Mechamorphosis

Ya know, I was digging around in my collections of gaming stuff. Books from a games gone by, maps of a different time, and character sheets I'd rather not go over again (oh the horror of our first characters!). And I found this book I had completely forgotten I'd even picked up. Made by Fantasy Flight Games - yes, the folks who are currently making the Star Wars RPG everybody loves - and it's Mechamorphosis. The name is a bit of a mouthful, but it's actually a neat game. Unfortunately, you need the D&D 3.5 Player's Handbook or d20 Modern book to use it properly, but on it's own it's got plenty of rules and such you could probably get away with just the Mechamorphosis book on it's own. I haven't seen this thing in almost a decade - I'd forgotten I even owned it. And now I remember why I bought it - A) it was $5, and B) it's really just Transformers with the serial numbers filed off, and only barely did they do that. Looking at the top notch art, you do get a sense of awesome, and it does invoke feelings of the original toys box art, and that's cool. The setting they put in the book is neat and would probably come in handy, but really I think most of us would just run a Transformers game. And that is cool, but that's not why I'm here. Presently, I don't have any plans to run this game, but since I'm converting some creatures from Pathfinder to Star Wars Saga Edition, why not recreate a couple of vehicles into a transformer mechamorph? So we'll do that.

First, a few things need to be decided. I think these guys should be treated as similar to droids. Sizes match up almost as you need them, with Mechamorphosis having 1 or two additional sizes that SWSE doesn't have, and we can easily scale if we need to. I want these guys to be sentient (or is it sapient?) like many of the other species. If a crystal can be an adventurer, then so can these guys. I am going to have to use 3 sets of rules to acomplish this. A)The Starship building rules for vehicles, B) the Droid creation rules for it's robot form, and lastly C) some rules from Mechamorphosis to get it to work right. I don't want to get too heavy into kitbashing this work, though. Essentially it'll be a droid that can transform with some special rules thrown on for balancing.

What rules need to be borrowed? Well, I think the Droid and Starship rules are fine for building each mode, with a slight alteration. Where it begins to break down is gear and damage against non-trans...er, non-mechamorphs. Gear is, I think, easy.  Basically, we'll borrow a rule from Mechamorphosis in that both modes have slots for gear. This includes weapons, equipment, and the like. Call them EP or whatever, the point is we only have so much space to get gear installed. If we want to use weapons in vehicle mode, your gonna have to dedicate slots to that. I'll try to show this as we build one. Next is damage, and this is more of a hang up for me. The simplest method is simply to say that damage is damage. In vehicle mode it does vehicle scale damage, in droid mode it does character scale damage. This is the easiest, as it keeps the rules the same as for regular characters as well. I think some feats and abilities might be converted, but we'll see. Depends on how I feel after this small foray into this conversion.

For this Exercise in Conversions, I am going to attempt to make 3 seperate characters. It's a bit of a load, but it'll be worth it I think. We are going to make 3 classics - a TIE fighter, an X-Wing starfighter and an R2-series Astromech. True, I could use the stock one form the book, but this is meant to be the transforming version, so I'm going recreate it. Plus, it gives us a chance to build a companion/minion/follower/link/whatever.

Names:
Overload
Blastover
Particle
Twindrive

Overload CL 4
Gargantuan droid (4th-degree) non heroic 12
Init +8; Senses Perception + 13
Languages Basic, Binary
Defenses Ref 16 (flat-footed 14). Fort 13, Will 10
hp 40; SR 20; Threshold 18
Immune droid traits
Speed 2 squares (walking). 10 squares (wheeled)
Melee unarmed +12 (ld4+3)
Ranged 2 laser cannons + 11 (3d8) or
Ranged 2 laser cannons +9 (4d8) with Rapid Shot or
Ranged 2 laser cannons +6 (5d8) with Burst Fire
Fighting Space 2x2; Reach 1 square
Base Atk +9; Grp +17
Atk Options autofire (laser cannons). Burst Fire, Point-Blank Shot, Rapid Shot
Abilities Str 16, Dex 14, Con -, Int 8, Wis 14, Cha 7
Feats Armor Proficiency (light). Burst Fire, Point-Blank Shot, Rapid Shot, Dual Weapon Mastery I, Dual Weapon Mastery II, Weapon Proficiency (heavy weapons, rifles, simple weapons)
Skills Perception + 13, Stealth -3
Systems walking locomotion, wheeled locomotion (exclusive). remote
receiver, 2 tool appendages, shield generator (SR 20). integrated
comlink, bronzium shell (+5 armor; treat as quadanium plating)
Possessions 2 laser cannons (treat as blaster rifles)
Availability Military; Cost 21,000 credits

