Wednesday, April 7, 2021

Wandering Titans, part II - Fast and Slow

Giant monsters that are also weather phenomena.

The basic mechanism I suggested in the previous post is to roll 2d6 each day, and move the titan to a neighboring hex when doubles are rolled. Here's a pair of titans brainstormed while thinking about twists to those rules.


Stampeding Winds

Keep track of the direction the titan last moved. Each day, roll 2d6, and use the sum to decide whether this titan continues in that direction (6,7,8) turns left or right (3,4,5;9,10,11), abruptly reverses direction (2) or stalls in place (12).

Donato Giancola

On the horizon (visible in neighboring hexes)
: Swirling clouds, moving at a visible pace, forming and dissolving in the blink of an eye. Distant sounds of roaring winds and hooves.

Environmental Effect 
:  Hurricane-force winds topple structures and knock you to the ground. But if travelling downwind, you'll find yourself magically invigorated and full of energy.  Travelling through the hex in the same direction as the winds provides the same benefits as a long rest. Travelling through any other direction is difficult and hazardous. Exiting the hex in the upwind direction is impossible. 

Appearance
: A herd of charging ethereal stallions precipitating from the air. Clouds run through the sky, and smaller instantiations charge along the ground. Windward, the air speeds up, forming into visible near-tangible wind-creatures, and then slowly dissipate as they approach the leeward edge of the hex.

Behavior / Desires
: Wants to run. Wants to be free. Wants mortal creatures to charge alongside it without end.


Things to Discover or Encounter Nearby

  • The smaller manifestations of the Stampede can be captured and used as a magical power source. Poacher-wizards try to do this with elaborate steel wind-traps. But it's dangerous work, as the winds speed up to impossible levels to batter down walls wherever a member of the herd gets trapped.
  • Wind-dependent ecosystems of whirlibirds, tumbletrees, and lumbering strandbeests.
  • Homes or even entire castles tumbling through the air.
  • An encounter with an instance of the Stampeding Winds. If it likes you, there's a chance it will bless you with tailwinds for the rest of the day. Party travels twice as fast until the next time they sleep.
  • Travelers hitching a ride on the winds
    1. Two blokes calmly rowing along in an airborne canoe.
    2. A gang of witches racing along on suped-up broomsticks.
    3. A village of people, rapidly evacuated, carrying as many possessions as they could grab from their now-destroyed homes.
    4. Bandits in a balloon with long hooks and nets, snatching up possessions that people left behind.
    5. 140-years-old woman, hunched over with age, slowly walking with the wind. Hasn't stopped or slept for the past 50 years. Barely kept alive by the sustaining force of the titanic winds.
    6. A whale which beached itself and just kept going.





The Ponderous Ox

This one's simpler. Roll 3d6 each day and move the titan when you roll triples.
While the party is awake within the titan's hex, don't advance the time of day, and don't roll for its movement.

On the horizon (visible in neighboring hexes)
: Clouds frozen in midair. Things sound slightly more quiet than they should.

Environmental Effect 
:  Silence. Stillness. Fires stop crackling and flickering, but still give out steady heat and light. Rivers freeze in place while remaining fluid. A diffuse mist fills the air. The sun and moon appear frozen in the sky. Your heart aches with nostalgia for things you've never seen. Loosed arrows slow to a stop and hover in midair.  Rest and rations are optional when near this titan. Cannot gain XP while in this hex. As you travel away from it, time suddenly returns to normal as if you never approached the titan to begin with.

Appearance
: A massive buffalo, with fur like boulders and horns like mountains.  Always faintly visible, far off in the distance, behind the next hill, shaded by the mists. You can always approach the titan, but can never reach it. 

Behavior / Desires
: No one has ever seen it move, or do much of anything at all but slowly breathe titanic breathes. (But surely it must move, for how else can it travel from hex to hex?)


Things to Discover or Encounter Nearby

  • Void monk meditating on a hilltop. No, they haven't been following the titan. They've been here in this spot as long as they can remember. The titan hasn't moved in all that time, they say. 
  • Small towns that don't exist, fiercely aggressive towards outsiders.
  • Strange pillars, can be hacked apart (may trigger localized earthquakes) and sold to wizards to make immovable rods.
  • Empty cabins, with a warm hearth and hot soup inside. If you sleep in the soft beds inside, you'll wake up on cold ground outside, weeks later, the titan having moved on.
  • Incomprehensible alien geometries slipping through the gaps between moments in time. Probably nothing to worry about.




Additional Titans: Part 1, Part 3Part 4

3 comments:

  1. Thank you very much for more titans.

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    Replies
    1. I'm glad they're enjoyable. I have a few more ideas for these jotted down. Though some of these ideas aren't any more developed than something like "Big cold goat."

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    2. I'd welcome all weather-titans, because what I am seeing is amazing.

      I am wondering what would titanic cat-weather be? Some lazy sun-haze, like a wandering apricity?

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