Miranda Nyx - Mutant

[tzabazeus]

Greetings Clavers. Here for you is my latest character for an upcoming campaign in Feb. Jotted down the initial concept whils replaying tomb raider(*sigh*, yes tomb raider, but its only the appearance i imagine her as).

Anyhow, here is Miranda Nyx

Miranda Nyx

Name:  Miranda Nyx ,  'Mir'

Age: Around 25 terran years

Appearance: Human female with an athletic build, jet black eyes that appear as little more than hugely dilated pupils, and  obsidian hair, with pale skin, considered strangely attractive by most who meet her. Her characterising feature is a set of what appear to be identical scar marks on either side of her neck, which she is reluctant to let strangers see.

Attire: Mir is almost exclusively seen in a black wetsuit of her own design, occasionally worn with a helmet to protect her head from the pressure of deep sea diving. Although she reluctantly wears something more formal when requested by Inquisitrix Brais.

Personality: Mir is described my most of her colleagues as quiet, mostly keeping to herself. Though this is not surprising given her treatment by the authorities as a child in the industrial plants on Noveria III. And her 4 years spent in an abhuman regiment during what became known as the Farlas incident.
In regards to exercise and hobbies she enjoys diving and reading, tales of the imperiums heroes in particular.

Abilities: Along with the set of gills places either side of her neck, Mir has a photographic memory which Inquisitrix Brais has found very useful in her role as savant.
During her years in the guard, she has become competent with firearms, preferring a pistol with its reduced size and weight than a rifle.

Equipment: As a non combat character Mir generally only carries an autopistol and a knife for close quarters combat. She has been known on occasion to carry a primitive harpoon launcher when participating in aquatic operations.

Acquaintances: As part of Inquisitrix Brais' entourage Mir frequently comes into contact with the rest of her warband, including the two kroot members, with whom she gets along better than the human members. She speculates this is down to the respect they give her for being a more evolved human in their eyes.
Outside the warband Mir rarely comes into contact with other human beings unless absolutely necessary, partly due to being a mutant, and partly because she has a compulsion to correct people on even the smallest details.

History: Mir, Born Miranda Nyx, was born on Noveria III. Born to two mutant parents, the slave overseer was baffled by this seemingly normal human child born to two mutant scum.

Mir was sent to work in the factories at three years old, generally doing dangerous and life threatening work cleaning out machinery and fluid storage tanks. It was whilst cleaning out one of these fluid containment tanks that two of the guards locked the top hatch and left her to drown when the water would fill the tank. At 10 years old, Mir was terrified. As the water level rose she was panicking, spending what she thought the last seconds of her life praying to the god-emperor who condemned mutants as sup-par to the rest of humanity.
To her amazement she was able to breathe in the water, and to the shock of the guards climbed out after the water was drained the next day. For another 5 years Mir worked as a slave, in the filthy damp conditions, before she had taken one beating too many. She had heard of mutants trying to escape on foot that got shot on sight. She wanted to escape, but needed a plan.

She was lucky enough to overhear a group of guards talking about the waste water pipes and the supposed damage being done to where it was being pumped straight into the ocean. This was her chance. When she was next rotated to cleaning out the water storage tanks she would make her escape.
Mir swam for several hours through the pitch black tubes before seeing a speck of light in the distance. Upon emergence from the tunnel it took her eyes a little while to adjust to the bright light emitted by the purple sun. She walked for miles before reaching the nearest settlement, the settlement where she was kidnapped by a group of gangers from one of the larger cities from the north. Mir has never spoken of what happened to her at the hands of the gang, one can only speculate the things a teenager would do to survive.

Trapped against her will for the second time in her short life Mir was broken and beaten. She was freed by an arbites raid on the ganger stronghold and left to fend for herself on the streets of the capital city. Just when all hope seemed lost the guard were amassing a new force to combat a xenos threat on the planet Farlas VI.
Upon recruitment Mir was screened and place in an abhuman regiment, and as she expected, they were primarily used as human shields during the campaign. Armed with faulty equipment and the rags on her back Mir was sent to war. The xenos she was up against were mindless beasts, unthinking monsters with razor sharp talons. Mir was part of the 3rd regiment, deployed to a continent on the equator, primarily composed of dense marshland and jungle.

