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Toys in the Vault

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Toys in the Vault

Posted: Sat Apr 03, 2021 9:37 am
by Rock of the Fraternity
Once upon a time, as these stories go, there was a learned man who doted on his children. Desiring both to entertain them and stimulate their creativity, he went to his workroom and there created the most wonderful toys! Little bricks of a mysterious, coloured material that could be fitted together to make just about anything!
The learned man's children were delighted by this creation, and they played to their hearts' content. However, the worlds they created out of coloured bricks seemed empty without inhabitants. Seeing his beloved children's dissatisfaction and recognizing it for what it was, the learned man again went to his workroom.
What he did next might, perhaps, better not have been done. But his children delighted in the new creation, and so the learned man wondered whether there might not be a market for such things...

Who here hasn't had fun with a certain (trademarked) game, creating buildings, vehicles and whole landscapes out of those coloured plastic bricks? And who hasn't walked those charming little figures through those creations, giving them voice and spinning adventures for them?
Now imagine a Lamordian scientist: intellectually brilliant; supremely elevated above primitive notions like good and evil; dismissive of notions that people with the capacity to do what they want should refrain from doing so out of notions of ethics and morals.

It is now anyone's guess what the true origins are of the Mi'fig, fine-sized little beings naturally suited to inhabiting the worlds created out of those coloured bricks. Maybe the learned man grew their ancestors in vats. Maybe he painstakingly grafted flesh to inanimate matter. Maybe he even created a scientific device capable of granting wishes.
Fact is, the angular little mannikins exist.
They are alive enough to have souls, to create offspring, to think and feel.
And the learned man has been breeding and selling them abroad. They are still very expensive, but their capacity to reproduce semi-naturally means the prices are gradually dropping off as the learned man is losing the monopoly.
Children love playing with them; creating landscapes and scenarios for them to inhabit. Some military people of a theoretical mindset enjoy releasing them in scenarios they have prepared, to see how civilians might respond. Of course there are sadists who just enjoy tormenting small things. At least one wizard is experimenting on a colony to see whether he could grow larger versions. And at least one king keeps a colony as a miniature reflection of his kingdom out of jaded amusement.

