Prototype Pattern Groups

[vagrant grotto]

"Hacked: A condition that indicates the computer systems of your mech are compromised. Hacked does nothing on its own, but abilities that apply it will describe an effect that lasts as long as a character is Hacked. Only one instance of Hacked may apply to a character at a time; a new instance and its related effects replaces an old one."

Am I missing something crucial? yes, almost certainly

[muted blaze]

1/2/3 feels like... Hardly anything... in vibes... 2/3/4 feels like it can be very potent...

[tepid arch]

It's because it was literally added in the very last prerelease update, haha. (It's the same reason there are so few Nexus weapons - they were split from Drones very, very late in development, though not quite as late.)

[vagrant grotto]

OS is just temporary armor

1 Armor is substantial

[muted blaze]

Yeah...

[vagrant grotto]

and on an at-will QA it'll stick out

[umbral sluice]

oh wow, learning new things today

[ashen crown]

Disengage is like. Exclusively useful for the last round of a Sitrep

That’s the only time I’ve ever used it no joke

[vagrant grotto]

Napalm actually felt good (outside of STC save effects being a lil hard but that would've been WORSE if Adhesive Gel was still its own thing)

gotta get some Incendiary Grenade tests on it now

[muted blaze]

I assume Having feedback for an NPC being "good" feels good lol

[vagrant grotto]

yes actually

[muted blaze]

Luv napalm (the NPC)

[vagrant grotto]

like, I do take notes in the bug tracker that says "this played well, not a bug. thumbs up"

if it feels solid then that's a big fuckin win

stuff I wanna test soon:

• Capacitor: Would you be surprised if I told you I've never fielded this fucker myself yet
• Ghost: Reworked Bond + Paradox State needs some verification

it's been a minute since I've heard about the Hatchet and Knight, but I assume no news is good news

they're the ones that I think are the most "locked-in" at the moment

Last time I touched either of them was v1.6

I could potentially release 1.11 if I really wanted to atm, with just the feedback from yesterday lol

gonna sit on it for a little though

unless I get an itchy trigger finger in the next hour

[south cypress]

I've been tossing a one shot together that a Capacitor could fit into pretty well. I'll probably include one or two and report back

[vagrant grotto]

I’m reasonably confident Capacitor is Fine™ I just want to actually use it and see how it fares

Also to figure out if there’s anything I would rather have in the moment than Arc Feedback

[vagrant grotto]

aight imma go down the line on my current "temperature" on each of the classes I've made:

• Anchor: I think it's generally fine, but not particularly popular. Hard to get a read. I think its base kit is okay. Its optionals are currently up in the air.
• Capacitor: Generally fine. Some OS numbers may be tweakable. Arc Feedback feels like an odd duck sometimes but IDK what to replace it with. One of the few holdouts of "Recharge in base kit" but at least it has the sensors to Lock On or Invade?
• Ghost: I am perpetually worried about the Ghost, though from what I've seen it's doing okay. Need to see the Tech Action Mirror effect in play before I'm calling it safe
• Hatchet: Solid. A couple optionals are iffy (I don't think I've seen anyone take Whirlwind Kick on it yet) but the core of Thrown Interactions seems strong.
• Kensei: As the new kid on the block, it's getting frequently tweaked. Core gameplay loop works but needs refinement.
• Knight: Solid. Compelled Duel is getting surprisingly few complaints for something that Just Works as a quick action, which suggests my "ongoing save" effect is working well for it. Sweeping Blows is the one optional I think is weak at the moment, but maybe I haven't used it in the right circumstances (if I used a Sweeping Blows Knight yesterday, for example, instead of a Torrent, I'd definitely have gotten at least one or two double hits with cone 3)
• Mesmerist: This is so close to solid, I can taste it. Its kit is self-synergizing, it hits the Hacker/Duelist fantasy, it just needs a little more refinement.
• Napalm: Base kit feeling alright. The Burn on STC may be worth reducing one last time to 4/6/8. Heat Haze may get the DZ focus reverted to self-DZ. Otherwise, optionals are the biggest question. Firefly drone finally feels good. IncenGrenade needs a look.
• Occultist: Seems alright but I feel it could use more feedback. It's still relatively "young"

• Prism: Seems to be working relatively well, surprisingly. Still the winner of "most FAQ entries" but otherwise seems alright. Omniglass Barrier could use some feedback.
• Torrent: This guy feels like a LOT of stuff happening thanks to Amorphous and Undertow providing a lot of passive power... but otherwise seems fine? Knockback scares folks (cool, good), but its bulk seems reasonable at least. Scalding Greywash and Wash Away could use some extra feedback (And maybe Crashing Tsunami?)
• Vulture: Magpie is loaded now. Need feedback on how Loading/Reloads feel with it. I think the abuse cases are reined in now but still need verification.
• Zealot: Feeling fresh and flexible. Base kit seems decent. Optionals need some feedback love (I have yet to see Flagellant's Cleansing get a report). Rally the Righteous's update could use some feedback.

For templates:

• Anomaly: There's a lot of ground to cover here and I likely never will see reports for all of these. That said I welcome any/all feedback on these optionals for this weirdo
• Brigand: Generally seems fine. I think a couple of the features may be sorta redundant and/or mean? I don't think I've heard about Enforce Limiters yet. Lockout seems like Rescind but more swingy and with less counterplay. I think Vandalize and Surgekiller haven't come up much (they're pretty niche), oh well.
• Veteran & Ultra: Yeah basically all of these could use some feedback, especially Ultra options. I think Knight and Zealot are okay at least.

[velvet cairn]

Shred until end of scene mogs any possibility of bracing tho

As shitty as brace is sometimes you really need to not mcdie

[vagrant grotto]

yes, quite

[velvet cairn]

The difference comparative to CRB npcs breacher needs to land two undescribably inaccurate shots

This little Samurai only needs one

[vagrant grotto]

it needs 2 actions to do so though

1 to prime, 1 to hit

[velvet cairn]

Idk

There's a small part of me that really is in love with how the charged profile was "A lot of damage, but telegraphed"

Especially because people like Assassin can just roll up and Devils Cough you

Whereas Kensei's was more telegraphed

"He's charging a big swing, you can interrupt it at the very least by making him parry a shot"

[muted blaze]

But seeing in practice, the choreograph is relatively easy to pull off with very high impact

[velvet cairn]

Things like Suldan's Phantom, Enhanced Combat's Executioner, or CRB's Sniper (the Mark)

Have the precedent of a One-Two

And the counterplay to them is disproportionately punishing too now that I think about it

[vagrant grotto]

I will say that in the playtests, the biggest impacts occurred on targets that got Exposed first

It baited Braces at the very least, but there were certainly times where I hit with the charged saber on non-exposed targets and still got very little out of it. But maybe that's just White Witch

in any case, I've reduced the damage profile and put a perma shred (until cleared) on for v1.11

the feedback was heard and acted upon

[muted blaze]

Perma shred

💀

That's horrible

I love it

[vagrant grotto]

it'll get past Brace now (idk how I feel about that) but the damage cap is lowered to compensate

[umbral sluice]

it's evil but like, is it really worse than a Demo Stun

idk i think not

and the sheath serves a similar purpose as i understand it

[muted blaze]

TBF tho, it could also be a very skewed due to brace changes

[vagrant grotto]

ehhhhhhhhh

then the complaint becomes "I have to brace all the time vs. this thing or I get chunked"

"I wanna use my actions"

[muted blaze]

Brace changes turns it onto "brace when you don't think anything else this combat will hit you harder than that" when previous brace is "brace in case of emergency"

[vagrant grotto]

right but in this case every charged hit is an emergency

[muted blaze]

TBF I don't want to compare it to demo stun because Kensei has an optional that forces hull save VS dazed

Which IMO is comparable to stun

[vagrant grotto]

an optional that I've received zero feedback on, by the way

[muted blaze]

Yeah

I need to see it

But it scares me

[vagrant grotto]

and while it's comparable like, it's not the same

prospective v1.11 release candidate does mean that if it has Posture Break, if you fail the save, you won't be able to immediately Stabilize the Shredded away without RSU

[velvet cairn]

Real talk

I feel like Anchor's existence is a deserved anti-Sunzi countermeasure

Well, at least, with the Reality Anchor optional

Blink charges are just too good

[vagrant grotto]

I have no love for Sunzi’s ability to screw with an entire battlefield

[velvet cairn]

Real

The saying is that every party should have either HORUS OS1 or Ferrous Lash

But in practice everyone just takes Sunzi 1 anyway

[umbral sluice]

maybe it's just me but i dislike sunzi 1 more than the rest of sunzi

it's just such a one stop shop for fixing movement on anything

[velvet cairn]

Oh, also

Vanity/aesthetics question

Do you have some art in mind regarding anchor

Just to help visualise what it's like

I know canonically NPCs come in all shapes and forms

But just as every has a Brazilian Samurai in power armor/Sekiro as kensei

Is there something that stuck out the most when making anchor that you as a GM can say

"Yes, it's an/kinda like X"

Other Examples:

Mesmerist is Mettaton Neo

Suldan Ogre is a fighting game character

And LEC Morningstar is a walking sentry buster

[vagrant grotto]

https://tenor.com/view/gravity-sigmaow-sigma-gif-10942030815393199195

Probably Overwatch’s Sigma in silhouette

Armored, with Stuff to house the gravity, but not thick enough to be a Guardian

I had originally thought it would be thicker but the abilities didn’t make sense with the vision

Plus it doesn’t have Heavy Frame either

[umbral sluice]

Sigma is so cool, I wish I still enjoyed overwatch because I really love his design

[velvet cairn]

ANCHOR Horror, Tier 2 Mech
[ STATS ]
  H: 4 | A: -2 | S: 0 | E: 2
  STRUCT: 1/1 | ARMOR: 2 | HP: 25/25
  STRESS: 1/1 | HEATCAP: 0/8 | SPD: 3
  SAVE: 14 | EVADE: 6 | EDEF: 8
  SENS: 8 | SIZE: 3 | ACT: 1
[ FEATURES ]
  Lodestone (II), Gravity Cannon (II),
  Siege Armor (II), Reality Anchor (II),
  Omninet Grounding (II), Newtonian Amplifier (II),
  Mutations (II), Terrifying (II),
  Abhorrent Redundancies (II), Quadruped (II)

Will be throwing this at people soon

any ideas to tweak it?
Otherwise will report how it played out afterwards

Plan is a Control Sitrep

Plonk this in some far off CZ and when they do Sunzi things i just redirect the enemy onto another point where this is

[vagrant grotto]

Gonna be interesting with this being a big ball of “nope”

I don’t know if Newtonian Amplifier is gonna see much use though

[ashen crown]

My exp with the Anchor from the last group I played it with has been "Sounds fun on paper, but may require more GM expertise to use effectively instead of sitting around being useless"

Which has been noted before but just thought I'd restate it

[ashen crown]

I ran my last anchor(s) in a Control, so the top tips I can give to not repeat my mistakes is either

a. Put the anchor in a CZ with high foot traffic so it can make more use of being big and it's Mag Cannon, or

b. Give it an artillery to babysit religiously

Also consider making it a Veteran with Slingshot if you have mid- or even cqb-ranged attackers rather than any true artillery- I didn't do that and I kept swearing to myself about not doing that

It was paired with an Elite REbake Strider and that + a Slingshot Anchor would've gone so hard b/c it could use it's Long Rifle with greater flexibility potentially and when swapping kits to deploy smoke bombs use the Anchor to fire long range Shotgun Blasts and i'm so mad I didn't do that

Plus, an Anchor that exists purely to upkeep Lodestone pairs really well with Limitless, since it can basically OC Loop by Overcharging, activating Lodestone, and then Stabilizing. It's less flexible but more useful if it's found a point + friends to sit by with no enemies nearby

[vagrant grotto]

I have a sinking feeling that Anchor is gonna be getting some changes soon lol

[ashen crown]

Is the OC Loop Strat unwanted?

