TRPG Thread

Anyone know how A Time of War is? I'd like to use it as a springboard to introduce battletech, and thus mecha to my group.

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My friend wrote and runs a mecha TRPG but he can't advertise to save his life. Like, the last time he came on /tg/ to look for players it ended up in people threatening to sue him somehow. System itself is pretty good at least, one of the better giant robot RPGs I've seen (admittedly NOT a high bar to clear), but the online-group bullshit invariably makes me sad.

>>15205954
You can't advertise either. Maybe post a link or give us some idea of what the game's about or where we can find more information if we're interested.

>>15205969
Aha, my transparent attempt to play it cool has been revealed. Alright fuck it, there's a link to the wiki page. MEGA link to the rules is on there too.
Short version, d10 turn-based strategy thing trying to emulate 80's real robot shows (your GUNDAMUS, your Pat's Labors, and so on). Players have SRW-style seishins and can buy feats and noncombat skills and things like that.

http://www.big-metto.net/RP_Wiki/index.php?title=Armored_Dragoon_Gunstrider

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>>15205870
I love the way the artwork looks for that game, but I hear the system itself is kind of shitty?

>>15205954
ACE-bre?

It was because of the patreon shit, he was trying to collect money off of work that was more or less a frankenstein of others' art and rules. Anons were actually pointing out rules ripped from Heavy Gear.

One of the best mecha systems I've ever played isn't even (technically) a mecha RPG.

Mini Six is a simplified form of the WEG d6 System most famously used in the old Star Wars RPG. It actually works amazingly well for mecha games as it has simple vehicle and space ship statblocks, vehicle/space combat rules, and easy scaling rules, and it all just plain WORKS. And while the Mini Six basis is super simple (the actual character creation, gameplay, combat, and vehicle rules are a total of like 8 pages) it's no problem at all at to expand on using rules from Star Wars or the OpenD6 line like d6 Space.

I've used it for a number of games and am in the planning stages of another one as well.

>>15205954
Your friend is a piece of shit man

>>15206055
I don't think he's talking about that faggot, given the rules he linked to aren't that game.

But more to it than the Patreon thing, that was just the icing on the cake. The guy was a shitlord who didn't know how to take criticism and lost his mind when people on /tg/ didn't find the friggen alpha test of his game to be perfect. His response to any comments or criticism were always just shit like "you're not reading the rules right!" or "go make your own game!" laced with more colorful language.

He was a piece of shit who brought all the flak he got on himself.

Now lets stop talking about him and let him and his shitty game die in obscurity.

>>15206055
Yeah I don't know why he did that. He stopped doing that. Except for the part about Heavy Gear, I never learned that game so I can't say either way what he did.

>>15206077
So I just looked at the doc in the link and it is ACE.

So nevermind, >>15205954 and his friend can fuck right off.

Sounds like we have some entitled fucks up in here.

>>15206107
>entitled
I don't think that word means what you think it means.

all are entitled. none are loyal.

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Most mecha TRPGs seem to got a bit too complex for me. I mean, maybe the appeal for some people is to know all the different mechanical systems and how they work, but it's hard to get a whole group to care about the same thing if it's not some established IP they all already know + enjoy.

>>15206109
>>15206150
Self-Entitled

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>>15206107

>>15206151
>Most mecha TRPGs seem to got a bit too complex for me.

Try >>15206067

PDF: https://img.fireden.net/tg/image/1452/92/1452929431285.pdf

>>15206200
Thanks, I'll give it a look.

So not exactly /m/ but how do you guys deal with your friends being flakes when you're trying to get a game started?

Any advice?

>>15206233
I had this happen to me recently and I just had to cut one of my players since he was flaking too much. It hurts because now we're down to two players and me GMing, but I just couldn't go another week of delays.

Sometimes it's shit and you're way more into a game than your players are and you either need to find new players or a new game.

>>15206233
Like them not showing up for sessions or them fucking around when the game should be starting?

>>15206248
I'm down to one player at this point and it sucks since I've recently tried to get a new game going but it's basically lead nowhere because of it

>>15206279
A bit of both on top of him being annoying during character creation. It's never fun to have to hound down a player to finish his character

>>15206704
It honestly sounds like this guy isn't actually interested in playing.

Remember the old /tg/ saying: "Not gaming at all actually is better than shitty gaming."

>>15206704
Yeah. Unfortunately some people just like the idea of certain things associated with "nerd" culture more than the actual things.

>>15206151
>>15206200
Chris Perrin's Mecha RPG has pretty simple rules too. 75% of the rulebook is just various settings and their descriptions, and nothing stops you from making your own one.

>>15206759
That's why I had to toss the guy I did. If he has other things taking his time during when we game (homework, whatever) then it's okay to turn me down when I ask who is interested in playing. The other two guys were being flaky too in terms of deciding how they were going to approach the plot, but at least they made characters tout suite

How many rpgs primarily featuring small-med sized mecha, like Appleseed where theyre mostly small scall but with large scale mecha existing.

>>15213093
Quite a few. Obviously there's the VOTOMS RPG, and Heavy Gear, Mekton has support for different scales of mecha (what you're looking for is what they call "roadstriker" scale), and a number of others have scaling rules that easily allow you to do settings with smaller scale mecha.

>>15213119
Hmm... the original Roadstriker iirc was made to also be a module for Cyberpunk 2020, does the most recent Roadstriker do that too?

>>15213259
*Roadstriker II
My bad

>>15213259
Zeta's "roadstriker scale" isn't a separate book, it's bundled in with the scaling rules in the core book and Z+, and IIRC, Z+ also has conversion guidelines for converting to CP2020.

>>15213093

Here's a list of every (English-language) mecha RPG I could find.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zFc57wN7noNauUzpeNB5Wr1vxSNMwG83eTCmeQVMP4g/edit

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A new tabletop thread just in time for the latest update from my ongoing campaign.

Our heroes were last seen fighting the asshole son of an arms dealer piloting an incredibly powerful robot with many lasers, missiles, flamethrowers and a prototype force field. He surrendered after his shield failed and Ark Gear, the party's super robot/demolition vehicle tore his mech's head off with a very large angle grinder in a fashion similar to Garmraid.

With the coup d'etat stopped and the government promising to sell the renewable super fuel it had been keeping secret on the open market, our heroes decided to settle a few loose ends.

First up, Zack - the cocky corporate prick - thought he'd make amends by saying he'd got away with it all by just resigning. He nearly got thrown out of a plane for that.

Next up Sarah Wong, the engineer who had tried to "protect" the party from the coup by sabotaging their mechs so they would be out of the fight, got the book thrown at her by Fiona for doing something extremely dangerous (fucking with a mech's engines). She cried a lot. The rest of the party forgave her, our resident Basara figure slept with her.

Finally, the rest of the army decided to stop us causing trouble by reassigning us to space, on one of the planet's two whole military starships. Our mission? Meet an Earth Federation fleet eager to purchase the first contract for the super fuel and escort them home.

The ship was not quite Soyokaze bad, but was no Yamato either. Its crew were space truckers, who wore vests and baseball caps and listened to dad rock but respected how dangerous space was. Fiona was in heaven.

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>>15213853

It was short lived. Reports came in that the Earth delegation had suffered mechanical failure on their lead ship and taken shelter in an abandoned shipyard in the upper atmosphere of a gas giant to perform repairs. The party moved to their last reported location...

A high tech cloaked warship from one of the other colonies had got there first, proceeded to cripple the party's ship in a couple of salvoes and deployed mechs to clean up the survivors. Fiona and Juyon, the "idiot kid with grandpa's robot" she is grudgingly being a mom to, tried to fight the mystery force's commander - a masked woman in a cape - but could barely touch her strange red mech. When all looked lost, though, a passing alien patrol vessel from a friendly race drove the unknown attackers off and recovered the survivors of the wreck...

Who is this crazy bitch wearing a dumb mask?

