LANCER
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Hey all!
I’m very proud to announce the first test release of a side project I’ve been working on for some time now, LANCER, the Mech RPG.
You can pick up, read, and download a test copy here for free. Give it a read, try playing it, and let me know what you think. If you’re into military sci-fi, Titanfall, Destiny, comic books, the Halo series, BattleTech, or all forms of Giant Robot media, you might love the hell out of it.
The Lord Abbadon is generous indeed. We are unworthy.
It seems just the right amount of awesome.
I’m starting reading right away
I might give it a try with my friends.
Thanks a bunch to make it public!
I’ve been looking for a mech RPG like this for YEARS, i honestly can’t thank you enough my Lord Abaddon, Father of the almight YISUN, I’ll do my very best to test this gift you have given us!
Looks Hella Dope! Super excited to try it out
Great!
PS. Your css hides link to pdf.
Well, shit. I was just looking at this on Reddit, I didn’t expect to find it in my webcomic RSS feed too. Nice.
Thank you.
Since you are a very good artist, the addition of your art would probably increase the appeal of the documentation and maybe increase the appeal of the system. If you plan on making a premium or for-pay version you might want to have the art reserved for the premium version.
I’ll take a look. I’ve been trying to find a mech RPG versatile enough to handle roleplaying in the Earthsiege setting.
If someone has any suggestions as to system, feel free to check out the computer games first and let me know what RPG system they think will work. I might have to bite the bullet and write a homebrew system.
The original Earthsiege would be hard to play without a flightstick that works in DOSBox, because you’ve got forward, backward, torso tilt (forwards and backwards), torso twist… it’s just hard to do with a keyboard.
As for Earthsiege II and Starsiege, you’ll probably have a hard time getting them to run without an older computer running Windows 98 or Windows XP (and even in XP, you have to mess with compatibility settings). For Windows 7 & 10, you’ll have to download a custom installer from sierrahelp.com
Your illustrations would be a great addition to the system. If you have a paid or premium version, you might want to save them for it.
Note: comment is hopefully not a repeat. Previous submit seems to have vanished.
I choose to believe this is one of the many Earth-universes in KSBD.
Like how TES has all that sci-fi elements, why can’t a far off corner of the cosmos be as well?
“Explosive Weapon Modification” seems to be missing from the IPS-N Raleigh.
Other than that, this is splendid – just enough implied setting and loads of feel in a very well-written introduction. There’s a bit of VOTOMS/Heavy Gear in the scale of the mechs, which again is right in my wheelhouse. Clearly described purpose and intent in each of the mech archetypes. The mechanical differentiation that you can achieve through skills and licenses reminds me of the good parts of D&D4e and 13th Age, while deep down it doesn’t feel all that more complex than my previous favourite “lite” mecha game, Chris Perrin’s Mecha.
Would pay good money for a more produced version with art and nice layout.
I’m interested to see how the Traits-as-Health system works in play. “3 dangerous fails and you’re out for the session” seems, on first blush, to be a bit unforgiving, but I’ve not gotten to the nitty-gritty combat mechanics yet and it
might be totally different in play.
Will report back once I can test it.
So, after speed-reading the rules, I have some first questions and comments. Note that I did not actually play the game, just read the rules.
– Examples please. Examples make us understand the rules.
– Pilots have no hit points. They can lose traits if they muss dangerous skill checks. I assume this means that playing as a pilot, only the players make rolls (e.g. to detect an ambush), we never have an npc make a roll (e.g. to attack from an ambush) as there is no mechanism for the NPC to damage the player?
– The base mechanisms are completely unclear for me. How do we make a skill check? D20 + skill ranks? How do we make checks on mech attribute (e.g. an agility checks to escape a blast)? I seriously have no idea after reading the rules.
– Generally I feel that the mechanisms for pilots and for mechs are different enough (one feels like a storytelling game, one like a classical ‘simulationist’ game) that they feel like two completely different games, giving the whoe thing an incoherent feeling.
– The hardsuit looks like it is conceptually an armored exoskeleton with a jetpack, life support and environment protection. Is my understanding correct?
– I assume that infantry wears the equivalent of a hardsuit. Correct?
– Can you take the pilot weapon (that is used with the hardsuit) and use it without the hardsuit?
