[Sorry for the delay, the last few days really got away from me. I wanted to write more, but figured it'd be better to at least get something out there.] On Tuesday, September 23, 2025 4:55 PM murph via Emerald Flame wrote:
[OOC Nia rolls an 18 vs Task difficulty 5, so maybe Nia spots something structural or other visible indicator on the automaton. She is specialized in perception, so maybe what she learns isn’t mechanical or magical, merely noticeable to a keen eye.]
On Wednesday, September 24, 2025 8:42 AM Mike Bloy via Emerald Flame wrote:
[magibot identification specialized plus effort succeeded! (d20=13 vs. diff. 5-2)] Gegren thinks to himself "Wait, I think I've seen something like this before..."
Both taking a moment to observe and study the magitech automata, Nia and Gegren get a pretty clear picture of the nature of the thing. A combination of enchantments have created an assistant focused on a handful of tasks. It has a basic mind, and is able to make some decisions about its tasks, but it'd be wrong to call it intelligent. It is, obviously, able to communicate verbally as part of the spells that compose it. It could potentially be given new commands, via countermagic and new enchantments, or otherwise reverse magi-engineered, with some time and dedicated study. It seems possible to interact with it verbally, at least within the scope of its tasks, regardless of whether or not it is reenchanted/reprogrammed. Mechanically, the assistant seems to be focused primarily on movement and physical tasks. The spinning panels that make up its quasi-structure can be assembled into new limbs, especially hands or claws for lifting and moving things, though they would not seem to be capable of any fine manipulation, so you assume it would be tasked with more general maintenance of the temple. As it probably doesn't have a huge variety of tasks to complete, especially over so long of a time, you surmise that it is probably capable of some form of suspension or powered off state until something triggers it. The assistant's hovering seems to be a basic levitation, keeping it just a couple feet off of the ground. It would seem to have problems with any major drop-off, such as the chasm you encountered. It does not seem to be designed for any kind of combat --- getting whacked with panels as they spin would probably smart, though --- it doesn't seem big enough to be a major threat and could be held down or destabilized by most people, or magically disrupted. You imagine that if you were to counterspell the magic at its center, the nexus of the spinning shape, it'd probably just fall apart, all the metallic plates clattering to the floor. Those plates, by the way, do seem like they are of specific construction for this magitech assistant, and are quite old, fitting the rest of the temple. It continues to hover, expectantly. On Wednesday, September 24, 2025 8:42 AM Mike Bloy via Emerald Flame wrote:
Is there any sense of direction that would let Gegren figure out where this main entrance would be, if it were not caved in/filled in?
Good question. The former entrance is to the north, on the center of the wall, directly facing the larger unexplored chamber (with the fancy archways/what-once-were-doors). That filled in area is pretty obvious; earth and time collapsed through whatever doors were making that external entrance, leaving a large heaping pile of ground, rock, and et cetera collapsed through the entrance and spilling out onto the foyer floor. None of you recall an obvious spot for this top-side, and you figure you might be around 30' below the surface at this point. -- bss (Brian S. Stephan) | https://bss.zone/ | GPG: 0x80895FCB