Was Zack's redemption arc really as shit as "I'm rich so I got away with it?"

Why is Camelot Colony attacking everyone?

And do alien battlecruisers crewed by space Oni have a tape of Queen's Greatest Hits?

You will see the tears of time...

>>15213868
Also although the GM is adamant the female, sword-wielding, ice maiden leader of an Arthurian themed mech team from a colony called Camelot is not a Saber reference we are not buying it

>>15206233
Murder works.

>>15205954
So you actually looking for players, there?
'bout to read the rules

>>15206077
I should've read more of the people talking before going "what? new mech game?".

This is ACE.
Damnit.

No wonder guy said "people threatened to sue", that's what happens with the whole stolen art deal.

>>15205994
I've been reading this, it's like a mix of Dark Heresy and Mekton which seems very complicated and crunchy. The lifepath stuff is Talsorian as hell.

>>15214009
>>15214017
Don't give ACE attention. Let him die in obscurity. That's all he deserves.

Well, hopefully translation on Gundam Senki is getting started since an anon put the book up last thread.

>>15218711
Here was an incomplete translation of Gundam Senki I found on the Internet. Shame the guy who was translating this stopped. Maybe someone else could pick it up.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B3GuThKv1m7BcTJaUHBQQTlYS0U/view

>>15213119
Speaking of Heavy Gear, if the system is too crunchy, someone made a d6 version of Heavy Gear: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5K6m56dGFijSkNpdHBoek5yeE0/edit

>>15205870
I briefly ran a d20 Modern game with d20 Future's rules for mecha. The idea was that in the future peopme discovered a way to get "free" energy by pulling energy out of another dimension, and weird natives of that dimension had started to notice and were arriving to go on rampages in urban and industrial centers. Players were a rapid response team, generally in mecha small enough to get insidw urban environments, though one player kept trying to get a giant tank, so I let him have trouble keeping up with the party and be the long-distance artillery. It never lasted long enough to have much of a story.

>>15218763
>I briefly ran a d20 Modern game with d20 Future's rules for mecha
I'm sorry you went through that.

Those are easily the worst mecha rules I've ever seen for an RPG.

>>15218711
>>15218746
>>15218754
>>15218763
>>15218902

I have a virtually complete translation, if someone would like to take stewardship of it. And help keep this contribution anonymous.

>>15219198
What's preventing you from just dropping it here and letting people save it?

>>15219362
Pretty sure only /tg/ lets you upload PDFs

>>15219198
You want full anonymity, you could save the translation as a PDF, and as long as it's under something like 8MB you can upload it directly to /tg/. Just make it a thread. There's a TON of people over there who'd appreciate it.

>>15219395

That's a good idea, I'll get on that. Thanks for the idea.

>>15219511
Don't forget to link us to the thread!

>>15218902
What's a good system for relatively down-to-earth mecha? Not a hundred feet tall, not in space, and not indestructible

>>15220024
>Not a hundred feet tall, not in space, and not indestructible
Depending on if by "not in space" you mean "mecha aren't used as space fighters" as opposed to "not on another planet," you just described Heavy Gear.

>>15220049
Yep, give Heavy Gear a shot then.

>>15220024
Remnants might be a good choice

Hmm, I wonder if FFG's Star Wars system would work for mechs...

>>15222701
Star Wars RPGs and mecha work together really well for several reasons. SW games tend to have vehicle combat that takes walkers into account, has robust cinematic space combat systems featuring a range of ship scales from fighters to capital ships, they try to be relatively simple to appeal to a broader audience, and big battles featuring a huge variety of toys are a must so they tend to have decent scaling rules.

I'm actually toying with the idea myself of using FFG SW since I'm such a big proponent of the D6 System for mecha. It's a little slow going since I'm now in the stage or trying to really internalize the ins and outs of the mechanics, and so far the biggest obstacle is that starship combat is notoriously deadly. There's apparently a well known issue with the system that ships are glass cannons, they have VERY low survivability with one hit kill death cannons, so trying to come up with a baseline for statistics isn't going to be easy. And otherwise vehicle stats are all over the board, and the system is pretty infamous for it's inconsistent vehicle and equipment rules. Which for turning it into a mecha game are pretty much the only rules that matter.

Otherwise it shouldn't be too difficult making professions and whatnot more "generic," and a lot of the Force shenanigans could translate pretty easily to Newtype-esque shenanigans. The Light Side/Dark Side point system that affects the overall game session even still fits as it's mostly a narrative tool and easily works with the tone of many mecha media, it's all just refluffing.

>>15222803
Yep, messed with the FFG system myself and anything that isn't a multi-crewed ship gets torn up really fast. Also, big spaceship combat can get weird as fuck.

There were a couple of house-rules for starfighter combat, and those could be useful. There were also some for human to vehicle scaling. Here's /swg/'s stuff for the FFG system. House rules are under "Unofficial Supplements"

https://www.mediafire.com/folder/h351f05cfxs8y//FFG%20Star%20Wars%20RPG

I do agree with the professions: they are pretty generic already aside from the Jedi stuff, especially if you're dealing from say, Age of Rebellion.

Well, hopefully you can make something out of it. I know my group's the most experienced with FFG's system, so it'd be really nice.

>>15205870
From all /m/ TRPG I played and I remember most fondly are Battletech and Jovian Chronicles. Mostly for thier setting not crunch.

Formes is very western type of Mecha with deep lore and how Battlemech are depicted.

Later for it Gundam like setting of space opera in Solar system with Cold War between Earth and Jupiter goverments that it is on the brink of turning into Hot one and other factions just trying to either survive it or profit from it. Also mecha have really cool design.

>>15222878
>Formes is very western type of Mecha
Newsflash: Battletech is anime as fuck and in denial about it. The mecha and the way they're depicted is STRAIGHT out of anime like Macross and Dougram, and the "deep lore" is Dougram meets Star Trek.

>>15219511
Wonder how this is going

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>>15205909
I've only heard a podcast with people playing it.
I'm currently reading through this oldie.

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>>15222701
>>15222803
>>15222851
So I've been looking at Age of Rebellion as the basis for an FFG SW-based mecha game. EotE and AoR are, as far as I know, the same game just with different focuses for character roles, and since AoR has a more military slant I figured that'd be the best one to look at for the baseline.

One of the things that would set mecha combat apart from normal vehicle/starship combat is, obviously, the humanoid form of mecha. SW has walkers which have the special rule of ignoring most terrain difficulties, but SW walkers aren't at all like, say, Mobile Suits.

I think one of the easiest mecha-specific rules to implement would be allowing humanoid mecha to perform certain maneuvers normally only characters can do, taking into account the massive size of the mecha.

You'd probably also need to add the Engaged range band for mecha melee combat, again it'd be easy to implement as you could just use "Drive/Fly" to go from Close to Engaged, and use the character combat rules for Engaged.

Shields get trickier, especially since they're pretty much the ONLY source other than evasive maneuvers to keep from actually getting hit. If the mecha have energy shields you can easily just use the normal shield rules, physical shields would still work the same (just protecting only the front arc), but get a little trickier mostly in how they'd be affected by crits and special hits. Perhaps you can even just make it easy and say instead of power failures of fluctuations reducing or taking out shields, physical damage reduces the effectiveness or destroys the physical shield. Just refluffing the existing rule and taking into account a physical shield has to be repaired/replaced and isn't just coming back online.

Probably the most work would have to go into critical hit results and vehicle components. Mecha tend not to have shit like hyperdrives and support droids, but do have arms and legs, so that seems like it should be taken into account in some way.

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>>15228843
The fragility of anything under silhouette 5 becomes something of an issue. I'd say just increase the toughness of everything across the board anyway. It's a well known problem with the system, and either way if characters are going to be spending most of their time fighting in giant robots they're going to need to survive multiple, extended combats.

