How to fight a terracotta soldier? - 1930s GURPS pulp game

[Milodiah]

Hey there Playground,

I decided to swing by because I'm a little bit stumped in preparing a GURPS pulp game which is pretty much turning out as Big Trouble in Little China meets The Sand Pebbles. The endgame of this is that during the Chinese Civil War/Sino-Japanese War, a warlord has teamed up with the stereotypical inscrutable Eastern mystic to magically reanimate the Terracotta Army (which hasn't been discovered by archaeologists yet, but go away this is pulp). What they end up with are nigh-indestructible, unflinching warriors who can casually ignore their chest being hollowed out by 12 gauge slugs.

The main thing I'm wondering here- what are the weaknesses of these things? They're essentially golems, after all, but I've been unable to unearth any sort of animated statue/clay/earth beings in Chinese mythology and folklore. In fact, the trend seems to be ghosts and other intangible creatures, which really doesn't help me. The only thing I'm going off of right now is that historically the terracotta soldiers were constructed limb by limb and then brought into one finished body in the firing process, which I'm saying means the joints are their Massive Damage Weak Spot™. So short of "using some ancient mystical sword specifically enchanted for this eventuality", which will probably end up in there, and "introducing them to the 20th century with a full artillery barrage/bombing run", which would obviously be rather anticlimactic, what would you guys suggest being an option for fighting these things?

[Max_Killjoy]

Hey there Playground,

I decided to swing by because I'm a little bit stumped in preparing a GURPS pulp game which is pretty much turning out as Big Trouble in Little China meets The Sand Pebbles. The endgame of this is that during the Chinese Civil War/Sino-Japanese War, a warlord has teamed up with the stereotypical inscrutable Eastern mystic to magically reanimate the Terracotta Army (which hasn't been discovered by archaeologists yet, but go away this is pulp). What they end up with are nigh-indestructible, unflinching warriors who can casually ignore their chest being hollowed out by 12 gauge slugs.

The main thing I'm wondering here- what are the weaknesses of these things? They're essentially golems, after all, but I've been unable to unearth any sort of animated statue/clay/earth beings in Chinese mythology and folklore. In fact, the trend seems to be ghosts and other intangible creatures, which really doesn't help me. The only thing I'm going off of right now is that historically the terracotta soldiers were constructed limb by limb and then brought into one finished body in the firing process, which I'm saying means the joints are their Massive Damage Weak Spot™. So short of "using some ancient mystical sword specifically enchanted for this eventuality", which will probably end up in there, and "introducing them to the 20th century with a full artillery barrage/bombing run", which would obviously be rather anticlimactic, what would you guys suggest being an option for fighting these things?

Frankly, I think blowing the entire chest cavity apart with a 12-guage probably hits the "physically disassembled" threshold.

Swords, arrows, even pistols, aren't going to slow them down, since they don't bleed, have no organs, and feel no pain. But anything that completely puliverizes part of them should be effective in ruining that part. Ruin the head, and it can't see, but continues searching for a target to attack by feel. Blow the body apart, and the arms keep flailing about trying to grab or stab an enemy. What makes them scary is that you have to sufficient break all the parts of every one of them to totally stop the threat.

[Milodiah]

Right, that's what I was going off of for the brute force approach.

I suppose the question I should be asking, in actuality, is should there be an easier option than "reduce to heap of busted pottery" in terms of stopping them? The main thing is I foresee the party fighting a large number of them in enclosed spaces, and I'd like there to be at least one somewhat-hidden option to make the fight easier on them.

[Max_Killjoy]

Right, that's what I was going off of for the brute force approach.

I suppose the question I should be asking, in actuality, is should there be an easier option than "reduce to heap of busted pottery" in terms of stopping them? The main thing is I foresee the party fighting a large number of them in enclosed spaces, and I'd like there to be at least one somewhat-hidden option to make the fight easier on them.

