Epic Beasts, tiny rules

Kaiju and Mecha for Into the Odd-likes

A sketch of a Mecha by Daniel Locke for Islands of Weirdhope

As you may have noticed, I love Chris McDowall’s elegant Into the Odd ruleset. I’ve been working within and around it now for three years, and I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve tried changing something, then realised that its exactly like that for a reason- everything ties together in such a tight way. But when I was thinking about the setting for Islands of Weirdhope, I knew I wanted to introduce some really BIG things, Mecha and Kaiju, the huge entities seen in things like Godzilla films, the Forest Spirit in Princess of Mononoke, the God Warriors in Nausicaa or Mecha in Neon Genisis Evangelion. Something alluding to the powers of nature, mechanisation and Gods.

Chris introduced the idea of detachments in his blog, entities larger than a conventional creature or individual, from an entire unit of soldiers through to immense creatures like a dragon. It’s a clever switch of scale, where all attacks against the detachment by regular creatures are impaired (d4 damage) unless they have the blast property (can attack an area). And all attacks by a detachment against a regular creature are enhanced (d12) and have the blast property. Mausritter uses the scale, renamed to Warband scale, to denote the difference between Mice and Cats, making Cats truly terrifying. In ECO MOFOS!! I called detachments “Units”, to give a modern military twist, and created large creatures like the Tentacle Hell. But what if… there was something bigger?

I remember playing Battletech as a kid, realising that my best tactic was to stand in water and fire, to cool the heat sinks. And I knew I didn’t want to emulate that experience. Besides, Chris has already done that. But I did want huge entities to feel awe-inspiring, and totally terrifying, like encountering a human as an ant. So I decided to write up some rules where three units are combined into one entity. The three units act independently, but only one can move, and one is a vulnerable control unit, a head or cockpit. And the less vulnerable parts can attempt to protect the control unit, like arms flailing up to deflect a blow.

Image for Islands of Weirdhope by Daniel Locke

I introduced the rules to our discord and people got pretty excited creating new weird huge monsters and machines. They’ve even set up a Jam for it. So make your own and share them around. Some of mine are at the end of this. There are going to be a whole bunch in Islands of Weirdhope too, the focus of some of the many factions in the watery world.

Anyway, here are the rules:

MECHA AND MONSTERS

Mecha and Monsters, collectively known as Titans, are vast moving entities in the Islands of Weirdhope. As tall as large buildings, they are lumbering but absurdly powerful.

A Titan consist of 3 Units: HEAD, HEART and LIMBS.

• Head is central control.

• Heart is the power system.

• Limbs are for action.

Each has its own Strength, Dexterity, Will, HP and Armour.

Actions

Titans always act last in a round. Each Unit of the Titan acts separately, and each Unit may act in a round, in any order.

Only the Limbs can Move. All in its path must roll a DEX save or take d12 Blast damage. Limbs can’t Move and use a ranged attack, but can make a melee attack.

Targeting & Damage

If the Head is targeted, the Limbs or Heart can attempt to shield the damage with a DEX save. If successful, they take the damage instead.

As an action, the Heart may reduce its Strength to allocate an equal amount of Strength to another Unit.

If a Unit fails a Critical Damage save or its Strength reaches 0, the Titan loses the capabilities of that Unit.

If any Unit is Down, the Titan can no longer move. If there is a pilot, the pilot may attempt to escape.

If the Head is Down, the Titan no longer functions, and the Titan will fall. The Titan will fall away from the last strike, all below taking d12 Blast damage.

Exhaustion Die

Special Manoeuvres are possible, at the risk of exhaustion. Each manoeuvre requires the action of two units.

• Moving twice

• Enhanced defence (2 turns of Hard Cover)

• Titan-Specific Special Manoeuvres

Complete the move and roll a WIL save using the Head’s stat. On a fail the Titan’s HP drops to 0 across all Units.

Monsters regain HP for one Unit by not making any action for a turn.

Mecha must cool heatsinks in water for a turn to recover HP for each Unit.

Battles between Titans

In a battle between Titans, each player chooses which Unit will act first for them in this turn, and rolls a DEX save to see which takes initiative. If both succeed, the lower roll goes first. If it’s a tie, the actions occur simultaneously.

EXAMPLE MECHA

Hercules 4000

HEART

10HP, 3 Armour, STR 18, DEX 10, WIL 10, Plasma Cannon d8 Blast

HEAD

10 HP, STR 12, DEX 10, WIL 10, Headbutt d6

LIMBS

8 HP, 3 Armour, STR 12, DEX 10, WIL 10, Punch d8, Canon d8

Special Manoeuvre

Hyper Turtle Requires functional Head, Heart and Arms. Creates a force field, adding 2 Armour to all Units until HP loss.

MUSKRAT 209

HEART

10 HP, 2 A, STR 10, DEX 8, WIL 10, Plasma Cannon d10 Blast

HEAD

4 HP, STR 9, DEX 12, WIL 16

LIMBS

8 HP, 1 A, STR 12, DEX 12, WIL 10, Punch d10, Canon d8

Special Manoeuvre

Core Overload Requires functional Head and Heart. Generates destructive tank-wide beam, d12 damage to all in one line.

NVOID Unit-03

HEART

10 HP, 2 Armour, STR 10, DEX 15, WIL 10, Plasma Cannon d10 Blast

HEAD

4 HP, STR 10, DEX 13, WIL 14, Mini Blasters d6

LIMBS

8 HP, 1 Armour, STR 12, DEX 14, WIL 10, Sword d10, Canon d8

Special Manoeuvre

Spining Blade Requires functional Head, Heart and Arms. Deals a Sword blow to all in range at once.

EXAMPLE MONSTERS

UR-MANTIS

HEART

10 HP, 2 Armour, STR 10, DEX 15, WIL 10, Paralyzing Screech (all that hear must make a WIL save or become paralysed. All affected make a further WIL save at the start of their turn, able to act if successful. STR damage causes each to regain action)

HEAD

4 HP, STR 10, DEX 14, WIL 14, Acid Mucus d8 blast

LIMBS

8 HP, 1 Armour, STR 12, DEX 14, WIL 10, blades d12

Special Manoeuvre

Fatal Blade Requires functional Head, Heart and Arms. Deals a double blade blow to a target.

LIZARD KING

HEART

10 HP, 2 Armour, STR 10, DEX 8, WIL 10, Throw Building/vehicle d10

HEAD

4 HP, STR 9, DEX 12, WIL 16, Eye Beams d10

LIMBS

8 HP, 1 Armour, STR 12, DEX 12, WIL 10, Punch d12

Special Manoeuvre

Plasma Beam Requires functional Head and Heart. Generates a destructive mouth-wide beam, dealing d12 damage to all in a direct line from the Monster to the horizon.