#Prototype Pattern Groups

1 messages · Page 16 of 1

vagrant grotto
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Yes good do that

ashen crown
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(and maybe no protocol claims too)

vagrant grotto
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Much better than the old one I had

ashen crown
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I think I ran it without protocol claims at the very least

muted blaze
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NGL, the two sitreps I have inn mind for my playtest aren't evenn in the CRB

vagrant grotto
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Nice

muted blaze
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Are they related to the existing ones... Maybe... But if I gave them a different name you would not ggo "wait, isn't this just X?"

vagrant grotto
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Yeah mood

muted blaze
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Valk has enlightened me

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"Stand next to a thing"
"Do QA or Protocol"
"Contested if someone is being mean"
"Increase clock"

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Bonus points if thing moves

vagrant grotto
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Extra bonus points if you use outnumber rules

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That worked well last playtest

muted blaze
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Sometimes it's decrease clock

muted blaze
ashen crown
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I personally liked Valk Gauntlet when it was pure QA rather than Protocol or QA, so I might do it for that again

muted blaze
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I liked valk control when it was QA or protocol, annd so did my players

ashen crown
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Control is different because the NPCs and PCs are racing each other so there's more urgent

muted blaze
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But like... Eneable or disable it when appropriate

vagrant grotto
# muted blaze Elaborate

I ran a modified version of my kill the noise control sitrep with the objective knowledge I have now

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Part of it was “If you outnumber the enemy team you don’t need a contested check, it just works”

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The other part of it was scoring asymmetry

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Only PCs were scoring

umbral sluice
vagrant grotto
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NPCs were playing defense

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So NPCs had incentive to try to clump on PCs and not straggle back on empty zones

muted blaze
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I see

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Hmmm

vagrant grotto
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THEREFORE PCs were incentivized to split off to undefended zones

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For easier points

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Maybe risking an Overwatch or 3

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And then the action-reaction cycle continued until victory

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A total of 4/5 different zones were touched

opaque crescent
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who would possibly eat 2-3 overwatches with a single movement...

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not me, that's for sure

umbral sluice
opaque crescent
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but yeah the control tweaks that were run last week felt really nice

vagrant grotto
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Also my conclusion is that 8 points is good for 3-4 rounds of play

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12 for around 5-6

muted blaze
vagrant grotto
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So 2x player count for 3-4 rounds, 3x player count for 5-6

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Or take point count and divide by 2 for average rounds to completion

granite saddle
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So y'all just went and talked about like 3 different subjects I am highly invested in without me ? /j
So mad I might just do Far Field feedback about it (lie, I was doing that anyways)

muted blaze
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Kensei?

granite saddle
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And the whole Battlegroup thing, TTRPG theory stuff, initiative styles, being named after a common thing (I am mostly Water now [haha, wordplay])

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y'all were productive tonight

muted blaze
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We were productive inn about like, a 1 hour span lmao

vagrant grotto
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Right. “Productive”

umbral sluice
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i'd generally call that distracted but it sure was entertaining

granite saddle
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I didn't even get to compliment Valk on his great sitrep rules !
(Bangin' job my man)

vagrant grotto
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It was something alright lol

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Tyty

granite saddle
muted blaze
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hrmm... I was wondering if I should shove a brigand torrent in with boarding leash and vandalise

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But it collides with other NPCs I want to test annd I think having a torrent here would just be painful

vagrant grotto
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Torrent ain’t about that grapple lifestyle anyway

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Too busy dancin’

placid glacier
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I don't know how well this would even work-

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(WF encounter spoilers)

||The combat juicing for Roadblock has two Avengers (which I'm promoting to ultras but that's beside the point) I think it would be really funny to give one of the Avengers Doppleganger||

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||"From across the river you see... An identical frame to [THE WEAPON] stride out from the treeline"||

||What?? Ok scanning that one too, that can't also be an Avenger||

||"it is... Another Ultra Avenger named [THE IDEA]"||

vagrant grotto
ashen crown
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This is probably a "too niche too worry about" question, but have Berserker+Occultist combos been tested yet?

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Also, would making a Gauntlet w/ Occultists, Vultures, and Engineers be too much?

vagrant grotto
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Not yet

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And I don’t know, try it

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It’ll be a lot of drones

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Are you packing OppSalv on Vulture?

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I nerfed it a while back for a similar combo

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Occultist can’t explode drones it doesn’t own though

ashen crown
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No OppSalv since these are multiple untemplated Vultures

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And I was mentioning Vulture since it can destroy Drones I believe, right?... wait did I hallucinate that?