Overload, Incom T-658 X-wing Starfighter CL 10
Gargantuan starfighter
Init +7; Senses Perception +6
Defense Ref 18 (flat-footed 12). Fort 26; +7 armor
hp 120; DR 10; SR 15; Threshold 46
Speed fly 16 squares, fly 4 squares (starship scale)
Ranged laser cannons +5 (see below) or
Ranged proton torpedoes +5 (see below)
Fighting Space 4x4 or 1 square (starship scale); Cover total (pilot). +5 (astromech droid)
Base Atk +2; Grp +33
Atk Options autofire (laser cannons)
Abilities Str 42, Dex 22, Con -, Int 16
Skills Initiative +7, Mechanics +6 (+ 13*). Perception +6 (+3*). Pilot +7,
Use Computer +6 (+ 13*)
Crew 1 plus astromech droid (skilled); Passengers none
Cargo 110 kg; Consumables 1 week; Carried Craft none
Payload 6 proton torpedoes
Hyperdrive x l, 10-jump memory (astromech droid)
Availability Military; Cost 150,000 (65,000 used)
* If the ship has an astromech droid, use these skill modifiers instead.

Laser cannons (pilot)
Atk +5 (+0 autofire). Dmg 6d10x2
Proton torpedoes (pilot)
Atk +5, Dmg 9dlOx2, 4-square splash

Blastover  CL 0
Small droid (2nd-degree) non heroic 2
Init +3; Senses darkvision; Perception +3
Languages Basic, Binary, 2 unassigned
Defenses Ref 13 (flat-footed 11). Fort 8, Will 10
hp 7; Threshold 8
Immune droid traits
Speed 6 squares (wheeled). 4 squares (walking). 9 squares (flying)
Melee electroshock probe +0 (ld8 ion)
Fighting Space 1 square; Reach 1 square
Base Atk +1; Grp-4
Abilities Str 9, Dex 14, Con -, Int 15, Wis 10, Cha 7
Feats Skill Focus (Mechanics, Use Computer). Skill Training (Perception).
Toughness, Weapon Proficiency (simple weapons)
Skills Mechanics + 13, Perception +3, Pilot +8, Stealth +6, Use Computer + 13
Systems wheeled locomotion, walking locomotion, flying locomotion (limited). magnetic feet, heuristic processor, 6 tool appendages, 1 claw appendage, diagnostics package, internal storage (2 kg). improved sensor package, darkvision
Possessions astrogation buffer (storage device, 10 memory units), circular saw, electroshock probe, fire extinguisher, electric arc welder, holorecorder, holoprojector
Availability Licensed; Cost 4,500 credits

Blastover, R2 Series Astromech Droid  CL 0
Small droid (2nd-degree) non heroic 2
Init +3; Senses darkvision; Perception +3
Languages Basic, Binary, 2 unassigned
Defenses Ref 13 (flat-footed 11). Fort 8, Will 10
hp 7; Threshold 8
Immune droid traits
Speed 6 squares (wheeled). 4 squares (walking). 9 squares (flying)
Melee electroshock probe +0 (ld8 ion)
Fighting Space 1 square; Reach 1 square
Base Atk +1; Grp-4
Abilities Str 9, Dex 14, Con -, Int 15, Wis 10, Cha 7
Feats Skill Focus (Mechanics, Use Computer). Skill Training (Perception).
Toughness, Weapon Proficiency (simple weapons)
Skills Mechanics + 13, Perception +3, Pilot +8, Stealth +6, Use Computer + 13
Systems wheeled locomotion, walking locomotion, flying locomotion (limited). magnetic feet, heuristic processor, 6 tool appendages, 1 claw appendage, diagnostics package, internal storage (2 kg). improved sensor package, darkvision
Possessions astrogation buffer (storage device, 10 memory units), circular saw, electroshock probe, fire extinguisher, electric arc welder, holorecorder, holoprojector
Availability Licensed; Cost 4,500 credits

