Rollibard "Ratchet" Piper's page

"If I'm going to do any scent tracking, I gotta start now. The trails will be too faint by tomorrow. I'll be back in a couple minutes," Ratchet said. Then he glanced around the street and started climbing. Subtly assisted by his mechanical arms, he ascended the buildings faster than most halflings could run climb speed 25

Once he was at a high enough vantage point, he clicked a lens down over his eyes and looked out over the distant rooftops. After finding fitting rooftop or balcony, he pointed at it, opened a portal, opened a second one next to him, and stepped through. Then he repeated the process. In a handful of portal jumps and less than a minute later, he was outside the city walls near his workshop.

Anything going on at the shop, or can I grab stuff and head back?

"I'm going to need some things from my workshop," Ratchet said. "Scent tracking might be possible, but I'll have to move fast."

How far away is my shop? Give me the straight line flight distance.

Hired onto a new crew and a new job in the same day! Ratchet felt like he could feel the coins pouring into his pocket. He did his best to keep quiet while the boss folks negotiated the contract. In his head he was already devising a half dozen ways to bend his inventions towards investigating a murder.

First Day of Vult in the Year 998 YK – Sharn - Oakbridge District

The Warforged Watch member heads over to the body with you, he arrives takes a knee and inspects, "Yep, he's ceased to function alright. That fall might've killed him, right?" He looks up at you Erix.

Ratchet pointed out the wound on the body.

"Maybe," he answered. "But he was stabbed in the neck before he fell."

"Deadguy!" Ratchet said, pointing back the way he came. "Fell off a balcony! This way!"

I'll lead him back.

Ratchet looks around for a city guard, or other official. He'd been in the wrong place and the wrong time too often to assume that attempting to help wouldn't be seen as culpability.

"I'm gonna find someone official! Brennus, wanna be my spotter?"

"Wait, didn't he just fall backwards? That's weird. Brennus, can you go check up there?" Ratchet asked. He tapped his headgear and a lens slid down over one eye. Thermal vision. Anyone else on the balcony?

He started towards the fallen man at a job. "Hope he's alright."

Perception (with thermal and detect magic): 1d20 + 12 ⇒ (15) + 12 = 27 Additional +4 vs stealthed/concealed creatures, plus thermal vision to see through cover, concealment, and invisibility. Also, ratchet's goggles reduce range penalties to visual perception checks by half.

"Oh, do you eat eyeballs?" Ratchet asked with clueless excitement on his face and all the tact of a hammer.

Knowledge Local: 1d20 + 9 ⇒ (7) + 9 = 16

Perception: 1d20 + 12 ⇒ (14) + 12 = 26

Broulnindre pulls her hood down, staying close by Frank as his 3' tall bodyguard.

I didn't realize she was a shortstack too. Nice!

Unlike most people, Ratchet's reaction to Gauntlet didn't seem unnerved. At all. Being unnerved might have been better.

The little inventor was terrible at hiding his expressions. He might as well have been wearing a sign with his emotions listed on it. Currently the sign said OBSESSED.

Ratchet watched the two Warforged like they were the most amazing things he'd ever seen, to the point of nearly tripping more than once as they headed in the direction of food.

In spite of his clear interest, he was doing his best not to be the unnerving one himself, and to that end he was concentrating on the nearly impossible task of keeping his mouth shut.

"Oh right! Food! I always forget." Ratchet added. He looked at the apple slices in his hands and ate two before his mechanical arms slithered back up his sleeves.

Those look like advancements that are more technical in nature than magical in nature".[/b]

"Yeah," Rachet confirmed. "I tried to be a wizard, but I'm really bad at actually casting spells, so I started trying to figure out other ways to replicate magical effects. Pretty much everything I build is like pre-casting a spell, and then using some kind of technology to capture it, maintain it, or release it with better precision."

EE looks at you as you speak Ratchet, "Fascinating, this unit would be interested in a demonstration of these creations".

When the Warforged addressed him directly Ratchet's grin was equal parts hero worship and maniacal glee.

"Sure! A lot of my designs are based on Warforged physiology, actually! Your people are just amazing! I can't wait to introduce you to Proto and Zero! They had to stay outside the city because of permits."" The word dripped with derision and venom, like the entire idea offended him.