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Okay no I did hallucinate that nevermind

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No Engineers then actually I don't want to deal with that

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I should throw grunts into that sitrep tho, to test Occultist Grunt Destruction

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Okay I think I got the NPC Class selections for the 3 sitreps I wanna do for my playtest mission:

Combat 1: Gauntlet

  • Occultist
  • Vulture
  • IGF Act 2 Ruiner
  • Berserker
  • Cataphract or Assault (Pure Reinforcement)
  • Demolisher or Pyro

Combat 2: Control

  • Anchor
  • Rebake Strider
  • Rebake Lurker
  • Mirage
  • Hornet (pure reinforcement)

Combat 3: Escort

  • IGF Act 2 Voider
  • Updated IGF Slinger
  • Prism
  • Barricade
  • Assault
  • Specter (pure reinforcement)
  • Goliath (pure reinforcement)

How does this look? For the playtest NPCs I'm guaranteed to deploy multiple at a time w/ minimum 1 in reinforcements. CRB NPCs are up for debate when it comes to duplicity (and are also all the Rebake Versions, but that's not as experimental anymore so not reiterating it)

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Pure reinforcement also indicates they will not be part of the initial deployments

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I was super tempted to throw more PPG NPCs into the mix but I think that would make the data way harder to read if I did

vagrant grotto
ashen crown
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It is gonna be a unique NPC comp per combat, but there's a lot to playtest so yeah

vagrant grotto
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I’d say to cut variety to 4-5 tops

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So it’s more comfy to deploy dupes

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It’s okay to have a role not represented

ashen crown
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Tru tru, I just keep fearing "rocket tag"

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That, and reinforcements becoming stale

vagrant grotto
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You want to test rocket tag tbf

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Like if dupes are too much then that means they’re overtuned

ashen crown
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I think the Control is safe in that regard since that's 4 NPC classes upon deployment, so if one of those goes extinct I can start deploying hornets

vagrant grotto
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And the best defense against stale reinforcements is shorter combats

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Aim for 3-4 rounds

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Also: templates like elite and veteran provide texture to keep reinforcements fresh

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And grunts *

ashen crown
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Oh yeah I omitted templates when listing these

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First combat's gonna be marines w/ the defender being a Commander, plus the initial occultist will be an elite, etc etc. Grunts will also defo be present for Occultist to play with

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And 2nd combat hinges on the initial anchor being a veteran

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to support the strider in Skirmisher Kit

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But I'm thinking maybe cutting down on variety such that there are 4 classes on the field at any time

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As such I can probably cut the reinforcement Cataphract/Assault in favor of just more Ruiners and Berserkers

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And maybe keep the Berserkers as pure reinforcements

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The escort can probably put the Barricade in the reinforcements as well- I do wanna keep the variety for the sake of "half the forces are reinforcements so if things get stale I wanna have the option of a wildcard"

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Or just ditch the barricade actually

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Nah I'll keep the barricade

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I wanna run the escort as an "indoor map" with narrow hallways and paths, and as such the Barricade and Goliath feel good for that. Specter is there because I ... wanan run a specter and they're good reinforcements.

Tempted to put a breacher but probably best I pare back a bit

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... I could also use an Aegis instead of a Barricade... yeah I'll do that actually

twin escarp
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At one point a moloch drone carried around a grappled engineer which gave it resistance via adjacency with that one optional, which was pretty funny

ashen crown
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That's a lot of things

twin escarp
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Yeah there were 2 oppforces with 5~ npc types each with like 2 optionals per

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My enkidu player got a chain of like 7-8 bifurcates

ashen crown
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I can probably exchange class variety with variation of specific NPCs. It’s easy to homogenize but perhaps if I wanna make a sitrep more interesting making the templates and untemplated versions of the NPC class distinct would be easier

ashen crown
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Question: how does Prism Projector interact w/ CRB Escort + Recoj objectives?

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From what it looks like:

Prism is considered adjacent to objective at the start of its turn due to projector.

Projector is immobile, but the objective moves with the prism’s standard movement so long as it remains adjacent.

Prism moves, and until the movement makes the objective break adjacency to the projector/prism, the objective mirrors the Prism’s movement. The projector does not move the whole time.

Would that be accurate?