Twindrive CL 4
Large droid (4th-degree) non heroic 12
Init +8; Senses Perception + 13
Languages Basic, Binary
Defenses Ref 16 (flat-footed 14). Fort 13, Will 10
hp 40; SR 20; Threshold 18
Immune droid traits
Speed 2 squares (walking). 10 squares (wheeled)
Melee unarmed +12 (ld4+3)
Ranged 2 laser cannons + 11 (3d8) or
Ranged 2 laser cannons +9 (4d8) with Rapid Shot or
Ranged 2 laser cannons +6 (5d8) with Burst Fire
Fighting Space 2x2; Reach 1 square
Base Atk +9; Grp +17
Atk Options autofire (laser cannons). Burst Fire, Point-Blank Shot, Rapid Shot
Abilities Str 16, Dex 14, Con -, Int 8, Wis 14, Cha 7
Feats Armor Proficiency (light). Burst Fire, Point-Blank Shot, Rapid Shot, Dual Weapon Mastery I, Dual Weapon Mastery II, Weapon Proficiency (heavy weapons, rifles, simple weapons)
Skills Perception + 13, Stealth -3
Systems walking locomotion, wheeled locomotion (exclusive). remote
receiver, 2 tool appendages, shield generator (SR 20). integrated
comlink, bronzium shell (+5 armor; treat as quadanium plating)
Possessions 2 laser cannons (treat as blaster rifles)
Availability Military; Cost 21,000 credits


Twindrive, TIE Fighter  CL 7
Huge starfighter
Init +8; Senses Perception +6
Defense Ref 15 (flat-footed 11), Fort 22; +3 armor
HP 60; DR 10; Threshold 32
Speed fly 16 squares, fly 5 squares (starship scale)
Ranged laser cannons +4 (see below)
Fighting Space 3x3 or 1 square (starship scale); Cover total
Base Atk +2; Grp +24
Atk Options autofire (laser cannons)
Abilities Str 34, Dex 18, Con -, Int 14
Skills Initiative +8, Mechanics +6, Perception +6, Pilot +8
Crew 1 (skilled); Passengers none
Cargo 65 kg; Consumables 2 days; Carried Craft none
Availability Military; Cost 60,000 (25,000 used)

