Character: LV-426 Life Form

[Susano]

[Once you get to the powers the identity of this adaption should be obvious.]

 

LV-426 LIFE FORM

Val	CHA	Cost	Roll	Notes
25	STR	15	14-	Lift 800 kg; 5d6 HTH Damage
18	DEX	24	13-	OCV: 6 / DCV: 6
25	CON	30	14-
12	BODY	4	11-
8	INT	-2	11-	PER Roll 11-
8	EGO	-4	11-	ECV: 3
25	PRE	15	14-	PRE Attack: 5d6
0	COM	-5	9-
9	PD	4		Total: 14 PD (5 rPD)
9	ED	4		Total: 14 ED (5 rED)
3	SPD	2		Phases: 4, 8, 12
10	REC	0
50	END	0
40	STUN	2
Total Characteristics Cost: 89

Movement:	Running: 7" / 14"
	Swimming: 4" / 8"

Cost	Powers & Skills
5	Claws: HKA 1 pip (1/2d6 with STR), END 1
15	Teeth: HKA 1d6 (2d6 with STR), END 1
38	Acidic Blood: RKA 1d6, Continuous (+1), Damage Shield (+1/2), Increased Stun 
Multiplier (+1/4), Penetrating (+1/2), Reduced Endurance (0 END; +1/2), 
Persistent (+1/2), Personal Immunity (+1/4), Uncontrolled (see below; +1/2); 
Always On (-1/2), 24 Charges which Recover by healing (character can only recover 
Charges by healing BODY damage; -1/4), Only Works Against Objects Which Cause 
BODY Damage Or On Which Character's Blood Is Spilled (-1) 
plus Autofire (20 shots; +1 1/2) for RKA 1d6; No Conscious Control (number shots 
depends on BODY damage taken; -1)
15	Exoskeleton: Armor (5 PD / 5 ED)
20	Alien Physiology: Life Support (Immunity: Terrestrial Disease And Poisons)
2	Frighteningly Fast: +1" Running (7" total), END 1
2	Swims Like A Fish: +2" Swimming (4" total), END 1
10	Can Climb Walls With Ease: Clinging (25 STR)
27	Apparently Sees Without Eyes: Spatial Awareness, Increased Arc Of Perception (360-
degree arc)
3	Sharp Senses: +3 PER with Spatial Awareness
5	Tail: Extra Limb, Inherent (+1/4); Limited Manipulation (-1/4)

Skills:
10	Combat Skill Levels: +2 With Hand-To-Hand Combat
4	Extendable Jaws: Combat Skill Levels: +2 OCV with Teeth
0	AK: Home Territory 8-
0	Analyze Animal 8-
3	Breakfall 13-
2	Concealment 11-; Self Only (-1/2)
6	"It Looks Like Some Sort Of Excretion": +7 with Concealment; Self Only (-1/2), 
Only In Home Environment (-1)
0	Language (native)
0	PS: LV-426 Life Form Abilities 8-
7	Shadowing 13-
3	Stealth 13-
3	"They're Coming Outta The Walls!": +3 with Stealth; Only In Home 
Environment (-1)
0	Survival (varies) 8-
1	Tactics 8-
181	Total Powers & Skills Cost
270	Total Character Cost

75+	Disadvantages
0	Physical Limitation: Human Size
10	Physical Limitation: Near-Human Intelligence (F, S)
20	Psychological Limitation: Utterly Hostile (C, T)
165	H.R.Giger Bonus
270	Total Disadvantage Points

OPTIONS
Cost	LV-426 Life Form Powers
9	"Being Cocooned Just Like The Others": Entangle 4d6, 4 DEF; Extra Time (roughly 
5 Minutes; -2), Gradual Effect (4 Minutes to fully harden, 1d6/ Minute; -1/2), 
No Range (-1/2), Must Follow Grab Or Target must be Willing and/or Unable To 
Resist (-1/2), END 4
85	Stinger: HKA 1/2d6 (1d6+1 with STR) plus Drain DEX 3d6, Delayed Return Rate 
(points return at the rate of 5 per Hour; +1), NND (defense is appropriate LS: 
Immunity; +1); 4 Charges (-1), Extra Time (onset time beings one Segment after victim is 
stung; -1/2), Gradual Effect (3 Segments; 1d6/Segment; -1/4), Linked (to EB; -1/2)
plus Drain CON 3d6, Delayed Return Rate (points return at the rate of 5 per Hour; +1), 
NND (defense is appropriate LS: Immunity; +1); 4 Charges (-1), Extra Time (onset time 
beings one Segment after victim is stung; -1/2), Gradual Effect (3 Segments; 
1d6/Segment; -1/4), Linked (to EB; -1/2) plus EB 9d6, NND (defense is appropriate LS: 
Immunity; +1); 4 Charges (-1), Extra Time (onset time beings one Segment after victim is 
stung; -1/2), Gradual Effect (3 Segments; 3d6/Segment; -1/4), No Range (-1/2), HKA 
Must Do BODY (-1/2)
45	"Maybe They Don't Show Up On Infrared?": Invisibility to IR Perception, No Fringe, 
Reduced Endurance (0 END; +1/2)
6	Create Face-hugger: Summon 100-point Face-hugger, Devoted (+1); OAF Expendable 
(corpse; -1 1/4), Extra Time (roughly one week; -4 1/2)