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(Ignoring how Mobile Projectors work- I feel like it’s safe to logically infer that a Projector moving in this way can move the objective but because the movement is moving the projector and not the prism, literally speaking it would not move the objective)

vagrant grotto
ashen crown
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I feel like there are ways it could move that maintain adjacency

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Lemme draw an example rq

vagrant grotto
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Prism projector ain’t moving

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Objective ain’t moving

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I have spoken

ashen crown
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Okay

vagrant grotto
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Days like these (read: any day I have to consider the prism’s interactions), I long for diegetic, fiction first systems

ashen crown
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To be honest I’m glad for this objective ruling because this would’ve been like being told to hold a gun for like 10 seconds. I’m not supposed to pull the trigger because it would make my life infinitely worse but god it’s so tempting because it’s right there

vagrant grotto
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Next patch: The 5,863,393rd rewrite of Prismatic Projector

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I don’t even know if I’m joking

ashen crown
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Maybe it’s just one of those things you just.. sweep under the rug and forget about

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Let the tables that run the Prism take care of it

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Not like you’re using the same Escort objective rules anyway

vagrant grotto
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The moment you said that I immediately felt the hate mail incoming lol

ashen crown
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I mean this earnestly by the way, like it feels like more trouble than it’s worth to take care of

ashen crown
vagrant grotto
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No no I mean the mere suggestion of “leaving something to the GM” EDIT: in a neo-trad tactical rpg* causing a massive metaphorical turning in graves

ashen crown
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This feels more like a “little bit of wiggle room” thing than putting a burden upon a GM, like choosing between directly measuring cover coverage or just guesstimating it

vagrant grotto
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Yes, and there are many who hate that

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But I can’t cover everything, you’re right

dapper goblet
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The vile and despicable "gm running the game"

ashen crown
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Yeah I just have a really bad habit of finding niche and concerning rules interactions lol

umbral sluice
ashen crown
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Also a made a map blueprint for the playtest Escort w/ the Prism. I feel like I just have the most unhinged map ideas because I’ve only seen like 4 indoor maps like this.

Considering the map I am pondering whether a Ghost would be a better playtest target than a Prism, but I don’t think it’d contest the objective at all so I’m not too in favor. That, and being in 2 places at once is very useful here.

IMG_0287.png
vagrant grotto
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Fuck yeah let’s go

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Ghost would be so dope here

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Intangible letting you phase through walls? chefkiss

ashen crown
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Alright that convinced me, I folded under no pressure

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I do worry Ghost won’t combo very well with the OpFor, but I can always just. Change the OpFor a little to accommodate

vagrant grotto
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Ghost is just a priest for Vanguards

ashen crown
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Tru, it’s mainly the fact that the primary striker class for this Sitrep will be Updated Slingers to lock down the halls

vagrant grotto
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Are slingers vanguards

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Do they take objectives

ashen crown
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Yeah but they dislike taking reactions

vagrant grotto
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Or do they just deal damage

ashen crown
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They would hold objectives pretty well tho- they key off the same gimmick brand as Kensei

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Except in AOEs + Barrage Potential instead of big single target damage

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I haven’t used it before, it’s another playtest NPC

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Slinger takes precedent over Kensei for me however since I’ve had major Brainworms over it

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Also minor narrative stakes

vagrant grotto
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Run what you like

ashen crown
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God I’ve missed Sitrep design <3

dapper goblet
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What's needing checking now?

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Im doing some blank-page sitrep drafting and I'll see if I can slot any pain points in

ashen crown
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The in need of data NPCs are

  • Anchor
  • Capacitor
  • Ghost
  • Kensei
  • Occultist
  • Prism
  • Vulture
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The rest are at least comfortable

dapper goblet
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Hm, I think i might be able to slot in a vulture

ashen crown
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Would Superimpose Firmament be worth testing for an Escort?

vagrant grotto
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Maybe? It moves with the ghost

ashen crown
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I feel like it’s not gonna be very relevant for the purposes of Sitrep objectives

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If the objective is intangible then so are a significant portion of characters adjacent to it

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Eh it’s worth testing- I could simplify by not having any optionals but it’s niche enough that it’s worth considering

velvet cairn
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I love Anchor

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I love ruining the day of blink charges

vagrant grotto
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So say we all

velvet cairn
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I love the face players make when they realise they can't just WACP the npc deathball 3 turns in the making off the KOTH point

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because Omninet grounding exists

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Veteran Marine Anchor's existence is a good thing

ashen crown
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Very tempted to make my Ghosts SpecOps, BUT I don’t wanna muddy the playtest data (and also this is getting way too complex) so I’m not

vagrant grotto
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Spec ops ghost is just elite ghost but easier to kill

ashen crown
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Even with Gyro Jet Cannon or Serrated Machete?