Laser cannons (pilot)
Atk +4 H autofire). Dmg 4d10x2

SWSE Fire Damage

Fire damage is pretty weak in this game. I get the idea that fire damage isn't really trying to kill the pc but more to deny actions. Stopping to put out a fire is a full round action, regardless of the character using water or just patting it out or even stopping, dropping, and rolling. 1d6 just doesn't cut it. And if you follow the Rules As Written (RAW) then the GM makes an attack roll for fire each time that character has a turn while on fire. 1d20+5 against Fortitude (Fort). Most time, this doesn't do anything since the attack is low and misses. My own house rule is simply that if you are on fire, you take the damage each turn - no attack roll vs Fort. THis works fine, except the damage is still so low that nobody ever stop to put out the fire unless they get low on health or have some other reason to stop and deal with the fire. So how do we turn up the heat and make the players feel the burn? A few ways, actually. One option is to apply a -5 penalty to any and all actions including damage rolls while the character is on fire. You could increase the damage however many steps you feel is necessary - from a d6 to a d12, perhaps. And both of those are good options. In fact, if you do both of those together, you still get relatively low damage plus a penalty that might get players putting the fire out. But, if your are players are like mine, or me for that matter, then you will need something a bit more potent. We will keep the d6 for damage, and we keep just automatically taking fire damage while on fire. What we change is the amount of dice. It increases the longer they are on fire. The first round a character is on fire, they take 1d6. Second round is 2d6, third is 3d6, fourth is 4d6, and so on. Alternatively, fire typically doubles in size every minute, so instead first round is 1d6, second round is 2d6, third round is 4d6, fourth round is 8d6, etc. I suppose to be fair, if you are going to double the damage every round, then the Gm should make an attack roll. The character will still take half damage on a miss. While I'm here talking about fire damage, let's take a moment to look at Lava damage. Popular culture says you melt into lava when you fall or stand in it, which technically is true - you will melt and be burned alive. However, it won't be anywhere near as fast as movies makes it look. SWSE does have some lava rules. If you are adjacent to lava, it makes an attack against Reflex (1d20+17), and if it hits the character takes 2d6 fire damage and moves -2 steps on the condition track. If you happen to catch fire from contact with lava, then an extra 1d6 until you put it out. it doesn't say if you take half on a miss, but since every other example of fire damage follows that rule, I will assume fire damage from lava does as well. Now, that's all well and good. If we combine our above fire damage rule with this, it means the players will be take a lot of damage real fast, and they should be. Lava is molten rock for crying out loud. It should be deadly hot and nasty. Only change I would make here is that if they become immersed in lava somehow, then they take 20d6 per round until they are no longer immersed. For example, if a hero, for whatever reason, falls into the crater of a volcano he's going to get hurt. AS the GM, we rule there are some rocks in the volcano walls and some huge masses of rock that haven't melted yet. Unfortunately, the character fails his rolls to catch himself and falls into the lava itself. That's 20d6 damage immediately. Luckily, he landed close enough to one he can pull himself out of the lava. He's gonna take 1d6 damage for that first turn while on fire, and you could get gross and add 2d6 for being adjacent to the lava. Next round, player puts the fire out, so he doesn't take fire damage but if the GM wishes he could take 2d6 for being adjacent still. So, the hero starts climbing out of the volcano, and the GM decides he now has two additional problems to deal with - smoke and extreme heat. Both of these deal 2d6 and move the character -1 step down the condition track if they hit but no condition track movement and only half damage on a miss. I'd call no more lava damage if the hero is climbing. Assuming the character has enough hp left, he could climb high enough and get outta dodge. After some point, the extreme heat will be gone and the smoke will be gone once he exits the volcano. You could rock slide or even a fire/heat version of icy cliffs in there for a challenge while climbing, but if the hero doesn't have something to help out with heat stuff - fire resistant gloves or something - then I'd say leave those off and just keep the climb DC low, maybe a 10 or 12 - 15 at most. Assuming he wasn't dead or knocked unconscious because of all the condition track damage, give the player a break. Hell, even a DC 5 can be challenging when you are at -10 on the condition track. OK, that's enough fire damage for one day.

Dragon Rules

In converting dragons, I decided to port some special rules from Pathfinder, as well as some special rules unique to dragons specifically. Some of them don't fit properly into the way SWSE does things, and my initial thoughts was to go with beast for a number of levels. But beast doesn't quite fit, at least not if we go strictly what the book says, and that's most beats follow the rule of having 1 or 2 Int. Well, that's no good for a dragon, now is it? Next I thought about going with non heroic levels, and this could work remarkably well - it would give them skills, feats, and some hp. the downside is it's a d4 for hp and we are limited in what we can do. however it would go well to making sure the dragons don't overshadow our players. Ultimately, I've decided to go a different route. Dragons will be a class unto themselves. While they can take heroic classes if they want, they won't need to. I'm hoping this will work along the lines of making them a bit mysterious and nobody quite knows type of deal, while also keeping them a credible threat in more than just combat. Not taking heroic classes would prevent them from taking talents, though, and I'd like to allow them to have some of those as well. Probably OP if we let them just keep there hit die, defenses, feats, and now gain access to talents. There has to be a balance somewhere. Maybe simply allowing a similar event as feats but they can only select form Noble talents? Or, they could keep the hit die but lose the saves?