[velvet cairn]

Proposal

Give the Anchor an optional that lets it redirect PC Teleports

[ashen crown]

Does it not already have that?

[velvet cairn]

at the cost of being a save/contested check/whatnot

No, it's only for OPFOR

"allies in line of sight"

Notably

Anchor is also, funnily enough

one of the best classes to pair with Op

because Op teleports with every move he makes

he can teleport, contest somewhere/harass somewhere

and then Reality Anchor back

[vagrant grotto]

No I just mean that I have a feeling the optionals may get revamped

[vagrant grotto]

Eh not feeling it

And not looking for design suggestions on it right now without playtest feedback

[ashen crown]

There’s also Lurker

[velvet cairn]

Tentative feedback, game is still going on

Give the Anchor Heavy Frame

or at least something that makes it harder to shift

i don't know if its just that Ferrous lash is lash

but they just shoved it off the point

and then they just kept shifting it so it could never get back because 3 speed and slowed from Lodestone

[ashen crown]

Outright Giving it heavy frame feels a bit boring but yeah some form of Force Move resistance would probably be for the best

[velvet cairn]

On a side note

I hate people who suggest

"Just Take HORUS OS1/LASH"

[vagrant grotto]

Listen, I hear you

[velvet cairn]

Yes, they exist
yes, they are functionally the most powerful tools a player can have access to that isn't damage

Yes, proliferating OS1/LASH forces the GM to escalate their OPFOR and then it'll be no fun for players who don't want to engage in this arms race

ugh

its just a bit annoying

Here's an NPC who's the star of the show/center of gravity and once again they relegate him into non-relevance by simply spamming movecontrol

[ashen crown]

On the "Just take X" thing or the "give Anchor Heavy Frame-style trait" thing?

[velvet cairn]

I even went to the trouble of picking out a unique image for him but then he's barely worth the attention except for the fact that they can't just OS1 him

[vagrant grotto]

Former

[velvet cairn]

Also i think i fucked up a bit

I allowed them to scan it from beyond lodestone burst

[ashen crown]

Hm... I'm not saying this is a good idea but my brain is racing rn so weird idea if Anchor were to be given a force move resist- while Lodestone is active, reduce number of spaces the Anchor is force moved by the number of allies (or even just characters, including enemies) affected by Lodestone

Even if it's just one character affected by Lodestone that's still pretty substantial, and the more "in the thick of it" the Lodestone is the more impactful the effect, which sounds fun. Plus unlike Heavy Frame, it is possible to brute force past the force move, but after a certain point it stops being "worth it" so to speak

Ofc this could be a dumb or broken idea but idk, it sounds interesting

[ashen crown]

They can still scan the Anchor, just not its allies

Since Lodestone's benefits exclude the anchor

[velvet cairn]

ah, right

oh damn
which means i played it wrong on another level

they absolutely could have OS1'ed it

[ashen crown]

There's the problem

[velvet cairn]

I can't tell if i'm just a bit salty or not
but it just feels wrong you can shift the lodestone

[vagrant grotto]

That’s fine tbh, lodestone doesn’t stop it from being targeted, just allies

Honestly now that I’ve given the Kensei “halve forced movement” it means that I could repurpose it for Anchor too

[ashen crown]

Yeah that's probably the easiest solution

[velvet cairn]

Onto something random

Knight's Duel Whiffing on a 6Edef PC was not something i expected to happen

[vagrant grotto]

Huh? It can’t miss

[velvet cairn]

I was under the impression it needed to connect

at a +0

at least, thats how i've been running it this entire time

[vagrant grotto]

From the pdf

Compcon will include a +0 even if it’s not a tech attack

[velvet cairn]

ah, damn it

[vagrant grotto]

Everything else that makes a tech attack will say so too

[velvet cairn]

i've been a dumbass then

[vagrant grotto]

It’s ok

It’s an honest mistake

[velvet cairn]

Weirdly enough

is there a reason why its a tech action and not something like a system/trait

[umbral sluice]

Goliath's Crush Targeting looks the same on foundry and I've made that mistake a good few times before

Don't sweat it

[vagrant grotto]

It’s a System that has the Quick Tech tag, which compcon unfortunately obscures but the PDF does not

[velvet cairn]

Convincing victory in the sitrep

Commentary (on stuff that was actually done):

1: Operator + Reality Anchor is a very funny combo because it lets it cross-map skirmish and yoink it out of danger
2: Anchor being so susceptible to force movement feels weird as hell. Maybe heavy frame, or something to mitigate as stated above
3: Flavor one: Gravity Cannon dealing explosive damage, idk if its a valid comment or not, feels weird. Would have thought it would work like kinetic damage, or Energy (like Black witch mag cannon)
4: Omninet grounding denying OS1 is good. Not being immune itself to OS1 however, 🙁

[vagrant grotto]

Thanks for the feedback! Re: Explosive: That’s because I view explosive damage as a kind of coordinated pressure wave, sometimes with shrapnel and sometimes not

[velvet cairn]

Stuff that wasn't done, but I have only realised after the fact-

Null-Grav Motivator: Didn't take the optional

only just remembered nullgrav/0G autoinflicts slowed on nonflight/EVA characters

[velvet cairn]

at least, in this case

i viewed it as like sigma
and based it off magnetic + gravitational fields combined to describe it

A small part of me wants to suggest limiting each instance of non MOVE movement that the Anchor takes/makes while under Lodestone to be reduced to 1.

Another part of me wants to try again but this time abusing LODESTONE to it's maximum as a proactive bunkering tool

[ashen crown]

Oh hey that’s kinda like what I said (except the amount of movement reduced equals the number of Allies or characters affected by Lodestone)

[velvet cairn]

My thought process is that the Anchor is using gravity to

'Anchor' itself while lodestone is active

which logically would imply it's also harder to shift it

[ashen crown]

Yours might be better tho since it favors sheer volume of forced movement rather than big bursts of it, which benefits aux weapons with Knockback, all the one of them

[velvet cairn]

we already see part of it in that the Anchor itself is slowed while Lode is active

[velvet cairn]

It WOULD be funny that the charged DD288 only knockbacks the Anchor 1 square tbh

that way I can legally make the "Standing here, I realise Raiden is punching" meme

[ashen crown]

I like my idea because it evokes a flavor of “Mutual Gravitational Pull” where the Anchor is using the bodies near it to keep itself anchored, and keys off of what the Anchor’s team chooses to do rather than just being a passive effect with minimal required input

But I will admit it’s more complex

[vagrant grotto]

Yeah no I have ideas

The feedback was helpful

No need to try to design for me right now

[ashen crown]

Fair nuff- my brain was just running. I might consider taking the concept of my idea and putting it somewhere else

Tho I have not had the time for anything lancer as of late :,(

[velvet cairn]

Lancer deprivation, tis a serious condition

[vagrant grotto]

Nah it’s Silksong enrichment, totally healthy

[ashen crown]

Well that and college

Both have been strangling my schedule

(The Silksong is fun tho)

[vagrant grotto]

Ah, the books are an essential source of vitamins and fiber

[ashen crown]

Ink tastes great

[umbral sluice]

Are you eating the books valk

[vagrant grotto]

I’m just saying what the bookworms would tell you

[velvet cairn]

Any people of culture here who played Bookworm Adventures?

[upbeat obsidian]

are prisms supposed to be able to be hit by like aoe, or exectioner, or etc, multiple times (if both the projection and the base is there?)

because, they occupy 2 different spaces, but if they are still just 1 thing its funky

[vagrant grotto]

check the FAQ

[vagrant grotto]

In short: no
In long: It's like the Prism is a funky size 2. Size 2 characters don't get hit for every space in an AoE, neither does the Prism

[upbeat obsidian]

i did check the faq actually, but i had to look for it lol

checked pins, then itch.io, then looked it up in this chat, before finding it on the pdf

[sudden cosmos]

My revamped wallflower missions 1 and 2 are looking like they're gonna feature Capacitor, Kensei, and Zealot

The CRT is gonna stay Knight-Hatchet-Mesmerist-Prism-Occultist

[vagrant grotto]

damn, zero CRB NPCs in the CRT? I'm flattered haha

[sudden cosmos]

they were also all anomalies

for one of the two tussles with them at least

[rare jay]

Considering something similar for running the Midnights

[upbeat obsidian]

Valk, any thoughts on prisms theoretically having infinite effective range with prep time?

Due to them being able to piggyback off the projections sensor range to place a new projection… and so on?

It’s funny to me

Also any tips if I want to run a bunch of npcs that use holograms or projections or other stuff and all start with P? How will my players keep it straight?

Prisms, phantasms, parallels, etc etc???

[vagrant grotto]

Yeah: It’s unintended. Increase its heat by 2 for each range increment if you do this

[vagrant grotto]

My tips are: Use different tokens for the holograms, and maybe reconsider this idea due to all the overhead

[upbeat obsidian]

Well, I wouldn’t use them all at once it’s more just

The difficulty of like differentiating them in some ways

[vagrant grotto]

Evocative names and neat tokens will help, as will a “bestiary”

“What’s the difference between a ghoul and ghast and a wight? Let’s check our Recall Knowledge bestiary!”

All that said it’s very funny that homebrew NPCs that start with P are more statistically likely to have clones

[granite saddle]

It's because the P stands for plural

[dapper goblet]

Im doing some very ill-advised warranty voiding

Zealot w/ the 1 burn for allies optional and the enhanced combat necromancer.

(A striker that throws out crappy, weak foes that dont hit for much)

[twin escarp]

I like, tinted the hologram token green

[muted blaze]

Wait does engineer + zealot work...

Oh lord

[dapper goblet]

Yep

Which is why I dont feel bad about trying this

(Necro is actually less turret spamy than engie is)

[muted blaze]

Rebake engineer at least

[dapper goblet]

Dunno about rebakes, still havent gotten around to making the shift

[muted blaze]

Rebake places 2, 1 hp turrets

[dapper goblet]

Brutal

[vagrant grotto]

Keep me posted on how this goes and if I should change it to Allied Mechs instead

[dapper goblet]

Will do. I dont think that this information will be especially valuable given the "cross homebrew" issues, and im plotting for a few weeks out

But I'll have some kensei info for you in a couple days

[ashen crown]

That phrasing tripped me at first so to clarify- all turrets have 1 HP but the Engi places them 2 at a time now

[icy tinsel]

what is the -9999 supposed to be on the extrude knife

[vagrant grotto]

The attack bonus

[icy tinsel]

AH. Hilarious.

