud. If the players come in contact with a cloud, the device will begin invisibly disassembling the players' suit/skin, etc. (they might not notice, right up until their suits disappear in a puff of powder).

 

I can think of all sorts of powers: RKA, no range, gradual, reduced penetration, AP, invisble effects, etc. maybe Desolid. They can detect metals and zero in on them. It might have an outer tenuous boundary where its corrosive effects are weaker.

 

 

What I'm not sure about is what I'm building. This is a cloud that could be spread across a landscape like a pond. They might encounter it as a floating cloud. One cloud, or maybe several, or a cloud large enough to engulf the ship, or half the asteroid. It's not really a single thing, or even a bunch of things.

 

They likely won't be able to defeat it in battle (how do you battle a cloud?), they'll have to figure out its weakness.

 

Do I build it as a character at all? Maybe with multiple levels of Growth? Megascale growth?

 

Or do I build it as a plot vehicle? I mean, do I have to worry about how fast it can move and its Dex? Or do I just plot hexes that it fills and treat it much like a natural disaster? I suppose automaton might be a possibility...

 

I tried building it in HD, but, well, it's just a group of naked powers.

 

 

The question here is not so much about powers-to-fit-effects but more about

what "framework" do I build it on?

 

 

 

*Rest his soul.

[Comic]

Re: Nanobot Cloud

 

Why do they exist?

 

Are they a weapon?

An accident?

A scientist's madness given physical form?

 

Just because the original source may be dead or far remote doesn't mean you can't build him, and attribute the powers to him.

 

Because if you build him, they will come.

 

What sort of characters are your players?

 

Are they the sort of detectives who can trace back from the cloud, reverse engineer it to discover the mind of its inventor?

 

Do they see backwards in time, or even travel, to meet the people who created it?

 

If they're like that, then you'll want to have the backstory filled in.

 

Even if the actual character is dead by the time his power (which literally seems to be a very small character with a huge Transfer to Duplication) gets to their world.

[Rebar]

Re: Nanobot Cloud

 

Why do they exist?

 

Are they a weapon?

An accident?

A scientist's madness given physical form?

 

It's a weapon. The enemy alien race had only a very narrow window to get through (literally, tiny ship, sneaking through the warp tunnel). Using nanobots means the weapon can come through weak and tiny, and build themselves into an immense power, given enough time.

 

The ship contains 3 pods that MIRV, each headed in a different direction. They may find and defeat one of them, but the others will have a chance to grow. (Nicely giving me three escalating episodes.)

 

The weapon is designed to defeat good guy forces as part of a longer-term campaign to wrestle control of Earth away from good guy forces. (Good guys and bad guys are waging war in the Solar System, but both want Earth to be ignorant of their presence.)

[SSgt Baloo]

Re: Nanobot Cloud

 

I'm putting my players up against a cloud of nanomachines. (Anybody read Michael Crichton's* Prey?) The nanomachines are von Neumann devices (they build copies of themselves. If left long enough, they will strip a planet's landscape or even an asteroid of all its metals to build more of themselves, and eventually, some as-yet un-specified destruction machine.)

 

They are atomic scale and invisible, except as a cloud. If the players come in contact with a cloud, the device will begin invisibly disassembling the players' suit/skin, etc. (they might not notice, right up until their suits disappear in a puff of powder).

 

I can think of all sorts of powers: RKA, no range, gradual, reduced penetration, AP, invisble effects, etc. maybe Desolid. They can detect metals and zero in on them. It might have an outer tenuous boundary where its corrosive effects are weaker.

 

 

What I'm not sure about is what I'm building. This is a cloud that could be spread across a landscape like a pond. They might encounter it as a floating cloud. One cloud, or maybe several, or a cloud large enough to engulf the ship, or half the asteroid. It's not really a single thing, or even a bunch of things.

 

They likely won't be able to defeat it in battle (how do you battle a cloud?), they'll have to figure out its weakness.

 

Do I build it as a character at all? Maybe with multiple levels of Growth? Megascale growth?

 

Or do I build it as a plot vehicle? I mean, do I have to worry about how fast it can move and its Dex? Or do I just plot hexes that it fills and treat it much like a natural disaster? I suppose automaton might be a possibility...