First, all dragons have the following:

Features

A dragon has the following features.

• d12 Hit Die.
• Base attack bonus equal to total Hit Dice.
• Def bonus equal to 1/2 of CL.
• A dragon gains 1 feat + 1 per every 2 Hit Dice after the first (so, 1 at 1 HD, 2 at 3 HD, etc.). It must qualify to take a feat as normal.
• The following are class skills for dragons (trained in 3+Int): Acrobatics, Climb, Deception, Endurance, Gather Information, Initiative, Jump, Knowledge (all skills, taken individually). Mechanics, Perception, Persuasion, Pilot, Ride, Stealth, Survival, Swim, Treat Injury, Use Computer, Use the Force.

Traits

A dragon possesses the following traits (unless otherwise noted in a creature's entry).

• Darkvision.
• Immunity to stun and fear effects.
• Proficient with its natural weapons only unless humanoid in form (or capable of assuming humanoid form), in which case proficient with all simple weapons and any weapons mentioned in its entry.
• Proficient with no armor.
• Dragons breathe, eat, and sleep

Following this is that each type of dragon will have a subset of rules.
Sub-types are:

•  Chromatic - Black, Blue, Green, Red, White
• Imperial - Forest, Sea, Sky, Sovereign, Underworld
• Metallic - Brass, Bronze, Copper, Gold, Silver
• Primal - Brine, Cloud, Crystal, Magma, Umbral
• Outer - Lunar, Solar, Time, Void, Vortex

Then there are various other dragons:  Aeetes', Fareie, Tidepool, Cave, Cloud, Dungeon, Skincrawler, Smoke, Wrath, Mist,  Mithral, and River.

There there are age categories. these consist of: Wyrmling, Very Young, Young, Juvenile, Young Adult, Adult, Mature Adult, Old, Very Old, Ancient, Wyrm, Great Wyrm.

Certainly not all of them use all 11 age categories, but if they did you'd end up with 407 new stat blocks of npcs. That is both awesome and cool, yet horrendously a big work load, and I'm going to say NO. Instead, I'll write the rules for each type of dragon, complete with any changes for each age category. This way, you can just go through and grab what you need. This cuts down the load from 407 to just 37, one for each type of dragon listed. Some of them are less work, using 3 or less age categories, but Using this set of above rules, and adding any ones specific to the dragon type, you should be able to effectively recreate the dragons.Magic will be an issue, as SWSE doesn't even use it, and the Force is very different. I will See which spells can be swapped out for a Force power, and which can just be made abilities. Already in the books are some creatures listed as "we don't know how it works, but it does it anyway." If I need to, I'll just use that to justify them.

 Some of the rules make dragons very effective, without needing non-heroic classes.

Here is a table that shows the avaerage hit dice a dragon would have at a given CL.

CL	1/2	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20
HD	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	11	12	13	14	16	17	18	19	21	23	25	29

Using the average of 6.5, this gives our CL 10 dragon an hp of 65. If we use a Chromatic Red Adult Dragon, which is size large, it get s a +16 to Con, which is a +3 before even giving stats. That puts us up to 95 hp and it'll only got higher with stats. If we presume that this dragon, at level 10, has a 16 for Con, and being large gives it a +16 to Con for a total of Con score of 32. This gives us a +11 modifier. Our dragon's HP is now 205. Which is a lot at level 10. Level 20 with those same stats? I will assume the dragon did not put any stat increases in Con, so we still have a 32/+11. At level 20, it now has 408 hp. All of this is using the average roll of 6.5 for the d12.

PF to SWSE - Dragons

Everybody knows about dragons and fantasy. I rarely see any kind of fantasy without some form of dragon in it. Even Star Wars has Krayt Dragons, so it's not uncommon for them to exsist. While this variation might seem odd, the universe is a big place and I think there could be a spot for a mysterious race of Dragons and even Half-Dragons. Dragons are, well, dragons and I don't think I'll need to go into too much depth with them. I will get into the ecology and those kinds of details, maybe even a bit on culture, but I don't think I need to go too deep on that. I want to write up a few Half-Dragon species. Human is the obvious candidate, but wookie, rodian, twi'lek, and maybe a couple more could be written up as options for players.