[vagrant grotto]

I had it at +9999 but it got abused as a crit tool lol

[icy tinsel]

I was confused a bit with reading the formatting, I thought that was damage first.

But that was silly of me, damage is after thread/range

[vagrant grotto]

I did my best to keep it looking like a Perfectly Normal Weapon, but I suppose some bewilderment is to be expected haha

[icy tinsel]

I dig it, appreciate having the very obvious Pegasus flavour optional

I'm also so far very fond of the Anchor and Torrent

[vagrant grotto]

Hell yeah, happy to hear some love for my Knockback Lads

[icy tinsel]

Not from having tested them yet, just reading over them tbc

[umbral sluice]

Ultra Anomaly something I'm guessing? For free Deadly procs?

[vagrant grotto]

Yup yup

[umbral sluice]

Sad because +9999 was funny to see but I understand how that can be annoying

Though -9999 that's a guaranteed miss is still pretty fun

[vagrant grotto]

Yeah it resulted in some not happy times, so the -9999 is fine for the reliable proc

[muted blaze]

Orchis stays winning

[magic rover]

Reading up on the Hatchet, and Return to Sender states 'actions' with the THROWN, ARCING, SEEKING or GRENADE tag, would this include the Skirmish action?

[vagrant grotto]

If it’s using the requisite tags, yes

A simple melee weapon isn’t gonna trigger it, it has to be actively Thrown

[magic rover]

I just mean the way this worded, I can use RTS against say, GMS Mortar

[vagrant grotto]

Yes

[magic rover]

Or Siege Mode Siege Cannon

[vagrant grotto]

Correct

[magic rover]

It does seem like a better version of Ronin's Rebound... Except it's the Hatchet making the attack themselves

[vagrant grotto]

Well, it’s an optional, and it does nothing against a Cyclone Pulse Rifle

Are you speaking from playtest experience?

[magic rover]

Well, yes, but I suppose all experiences are situational

One of my players has been ungodly lucky with their siege cannon, and I decided the turn the tables

[vagrant grotto]

I’m guessing they were upset about it?

[magic rover]

I wouldn't say 'upset', more so in the typical player whining that their tried and true method that has worked the past 8 combats got stoppered

They're also playing the barbarossa, which doesn't leave much in the way of versatility

[vagrant grotto]

I don’t know what your fights look like, but at the very least they could shoot somewhere else? Or just shoot with regular mode

Direct fire won’t use the Arcing tag

[magic rover]

I'm not too worried about their options haha, it's their job to figure out the combat

[vagrant grotto]

If it’s too warping at 1/round I can consider adding the Recharge tag, maybe removing the 50/50 to compensate and make it more deterministic

Please keep me posted!

[magic rover]

They're in a 'combat sim' part of the narrative at the moment, so I'm taking it as an opportunity to test out NPC comps from PPG and Enhanced Combat while they mess around with their builds.
I'll definitely throw in the Hatchet a few more times and see what crops up

[upbeat obsidian]

issue found: extrude knife does not scale attack bonus

[vagrant grotto]

How is this an issue? Wallflower NPCs don’t scale either

[muted blaze]

If extrude knife scaled

How would it scale

Would it be -9999/-9998/-9997, would it be -9999/-9998/-9996 or -9999/0/9999

[granite saddle]

It'd be -9999/-99999/-999999

[vagrant grotto]

I think the primary offender that triggered the anti-crit change was a tier 3 fight? I might be misremembering

[sudden cosmos]

It was stacking crits is all I remember

Have it scale like waterdragon said, or -99/-999/-9999 for smaller number purposes

[vagrant grotto]

But yeah I have zero reason to add scaling when the current stat line fits the page and does the same thing

[granite saddle]

I can't speak for the others, but I was just jokin' dw

[upbeat obsidian]

This is a reference to the time I did this bit

[vagrant grotto]

Oh, went over my head, whoops

[muted blaze]

What's the largest number an LCP can handle

[sudden cosmos]

Please no

[umbral sluice]

al what are you cooking

[vagrant grotto]

Depends on how compcon and or foundry type the input. If it’s integer, it’ll be a smaller cap than a LongType

Basically once it goes over cap, it’ll wrap around to negative numbers

This doesn’t even touch the display of such a number though

[muted blaze]

I was curious just because how negative could it go

Like. Triggers have an absurd character limit

[vagrant grotto]

I’d start with trying the 32 then 64 bit integer limits

[vagrant grotto]

Unrelated to PPG, I did something questionable: https://docs.google.com/document/d/12nb--GO1G52xXfVqLle9KCdbCxIJb2HRz91PJeaesxQ/edit?usp=drivesdk

[ashen crown]

You’d probably wanna modify Frame SP calculations in order to compensate for these rules (because without inherent talents Mech versatility goes way WAY down so even if you wanna reduce the total number of abilities a pilot has it may be unwise to reduce them by that much), but the intent is valid and it looks interesting

Predator Mod and Sledgehammer Servos do look like fun consequences of the rules, good Custom Paint Job alts

I do also think the Hacker Intrusion Suite could perhaps get away with being 1 SP due to how niche the invade options are even compared to other licensed invasion suites

Making Last Argument of Kings accurate is nice tho

[granite saddle]

About that actually, given your comments on the Mino's Full tech, would you consider adding that to your standard house rules Valk ?

[granite saddle]

Cleave mod looks like it'd be really bad for 2 whole SP on most builds, especially with the loss of all bonus damage ever. Consider it just being 1SP maybe.
Except for Combat Drill, yeah.

Is Breach Ram 1QA activate + 1QA boost (on which it applies its effects) or 1QA double boost+effects ? If it's the latter, you probably shouldn't be able to also regular boost on top of that.

[vagrant grotto]

Maybe? I don’t know if I gotta keep Hacker I’d probably do something different

[granite saddle]

As a quick fix in the meantime I figure it'd do the job, but it is your rules so do what you want in the end.

[vagrant grotto]

1 QA total

Because it’s still just using your boost

It augments your existing boost

Like Juggernaut 3 does

[granite saddle]

yeah, so it's still a boost you can't double-up on, good

nothing more to say on talentless for now then.

[vagrant grotto]

Fun fact: RAW, if you perform Pathfinder 2E action compression and make the actions part of a Quick Action, they technically still are subject to the No Duplicate Action rule

At least under one interpretation

[granite saddle]

I'd say so, with the Lycan CP as evidence

[vagrant grotto]

That said I’ll call it out when it’s relevant in the Talentless Hack

[minor crest]

"Talentless Hack" is an amazing name btw lmao

[vagrant grotto]

I’m especially proud of it yeah haha, thank you!

[twin escarp]

and Supreme melee and headshot and overcharge

[vagrant grotto]

Aight folks I’m coming in with another playtest proposal, this one for <t:1758996016:F>

Do not fear, this will not feature the Talentless Hack

LL6, any Massif official content with my homebrew mods

[sudden cosmos]

Tentatively available here. Willing to deploy the cat or pivot.

[warm cedar]

I don't know if you accept people less familiar with the homebrew but I can be here if needed.

[vagrant grotto]

I absolutely do! You’d be welcome

[warm cedar]

Ok I'll try to not be too late.

[vagrant grotto]

No pressure or obligation though, it’s just hobby fun time with a side of testing

[warm cedar]

I can play anything btw.

[umbral sluice]

I could try make it if people are needed (and you wouldn't mind me there ofc) but if not I'll skip for a different group. I haven't heard back from them all yet so I may be more free, idk yet

[vagrant grotto]

1. Of course I wouldn’t mind
2. I can put you on the waitlist for now then, again no obligation here

[muted blaze]

I'm not free 😔

[velvet cairn]

Tentatively available

Would like to try bringing a sherman, or the Swallowtail hacker

[placid glacier]

The same parameters of testing for the mesmerist (two normals, one vet, or one ultra)?

[vagrant grotto]

Yup, that sounds fine to me

[placid glacier]

👍

[dapper goblet]

Oh i forgot

I ran some spacer ronins with grav rifles that didn't come up much so

With mirages, demolishers, and sentinels. Lots of "dont come here" and "you are now here"

Mostly no notes. I do feel like the heat on sheathed needs to come down a bit or the overshield for mag parry needs to come up a bit

As is it feels very rarely worth it to un-rev for the overshield given how stacked the charge profile is, especially if the players have any heat pressure at all (even like a toku with nuke cav felt like a bit too much pressure, I shudder to think about a dedicated hacker)

[vagrant grotto]

Thank you for the feedback!

I know the sword is slated for a damage ceiling nerf soon, which may shift priorities. I also noticed that the 2 Heat was a bit spicy, especially on multi structure Kensei that lives longer. But maybe it’s still okay?

[dapper goblet]

Oh man I wrote ronin not kensei huh

[vagrant grotto]

I picked up the gist all good. And Spacer combo is devious

[dapper goblet]

Yeah i do think dropping the charged profile and bit would help with the feel ironically. One of those

"Game design" things

[mild trail]

Spacer keeps winning

[dapper goblet]

Spacer never stops winning

Grav rifling in a Pegasus who thought he wasn't in whacking range

[mild trail]

Controller-in-a-can gotta be one of my favorite templates

[placid glacier]

huh- maybe I need to take advantage of the spacer template in my Zero-G campaign more 🧐

[granite saddle]

I cannot be there this time, like at all.

At least you'll get some fresh eyes on your stuff !

[foggy wadi]

Are there still slots available?

[vagrant grotto]

I’ve got a bunch of tentatives so please throw your hat in the ring!

[foggy wadi]

https://tenor.com/view/jeff-bridges-agent-champagne-kingsman-golden-circle-toss-gif-9381860

consider my hat thrown

[vagrant grotto]

Alright here's the pitch

Title: Valk's Lancer Playground - Somebody Set Up Us the Bomb
Game System: LANCER RPG
Platform: FoundryVTT
Chat: Voice through PilotNet, text through Foundry
Availability: 4 seats
Time: <t:1758996016:F>, ~4-5 hours in length.
Tone: Fast and furious playtest skirmishes.
Hook: Blow the STIX's joint sky high! Plant the bombs and protect them to detonation!
Requirements: Must be experienced with Lancer combat. Create an LL6 character using Massif-published content. No meme builds, pack what you would for a normal mission.
Details: This is a playtest for some of my homebrew NPCs and special house rules. Most of my houserules can be found here, but key highlights:

• Overcharge lets you reroll an attack/check/save instead of take an extra action, and refreshes on a rest.
• Aid lets you split Stabilize’s action cost between players!
• Overkill is now opt-in: Choose to use it or don't!
• Brace is 1/scene but now has no downside.
• NPCs with Recharge abilities also take Self Heat from those abilities.
• Overheating can inflict Overheated, which prevents use of self-heat abilities.
• Structure Damage is replaced with picking between being Dazed or suffering System Trauma.
• All mechs only have 1 Stress, become Exposed & Overheated upon reaching max heat cap, and take excess heat as irreducible Energy damage.
• Lifting/Dragging rules are revamped to support Escort Objectives in a sensible way!

Other: I’m Valk! I’ve previously published several third-party modules for Lancer. I run brisk and fluid combats. If you have any questions about the rules I plan to include, please ask!