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Or any of the other nonsense SpecOps optionals?

velvet cairn
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What use does Ghost have for serrated Machete again?

ashen crown
vagrant grotto
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Very well

velvet cairn
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needing a crit not exactly reliable tho

ashen crown
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Active Camo fixes that

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There’s also Automated Battlefield Awareness Node or Full Spectrum Sensor Suite

velvet cairn
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i can see how FSSS helps since acc/no cover

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but isnt ABAN just for saves

ashen crown
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Ya know it occurs to me- Grapple probably fails due to non-mutual adjacency, but a Ghost could easily just ram anyone who gets close to their bonded target

ashen crown
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It’s only constraint is using a reaction and being range 8

muted blaze
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Something like a ghost with one of the support powers would be quite potent

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The person it's bonded to is luckily in range 8

ashen crown
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And on an Intangible Ghost that’s wandering around with a frontliner that is a big shutdown for anything save based

velvet cairn
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Can the ghost use the reaction while intangible though?

ashen crown
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Yes

velvet cairn
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correction

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can it affect tangible units while intangible though?

ashen crown
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Yes

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Quantum Bond

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Sorry Phase Shift

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Wrong ability cited at first

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But yeah Ghost gets big bonuses via templates because many templates come with the assumption of “oh the character using this is a target for attacks and stuff, and if they’re not then they have limited interaction with the field.” Ghost just. Defies that assumption. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, in fact it’s potentially a good strength- there’s a reason ghost has so many ways to break Quantum Bond

velvet cairn
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Spec Ops Commander Ghost
would be degenerate yeah

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Hey, er

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stupid question

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While the target is grappled this way, anyone besides the grappled character who makes a ranged or melee attack against the Marine must first roll 1d6: on 4+ the attack automatically hits the grappled character instead (this effect does not stack with Invisible), dealing half damage and heat. This effect lasts until the grapple is ended or until the Marine takes this action again.```
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So Captive Spike (Marine)

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If the ghost, while intangible and bonded

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captive spikes someone

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is it RAW impossible to break free

vagrant grotto
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They can just pass a hull save as a full action as listed

velvet cairn
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wouldnt breaking the grapple (even as a save) be considered as "interacting with a character"

vagrant grotto
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No

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You’re just breaking free

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And if the concern is “intangible RAW is loosey goosey here” well we can do the same logic that the ghost is interactable enough to escape

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But also the extent of “break free” interacting with anything is just the contested check

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Otherwise it’s all worded as “self affecting”

velvet cairn
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i'm not following the last part

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the rest kinda make some sense

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"self affecting" in regards to breaking free?

ashen crown
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I don’t know if Ghosts can even Maintain a Grapple is the thing. The Ghost can target and affect characters that are tangible, but other characters can’t do that back.

That indicates that an intangible ghost is adjacent to other characters, but other characters are not adjacent to it. Meaning it’s not mutual and the Grapple likely breaks. At least via my interpretation- mainly because I do not think Ghosts should be allowed to Grapple

muted blaze
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Grappling is mutual...

ashen crown
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Right so if it’s mutual then a ghost can initiate but not maintain a grapple with a tangible character

muted blaze
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If a ghost grapples someone whilst intangible it makes sense. But if someone grapples a ghost and then it goes intangible it makes sense for it to drop grapple

velvet cairn
# ashen crown I don’t know if Ghosts can even Maintain a Grapple is the thing. The Ghost can t...

At least as how i think of it

Ghost can affect tangible characters.

Tangible characters cannot affect intangible characters unless otherwise stated.

Ghost can start grapple on Tangible character

Ghost (while in control) can maintain grapple)

If Tangible character succeeds the check to assume control grapple breaks immediately (since illegal gamestate of tangible character affecting intangible character)

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which is why i was wondering about captive spike since it comes with the wording to make it so marine is autolarger

ashen crown
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See I don’t think it matters whose in charge is the thing

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If a grapple is in progress, regardless of whose in control, both characters must be adjacent to each otber

vagrant grotto
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yeah no the grapple initiator is the grapple initiator no matter what

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even if they lose control

ashen crown
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And regardless of whose initiates the grapple, both characters still need to follow the rule

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If either character is involuntarily moved, movement stops being mimicked and the grapple is broken upon disengagement

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Similar logic

ashen crown
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Btw with the new vulture updates, is the word of Valk of “Magpie may consume limited equipment w/ 0 remaining charges” still in effect?

vagrant grotto
ashen crown
ashen crown
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Tho I guess if it’s in the FAQ then like. Yeah

vagrant grotto
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I didn’t use the language of System Trauma so it doesn’t act like system trauma

sudden cosmos
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Do the objects for Anchor's Techtonic Wave get made after the movement effects from the attack happen or before?

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Just checking to make sure

ashen crown
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Out of curiosity, what’s more important for playtesting Vulture right now? Self-sustainability or magpie bonuses?

While I am giving it the Portable Barricade from Marine (i could move it to the Occultist tbh), I am debating whether to give it OppSalv to pair with the Occultist, BUT that also significantly changes how a Vulture’s long term sustainability operates, and I’m not sure if I wanna muddy that sorta result so to speak

vagrant grotto
vagrant grotto
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I need to know if Vulture’s base kit is functional

ashen crown
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Gotcha, removed all templates + everything from the vulture. So long as they babysit someone they should be operational.