"For what I can show you here though, uh, let's see..." He picked up an apple off the tray of snacks and tossed it in a slow arc towards a clear spot on the floor. With a snap of his hand something small deployed from inside his sleeve and snapped into his grip before firing a bolt of blue energy at the floor beneath where the apple fell. Before the first bolt had struck he fired a second orange bolt into the ceiling.

The floor and ceiling warped and yawned. The apple fell into the blue-ringed hole that had just appeared, and fell out of the orange one above.

It kept falling, picking up speed between the two gaps in space. "I based this one on the Dimension Door spell. My version lasts longer and is a lot more stable."

"And this is based on Magic Missile" A short volley of needle-like projectiles shot from the device in Rachet's hand, hung in space for a brief moment, then lanced forward and incredible speed. The needles struck the falling apple one after another, targeting perfectly in spite of how fast it was falling.

Then he gestured towards the wall and shot another orange pulse towards it. The portal in the ceiling closed and another one opened where he pointed. The apple shot out at terminal velocity, only to be caught by a mechanical hand that now protruded from Rachet's wrist. It's five evenly-spaced articulated fingers closed, slicing the apple neatly. The spikes that pierced it held it together until a second mechanical hand appeared from Ratchet's other sleeve and started pulling the sections apart.

The pair of portals closed with a crackle of dissipating energy, and each of Rachet's four hands, two biological, and two mechanical, offered his new friends slices of apple on small metal sticks.

"Who's hungry?"

All this happens over about 10 seconds. That was two rounds worth of actions. Rachet is fast

Ratchet was in a similar state of speechlessnes. He hadn't even asked to join yet. He kept glancing around the room trying to figure out if he was dreaming.

He was used to being the unluckiest halfling alive, so the sudden rush of good fortune took him completely off guard. He took a step nearer to Dev and took a firm hand on the man's sleeve for a moment. "Thank you," he said with an intensity that seemed a bit much for the situation. "I owe you a big favor. Whatever you need. Really."

Mickey blinks and shakes his head as Ratchet prattles on, "Glad some of you got that I didn't. Innovations have a funny way of ending up in the wrong hands you had better be careful Ratchet...".

Ratchet shook his head at Mickey's warning. "I doubt anyone else could keep my prototypes running. The stuff that's more permanent, well, it's still mostly unusable by anyone who isn't trained, and the batteries are custom, so when they stop working they're just junk for anyone else. Honestly, the only reason I care about security is for other people's safety, not because I'm worried about theft. Anyone who manages to make it into my workshop deserves what they end up with."

Ratchet did a double take as the bird started talking to him, and his mouth turned into a little O of happy surprise. "Uh, hi! You're a spellcaster? Not a familiar? Wow! That's so interesting! Were you polymorphed or reincarnated? Or Awakened? I have so many questions."

Mickey changes the subject, "What do you need a flywheel for anyway Ratchet?"

Then his attention was pulled in another direction. His excitement didn't leave, and apparently completely overrode his earlier awkwardness. "Well I hybridized a clockwork construct chassis with an electrical field based sensory array and a central power system based on ioun stones, and now I'm having an issue with power distribution because of how much energy i lose translating magical energy into mechanical and electrical, and I thought localized energy storage might be a better solution than transferring energy from a central bank like I'm going now. Like irrigation, you know? Multiple smaller sources fed from a primary source, rather than trying to pull everything from the primary source directly. Flywheels already do a good job of storing power and releasing it incrementally, so I'm going to try integrating them into Proto's actuator systems as a smaller scale, localized power source for finer, less strenuous movements that wouldn't need to draw from the central bank. I think that will make the whole power system more efficient overall."

Ratchet shut his mouth abruptly as he realized most of the room was staring at him. "I mean, uh, it's for a weapon. Normal mercenary stuff. Just... a weapon."

"Uh... I'm really good at fixing things," Ratchet said to nobody in particular. "If you need a hand, I mean."

"Heh, we're a mercenary company; but if the gig pays well enough I suppose I could learn an instrument." Franks says with a smirk.

