Other than their original appearance, the Usurians have only featured in one story, an audio where they are manipulating events from behind the scenes.
Description and Biology
The Usurians are described as fungal life-forms, appearing as an amorphous green mass in their natural form, but able to take on humanoid form – and presumably other shapes, if required. How much meaning we should attach to them being ‘fungal’ is arguable. They, after all, are aliens, and so not related in any way to Earth fungi. It likely means that they are plant-like but (despite the colour) do not photosynthesise, instead subsisting on decaying organic matter or other freely available nutrients.
This, and their ability to change shape, implies that they are essentially homogenous. On the microscopic scale, real-world fungi are typically composed of fine cellular filaments, which may or may not be true of these alien ones. If the filaments can move and rearrange themselves, that would explain their ability to change shape, but this could also be achieved if their cells were amoeboid. Slime moulds are a possible analogy here, being composed of amoeboid cells that can merge to form a protoplasmic mass and take on a limited structure. (Slime moulds, incidentally, are not themselves technically fungi, being more closely related to amoebas and the like, but they’re probably close enough for these purposes).
In reality, organisms of this type are limited in size; they can form flat sheets or weblike networks as large as you wish, but not anything solid, since oxygen wouldn’t diffuse into the central parts. On the other hand, the Usurians are said not to breathe, which would dispose of that problem even if it does raise other questions about how their metabolism works. Surely, however, they would need to feed, if only on organic slurry. Despite their external appearance in humanoid form, we can assume that they lack internal organs, and, for example, their ‘brain’ may be distributed throughout their entire body. They might reproduce by spores, fission, or budding and could be asexual or have two sexes – or more, as some real fungi do. Not that there’s likely to be much difference if they do.
Game Attributes
The Usurians, as depicted, seem essentially incapable of combat – apparently, they were warlike once, but one has to assume that this involved technology of some kind rather than hand-to-hand fighting. In many game systems, therefore, there may be little point providing detailed stats for them; in the unlikely event anyone physically attacks them we can simply assume they’ll lose. But that’s less true in systems that place a greater emphasis on non-combat interactions and it’s interesting to see what they’d come out like anyway.
Usurians are significantly smaller than humans, and even when they form limbs, they would have only a very low strength and their movement seems restricted, suggesting a low agility, too. Manual dexterity is probably decent, though, and most systems merge the two so they might cancel out. They don’t seem especially resilient, with a severe shock reducing them to their natural form of protoplasmic goo. Still, their lack of blood and internal organs may partially compensate for that, especially in systems that make specific allowance for that sort of thing. In many systems, their small size will also reduce the amount of damage they can take, allowing a different attribute to reflect the absence of vital body parts.
The only example we see is a financier, and acquiring wealth seems to be the entire focus of their civilisation. Even if there is a lower class of some sort, the ones we are likely to encounter will surely follow the model established in the show, so that’s what we’ll assume here. They are likely to have a few technical skills since they are evidently capable of space travel, and that requires at least competency in such areas. However, most of their skills will be related to financial and bureaucratic matters – something that many systems understandably brush aside given their lack of relevance to action adventure. We can assume a complete lack of combat skills, beyond the bare minimum that a given system allows. From a human perspective, they seem uncharismatic, although that may differ among their own species.
5E - Usurian
Small plant, neutral evil
Armour Class: 10 (natural)
Hit Points: 11 (2d6+4)
Speed: 10 ft.
STR 6 (-2) | DEX 10 (+0) | CON 14 (+2) |
INT 16 (+3) | WIS 12 (+1) | CHA 8 (-1) |
Saving Throws: Intelligence +5, Charisma +1
Skills: Deception +1, Insight +3, Perception +1
Damage Resistances: Piercing
Senses: Passive Perception 11
Non-Combatant Accountant: Usurians do not have proficiency with any weapons or armour but they do have proficiency on any Intelligence roll related to finance or accountancy.
Challenge: 0 (10 XP)
BRP - Usurian
STR 1D6+3 (6-7) | CON 2D6+6 (13) | SIZ 1D3+6 (8) |
INT 3D6+6 (16-17) | POW 3D6 (10-11) | |
DEX 3D6 (10-11) | CHA 2D6 (7) | |
Hit Points: 10 | Move: 2 | |
Base SR: 5 | Damage Bonus: -1D4 |
Armour: None
Combat Skills: Brawl 25% (1D3-1D4 damage)
Homogenous (if using hit locations): Although the Usurian can take on humanoid form, it has no internal organs or other vital parts. Attacks on specific hit locations are purely cosmetic and have no effect beyond reducing general hit points.
GURPS - Usurian
ST 6 | DX 10 | IQ 12 | HT 12 |
Thrust: 1d-4 | Swing: 1d-3 | ||
Speed: 5.5 | Move: 3 | Size: -1 | |
Savage Worlds - Usurian
Agility: d4 | Smarts: d10 | Spirit: d6 |
Strength: d4 | Vigour: d6 |
Skills: Academics d4, Electronics d4
Edges: Hard to Kill
Pace: 3 Parry: 2 Toughness: 4 Size: -1
STA - Usurian
Control: 8 | Fitness: 10 | Presence: 8 |
Daring: 7 | Insight: 8 | Reason: 10 |
Command: 2 | Security: 0 | Science: 1 |
Conn: 0 | Engineering: 1 | Medicine: 0 |
Stress: 10 | Resistance: 0 |
No comments:
Post a Comment