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There’s no preplaced wrecks but I am throwing some Artillery grunts into the mix to have some ranged DPR on the field before reinforcements trickle in

vagrant grotto
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That’s fine yeah

ashen crown
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Is there a specific Occultist Optional in need of testing btw? I’m trialing Elite Occultist to see if the Flock Drone change can accommodate for Multi-Action Occultists

vagrant grotto
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And maybe Jealous Flock

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Scapegoat I’m not worried about, Call from Below seems tame now that it’s adjacent only, and Lead Astray is temporary/niche

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But spamming heat and burn, and spreading passive Shred could be problematic

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That said, the counterplay is usually “walk 1 space away”

ashen crown
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Gotcha, I think I’ll go with Harvest Pyres

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Is there actually a list of optionals in need of testing anywhere? I feel like that got posted a while back or smthn

sudden cosmos
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Ultra Anchor test looks like it's gonna be me shoving my players back into combat 5 of OSR because I'm monaSleep for making maps right now

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The party is a 50/50 melee/range split so that part will be interesting

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And I don't feel bad giving the anchor Argus Armor because they've got a swallowtail

ashen crown
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Since if I added the playtest optional in that’s 3 optionals on an elite. And I really wanna use Portable Barricade on one of the NPCs

vagrant grotto
vagrant grotto
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It’s one thing when it’s an offhand drone and another when it’s a Dedicated Drone

ashen crown
vagrant grotto
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Turret drone can eat shit but tempest drone may raise eyebrows

ashen crown
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Yeah reading back there it’s mainly just Vulture and the 2 mentioned Occultist optionals that are on public notice

vagrant grotto
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PPG optionals to test
Anchor

  • [ ] Newtonian Amplifier
  • [ ] Magnetic Reversal
  • [ ] Null-Grav Motivator (one big zone)
  • [ ] Slingshot (vet)
  • [ ] Tectonic wave (ultra)
    Capacitor
  • [ ] Purifying Lightning
  • [ ] High voltage (vet)
  • [ ] Thunderfall (ultra)
    Ghost
  • [ ] Superimpose Firmament
  • [ ] String Theory Marionette
  • [ ] Maxwell’s Demon (vet)
  • [ ] Coherent Entanglement (ultra)
    Hatchet
  • [ ] Rocket Bola
  • [ ] Reckless Dive (updated)
  • [ ] Return to Sender (updated)
  • [ ] Pull the Snare (veteran)
  • [ ] Hurricane of steel (ultra)
    Kensei
  • [ ] Gaussian Blur
  • [ ] Pommel launcher (vet)
  • [ ] Mortal draw (ultra)
    Knight
  • [ ] Hero’s Banner
  • [ ] Punishing Blow
  • [ ] Mighty Throw
    Mesmerist
  • [ ] Mountebank’s Jaunt
  • [ ] Hall of Mirrors (veteran)
    Napalm
  • [ ] Incendiary grenade
    Occultist
  • [ ] Jealous Flock
  • [ ] Harvest pyres
  • [ ] Doubling season (vet)
    Prism
  • [ ] Omniglass barriers
  • [ ] Scintillating gleam
    Torrent
  • [ ] Wash away
  • [ ] Crashing tsunami
  • [ ] Primordial (vet)
  • [ ] Split the sea (ultra)
    Vulture
  • [ ] Jumpstart
  • [ ] Carcass bunker
  • [ ] Rapid refabrication (ultra)
    Zealot
  • [ ] Flagellant’s Cleansing
  • [ ] Rally the Righteous (reworked)
vagrant grotto
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I may have forgotten feedback so if y’all sent me some on the above then please forward it to me so I can review

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Sometimes I miss stuff

sudden cosmos
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Have you made any changes to slingshot since it was first posted? I've used that one before too.

vagrant grotto
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I know folks mentioned planning to use some of these but couldn’t offhand recall the results

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Which is more on me for not taking more detailed notes

sudden cosmos
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Given the circumstances I used it in, slingshot seemed fine. It's metered by lodestone being active but didn't cause any outrage at the table. At most it got the sunzi player to go "Wait! That's what I do!"

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It was somewhat limited by most NPCs having ranges equal to or longer than 10 in the fight. I mostly decided to just shoot the PC directly instead of trying to curve the bullet around the anchor

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I got a couple uses in on it for an NPC shooting the anchor to get a couple extra spaces of range on a PC attacking the anchor because they were otherwise out of range.

ashen crown
ashen crown
ashen crown
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Ya know I imagine a Breacher paired with a Slingshot Anchor would be quite the pain

ashen crown
granite saddle
# vagrant grotto Go for it then

This talk about lead astray made me check the FAQ and now I have two bits of feedback :
1- Napalm faq entry is outdated, adhesive gel doesn't exist anymore.
2- it seems fairly logical that lead astray lasts until the end of the Occultist's next turn (as opposee to the drone), but there is some ambiguity there, especially when factoring in that most effects with that wording in Lancer do mean the [target]'s next turn

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So maybe just an faq entry works, or new wording if you feel inspired

vagrant grotto
vagrant grotto
granite saddle
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Yeah that
I'll let you see how you want to handle it

vagrant grotto
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the thing to note too is that drones don't usually have their own turn

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but yeah moreso that this reads in a stilted way:
On a hit, the Occultist controls the target DRONE until the end of the Occultist’s next turn.