As Ratchet arrived, the little audio enhancement device in his headset let him pick up snippets of the conversation from much further away than he'd otherwise be able to hear.

The words "mercenary company" jumped out at him like a flag waving street performer. His big eyes widened even bigger, but he was still too caught up in the newness of the situation to jump right in and start taking a league a minute the way he usually would. Shoving himself into a conversation from across the room without being introduced first probably wouldn't help him get a job.

So he stood next to his new acquaintance silently, waiting to be introduced, practically vibrating with excited, nervous energy.

His intense gaze flicked back and forth between the Warforged in the room like a kid eyeing gifts on Yule morning.

Ratchet's big green eyes blinked in surprise and confusion. He looked down at himself, tilted his head in thought then shrugged. "Uh. Sure? I didn't expect to be going to a party. Glad I decided not to wear my work clothes."

"Can we talk shop while we walk? Crystals are on my list too, but not the usual stuff. I need really high quality quartz and zircon..."

Ratchet will prattle about weird supplies he needs for the entire trip to the dinner party if Dev lets him. I'm fine with cutting to that scene unless there's something important about the talking and traveling.

Augie's Augmentations- Ratchet

"Oh, I don't want to keep you!" Ratchet said. "I just saw your sign and was curious. Some of the stuff I need is hard to source around here, so I'm just poking around really. I didn't think it would be so hard to find good flywheels in a city this size. Anyway, I'm Ratchet!" Ratchet said with a bright, but somewhat awkward smile.

The energetic halfling looked like someone had taken a ne'er-do-well street rat and enrolled him in a preparatory school. He wore a white collared shirt, and matching vest and trousers, but over them he wore a bandoleer and belt covered with pouches and tools, and a leather armored jacket that currently hung unbuckled and open. Attached to the jacket by a series of clips and straps was a compact, hard-framed backpack with a tool roll secured underneath it. Perhaps oddest of all for a halfling were his sturdy boots.

His hair was cropped close to his scalp, and a pair of elaborate protective googles sat on his forehead. He had a scar across his eyebrow, and another on his lip, and what looked like a fractal electrical burn rising out of his collar and crawling up his neck, past his ear, and webbing across the side of his head, where some of his short hair had turned white.

In contrast to his rough and tumble look, he wasn't visibly armed.

Active Camo sounds amazing. Also goggles and double masterwork thief's tools xD

I'm afraid you'll have to pick one. I can't make a single gizmo that does all those things (yet).

Ratchet has all of them, but they take up 3 gizmo slots.

Before I get too greedy, how many of your gizmos are you reserving for yourself?

The Hookshot seems pretty great, especially since I was gonna ask if you had a way to increase the length/range of my chain...

Most of them. They're about half of my character's bag of tricks. I figured I'd give each of you one (which is all the extra gizmos I got from the bonus feat).

I can't really increase the spiked chain's effective range as a weapon. When you use it as a grappling hook, it uses a grappling hook's weapon stats. If you're proficient, you can use it that way.

I can add all three modifications I listed to your chain. Modifying weapons is something Ratchet is good at.

As I go up in level I'll get more gizmos, so I will eventually have more to spread around to the party, and I'll have access to more modification options as I gain more Talents as well.

skill bonuses? tell me more :D

B has a few skills that she might want a bonus to...
Mostly Stealth and Perception, I expect. But maybe Disable Device for particularly dangerous traps that we can't blow up from far away...

I can make a sensory enhancement device that makes one of your senses sharper (most people pick vision), which adds a +3 circumstance bonus to Perception for that sense, and reduces distance penalties to Perception.

I can make an active camouflage field projector that grants a circumstance bonus to Stealth equal to 1/2 my level, and gives Hide In Plain Sight as long as you don't move.

I can modify a Masterwork set of Thieves Tools to give a +4 bonus instead of +2, and can attach to the target of a Disable Device check to automatically make a DD check every round for 1 minute

Need a bit more info, but is this one of those things that we're limited in the number we can have/you can make at once?

I feel like anything that can be added to Erix' spiked chain would be a good initial gizmo.

Then maybe later on a motorcycle, especially if that requires ranks in a skill or some other stat I could build towards.

