Homebrew Gearforged 3.5 Species Details

Making a Gearforged
Gearforged are an artificial race created by a complex process combining technology, mysticism, divinity and arcane arts to transport the living consciousnesses of being from the biological body into a construct of metal, and crystal.

• All gearforged were once other creatures, now inhabiting standardized bodies with cylinders, springs, and articulated joints of varying quality.
• Each is made of iron, brass, and steel and as distinctive in appearance as other people differ by their hair and eyes.
• The gearforged are thinking creatures and can serve as city watchmen and soldiers.

Gearforged have free will

• Separate from other mechanical devices
• Gearforged mechanisms are more than mechanical
  • All gearforged are machines with a soul.
    • Their arms and legs depend on actuators powered by everwound springs.
    • Their minds depend on memory gears, transverse cognition gearing, and the marvel of a soul gem connected directly to a maze of silver and mithral steam, spark, and magical conduits.
      • These elements are all held in a shell of iron, brass, and steel, and the bulk of the things is remarkable.
  • A large and heavily armored gearforged can weigh 400 pounds, since its armor is built in.
• GEARFORGED COMPONENTS
  • The range of gearforged anatomy in all its variants is remarkable, but all gearforged share some common parts.
    • EVERWOUND SPRINGS
      • These magical springs provide energy over long periods, effectively acting as the power sources for most of the School necromancy;
      • Effective Level 5th
      • Skill Check Craft (clockwork) DC 20, 4 successes;
      • Knowledge (arcana) DC 20, 2 successes (Priests of Rava may substitute Knowledge (religion)) Components M, S, SC, V
      • Material Components—a complete mechanical body
        of actuators, springs, gears, and engraved gemstones (minimum cost 10,000 gp)
      • Secondary Casters—up to four additional casters are optional; each who makes a successful Knowledge (arcana) or Craft (clockwork) check (DC 20) adds +1 to the primary caster’s check
      • Casting Time 60 min
        Range touch
        Target one humanoid creature
        Duration permanent
• SOUL GEMS
  The mind of a gearforged creature is as sharp as that of any flesh-and-blood soul, but it is more portable.
  • The animating, vital principle of a gearforged—its will, its personality, and its mind—are retained in one or (for an extra 8,000 gp) two soul gems.
  • These are the elements that retain an individual’s spirit or soul, and their destruction means the death of that gearforged.
• MEMORY GEARS
  • These delicate constructions are scroll-like ribbons pierced with thousands of pin-sized holes, and others wound about with tiny enchantments of great complexity.
  • The memory of a gearforged for all the days after its creation lives in the memory gears.
  • Older gearforged have many such gears, and the material component for the magic to create them requires one new gear/two levels attained or every 10 years of life. Installing one requires one day’s work and 2,000 gp.
  • Memory gears can be taken from a dead gearforged and read by others. This is a lengthy process and viewed with some alarm by most gearforged, since it is akin to peering into the most private details of a creature’s life.
  • Installing an existing, used memory gear in a new gearforged requires a new Ritual of Soulforging and at least one week for the recipient to remember and understand the results.
  • The process is dangerous, requiring a
    • Fortitude save
      (DC 10 + one-half level of dead gearforged + Cha modifier of dead gearforged) to succeed.
    • If the Fortitude save fails, the gearforged is ill for two weeks as it resorts its own memories, and the found memory gear is rendered useless.

Gearforged 3.5 Traits

Your warforged character has the following traits. A few of the traits give you a choice; consider how your choice reflects the purpose for which your character was built.

Ability Score Increase

Your Constitution score increases by 2, and one other ability score of your choice increases by 1.

Age

A typical warforged is between two and thirty years old. The maximum warforged lifespan remains a mystery; so far, warforged have shown no signs of deterioration due to age. You are immune to magical aging effects.

Alignment

Most warforged take comfort in order and discipline, tending toward law and neutrality. But some have absorbed the morality, or lack thereof, of the beings with which they served.

Size

Your size is Medium. To set your height and weight randomly, start with rolling a size modifier:

Size modifier = 2d6

Height = 5 feet + 10 inches + your size modifier in inches

Weight in pounds = 270 + (4 × your size modifier)

Speed

Your base walking speed is 30 feet.

Constructed Resilience

You were created to have remarkable fortitude, represented by the following benefits:

• You have advantage on saving throws against being poisoned, and you have resistance to poison damage.
• You don’t need to eat, drink, or breathe.
• You are immune to disease.
• You don’t need to sleep, and magic can’t put you to sleep.

Require Maintenance

• You must spend at least 4 hours in an inactive, motionless state, rather than sleeping. In this state, you appear inert.
  • it doesn’t render you unconscious
  • you can see and hear as normal
  • you are fully aware during this period
  • any interruption in their routine during these 4 hours requires them to start again from the beginning.
• Gearforged can function a number of days equal to their character level without performing this maintenance, but
  • each day without such a repair period applies a cumulative –2 penalty on all attack and damage rolls, saving throws, and skill checks.
  • If a gearforged neglects his maintenance period a number of days equal to his character level, he becomes immobile and helpless until
    • maintained by another gearforged or
    • an individual with the Craft (Clockwork) or Knowledge (Engineering) skill.
• One 4-hour maintenance period eliminates all accumulated penalties.

Integrated Protection

Your body has built-in defensive layers, which can be enhanced with armor:

• You gain a +1 bonus to Armor Class.
• You can don only armor with which you have proficiency.
  • To don armor other than a shield, you must incorporate it into your body over the course of 1 hour, during which you remain in contact with the armor.
  • To doff armor, you must spend 1 hour removing it. You can rest while donning or doffing armor in this way.
• While you live, the armor incorporated into your body can’t be removed against your will.

Specialized Design

You gain one skill proficiency and one tool proficiency of your choice.

Languages

You can speak, read, and write Common and one other language of your choice.

Mind of Metal

Gearforged gain a +4 vs. mind affecting effects.

Gearforged are not subject to nonlethal damage, and they are immune to fatigue and exhaustion.

They are not at risk of death from massive damage, and they automatically stabilize when taken below 0 hit points or less.

A gearforged body is destroyed at their negative Con score, though they can have their soul gem and memory tapes implanted in a newly constructed body as long as they are intact.

They cannot be raised or resurrected through normal magical means, though a wish spell can restore them fully.

 

Submersible

• Under water Gearforged continue to function normally
  • Can stay submerged for # of hours = to Strength
    • Grinds to halt if under water longer than time = strength score
      • Requires 4 hour repair period to free up movement
• Gearforged Suffer -2 penalty to swim checks