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I'd also say something like "end of the original owner's next turn" if I wanted it to be tied to them

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since again, Drones don't have their own turn

ashen crown
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Hey Valk, what map size do you recommend for Gauntlets? I plan on maybe using a version of your Gauntlet rules, and I also wanted to make a smaller map since Gauntlets tend to be "get to 20% of the map and ignore the rest" and wanted to buck that just a tad

muted blaze
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Not valk, but I'd say his maps tend to be about 20-25 range... Square-ish usually

ashen crown
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Hm. I might keep the map more narrow, on the prospect of I'm not really sure what to occupy the edges of the map perpendicular to the travel path with

vagrant grotto
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Same aspect ratio as 35x21

ashen crown
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So here's my idea for a gauntlet w/ Valk's rules:

There are 3 objectives, and each one can only be claimed 1/round as a protocol or quick action, 1/turn regardless. If it's contested, the player needs to make a contested Hull or Systems check to succeed. The players need to get 2xplayer count points to win.

Once the players get 2 points, the gate opens up so they can proceed and get more points from the third objective zone... or they break the wall but that's harder. The map is 0g, w/ the debris being Kinetic Dangerous Terrain. The logic is that the PCs are currently invading a space elevator in the fog of an asteroid strike.

How does this look?

Preview_Map.png
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This is the playtest combat w/ the Vultures and Occultists, btw

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I was thinking "put a higher fraction of objectives behind the gate than in front," but that would make combat start really slowly and force a portion of the map to be inaccessible for nearly half the combat. And having an equal amount behind both would either make the combat too short (w/ 4 zones the combat's done in like a round) or too long (it'll take minimum 4 rounds to beat combat)

vagrant grotto
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if they're supposed to be consistently grabbed at least

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if they're 1-off push a button objectives, then sure players can have some freebies

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but the majority should require an offensive push

ashen crown
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Hm, I can agree to that actually

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The point of the gate is to make sure the front half of the map is used for a longer duration, but a Gauntlet demands that the push be aggressive

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I'll split up that objective into a few more in that case. Total 3 active good?

vagrant grotto
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if you want a sub objective: Make gate-dropper spaces

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then players can drop the gates for buddies and get in, while being a temporary one-off on the way

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and if the players have ways to circumvent it anyway, good for them

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3 total active sounds fine

ashen crown
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Also, after dwelling on it, might drop Marine from Occultist. And not give it any EVA trait at all, on the account of “I’m running it so that characters adjacent to terrain ignore 0g as long as they continue to do that so may as well make it significant”

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And it simplifies things for me

ashen crown
#

Also also, dumb idea for how to exploit the “only 1 claim action per turn” rule: Bentham Focault + some form of free action claim.

Eg, Protocol claim a point, move next to an ally next to a different point, Lock On and trigger Bentham Focault, they use the reaction to claim the objective they’re next to.

I do not think this strategy should be a concern, because it is very niche + expensive. But it is funny.

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One last point of order for the night- for the playtest mission I’m running, I’m realizing it’s almost guaranteed all my players will have some form of EVA. I should probably replace Null-Grav on the second combat anchors with something else, right?

placid glacier
#

... Hey I just noticed something that is probably not intentional wording

was looking at carcass bunker again because I noticed it was on the testing chopping block and it says "all attacks", and correct me if I'm wrong but that specific phrasing also usually applies to tech attacks as well yeah?

placid glacier
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Unrelated but looking at my machine vulture token and the legs were bothering me so I decided to give the token a redo

machineVultureNew.png
vagrant grotto
vagrant grotto
vagrant grotto
ashen crown
vagrant grotto
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Think One Flag on Zanzibar

ashen crown
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Oh wait yeah that was already the plan lol

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Which would be the two points that use to be Objectives, now they just both need to be interacted with as a quick action to open the gate

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I could also make it protocol exclusive to make it more of a challenge, especially because I’m not adding a contesting mechanic to it, but idk

muted blaze
#

Manipulators stay winning

vagrant grotto
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Yeah no reward manipulators whenever you possibly can lol. That and Extended Compartment and Comp/Con unit

ashen crown
ashen crown
vagrant grotto
ashen crown
#

Another game I was (temporarily) in (for scheduling reasons) had one of the players want to have a copilot, and what we did was give her an expanded compartment and also require she spend her Personalizations on actually having a copilot. Mechanically, the copilot was basically like a Comp/CON unit, able to take control of the mech like an AI, which I think is pretty clever.