Ecology:

The LV-426 life form is an extremely hostile alien organism known only from several brief encounters on the planet Acheron (originally designated LV-426). It is apparently not native to the planet, as the first specimen was discovered (while still an egg) in the hull of a derelict alien vessel.

 

Although details are unclear, the LV-426 life form is definitely a parasitic species, and requires a living lost in order to gestate its young. The organism's life cycle seems to be as follows:

 

1) The life form starts its life cycle as a egg. Inside the egg is a creature known as a "face-hugger." This egg remains viable for extremely long periods and responds (i.e. opens) to outside stimulus, such as being touched.

 

2) Once released from its egg, the face-hugger will attach itself to the nearest living being, using its multiple legs to grip the target's face, while its tail is wrapped around the target's neck. A tube is then thrust down the target's throat, allowing the target to breathe, but also allowing the face-hugger to implant an embryo.

 

3) After a period of only a few hours to perhaps a day or so, the face-hugger will drop off and crawl away to die. Meanwhile the embryo continues its gestation period. This period is remarkably short, lasting only for several hours, at which point the appropriately named "chest-burster" will emerge from its host, with almost fatal results for said host.

 

4) The chest-burster will crawl away to molt, doing so rapidly, and growing to great size in only a short period of time, eventually assuming what is known as a "warrior" form.

 

5) The warrior will then seek out living hosts for two purposes. The first is to create new eggs (and thus new face-huggers). The second is to find new hosts for the mature face-hugger. Thus, a warrior needs two victims to create a new warrior. However, evidence shows that it is possible for a warrior to undergo a further metamorphosis, transforming into a gigantic "queen" form, which lays eggs directly.

 

Naturally, this life cycle is based heavily on guesswork and may not be fully complete. Evidence does point to the LV-426 life form as being a bio-engineered being, possibly created as a living bio-weapon. The derelict in which the first egg was found is known to contain thousands of eggs (possibly millions) and may have been a freighter hauling the eggs for purposes one can only guess at.

 

Personality/Motivation:

The LV-426 life form is incredibly hostile. It cannot be reasoned or negotiated with and will seek to kill and/or capture anyone it comes across, seeing them only as possible reproductive source. The continuation of the species seems to be the organism's sole motivation, and since it requires a living host in order to do so, it will prey on any living thing it comes across.

 

A queen form seems to have a greater degree of intelligence than a warrior, or, at least, is less driven by instinct. It may be possible to "reason" with the queen, although this would be purely through applications of force and not diplomacy.

 

Powers/Tactics:

An LV-426 warrior is extremely well-equipped to accomplish its mission, which in most cases is to defend the nest and to find new hosts for the face-huggers. First of all, a warrior is incredibly strong, and is capable of lifting an adult human male, dressed in full combat gear, off of the floor. They can also punch through armored glass and can dent armored bulkhead doors. Warriors are also quite agile and are capable of crawling through surprisingly small spaces. They can cling to a ceiling with ease, and can curl up in a fairly small space to hide and/or hibernate.

 

Offensively, a warrior has a fearsome set of teeth with an even nastier set of teeth behind the first! It will often use its teeth to disable a struggling foe before taking the body back to its lair. Defensively, it's body is well armored and capable of resisting most small arms fire. Worse yet, its blood is a highly corrosive molecular acid, and can dissolve most substances with ease. The acid uses the rules for acid powers on page 8 of the "Until Superpowers Database." Simply put, each drop of acid lasts for either 1d6 Phases or until the acid rolls 12 BODY worth of damage.

 

Appearance:

A full-grown LV-426 warrior stands well over six feet in height and may be as tall as eight feet from head to toe. The body is humanoid, with a black exoskeleton covered in assorted armored plates, tubes, and protrusions. It has a distinctive skeletal look to it, especially the long tail, which is quite articulate and tipped with a sharp blade. The head is long and pale, with a translucent "skull". Reports describe the teeth as looking like steel, with a second set of jaws *inside* the main mouth.

