RANDOM ENCOUNTER: Tasty mutagen comes with side effects...

Here's a random table and some GM notes to help fashion a nice little complication for your next gamma adventure. The PCs stumble upon a canister of mutagen tablets. The tablets themselves appear like large, chewable multivitamins (and should be introduced as such) and smell like delicious, sugary confections.

Once ingested, the tablet goes to work mutating its prey...

1d20 of icky random mutations:

1. Eye tendrils, flailing all the time
2. Back scales (2"-3"), itchy and molting
3. Constant, loud wheezing from your new, tiny "throat mouth"
4. Sideburns, running down neck, shoulders, ending at wrists (hopefully)
5. A slippery ooze between extremities that won't go away, even with washing
6. Extra teeth! Pop out of jaw line, hairline, and along knuckles of hands and feet
7. Shoulders begin to bubble and swell into large sacks of leaky, too-sweet smelling fluid
8. "Everything is normal!" say the tiny faces that appear where your kneecaps used to be
9. Iguanna tail sprouts, greens up nicely, turns brown and dies and falls off...on an endless cycle
10. Roll twice on this table, if you get #20 both times, you lucked out--no mutation!
11. Knees now bend the other direction, walk like a chicken (add +2 to your move if you roleplay a headbob for the rest of the session)
12. The person on your left gets to pick any two from this list for you
13. Heel hooves! Which are hooves. On your heels.
14. Fancy colored fish fins line your cranium and spine; also, constant dry mouth for some reason
15. Polydactyly protrusions overcome hands, constantly wiggling
16. Gurgling a pungent slime when attempting to make persuasive arguments
17. Narwhal tusk! You know that's a tooth that protrudes through your face, right? 
18. An ankylosaurus tail bursts out the back of your pants---pray you have the abs, back, and calf muscles to counter the added mass
19. Pheromone firestorm gives you a massive +5 Charisma bonus, any NPCs you encounter follow you around for 1d10 rounds
20. All of the above (you poor bastard!)

Optional GM imposed fun!
Apply as desired...

• PCs with one mutation from the above list suffer -2 on any rolls involving NPC interactions (interviewing, negotiating, bluffing) but gain +2 to intimidate
• PCs with two or more mutations will be considered "monstrous" and hunted on sight by any armed NPCs
• Bounty is equal to Hit Points times 10 credits
• If PC rolled any of the following mutations: 2,3,5,7, 9, 16, 19, it's nearly impossible to cover her/his tracks as she/he flees (pursuers gain +2 to track you)
• If PC evades capture for longer than 1d10 rounds, the bounty on his/her head triples
• If PC evades capture the entire game session, the PC becomes a local legend and the bounty now equals HP times 100 credits
• If PC becomes a local legend, a squad of killer androids (8) with cyborg hounds (4) is unleashed to hunt he/she down; androids are equipped with infravision, +1 laser-eye sights (to hit bonus) and a 2d4+1 sub-machine gun; hounds have olfactory and audio sensors (+2 tracking) and armed with 1d8 robo-bite and 1d6+1 cyber-claw
• If adventuring party finds a science or medical lab, a cure can be reverse-engineered from mutated PC's blood; at least one member of the party must have relatable skill (science, medicine, genetics, etc.), or find an NPC who can concoct antidote in 1d10 rounds -1 round for each level of experience in that skill; cure takes effect immediately
• If more than one PC consumed mutagen tablet, the cure works for all affected and they return to their "normal" selves

Enjoy!

A previous version of this table was posted on Exonauts.

Build PCs Quickly with Interactive GW Character Sheet

Wizards of the Coast has a neat little tool for quickly making player characters in 4E by way of an interactive character sheet. You can work up your PC from scratch or--in the spirit of the totally random nature of the game--you can instantly create one at the click of a button. The nice part is, if you want to make up your own, it will auto-calculate scores for you so it's a handy time saver. From Wizards:

• Any die icon can be clicked to generate a random result for its particular field. You may also click the Quick Character die in the upper right to randomly populate all fields.
• Check the box in a particular field to lock the results. For example, you may wish to lock one of the origins and continue to roll randomly for the second.
• Some fields can be manually modified. For example, click in the name field to type in a specific name, or use the drop-down menu in the origin fields to choose specific origins (just be sure that Form Elements is checked in the far right column).
• In the far right column, check Base Set, Famine in Far-Go, or both depending on what material you wish to include for your character.
• In the far right column, Calculations shows you the formulae behind your character’s statistics. You may opt to turn this on or off, depending on what you wish to keep visible.

I'm less likely to use a pre-made character, but it definitely shaves off time during chargen--especially when 4E has such high mortality rates!

Try it out!

They also provide an FAQ.

Randomize with the Junkulator!

Oh man, this thing is awesome! You'd think that a guy like me who's loves random tables would have heard about the JUNKULATOR from CriticalHits.com. IT'S FULL OF WIN!

Basically, it's a web script generator that will spit out random junk finds for a post-apocalyptic/Gamma World setting. You can set it for 1d4+1 pieces or just a single piece of junk. There's also options for item condition and PICTURES!!

Here's a few snapshots of stuff I "found". Click to embiggen:


Aw, man, the things you can do with an "intact rototiller"!!

It's a riot, give the Junkulatator a whirl!