 

I tried building it in HD, but, well, it's just a group of naked powers.

 

 

The question here is not so much about powers-to-fit-effects but more about

what "framework" do I build it on?

 

 

 

*Rest his soul.

 

Since the "cloud" dismantles ordinary metal into atoms, then reassembles them as more nanobots, perhaps their ultimate weapon is just making enough nanobots so the next stage in their programming may commence.

 

Stage One: Consume all metals on the planet, turning them into nanobots.

 

Stage Two: the Nanobots, once sufficiently numerous, alter the balance of gases/liquids in the atmosphere/ocean to what the badguys prefer to breathe/drink.

 

Stage Three: Convert all organic matter (including unprotected people) into organic "nanolegos" (whatever the building blocks of life are on Planet Badguy).

 

Stage Four: Nanobots assemble these organic nanolegos into a duplicate of the Badguys' biosphere, right down to the plants, animals, fish and fungi.

 

Stage Five: Upon completion of Stage Four the nanobots build factorys/housing/office space for the new badguy overlords.

 

Stage Six: When complete, the nanobots clump together and deactivate, leaving behind easily exploitable piles of raw material.

[Rebar]

Re: Nanobot Cloud

 

Yes, thank you. But this has nothing to do with my question.

 

My question is: conceptually, what kind of NPC is this? A character? An automaton? A vehicle? Or do I just treat it as a natural disaster?

 

It doesn't really have STR, not sure it even has a DEX, or CON, etc. I could even treat it like a natural disaster in the sense that I merely define where it is and what FX it has. But it does move, and willfully. And there might be clumps of them, shifting, coalescing and splitting.

 

Do I just do this as GM fiat (i.e. "this happens") or should I build it like a character, and have it follow character DEX/SPD rules, etc.?

[SSgt Baloo]

Re: Nanobot Cloud

 

Yes' date=' thank you. But this has [i']nothing to do with my question[/i].

 

My question is: conceptually, what kind of NPC is this? A character? An automaton? A vehicle? Or do I just treat it as a natural disaster?

 

It doesn't really have STR, not sure it even has a DEX, or CON, etc. I could even treat it like a natural disaster in the sense that I merely define where it is and what FX it has. But it does move, and willfully. And there might be clumps of them, shifting, coalescing and splitting.

 

Do I just do this as GM fiat (i.e. "this happens") or should I build it like a character, and have it follow character DEX/SPD rules, etc.?

 

I'd just call it a "natural disaster" and have there be several ways it could be destroyed/stopped. Perhaps they need to gather a sample for testing and discover that a concentrated burst of Z-rays will stop them dead in their tracks. Likewise there may be a MacGuffin that can switch off the nanobots or otherwise destroy them.

 

If you want to make it as a power/person, I'd recommend building it as a sticky transform that's triggered by (and has senses to detect) proximity to metals, with the "person" being a desolid character that has a vulnerability to whatever it is that shuts it off (and there should be more than one way to do it). The trick isn't to give it so much body that it can't be stopped by anything less than a nuclear device, but to make the quest for the counter to this stuff challenging but not impossible. Once the characters learn what these nanobots are vulnerable to, there may be a further challenge in getting the experts to design/build the device which provides them with an "off switch."

[Prometheus]

Re: Nanobot Cloud

 

Have you had a look at the insect write ups in the Bestiary? An entire swarm is built as a character, so you could design the cloud along the same lines. On the other hand, the scenario you've described doesn't really lend itself to that build- you're probably looking for something closer to Grey Goo.

 

I would probably just give it a BODY stat, with a BODY Transfer to feed it, and have it increase in size for every +5 BODY.

[Comic]

Re: Nanobot Cloud

 

Megascale sticky attack from a base weapon with Indirect, sounds like.

[Rebar]

Re: Nanobot Cloud

 

So, I basically ran it as a collection of effects - sort of natural disaster-style.

 

I left it up to them to figure out a way to defeat it even while their ship and their crewmembers were being disassembled atom by atom.

 

 

In wrapping up the plot threads from last episode, the Gadgeteer (who has a "Scavenged Junk" pool) decided to scavenge a couple of anti-matter grenades from the vanquished enemy.