@warm cedar @foggy wadi @sudden cosmos @velvet cairn how are things looking? Same for you, @umbral sluice , though I have you on waitlist

[warm cedar]

Looking good, I have already played games with WaterDragon who basically uses the same ruleset as yours.

I can play anything so I let my comrades decide of their build first if they want to.

Question : I guess we need to send you our tokens for the combat ?

Like the mechs and deployables ?

[vagrant grotto]

yeah I'm gonna make a thread in #campaign-hub and you can send me Share Codes + Tokens and discuss builds

[foggy wadi]

I have never played with these rules before, but I will try my best

[umbral sluice]

if it's not a problem i'll be able to let you know in a couple hours, i'm still waiting on someone to tell me if i need to be on another game

[vagrant grotto]

all good, you're currently on waitlist in case someone of the other 4 can't make it

[sudden cosmos]

Ready to deploy the cat 🫡

[velvet cairn]

[ LICENSES ]
  SSC Swallowtail 2, SSC Dusk Wing 1, HORUS Minotaur 2, HORUS Goblin 1
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  The Lesson of the Held Image, Superheavy Mounting
[ TALENTS ]
  Technophile 3, Spotter 2, Black Thumb 2, Hacker 1, Orator 1
[ STATS ]
  HULL:2 AGI:0 SYS:4 ENGI:2
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:15 ARMOR:0
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:6 REPAIR:6
  TECH ATK:+5 LIMITED:+1
  SPD:6 EVA:10 EDEF:14 SENSE:20 SAVE:13
[ WEAPONS ]
  SUPERHEAVY MOUNT: Cyclone Pulse Rifle
  FLEX MOUNT: Autopod
  AUX/AUX MOUNT: SUPERHEAVY WEAPON BRACING
[ SYSTEMS ]
  Enlightenment-Class NHP, Viral Logic Suite, H0R_OS System Upgrade I, Aggressive System Sync, Neurospike, Personalizations, Armament Redundancy```

This be the build i'm likely going to run.

Basically its just a Swallowtail Hackmech

but with a Backpocket CPR to delete something if it really needs to die

[granite saddle]

(you probably meant to send that in https://discord.com/channels/426286410496999425/1421173339673727028)

(be sure to have it there too so the others can reference it more easily)

[velvet cairn]

Ah, my bad!

[placid glacier]

would putting legion on a mesmerist be too mean?

[vagrant grotto]

Eh, I don’t know? How often are you hacking a Mesmerist

[placid glacier]

dunno how my players would interact with one- first time running one

[umbral sluice]

What's the party comp looking like

[placid glacier]

melee caliban, MOI Houdini, and dunno for the last

[vagrant grotto]

Mesmerist has high natural EDEF so Legion will probably just put it ahead of most dedicated hackers unless they pack some Lock On or what have you

[placid glacier]

fair

gonna go with Sight and Extra Deadly then for Ultra addons

[placid glacier]

wait @vagrant grotto when Gaussian Blur says activation, does it mean for the 'sheathe' part or 'unstheathe' part?

sorry if that was asked before

[vagrant grotto]

Activating Mass Driver Sheathe sheathes the sword, only

It’s like the Activate action for any system

[placid glacier]

got it 👍

my b

[vagrant grotto]

All good!

[ashen crown]

Doesn't legion also give +1 accuracy to all tech attacks?

[vagrant grotto]

Ah! So it does. Would likely be quite nasty

[ashen crown]

I mean if Witch can have it I don't see why the Mesmerist can't, but again it's all about context

Unlikely Supreme Melee the Kai Rebake kept the tech attack accuracy around, and I assume the rarity of tech is reason enough

Problem with Mesmerist is that it has AOE tech attacks, which falls outside the purview of both Tom+Miguel and Kai, so like ???

But at the end of the day the purpose it serves is more consistent Mirror Images. It's nasty, but not overwhelming. Helps that Tech Attacks can't crit

And as this is gonna be an Ultra mesmerist it can probably use the extra survivability

As a side note, I'm now imagining a Mesmerist with an HA flavoring, where it's mirror images are instead a Heat Haze it builds up and it behaves more similarly to a Tokugawa in terms of playstyle. So that's cool.

[placid glacier]

the hacker is getting jumped

[vagrant grotto]

Uh oh lol

[placid glacier]

ok refreshed enough to give more substantial feedback now

[placid glacier]

Player Forces (LL6) - 3 Players
1x Caliban
1x Houdini (MOI)
1x Viceroy

Enemy Forces (LL2): 
1x Ultra Mesmerist (Death By Glamour, Mountebank's, Dimensional Raid, Sight, Extra Deadly)
1x Veteran Pistolero (High Noon, Dance, Rebound [Ronin])
2x Kensei 
- Kensei 'Hook' (Daunting Grudge, Posture Break)
- Kensei 'Sinker' (Gausian Blur, Disarming Retaliation)

Reinforcements:
1x Priest (Fractal Assault, Feedback)
1x Hive (Electro Nanite, Solipsis Swarm)
4x Artillery Grunts (Mortar)```

**General**
- Players found the True CZ early which shaped to encounter to function more like a Koth map
- Much smaller group size than players were normally used to 
- Players didn't clump up as much this encounter (relevant for Mesmerist)

**Kensei** 
- Early on I was able to use Daunting Grudge with it between the player and the control zone, causing players plans to change in a way that was engaging
- Gausian Blur felt good as a repositioning tool and the Houdini player thought that the sudden pressure was fun to fight against
- On a strike where Posture Break *would* have gone off, player braced against the blow which led to largely the same outcome anyway, but I showed my hand on how the feature would have gone and players received the "Dazed" condition well, thought it was more interactive than just a stun
- Mach Parry was well received, Houdini player said it was telegraphed well

Mesmerist
(Players had a lot to say about this one)

• Surprisingly enough, most well received part of the Mesmerist was Dimensional Raid/Mountebank's Jaunt, players on the receiving end of it thought that it was a fun gimmick for the 'puzzle boss' nature of the ultra
• Players pointed out that the invis combined with the ultra felt like it tipped too far in the direction of "Don't engage with this enemy"
• Combined with the mesmerist having multiple activations, and the players feeling like they didn't have adequate anti-invis tools, it made it too easy for the Mesmerist to snowball into a really annoying enemy to whittle down
• Extra deadly didn't proc until the end of the game so by the time the big moment happened the encounter was winding down, but when it did proc it resulted in a double Structure/Stress
• On the GM side, there was never really a point where I was worried it would lose it's invis safety net, so I also think it is something to address with Ultra and Elite mesmerists
• On that note though, the recharge on Overwatch did feel really good on DM side, even if it led to having more tech attacks to be able to throw around

[vagrant grotto]

Thank you for the feedback! This bodes well for all the optionals yeah. How did they feel about the Charged profile’s damage?

[vagrant grotto]

Legitimately surprised by DimRaid and Mountebank being okay. Glad the Recharge on Overwatch felt good! I may cap off mirror image to 3 images to be completely honest, or make it binary…

Or reduce it to 1/tech attack or 1/round

Already planning to reduce the initial mirror images from 2 to 1 at least (if I haven’t already?)

[placid glacier]

When I used it initial mirror image was still 2 yeah, and once per round sounds right because the main kick in the teeth was the multiple activations I think

[placid glacier]

Felt suitablely threatening, but I also know that a damage nerf was in the pipeline

Players thought it was fine, but probably because the blows either missed initially or they had tools to mitigate some damage

[vagrant grotto]

My takeaways from the playtest:

• Capacitor gives out a lot of Overshield, hoo-wee
• Arc Feedback could be better with a slash to OS, removal of Recharge, and granting AP to the affected target's attacks (but only have the AP last as long as the OS or until the Capacitor uses Arc Feedback again)
• Amplifier Drone could stand to be +1 OS instead of +2, and maybe have some mechanism of moving it around but making it Limited 1 or Recharge 5+ or something (don't like the Limited 2)

Also:

• "Bomb Recon" has legs
• But there should be a "point of no return" where the bomb can no longer be disarmed and the arming characters can get outta dodge
• Also "Fail Forward" objective clocks are unnecessary for NPCs due to their sheer number

Also: Capacitor does NOT need 6 speed omg

It should have 5 max

[umbral sluice]

wait it had 6? that's insane

[placid glacier]

damn

[umbral sluice]

i assume that became a problem in the playtest?

[vagrant grotto]

It was a prominent strength to set up its lines

It does NOT need it

The arcing was absolutely necessary for it to be effectual

@muted blaze it was on a subset of the Bad Star map

[muted blaze]

Gaming

[placid glacier]

Hmm... Composition idea- capacitors, engineers, barricades, technicians (Liminal space)

Fortnite opfor

[muted blaze]

Did it work well did anyone notice any parts of the map that were broken

[vagrant grotto]

I personally loved it, I focused on the left side with all the fuel tanks. Made Bomb Deployment Zones next to four clusters of them

The size 4 walls and size 6 obstructions were great for cover and sniper perches

And it let the capacitors do their job with safety thanks to their Arcing

[muted blaze]

It's interesting how the maps can play out, since like, when using that map with preset rules, preset spawns and preset enemies will probs lead to the same areas being used 80% of the time

So by swapping up comp, rules, spawns and locations the same map can be totally different

[vagrant grotto]

I basically did a Recon layout yeah

[muted blaze]

One of the maps I wasn't happy with, it was too easy for the players. They had better sightlines, better los blockers and terrain that you could walk up like oversized stairs

Over 2 groups it occured both times

So I just... Swapped the spawns lmao

I'm curious how different that makes it

[umbral sluice]

Which map was that out of curiosity

[twin escarp]

I did just run a capacitor. I could see the arc feedback changes being nice

when it wasn't recharged it was mostly just locking on or boosting with it's other quick action

other notes from that session are that the hatchet is cool and fun. Napalm struggles to scramble onto an objective which is a fun weakness in the situations it's applicable i think.

[vagrant grotto]

Glad Hatchet is feeling good 😌

[twin escarp]

It was a great session all around

only negative note I have is that after running an ultra veteran demolisher with seeder grunts and an assassin with sap i think stun is an evil condition

but none of that is ppg-related

[vagrant grotto]

Oh yeah no that’s a lotta stun in one comp lol

I’m glad Kai’s rebake makes Assassin stun more interesting, and removes Stun mine from the Seeder equation

[twin escarp]

I did use other mines generally yeah

I used an elite demolisher before but it just kind of got stonewalled by all the control tools my party had at the time

so for this ultra vet i gave it Lead the Charge, Superior Frame, and Acrobat and wow that felt like bullshit

because acrobat is "After the Veteran move or Boosts" and Lead the Charge is "The Ultra can Boost." so it was so sticky

even to a party with 4, 6, 7, and 7 speed respectively

and superior frame just removes the counterplay with slow/immobilize

my orchis player managed to keep it preoccupied for most of the fight though which was kinda mvp behavior

[warm cedar]

Hi, nothing to say much more beside what has been already said earlier.