You can also steal from Vexwerewolf's design idea of "while x is in control of your mech, the mech benefits from these talents instead of your normal pilot talents." It gives an extra level of fun depth to making reserves and is a really useful tool to have for campaigns that go wild with them.

vagrant grotto
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“Specialist copilot” reserve that has a special set of skills/talents and is treated as licensed for your mech for the mission, but you gotta pay their upkeep (keep earning the reserve in downtime)

vagrant grotto
ashen crown
#

Vex was the first person I ever saw do that and it opened my eyes so much upon seeing it- it's so deceptively simple but I think it's one of the most clever ideas I've seen when it comes to making reserves and exotic gear

vagrant grotto
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all I'm saying is that if someone wrote a dedicated lancer copilot supplement, I'd drop some money on them

ashen crown
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Huh. Yeah I guess there is enough there to write a supplement on it lol

vagrant grotto
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yeah absolutely

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you've got

  1. The copilot subsystem, which ties NHPs into it
  2. How to build a copilot, along with examples
  3. A loyalty subsystem for copilots that simultaneously replaces Cascade
ashen crown
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"Replacing Cascade" is a little debatable but yeah!

vagrant grotto
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at least that's what I'd do

ashen crown
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I might work on that in addition to my Bespoke Cascade rules (when time finds me again) (and if no one beats me to it lol)

vagrant grotto
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loyalty checks are made when you take structure/stress damage

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on a failed check, the copilot panicks and tries to take over for a turn, following their best interests

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oh, another thing
4. how to RP copilots (read: give them to the person on your left)

ashen crown
#

Yeah I'm sorta wishing in hindsight I made my players RP the NHPs lmao

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SOmething for next campaign

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Hm. I wonder if stealing from the way Bonds work would be too complex. Something like "Copilots have a respect clock that loses a tick each time they make a loyalty check. WHen it is depleted, they will not participate in missions until the PC spends a downtime action performing an intervention. After the intervention, the Copilot gains new abilities and the clock resets"

Probably a bit too rigid tbh, I just like the "fail forward" mechanic of Burdens w/ Bond XP.

vagrant grotto
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I'd keep em simple

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They have a loyalty score, a like, and a dislike

muted blaze
#

You could probs make a "loyalty check" thing which is "when your copilot has to make a test of trust/faith in you. Make a trust roll" and cascade checks are the absolute absurd extreme of that... Where if you're a BEST BEST mates with an NHP and they cascade there's a chance they go sicko mode but remain an ally (even if cascading)

vagrant grotto
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you follow their likes/best interests (or just fuckin pay them well) and loyalty go up

you do what they dislike or treat em like shit, loyalty go down

vagrant grotto
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loyalty go from -6 to +6

ashen crown
#

I'd wanna take a leaf out of Eureka!'s book with what it does with Composure and make any "loyalty score" have a direct mechanical impact. That way there's less guesswork required about "but what does having a loyalty of 0 even mean?"

vagrant grotto
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tbf I'm basically stealing from Mothership here

ashen crown
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I need to finish reading mothership

vagrant grotto
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anytime a hireling is asked to act against their best interest, they roll Loyalty

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on a failure, they defect

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on a success, they'll (begrudgingly) oblige

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loyalty doesn't need to be involved

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at the end of the day it's a matter of "will they work with you or not"

ashen crown
#

I'm personally not a big fan of that since generally in Lancer, scenarios where that happens likely won't pop up as much. In Mothership everyone is in danger of dying constantly so there are way more things that can go against a character's best interests, meanwhile in Lancer you can have a metavault lie between you and nuclear destruction

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Tonally the mehcanic doesn't match as well and it's harder to guess when it's applicable

vagrant grotto
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scenarios where that doesn't show up means that the loyalty is tested less often meaning that the genre self-selects to the mechanic

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shit hits the fan frequently in Mothership so yeah it's more important and stress-inducing there

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which is good because it's a Horror system

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in Lancer, the people you're hiring have to accept a baseline of "riding inside a machine of war" otherwise you simply can't hire them haha

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this means you're naturally more aligned with your copilot and thus make fewer loyalty checks (but not zero)