Brainstorming... if there's a martial artist and/or mystic in the group, maybe there's a sequence of points that can be struck to sever the "dark chi" lines that animate the soldiers. If there's a sharpshooter / gunslinger in the group, maybe they can be instructed how to shoot those precise points in the right order.

[Koo Rehtorb]

Sledgehammers.

[VoxRationis]

Knock 'em off a shelf. Everyone knows that's the best way to destroy Chinese pottery.

[Knaight]

Ceramics tend not to handle being dropped well, and I'm guessing that these aren't particularly bright (although it would hardly be off for them to have the skill sets of the soldiers they represent, in which case they are much scarier). Pit traps, luring them to cliffs and shoving them off, and other ways of arranging a drop onto a reasonably solid surface are likely to work well.

Incidentally, second story or above windows above a paved street fit this category just fine, and 1930s China had no shortage of them.

[Lazymancer]

What they end up with are nigh-indestructible, unflinching warriors who can casually ignore their chest being hollowed out by 12 gauge slugs.

If there is not enough dakka, you need more of it.

The main thing I'm wondering here- what are the weaknesses of these things?

Depends on how they were animated.

If you want to use the same weakness as the original (Jewish) golems had, then the eyes might be weak spot (look up "kaiguang" ritual).

I.e. if terracota warriors were animated via the ritual of painting eyes on them, then using paint thinner to wash off the eyes will deanimate your Chinese golems.

[Lord Torath]

Water-grit mixture delivered via high-pressure hose?

Cannons with bola-shot (two cannonballs connected by a chain)?

[Slipperychicken]

The weaknesses of terracotta soldiers include being made of brittle clay and missing out on two millennia worth of innovations in violence.


Just keep putting bullets in them until they fall apart, and stay out of close quarters. Put something hard between you and any archers they might have. Use a vehicle, possibly an armored one, ideally a tank. Also it's post-WW1 era; many weapons exist which do terrible things to infantry charges. Use a variety of explosives and automatic weapons to render them ineffective by blasting them to pieces.

[Tinkerer]

Usually things where you can destroy their head and they keep trying to flail away are pretty dumb so luring them into a trap would be my first thought. Even something as simple as a locked door may be enough to stop them if the door is more durable than their bodies. The cliff idea above also seems pretty ideal.

Aside from that taking out their legs to reduce their speed so they can be defeated by a brisk walk would be the second idea. Vehicular combat would be another idea, particularly with some sort of ram which targets around kneecap height and enough people to fight off the inevitable hangers on could be both fun and climatic.

[RazorChain]

Now pick up a gun, grab yourself some pottery. Shoot pottery and watch it explode!

Pottery is brittle, just give it weakness against crushing attacks and if a damage does 1xHP damage to Chest/abdomen or 1/2 HP to limb in one attack it gets destroyed or it gets destroyed when it gets to -1XHP.


If playing pulp someone is bound to have picked up Holland and Holland 600 nitro express and will have fun shooting through multiple terracotta soldiers :)

[Bulhakov]

If not properly glazed terracotta will absorb water (potentially a lot of it) making it fall apart more easily.

If it is glazed water-resistant clay, then one thing I know will crack it are rapid temperature changes (flamethrower + water pump combos?, or just one if it's very cold or hot weather).

If you're at early XX century tech, tanks will just plow through these guys. E.g. these fun flail-equipped tanks for clearing minefields:

[MrZJunior]

Are there any industrial rock crushers available? That would be fun.

[Mr Beer]

They should have Homogenous, which makes them nicely resistant to firearms but not cutting attacks. If they have Vulnerability to crushing damage, strong PCs with hammers can break them apart.

You mentioned limbs, so you can add a location Limb Joint (maybe -5 to hit?) where DR does not apply and they have an additional Vulnerability if hit there, making it easy to knock limbs or heads off. Removing the head could be an insta-kill.

Fragile: Unnatural is appropriate and a good way to make them shut down after a certain amount of damage. They should have Unhealing as well.

