Engine Heart setting

    Ocean Mountaintops

    The upper floors of several skyscrapers in a now flooded metropolis are still supplied with emergency power from rooftop solar collectors and wind trap turbines. A population of automatic cleaning, maintenance, and office service bots, with the occasional law enforcer or messengerbot mixed in, has constructed an island empire.

    On the water level sea life is harvested for iron traces and fuel by grimy servitors. Above complex communities have developed between islander pragmatism and adherence to the old way of filing and cleaning. The rooftops and upper floors are run by the island lords, units that have proven successful in managing their tower mountain, and who constantly scheme over the limited real estate and power supply.

    The higher the tower, the more powerful its tribe. With treacherous seas below and the cableways above strictly controlled, robots have to arrange themselves with their cohabitants or find their own way to another island.

    Corporate hq - tallest building for as far as cameras can see, huge population, mostly busy calculating and filing insurance risk assessments.

    News studio - they not only have a (barely fueled) news helicopter, but also the monopoly on video broadcast, which they exploit with a newsreel funded by messages from sponsors.

    R+D - labs of some bioengineering upstart. The can ferment and distill high grade fuel and oils, maybe there's even a 3D printer...

    Construction site - unfinished tower with 2 cranes and other machinery, but always in need of more fuel for the generators.

    Hospital - Sterile. Ready to receive emergencies. But there are rumors about part stealers on the lower levels

    Rooftop theme restaurant - Ye olde Pirate Cove. Harr, matey.

    The ferry - it floats! But are you willing to pay their price?
    ...

    Postapoc currency is charged and uncharged batteries, fuels and oils, and robot parts.


outlying tower

    In one outlying low tower, almost out of sight from the others, the last human survivors used to make a life before they left for good. They explored the city and boated away what they could use. Wondrous artifacts have been stockpiled here, most incomprehensible. Everything has been heavily modified with rooftop arboretum, docks, windmill generators, an artificial reef full of dangerous creatures, and an AI with robotics bay who will gladly modify any willing robot's programming to remove any directive or misconceptions, let them face their predicament unhindered, at the price of an overriding directive: Protect Life! So no more burning kelp for steam generators.

    But the robots in the mountains are unaware of this. Their databanks show that the area is dangerous for several reasons and to be avoided by any functioning model.


battery tribe

    The battery tribe is a nasty bunch. They inhabit the old steel radio tower. Unprotected from the elements and with only one solar panel and a few portable generators, their casings look haphazard, underlined by the war paint (a rainbow colored fruit?) they apply. Over this they hang bandoleers of raided batteries to display their battle prowess and power reserves. The chiefs lob around arrays of spare car batteries, but are always protected by gangs of AA and 9V carrying soldiers.

    With every full moon they raid other towers. They usually manage to grab a few trinkets at great peril (hardly any of them float), but any organized tower is well protected with patrols and an alarm signal.


    >What would you do about sharks or other ocean life? No sea creatures would really want to eat a robot, so how much of a danger would these things pose, and why?
    They're alive, unpredictable, fast, corrosive, possibly infected with degrading fungi, and generally something to be wary of. Those poor servitors on the low levels are brave units, and they disappear into the depths all the time.
    >If there are still boats, then who is exploring?
    Only very brave robots who can afford the ride, or are so incredibly rich, they can purchase something that floats.
    > What kinds of factions would be present?
    More than I can list. Up to you. Mad Max? Waterworld? Boy and his Dog? whatever.
    >Why wouldn't robots just build submarines to get fuel out of sunken cars?
    Submersible is a powerful feature. Too powerful. It needs a stigma. Divers are strange and possibly dangerous, yet vital for trade. They dwell below, in the flooded levels of doom.
    >Maybe some interesting secrets for the lower levels?
    Event Horizon? Nazi Uboot base? I dunno


    Sharks have bad eyesight, they go by 'smell' and vibration, like from a servo or an exposed actuator. The sea air wreaks havoc on joint couplings. And sharks like to test by taste.



Tower Construction Kit
----------------------
    The tribal culture is shaped by the environment, and the environment is changed by the tribal culture inhabiting it. They should match and support each other, or clash in some plot relevant way.

- Architecture -
    The flooded city has hills, so houses can be flooded to different levels, the ground never comes closer to the surface than 8 meters/yards (2nd-3rd floor) though. The majority of houses that break the surface only have a few dry levels (1-5). The big towers are fewer, but offer a lot of area on all their levels (up to 150). These towers are futuristic. They feature wind engineered facades, skywalk atriums, counterweight stabilization systems, and all kinds of smart building gimmicks.
    Most high buildings used to house offices. But there can also be residential levels of varying luxury, labs, studios, server farms (without power), malls, daycare, fitness clubs, anything city planers imagine 100 floors above ground. Buildings can be linked with bridges, but this should be used sparingly. The isolation of the towers because of unreliable cables and ferries is a major factor.

- Electricity -
    Power is rare, a currency, and always an issue. Buildings need a somewhat stable power supply to permanently house a tribe. There are portable generators, but they are precious, and so is their fuel. So power is an instrument of political pressure and dissenters can get turned away at the outlet in many tribes.
    Buildings can provide electricity through their smart grids, which can limit supply according to local tradition, and which automatically severed the lower levels as soon as they shorted out. Power is created by solar panels, air turbines harnessing wind and termic rise below glass faces, biogas reactors and garbage furnaces fed with sea-life, combustion and fuel cell generators of varying sizes in need of oil, diesel, methane, or hydrogen, and the occasional steam engine burning dried kelp.