This is all just preliminary ideas, not set in stone. But I have the cool idea of dropping these onto my players and allowing them to go at it. I'll need to alter some things form PF to SWSE, but I think even a number of abilities and special qualities could be ported over.

So next time I'll try delivering a dragon or two.

More PF to SWSE

I should probably add that I have an affinity for fire, or fire themed, creature as a whole. So, I'll probably add a bunch of them. I will, however, endeavor to get more that are not fire or are not a specific element.

Gelatinous Ooze

Bits of broken weapons, coins, and a partially digested skeleton are visible inside this quivering cube of slime.

Gelatinous Ooze  CL2

Medium beast 3

Init +4; Senses tremorsense; Perception -4

Defenses Ref 7 (flat-footed 7), Fort 18, Will5

hp 29; Threshold 23

Speed  3 squares

Melee  slam +2 (1d6+1+1d6 acid)

Fighting Space 2x2 squares; Reach 0 squares

Base Atk +2; Grp +7

Abilities Str 10, Dex 1, Con 26, Int 2, Wis 12, Cha 10

Feats 

Skills

Tremorsense- Automatically know the location of any object or creature touching the ground within 100 squares.


Acid
A gelatinous cube's acid does not harm metal or stone.

Engulf
Although it moves slowly, a gelatinous cube can simply engulf Large or smaller creatures in its path as a standard action. It cannot make a slam attack during a round in which it engulfs. The gelatinous cube merely has to move over the opponents, affecting as many as it can cover. Opponents can make attacks of opportunity against the cube, but if they do so they are not entitled to an acrobatics check. Those who do not attempt attacks of opportunity can attempt a DC 12 Acrobatics check to avoid being engulfed—on a success, they are pushed back or aside (opponent's choice) as the cube moves forward. Engulfed creatures are subject to the cube's paralysis and acid, gain the pinned condition, are in danger of suffocating, and are trapped within its body until they are no longer pinned.


Paralysis
A gelatinous cube secretes an anesthetizing slime. A target successfully hit by a cube's melee or engulf attack (d20+15 vs Fortitude) is paralyzed for 3d6 rounds. The cube can automatically engulf a paralyzed opponent.


Transparent
Due to its lack of coloration, a gelatinous cube is difficult to discern. A DC 15 Perception check is required to notice a motionless gelatinous cube. Any creature that fails to notice a gelatinous cube and walks into it is automatically engulfed.

Fire Fish

Fire Fish  CL1

Small beast 1

Init +2; Senses low-light vision; Perception +1

Defenses Ref 15 (flat-footed 13), Fort 10, Will 11

hp 4; Threshold 10

Immune Drowning, fire

Vulnurable Cold

Speed  8 squares

Melee  Slam -1 (1d3-4+heat)

Fighting Space 1 square; Reach 0 squares

Base Atk +0; Grp -3

Abilities Str 3, Dex 14, Con 10, Int 1, Wis 12, Cha 5

Feats  Dodge

Skills Stealth +7, Swim +1

Low-light vision- Ignore concealment (but not total concealment) from darkness

Aquatic- Can't drown and doesn't need to make swim checks; low-light vision.

Heat- Deal 1d4 fire damage

Aquatic firefish can swim and breathe in molten lava as easily as a regular fish in water. They are ‘aquatic' only in the sense that their natural environment is lava instead of water

Fire Whale

Fire Whale  CL9

Huge beast 10

Init +6; Senses low-light vision; tremorsense; Perception +6

Defenses Ref 20 (flat-footed 19), Fort 17, Will 12

hp 120; Threshold 32

Immune fire

Vulnurable Cold

Speed  8 squares

Melee  bite +19 (1d3-4+heat)

Melee  tail slap +19 (1d3-4+heat)

Fighting Space [/b]3x3 squares; [b]Reach [/b]0 squares

Base Atk +7; Grp +29

Atk Options Power Attack

Abilities Str 35, Dex 13, Con 23, Int 2, Wis 12, Cha 6

Feats  Dodge, Improved Damage Threshhold, Improved Defenses, Power Attack

Skills Stealth -4, Swim +22

Hold Breath- A fire whale can hold its breath for 8 x its Constitution score before it risks drowning.
Scalding Blast- As a full round action, a fire whale can release a blast of superheated air from its blowhole that scalds or burns those contacting it. The cone-shaped blast has a range of 12 squares and deals 12d6 points of damage on a successful attack, half on a miss.