 

Harmless, I thought. In fact, it was great fun when the nanites got into the grenade fuses. I'd roll every few phases to see if one would arm itself and the Gadgeteer would have to toss it out the airlock or risk blowing the bridge to smithereens. Just a fun sub-plot.

 

That is, until the Gadgeteer (played by a ten-year-old player, btw), decided to extract the antimatter from the grenades and Gadgeteer a body suit with an antimatter force-field ... His teammates dangled him from the ship's grappling hook in the cloud of nanites. I'd already established that the nanites were attracted to the exotic metals he had, so they were single-minded in swarming over him.

 

His suit lit up like a giant anti-matter bug zapper! Wiped em out in minutes!

 

It was brilliant! and there was nothing I could do to thwart them!

[Hyper-Man]

Re: Nanobot Cloud

 

It's made Plot-Devicium. A 'HERO' build is completely unneeded.

 

It's like asking what are the effects of visiting ground zero of a nuclear blast 6 hours after detonation. No stats are required. If characters don't have the ability to withstand High Radiation, Heat and other effects either naturally or via tech then they would die instantly.

 

In a super-heroic setting (Champions) this is an ability that must be paid for with character points and some characters might have the ability as a default (player choice).

 

However, in a heroic setting like Star Hero it depends on whether tech is available to deal with the issue. Star Hero tech is paid for with money or otherwise aquired 'in-game' like just about every other RPG on the market.

 

The way to defeat this 'Nanobot Cloud' is whatever you want it to be. There is no 'right' answer besides that.

[AmadanNaBriona]

Re: Nanobot Cloud

 

So, I basically ran it as a collection of effects - sort of natural disaster-style.

 

I left it up to them to figure out a way to defeat it even while their ship and their crewmembers were being disassembled atom by atom.

 

 

In wrapping up the plot threads from last episode, the Gadgeteer (who has a "Scavenged Junk" pool) decided to scavenge a couple of anti-matter grenades from the vanquished enemy.

 

Harmless, I thought. In fact, it was great fun when the nanites got into the grenade fuses. I'd roll every few phases to see if one would arm itself and the Gadgeteer would have to toss it out the airlock or risk blowing the bridge to smithereens. Just a fun sub-plot.

 

That is, until the Gadgeteer (played by a ten-year-old player, btw), decided to extract the antimatter from the grenades and Gadgeteer a body suit with an antimatter force-field ... His teammates dangled him from the ship's grappling hook in the cloud of nanites. I'd already established that the nanites were attracted to the exotic metals he had, so they were single-minded in swarming over him.

 

His suit lit up like a giant anti-matter bug zapper! Wiped em out in minutes!

 

It was brilliant! and there was nothing I could do to thwart them!

 

Well done on the part of your player. Give him mad props, he earned 'em

[Rebar]

Re: Nanobot Cloud

 

It's like asking what are the effects of visiting ground zero of a nuclear blast 6 hours after detonation. No stats are required. If characters don't have the ability to withstand High Radiation, Heat and other effects either naturally or via tech then they would die instantly.

Yes, but the key difference here, is that they have to FIGHT it and defeat it.

If it's just a plot device then the players have no recourse; their win is purely at the GM's whim. (eg.: "Hey! how did it travel from here to there in one phase! It must have a movement rate of X!")

 

 

 

In a super-heroic setting (Champions) this is an ability that must be paid for with character points and some characters might have the ability as a default (player choice).

I decided that the attack was AVLD:Hardened defenses. If the nanites are able to pull individual atoms off materials then a 'hardened' material probably has some extra property to make it more than merely atoms. The atomic bonds are surely strengthened.

 

The way to defeat this 'Nanobotc Cloud' is whatever you want it to be. There is no 'right' answer besides that.

My Achilles Heel was going to be 'wide-spread sustained heat bath'. Nanites may be able to withstand a lot, but, just like all tiny creatures with a high surface-to-volume ratio, if they can't dump their heat, they'll soon shut down. No high-tech defense for fundamental laws of thermodynamics.

 

But an anti-matter bug zapper was brilliant.