The Capacitor is overall okay I don't feel it can make things harder (tho 2 Capacitor on the Field might be a lot) maybe just 2 or 3 tiny things to tweak :
-A bit too fast, maybe lower the speed from 6 to 5 (or 4)
-Arc Feedback may give too much overshield at Tier 2 (lower by 1 would be enough I think)
-Same thing for the Amplifier Drone, you may want to give 2 Overshield to one allied character or 1 to every allied characters in the zone.

But beside that, I don't think the Capacitor is busted, I think it's pretty alright actually.

[muted blaze]

Lowest bidder work

Also, pink now 😎

[vagrant grotto]

I appreciate the feedback! One of my balancing goals is to make sure my NPCs feel good when there’s 2 or more on the battlefield, so the discussed tweaks should help rein it in

[vagrant grotto]

Proposed replacement for Capacitor's Arc Feedback:

Power Surge
System, Quick Tech
An allied character with OVERSHIELD within SENSORS becomes supercharged. Their weapon attacks gain AP until they lose all OVERSHIELD or until the Capacitor uses this action again.

High Voltage (Veteran)
Trait
Characters affected by Power Surge emit a Burst 2 area of electricity. Hostile characters that start their turn in the area or enter it for the first time in the round take 2 AP Energy damage.

[vagrant grotto]

Giving Quickening Bolt the same treatment. Also, changing Amplifier Drone so that it's no longer Limited, only affects the Capacitor's allies (instead of the Drone's allies), only boosts OS by +1, and only has 1 drone active at a time

Basically, the only way Capacitor is going to dispense OS now is via the Arquebus, and then it can supercharge some OS'd buddies in LOS

[ashen crown]

Do you think changing the Veteran Trait's phrasing to "Characters benefitting from Power Surge" may be better? Just to more explicitly tie the durations of the two effects together- it's a nitpicky thing but could prove useful as a point of clarification

[vagrant grotto]

sure

[ashen crown]

Folks are probably smart enough to know what "affected by" means, but when I first read it my brain skipped a beat and thought it was just when Power Surge activated

I figured it out quickly but it wasn't immediate is my point

[vagrant grotto]

"Allies benefitting from "

[ashen crown]

Perfect!

[vagrant grotto]

I'm looking at Capacitor and feeling a lot better about it now

I think the one last NPC I need to personally test is the Prism

and maybe pull out the Anchor, Hatchet, and Ghost again, for good measure

I was pretty happy with Occultist from the one outing I had with it tbqh

[ashen crown]

It'll probably be a couple months down the road unfortunately, but I am thinking about designing a custom "transition mission" for my group between Modules using a bunch of PPG NPCs

[vagrant grotto]

(I think Hatchet is doing fine, I just wanna enjoy its kit)

[ashen crown]

Mainly re-using my last playtest combat as one of the fights after refining it

(The one with Anchors and Vultures- this time with only one Anchor, a Veteran Specifically)

I'm really looking forward to using a Slingshot Anchor- with the right allies it looks like a nasty and fun as hell ability

But unless PPG gets finalized before then (making the data near useless but I'm still gonna do it), it's probably gonna be using a very different version of PPG than the current one

[granite saddle]

You just really hate armor, don't you ? /j

[vagrant grotto]

listen

[ashen crown]

CRB don't have a lot of them I guess

[granite saddle]

(not necessarily a problem, but certainly a pattern)

[vagrant grotto]

they're meant to be supplementary to CRB

[ashen crown]

Burn doesn't count, Shred is only half credit

[granite saddle]

Burn absolutely counts what do you mean ?

[vagrant grotto]

and let's be real I downgraded the shred on Arc Feedback here

Burn counts for sure though

[granite saddle]

(forgot that was there, yeah ok)

[ashen crown]

It has more counterplay and different math than regular AP is all I'm saying

[umbral sluice]

it has 2 and a half, to be precise

i say half because rainmaker has AP when consuming lock on

[granite saddle]

Still fucks over high-armor mechs/teams is my criteria

[ashen crown]

I guess if you count Burn + Shred that's Pyro, Hive, Scout, Sniper, Demolisher, a quarter of Scourer, Rainmaker technically, and I feel like I'm forgetting one or two more

So it's not a small number

[ashen crown]

Oh right Breacher and Berserker to a half degree

[umbral sluice]

aegis and breacher are burn

[ashen crown]

Aegis is Burn, Breacher isn't

[umbral sluice]

well breacher optional

thermal charge

breacher shotguns are shred

[vagrant grotto]

listen 7 out of my 13 NPCs have no AP/shred/burn in their base kit

[ashen crown]

I forgot about Thermal Charge after the Kai rebake

[umbral sluice]

i think rebake still has it

[ashen crown]

I'll need to check

[muted blaze]

But if that's the case that's what makes armour good

Thermal charge CRB does burn, rebake does burn and shred

[ashen crown]

Issue is with all possible player options, Armor is more of a "nice to have" thing than something you build around

You can't really build around it outside Forge-2 Subalterns and Sloped Plating

[muted blaze]

It isn't something gyou bbuild around but it's more than nice to have

It's a defensive choice

[ashen crown]

Fair enough I suppose

[granite saddle]

You build around it when you take sloped because of the Emperor on your team

[vagrant grotto]

Capacitor's AP is something you can play around at least. Power Surge ends when the OS goes away, so just shoot them

and Capacitor only grants 2/3/4 OS at a time now

3/4/5 if AmpDrone is in play

Hatchet's AP is constrained to Plasma Knife

[ashen crown]

Still, I think 50% of the NPC roster having AP is still within margins of "Armor Being Useful," as ridiculous as it sounds. It's when you tip past that that issues start to arise.

It's not like Invisibility where you specifically have to build into it (and thereby common anti-invis is kinda feelsbad)- most frames have armor.

[vagrant grotto]

Kensei is scary, I'll grant you that, that's the point though
Knight's Shredded is up for debate though

[ashen crown]

Are you worried about any playtest data potentially causing you to swap Knight's Shred for something else?

[vagrant grotto]

Prism's AP is only through its Projection at least? I could maybe consolidate it to the Lock On benefit

[vagrant grotto]

Potentially? But so far I've heard only good things about the Knight

like, it's been solid the past 4-5 versions

either it hasn't gotten feedback or the feedback has been positive

[ashen crown]

Yeah I've heard nothing bad about the Knight tbh

Apart from when Evergoal was a Veteran Feature instead of an Ultra feature

[vagrant grotto]

Occultist's one AP effect is Harvest Pyres optional dealing Burn
Torrent's one AP effect is its Scalding Greywash optional dealing burn

[ashen crown]

Every NPC can have a burn/shred/AP optional. As a treat.

[muted blaze]

Next playtest I need to just play Agimaxxed

See how that ggoes

[ashen crown]

I don't personally count optionals as part of "enemies that have AP" because it's so "your mileage may vary"

[vagrant grotto]

can't hurt, and maybe I'll throw Isa a bone and instate Maria's Overshield-based White Witch

[ashen crown]

I'm sure a strong majority of Lancer player's haven't seen every NPC feature in play

[vagrant grotto]

yeah no I agree, I'm just acknowledging it exists

Capacitor's new Veteran trait will also deal AP but it's a rider on an effect that already grants AP (Power Surge) and can be shot off

but that's mostly because

1. I wanted the damage to be something all folks had to consider
2. I didn't want the damage to be high enough to reach over Armor because then it would massacre folks without Armor

so, 2 AP damage! it's just a little ping, a little guy!

the playtest from yesterday was:

• Elite Sentinel
• Seeder
• Veteran Sniper
• Capacitor
• Assassin

so like, yeah there's some anti-armor there, I'll give you that, valid, but Seeder and Sentinel still had to respect armor at least.... And the Capacitor changes will rip out the Shredded effect and constrain the AP to one guy at a time

[muted blaze]

Bloodies the lich

[vagrant grotto]

Lich knew what it was signing up for

also, it's Lich! what does it care!

[umbral sluice]

it can just soul vessel it smh

[muted blaze]

Last session I had a narrative combat in a mech wrestler fighting ring, there was a lich and basically every attack the PC made ended with "Killing the pilot instantly!"

[vagrant grotto]

hell if it doesn't kill the Lich, the Lich can just say "yeah I take it"

my design mission is accomplished IMO

[ashen crown]

If it becomes a bit much I'd rather you change the damage trigger to ending a turn in the area rather than sack the AP

[vagrant grotto]

I'm okay with Starting Turn ping when you can shoot the thing to peel it off instead of walking away

[ashen crown]

Only if it becomes too much- doesn't seem like it will

[vagrant grotto]

but yeah every playtest I get with these NPC chucklefucks is proving helpful

[muted blaze]

Playtest good

[vagrant grotto]

every iteration results in a more pleasing shape

a more elegant weapon, for a more civilized age

[muted blaze]

One of the saddest things about playtests I think is a weakness in lancer's greatest strength in NPC design

How modular they are

You can't test all 5 optionals, the NPC, it on a regular, grunt, vet, elite or ultra all in one

😔

[vagrant grotto]

True, or the combinations thereof

[muted blaze]

Yeah

[vagrant grotto]

benefit of Modern Tactical RPGs is the NPC group

[muted blaze]

It'll probably take a while to find out... IDK Kensei is actually really OP as a spacer

[vagrant grotto]

You get Hobgoblin soldier, Hobgoblin crossbower, Hobgoblin magekiller, Hobgoblin dirgecaller

[muted blaze]

Oh god I said that as a joke

[vagrant grotto]

someone ran Kensei as Spacer with Grav Rifle recently actually

[umbral sluice]

can it use gravity rifle before the sheathed sword

[vagrant grotto]

I think it worked out for them

[muted blaze]

Fun fact, if you barrage with a non SH ordnance weapon, the ordnance weapon can be second in the attack order

[muted blaze]

Spacer gaming

[umbral sluice]

yep! it's pretty good

oh also Al, complements from my players for the maps, they seem to be big fans

[vagrant grotto]

Honestly Gravity Rifle + Charged Saber barrage is probably fine. Gotta

1. Hit with the Gravity Rifle
2. They fail their Hull Save vs. Gravity Rifle
3. Hit with Charged Saber
4. Suffer without Sheathe for a round

[muted blaze]

Yeah

[vagrant grotto]

Al deserves lots of money for their maps, they're so fucking good

[muted blaze]

Also that

I mean, as I LOVE comparing Kensei's to demolishers

Spacer demolishers is probably as bad or worse

[umbral sluice]

you know it's real shit when the official IGF thread has them pinned

[vagrant grotto]

I've been trying to use Czepeku maps and while they look good their scaling is fucky wucky sometimes and I can't go Gridless and still use THT

and I canNOT figure out how Terrain Mapper works, for the life of me

[umbral sluice]

i mean is it? demos are superheavy so i dont think its quite the same

[muted blaze]

Tru

[vagrant grotto]

Spacer demolisher Grav Rifles you then grapples you

better telegraph probably

but Kensei is getting a damage nerf anyway so

[muted blaze]

Point is, some enemies are just gonna be better with certain templates than others, and it isn't on the NPC for that to be a problem. If I see a spacer Kensei, I will shit myself and not complain to Valk after the combat for how busted it is

[umbral sluice]

yeah feels like you have more counterplay

points at Operator with any crit bonus damage trait

[vagrant grotto]

I have no doubt you'll live 😄

[muted blaze]

Eh

I have a 50% survival rate with Kensei's

[vagrant grotto]

2 data points is not enough data lol

[muted blaze]

Yep lmao

I'm being biased for the sake of being a lil bitch, not because I have anything to actually say about it lmao

[vagrant grotto]

you need like, 30 data points or you gotta use a t-distribution which is a lot more imprecise

me recalling my stats class from high school

[muted blaze]

Unfortunately we don't have 30 playtests 😔

Yet 😏

[vagrant grotto]

👏 get 👏 on 👏 it 👏 fam 👏

[muted blaze]

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

I mean act 1 of my campaign finished...