Yes. Normally I'd have be able to have up to 9 gizmos up and running at a time. With the bonus feat I've increased the limit to 14. They're permanent until I break them down to make other gizmos.

Here's how I can modify a spiked chain-

I can let you change the damage type, add an extra special feature, and I can add a mechanism that allows the chain to lengthen and retract, letting you treat the chain as a grappling hook with a winch.

With that bonus feat, now I can make magitech gizmos for the whole party!

I have enough gizmo capacity to make one for everyone. Think of them like a minor science fiction themed magic item.

The most straightforward examples that wouldn't require rolls to operate are things like skill bonuses, temporary HP, adding energy effects to weapons, and ray guns.

If you want a motorcycle or second head, I can do that, but it'll be more expensive and might require you to make rolls every time you use it.

There's a lot of options, and the rules are complicated, so just let me know what kind of thing you want, and I'll come up with something.

Gauntlet of Sharn wrote:

I don't think we are. The GM gave us a bonus 1st level feat when we made these characters...

Correct.

Say what now? How'd I miss that?

Oh, it's like Christmas!

Being fired was bad enough, but then the guards wouldn't let him bring his workshop into the city! It was just insult to injury lately How was he supposed to know that he needed permits for constructs? The workshop wasn't really a construct anyway. It was more like a really complicated rickshaw. The streets were too wide enough! Barely, sure, but still. He saw plenty of wagons. The shop wasn't that much bigger! Hopefully the instructions he'd left Ace with would be enough to keep them occupied, and hopefully nobody would be dumb enough to try to break into the shop. Curious passersby and bored Constructed Intelligences did not mix well.

Ratchet wasn't really worried for their safety. Proto was in guard dog mode, and if it really came down to it Ace had the Armory, and even the workshop itself. The warnings couldn't possibly be any clearer, so anyone that managed to get inside deserved what they found.

Ratchet meandered through the city, occasionally snagging small treasures from anyone who looked decently well off. Most of the money and generic valuables ended up dropped into beggar's cups and street urchin hands. The more interesting baubles vanished into Ratchet's seemingly-bottomless pockets. He didn't really need the stuff. It was just part of Zero's training. The thin metallic arms were currently inside Ratchet's sleeves, copying his technique, memorizing patterns and movements, learning at a mind-boggling rate.

He was in the bustling city to look for work, but Auggie's Augmentations was just too tempting a name to ignore. With a wide grin and an extra spring in his step, he walked in.

*munches popcorn*

Shadow, I just realized I need a GM ruling on an ability interaction-

Weapon Amplifier (from the Weapon Modifications talent) is basically a "floating" weapon enhancement. In effect, I am the thing that has the weapon enhancement, and the enhancement gets added to any weapon I wield. (current amplification is +2d6 electricity damage and a Fort save or fall prone)

Blaster (from the Technological Weapons talent) is a "design your own science fiction shooty device" ability. One of the options is a Volley which works similarly to Magic Missile, but allows a Reflex save to negate (effectively turning the enemy's Reflex save into my attack roll).

My question is, does Weapon Amplifier work with Volley?

RAW is that any attack that doesn't require an attack roll can't be considered a Weapon, but RAI on these abilities seems to be that they're supposed to have synergy (weapon amplifier works fine with all the other Blaster options).

Overall Effect: Volly on it's own deals 2d4+2 damage (same power as a 3rd level Magic Missile but also allows a Reflex to negate).
With Weapon Amplifier the Volley would be 2d4+2 +2d6 electricity (Reflex negates), On Hit: Fort save or fall Prone.

To me that seems like a lot for a spammable auto-hit attack, but it's definitely within the power level of a 3rd level spell.

There's a feature of most Tinker talents where I spend a Battery to amplify a gizmo (which costs me 5 GP and a few minutes to make), so a possible compromise is that I need to spend a Battery to use the Amplifier with Volly.

Thoughts?

I have far too many character concepts for an Eberron specific game, lol

With Ratchet, I somehow managed to cram 4 different character concepts into a single little guy, and somehow it still makes sense thematically. I'm not sure if I recommend it. Building him felt like writing a system mastery thesis.

Don't be like me. It's a lot of work. >_<

Monkey! This game just keeps getting better and better!