Autofire might also become an issue. Is there some kind of errata for that? It's seems.... massively overpowered.

On the character side of things the majority of it really comes down to refluffing.
Duty/Obligation/Whatever tables would be campaign specific, you could use the SW ones as a baseline model easy enough and just modify for the campaign.

>>15228843
>>15228868
Silhouette is also starting to be a bother. It's a non-linear scale and almost completely arbitrary, with vehicles of wildly different sizes and masses sharing the same silhouette scores. You could easily argue the RX-78, for example, fits perfectly as both 3 and sil 4 just using other vehicles/starships in comparison.

>>15228868
>>15231290
Yep, I would think mecha would act very much the same as player characters, so I would agree on that.

Engaged band is needed, yes.

I'm guessing for shields, they should act as items that can increase Soak, but can restrict use on some weapons. Every critical hit can reduce the amount of Soak it provides until it's gone. A Triumph or two should just take out the shield.

Just need to make some effects when a vehicle component is hit. So far, the components I can think are arms, legs, boosters, weapon, & sensors. Maybe electronics for system strain shenanigans.

>>15228868
For the fact that anything Silhouette 5 dies easily, there are two thoughts I've seen on changing the system.

One is increasing the hull and system threshold and making shields an opposed check as seen here:

http://www.mediafire.com/view/y9w713etmckbs98/Shipfag.JPG#

The other one is making a sort of "shield HP pool" that wears down per hit and doesn't get back up until shields are back up somehow (for energy shields) or replaced (maybe for physical shields?)

It also provides some incentive to level up in that the Defensive Driving talent, normally giving setback to someone who's trying to hit you, becomes a boost to your shield HP ( how much depends on the silhouette of your vehicle times how many ranks you have of said talent) that charges back on your next action. If the points are all used, extra damage starts wearing down the shield.

Example: A shield has 6 points due to being on a Silhouette 3 mech. Bob here has two ranks of Defensive Driving. That would mean he has an extra 12 HP. Someone hits him for 14 damage. All that extra damage would be used, and 2 damage would wear down the physical shield. That would mean that the shield would take 4 more damage to be destroyed. But if Bob managed to not get hit by the start of his next action, he'd have those 12 points back to take another hit.

>>15231650
A lot of those starship fixes revolve almost wholly around how shields work, unfortunately for a mecha-focused system shields are kind of a moot point unless they've got something like an I-Field or GN Field or whatever, so most of those fixes are pretty useless.
Also depends on how you want to handle hand-held physical shields which, while pretty common, shouldn't be the fix. Especially if you're going the "held shields are extra Armor that can be critted away" rout.

Armor, HT, and SS are where the problem lies, and simply upping those is a quick and dirty fix for the issue. The one that proposes boosts to hull and SS probably has the best idea for our purposes.

>>15228868
No errata for Autofire, unfortunately. The real counter is that in Star Wars, autofiring weapons tend to be bulky and easy to spot, so you can always ban them on certain missions. There's also having them roll challenge die and if they mess up hard, have autofire hit allies.

And there's giving autofire to enemies...

One solution is more for bosses and PCs, but the GM kit for Age of Rebellion had a squad/squadron system where you can use Leadership to pull a couple of mooks into a squad or squadron. Gave boots for actions, but the real kicker was that if the leader would take a hit, a squad member would take it for them, so they become ablative armor.

A house rule I saw for autofire basically states that if you wanna paste one person with autofire, you have to spend 1 additional advantages to activate a hit (so the initial 2 for one hit, 3 for two hits, 4 for three hits, etc.)

Still makes clearing groups easy, as you can spread the damage around, but it doesn't paste a single guy easily.

>>15231708
I'd go combine the two, personally, because you're right, it's more of the basic hit points that creates most of the problems. But I actually do like the whole talent gives you extra to survive, since it does provide an incentive to actually get the talents and does provide a way to determine how good someone could be.

As for Silhouette, I agree on it being wonky and hard to judge where something should be.

>>15231650
>>15231708
While not totally fixing the fragility issue, a good but more complex way to handle a mecha's hand held shield might be to give it its own Armor and HT, and pilots can opt to have attack hit the shield instead of the mecha (maybe with a skill roll? You might start getting too roll-heavy though).
That way you can have a variety of shields from simple slabs of metal that will quickly get blown apart to advanced alloy anti-everything shields that will take a beating before even needing repairs.

>>15231721
Star Wars also uses blasters and stuff more than mecha shows do, and ammo is effectively unlimited. I wonder if autofire would actually be such a problem when most weapons would have limited ammo and you houserule autofire as using up X amount of ammo per hit.

>But I actually do like the whole talent gives you extra to survive, since it does provide an incentive to actually get the talents and does provide a way to determine how good someone could be.
Totally agree.

>>15231728
I'd probably pull it as either you can decide to take full damage for a successful block or be a little bit like Mekton Zeta and roll an opposed check:

Success is basically defending correctly and reducing damage for every 1 point of success you take. Failure is just automatic damage to you. Advantages, disadvantages, triumphs, and despairs still work, but not quite sure how they would work myself.

Sounds like something that can be a good addon.

>>15231758
There's actual slugthrowers in the system, and they do have limited ammo. Autofire just works the same, but would have a hard-limit.

The added house rule is nice to have, though.

I want to do "Spies and Saboteurs" : OYW edition.
I have no idea how to proceed.
So far, I had in mind that one player is an engineer, one a professor or a buddhist, one part of the Feddie propaganda and maybe a soldier. I'd restrict the use of MS only for the big finale. The whole thing entirely WW2-themed, of course.
The plot itself would be pushed by the actions and decisions of the characters to the actions of other PCs.
I once tried asking /tg/ but nobody replied. Any ideas how I should proceed or if anyone tried something similar and could give me some cues?

>>15231784
Also, this link has an example of how starfighter combat normally works in Star Wars FFG:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1g1o0L-Yp0Zb5zqs5_r8UHguQ4TU1OP1hcoCPh7SyEHs/pub

>>15231728
The more I think about this the more I think the easiest and probably best way to handle mecha hand-held shields is like the Riot Shield in the Far Horizons book: A "melee weapon" that has the Defensive and Deflection traits.
I think this also handles every question on how to handle hand held physical shields differently from energy shields, they're basically just a weapon system.

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So here's some random disjointed notes I have so far on FFG SW mecha:

Walker movement: Because mecha have legs, when operating on the ground they follow the Walker rule of ignoring light terrain penalties and difficult terrain penalties from hazards less than half the height of the mecha.

Mecha are typically multi-role, able to operate in multiple environments (typically ground and space), thus mecha will usually have multiple Speed stats, one for each environment they’re capable of operating in.

Because of their humanoid forms, mecha are able to use certain maneuvers vehicles normally couldn’t:
Guarded Stance
Interact with the Environment (logically taking into account the size of the mecha, of course)
Manage Gear (Again, taking size into account)
Drop Prone or Stand from Prone

Engaged range:
Mecha are capable of melee combat, so mecha combat adds the Engaged range band to vehicle/starship combat. A mecha (or other vehicle) can use a Drive/Fly maneuver to move from Close to Engaged, or from Engaged to Close (disengaging). This works like normal character combat, including modifiers and effects for using ranged weapons while Engaged or being attacked from ranged.

Arms:
Unless otherwise specified a mecha has two arms. In their stat block under “additional rules” there is a rating for “Arms: #.” This rating their effective “Brawn” stat for deciding things such as melee damage, lifting, ect. One rank in Arms translates to ten points of Brawn for characters. (Average Arms rating, 2?)
Melee and unarmed combat: A mecha’s Arms rating is their base melee damage, being giant humanoid robots, they can also fight “unarmed” using the Arms rating like their Brawn. They can also pick up objects and use them as improvised weapons the same way characters can (the improvised weapon damage chart being relative to the mecha’s size).

