Control Machines

[Zac]

I have a question to the community at large concerning a new Villian: Mechanix, aka the Machine Master. Here is his game bio:

 

Mechanix – aka The Machine Master, weilds almost total control of technology. He is somehow able to corrupt computer logic and reprogram technology on the fly. Time and time again his schemes for domination were thwarted by the Ministry of Justice. His last plan was to attach his floating sky fortress to the industrial section of the city. This would give him a huge supply of raw materials and power to produce an immense robot army. He vanished after the Battle of Center City, thought to be destroyed when his floating sky fortress was scuttled by Liberty Belle.

 

He can do this in two known ways:

 

1. He personally takes control of the machine and subverts it to his will (Mind Contol, Machine only)

2. He use a small machine to slowly subvert another machine to his will (same as above but it is done through a created being that has been nicknamed a Tick - ie a machine parasite)

 

 

This is scarry because he could do this not only to a 1993 Grand Marque, but a factory that use computers or a supers technological battle suit.

 

I was thinking the "Tick" would be a penetrating Mind Contol (machine only), continous. The device uplinks some sort of viral code that attacks the machine until it takes it over. X amount of hardned mental defense would keep it at bay. A minor, culmulative transformation (your control to my control) would also do the trick. This is the subtle way Mechanix get things to bend to his will, he seeds an area with his miniture troops. Once they all go online he beings to control as needed.

 

Mechanix himself is just a cannon form of this control, he uses raw power to take control. I thought about telekinesis (only to control technology) but once he has something, it is his.

 

What is the communities thoughts about this major campaign level villian. The players should NEVER really see this guy. Its his influence and corruption are what you really fear.

 

Any advise for a GM would be helpful. The age old mass scale mind control is an option, but that is more of an adventure plot not his standard power (ie he builds a device that does X until the players destroy it).

 

Thanks,

Zac

[mwiggins]

Re: Control Machines

 

I have a question to the community at large concerning a new Villian: Mechanix, aka the Machine Master. Here is his game bio:

 

Mechanix – aka The Machine Master, weilds almost total control of technology. He is somehow able to corrupt computer logic and reprogram technology on the fly. Time and time again his schemes for domination were thwarted by the Ministry of Justice. His last plan was to attach his floating sky fortress to the industrial section of the city. This would give him a huge supply of raw materials and power to produce an immense robot army. He vanished after the Battle of Center City, thought to be destroyed when his floating sky fortress was scuttled by Liberty Belle.

 

He can do this in two known ways:

 

1. He personally takes control of the machine and subverts it to his will (Mind Contol, Machine only)

2. He use a small machine to slowly subvert another machine to his will (same as above but it is done through a created being that has been nicknamed a Tick - ie a machine parasite)

 

 

This is scarry because he could do this not only to a 1993 Grand Marque, but a factory that use computers or a supers technological battle suit.

 

I was thinking the "Tick" would be a penetrating Mind Contol (machine only), continous. The device uplinks some sort of viral code that attacks the machine until it takes it over. X amount of hardned mental defense would keep it at bay. A minor, culmulative transformation (your control to my control) would also do the trick. This is the subtle way Mechanix get things to bend to his will, he seeds an area with his miniture troops. Once they all go online he beings to control as needed.

 

Mechanix himself is just a cannon form of this control, he uses raw power to take control. I thought about telekinesis (only to control technology) but once he has something, it is his.

 

What is the communities thoughts about this major campaign level villian. The players should NEVER really see this guy. Its his influence and corruption are what you really fear.

 

Any advise for a GM would be helpful. The age old mass scale mind control is an option, but that is more of an adventure plot not his standard power (ie he builds a device that does X until the players destroy it).

 

Thanks,

Zac

 

I recently built a cyberpath that desolidifies to take controll, so heres what I learnd from the build...

the mind control (machine) covers the computers. but it takes telekinisis to controll a 1993 Grand Marque, since a car has no intelegence or ego, and the electronices isnt advanced enough to let you steer.

to rewrite code needs a major transform if you want the changes to stay.

the downside of my build is that every power requires "affects real +2" and that makes it expensive.

the bug might be built as a follower with duplication (if you want it to spread). I was thinking of this but I was out of points.

[Fedifensor]

Re: Control Machines

 

I see this as a multipower with the following slots:

* Mind Control vs Machine class of minds, telepathic

* Mind Control vs Machine class of minds, telepathic, uncontrollable continuous, penetrating

* Transform (technology to controlled technology), vs the greater of Power Defense or Mental Defense (machine class)

* Telekinesis vs technology only, affects whole object

[Zac]

Re: Control Machines

 

I recently built a cyberpath that desolidifies to take controll, so heres what I learnd from the build...

the mind control (machine) covers the computers. but it takes telekinisis to controll a 1993 Grand Marque, since a car has no intelegence or ego, and the electronices isnt advanced enough to let you steer.

to rewrite code needs a major transform if you want the changes to stay.

the downside of my build is that every power requires "affects real +2" and that makes it expensive.

the bug might be built as a follower with duplication (if you want it to spread). I was thinking of this but I was out of points.