The war lasted for 4 years. Mir had survived, one of the few. It was during the debriefing that Mir caught the attention of Inquisitrix Brais. Brais had been informed from several of the officers the usefulness of having Mir on an operation, particularly when remembering detailed parts of a plan and, most commonly, having her give notes exactly how events passed for a debriefing report.
This was how Mir was sworn into inquisitorial service, becoming a useful savant to Inquisitrix Brais. Accompanying Brais in situations where the xenos members of her warband may attract too much unwanted attention.
Currently Mir has been reading in several libraries, including those of restricted access in a quest for knowlege, this expanded repetoire of information has been extremely useful in tight situations, able to put all of that knowlege into prctice and advise Brais on the most efficient strategy to proceed with, right down to the odds of survival of each member in the plan.

Miranda Nyx
WS   BS   S   T   I   Wp   Sg   Nv   Ld
45   47   50   48   52   50   56   49   53

Equipment: Knife, Autopistol with reload, Harpoon launcher (treat as heavy crossbow from revised armory) with 4 harpoons. Wetsuit (3 points of armour on chest and arms)
Special rules:
Gills: Mir cannot drown in water, and can stay submerged indefinitely (GM discretion)
Eidetic Memory: the character is able to remember information gathered previously in perfect detail, treat the character as being able to re-roll failed Sagicity tests

Niall

[MarcoSkoll]

A pretty original mutant, I think, rather than resorting to regeneration or some arbitrarily high stat to represent super strength/agility.

One thing I would say is that I'm not sure about mutants who don't look like mutants (excepting psykers). It's more X-Men than Grimdark.
In 40k, while a mutant might be able to hide their mutation behind clothes, goggles, etc, those who are lucky enough to be able to stand buck naked in front of you and still have no more than a couple of minor flaws that can be explained away are rare. However, there are canonical examples of such mutants (although their "mutant powers" tend to be relatively minor), so I guess that can slide.

Still, I'll share some of the extended background I've been writing for Jax Lynn. She was seen as something of a half-breed by other mutants. This was technically incorrect (as both her parents were mutants) but it derived from the fact that she was seen as "not a proper mutant" and "too normal".  In the mutant ghettos where she spent her youth, only being differentiated from a normal teenage girl by her tail and blotchy skin colour was minor in comparison.

As someone who was a mutant, but looked mostly like a normal human, I could see Mir having similar problems of being rejected by both sides.

[tzabazeus]

Slightly modified the appearance to be more grimdark in the original post. thanks for the suggetion marco.

On another note, since i have had the night to think about it, her Sg seems rathger low to me considering her photographic memory. Do you guys have any ideas of how to represent this in game? i was thinking a higher Sg value, if so how much higher? or would a rule be better?

Any other comments and criticisms are welcome.

Niall

[MarcoSkoll]

Slightly modified the appearance to be more grimdark in the original post.

One comment with this is that the mucus/scales might be a bit too fishlike and again starts to get back into the realm of comics with characters who are "half fish, half human".

I had originally considered a lizard theme for the aforementioned Jax Lynn. As she's a regenerator and lizards have some of the best "healing" of vertebrates (able to regrow limbs/tails) it would seem to make sense, but then I realised the whole "animal person" dealie was inherently less believable.

While almost any mutation to the stretch of actually "empowered" 40k mutants (rather than the unlucky ones who just get a shrivelled arm and look like their skin is melting off) is stretching the bounds of believability, mutations are random - your genetics don't suddenly decide "You're going to be a fish" and come together in a coordinated way.
As such, a character who has unthemed mutations is actually more plausible than one where they all emulate some creature.

On another note, since i have had the night to think about it, her Sg seems rathger low to me considering her photographic memory.

Ah, I meant to comment, but forgot.

I'm currently writing a character with a near-eidetic memory myself. I may yet just give her a high Sg, but that represents lots of learning and experience. A eidetic memory is an improved recall, it won't help you know things you never knew. So I'm looking to see if there's a rule that seems more representative.

- The Logis Circuit rules Kaled wrote for the Tech-Priests article.
- Allowing her to re-roll failed Sg tests. This will improve her chances of success, but a high test penalty will hit her harder than a higher Sg character.
- Halving any penalties to an Sg test. (I'm not a huge fan of this. I think it feels more representative of the reverse. Someone who's got lots of experience.)
- Increasing her auto success range on Sg tests. (Perhaps as high as 01-20).

I haven't yet decided (I think I prefer the reroll though), but it might give you ideas.