I'm fine with giving the original NPCs some re-introduction time.

Also DH, I haven't forgotten your cannon request, just haven't had the bandwidth to contemplate it too deeply, will do so once this game officially begins next week.

Since it's something you're not sure about, I'll switch gears. Nothing about Ratchet's build requires cannons or guns. I'll switch gears to ballista and crossbows. They're quieter anyway.

Rollibard "Ratchet" Piper wrote:

If only you knew someone who could build you a fancy prosthetic hand...

That sounds hilarious and awesome, we should do it

Sure. Once it comes up in game, I'll need to swap out my modular tinker talents for a day and spend a little time building them, but after that they're permanent.

Prosthetic Gizmos don't need any rolls to use, so you'd get 2 fully functional arms at the cost of one of my Gizmo slots, and the occasional 10GP Battery (which I can make on the fly whenever you need more).

The combination of talents I have gives my gizmos a lot of different features.

Each arm would have storage capable of storing 1 Tiny object or 2 Diminutive objects. (your size is really working against you for this feature). I can also build spring loaded wrist sheaths into each arm.

The arms can also store information. The amount varies by the type of information you're trying to store, but the most relevant one for you is the ability to scan and store up to 10,000 pages of written information.

You'd have the choice of having the arms be Worn or Implanted. (Implanted takes a Heal check and makes them part of you. It would be really hard to pretend to be a normal bird, but they couldn't be disarmed or stolen, and you'd get the appropriate item slots for rings, gloves, and bracers)

Each arm would get a built in weapon.

Here's the options to choose from. Pick one from each category for each arm.

1) What blast type? (bludgeoning, slashing, piercing, fire, cold, electrical, acid).

2) What blast shape? (short range ray, 20' line, 10' cone, low damage auto-hit barrage)

3) What additional effect? (Knocked prone, distracted, shaken, sickened)

All of these options can be temporarily boosted at the cost of a Battery.

whatever Ratchet wants to be in the end (ranged guns or melee with his 'suit')?

I think the best way to describe Ratchet is a skill monkey rogue who can turn into a highly mobile zone-controller tank. The closest standard class comparison is a Synthesist Summoner.

His bots will be ranged support. No cannon for now though. Had to put it off for another two levels. It's sad, but the tradeoffs were worth it.

Time for Brennus to chime in about discrimination about those without easily used opposable digits. :D

If only you knew someone who could build you a fancy prosthetic hand...

At least we still have 4, I suppose.

4 is a good number as long as we all stay committed and reliable. We have plenty of party role flexibility, so if we just agree to let whoever is available first take over the pointman duties we should be able to move along pretty fast.

Just don't let Ratchet be the party Face. It'll be a trainwreck.

The group will consist of just a 4 man team,

Extremely loose definitions of "4" and "man"

One of Rachet's class abilities is "Unethical Science" so I think bad things done with magic will be graded rather than judged.

Brennus and Ratchet are going to have some fun conversations, I'm sure. :D While he may be most focused on his universal theory of magic research, Brennus is very much a renaissance raven who wants to learn about everything. :D

I'm looking forward to that roleplay. Ratchet has a very love/hate relationship with magic.

Oh, I almost forgot-

The dinosaur can pilot the mech suit and fire the cannon.

I don't think I'm going to have it do that, but it's explicitly allowed by the class abilities.

Ratchet's 95% done. Just waiting to find out if I'm using a cannon and guns, or a ballista and crossbows. The difference is mostly in the decibels.

I think Ratchet might be the most complicated Pathfinder character I've ever made. Conceptually he's hilarious and I'm excited to play him. Mechanically, he's kinda daunting.

He's just kinda all over the place. He can fill/support so many different party roles it's hard to keep track of them all.

He's a sneaky trapspringer with a freaking portal gun, throwing weapons (because halfling), and some minor spellcasting ability (he can only cast spells in his workshop because he's a special snowflake, but he makes scrolls to compensate).

He has a mechanical dinosaur pet who can track like a bloodhound.

He also has a semi-autonomous mech suit with a giant servo arm capable of throwing boulders.

and he has a deployable cannon.

Still looking into this question.