So I'm not running Lancer for a WHILE

[vagrant grotto]

MIRROR IMAGE    Trait, 1/round
The Mesmerist deploys with 1 mirror image occupying its space. In addition, 1/round when the Mesmerist hits with a tech attack, it creates 1 mirror image (to a maximum of 3). The Mesmerist is INVISIBLE while it has any mirror images, but each attack that misses the Mesmerist destroys 1 mirror image.

Ultra Mesmerist is getting a lil nerf

and regular mesmerist I suppose

reducing stacking from 5 to 3 and limiting image generation to 1/round

honestly when the biggest issue is numbers, that's a good sign

[muted blaze]

Mesmerist weird... (Not a bad thing)

Just conceptually... Like, will be bodied by an aux spam which is cool, and if it keeps up it's mirror images and the PCs rely on big single hits... Like... That isn't much worse than a specter??? Which is honestly fine...

[ashen crown]

What about Gravity Rifle -> Sheathe Blade?

[vagrant grotto]

what about it

[vagrant grotto]

I am happy to give AuxSpammers a Defender NPC that won't wall them for once

[muted blaze]

(Ignore my ||ultra veteran pyro|| that was killed by a revolver spam Raleigh)

[vagrant grotto]

like legit if Armor is too much on Knight, Anchor, and Prism, I might reconsider given the sheer amount of Armor bandied about in the defenderspace

I admit I was going on vibes, and that's dangerous

Lancer NPCs being balanced on vibes does not make it any less dangerous

[umbral sluice]

did someone have shred?

[muted blaze]

No

They just rolled well occasionally, hit their shots, killed with their heart and roland chamber

[umbral sluice]

holy shit

[dapper goblet]

It was me!

It didn't come up much because those bastards kept passing their saves (kensei save target keeps this combo in check unironically) but whoo boy

When it pops it pops

[granite saddle]

Rebake Aegis my beloved

Between that and the Mesmerist, it's almost like auxspamming is actually a viable strategy !

[ashen crown]

Hey yeah, rebake Aegis and Mesmerist kinda do have the same "misses generate penalty" mechanic (just like how the ocean and the sky are blue)

[muted blaze]

Blasting an aegis with an AOE is always fun

[umbral sluice]

rebake makes Aegis more like Big Sal and I love Big Sal

[vagrant grotto]

anyway, v1.11 is incoming

I changed Allied Arcing btw

now you need LOS to the ally that has LOS to the target

[granite saddle]

Would "you can draw LoS from allied characters you have LoS to" be a good way to phrase it or does that bring up problems somehow ?

[vagrant grotto]

maybe??? idk

I can reword

Current wording:

“This weapon can be fired over obstacles, usually by lobbing a projectile in an arc. Attacks made with this weapon don’t require you to have line of sight, as long as an allied character in line of sight has line of sight to the target and it’s possible to trace a path from you to the target; however, they are still affected by cover.”

lemme try a different wording then

"This weapon can be fired over obstacles, usually by lobbing a projectile in an arc. You can draw line of sight with this weapon from allies to whom you have line of sight. However, cover is still determined between you and the target."

[granite saddle]

That's a whole lot clearer imo, and more concise

So if you're good with it I'd say use that one

[ashen crown]

What about using the wording Anchor’s Slingshot uses?

Oh wait this is very different now that I’m seeing what it says oops

[vagrant grotto]

I might reword the last sentence to "However, this doesn't affect the origin of the attack for the purposes of cover"

to cover whataboutisms about Blast templates and the like

[granite saddle]

Maybe also "for any purpose, including cover" or something similar (and better worded) for backblast-type effects and the like

There's only one of those in official content and it doesn't have arcing, sure, but hey, maybe you still want to add something of the sort what do I know

[ashen crown]

There’s “this weapon has Arcing against targets within allies’ line of sight” or smthn but that’s probably less clear/concise than the most recent idea

[vagrant grotto]

"for other purposes, including cover"

[ashen crown]

Question which message is that referring to?

[vagrant grotto]

this one @ashen crown

[vagrant grotto]

and yes this is very different

Update to 1.11!

[muted blaze]

On the topic of "Valk was here" "AP" on power surge

[vagrant grotto]

that was what prompted the meme yeah

[muted blaze]

just had an idea if it needs changing in the future... Could go the opposite way? Lightning arcs or something 1/action to nearby characters?

[vagrant grotto]

I thought about the arcing lightning and decided it was less overhead to do it this way

[muted blaze]

Valid

I was just thinking of "how can you power up attacks without making it AP"

[vagrant grotto]

I did the change to High Voltage to do the arcing lightning thing

[muted blaze]

Add reliable lmao

[vagrant grotto]

and yeah no I get it but also I hate little damage pings

they're a pain to track

It’d be great if there was a way to just push a damage button to chat to have anybody push it

Or if Lancer had Splash Damage support like pathfinder 2e

[umbral sluice]

i wonder how lancer would feel if pf2e splash damage was how AoE attacks were done

[vagrant grotto]

I know lancer was cribbing 4e AOE attack notes but yeah it frankly makes shit funky when saves also exist

[umbral sluice]

what was 4e AoE like?

i assume just what lancer does right?

[vagrant grotto]

Basically yeah

Everything was an attack roll, zero saves except as a flat d20 roll as duration tool

[ashen crown]

Is that… not what Burst does?

[umbral sluice]

i could see some people preferring that kind of style, it's valid methinks. although i am a sucker for the exploiting weak save gameplay of pf2e

[ashen crown]

Wait I actually donate know what Splash Damage is in this context (in general I kinda do I just feel like in this context I don’t)

[umbral sluice]

in pathfinder 2e, splash damage weapons/spells are when you hit a target, it does a smaller amount of damage to all adjacent characters, i think in this context it was about the foundry automation it has

[steel apex]

not a value judgement but an explanation: the reason 4E handled everything as an attack roll was specifically because in 3.X D&D (and PF1E) exploiting weak saves was by far a predominant strategy that rapidly outstripped the value of attacks, and frequently didn't justify itself otherwise

you still HAD ways to fish for weaknesses, but it was usually by utilizing things that targeted different defenses rather than "I will cast glitterdust and render this encounter irrelevant"

[velvet cairn]

Yesterday's was a fun game, but i'm glad that the capacitor is getting a little kick in the legs

Lil' guy 2speedy to line up the perfect arquebus shot.

[steel apex]

so like the way lancer has Evasion and E-Defense, 4E has Armor Class, then it had Fortitude, Reflex, and Will as defenses

and different abilities might target different defenses, which depending on the enemy could often be substantially higher or lower

[umbral sluice]

Yeah pathfinder 2e keeps that part, though most AoE stuff does saves and single target stuff like athletics maneuvers sometimes hits a static defence number instead

Though that is an interesting insight on why 4e is that way

Thank you Kai

[vagrant grotto]

Yeah, it’s weird to decide where to draw the line on who rolls the d20

[steel apex]

I'll be honest, I even think Lancer's implementation of saves is really only sort of born aloft by how that hooks into things like Jammed, Invisible, etc, like it resides largely on the back of the fact that there's stuff in Lancer that cares about "attacks" as a thing that can get stymied or prevented, and thus they have a niche made for them as a thing that can be done in spite of that. If it wasn't really for that, I'm not sure it would be some huge downgrade to just have everything work via to-hit rolls

[vagrant grotto]

Like I don’t think anything is being done “wrong” in any of these cases per se, only that it affects how the rest of the system resolves stuff in unexpected ways, sometimes

[vagrant grotto]

No, PF2E Splash damage is a kind of “on miss” damage for the main target and tack-on damage for adjacent targets

Mostly learned it from watching our Alchemist carry us with Quick Bomber

[umbral sluice]

God remastered alchemist is awesome

[vagrant grotto]

Night and day, we transitioned to remaster partway through our Outlaws of Alkenstar campaign

[umbral sluice]

Man I want to play more pf2e now my regular game is on hiatus because of irl stuff

The eternal ttrpg struggle

[ashen crown]

Considering how Int and Charisma saves in 5E are now easy ways to render a lot of enemies helpless… yeah I see why that was done. Also makes me appreciate Lancer prioritizing Attack Rolls over Saves most of the time, and how HASE at the very least makes the distribution a bit more fair and failing saves a little less “you lose immediately”

[vagrant grotto]

But yeah, in any case: feeling good about the v1.11 changes. Major Topics of testing now are:

• Reworked Capacitor
• Mesmerist post-nerfs
• Kensei post-nerfs
• Zealot (more info on Fanatical Charge rework)
• Ghost (now with tech mirroring instead of condition mirroring)
• Vulture gamefeel
• Anchor gamefeel
• Anything Anomaly or Brigand
• Any Veteran or Ultra features

And I’m personally gonna test the Prism and Hatchet myself soon

[velvet cairn]

Don't there exist some really obnoxious System saves that tell the player hit:

"Save this or hope your friends save you, because there's nothing you can do?"

Iirc, Specter and Drain Systems as an example.

[ashen crown]

I said a little less I never said 0

[placid glacier]

been waiting on running my Sepulcher encounter for this week so I got some anomalies in the pipe

Anomaly Veteran Vulture [Systems Boost] (Grapplescrapper, Mag Bomb, Chronotorus)

Anomaly Elite Commander Goliath (Power Knuckle, Coercive Force, Spatial Rend, Military Discipline)

2x Anomaly Kensei (One with Posture Break, One with 40mm Hand Cannon. Both have Local Climate [Extreme Cold])

[vagrant grotto]

Arcing thoughts this morning:

• Allied Arcing may just be too fiddly to be worthwhile
• considering the value of just, auto-applying Hard Cover or Invis (a la Phase Ready) to targets to whom you lack line of sight, regardless of AOE template
  • Lotus Projector and Invis-killers then get extra value for Arcing users
  • but then arcing weapons player side may need an accuracy bump to match? I don’t know

[foggy wadi]

Mortars would really suffer from that, with them being Inaccurate right out the gate

[ashen crown]

GMS blast arcing in general tbh

[muted blaze]

I think allied arcing is already a good change but due to the map size you run on it somewhat skews it...

