Characters In Game: Beetle
All Characters: Beetle
The following were notes made while this was in development. They do not necessarily represent the final state of the thing.
A late experiment of Amagog's, which eventually led to Sarah. The Transformator is a crude, short-term shapechanging device. The holder needs only point it at a person, think of another being (any person or animal), and press the button. It will transform them for up to half an hour, if the shot was point-blank and well-centered. The further away, or if it wasn't as perfectly on, or if it is applied to multiple people at once, the effect will last significantly less time -- perhaps ten minutes for two people, three minutes for three, and so on.
Beetle is holding the Transformator at the beginning of the game. He has puzzled out its uses empirically, and is using it to appear as Hugo; he knows that he needs to re-apply the effect every half-hour. He is not particularly aware of the limitations of the device, though -- he's only used it on himself, and since he is pointing it at himself, he has only used it at point-blank range.
The person who it is used upon can still think as normal. However, note that if, eg, Krosp were to transform someone into a cat, he could command them.
The device has no effect upon Sarah if she chooses not to.
Darker: Nice - very nice, given that it's the sort of thing that can malfunction anytime it's desirable from a make-things-interesting standpoint. (And I think having the real Dr. Beetle around for at least part of the game would be a great catalyst for roleplaying and possibly action.) How far are you planning on going in printing out extra namebadges for Sarah, this thing, etc? Justin: current plan is a full set. It will be kept by the GMs, and used for both runs, so my expectation is to create three complete sets of badges -- one for each run, and one for Sarah. Darker: Suggestion: in each set, include a few (min 1 male, 1 female) "anonymous" namebadges: illustrations of background characters; names which don't map to anything. Unless a shapeshifting ability is limited to mimicing only those who are in the immediate vicinity (which is an entertaining notion, admittedly), there's every reason for characters to choose to look like 'just some guy'. Justin: Good idea; help me remember to do this.
Questions:
Prop: The Transformator will probably be represented by my best raygun -- besides being cool-looking, it's loud, which will be inconvenient for Beetle.