There are Warforged but I am not entirely certain that the tech level in Eberron has reached guns yet or cannons for that matter. But someone has to invent this stuff right? House Cannith I am sure would be QUITE interested in dissecting... er I mean interviewing you!

Motorcycles yes. The group took a craft VERY similar to a car in previous adventure.

I'm very interested in being the guy that invents this stuff.

Rachet's main motivation is reverse-engineering how Warforged work, so he can give them the ability to make more of themselves without Creation Forges (because screw House Canith). He's really close to being able to make fully intelligent autonomous drones (2 more levels).

I asked about the cannon because one of the Technician class options is a mobile, self-loading siege engine. If I can make a tank, I'm going to. There's other things I could do instead, so don't feel like my whole character hinges on it or anything. I just think it's cool.

I took two different drawbacks that convert all his tech into magi-tech, so none of it is actually based in science. Mechanically speaking, Ratchet is just a really weird magic item crafter.

Stargates... you mean portals to other planets without a Spelljammer?

That one was mostly hyperbole, but yes. It's within the realm of possibility.

Hey Shadow, I have some GM questions for you-

1) What's the tech level? I took the alternate feature that turns all technology stuff into magi-tech, but I still wanted to check with you before I break out things like magic machine guns, motorcycles, and stargates.

2) Can I buy a cannon?

Here's DH's character. Turns out, he's a halfling.

Ratchet is a hyperactive, autistic, genius inventor obsessed with constructs.

He comes with his own mech suit, and a robotic dinosaur, and an unreasonable amount of firepower.

I still need to do equipment.

After arguing with myself for quite a while, I've decided that I have to cut back on the number of games I'm in.

I apologize, life has just gotten too busy for me to keep up.

I've really enjoyed playing Ratchet. This group has been awesome. Maybe at some point in the future I can come back, but for the next few months I can't see my life slowing down to the point where I can commit time to gaming again.

Ratchet eyes the armor, but passes it to Ulfak. Their resident savage got swung at more often than the dwarf.

Perception: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (1) + 6 = 7

It's only supposed to deafen people within 10 feet of the blast, which is why I tossed it over the grimlock's head. Works for me though. Kinda funny and possibly useful later. Sorry Sandra, I didn't expect that to happen.

Ratchet stuck his pinky in his ear and worked it around a little. "Damn. Tha' one had some extra punch to it."

Fort: 1d20 + 5 ⇒ (5) + 5 = 10

"Ah think it sees with it's ears, so that shoulda done a number on it."

Then he realized he couldn't hear himself talk.

"Aw, hell…"

I guess I'm just going to Delay my action. There's not a lot left for me to do. I'll get creative if Ulfak gets in a bad way.

"No eyes, eh. Let's see how you like this."

Ratchet pulls a strange round rock the size of a large marble from his bandoleer and tosses it over the gridlock's head.

Ranged Touch, targeting the grid space 5' behind the Grimlock, AC 5: 1d20 + 6 - 4 ⇒ (5) + 6 - 4 = 7

It strikes the ground with a concussive bang.

Thunderstone, targeting behind it so I don't catch Ulfak in the radius. Grimlock needs to make a DC 15 Fort save or be deafened (which I'm guessing will blind it).

"Lets see how truly dangerous 'e is when 'e's glued t' th' floor…"

Ratchet says pulling a pair of canisters from his bandoleer.

Tanglefoot Bag, touch attack, firing into melee: 1d20 + 7 - 4 ⇒ (19) + 7 - 4 = 22
Splat. Ugly is Entangled. That should make it easier to hit, and less able to hit back. DC 15 reflex save or be stuck to the ground, too.

Ratchet wasn't about to waste a bomb on just one foe. Instead of tossing another bomb he pulled a short javelin from over his shoulder and let it fly.

Ranged Attack: 1d20 + 6 ⇒ (8) + 6 = 14
Damage: 1d6 + 1 ⇒ (5) + 1 = 6

Move action, draw javelin. Standard action, attack with Javelin. 5' adjust (if necessary) to let someone else in to my slot. I'm not particularly effective when I'm not throwing bombs, so I should get out of the line of fire.

Ratchet climbs as well, looking around for danger.