 

Designer's Notes:

The Alien, first introduced in the 1979 film of the same name, is possibly one of the best movie monsters ever made. This character sheet uses the films "Alien" and "Aliens" as a basis. I haven't seen "Alien 3" and am unsure I want to. I included everything I felt was fairly documentable in the main character sheet, and then added a few "director's cut" powers under Options. The Entangle could be a main power, although it doesn't have an direct combat use, so I left it off. The Stinger is described in the script for "Aliens," and (I think) in the novelization. Not showing up on IR is a guess on my part based on the initial encounter scene in "Aliens." The Summon Face-hugger power is taken from a deleted scene in "Alien" and the novelization of "Alien." This scene has been restored in the recent director's cut of the film.

 

Personally, I have long felt the alien is a bio-engineered life form, and was used as a combat "machine" by some alien race. My guess is the ship seen in the first film was transporting the eggs when an accident happened. I also feel the warriors probably have a very short life-span, and the one Ripley kills at the end of "Alien" was dying anyway (look at how slow it was moving).

 

(The LV-426 Life Form created by Dan O'Bannon, H.R. Giger, Ron Cobb, Ridley Scott, and James Cameron, character sheet created by Michael Surbrook)

[chaos_engineer]

Re: Character: LV-426 Life Form

 

Originally posted by Susano

[Once you get to the powers the identity of this adaption should be obvious.]

 

LV-426 LIFE FORM

 

excellent job, Mike. that's always been one of my favorite monsters, mainly because of Giger's influence.

 

makes me want to game Batman: Dead End.

 

 

(The LV-426 Life Form created by Dan O'Bannon, H.R. Giger, Ron Cobb, Ridley Scott, and James Cameron...

 

since we're giving credit, it's worth mentioning that the idea for the film was taken from a scene in A. E. van Vogt's classic The Voyage of the Space Beagle.

[Sociotard]

Very Nice. Very Nice Indeed. Do you have any plans to stat out the face-hugger? It looks like it has clinging, Penalty skill levels to target faces, and another summon (the embryo). Monolith had some good suggestions on how to do the parasite. He advised a desolidification and 1 pip hka nnd affects solid. This would be followed by a multiform into the warrior form, and would take effect once the subject had been reduced to 0 body. I'd say the chest burst itself would be a 1d6 hka. That way, even after being reduced to 0 body, the victim might still be saveable. might.

 

I noticed the critter usually fights in warm environments. Could it have the cold-blooded limitation?

 

As for the short lifespan . . . that could be a disadvantage too, one that may be worth exploiting. I could see the marines try to out last it. So lets use LS longevity backwards. If standard human life span is 100 years, for 1 point it's 50,

[*] 50 years

[*] 25

[*] 12 years 6 months

[*] 6 years 3 months

[*] 3 years

[*] 1 year 7 months

[*] 9 months

[*] 5 months

[*] 2 months

[*] 1 month

[*] 3 weeks

[*] 9 days

[*] 4 days

[*] 2 days

[*] 1 day

[*] 13 hours

[*] 7 hours

[*] 3 hours

[*] 1 hour 40 minutes

[*] 50 minutes

[*] 24 minutes 40 seconds

[*] 12 minutes 22 seconds

[*] 6 minutes 10 seconds

[*] 3 minutes 5 seconds

[*] 1 minute 33 seconds

[/list=1]

25 being the usual limit on disadvantages. Come to think of it, that list would be good to pop into my bestiary. A large dog has a 4 point limitation, cats have a 3 point limitation, mayflies have a 25 point limitation . . .

[Edsel]

Excellent write-up Thanks.

[Peregrine]

Sweet! Long one of my favorite critters (I inserted them into a FASA Star Trek RPG campaign I ran), it's good to see them fully statted out for HERO.

[Susano]

Re: Re: Character: LV-426 Life Form

 

Originally posted by chaos_engineer

excellent job, Mike. that's always been one of my favorite monsters, mainly because of Giger's influence.

 

since we're giving credit, it's worth mentioning that the idea for the film was taken from a scene in A. E. van Vogt's classic The Voyage of the Space Beagle.

 

Thanks.

 

I had heard van Vogt sued over the film and it was settled out of court. I also read that O'Bannon got the idea from a wasp that implants its larva in still-living spiders.

[Susano]

The version that goes on my website will have some additions and alterations based on comments by readers.

 

Also, does anyone have a decent pic of the thing?

[The Horror]

Re: Character: LV-426 Life Form

 

Originally posted by Susano

LV-426 LIFE FORM

 

Very nice! Do you have a write up for the Predator as well?

 

 

The Horror

[Nightfly]

Aren't Aliens somewhat immune to the vacuum of space (also)?

Perhaps having some sort of extended breathing.

Not sure, just asking.

 

Excellent work, as always Susano!  I'll look for it on your website!

[Susano]

Re: Re: Character: LV-426 Life Form

 

Originally posted by The Horror

Very nice! Do you have a write up for the Predator as well?

 

I will. Eventually.

