DW Monsters: Sontarans

I'm going to kick off this series with the Sontarans. That's partly because they've just been heavily featured in a new episode as I write this, but also because they are one of the races with the greatest potential for stories. They could even be adapted for other SF settings with a few serial numbers filed off. For that matter, they would make decent player characters, but I'm describing them here only as opponents since player rules would involve game balance considerations beyond the scope of these posts.

To begin with, let’s list the available source material, then look at what we know about this particular race.

Appearances

The Sontarans first appear in the Third Doctor story The Time Warrior, with a single Sontaran warrior trapped on Earth in medieval times. They appear as antagonists three more times in the classic series and twice (so far) as major antagonists in the modern one, plus several shorter appearances. And that’s ignoring Strax, who has appeared as an ally in five TV stories, and the appearances of the race in the Sarah Jane Adventures.

Outside of canonical TV episodes, Sontarans have been a popular race in the spin-off media, along with various web “minisodes” and the like. Back in the 1990s, they appeared in three micro-budget straight-to-VHS releases outside of the official Doctor Who license, something possible because of their separate copyright status. They have featured as major elements in well over a dozen of the audios, often as enemies, but sometimes in a more sympathetic light as a militaristic, but not necessarily evil, race. They feature heavily in three original novels, and numerous comics and short stories. Among the novels, Lords of the Storm is particularly notable, as an unusually detailed description of Sontaran society and culture.

Description and Biology

The Sontarans are sexless humanoid aliens, shorter and more muscular than humans. According to The First Sontarans – a planned classic TV story that was never made due to the series going on hiatus that year – the original Sontarans were much more human-like. After they began a war with the Rutan Host, they developed a race of cloned warriors to provide readily available troops, which eventually replaced their creators.

It’s apparent that, over the thousands of years that the Sontarans are known to be active, there are multiple variations in their clone batches, so that they don’t always look identical from story to story. Nonetheless, the fact that they are produced in batches means that systems that describe stats in terms of variable numbers will likely want there to be much less variation between individuals than would be the case with most other races.

Game Attributes

Having been created on a high gravity planet, Sontarans are specifically stated to be stronger than humans. We don’t see them performing many superhuman feats of strength, however, so this is likely at the upper end of the human range, rather than off the regular scale. They are also said to be highly resilient, both to injury and to harsh environmental conditions, which would be reflected in a high constitution - and hit points if the two are not directly linked. They probably don’t have natural armour nor an especially high dexterity. Indeed, if acrobatic agility is separate from the ability used to aim missile weapons, then that may well be lower than the human norm, given their squat builds.

Sontarans are commonly portrayed as less intelligent than humans. This comedic potential is apparent right from The Time Warrior but is more strongly played up in the modern series and in some audio plays such as Heroes of Sontar (which is a pastiche of British sitcom Dad’s Army). However, the full story is unlikely to be this simple. This is because Sontarans are clearly capable of designing and operating an array of high-tech weaponry and faster-than-light spaceships.

The most likely explanation for this (explicitly supported in Lords of the Storm) is that some clone batches are genetically engineered to have higher than usual intelligence for the race – whether they are destined to become senior officers with tactical skill or the low-status engineers required to keep the military technology ticking over. It’s arguably useful for regular soldiers to be a bit dim, since you don’t want them questioning orders, but a functioning military does require someone with smarts.

Nonetheless, in the stats, I’ll be looking at the ‘typical’ members of the race, so low intelligence without absolute stupidity seems desirable. Charisma is similarly likely to be low, which isn’t a handicap if the entire race is like that and doesn’t much care about negotiating with outsiders.

Since the entire Sontaran culture is military, all Sontarans will have the skills of a soldier, doubtless including such things as Survival and First Aid alongside the more obvious combat abilities. Sontaran soldiers also all seem to have the ability to pilot at least the one-man capsules that they use to make planetfall, so that's another skill to add. There’s no indication that they have enhanced senses compared to the human norm.

