New Salem Character #8: The Enormity (or Warlock, or Mister Toad)

the Enormity (Jonathan Smalls)

Pyramid Tier: 1    Experience level: 2

Affect/Gimmick: A huge, revulsive, wart covered man bearing the Innsmouth Look, virtually half man/half toad, and practitioner of the dark arts that sap people's wills; but this is all a ruse for the little person who runs the Enormity mech. 

Gang?: Yes, The Familiars, these all wear head-masks that make them look like a cat, bat, toad, raven, snake, or weasel. Plus the 'dwarf' who is sometimes with them (who is Smalls outside the mech, running the mech via remote). 

Status: The Enormity (or as he wanted to be called, the Warlock, and not, as many call him, "Mister Toad") is a relative newcomer, but has taken over prostitution and chickenhawking (abducting runaways that arrive in New Salem into lives of prostitution and addiction) around Covenant Station and the seedy, sordid, kitschy center of the city.  

Powers: 4

1. Size Change - Smaller: Permanent. Scale 3', Height Factor 2, Weight Factor 0.125
2. Robot Body - the Enormity Mech: When he's driving this he's 7' tall at full height, 5' in its usual hunched posture, and 600 lbs in weight. The complexity in running the mech accounts for the 4 points of agility loss. 
1. He has Robot Body defense from the metal mech under the thick foam and rubber skin. It provides Heightened Strength C +10 (see mechanics note here) +10.
2. Illusions A device: This can generate visual and audible illusions, requiring one action to create, movement only to change, and lasting 6 rounds (1.5 minutes) before fading. This has 8 charges. These are holograms and AV gear. 
3. Emotion Control Device: Initially only able to generate Trust through a hypnotic lightshow that is mostly in the IR/UV range (people can see faint red and purple swirls) he has via invention added Fear (via ultrasonics) and Despair (via pheromones). For simplicity he has 15 charges that can be expended for any one effect, targeting 1 person (where the charge is expended only if it works) or an 10" half-radius (charge is expended whenever attempted). Once someone is effected he can hit them with the same emotion again for deeper effect: 
1. Trust goes from a general agreement to a strong friendship to slavish need to please ala mind control.  
2. Despair goes from a -4 on all attacks, defenses, and saves to an emotional numbness that gives an additional -4 on all saves.  Note that this is very often combined with Trust, so a normal person's % chance to escape is down to 1-3%
3. Fear goes from a clumsy need to escape (one half movement, d% save vs. I*3 to not scramble somewhere with no exit), to devitalization-style damage to their Power score (2d10) for the next 3 hits, to a Death Touch attack on the 5th hit. He can kill with fear, given enough time. 

Weight: 60 (600)      Basic Hits: 6 or 12 (per size change effective weight is 300)    Agi Mod: +0

S: 10/20   E: 10        HP: 11 as Smalls, or 22 in Mech. 

A: 15/11    I: 14         Pow: 52 (we are just splitting the difference here)

C: 12                        Move: 35" as Smalls, 41" in Mech

Accuracy: +2 or +0

Damage Mod: +1 or +0

Reactions Mod: +1

Carrying Cap: 300 as Smalls, 2,700 in Mech    HTH: 1d6, or 1d12

Inventions: all of his inventions have gone into his Emotion Control, and he will continue to do so.  

Background/Origin: There may be no small parts, but Jonathan Smalls desire to be an actor was hindered by his dwarfish stature - at least according to him. Also a lack of talent. But that didn't stop him from being bitter, and turning his genius for special effects and engineering into the "Warlock" mech, which is now called the Enormity. He then stumbled onto his hypnotic light pattern device, and the ability to control and manipulate people took him to some very dark places. 

He now uses his devices and the reputation of the Enormity to control (with the Syndicate's permission of course... for now...) the vice activity in the worst part of New Salem, and he is the very worst part of it. His Familiars are generally loyal to him due to money and the opportunities for debauchery he gives them, but they are trained to act like they were under his emotional control once caught. The mech itself will self destruct if he orders it (he has spares build), and he can run it via remote control for short periods to that Smalls is established as a sort of court jester/herald for the Enormity who the PCs might 'rescue'.

Imagine the worst images of 42nd Street and Penn Station from the 1980's - flooded with drugs, crime, prostitution, peep shows, and desperate newcomers stepping off the bus into this to be preyed on by horrible people. The Enormity sits in the middle of that in New Salem and directs it. Revels in it. You may want to tone down the worst of it for your players (drop the implied pedophilia for teenage runaways, for example) but he is the first villain the heroes should actively and constantly want to punch in the head.