[Vanguard]

Very nice indeed. I'll more then likely use a modified version of that write up for when I have the Colonial Warriors from my Battlestar Hero game meet them.

 

On question though, why only 1 Pip for the Claws?

[Susano]

Typical HERO Bestiary Value for such things. Besides, in the films I've never really seen the claws used for much. It was the teeth that did most of the damage.

[TheFool1972]

You know, I built these things for d20 at one point for a realm in ravenloft (a horror setting for D&D). The way I figured it, ravenloft was probably a lot bigger than was mentioned in the book, and probably had a lot of realms that broke away from the midevil/victorian referance.

 

So I decided to add in colony XX-### as a horror realm that the characters acciented across. As the master of the domain, I placed a not-so-standard exec from "The Company". He was actually contolling the aliens subconsciously. From there they also ran into the broken realm of No Man's Land, ruled by the Joker of DC comics. Finally, they limped into Purity city. Here, those with mutant powers were hunted to extintion by sentinals (think marvel) with the actual lord not being a political leader, but a mad AI manufacturing the sentinals.

 

Man, that was a wierd game. The players thought it was intersting though....

 

The Fool

[TheFool1972]

Originally posted by Susano

Typical HERO Bestiary Value for such things. Besides, in the films I've never really seen the claws used for much. It was the teeth that did most of the damage.

 

Nope, it was usually the ACID that did most of the damage.

 

 

The Fool

[Southern Cross]

Alien vs. It! The Terror From Beyond Space

 

Most people don't know this,but Alien is widely considered to be a remake of It! The Terror From Beyond Space.

I've assumed for years that the LV-426 lifeforms were bred in order to fight the creature(s) in that film,for the following reasons:

(1)Acid blood is primairily a close-range weapon.However,against a space vampire such as It!,it is a great defense.Also,consider the strength of the acid-in the first movie it almost ate through the Nostromo's hull!!! Remember, It! could stand up to bazooka fire ,so it would take a VERY strong acid to hurt It.

(2) The creatures from the Alien movies didn't seem to require oxygen.Considering It could survive on the surface of Mars for long periods,this would be a necessary ability for them to have.

(3)The LV-426 Aliens were clearly intended to reproduce VERY RAPIDLY.As even they would take heavy casualties fighting one It,rapid reproduction would be vital.

[Herolover]

Vanguard and more

 

Vanguard:

Email me at herogm@redbow.net about you Battlestar Galactica Hero game. I would like to exchange information with you.

 

Susano:

As usual great write up. I agree with another poster that something should be mentioned that would allow them to survive short term jaunts into an airless vacuum.

[Susano]

This board and the HERO List have given me some excellent suggestions for the final version that will appear on my website.

[Susano]

Originally posted by TheFool1972

Nope, it was usually the ACID that did most of the damage.

 

I meant when the alien actually attacked someone.

[Vanguard]

Depends.

 

If you read the novelizations of the books, those claws can do some damage.

The acid-blood is still their nastiest defense as well as there just being hundreds of the little buggers to deal with.

 

Susano, you might want to try and include something in there that shows how intelligent they get/can be. I mean, if you look at the first one, that lone Xenomorph was a tricky sneaky little but in Aliens 2, they were just drones and were being killed by the dozen. Resurrection shows a sorta 1/2 way point but again, I feel, show-cases their intelligence (the three in the cell discussing who needed to go in order to break out).

 

Still, all in all, throw a comment up on this thread when you get them up there so I can . . uhhh borrow them.

[TheFool1972]

Actually, the drones in Aliens 4 were human/alien crossovers. They were more "human' in thier thinking patterns. And about the one that sacrificed itself in the cell: It was not actually voulantary. In fact, it seemed to think the idea sucked.

 

 

The Fool

[Vanguard]

Yeah, now that you mention it did seem to like the idea much at all.

 

I forgot that they were human/alien crossbreeds. Still, some of the novels I've read point to a higher intelligence.

[Susano]

Originally posted by Vanguard

Still, all in all, throw a comment up on this thread when you get them up there so I can . . uhhh borrow them.

 

They are up on my website.

[Susano]

Originally posted by Vanguard

Yeah, now that you mention it did seem to like the idea much at all.

 

The quote "Sucks to be you!" comes to mind.

[Zeropoint]

I seem to recall reading that an LV-426 alien will take on some of the characteristics of its host. For instance, the alien incubated in the dog was smaller, quadrapedal, and seemed less intelligent than the aliens incubated in humans.

 

Zeropoint

[Susano]

Originally posted by Zeropoint

I seem to recall reading that an LV-426 alien will take on some of the characteristics of its host. For instance, the alien incubated in the dog was smaller, quadrapedal, and seemed less intelligent than the aliens incubated in humans.

 

Zeropoint

 

Yeah, that's from Alien 3... a film I've been avoiding.