I am running a Hoard of the Dragon Queen and Rise of Tiamat campaign right now. Each of the players is level 3, they are currently at the encampment of the Cultists and Kobolds. Each one of the players will be getting a unique, magical item after Hoard of the Dragon Queen wraps up, each on their own personal side quest. One of the players is a Half-Orc Barbarian, path of the Berzerker. He is the one who will be getting said "Hulk Buster" armor.
Now, I know nothing of comics, I don't really follow them, however I know who Iron Man is and who the Hulk is. I know enough to know that apparently the Hulk Buster Armor was made to combat the Hulk. That is all I really know, that is all I really care to know.
For my "Hulk Buster" suit, I am making it a strange, alien sphere, not from their planet or time. It will bind itself to Znarftarf (as in nobody else can use the suit). It will take over his body, or should I say Znarftarf will be inside the suit much like Tony Stark is inside his Iron Man suit?
Znarftarf without armor has a 16 armor class, 2 from his Dexterity bonus and 4 from his Constitution bonus. Letting him wear the suit will negate his bonus from Constitution, but I want to treate it like Half-Plate armor, with a 15 armor bonus plus his 2 Dexterity bonus granting him a 17 armor class.
Here are a list of abilities the suit can grant -
Pros
- It counts as a suit of Half-Plate armor
- The wearer can fly in a speed equal to their original movement speed, to set the suit up to fly and to land is an action
- Wearer can shoot energy blasts up to 60', a blast does 2d4 radiant damage
- The suit grants the wearer resistance to Bludgeoning, Piercing, Slashing, Fire, Cold, Necrotic
- The suit is water proof as well as allows the wearer to breathe in conditions where they normally would not be able to, such as underwater or in outerspace, though having the breath crushed out of you still prevents you from breathing
- The suit grants the wearer a hand to hand ability of 1d6 or a die-grade higher of their normal hand to hand if they're trained in hand to hand combat
- Heals the wearer 1d4 HP a round
- The wearer can take 1 full-round to lock-on to an opponent, granting them advantage on attacks to the target on their next round
- The wearer has advantage on all Strength based checks and saves as well as can carry double their normal carrying ability in weight
- Perfect Darkvision, though the wearer is unable to discern color while surrounded in darkness, everything is various shades of green while Darkvision is kicked in
Cons
- The wearer can only move at half speed while on land
- The wearer can not be the recipient of touch based skills/attacks unless they are damaged based ones, such as Shocking Grasp, no touch based healing
- The wearer has disadvantage on all Dexterity based checks and saves
- The wearer can not cast spells while in the suit
- The wearer can only get Reaction Strikes on targets directly in-front of them, not on the sides or behind
- Electric based damage effects the wearer double
- The suit can not come off unless the wearer is rendered unconcious, it takes 1 round for it to come off and return to it's spherical shape
- The suit takes 3 rounds to morph itself over the wearer, which in this state the recipient is immobile
Give me opinions on the suit, suggestions. Have you done anything similar? Describe below. Thanks!
This "mecha-suit" would need a special module about steampunk technology. It is so powerful, what enemy nPCs with mechasuits should to get a extra XP rewards like an added monster template, a mixture of monster ally and magic tiem. They are like constructs, but they can be hurt by mind-affecting powers, because they have the mind of the mecha rider/pilot.
One of my many crazy ideas for settings was a confrontation between a gnome kingdom with teslapunk technology againts a revolutionary union of goblins with biopunk "mecha-suits".
LuisCarlos17f wrote:
If I was DM'ing a table where a PC showed me that armor, I would pull a copy of Dragons of Faerun and look up one of the CR30 Ancient -insert Color here- Wyrms to give him the London Blitz treatment, as long as it takes until dead. I would have the dragon take the item for his hoard. If it won't size-up to fit, he can sell it to Severin via the Zhents just before the final fight. Because turnabout IS fair play, and that armor is so overpowered as to be just silly.
A simpler method would be to say, "I'm sorry but you are not going to use that at my table. How does your character stat out without it?"
BRJN wrote:
The armor looks overpowered to me but it also sounds fun. *Balance* is overrated I think 
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Slit518, you should check out this thread over at ENWorld.
Artifact wrote:
i have a DM that manages to give at least one player some sort of giant mech in most campaigns he runs. I had a ninja that ended up bonded to a cursed mech with predator-style stealth camo that tapped my blood, dealing Con damage. As a ninja, i didnt really want it in the first place (giant robots are soooo sneaky) but the Con drain mechanic made using it a risk/reward type deal.
You could do something like that if balance it an issue at all for you. Have "super" abilities cost hit dice to power.