Mars is possessed by its namesake. First it bought its independence with blood, and now competing visions of the future prowl the algae fields bearing rifles and haloes - coteries of hovering drones used by Centralist regulars and Symmetrist militiamen alike.
All but the most impoverished soldiers wear a halo-controller as part of their uniform, with six plug-sockets in a row on their chest like bullet holes. The halo turns the infantryman into a fireteam, and the infantryman's LoS laser-comms protect the halo from omnipresent electronic warfare. When tanks couldn't stray from their warehouses for fear of orbital strikes, the halo was there; when those orbital strike platforms were laid low by Kessler syndrome, the halo was there; and when you are dead, your halo will hover over you like a loyal dog.
PCs with a halo-controller can command one member of their halo every turn, without requiring an action.
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| WhaleOil2 |
One-Plug
Scout - a folding ornithopter with a night-vision camera and a laser designator. Probably worth more to you than the rest of your halo put together.
Seeker - a grenade with wings. Pathfinds effortlessly, driven by image-recognition neural nets and LIDAR rangefinding.
- Fragmentation - 3d10 damage (fire/explosives), attacks as Combat 50. A packed cone of flechettes, able to go off right next to your head without scratching you. Shame about your hearing, though.
- Flashbang - Body Save versus blindness and deafness. Each drone comes with two charges.
- Smoke - contains micro-flares and radio-reflective dust to throw off thermals and radar along with eyesight.
Interceptor - watches for incoming projectiles and then explodes into a tight grid of EFPs to set them off at a distance. When you or someone standing next to you would be hit by a seeker, recoilless rifle round, et cetera, expend an interceptor to simply not be.
Two-Plugs
Dazzler - a hovering countermeasure that blinks infrared light into enemy sensors. Roll 1d10 every round the dazzler fires - on a 1, the sensor is blinded permanently. Otherwise, it is blinded as long as the dazzler continues to fire on it.
Loitering Munition - circles above you like a vulture. Built to crack light armored vehicles - everyone in Close Range must make a Body Save or take a Wound (explosive). Can't hit anywhere that doesn't have line-of-sight to the sky, and is utterly undiscerning.
Engineer - a wheeled earthmoving machine small enough to wear like a backpack. Digs as well as a man with a shovel, and never tires.
Three-Plugs
Breacher - a legged drone with a lock-shattering captive bolt gun, manipulator arm, and shotgun (4d10, 1d10 at long range or greater). Hits 1(10), A7, C35, I15, grants Cover to anyone behind it.
Spotter - a skittering, spidery drone with a cantilevered laser designator. Marks a target for your preferred side's artillery, burning itself out to shove through EW countermeasures. There is a delay of 1d10+3 minutes, then everything within a 1d10x10 meter radius of the designated point (or close enough - keep your distance) is destroyed utterly.
Sniper - a quadcopter (Hits 1(10), C35, I25) with an inbuilt railgun (4d10 anti-armor, 3-round rotating magazine, [-] at Close Range). Can and will fire through unarmored walls.
Ready to spend all of my plugs on grenades o7
ReplyDeleteI feel the need to know more about the Centralist and Symmetrist regimes.
ReplyDeleteHa! Thank you - most of the post was written so I can make people go "huh, I wonder what's up on Archon's Mars".
DeleteEssentially, it's a disagreement on the need for a Martian planetary government. The Centralists think one is necessary in order to make an appearance in system-wide politics - a governing body in the city of Noctis Labyrinthus declaring a path for the "nation" of Mars.
The Symmetrists think this is handing too much power to Noctis Labyrinthus, who they see as Too Interplanetary, Kind Of Foreign, and Probably Untrustworthy. They want the distant habitat-domes to have free reign - to act as their own nations under a Martian Culture.
Of course, outside forces have their hands in the situation - some want Mars to be "legible", a monolith they can easily communicate with (and, with luck, a monolith that's on their side), so they support the Centralists. Others would prefer to keep the status quo as is (without a new potential great power) and support the Symmetrists.
All of this worldbuilding is for, in theory, A Pamphlet Adventure - I tend to go... a bit overboard.
I'm very glad my wonder was triggered! Thanks for the added details, they certainly don't disappoint! Please carry on going overboard.
DeleteGreat stuff! Simple yet incredibly effective. The interceptors especially make the neurons in my brain fire—I love throwing rocks at missiles.
ReplyDeleteHope to see more Sci-Fi stuff from you, Mothership or otherwise!
Check the Sci-Fi tag! This is, more than fantasy, the genre I work in - I've even got a Mothership adventure coming out for sale some time this year, if all goes well.
DeleteAnd thank you; the interceptor definitely has a certain Vibe to it, watching an incoming rocket go off just *barely* far enough away to not leave you maimed.