(cont)

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>>15233130

Handheld weaponry: Mecha can pick up and hold gigantic weapons and wield them just like a character wielding a sword or rifle. Handheld weapons can be picked up, stowed, or dropped as normal, and be reloaded on the fly. Open hardpoints, tech facilities, and engineers are not required to swap out hand held weapons, just the weapons themselves. Handheld weapons aren’t directly affected by vehicle critical hits (though Arms CAN be affected, which may impact the ability to use a handheld weapon even if the weapon itself isn’t damaged), but can be affected by Sunder or be damaged or disarmed by spending Advantage/Triumph/Threat/Despair/whatever.
Mecha can also use Two Weapon Combat with two handheld weapons without the need for the Linked quality.
Since a mecha can move like a human, able to point their arms different directions, turn their torsos, and reach around their bodies, handheld weapons typically have Fire Arc: All to represent this mobility.

Shields:
If a mecha has some kind of energy shield, it works like normal vehicle shields. Most mecha however have a physical metal shield they use to defend themselves. This Shield is a handheld “weapon” (typically with +0 damage if used to bash) with the Defense and/or Deflection qualities, and work like a normal weapon with these qualities and NOT like vehicle shields.

I'm in the process of either scraping together a Muv-Luv specific tabletop or running some mecha musume wankery in GURPS using the splats from one of the recent Pyramid magazines. The latter is more appealing because, in the likely event that nobody shows up, I won't have wasted hours constructing a system that is never going to be used.

Also, while I don't want to bring up ACE again. I do feel the need to say that the problem with ACE is the same problem that Mekton and GGG/Battle Century G both share: Trying to make a system universal to all types of mecha rather than having a dedicated system is what make most systems seem either mechanically clunky to the point of being non-playable, or so light and bland that you could use the mechanics to represent just about anything.

>>15233396
I would actually argue that Mekton and BCG's main problems are that they pretend to be universal to all kinds of mecha but are actually only good for specific styles. It's not that they try to do everything and fail, it's that they can only do so many things and lie about being able to do everything else too.

>>15233130
>>15233141
So far, that sounds pretty good.

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>>15235824
Thanks. Thus far I'm thinking it's just better to try to keep things in line with existing rules, so in the end most mecha stuff comes down to "scaling up" a lot of things characters can do, which thanks to the system's narrative slant is SUPER simple.

Right now my issues as with Silhouette scores and talents. As for silhouette, I think pic related should pretty much be the model. An AT-AT is sil 4, and both these models are 1/144 scale apparently, so that MS should be sil 4.

When it comes to talents I'm mainly wondering if certain non-vehicle talents could be applied to mecha combat because of the humanoid form. Maybe not by default but you could have something like a Neural Link upgrade that allows it?

Either way, mecha in FFG's SW system is super simple, the challenge is probably in balancing stats.

>>15235893
Well, AT-ATs are about 22.5 meters, while AT-STs are around 9 meters, so that could help things.

Maybe.

>>15235913
Logically that's how it should work, but there's not a lot of logic in the silhouette scores beyond what qualifies as being 4 or less or 5 or more.

>>15236467
Yep. Well, I had it in my head where Sil 3 were the late-UC mobile suits while Sil 4 was the early to mid-UC mobile suits, for one.

>>15231786
First thing I'd suggest is being straightforward with your players from the get-go that they won't be in MSs for the majority of the game.
Nothing more aggravating than signing up for a mecha game only to find out that you'll only actually get to use mecha once in a blue moon. (I'm looking at you, every Battletech game I've ever tried to join)

Otherwise I'd actually look at WWII games for inspiration, particularly stuff that has players playing French Resistance or the like.

Otherwise if everything is player driven there's really not anything to say about how you should proceed because it's going to be the players, in game, that are going to be deciding that. You can't plan that in advance.

>>15236741
I think this makes the most sense, given the small amount of logic that CAN be found in the completely fucking arbitrarily assigned silhouette stat.

Why does it take into account dimensions and mass sometimes but not other times? Why does it sometimes take into account agility and nimbleness of a craft WHEN THERE ARE OTHER FUCKING STATS FOR THAT, and then TURN AROUND AND SAY THAT DOESN'T MATTER IN OTHER INSTANCES? It's so fucking stupid, looking at the books will give you nothing but a headache if you try to find ANY consistency in what silhouette represents. You've just got to go with a gut feeling of "do you want it to use fighter maneuvers or not," then just fudge it from there.

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>>15235893
>>15236467
>>15236741
>>15236966
Pic related, another 1/144 scale silhouette 4 vehicle compared to a 1/144 scale Gundam.

>>15236946
Also every fucking Star Wars game I've ever joined, to add to your complaint anon. Not only mechs have gone promised and unfulfilled. Starfighters never fucking happen.

>>15236966
This is a common issue with anything FFG. Their equipment and vehicle rules range from "their offices must burn" to "but not before they watch their families die before themselves"

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>>15237121
>>15236741
>Sil 3 were the late-UC mobile suits while Sil 4 was the early to mid-UC mobile suits

All these models are the same scale (1/144).
That AT-ST? Sil 3.
That tiny little speeder bike is sil 2.

One thing we can be sure of is that silhouette is a non-linear scale. Otherwise? There is no fucking logic here.

>>15236966
>>15237135
Pretty much. Thinking about it, the silhouette system feels less of an actual size comparison and more of a class comparision.

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Finally got the first session rolling last night. The players were tasked with protecting a factory on Mars where the workers were staging a coup from the Earth Military. The Earth frames were all heavily armored, which presented a lot of trouble for the players, but with some smart tactics and a lot of help from the artillery unit they brought (The blue B) they managed to beat the attackers off to the point where they forced a retreat.

The battle ended up being a lot rougher than I expected, as armor turned out to be way more effective than I had anticipated. The real heroes of the fight ended up being the two MTs (Forklifts retrofitted with guns) who drew a lot of fire and managed to stay alive though the whole fight. Other highlights were the idealistic kid begging his opponents to give up and trying to minimize losses while the hardened mercenary-nee-terrorist brutalized a disabled suit in an attempt to scare the remaining attackers into fleeing.

>>15239509
What system did you settle on?

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>>15240430
I'm using PDQ with MF0's rules bolted on for mech combat. MF0's systems are replaced with +2 or +4 qualities and ranges are simplified as same hex = hand to hand, 1 hex away = direct fire & more than 1 hex away = artillery. PDQ difficulty ranks are used both as distance for moving more than 1 hex a turn and for getting a sensor lock (with the first hex being free if you have the relevant system)

It sounds complex, but it turned out to be really elegant, giving a good mecha feel to the combat without compromising PDQ's design aesthetic too much. The whole fight took about two hours talking over discord while I was altering the map every turn. (thank god for layers) It would've definitely gone faster if we had used an actual map and tokens, and if all the enemies didn't have an armor system. Next mission I think they'll fight something that's a little more fragile.

>>15240491
I'm familiar with Mobile Frame Zero, but what's PDQ?

>>15240604
http://www.atomicsockmonkey.com/freebies.asp
PDQ used to stand for "Pretty Damn Quick" but now it has a much more pretentious name. It's a really simple system where everything is 2d6 + a quality, which is usually rated around -2, 0, +2, +4, or +6 and difficulties are either opposing rolled, or based on a scale going from 5 (super easy), 7, 9, 11, to 13(difficult).
Specifically we use the rules from Truth & Justice, the superhero expansion which includes a bit more crunchier rules and give players a bit of narrative control with Hero Points they can spend.

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Mecha for FFG Star Wars here.