 

I was not really worried about the pets/followers. In Mechanix's heyday he had a huge pool of followers (army of robots) and some nice bases. After the fall, he is not in as good a shape. However, he still has a LOT to pull from. I was really likening his control to the old Stephen King, the machines take over the world book/movie. Now, in no way are most cars contol boards tied into stearing/brake/acceleration BUT they were in the movie/book. Same kind of thought for Mechanix.

 

Mechanix is really scary when he can get ahold of a factory, when he can start punching out real tools for destruction not just ad-libing off someone Ford.

 

Zac

[Zac]

Re: Control Machines

 

I see this as a multipower with the following slots:

* Mind Control vs Machine class of minds, telepathic

* Mind Control vs Machine class of minds, telepathic, uncontrollable continuous, penetrating

* Transform (technology to controlled technology), vs the greater of Power Defense or Mental Defense (machine class)

* Telekinesis vs technology only, affects whole object

 

These all look pretty solid and I was thinking along some of these lines. I am still looking for any "unique/unusal" ways for control. Against a player, I was probably going to use a something like Telekinesis on the fly, with a transform to soldify the hold.

 

Zac

[Cold Steel]

Re: Control Machines

 

maybe he can take control of a machine (or computer) by having his "ghost" (or mental essence) to have full possession of said machine like Marvel's the Machinesmith or Champion's Cybermind.

 

The drawback would be that he suffers damage every time the machine he is possessing take hit.

 

The thought of a depowered Iron Man chasing after his own armor is appealing.

[Checkmate]

Re: Control Machines

 

I would make Tick a computer. Give him Computer Programing as a skill and Take Control as a program. I think those will work for the car and the factory. If you want to use it against a character in a suit, personally I would use Transform, Invisible Power Effects. If it I were GM'ing I'd also add Gradual so it takes Tick some time to subvert the Power Armor... Why am I suddenly afraid if Guardian makes it into your campaign?

[Heckus]

Re: Control Machines

 

In the past my group had a "phase-in-and-take-control-of-machines" guy too. Figuring out the logistics took some trial and error but we settled on a multipower with MC (cyber only), telepathy (cyber only, for scanning), and finally TK for machines with a limitation called "object animation only (-1/2)".

 

He could only animate an object to do something that it could normally do. He couldn't make things fly around or even walk if they normally couldn't and he couldn't crush anything. This allowed him to open mechanical doors by exerting his TK STR or manipulate odd ball things like photo copiers or elevators that wouldnt stop at certain floors). All required him to phase inside and had the further limitation that he took NND stun damage equal to BODY done to the machine. As the GM i felt that this was an acceptable counter to "affects physical world". This worked for a while with only a few odd occurrences like phasing into a guy in a power suit or taking over a tank's turret.

 

Side note:

The character (Phantos) entered the campaign with a completely unknown background and the player left it up to me to reveal over time. In the end he turned out to be a colony of the villainous Time-Master's nanites that had been stolen from a previous battle site by an evil corperation. They eventually assimilated a dying scientist's body as a means of understanding our world and became "Phantos" (taken from the Scientist's linux ID, Paul Hantos). Unfortunately, partial brain death and the shock of dying resulted in his memory loss for both paul and the Nanites. Later in the campaign the Time-master tried to reclaim him but he had evolved to far to be so easily controlled. Later still , he lost an arm (attacked by the narrative) and had to assimilate one from a dead gang member which resulted in his Secret ID having a miss matched left arm with gang tattoos (regen, only usable when "spare parts" are available). It was big fun.

[Zac]

Re: Control Machines

 

I would make Tick a computer. Give him Computer Programing as a skill and Take Control as a program. I think those will work for the car and the factory. If you want to use it against a character in a suit' date=' personally I would use Transform, Invisible Power Effects. If it I were GM'ing I'd also add Gradual so it takes Tick some time to subvert the Power Armor... Why am I suddenly afraid if Guardian makes it into your campaign?[/quote']

 

I already put pen to paper on it. If you take a "tech" based character, you better think about getting Power Defense (helps against those pesk transformations). 7 points hardened should do it. If you take a robot/cyborg/etc character, you better think about 7 points of hardened mental defense (helps you against those pesky "you are my puppet" moments).

 

Mechanix, his minions and/or his toys are part of the game world. I am just looking at different power angles for implementation.

[Zac]

Re: Control Machines

 

In the past my group had a "phase-in-and-take-control-of-machines" guy too. Figuring out the logistics took some trial and error but we settled on a multipower with MC (cyber only), telepathy (cyber only, for scanning), and finally TK for machines with a limitation called "object animation only (-1/2)".

 

He could only animate an object to do something that it could normally do. He couldn't make things fly around or even walk if they normally couldn't and he couldn't crush anything. This allowed him to open mechanical doors by exerting his TK STR or manipulate odd ball things like photo copiers or elevators that wouldnt stop at certain floors). All required him to phase inside and had the further limitation that he took NND stun damage equal to BODY done to the machine. As the GM i felt that this was an acceptable counter to "affects physical world". This worked for a while with only a few odd occurrences like phasing into a guy in a power suit or taking over a tank's turret.

 

Nice way to do it. I like the NND stun option, very creative.