It comes up in practice but so far the enemies have more LOS because they have more bodies

Like these changes will heavily effect weapon balance when allied arcing will be more limiting on players then NPCs

But also like... Due to how soft cover works off hard cover, if there's hard cover in between but no one is next to it both targets have soft cover so most the time with arcing they have soft cover anyway in my cases... Then blast and line/napalm throw that off but they have an innate accuracy anyway

Applying invis will just, make me not use arcing

[umbral sluice]

Agreed here, I'd just not bother with it tbh, same went for phase ready until I found the errata for it

Invis is just kind of frustrating as a mechanic imo, but that could be just me

Granted I haven't actually seen allied arcing in play much (little arcing on either side in my game so far) so take my words with a grain of salt

[muted blaze]

Invis is frustrating but IMO it's fine because it's moderated and can be built around

[umbral sluice]

True

And not many things actually have easy access to invis, I think it's only Mirage, Scout, Op and Spectre

Yes I know Witch but that's during her turn so I count it less

[ashen crown]

Oh also Bombard cannon

[ashen crown]

Phase-Ready already exists for example

[vagrant grotto]

Yeah what I was musing over was “what if arcing was just errata’d phase ready minus ignoring cover”

Like, if you can’t see the target visually, they’re literally treated as invisible

And this is offset by Arcing weapons often being AOE

I don’t know I’m thinking about it

But also: I don’t like “ignoring line of sight” to be easy

So that’s just on my mind

Like what happens if everybody has RAW arcing or seeking, what does the game look like

How does the positioning play, if at all

[umbral sluice]

not fun, would be my guess

even just one person with seeking, in my experience, is just so uninteractive

[vagrant grotto]

I’m asking genuinely but not optimistically

[umbral sluice]

"oh i'll block LOS" seeking
"oh i'll get cover" seeking
"oh i'll use blind" seeking
has been my experience with it tbh

[muted blaze]

I'm fine with arcing because not many things grant it, it doesn't ignore cover and there's no ways to get it outside of a weapon having it

I don't like seeking because it already ignores LOS, ignoring cover is just boring... And because nanocomp exists it's easily accessible

[umbral sluice]

yeah about half of my issue with seeking is just Nanocomp being a thing

[umbral sluice]

also minor asterisk: you can use Walking Armoury for arcing iirc, but only main so it's specific

[ashen crown]

Making it so that Blast doesn’t ignore the LoS nonsense would probably be enough tbh

And maybe errata-ing Nanocomp

Seeking has a place imo, but it needs to be earned

Smartgun wouldn’t be nearly as good as it is without Seeking for example, and it definitely wouldn’t be worth 2 SP

And while investing 2 SP + taking 2 ranks in Balor is a big investment, if Phase-Ready is also right there then maybe it is too easy

[muted blaze]

I got bored and made a build I might play in a future playtest

The mech itself is called "the type of mech that if my players used against me I'd have an aneurysm"

[vagrant grotto]

Yeah I’m coming up on the same conclusion tbh

There’s no Arcing mod outside of a generous interpretation of Walking Armory

[muted blaze]

And like, ignoring cover on... A range 10 rifle is fine? It does 1d6 damage anyway

And reliable 2

[vagrant grotto]

I’m split between wanting to know but also wanting to be surprised

[muted blaze]

Longer range than that mains exist but it isn't too game breaking unlike a long range heavy or sheavy that ignores cover

[vagrant grotto]

Thinking harder on arcing yeah it seems like it’s appropriately accounted for in most cases

[muted blaze]

I'd probably hate playing it even if it's effective

[vagrant grotto]

Aight I gotta know now

[muted blaze]

But long story short, I believe the +2 evasion CB doesn't need to be orchis lite with the rebakes in effect...

So I'm gonna see if I can abuse that whilst I can

[vagrant grotto]

Yeah no that’s fair

[muted blaze]

Wait I could make it worse

...

I should make it worse...

[umbral sluice]

Dew it

[ashen crown]

There’s Marathon Arc Bow and Veil Rifle

[muted blaze]

Ah yeah

I think those are probs the best uses for them

Marathan arc bow definitely

[muted blaze]

I didn't make it worse

[velvet cairn]

So i tried the Vet Anomaly Anchor

and things got really hilarious

as it turns out

having what is puppet systems 1 that is turbocharged while allowing you to either send pcs into a really bad position/save allies from certain death is something that opens up alot of playmaking potential on the GM side

will report more, as well as what the players strategy in response to it is

[ashen crown]

Question: Which trait are you referring to as Super Puppet Systems?

[velvet cairn]

"Swap the position of all objects and terrain within the areas, teleporting them to the other's spaces, or if occupied, as close as possible."

[ashen crown]

That doesn't include characters

Which I believe is intentional

[velvet cairn]

well shit

i need to go apologies to the players

[ashen crown]

IF it included characters it'd be absolutely stupid as just an Anomaly trait

Teleport groups of people up to range 40 from where they were

Maybe it could get away with being a bespoke Ultra trait but even then

[muted blaze]

Realm warp would be very funny if I could easily create tiles from a screenshot and screenshot that chunk of the map and swap them

[ashen crown]

God I wish

[velvet cairn]

i guess i'll run an engineer in the next sitrep then
and see how viable dumping groups of turrets into people's faces are

[ashen crown]

Still characters

[muted blaze]

^

[ashen crown]

Do this with a Barricade, or Seeder if you could Mines as Objects

[velvet cairn]

What about Prism's projector

[muted blaze]

Placed things from NPCs are either:

• Drones (characters)
• Deployables (Objects)
• Mines (mines)

[ashen crown]

That's not a thing

It's just kinda another space the Prism occupies

If you tried to force move the Projector, the effect would just transfer to the Prism

And the Prism is a character

[velvet cairn]

Hmm
guess that leaves the knight and it's banner/evergaol then

[ashen crown]

I don't think the Evergoal is a targetable thing either

[velvet cairn]

It's a deployable

[ashen crown]

Nevermind

[velvet cairn]

but i'm trying to think of the interaction where

the gaol is sent halfway across the map

what would happen to the knight and it's duel partner

since it says

"The knight and it's duel opponent cannot leave the area"

[muted blaze]

I'd say they can move anywhere but once they enter it they cannot move out again

Or I'd say "Hey valk, you should probs make this deployable immune to movement or teleportation"

[ashen crown]

Yeah nothing in the Gaol text says it is immune to involuntary movement

So even without Realm Warp nothing is stopping someone from just grappling it or ramming it

[muted blaze]

The targets being intangible

[vagrant grotto]

Yes there is: You can’t ram or grapple objects (you must lift or drag them)

[ashen crown]

Fair- still should probably account for that because there are other ways to force move objects, including your custom lifting and dragging rules

[vagrant grotto]

But also: if the seal moves then they stop being intangible

There you go

Like I could add a “voluntarily” in front of the leave I guess

[ashen crown]

That's what I was thinking

The concern is mainly the "cannot leave the area" part

[vagrant grotto]

Or I could make the seal immobile

[velvet cairn]

them losing intangible is accounted for

my concern/question was with the first part
because some part of me who read it literally thought that the people inside would be schrodingered over to the new seal location

[ashen crown]

Tbh this doesn't seem like the type of thing you'd want to be able to move

[muted blaze]

OR tbh it could be funny counter play

[vagrant grotto]

This is partly where I’m at

[muted blaze]

"Hey we're having a duel here"
TSS Zheng: WElp rents past due

[ashen crown]

IT just feels too easy compared to just destroying it

[vagrant grotto]

This is also fair

Anything can boost up, grab it, and walk away

[muted blaze]

Yeah, 25 health VS pick it up and leave is a bit disconnected

[vagrant grotto]

“Place an immovable gaol seal” done

[muted blaze]

If it's moved and say the target is

[vagrant grotto]

Added to bug tracker

[muted blaze]

Ah that fixes it

Hmmm

Prospector

😩

[vagrant grotto]

But yeah realm warp is only so much

[vagrant grotto]

Seal is not terrain

Prospector only harms terrain

Y’all

[muted blaze]

Ah sick

DD288 Stays winning

[vagrant grotto]

The Devil’s in the details

[muted blaze]

Terrain and deployables share the same headspace for me

[ashen crown]

There's also Siege Spec 1 I suppose

[muted blaze]

"objects"

[vagrant grotto]

This is fine

Siege spec stays winning

[muted blaze]

Like, it takes multiple, anything made to pop objects is effective but won't be one and done

[vagrant grotto]

Zheng must be busted at your table lol (wrong reply)

“I destroy the floor and move 3 spaces”

[muted blaze]

The duel gets interrupted as the two targets randomly appear in a melted pile of burning apocalypse rail dust

[muted blaze]

No 😩

I just count the floor as not

[vagrant grotto]

“I destroy the hill and move 3 spaces”

[velvet cairn]

"Did we get Isekai'ed to Fallout"

[ashen crown]

I mean it does say "Object or piece of terrain."

[muted blaze]

"No, that's my buddy. They just gave your flag 100 AP Explosive"

[vagrant grotto]

I am boo-boo the fool

[velvet cairn]

Ok, fr

i guess since evergoal is meant to be immovable

time to see how good using realmwarp to send knight banners to the front lines is a go

[ashen crown]

Then again depending on the GM "the floor" might occupy a similar space to mines as just "something else entirely"

[muted blaze]

I'd persoannly say the floor is just the bottom of the map and exists

[ashen crown]

Specifically because you can't go outside the height 10 band a map is contained in without being effectively removed from combat, so if you're a real stickler anything below height 0 might count as that

[umbral sluice]

Secret Third Thing

[muted blaze]

I mean, if my apoc rail blasts a map, as cool as a blast 2 crater beingg left would be... No

[ashen crown]

That's what the burn terrain is for

[muted blaze]

Ya

[ashen crown]

TSS 1 supports that fact by stating "the floor" as a separate thing than "adjacent object or piece of terrain"

[muted blaze]

TSS1 floor pulling I think works like how a L4D2 tank takes rocks from the floor lol

[vagrant grotto]

Speaking of which, I’ve been inspired to rework a few Long Rim mechs and their equipment

My biggest gripe with Long Rim content is how several pieces of player content introduce a LOT of decision points as effectively free actions, thus slowing down the game for what amounts to tactical bookkeeping

So I’m taking a crack at a few offenders and seeing if the results are anything

Zheng
    • Increase speed to 4
    • Merge Xiaoli’s Tenacity with Destructive Swings
        ○ After making a melee attack vs a hostile character, choose between making a piece of terrain adjacent to that character or destroying a piece of terrain next to them. Destroying works like Xiaoli’s Tenacity
        ○ CP: Melee attacks gain knockback; if Destructive Swings destroys an object/terrain, all affected characters are shredded until the end of their next turn

Caliban
    • Increase speed to 4
    • Replace Pursue Prey and Slam with “Follow Through”
    • Follow Through:
        ○ 1/round, when the Caliban would inflict knockback as part of any action, it can move an equal number of spaces towards the same target by the most direct route possible. This movement is part of the same action, ignores engagement, and doesn’t provoke reactions. If the target would be knocked into an obstruction that would stop its movement, they must pass a Hull save or take 1d6 kinetic damage and become Impaired until the end of their next turn.

These Zheng and Caliban changes are me pointing out that these mechs have super small Speeds justified by huge mobility traits. Except those traits either have no limit or are capable of achieving an arbitrarily high limit in certain situations EDIT: AND each “activation” of those traits is another free action decision point to eat turn time

So I buff the speed and try to consolidate the mobility traits into stuff they’re already doing

[umbral sluice]

out of curiosity: are these changes implemented in the playtests happening here?

