Welcome to the Dog Days of Podcasting, 2022 season. This year we’re taking part by creating 30 NPCs to use with table top gaming, writing projects, or other creative endeavors. These NPCs are system agnostic, but may include minor suggestions for how to run the characters with a party of adventures and explorers. They are written with a specific genre in mind, but will include notation for how to use them within at least two other realms.
That said, let’s get started.
Today, we’re visiting The Effigy Remains, an NPC designed for Science-Fiction and post-apocalyptic campaigns.
The Effigy Remains
VI
The breeze dances through the meadows: tickling grass, jostling flowers, and tugging the leaves of the branches of the lone ancient oak. The dusk side of the tree is full of bright leaves coating strong limbs up and down the tree’s trunk. The dawn side is dotted with younger limbs, small twigs of branches reaching around the hulking form that sheared off the old wood. The mech and old oak were similar companions, covered in somber greens, broken limbs, and a shattered carapace. The breeze dances along fraying wires, through dried and caked oils, and sings through bullet holes.
Its form was once human, tall as the tree, strong, armor anodized imperial blue and royal crimson. A fierce weapon of the stars. The units were said to be an Effigy of the great soldiers that guided the empire to through the heavens, but here the effigy remains a machine without a master, a guidance system waiting for the reactor to finally die.
The machine can speak through the comm unit in its cockpit. It was up to date to most network languages when it was commissioned, and many will find their devices capable of interacting with an encrypted signal.
It yearns to speak. The motivation of the machine varies, but it seeks to find the truth. To know what’s going on. To find out what happened to it. To know if it did good. Promises of data, proofs of station, these go far to manipulate the machine. It does not fear death, and will answer threats with promises of violence of it’s own.
In sci-fi, the Effigy is a crashed war machina, a combat exo-skeleton, or other vessel bonded to pilot and mission.
In an age of exploration, they’re a walking construct once a part the invading army, now left rotting in some mire. Their feet still yearn to march beyond the swamp and find victory.
In mythos, they’re a bound spirit, locked in a statue, awaiting a mystic that will never come. Some great soldier of the wars in the heavens, a fearful seeking to protect the aspect of the divine in their belly.
Maybe there’s a shadow of a pilot left. Maybe they jettisoned before crashing or were dragged off after the great solider came to rest against a once young oak. But now the leaves of the once adolescent branch fall upon the metal bulk like a child out growing a parent. There’s not much time left, but the machine would have words with those who will listen.
The audio portion of this episode is shared on a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License. Sounds and music are provided by Syrinscape’s Train Games Soundset. Please see the website for individual song and sound usage. The text for this episode is shared under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Have a good time with the character, and let me know if you use them for something.
Until tomorrow.