Once a fire whale uses this ability, it must wait 1d4 rounds before using its scalding blast again. After using this ability four times, the fire whale must submerge for at least two full rounds before it can use it again.

Pathfinder Conversion to Star Wars Saga Edition

I've been converting things from Pathfinder and D&D3.5 to Star Wars Saga Edition. There is a lot of things that are difficult and almost impossible convert, and I'm trying to stay away from such things. There are plenty of equipment, mundane and magical, and creatures that can be converted though. It's never perfect, but I like to think these can add a nice touch to a campaign, even if they only get used once and regardless of whether or not the players interact with them in anyway. One idea I have is that there is a large "animal preserve" type of deal,except it's an entire planet. Kind of like Coruscant and how it's pretty much just one big city covering the entire planet, that's what this will be - just that it's a type of zoo or game preserve. People can come look at the exotic creatures and plant life and all that. Different sections of the planet are built for different types of critters, all that jazz. Maybe a few critters get loose, or we have a Star Wars versions of Jurassic Park going on. Obviously, these creatures can make appearances on other planets and locations - maybe some rich dude got the wild notion that a cool idea was to have a pond of Fire Fish, but he didn't consider the ramifications of them getting loose into the plumbing and into town and now the town has lava for water and fire fish everywhere. How will the players handle this? I dunno, but it sounds like a good side quest. Really, there is almost no end to the things you can do with these. I've got the idea to not just do this for Saga Edition, but (possibly) for Savage Worlds and (less likely) FFG Star Wars. I don't know FFG Star Wars very well, so I probably won't be touching that one for some time.

So without further adieu, I give to you:

Cinderwolf

This wolf-like beast has a charred and blackened hide, its flesh split in places and seeping a fiery red ooze. The slaving creature stalks closer, snarling gutturally as cinders flicker from its maw.

Cinderwolf  CL2

Medium beast 3

Init +2; Senses low-light vision; Perception +7

Defenses Ref 14 (flat-footed 13), Fort 12, Will 11

hp 33; Threshold 12

Speed  10 squares

Melee  Bite +5 (1d6+4+1d6 fire)

Fighting Space 1 square; Reach 0 squares

Base Atk +2; Grp +5

Abilities Str 17, Dex 13, Con 14, Int 2, Wis 12, Cha 10

Feats Skill Training, Toughness

Skills Perception +7, Survival +7

Low-light vision- Ignore concealment (but not total concealment) from darkness
Desert- May reroll Survival checks to endure extreme heat, keeping the better result
Firey Body- A cinderwolf inflicts 1d6 points of fire damage when it bites a foe in addition to the normal bite damage. Due to increased metabolism, a cinder wolf gains fast healing 3.

 

The hides of cinder wolves prove exceptionally useful in the creation of heat resilient armors. By making a DC 18 Survival check, one can successfully skin a cinder wolf, leaving its coarse pelt in
quality good enough to work into clothing or other goods. Should this pelt be used later in the creation of a cloak or jumpsuit, the wearer becomes immune to cold effects and gains a +5 to Fortitude checks regarding extreme cold. A cinder wolf pelt is an uncommon commodity and can rarely be found for sale, the bristly fur being uncomfortable and hard to work with and the demand - despite their usefulness - is limited. Even when found in markets, the cost is typically upwards of 6,000 credits. Thus, most who desire a cinder wolf pelt are forced to either find and skin a cinder wolf himself, or trade with natives.