In D&D, there’s also the question of alignment. Although they’re usually the antagonists, I’d argue that Sontarans aren’t generally portrayed as ‘evil’. Styre in The Sontaran Experiment might be an exception to that, but most Sontarans are just obsessed with military efficiency and a warrior’s sense of honour. Notably, for instance, more of the spin-off stories dwell on that aspect of their culture than on them harming people for the sake of it. To my mind, then, the majority of Sontarans are Lawful Neutral… albeit an aggressive Lawful Neutral.

Special Abilities

Sontarans don’t have any special abilities as such, but they do have a special weakness: the probic vent. In many systems, it’s justifiable to roll this into their overall armour and hit points (or equivalent). Few systems have rules for say, striking a human opponent in the eyes, and it’s much the same thing. For instance, the GM could describe a critical hit as being a strike on the vent if that otherwise makes sense.

But, if specific rules for the probic vent do seem useful, then it’s a small object that can only be targeted from the rear and that takes extra damage when struck and/or requiring some sort of save to avoid unconsciousness. I’ll be taking that latter approach in the stats, rather than leaving the possibility out.

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5E

Medium humanoid, lawful neutral

Armour Class: 17 heavy combat armour (15 without helmet)

Hit Points: 33 (5d8+10)

Speed: 30 ft.

STR 16 (+3)	DEX 10 (+0)	CON 14 (+2)
INT 8 (-1)	WIS 10 (+0)	CHA 8 (-1)

Saving Throws: Strength +6, Constitution +5

Skills: Survival +3

Combat Skills: Melee Attack +6, Missile Attack +3

Senses: Passive Perception 10

Probic Vent: An attack can only be aimed at the probic vent if the attacker is behind the Sontaran. A successful attack against an AC of 20 delivers normal damage and knocks the Sontaran unconscious for 10 minutes. A failed attack has no effect.

Challenge: ½ (100 XP)

 

BRP

STR 1D6+12 (15-16)	CON 1D6+10 (13-14)	SIZ 10 (10)
INT 1D6+6 (9-10)	POW 1D6+7 (10-11)
DEX 1D6+7 (10-11)	CHA 1D6+4 (7-8)
Hit Points: 14	Move: 10
Base SR: 5	Damage Bonus: +1D4

Armour: 10-point combat armour (8 without helmet)

Skills: Command 20%, Pilot Space Vehicle 25%, Strategy 20%

Combat Skills: Brawl 50%, Energy Rifle 60%

Probic Vent: A knockout attack from the rear ignores armour when calculating damage.

 

GURPS

ST 16	DX 10	IQ 8	HT 13
Thrust: 1d+1		Swing: 2d+2
Speed: 5.75		Move: 5

Advantages: Doesn’t Sleep, Fearlessness +1, Fit, Will +2

Disadvantages: Code of Honour (Soldier’s), Dependency (energy feed, common, daily), Wounded (probic vent, does not require dressing)

Skills: Armoury (small arms)-10, Beam Weapon-14, Brawling-12, Electronic Repair-8, First Aid-9, Intimidation-10, Leadership-8, Piloting (small spacecraft)-10, Soldier-11, Survival (any one)-9, Tactics-8

Savage Worlds

Agility: d6	Smarts: d4	Spirit: d8
Strength: d10	Vigour: d8

Skills: Fighting d6, Intimidation d4, Piloting d4, Shooting d8, Survival d4

Edges: Hard to Kill, Soldier, Sleep Reduction (2)

Hindrances: Driven (Minor, Sontar Ha!), Dependency (energy feed), Probic Vent (Tiny, unarmoured area, can only be struck from the rear; a hit renders the Sontaran unconscious)

Pace: 6                  Parry: 5                Toughness: 10 (4)                  Size: 0

Gear: Armour +4

 

STA

Control: 9	Fitness: 11	Presence: 8
Daring: 10	Insight: 7	Reason: 7
Command: 1	Security: 2	Science: 0
Conn: 1	Engineering: 1	Medicine: 0
Stress: 13	Resistance: 2

Traits: Probic Vent (An attacker striking from the rear can make a combat roll with a base Difficulty of 4 to hit the probic vent, and, if successful, delivers an Injury even if they inflict less than 5 points of damage. Resistance from armour does not protect against this damage.)