[tzabazeus]

Thanks for the input marco, insightful as always. I'll probably change it back to what it was originally, the pallid skin almost albino in appearance .

Another question if I may, where is the article kaled wrote on the tech priests? A DM article?

Niall

[MarcoSkoll]

I'll probably change it back to what it was originally

Yeah - I think I prefer a mutant who doesn't look that unusual to one who could be described as "Fish Woman". (Partly because I can't see "fish woman" as "attractive to most people who meet her")

Another question if I may, where is the article kaled wrote on the tech priests? A DM article?

Yeah. Unfortunately, DM is down at the moment (exceeded its bandwidth limit apparently).

The Logis Circuit basically allows a character to concentrate before attempting an Sg test in the same way a psyker can focus before a psychic test.

[DapperAnarchist]

I would recommend you read the short novella "The Taint" by Brian Lumley (in the collection of the same name) - may give you some interesting ideas.

[tzabazeus]

Right then, changes made to original post with regard to stat and rule changes (highlighted red) along with changing the backround of her appearance back to what it was originally.

For all of the Clavers ive created a concept on heromachine(thanks for the link to this Kaled) to try and express how i imagine her to look like, because a picture is worth a thousand words as they say.



Comments and criticism welcome as always with regards to new profile changes, and incase anyone is interested the model is being converted from the enforcer body with a new head.

Niall

[InquisitorHeidfeld]

A comic book character...

Inquisitor is not X-Men or whatever else, Mutation in the grim darkness of the 41st Millenium is either the influence of the Warp (which we aren't dealing with here) or congenital mutation, faulty genes...

This mutation is too neat, too Marvel, for 40k. There is a point at which a human fetus could, if things weren't switched, develop with gills but the result would not be tidily concealled behind fish-like flaps (not to mention that a human head is not large enough to provide the space to conceal gills sufficient to run the human body) but would rather look like a pair of glossy, deep red sponges about a foot long and six inches wide stuck to the side of the neck... It's another non-mammal but the Axylotle might be a better model to consider.

When considering (non-chaotic) mutation you need to think more in terms of Deliverence or Total Recall - you aren't crossing the species barrier (let alone the genus barrier) you're breaking the way a human is put together.

Time in the Guard is out - the medical is certainly going to discover gills even if they were hidden...

[Kaled]

Regarding the Heromachine sketch of the character, it should be remembered that it's designed to draw comic book characters...

Also, while mutations in 40k are not like in Marvel comics, neither are they exactly like in the real-world.  Plus, plenty of tampering went on with the human form during the Dark Age of Technology.  And I can think of at least one type of 40k mutant that can develop gills, the Navigators.  In addition, Imperial medical science could have been employed to take a useful mutant and give her a more conventionally human appearance.

I really like the Axolotl idea - maybe have her external gills bound up with her hair in an elaborate hairstyle.  Added to the pale skin and black eyes should could look a little like a leucistic axolotl.

[MarcoSkoll]

Time in the Guard is out - the medical is certainly going to discover gills even if they were hidden...

I don't see why. It's a regiment specifically full of mutants.
They'll know what her mutations are, but unless those are actually something they'd take as Chaos influenced and shoot her for...

Still, for that matter, I'm not even sure they'd bother. Abhuman and mutant regiments are unlikely to receive big investment of medical knowledge - they're twisted half-humans, what do you care about their physical health?

[tzabazeus]

The idea of external gills, such as those of the Axolotl, seems a better idea, and kaled the idea to have them interwoven into her hair style is genius.

Though the other idea i had toyed with was removal of the gills altogether and have underwater respiration occur through the skin  (not inconceivable given the size a chinese giant salamander can grow to).

InquisitorHeidfeld, as Marco has pointed out, she was part of an abhuman regiment and used as little more than moving cover throughout her military career. The screening as, i imagined it, was nothing more complex than signing up along with other mutants from the city, apologies if this isnt what had come across in the original background.

Niall

[InquisitorHeidfeld]

Yes, apologies, I'd missed the abhuman regiment reference.

I would suggest that even the Abhuman regiments are going to receive medicals - not necessarily to ensure their health so much as to ensure the health of the pure humans who may come into contact with them... an outbreak of any form or pathogen amongst the Abhumans is quickly going to become a problem for everyone else.
Watching the slums for outbreaks doesn't of course mean giving those in the slums proper medical attention, but it's just good sense to ensure that you aren't bringing a plague aboard.