[vagrant grotto]

Potentially soon

These are napkin writings at the moment

But yeah my goal here isn’t to “nerf” the Zheng and Caliban here, it’s to reduce the number of given decision points they have each turn so their turns flow faster

[muted blaze]

So

[vagrant grotto]

“Caliban for dummies” so to speak

[muted blaze]

From experience, I think Zheng isn't too bad

BUT

Core power says otherwise

[vagrant grotto]

Zheng CP drives me up a wall yeah

And the Zheng too

[umbral sluice]

personally i've never really had that problem with Caliban tbh, but zheng i can agree on

[muted blaze]

Zheng core goes through the wall you're being driven up

[umbral sluice]

though i can see how a newer player would get tripped up a lot

[muted blaze]

Remembers to not abbreviate core power

[vagrant grotto]

I’ve seen enough Caliban play to know I’d like them more at speed 4 and a committal movement option

[muted blaze]

I think the casual case for both aren't bad but the extremes are horrendous

[umbral sluice]

HAAAANK

HAAANK DONT ABBREVIATE CORE POWER

[muted blaze]

Asquared's Caliban with demolisher and knockback grenades

[vagrant grotto]

Ah hell is this a dogwhistle, fuck

[muted blaze]

Dog whistle?

Ah

[vagrant grotto]

I can’t remember oh

Never mind

I remember now

[muted blaze]

Yeah

[umbral sluice]

yeah

famous tweet about cyberpunk or something

but anyway, i am very curious to see how these changes work out

[vagrant grotto]

And yeah my goal here is to preserve the casual but curtail the horrendous

[umbral sluice]

i do see your point in that, Zheng core power turns are infamous for taking ages

[vagrant grotto]

I wanted to lean into the Zheng’s terrain destruction by making it fuckin hurt

[umbral sluice]

oh lord how will i deal with that when my igf game hits LL2, i dont know, but maybe at that point this version will be in a good state and i can propose it because it's simpler

[muted blaze]

I wonder if you could reduce the core by making it a one off and efficient or something

[vagrant grotto]

Like punch someone so hard they hit a rock and it explodes into eviscerating shrapnel

[muted blaze]

Wait bonus points

Zheng might... not have antisynergy with its own superheavy

[muted blaze]

https://tenor.com/view/torgue-explosions-borderlands-gaming-game-gif-16537893

[vagrant grotto]

See? This approach has legs! 😄

[muted blaze]

So if trying to stick to the originnal identity as possible I'm curious how much 1/action would work on pursue prey

(Random ideas)

[umbral sluice]

anything to make dd288 on zheng good

[vagrant grotto]

Probably very similarly

[umbral sluice]

please i need it

[vagrant grotto]

Punch them into a rock, it explodes for Shredded + 1d6 + Dd288 damage

Like, a Fomorian Zheng vs a Demolisher could do some damage there

[muted blaze]

One of the things I worry about playtests with cool features

Is how many cool features can be implemented before you're quite distant from other playtest data because the game has strayed quite far

It's one of the worries about talentless hack I have

[vagrant grotto]

It’s certainly a concern! But I console myself with “this is for my table and I wanna have fun with it”

[muted blaze]

Fair

[vagrant grotto]

Usability for other tables may be affected yeah, I can’t argue there

[muted blaze]

I'm curious if it's worth turning some house rules on and some off at points when it comes to features

[vagrant grotto]

Probably for some! But also, there’s some RAW features that I honestly think aren’t worth balancing around

[muted blaze]

[vagrant grotto]

ASURA HMG Everest exists, but I’m not gonna balance around that

So some of these house rules are me saying “this is the power level that I’m willing to balance around”

Because for something like Zheng it can cut both ways

“Zheng stomps this because it’s able to explode all rocks around it”

But on the other hand

“This is too mean to Zheng because it inflicts Slowed”

Hyperbole but you get my gist

Honestly better case in point is the RAW structure damage table imo; did the PC die to my Kensei or did it die to a bad structure damage roll

If I didn’t have that rule then I think the damage profile of Kensei would be a lot more muddled

“It’s fine it’s just the structure damage table”

[muted blaze]

Oh eyah deffo

[vagrant grotto]

Vs “no, that’s on me fam, my b”

[muted blaze]

And like, the Brairos (?) frame CB change in your house rule doc (Marias change) is much better vanilla than in say, Maria or your structure house rules

(I still find this playtest very funny)

[vagrant grotto]

Exposed: Not Even Once

[umbral sluice]

what the hell happened here

[vagrant grotto]

I think Maria and I had convergent design on Briareos though

Not that it matters much tbf

[vagrant grotto]

Exposed + Charged Kensei Slash

[muted blaze]

L + Pyro + White hot flames vet optional + Self heat build + Kensei + Charged slash + 3 Armour + 14 AP Kinetic + Exposed

[umbral sluice]

holy shit

[vagrant grotto]

Kai’s rebake pyro slaps, relatedly

[umbral sluice]

TRUE

pyro might just be my favourite rebake

but it's fighting with operator

(though that last one is skewed by a hatred of core operator)

[ashen crown]

I do think it’d be more fun- not necessarily good just fun- if the Zheng Core Power modified the placement and removal of terrain.

[vagrant grotto]

So like add a rider to the Create Terrain part of destructive swings?

Because I could see that

[ashen crown]

Ye

Like, idk, knocking characters into terrain created in the same turn brings back the +2 damage from OG Tenacity

To spitball something

[vagrant grotto]

I’m not really about nickel and dime damage effects

[ashen crown]

Fair

[vagrant grotto]

I’d sooner say “if you create terrain, impair the target until the start of their turn” or something

Off balance from the floor getting ripped up around them

[ashen crown]

That sounds good. my thought process is when you have a core power that lasts the scene and requires a modification to decision making, players are always gonna wanna optimize their turns to maximize effectiveness, which is part of the fun. If only the destroy part has an additional rider, then the incentive to make terrain gets penalized

Impair is a good one, tho save against prone or slowing also work within the themes, albeit while being more disruptive

It leans into the fact that Zheng is a controller even though it pretends not to be

[vagrant grotto]

Part of the initial pass was also emphasizing the Destructive part of the swings rather than the creative part, too

[ashen crown]

That‘s also fair

[vagrant grotto]

The payoff is blowing up the terrain, but in a pinch you can create it to setup instead

[ashen crown]

The destroy part is always gonna be more appealing since it does Damage + Knockback, but the core power shouldn’t make the difference even bigger imo otherwise it’s gonna feel bad if you ever end up “forced” to use it while Core Active

[vagrant grotto]

True, but remember this is on the frame that gets TSS1 in license

If you need on demand terrain, it’s there

[muted blaze]

Could core power just do both?

Create AND destroy but cannot do the same

[vagrant grotto]

I mean that’s what I’m proposing it does baseline

Destructive swings I mean

The Core power question is just “which part(s) should it enhance”

[muted blaze]

I mean like

With the core power it isn't do X or Y, it becomes X AND Y, and X is buffed

[vagrant grotto]

Got it

Well, that basically means that 1/round you deal 1d6 damage in a ring, no questions asked

Because you make the thing and then immediately destroy it

[umbral sluice]

for a core active? that's probably fine no?

though they are infamously hard to balance, core actives

[vagrant grotto]

The reason I don’t like it is because it removes the need for terrain placement

It obviates the original dynamic instead of feeding more deeply into it

[umbral sluice]

hmm you make a good point

[vagrant grotto]

So yeah I think the loop I’d want is to have the Zheng continuously drive the opponent into existing terrain; if they need extra in a pinch, they can create it or TSS1 it

But if you corral the opponent well, you can conserve your Quick Action and damage feature

[ashen crown]

Bring back the movement element of tenacity and make terrain placement involve free movement?

THe thing about this version of Destructive Swings is that in order to reduce the amount of actions necessary to keep placing terrain to destroy, you need to be on the move constantly in order to keep up the loop. Without any core power this should be a build and strategy challenge, but with the Core Active, that immediate movement can more hastily move enemies that are grappled (can't boost while grappling in a Zheng after all) as well as move into new groups of enemies more easily, but since it's terrain placement it's focusing all in on the setup element rather than mixing setup and payoff

[vagrant grotto]

This is why I boost the speed to 4

If not 5

[ashen crown]

Fair enough

[ashen crown]

5 would make sense tbh, even if it makes Zheng a "Tortuga but sucks at computers instead of speed"

[vagrant grotto]

Tenacity already must obey Engagement and trigger reactions; we have that already at home, it’s called Standard Move and Boost

[ashen crown]

It has sensors 3, so it has little to nothing to do outside range 3 or even range 5 if you assume it always has TSS 1

[muted blaze]

Make it so the made stuff can't be crushed in the turn made?

[ashen crown]

I think the Impair idea is enough

[vagrant grotto]

sure, but this does mean that it introduces amother decision point

[ashen crown]

If adding impair it's still gonna be less preferable than destruction most of the time but it's gonna make the gulf between Creation and Destruction remain somewhat constant for with and without Core Power rather than just increasing the gulf when Core Power is active

Plus it leans into what Cover does- protect you from attacks. Here, it'll be in melee as well as at range

[vagrant grotto]

Aight. I can get that

I’m not supremely compelled to balance “both sides” of this otherwise

[ashen crown]

It's just about keeping the gap constant rather than removing it outright imo

[vagrant grotto]

Right, I mean I’m not compelled to maintain the gap width otherwise

[ashen crown]

Fair enough

[vagrant grotto]

But I can understand how this would be how Xiaoli shifts into using the terrain as a defensive tool

A stance change if you will

[ashen crown]

Oh that's a much better way of thinking about it yeah

[vagrant grotto]

She’s being a scrappy survivor

This is how she’d keep her mech alive

[ashen crown]

This new Destructive Swings also has the benefit of allowing you to TSS 1 terrain you made in the same turn, which wasn't possible in OG Zheng

Which is a neat thing I like to be clear

And also doesn't really do much mechanically, I just like it

[vagrant grotto]

Thematic victory

Anyway, I also have Atlas thoughts and how I’d revisit my existing house rules for it

But that’s still a nebulous thing I’m trying to nail down

[ashen crown]

My one note on Atlas is I don't think it earned Exposed Reactor

[vagrant grotto]

The grand question is “what the hell does Atlas actually want to do”

[ashen crown]

That's kinda it

[vagrant grotto]

Does it want to

1. Hide
2. Ram
3. Grapple

Hide is often described as the way to survive as Atlas but its own damage trait wants it to Ram

[ashen crown]

I think Ramming and Hiding are able to coexist, as well as Grappling and Ramming, but Grappling and Hiding are at odds with each other

Plus Grappling disables it's Jager Dodge

[vagrant grotto]

And Grapple has anti synergy with Jäger Dodge

[ashen crown]

yeah that

To be fair Atlas has 3 ways to knock people prone in its equipment, but that's specifically its equipment

[vagrant grotto]

Right now my mind is gravitating towards “Make Atlas more of a mobile Shinobi, that gets Weakness Analyzer”

[ashen crown]

What's Weakness Analyzer in this context?

[vagrant grotto]

Specter’s feature

[ashen crown]

Oh right!