Here's some test stats slapped together based on some wiki info and eyeballing various stats in the FFG SW rulebooks:

RGM-79 GM
Sil: 4, Speed: 2 ground/4 space, Handling: +0, Def: 0/-/-/0, Armor: 6, HTT: 40, SST: 22
Vehicle Type/Model: Mass Production General-Purpose Mobile Suit/RGM-79
Manufacturer: Earth Federation Forces
Sensor Range: Short
Crew: One Pilot
Encumbrance Capacity: 4
Passenger Capacity: 0
Price/Rarity: Buh...
Customization Hard Points: 3
Weapons:
Fixed:
60mm Vulcan Gun (Fire Arc Forward; Damage: 2; Crit: 5; Range: Close; Auto-Fire, Linked 1)

Hand Held (Maximum of 2 weapons can be equipped at any time, weapons can be swapped):
THI BSjG01 Beam Saber (Fire Arc All; Damage 10; Crit: 1; Range: Engaged; Breach 1, Sunder, Vicious 2)
BR-M-79C-1 Beam Spray Gun (Fire Arc All; Damage: 5; Crit: 3; Range: Close; Breach 1, Linked 3 [this represents the "shotgun" effect])
FADEGEL RGM-M-Sh-003 Shield (Fire Arc All; Damage: 2+0; Crit: 6; Range: Engaged; Defensive 2, Deflection 2)

Additional Rules:
Humanoid Form: See >>15233130 >>15233141
Arms 2: "Brawn" rating for sake of melee and unarmed attacks is 2.

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>>15242707
MS-06F Zaku II
Sil: 4, Speed: 2 ground/3 space, Handling: +0, Def: 0/-/-/0, Armor: 5, HTT: 40, SST: 25
Vehicle Type/Model: Mass Production General-Purpose Mobile Suit/MS-06F
Manufacturer: Zeonic Company
Sensor Range: Close
Crew: One Pilot
Encumbrance Capacity: 4
Passenger Capacity: 0
Price/Rarity: I dunno.
Customization Hard Points: 3
Weapons:
Fixed:
Shoulder Shield (Fire Arc Front; Damage: 2+0; Crit: 6; Range: Engaged; Defensive 1, Deflection 1)

Hand Held (Maximum of 2 weapons can be equipped at any time, weapons can be swapped):
ZMP-50D 120mm Machine Gun (Fire Arc All; Damage: 5; Crit: 4; Range: Close; Auto-Fire)
Heat Hawk Type5 (Fire Arc All; Damage: 3+3; Crit: 2; Breach 1, Sunder, Vicious 3)
MIP-B6 Cracker Grenade (Fire Arc All; Damage: 6; Crit: 3; Range: Close; Blast 4, Breach 2, Limited Ammo 4, Slow-Firing 1)

Additional Rules:
Humanoid Form: See >>15233130 >>15233141
Arms 3: "Brawn" rating for sake of melee and unarmed attacks is 3.

Quick errata
>>15242707
I'm not sure if you can combine auto-fire and linked since they effectively do the same thing minus hitting multiple targets with linked. If that's the case, remove linked on the vulcans and keep auto-fire.

>>15242748
Obviously, the Heat Hawk's range is "Engaged"

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>>15242707
>>15242748
Also to note, the HT and SS thresholds look crazy high because I'm basing their stats off the assumption of using pic related houserules. If you want "baseline" stats just reduce HTT and SST by 60% and 47% respectively.

>>15242707
>>15242748

Interesting. I'll probably make some runs, probably with pilots with 3 Agility, 3 Piloting, and 3 Gunnery each.

>>15242707
>>15242748

What does "Sil" stand for, again?

>>15245103
Silhouette

>>15245144
>Silhouette

Ah yes. Basically a measure of relative size, if I understand correctly?

>>15245155
More or less, yes.

It's a non-linear scale that doesn't really have much function unless the size difference is significant between combatants, and if it's 4 or less you can use fighter maneuvers but if it's 5 or more you're considered a capital ship.

I settled on 4 because mobile suits are roughly similar in size to most things classified as 4.

>>15245439
Yeah, I'm definitely starting to think Silhouette is less size and more classification, like how Sil 1 is basically humanoid, Sil 2 tends to be anything not humanoid, etc.

>>15245439
Really?

>>15246601
What?

I'm trying to build a Mekton campaign, and I'm scratching my head at one element at Mekton - map size and ranges.

So, from what I gather, 1 hex is 50 meters, and suits can have weapons that shoot ridiculous amounts of hexes (one I've built goes as far as 80), and even wimpy sensors can see as far as 4km.

My question is, how the hell big are the maps expected to be? It seems like they'd have to be absurdly large to accommodate this scale. Roll20 can't even handle a 100-hex map, how am I supposed to have maps of these sizes?

I'm tempted to just scale the size down so that maps are typically no bigger than 75 hexes, but it seems like a bitch to balance sensor ranges then.

>>15249776
Okay so I was totally wrong about Roll20, it can handle pretty big maps, I brainfarted. Still not sure if this is right though, this map seems too big to manage reasonably. Maybe I'm just nuts.

>>15249776
>>15249803
Ever seen how far real life cannons and missiles can shoot? We're talking "close" ranges measured in kilometers.

>>15249776
>suits can have weapons that shoot ridiculous amounts of hexes (one I've built goes as far as 80)

I'm assuming this is the Long range of the weapon? (Like, the square of the Range.)

Most ranged combat engagements take place within the normal Range of the weapons (rather than the Long/squared Range), since -4 to hit is a reasonably hefty penalty.

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>>15220024
if you dont mind in space then I strongly recommend the Jovian Chronicles setting, as its like Gundam but actually does more to ground the setting.

By the way has anyone tried the Jovian Wars beta yet?

>>15250510
>if you dont mind in space

>>15220024
>not in space

>>15250318
Yeah, it's the long range.

I figured most action would happen in combat range, but does that mean I should make most of the maps small, or should they be big and players have to work to close the gap?

>>15250510
>if you dont mind in space then I strongly recommend the Jovian Chronicles setting
I don't know why people talk up JC so much. It's not a very good setting. Silhouette, the system it uses, is pretty good, better than Mekton if you ask me, but JC as a setting is pretty limp. Despite all its detail, it doesn't seem to have any conflict going on aside from the cold war between the Confederation and CEGA, with the friction between the two martian nations as a kind of subsidiary to that. Aside from that, everyone in the setting seems to enjoy a pretty decent standard of living, they're tolerant of other cultures and ways of life, religion isn't much of a factor and so neither is the conflicts that go along with that. Even on earth, which is supposed to be a complete hellhole, if you read its two sourcebooks, is actually fairly livable overall.
I actually think Gundam might be a better setting RPG wise, since it leaves enough things vague that you can invent your own conflicts.

>>15250952
>Yeah, it's the long range.

Ah so.

>I figured most action would happen in combat range,

Indeed!

>but does that mean I should make most of the maps small, or should they be big and players have to work to close the gap?

It's up to you, whatever you prefer. (shrug)

>>15251830
>I don't know why people talk up JC so much. It's not a very good setting.

Yes!!! Thank you!! This x1000!

>Silhouette, the system it uses, is pretty good, better than Mekton if you ask me

Ehhhhhh... They both have their strengths and weaknesses I'd say. Neither one outshines the other by a wide margin, I think.

>but JC as a setting is pretty limp.

Fucking true as hell. It's pretty damn unimaginative, really. Totally standard Sol-system-has-been-colonized fare.

>I actually think Gundam might be a better setting RPG wise, since it leaves enough things vague that you can invent your own conflicts.

Damn right. JC was conceived as "UC Gundam with the serial numbers filed off" but that is not giving Gundam much credit. UC Gundam is actually interesting, really compelling stuff; JC's setting is profoundly bland.

>>15249776
Generally I think that if you're going to worry about ranges on weapons, as in the party is far enough away from the enemy where it matters is that you won't be using hexes for that part of combat. Just say "Oh, the enemies are 3000 meters away" or whatever until they get in range for close combat where you're going to need hexes, then bust out the map.

>>15251830
>>15252029
Eh, I mostly agree but not entirely.
JC when it was first conceived in the green books was pretty good because the details were just vague enough to let DMs create their own image of life in the solar system and was set up as a powder keg ready to explode.