Mi'fig (16 RP)
Half-construct
VIEW CONTENT:
(Half-constructs gain a +2 racial bonus on saving throws against disease, mind-affecting effects, poison, and effects that cause either exhaustion or fatigue.
Half-constructs cannot be raised or resurrected.
Half-constructs do not breathe, eat, or sleep, unless they want to gain some beneficial effect from one of these activities. This means that a half-construct can drink potions to benefit from their effects and can sleep in order to regain spells, but neither of these activities is required for the construct to survive or stay in good health.)
Size: Fine
VIEW CONTENT:
(Mi'fig's size confers the following traits: +8 Dex., +8 to AC, +8 to Attack rolls, +16 to Stealth checks; -8 Str., -8 to CMB and CMD)
Speed: 20 ft.
Ability scores: -8 Str., +8 Dex., +2 Con., +2 Int., -4 Wis.
Languages: Mi'fig start play speaking their native language, Isalun. Mi'fig with high Intelligence scores can select bonus languages from among Darkonese, Falkovnian, Lamordian and Mordentish
Magic traits: Some assembly required.
VIEW CONTENT:
(Mi'fig may exchange body'parts with another Mi'fig who is either willing or incapable of resisting, without inflicting damage. Optionally, one Mi'fig can combine with up to four others of its kind, creating a Diminutive gestalt that uses the highest physical ability scores and the lowest mental ability scores of its constituents. Such gestalts must be formed willingly; any constituent can end the gestalt at any time, and any attempt to incorporate a Mi'fig into a gestalt against their will automatically fails - unless the unwilling party has been subdued through magic, hypnosis or a similar technique. If the control is broken while the gestalt is formed, all constituents suffer a Major Madness save and the gestalt immediately breaks up.)
Offense: Swarming
VIEW CONTENT:
(Mi'fig are used to living and fighting communally, and are adept at swarming foes for their own gain and their foes’ detriment. Up to two Mi'fig can share the same square at the same time. If two Mi'fig in the same square attack the same foe, they are considered to be flanking that foe as if they were in two opposite squares.)
Weaknesses:
* Class restriction.
VIEW CONTENT:
(Due to the nature of their creation, all Mi'fig start out with levels in one of the NPC classes Aristocrat, Expert or Warrior. This actually appears to be a genetic trait; depending on which parent is dominant during the creation of a new Mi'fig, the resulting offspring adopts the NPC class of that parent. Mi'fig would find it difficult to learn from 'giants' (humanoids), so they are unlikely to ever gain levels in PC classes. However, this does not stop them from developing their own Prestige Classes, suited to their existence.)
* Perspective shift
VIEW CONTENT:
(A Mi'fig's "natural environment" is normally a gaming table, covered in the colourful bricks that are their tools, their homes, and indeed their whole world. Alternatively, their world might be limited to a toy box full of bricks, which they inhabit like burrowing insects. They usually do not even realize a world beyond the bricks exists. If Mi'fig are either forcibly removed or willingly depart their natural environment for up to five minutes, they gradually start to perceive the wider world. Part culture shock, part agoraphobia, perspective shift occurs at this time. Mi'fig who suffer perspective shift become staggered without save and cannot attack. Perspective shift - and perception of the wider world - ends the instant a Mi'fig returns or is returned to its natural environment.)
* Slave to the rhythm
VIEW CONTENT:
(Even the most curmudgeonly Mi'fig has an instinctive response to music. Any Mi'fig who hears music must make an immediate Will save as though the one producing the music were a Bard using a Bardic Performance. A Mi'fig who fails this save immediately starts dancing as though under the effect of Irresistible dance, and continues to do so until they can no longer hear the music against which they failed their save.)
Reproduction: Mi'fig reproduction might seem cutesy to humanoids and the like, but is very serious to them.
If two or more Mi'fig wish to reproduce, they must first gather sufficient material (bricks and the like) to create a new body. They tend to be sticklers for finding the best quality material.
Once the materials are secured, the Mi'fig pin and suspend those materials between them while they link hands. To humanoids, it looks as though the Mi'fig are hugging their potential child while holding hands, but a lot more is going on: Mi'fig who wish to be parents actually infuse the chosen materials with their own lifeforce.
VIEW CONTENT:
(In game terms, the Mi'fig willingly undergo level drain as they pour out their own life into inanimate matter to transform it into a new Mi'fig.
* The process is very painful and requires utmost concentration over a period of 216 hours. If Mi'fig are interrupted while 'breeding' to the point that half or more parents lose concentration, they do not lose the invested levels, but the process is ruined and the child will not be born. Mi'fig consider deliberate attempts to interrupt and thereby ruin their version of childbirth to be an abomination.
* In order to create a level 1 Mi'fig, the parents must donate three levels. To create a level 2 Mi'fig, they must donate five levels. For a level 3 Mi'fig, seven levels, and so on.
One parent is 'dominant' in the childbirthing, in that they contribute one more level than the other parent(s). The parent who is dominant determines the newborn's gender identity and their initial class, as well as certain cosmetic traits (coloration).
* It is not possible to force a Mi'fig to reproduce, as the outpouring of lifeforce needs to be completely voluntary. It is, however, possible to provide extremely bountiful environments and ample stimulation for personal growth. Mi'fig with reasonably high levels (5+) and more resources than they can handle are generally quicker to breed. Of course, the fact that Mi'fig are mortal beings also induces them to breed at least once in their lives, even though these lives may easily last two centuries without unnatural enhancements.
* Newborn Mi'fig are physically indistinguishable from adults, but do require careful raising for at least one year, just as do humanoid children, before they can reliably support themselves. Mi'fig have no set roles for which parent(s) do the child-rearing, but there is a tendency for the 'dominant' parent to do most of the work since the newborn is virtually guaranteed to have a lot in common with them.)
Dread Possibility: The Outsiders
VIEW CONTENT:
The Mi'fig look like toys, are treated as toys, and live - and often die - at the whims of gargantuan creatures whose existence they cannot normally perceive. What other horror could be injected into their existence?
The occasional appearance of Outsiders, Mi'fig not born of Mi'fig and frequently irreparably insane, might. Outsiders tend to shake up Mi'fig society with blasphemies and brilliant inventions, provoking wars or founding glorious empires, going on killing sprees or shunning all company and becoming mysterious hermits.
If an Outsider were to tell the Mi'fig that they were once bigger than the world of bricks, but a cruel enemy banished them to live among the Mi'fig, they are more likely to be shunned, patronized or locked away for their own safety than they are to be believed... Which is unfortunate, for it is true.
If a sufficiently powerful and cruel spellcaster uses soul-binding magic and performs the correct ritual upon sufficient brick-material to create a Mi'fig, it is entirely possible to bind a victim's soul into a Mi'fig body as its animating force. The unfortunate retains their own mental ability scores, but must readjust their physical ability scores and loses its racial traits in favor of a Mi'fig's. In addition, a victim of this ritual loses their class levels, starting out as a member of one of the NPC classes allowed to a Mi'fig of HALF its level before it was bound, rounded down.
Physically, Outsiders can be distinguished from natural-born Mi'fig by a black gem set in their torso.
Outsiders who do not go instantly insane on realizing what has happened to them, actually tend to go far. Possessing knowledge of the wider world and its developments, an Outsider who manages to apply that knowledge to their new environment can indeed cause sweeping advancements to their new people's society, and some have gone on to found empires in the realm of bricks.)
More to come...

Re: Toys in the Vault

Posted: Sat Apr 03, 2021 12:24 pm
by Mistmaster
Class restriction must go, the rest is interesting.

Re: Toys in the Vault

Posted: Sat Apr 03, 2021 12:28 pm
by Rock of the Fraternity
If the class restriction went, they wouldn't be child-safe, now would they? :wink:

Re: Toys in the Vault

Posted: Sat Apr 03, 2021 1:16 pm
by Mistmaster
Well, for that, a "thou shall not harm a human child" commamdment engraved in theyr nature would be enought.

Re: Toys in the Vault

Posted: Sat Apr 03, 2021 1:47 pm
by Rock of the Fraternity
Imagine teeny-tiny Wizards casting Fireball, and Clerics casting Flame strike, then consider how those spells are NOT scaled to the caster's size. Or imagine a weensie little Bard accidentally catching a child in the area of their Mass charm person.
They wouldn't mean to do hurt any kids, they wouldn't even know they had done so until sometime after the fact, but you can bet the parents of the charcoal or mind-slaved kid would not be best pleased.

That said, I do have magical options in mind for the Mi'fig.

Re: Toys in the Vault

Posted: Sat Apr 03, 2021 2:37 pm
by Mistmaster
Scale the spell down to size or simply say they don't work on children.
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