[Index]
Numenera Discovery
A disassembler is a strange-looking artificial creature of glass and steel with six spindly metallic arms arranged around its circular midsection. Its upper half is all glaring green lights and mechanical protrusions, some of which might be sensory mechanisms. Its lower half is a broad engine that allows it to hover 3 feet (1 m) off the ground. If it landed, the disassembler would be about 8 feet (2.5 m) tall.
Disassemblers are artificially intelligent automatons that seem to have gone mad at some point. Now they act erratically—sometimes attacking creatures, sometimes ignoring them, sometimes destroying what they come across, sometimes wandering aimlessly.
Motive: Unpredictable
Environment: Disassemblers travel alone or in pairs and can be found anywhere.
Health: 18
Damage Inflicted: Moderate wound (5 points)
Armor: 4
Movement: Short
Combat: A disassembler's arms end in tools that allow it to take apart inorganic matter on a
molecular level, turning solids into liquid and gas. Obviously, this ability makes it an effective combatant against automatons and the like. A disassembler inflicts 10 points of damage against inorganic foes. In addition, a disassembler can destroy a foe's weapons or armor by touch, which is usually its initial strategy against organic opponents that are armored or armed.
The creature's disassembling tools cannot affect organic matter, but this limitation might have been programmed into it—perhaps as a safety mechanism—rather than an inability. A disassembler with this prohibition removed would be a true terror.
Interaction: Disassemblers are intelligent but erratic to the point of insanity. They understand speech and, after listening to a language for a time, can often speak it in a very basic way. It is possible to converse with a disassembler, but the creature is just as likely to attack without provocation, perhaps in the middle of a conversation. Still, a well-spoken, intelligent, and quick-witted character might be able to figure out what a disassembler wants (at the moment) and convince it not to attack or perhaps to do something to aid him.
Use: In old ruins or amid ancient complexes, disassemblers make for excellent encounters with unpredictable outcomes.
Loot: The remains of a destroyed disassembler might hold 1d100 shins, 1d6 + 1 cyphers, an oddity, and perhaps a salvageable artifact.
GM Intrusion: A friendly or ambivalent disassembler suddenly attacks without provocation.