Depending on the magic system you are using, there should be some way to de-animate them, whether physically removing a power crystal or sacred scroll from their bodies, luring them into a no-mana zone or casting a spell to break the ancient commands they are under. Whether this is a Deus Ex to destroy the entire army or just a way of being able to fight a bunch of these things is up to you.

[Mutazoia]

Watch the 3rd (?) "Mummy" movie, where they have this exact problem. The general problem isn't how to destroy them...it's that there are so damned many of them....

[Lapak]

Another classic with an animated army is ‘mess with / destroy whatever MacGuffin is the ultimate source of their power.’ Did the villain turn normal terra cotta soldiers into an army under his own power or restart an artifact that runs them (and is the point of vulnerability for the whole crowd?)

Let the PCs smash a few the hard way, get driven out of a position or two by an endless wave of them, then give them the tools to figure out what to do once it becomes clear brute force won’t cut it.

[GrayDeath]

Mundane means in rising order of hard to get hands on":

Lots of large Guns
Some Machine Guns with loads of Ammo
Some Gatlings
Artillery (small)
Artillery (large)
Tanks (any)
Mine field Clearing Tanks


Magical, as many have said, it heavily depends on how the were animated.

If you ahve Magic users on Players Side, changing the terrain they are advancing over into quicksand or covering it with lots of oil will at least keep them harmlessish.

[Traab]

Go with fire, claim it dries them out even more, making them break apart under their own movements. Water to make them effectively collapse under their own weight is another option. Hijack a fire hydrant and unleash a torrent on them! Toss molotovs all over the place until its like the reverse of that scene with the liquid nitrogen from T2. Or go for the dismemberment route where they have to blow off limbs one by one to eventually bring it down.

[Ts_]

Falling damage was my first thought as well. Even just falling over might hurt them significantly. Now it depends on how dexterous they are (they are fighters after all) and how comedic the campaign is whether you trip them with banana peels, or marbles, or oil, or bolas.

Second of all, do they jump? Because jumping is kind of like falling except you're more prepared for the landing. Heavy things might not be good at jumping, so they either take damage or simply cannot cross even simple terrain. And if they are heavier than the PCs (one page says 200-600 pounds / statue!), wood boards across a pit/chasm would be easy for the PCs and impossible for large parts of the army.

Third, do they swim? They might be watertight and the large volume of air inside keeps them afloat enough to actively swim (despite weighing more than humans at the same volume ...). But imagine if you then put a little bullet hole into them that usually hardly harms them, but now the water rushes inside and they finally sink. Hard to set up, but one-shot kills in the water would be nice.

Fourth, are they as tough on the inside as on the outside? Glass (and by pulp extension, terracotta) can be created such that it withstands different forces from the inside and the outside, and it's a trade-off. They could be made much tougher on the outside but somehow being poked from the inside or damaged in an unusual place would just make them crumble. Here's a real-life example for glass: https://www.popsci.com/diy/article/2...t-glass#page-2
It wouldn't make sense for proper terracotta vases to be created with such internal stress, but for warriors it might be advantageous to have a really shatter-proof outside.
So how do you shatter them from the inside? Shoot/punch holes in them, then drop smallish explosives inside. Or use powerful guns that overpenetrate and come out on the other side again, which could be considered enough internal damage to break them (suddenly increasing damage from the expected 1 HP per tiny hole not to 2 HP for two tiny holes but to a lot).

I guess freezing water inside would also be fun, but that's getting to the point where you first have to get them to swim across a river, drowning them in the process with single shots, having them walk out again (does-not-breath style), and then freeze them to make them explode (expanding water + internal stress) ... Not sure how you would actually freeze lots of water in the 1930s short of leading the army into an iceberg museum, but that approach deserves bonus points if someone actually manages to pull it off. ;)

Best regards
Ts

[Mutazoia]

You could use the Clay Golem from Gurps Magic (pg 59) or use this version that someone made up.

[Kami2awa]

There is always the Pratchett approach of

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heat it up to red-hot in a fire then pour a lot of cold water on it.