Savage Ghostbusters

 Every October, I run a month long Ghostbusters Campaign. When I first started doing this, around 2006, I started off using the Ghostbusters International RPG - which is itself a sequel/rewrite of the original Ghostbusters RPG. In 2012 I discovered Savage Worlds and promptly put it on my bookshelf for a year. I was already running multiple games and didn't really have time to run another, let alone get into a new system. So in 2013, I finally caught a break and began looking at the system. I've since used it for a ton of settings and genres, though there are a few I wouldn't personally run in Savage Worlds. It can do just about anything you want it to though.

But back to the topic at hand. Ghostbusters is one of those settings that is perfect for an rpg. There is a plethora of lore and ideas you can play with -the franchise consists of 2 movies, 3 separate comic book lines, numerous books, 2 cartoon shows, both rpg's and the 2009 video game. 30 years worth of setting stuff to mine. There is a wide array of things that have been explored - from alternate dimensions to time travel - it's all open game - even the Boogie Man makes an appearance. There's no shortage of equipment either. There is a lot to play with no matter how you look at it.

First time I ran it, I used the Core book and the Horror Companion and it worked just fine. Later, I wanted to make it better, and I tried to replicate equipment and vehicles and a lot of that jazz. I ended up getting way overboard and making it more complicated than it needed to be. Fortunately, there is a setting conversion already done. It's called Savage Ghostbusters and it does an excellent job at capturing the Ghostbusters setting for use in Savage Worlds. He even gets some of the equipment form the video game in there. It's a very fluid deal, so go check it out. The setting can be found at http://greywolf.critter.net/ghostbusters.htm . All the details are there.

Grimoire

Wizards & Warriors: is there a better setting for fantasy? Maybe, but it's the one my players enojy so it's the one I'll be running the most. I change it up a bit form time to time, and right now I'm gearing up a Savage Worlds campaign. It'll be a Fantasy setting, sort of a generic one at that.

In it we'll use 3 type of magic users: Wizards, Sorcerer's, and Alchemists.Wizards use AB: Magic, and are have more utility over other casters, as they have access to the full spell list and start with 3 powers. Sorcerer's use AB: Sorcery and start with only one power and gain Dispel as a bonus power regardless of their starting rank, and gain access to all spells except for healing, greater healing, and succor.. Because they only get one power of choice, Sorcerer's tend to focus on one area of spells, such as fire, and tend to be more powerful than other casters. Alchemists use AB: Alchemy, start with 3 powers, have access to only the following spells armor, blast, boost/lower trait, burrow, detect/conceal arcana, environmental protection, fly, greater healing, healing, invisibility, light, obscure, quickness, shape change, smite, speak language, speed, stun, teleport.

All 3 are split into guilds,though it's not required you join one. Guilds do have benefits, however, such as taking care of paperwork and helping with food and lodging as well as being a center for assistance and being able to take jobs. While players could certainly find work outside of them, most people will only work with certified guild members, which means the players would need the mark of their respective guild, usually a mark similar to a tattoo but magically done so that removal is more difficult. Each has it's own requirements for membership, though each type of spell caster can generally be found in each guild.

I decided to put alchemists in the setting to give me an easy way to explain all the magical items like scrolls, potions, wands, staffs, rods, and rings. Not to mention the weapons and armor, and gloves and so forth. there is one item I am adding: Tomes. Tomes are probably one of the most useful items for a spell caster. Without the Gm doing anything, there is only one way of gaining new powers, which is the New Power Edge. Tomes change this. By reading one, a spell caster gains that new power. Below are how Tomes will work in my setting.

TOMES
Any character with an Arcane Background can use a tome, so long as he meets the Rank requirement for the spell and has the same Arcane Background as the writer. If he does, he must spend 1d6 hours per rank of the spell in quiet study. At the end of this time, he must make a Smarts roll. If successful, the reader may add the spell to his repertoire. With a failure, the character must begin the study process from scratch.

 Naturally, they only gain the spell if it's available to them as well. Fortunately, magic is not considered evil or taboo, though some uses of it might be. But for the most part, magic is just magic, and most every town has at least a small shop that items can be bought.