- Top -
    There used to be something special here. A helipad, a satcom array, an observatory, tennis courts, a rooftop mansion, or -club, or -restaurant. Only now it is a curiosity at best. What matters instead are the house systems (power, air, window cleaning, sprinkler reservoir, ...) and the cablesways rigged to neighboring towers. There's all kinds: Single wires, high-low doubles, shaky makeshift causeways, carrier-puller systems to hang from, even elaborate gondolas. The sophistication and reliability of each connection indicates two things: Local resourcefulness and relation to the neighboring tribe. Rooftops are more or less fortified and always patrolled. High towers might have the cables instead on a lower maintenance or lobby level with balcony. Additional lines down the tower are possible, if the local economy is so sophisticated.

- Upper levels -
    These are the boss levels, designed to suit the fancy of the local island lord and his chiefs. They vary greatly, but always have good security, and usually an independent power supply. Any kind of treasure and loot will most likely be here as well. Some towers have these levels open to tribe members, many limit access to chiefs and security, and visitors should never wander here without invitation. A nice tribe might just push intruders back. A less nice tribe might not stop pushing until there is a drop to the sea below. And primitive or desperate tribes may take such an infraction as a cue to start dimantling the intruder for their battery and parts.

- Main levels -
This is the beating heart of almost every tower. Where normal robots manage their existence, produce what the tribe can make, charge, and socialize. There are almost always distinct classes. The haves and the have-nots, warriors and civilians, natives and foreigners, walkers and rollers, ... every tribe has its rules.

- Lower levels -
    This is the dirty part. Bots low in standing have to brave the perils of the moody surf and gather biomass. In simpler tribes the servitors just gather whatever got stuck in the tower by the tide and carry it up a floor or two so it can dry on clothes racks or in piles on the ground.
    More advanced towers might have chains or even pulleyed wires so secure the workers, as well as grates and fences fixed in the tidal zone to create a bigger haul of stuck biomass.
    The best organized societies not only have a penal or reward system in place to staff the lower levels, but also complicated dragnets to scrape the sea floor for much greater hauls even between tides, and improvised bucket lines or a conveyor to transport the biomass to drying and processing.

There would probably be barriers and defenses for full moon nights, or nights in general, or just in general, according to local levels of resources and paranoia. This is also where a ferry would stop, if one can be reached and summoned. The tides can do whatever you want, this isn't science. But limit their difference to a record 17m (4 floors) max.
    >Some shorelines experience two almost equal high tides and two low tides each day, called a semi-diurnal tide. Some locations experience only one high and one low tide each day, called a diurnal tide. Some locations experience two uneven tides a day, or sometimes one high and one low each day; this is called a mixed tide.


- Below -
    Depending on where the tower stands, this can be anything from 2 to maybe 30 submerged levels. This is where submersibles hunt for treasure (like batteries, metals, parts) and no fully functioning robot would even want to know what goes on down there. But if rumors can be believed it is a seething biomass of sticky corrosive goo, countless tiny beasts that explore every crevice and ventilation grill with sharp teeth and the ability to reproduce. Infinitely!, and large predatory monsters with shredder jaws and wire cutting tentacles.
    There is another rumor that once there was a mighty tower with a powerful and wise tribe, that completely collapsed one night because of something that happened below.

    But these are just rumors


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    I would like to see some more specifics. While it is nice of you to leave a lot of these things up to the Programmer, I quite honestly would like to just delve into this world with it already being more fleshed-out. There are already lots of great things to go on, but most of these things seem to be broad physical locales. In addition to more detail, like specific buildings (which I would love to help out with if you want some specific locations/functions) I loved how you had a distant AI to reporgram PRs, and how one building was under construction semi-permanently.

    More setting-specific story buildings/encounters/robots (like maybe the Charon of Engine Heart who runs a night ferry) (or a derelict boat/aircraft carrier, maybe with some almost-functional drones?)would be highly appreciated.


    This is Engine Heart, start writing.

    I will keep working on this setting, but I won't finish it for this weekend. My next EH game is months of, and so is, I fear, my motivation to get it done. But by all means, please do pick up the slack. I love when /tg/ gets shit done.

    I want to flesh out more details, but right now I'm just sounding out the concept. As for balancing NPCs and templates I was hoping for Viral's help. I got the crunch down, but balancing isn't my stregth.

    This is meant to be unfinished, so that you have to finish it. I will write a short adventure that introduces a few general issues and some tribes. But the scope of the city is supposed to be much greater than that.
    And we DO need some drawfags!



    Ocean Mountaintops
    Sea of Ruin
    Concrete Coast?
    Pillars above the Deep?
    Ruins of Rust
    Isles of Artificial Intelligence
    Sea of Cyber
    The Seascrapers?
    Clockwork Coast
    Shores of Automata
    Rust

    infections and infestation
    lubrication rules
    low power rules
    exchange rates
    local products
    gardening>fruit>fermentation>distillation>fuel
    local laws
    tribe alignments
    extreme weather
    secret knowledge
    trader ship or airship
    low rise slums
    arena battles
    quest givers
    robot-salvage
    cable tax
    blast furnace
    deactivation cult or virus




    I'd like to keep a lot of it undefined so that a GM can just make up new towers as needed. For that I want to create a scalable scheme by which NPC population can be created on the fly.

    So I'd need maybe 10 standard configurations with a few points left for Intelligence Attributes to customize. Things like office cleaner, maintenance unit, office manager, window cleaner, messenger, security drone, human interaction android, fire control unit, ... Each should have obvious advantages and disadvantages in the towers/ocean environment.

    Then I'd make up a bunch of personality traits that can sum up a first NPC draft in 2-3 words (outgoing, pedantic, distrustful, eager to please,...) and can predestine a model for a certain position in the tribal hierarchies.

    Add tribe flavor, overriding directive, and start rolling dice.

    Of course central NPC and BBEGs are still custom work. These would just be Common Model templates to liven up the backdrop and react to off-the-rail parties (the best ones).