Description
BlackSheens are constructs created to patrol and protect an area. They normally show up in groups of three or more, and attack without warning.
Their black armor allows them to make themselves almost invisible in darkness (2 shift advantage to avoid being seen), and they are able to see easily even in total darkness. Oddly, when confronted with bright light, they lose both advantages, and take a one shift penalty to all skill rolls, including attack and defense rolls.
BlackSheens are constructs, armored in shining black synth that seems to heal itself. They look more like humanoid insects than machines, and move with a predator’s grace and purpose. They often roar and screech while fighting, fooling most people into thinking they are living things.
As constructs, they are made of synth and metal, but also have organic components that are bathed in a purple slime that seems to preserve them. Brains, muscles, organs and bones are all used as parts to replace synthetics components throughout its body, seemingly at random. Worse still, the parts are not even alive any longer in any biological sense. They are just chemically sustained chunks of flesh.
Details
- Level:
- 3 (9)
- Motive:
- Defending the nest
- Environment:
- Ruins, wilderness at night, dark places
- Health:
- 8
- Damage:
- 6
- Armor:
- 4
- Movement:
- Short
- Modifications:
Immunity to mental attacks. Can see in total darkness. Invisibility while in dark places, offering a 2 shift advantage to hiding and speed defense rolls. Blinded by bright lights, causing a 1 shift penalty for all skill checks, including combat.
- Combat:
BlackSheens fight with no real sense of tactics, normally attacking whomever last caused them notable damage. They only seem to become organized when someone invades the area they’re defending, forcing them to attack en-mass against the one they deem the “worst” of the invaders.
BlackSheens can and will retreat when fighting away from it’s nest, often running back to the nest with any resources they can grab (usually meaning dead bodies and numenera). They never retreat when defending their nest.
- Interaction:
BlackSheens do not converse, and seem incapable of complex thought. They are often only noticed after they have acted, such as finding a guard missing with nothing but bloody stains to mark his loss.
Those able to communicate with machines get a sense of unease around BlackSheens for the moment or two they are able to try it. They don’t get much longer to try and communicate since BlackSheens will seem to immediately attack any such person to drag their body back to the nest.
- Use:
The players are being hunted by BlackSheens, always hiding in the shadows and never showing themselves. NPCs disappear at random, eventually allowing one of the players to see the BlackSheen right before two others attack from behind.
- Loot:
Not only will a group of three BlackSheen have 1d6 cyphers that can be recovered from their bodies, but every three BlackSheens can be harvested for enough synth pieces to make a single suit of medium armor that offers a 1 shift advantage when hiding in darkness and 1d6 knives that do +1 damage.