This entire article is full of spoilers for my GenCon 2018 game – sort of.

If you’ve looked at the original article, it should be apparent (felgercarb, and “Lorne”) that Battlestar Galactica is going to show up in one way or another. And you can’t have Battlestar Galactica without Cylons. Making Cylons in DnD starts with a few base decisions.

• No organic material. It’s not a person in a metal suit.
• No magic. The Cylons are created beings.
• No free thought. Cylons can react to situations, but cannot choose to disobey orders.
• Blasters. There will be blasters.

There is an “example” in the Monster Manual, animated armor, but it requires some modification to become a Cylon.

Some of the conditional immunities need to be changed, and the weapons upgraded (blaster added to the slam).

The idea is a “pack” of robots. In the series they were often seen in crews of three. It would make sense that they would seek out each other and then attack as a group.

After using the animated armor as a base, a couple of other animated/constructed monsters can be used. Helmed Horror, is a good example of a boss, and a golem has potential as a final boss monster.

But why alter things when there are already robots pre-made for DnD? On one of the Don’t Split the Podcast shows, I heard a designer talk about a Sci-Fi version of 5e using the open gaming license. It’s called Esper Genesis and the designer is Rich Lescouflair.

Not surprisingly Esper Genesis had a couple varieties of robots (constructs) that I could use with very few limitations. Next up is to check out vehicles and see how they do spaceships – need some Vipers and Cylon Raiders.

I have not played Esper Genesis, so cannot speak to the game or the writing. However, it reads like DnD, and the setting is very cool. If you’re not sure about purchasing it (I got mine through Drive Through RPG), there is a free version of the base rules. Check it out.