– If the hardsuit has radiation protection, vacuum protection and life support, why do the mechs have life support, and why are so many places in the rules that mention that a damaged life support system will cause trouble?
– The ‘cataclysmic reactor detonation’ (27+ on critical damage table) is much worse than any other reactor meltdowns as it multiplies heat damage by further d6. This looks like it may be completely unsurvivable for close by mechs. You may want to consider downgrading it to a meltfown and therefore use the same rules for all meltfowns (4d6 explosive and heat each).
– The tables say to make checks with ‘bane’ – I assume this should be ‘difficulty’.
To help the above:
2. yes, as a pilot all rolls are currently player facing. If you get attacked, you’ll have to use an appropriate skill to get out of trouble. If you fail, you’ll lose a trait, and if you lose all traits you’re done (for the time being at least).
3. it’s 1d20, aiming for a 10 or higher. If you’re rolling with Accuracy, you add the highest of xd6 (equal to the amount of Accuracy you have) to your 1d20 roll. Conversely, if you have Disadvantage, you subtract the highest d6 from your 1d20 roll. Accuracy and Disadvantage cancel each other out.
Addendum to the above, in mech combat things are a little different. In that you might be rolling against a different target number instead of ten (e.g. an enemy mech’s evasion). And you might add an additional bonus to your roll (e.g. your Aim or your Melee Attack bonus).
4. different strokes I suppose. The game is clearly supposed to be a mech game. It doesn’t want to disregard pilot situations entirely, but moving all the crunch to the mech side of things and keeping pilots relatively light on mechanics is a smart move given the focus of the game, imo.
5. That’s what hard suits look like to me too.
6. A safe assumption for the current playtest rules, imo (as we lack a GM or adversary chapter at present).
7. Don’t see why not. You can’t argue with a rocket launcher after all.
8. My guess is the life support doesn’t last all that long (comparatively speaking), but I had the same question reading the rules.
9. This one’s trying to emulate the genre source material more than anything. That mechs are powered by nuclear bombs and that you should really be careful when they’re critically damaged is just the sort of thing pilots have to watch out for. It might be too much though! Must play test to see if mechs explode properly…
10. I’d bet money you’re correct. Accuracy/Disadvantage system first appeared (to my knowledge) in an RPG called Shadows of the Demonlord. The equivalent of Accuracy/Disadvantage in SotDL were called Boons and Banes respectively.
Incidentally, loving what I’ve read so far. I’m hoping the GM and Adversary chapters are just as good as the rest of the system. Maybe with something akin to D&D 4e’s approach to monster design…? Different rules for PCs and NPCs seems a must to reduce GM load in this sort of game, and lots of interesting stat blocks to play with would make encounter design fun and breezy.
I would suggest organizing the mechs according to some archetype rather than manufacturer.
IE, it might be less interesting to choose between an IPS-Northstar mech vs a GMS-mech and more interesting to chose between:
Soldier (Generalist Ranged/Melee hybrid)
Fire support (Heavy Ranged)
Invader (Hacker focused mech)
Queen (Drone swarm focused mech)
Brawler (Melee focus)
Survivor (Reconnaisance/explorer mech)
Something like that. You could still tie the archetypes to different corporations though. Maybe one corporation focuses on mechs with lots of hacking/sensors/drone/ai support, another one goes all in on firepower, a third tries for more all round mechs etcetera.
Also I think more setting information would be good.
Looking forward to beta testing this. Questions while I read through it –
-Does unlocking a license rank allow for the equipment gained to be used on any mech, regardless of chassis?
-Are the stat bonuses given by unlocking a license rank applied to ALL mechs, or just the one of the license you unlocked? For example, if I hit level 2 and spent a license point on the 1st rank of IPS-N Drake, would I get +4 HP and +1 hull to any GMS mech I made?
-Does unlocking the chassis only occur on rank 2? So, for instance, I could only actually get an IPS-N Drake’s base statline chassis after the second rank?
-Is the term “Mech Core” supposed to be synonymous with the term “Chassis”? The Harrison Armory Tokugawa, for instance, does not have a chassis listed in any rank, but has a chassis statline.
-Where should we/how should we/would you like us to report playtest data?
Thanks for your time and hard work, I look forward to running this game for a playgroup!
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