Then Dream Pod 9 got hold of it and their autistic attention to detail, USUALLY a strength of theirs, was their first step on the path to completely killing it. They built on the setting so much they actually ended up writing OUT most of the potential for non-military adventures in the setting.
Did you know there used to be space pirates and shit in JC? And multiple terrorist organizations in pretty much every solar nation dissatisfied with the solar governments (not just STRIKE)? And speaking of, STRIKE was supposed to be a major threat? Because DP9 fucking forgot all this shit with time.

And then DP9 decided that the JC setting would ostensibly be a war game. And that was the final nail in the fucking coffin. Why? Because DP9 decided that the setting would always be perpetually in that powder keg state, no matter WHAT happened.

THEY DECIDED IT WOULD BE A FUCKING BRILLIANT IDEA TO HAVE A WAR GAME SETTING WHERE THERE WAS NO FUCKING WAR.

The Odyssey and Europa incident from the green books were meant to be the match that lights the powder keg. The setting was supposed to go hot from then on and it was intended for GMs to play out the impending solar system wide war any way they wanted. But DP9 was NOT going have that. No, no. Instead all the solar nations would be neutered and pacifistic to the point they could fucking nuke every fucking colony they have, or at least in the case of Mars suffer TWO VIRTUAL COLONY DROPS and instead of fanning the flames or sparking angry nationalism in any given nation, like what would realistically happen in a world where people and governments are ITCHING for a fight, everyone would get all somber and any fighting would just immediately stop.

>>15253358
And this would be the standard to the setting. No matter what happened, no matter how many people died, no matter what the incident, no matter how many blatant massacres and war crimes perpetrated by any solar nation, any conflict would last maybe a battle or two before the nations involved would SCRAMBLE to negotiate peace as fast as possible.

This is a setting for what is now a war game, remember. A war game. A game about war.

And now they're trying to revive it with a new fleet scale game? The setting that already fucking died once because they won't let it have an actual war at all is going to be brought back in game centered around FLEET BATTLES. Maybe they learned their lesson and JC is finally going to go hot? Doubt it. I don't think DP9 is that competent.

JC is great as an RPG if you roll back to the green book setting with maybe some of the material from the 1e white books to flesh things out, it being UC Gundam with the serial numbers filed off WAS one of the strengths because you used to be able to use it as UC Gundam fan fiction wish fulfillment sandbox.
It only went to shit later because DP9 made completely incomprehensible decisions with the setting.

>>15249776

>>15252049
This right here.

You shouldn't be using hex maps for the initial stages of a fight where sides are still closing in on each other. That's just going to get very boring very quickly as it drags every fight out and is just a massive waste of time.

Crack out the maps only when they're ready to actually begin shooting. If you want that initial positioning and maneuvering to matter, instead of making everyone move towards each other start combats with a "deployment phase" to represent that initial closing in and positioning, maybe mark off deployment zones based on relative direction from one-another and have the opposing squad leaders make opposed command or tactics skill rolls to decide the order of deployment (have the loser deploy FIRST so the winner can deploy in response to the enemy's positioning).

>>15253397
I would imagine they're doing so. Also, there pirates in the white books though I've no idea what the hell happened in second edition. A lot of people rag on it for being too peaceful but there was actually still stuff like terrorist cells and pirates floating around. Don't get me wrong its not a perfect setting by no means but its got plenty of good stuff in it and takes very little work to actually kick off a solar war.

>>15253420
Good points and interesting ideas, thanks!

The guy with the ongoing Battle Century G campaign reports here, with the newest episode.

Last week's session was light on actual plot but involved some supremely good action and a massive twist.

With the Naul, a species of space oni druids with organic warships, helping them, the pilots of Delta Squadron hatched a plan to defeat their unknown assailant.

It transpired the ship was a top-of-the-line warship from Camelot, a colony the Naul had uplifted, which had gone rogue following a trip into a mysterious supposedly cursed area of space. With a 2:1 ship advantage now a plan was hatched - while the Odysseus, the human cruiser, and the Naul warship engaged the rogue ship at long range Delta team would attack it directly with a boarding action in their mechs. With some reservation, the Naul engineers admitted they had a single "fuel rod torpedo" (the setting's N2/Reaction weaponry) on their ship that could possibly be used. To the disappointment of the whole team it could not be fired from a shoulder-mounted launcher.

It worked surprisingly well, mostly due to Ax's decision to load up with a surprising amount of guns to shoot a number of holes in the enemy ship while Fiona used a home-made plasma-edged "Anti-Ship Sword" to cut things like weapon turrets off.

The enemy ace intercepted them, in her obscenely fast mech, and kicked Specter, the team's well meaning Chuck Keith analogue, to the ground in the mistaken belief he was the most dangerous person around. This was, in fact, exactly the moment Fiona had been waiting for. (cont.)

>>15258102
With a warcry something like FLAME SWORD, DECISIVE OVERHEAD STRIKE she leapt high into the air above the ship's surface and drove the forty-metre long broadsword straight down towards the enemy pilot. They dodged the sword (which subsequently overloaded and blew up) but failed to dodge the mech behind it, and the three units ended up falling into the massive hull breach the exploding sword had caused, at which point Fiona and the enemy ace managed to impale each others' reactors simultaneously - one with a sword, one with a pile bunker. Both pilots ejected, but the Camelot ace had a head-start and took Specter hostage. What followed was an intense boarding action, all of Delta Squadron's mechs destroyed by the Camelot mech squadrons, but the ship itself crippled and swiftly captured by Naul boarding parties.

The Camelot ship's master-of-arms was stabbed by Ax with the remains of the guitar he used to control his mech, the enemy ace - who remained nameless - was restrained and captured, and all seemed well.

Until it was revealed what the fuck had happened in the cursed space zone. The Camelot ship had apparently begun hearing voices and seeing visions, which had convinced them that aliens had been influencing their commanders. This was clearly bullshit, as Delta Team knew.

Except they were then told by the Naul fleet command that the research station that had sent them an "SOS" which had drawn them into the Camelot ambush had been destroyed years ago, and the freighter convoy they were trying to find which had "not checked in" had, in fact, been on the other side of the sector being met by a ship carrying the IFF of the Odysseus, and a unit of mechs carrying Delta Team authorisation...

At this point the party android very calmly and forcefully decided to put the pilots in quarantine...

>>15255122
>I would imagine they're doing so.
I hope so, otherwise they're going to fall flat on their faces, again.

>Also, there pirates in the white books though I've no idea what the hell happened in second edition.
They just stop getting mentioned after a while. They basically start as 90% of the reason SolaPol and the JAF even do patrols, with the greater majority of JAF pilots only ever seeing combat against pirates, to a total non-issue and an occasional nusance the JAF sends trainees to go fight, to just completely vanishing from the books.

>A lot of people rag on it for being too peaceful but there was actually still stuff like terrorist cells and pirates floating around.
And it eventually gets to the point that all these pirates and terrorists do is "exist." If even that. They get shoved so far into the background they might as well not even exist for all they matter to the setting. Even STRIKE's whole plot line of basically becoming Neo-Zeon falls to the wayside.

>Don't get me wrong its not a perfect setting by no means but its got plenty of good stuff in it and takes very little work to actually kick off a solar war.
Reread the post you're replying to.
It SHOULD take very little work to actually kick off a solar war, because the setting is stuck in a perpetual Cold War so volatile anything could set it off. But DP9 decided it has to remain in THAT state forever so any time something that should set it off happens, everyone just shouts "TRUCE!" and the fighting immediately stops and they all go home and carry on with business as normal. And it happens SO FUCKING MUCH that without even realizing it they've doused the powder keg so badly it's growing mildew. DP9's JC is so incompetently written, plot wise, that even hardcore fans back in the day got sick of nothing ever amounting to anything.
"Oh they're finally setting up for the war!"
"Oh never mind everyone just went home, again, and the whole incident amounted to nothing... again..."
Ad nauseam.

