The clang of steel against stone rang throughout the mine shaft, providing the barbarian an easy path to follow. His grip tightened around the haft of his axe and he glanced towards the foreman who lay crumpled on the floor, struggling to breathe as the bard and ranger looked over his wounds. Once ensured that he would survive, they joined him and the sorcerer and the quartet forged deeper into the mine tunnels. As they rounded a corner, they found the source of the noise. Standing at the end of a tunnel, with its back turned to them was an immense figure covered in dented, metal armor. Whistling pipes and vents were built into one side of while extending from its other was a powerful limb, thick as a man’s leg and ending in a fist that looked like the head of a mace. It slammed the fist into the wall in front of it again and again, sending up debris and stone shrapnel with each blow. Each impact caused cylinders jutting from the back of its forearm to push farther up until it drove a punch into the wall and the cylinders slammed down, releasing a secondary explosion that sent a shower of stone spraying behind it. The sorcerer squeaked in shock and the burly construct froze – before slowly turning to face them. A single crimson eye glowed in its chest, seeming to focus on them, as the cylinders on its limb slowly rotated and slid back into place with a foreboding click.
Art by SethMonster
This is a concept that was originally rattling around in my brother’s head that he trusted me to bring to life – or as much life as a clockwork construct has. The lore of this creature is as advanced mining equipment that has been abused by unscrupulous mine owners and slowly founds its way into the hands bank robbers, bandits, and criminal gangs. They are reinforced like many clockwork, equipped with resistances specifically intended so that it can be retrieved from cave-ins. Its clunky and cumbersome leading to only a moderate armor class. The idea is that the demolisher uses its piledriver to break up rocks and shatter stone, which leads to the inclusion of razing and forceful, allowing it to hammer away at whatever is in its way. But it needs to do so without damaging the materials and minerals it’s digging out and it therefore utilizes a high attack bonus with low damage – which is actually why it uses the level it does. It needed to start at a d4 damage die that goes up to a d12. All for its Building Force increasing its damage with each blow, eventually causing it to start punching at extreme damage with a high attack bonus.
Most of its abilities from there are based around its increasing damage die. It starts with Focused Jabs to make two Strikes, both at the same multiple attack penalty. This helps it crank up its damage quickly and more importantly, hopefully efficiently. This sets it up for Ringing Blow, which I did partially name because I wanted to include some boxing concepts in the creature. It rings people’s bells just like they ring the bell in a boxing match, causing creatures to become stunned unless they succeed at Fortitude save. Flourish makes sure that the demolisher can’t go around stunning almost the entire party though savvy users may finish a round with Ringing Blow using a d8 damage die so that they can use it again at the start of their next turn. After the final increase, the demolisher is ready to unleash its Explosive Force. This gives the demolisher an area effect that is using limited use damage since this ability sets the demolisher back down to a d4 damage die, meaning it has to build back up again before it can use it. Between this and Ringing Blow, I do like having varied saving throws that it can force from the players.
The demolisher does have some abilities to help round it out. Gather Momentum is meant to help it against enemies trying to kite it but there are still weak points to it for the heroes to take advantage of such as twenty feet of the movement having to be in a straight line to increase the damage die by two steps. Reconfigure Limb gives it a third action ability while also allowing it adapt to whatever it encounters. I wanted to use a variety of traits it could add to its weapon of similar value and I’m pretty happy with it – while I think deadly may be the most valuable of these traits, I think they all have value depending on the circumstances it finds itself in.
Pathfinder 2e:
Clockwork creatures stand out a bit more in Pathfinder 1e than 2e, having more innate abilities to them but beyond that, it is a pretty faithful translation. As a mindless construct, there isn’t even feats to help set it apart as Improved Initiative and Lightning Reflexes are feats innate to clockwork creatures. So I don’t have much else to add to it.
Pathfinder 1e:
Blue's D&D 5e:
ENCOUNTER HOOKS
Decentralizing the Bank: The heroes are at a bank or other location with a vault when it is hit by a gang of bank robbers who are accompanied by a clockwork demolisher. The robbers try to control the crowd while the demolisher is set to cracking the vault. With the robbers unaware of the heroes’ presence, they have the chance to turn the tables – but if they aren’t quick enough, the robbers will command the demolisher to defend them. If the heroes can defeat the criminals before they can command the demolisher, it remains at the vault until somebody interferes with it, only then turning on the interloper.
What’s Mine is Mine: There’s been labor disputes at a local mine that the heroes have been drawn into, whether due to being friends with some of the involved miners or having a need for some of the resources from the mine. When they arrive, they find injured workers and fights happening. Managing to talk to the people reveals that one of the clockwork demolishers within the mine has started malfunctioning. It is lashing out at everybody within reach and claims that it has been sicced on complaining workers have resulted in generalized violence. To resolve anything at the mine, the heroes must dive into the caverns and put a stop to the rampaging robot.
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