>>15258605
And while I'm ranting again.

I'm sure given time DP9 would have phased out the mecha as well. Just look at how much effort and detail DP9 put into the starships of the setting, to this day it's STILL praised for its realistic designs. They even printed multiple books for each faction and the new game has a much stronger focus on starships than anything.

How many books did DP9 print that were dedicated to Exos?

Spoiler, the answer is ZERO. None. There wasn't a SINGLE book dedicated to Exos. Even the tech manuals were 90% equipment and starships. A setting that was meant to be a UC Gundam analog, and DP9 decides to downplay the MS expies. We were LUCKY to get one or two new exo designs per faction any time a new book came out. Meanwhile here's a dozen new ships, variants of old ships, detailed duty rosters, and deckplans.

Oh whoops this was supposed to be a mecha setting? Sorry we forgot. ...What's a Dragonstriker?

I'm sure they would have phased mecha out of the setting completely given the opportunity.

>>15258636

Damn, good points.

Those first two green books were good, though.

>>15260522
The only thing the green books didn't do better than DP9 were the ship designs. For as much hating as I've done on what DP9 did to the setting so far I cannot deny their ships were on point, WAY better than the designs from the green books.

>>15260699

Absolutely true. The Valiant-class Strike Carrier is a sexy beast.

>>15258605

It SHOULD take very little work to actually kick off a solar war, because the setting is stuck in a perpetual Cold War so volatile anything could set it off. But DP9 decided it has to remain in THAT state forever so any time something that should set it off happens, everyone just shouts "TRUCE!" and the fighting immediately stops and they all go home and carry on with business as normal. And it happens SO FUCKING MUCH that without even realizing it they've doused the powder keg so badly it's growing mildew.

The main problem in the setting is that it does not seem to know gradations of conflict. Everything is so tightly wound up that it's either complete peace or SOLAR WAR BURN EVERYTHING. Which is stupid, because it completely glosses over the reality of the Cold War, and the things you can do with a wargame running on the concept. In the real world, the USA and CCCP never went to war with eachother, but the era was still packed to the rafters with war and conflict, much of it directly influenced by that cold war. Vietnam, Afghanistan or the Arab-Israeli conflict were never going to be the great all or nothing war that would decide the fate of the planet, but they were still important enough to the mayor powers that they spent a lot of resources on them.

Similarly, the easiest way to fix JC's metaplot is to cool of the tension a little bit, as weird as that may sound, but give a lot more smaller conflicts which both sides are trying to tip to their hands - but at the same time will not upset the balance of power so much that they would force the other party into starting a full war. This also lets smaller groups, including pirates and terrorists, be a thing of their own, a small but sizable threat that the other side can turn to their cause, and arm and supply to make them a real hassle.

>>15263511
That happened all of once in the setting, on Mars, and guess what happened?

A Godsfire class supercarrier fell out of orbit and completely obliterated a Martian city in the crash, so everyone shouted "TRUCE!" and went home to carry on with business as usual.

JC doesn't have any room for those kind of smaller conflicts. Only two of the planets aren't a "whole-planet" government, Mars is just two factions while the handful of independent nations on Earth literally don't matter to anyone because only like two of them barely have any means of getting into space, making them virtually non-existent as far as the rest of the solar system cares. They have literally nothing of value to anyone, not even CEGA who basically lets them exist for that reason.

The nomads in belt hardly even count, they're too small and ineffectual for any of the nations to even care what they do so long as they don't turn to piracy.

So the only real options for conflict that even exist in the setting are the occasional brushfire war on Mars or full on OYW between Zeon, sorry, CEGA and the Jovian Confederation.

>>15263585
>occasional brushfire war on Mars

Well, brushfire wars can be fun to play. But you are right, there's not nearly enough room for conflict in JC.

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Heads up: the co-creator of the Bubblegum Crisis RPG showed up in >>15249821

>>15263772
Someone from R. Tal?

Maybe they can tell us where the fuck the new Mekton is. Fucking scammers.

>>15264068
He gets kick out exactly because he made this question.

>>15264114
Try that sentence again one more time, in English.

>>15264158

Give the guy a break. Obviously english isn't his first language, but still -- he writes a second language better than you probably can.

And what he means is, "He got kicked out of R. Tal exactly because he asked that question." (Namely, where the fuck the new Mekton is.)

Go read the thread, it's quite a story.

>>15263655
>Well, brushfire wars can be fun to play.
They are, that's why it's a shame Mars is the only viable place they can happen.

JC was set up with the Jovian Confederation as the Feddy expy and CEGA as the Zeke expy, with Mars providing the terrestrial battlefield and Venus being "the man behind the curtain." Mercury was just there for people who wanted to play caravan guards in space.

It wasn't really meant to be more than that, and trying to make it something more than that ended up detracting from the setting.

>>15264068
>>15264346
Yeah, my bad.

That IS quite the read, it makes me honestly wonder if Mike Pondsmith and Kevin Sembeida are the same person...

So what made folks think that the old Star Wars D6 system would be good for a mecha game?

The fighters and walkers?

>>15265008
See
>>15222803

Heavy Gear D6 is proof enough that it can work. I myself have run more than a few successful D6 System and Mini Six based mecha games and it works surprisingly well.

>>15265031

Innnnnnteresting.

>>15219198
Wonder what happened to this...

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Session went well tonight. It was a talky type session and no big metal robots beating each other up. The crew got their new mission for next week,which is to help take out a bridge.

>>15268593

Just need to go through it make sure there's nothing, ummm, I don't want seen. One I've done that, I'll upload.

>>15206004
>but I hear the system itself is kind of shitty?

Chargen is about as hilarious as Maid's, and a lot more in-detail.

>>15268824
But that's, like, the opposite of shitty

>>15233396
>>15235370
What kind of mecha is Battle Century G bad at portraying? I recently bought the PDFs.

>>15268894
In BCG's case the problem is less what kind of mecha it sucks at and what kind of mecha show styles it sucks at.

BCG's system revolves around the mecha gaining XP alongside the pilot, and it levels in the form of "upgrades" (or depending on how you fluff it, "unlocked innate abilities"). So if you're playing a game where the PCs are going to be sticking to the same basic machine through the campaign and improving it with upgrades and whatnot, like most Gundam shows for example, BCG is your game.

The thing is that fact system is built around the mecha gaining XP and growing with the pilot. So if you're playing a game where the mecha is a disposable machine, like VOTOMS, is the same for everyone but is the pilot that makes the machine, like SDF Macross, or where you want to start the PCs with grunts then give them super prototypes later in the game, then BCG is not the system you want to use. It doesn't just suck at these things, it just straight up CAN'T DO IT.

Admittedly it's a smaller subset, but it is revealing of how "universal" mecha systems are always anything but.

Also I hear it's not very good for super robots, but I've never tried it for that.

>>15270769
Wait, it's meant for unique grow-with-the-pilot mecha and is bad at supers? How the fuck does that even happen?

>>15270769
>Also I hear it's not very good for super robots, but I've never tried it for that.

It really depends on the kind you want. I was recently in a game with a tone like some kind of kitbash of Dancougar (evil space empire's conquered the world, mankind forms a resistance group) and Shin Mazinger's Myceane plot (A lot of ancient conspiracies and plays on common mythology) with everybody having their own unique unit.

We did have to jury rig some stuff, like the person who wanted to play an established vet getting a slower experience gain compared to everybody else. We normally got a level a session; they were given a level every two sessions but with some abilities and upgrades already in place to compensate.

We also played with a deck of cards (that we got to play when we wanted) instead of dice and that ended up being kind of fun. I ended up getting most of the bad draws myself so my character ended up in critical state by the end of session 3. I think my worst was a hand of a Joker, 1 of Diamond and King of Hearts. The Joker was a crit failure with the King, Queen and Jacks being guaranteed crits.

>>15270769
>>15270886
Hmm, I should give BCG a shot then, since I was planning something like that for a small group.

>>15271251
Absolutely give it a shot, if that's the style of game you want you won't be disappointed by any means. It's a good, solid system, and I highly recommend it even if I personally prefer others for my own games.

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Where's a good place to go to find people who are interested in running/playing mecha themed rpgs online. I have a RL group that does fantasy, but they're not really into /m/ stuff at all. The best would be something online I could fit into my schedule.

>>15274402
/tg/'s gamefinder threads can be pretty hit or miss, I've only ever had one game group assembled from those threads that didn't completely fall off the face of the earth before the first session could be scheduled.
Roll20's LFG section has an 80% chance of That Guys or insufferable speshul snoflake types who will demand you learn their pronouns.
Obsidian Portal has a 90% chance of the above.

Quite frankly getting together an online group of random strangers that actually results in a fun complete campaign is completely up to chance, and it'll very likely take a couple dozen tries, bans, and bootings before you finally get together a good group.

>>15274402
>Where's a good place to go to find people who are interested in running/playing mecha themed rpgs online. I have a RL group that does fantasy, but they're not really into /m/ stuff at all. The best would be something online I could fit into my schedule.

I'd say chatroulette is the obvious choice.

bamp again

have a bump

So are there any good fantasy mech settings?

>>15284093
Dragonmech is pretty good if you ignore everything published after the core rulebook and use a system other than d20.

>>15270769
You're mostly right, but I disagree a little on this.

>So if you're playing a game where the mecha is a disposable machine... BCG is not the system you want to use
I successfully ran an entire campaign of this in BCG. The players had basic mook suits with most of their XP already spent, and a tiny bit of XP left over for "tuning" and "customization." The mechs didn't gain more XP, but the players could continuously respec them and swap out the upgrades they bought through tuning their mechs. The mechs never gained more XP, but they did capture or find better models that had more stock XP spent and more customization XP they could use. I also separated character and mecha XP for that campaign, so the PCs were still getting stronger and unlocking new genre powers despite their mechs remaining mostly the same.

The game was really successful and everyone had a lot of fun with it. I probably could have run the campaign's scenario in a different system more suited to mook combat, but my group had already played BCG a lot and kind of settled on it as our favorite mecha game and started adding our own homebrew stuff to it such as the stuff I already mentioned. Once you get a bit of system mastery, you can easily run just about anything in BCG if you include a couple fixes and house rules to tailor it to the experience you want.

The other half of it is how you're framing the narrative of the campaign, and how the player characters are portrayed in the story. In the game I mentioned above, the PCs were basically random mooks on the greater scale of things, but within their own story they were the main characters and had a ton of hype behind them from a narrative viewpoint, which made BCG's over the type mechanics portray the story perfectly. Think 08th MS Team, where the main characters are basically in grunt suits and yet Shiro has crazy plot armor and gets to do a lot of cool shit despite the "gritty" atmosphere of the show.

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>that feel when no one in your usual gaming group likes giant robots
>that feel when you're a mecha guy and love em.
man this sucks.

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>>15287759
We know your pain, bro.

If only there was some way for us /m/en to get together and play a game over the internet.

If only...

>>15284093
Remnants is a pretty good one, although it's fantasy in the Galient or Orguss 2 way rather than like Dunbine

Here's a bump with some actual content.

I'm still chipping away at the idea of mecha in FFG's Edge of the Empire/Age of Rebellion etc system (I posted those preliminary mecha statblocks using the GM and Zaku II upthread).
I'm torn between several ideas:
A) Mecha melee uses Piloting skill instead of Gunnery
B) Make "Mecha Melee" a new skill
C) Make "Mecha Melee" a new skill AND make "Pilot (Mecha)" a new use of the piloting skill to cut down on skill bloat, leaving Pilot (Planetary) and Pilot (Space) be for non-mecha vehicles.

>>15290582
Oh, or D) Make Pilot (Mecha) a new skil and let mecha meter combat work off that

>>15290585
Fucking phone

Mecha MELEE not mecha meter

>>15274800
Basically just lurk around here or /tg/ and hope for the best

Senki upload when?

>>15290582
Then I'll come with my own content...ish.

Anyway, I'm considering a system where the pilot has 3 stats, and the mecha has 3, and resources for upgrading either are separate, allowing both unit tuning and character improvement to happen without clashing into one another.

For attacks/hot-bloodedness/other stuff, I was thinking of a Will system, like in SRW. Thing is, it would also function as a Spirit Point system, where it would be used to buff yourself up, as well. Damage you deal or take will also decrease this resource, making fights tempo-based.

>>15292903
>a Will system, like in SRW

Speaking as someone who's never played an SRW game but is an avid TRPGer, I'd love to know some more details about that.

>>15293080
Basically, it's a stat that measure's the pilot's morale or tension, fluctuating depending on the flow of battle. Higher will causes you to take less damage and deal more damage, and certain attacks or special abilities require a certain amount of will in order to function.

For instance, you could set up the Zeta Gundam something like this: most of its attacks are available regardless of the pilot's will, but the biosensor activates (increasing the unit's accuracy and evasion) when the pilot reaches or exceeds 130% will, and having at least 140% would allow use of the waverider crash. Something like that.

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Game report from last night:

This time the players were tasked with blowing up a bridge for the Independant Mars cause. They could accomplish this either with artillery strikes, or to send in a ground team with explosives once they had successfully lured away the mechs guarding the bridge.

This map shows the starting positions, with the heroes in Cyan stacked in the same hex to start. C in orange was also an artillery unit, and I stacked things against the players slightly due to the fact that they just needed to get in there, do the job and leave.

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>>15295756
The players decided to trudge through the cover to the south, drawing the two guards towards them. The enemy made some terrible movement rolls the whole game and took too long getting into position, allowing the players to blow away most of B's armor and systems, eventually getting the pilot to surrender.

The player marked as A had his cover bombarded constantly, but only got away with minor scratches.

>>15206077
>Shitlord

When did tumblr infect /tg/?

Are quests permitted?

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>>15295772
In the end the players didn't manage to get a lock on the bridge to fire their artillery, so the ground team was sent in. Since C on the enemy team didn't move (being an artillery machine) there were some stealth rolls for getting in and getting out. But since this was at night and C was focused on the giant robot assault, the ground team managed to set the charges and escape.

The players left in victory and earned their pay for the subcontracted terrorist work.

>>15293156

Cool. Thanx for the succinct explanation.

>>15295775
Fuck you, shitlord was my favorite insult for years before the SJW faggots latched onto it and I'll be fucked in the ass with a rake before I stop using it.

>>15295907
You write like you just discovered cuss words, my dude, you don't have to prove anything to anyone

>>15295779
I'm sure they are. Go ahead, don't be afraid!

>>15295779
>>15296043
Pretty sure you'd have to do it on the quest board.

I think shit may have just got real in my Battle Century G game

First up, we just got outplayed by the Earth fleet who decided the best plan to invade our planet was hide a FTL beacon in orbit, disguised as space debris, during a diplomatic mission.

Allowing them to jump several ships into orbit while our fleet was away waiting in ambush at their projected arrival point.

Secondly the resident ladies' man of the team tried seducing an amoral mech designer to convince her to give up her unethical ways.

On the eve of our last stand she visited him and injected him with a mysterious drug that appears to have turned him into Stinger and/or Cohen from Getter Armageddon.

It turned him into an invincible newtype psychopath who thought it would be fun to shoot an overloaded reactor core into an enemy warship's crew quarters, flooding the ship with radiation, before going Black Getter on the rest of it.

We are probably intensely fucked.

But at least I convinced the team to use the warcry "Carrying the planet's hopes on burning wings, and bringing peace with the sun's light, the colonial defence force arrives on time!"