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leading to a more teamwork/heroic frame of reference

ashen crown
#

If I were going about the design, I'd flavor the rating as "Confidence" as opposed to "Loyalty," as that feels better for a more heroic + teamwork frame of reference

vagrant grotto
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in FIST they call it the CHOKE Score

ashen crown
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And it can include Loyalty under its umbrella while not being exclusive to it

muted blaze
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Choke in Fist is interesting

vagrant grotto
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which is "what do they do when they panic under pressure"

muted blaze
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It's "If shit's goingg wack, roll a d6. On a chokescore+ they do the thing"

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Which works... IG

vagrant grotto
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which lines up with "What happens when the machine of war you're riding in takes an AMR round to the shoulder"

ashen crown
#

Here's how I think i'd go about it- Confidence is a clock that each time you take structure or stress, loses a tick, no roll or anything. If it goes empty/would have ticks subtracted from it but can't, the Copilot goes rogue and forcefully takes control of the mech. It resets to full at the end of the mission, and there are some listed example ways to restore confidence during rests/when the copilot goes rogue.

That way it's more predictable than cascade, and while the extremeties are more complex the base loop is simple.

vagrant grotto
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okay I can dig that

muted blaze
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EEeeeh both could work for that...

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Trust and confidence feel like two different factors

vagrant grotto
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yeah no at the end of the day here it's a matter of modeling the kind of "commitment to the bit" in an interesting way that ALSO motivates interaction and treating the NPC like their own realized person

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like, that's my ultimate goal here

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make NHPs feel like people instead of gear by presenting them alongside people you can hire/recruit

ashen crown
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Confidence could be either "confidence in oneself," "confidence in the missoin," or "confidence that their copilot is doing a good job" is how I see it, hence why I feel it's better. Keeping it vague allows it to be flavored in a more versatile way

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An experienced merc is more likely to feel that their copilot is doing a bad job if they keep taking hits, meanwhile a squire is gonna feel they're the one doing something wrong if the mech is almost destroyed and hasten to fix things. Confidence falters, but in what specifically differs between the characters.

vagrant grotto
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while also:

  1. encouraging making and strengthening NPC relationships and
  2. making Expanded Compartment cool and useful
muted blaze
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I have a session 0 for another game coming up... I want a technophile NHP and I'm probs just ggonna ask for their own triggers

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But shared on 1 character sheet

ashen crown
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I think you could track it using a reserve potentially

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Since those can give triggers

muted blaze
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But like "Take someone out + 2, Threaten + 2, Hack or fix (But it's my NHP doing it) + 2, Charm (But it's my NHP doing it) +2", etc

vagrant grotto
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yeah I'd give a hireling like 1 or 2 triggers

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but that's me

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the geologist has +6 to "Rocks and Rock-related paraphernalia"

muted blaze
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:O

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GAMINNG

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GGEOLOGY GAMINGN

vagrant grotto
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"I don't got scooby doo, mate, but Rocky does"

ashen crown
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I'd personally make it so that Copilots can only have niche triggers, write in stuff that you'd get through a downtiem action or smthn. For stuff outside of that, either they can do it no roll, or the pilot will get better results by rolling regardless of what bonus they have

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Ideally, you have the copilots roll infrequently to reduce complexity

vagrant grotto
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yeah copilots are the people you call for niche expertise or just for Basic Help Action accuracy

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that's what I do with Glamdring (your dropship pilot) in my SR Remix

ashen crown
placid glacier
#

@vagrant grotto I know you're probably asleep, but I got Napalm feedback

Incendiary Grenade (this first because you specifically listed it as something you wanted data on)

Player Side
Players thought that the Incend Charge's AoE creation struck the nice middle ground of expansive enough to be threatening, but not too big to be annoying. They thought that the 2 heat and 2 burn could have been a problem with more time to linger in the encounter.

DM Side
The first Napalm that I deployed I held off on using the Incendiary that it didn't use it until it got destroyed, so there could be something to be said about fear of using the resource with it being a limited system instead of a recharge system (but that could just be a personal thing). I also probably didn't do the optional favors by using it in a holdout mission where the napalm was on the offensive and not denying pushes as much (will try again in an escort mission to compare)

General/Smolder Charges

In a more general sense, the players thought that the control aspect of the Napalm felt fair, the Smolder Charges specifically really worked for juicing the "Flushing Players out of Position" aspect that the Napalm wants to leverage and my players reported it felt fair on their side as well.

Something I want to note is since the last time I played with the Napalms, the Black Thumb Tortuga had switched off leaving just the Lannie for burn control. But it also got me thinking after the session ended that the burn might be a bit more oppressive in a team without easy burn clear like BT or a Lannie- A consistent 'fear point' with my players was hearing me say '5 Burn'

vagrant grotto
# placid glacier <@151414024003649537> I know you're probably asleep, but I got Napalm feedback ...

Thanks for the feedback! Surprised to hear Incen grenades didn’t perform on holdout; I would’ve chucked them down in the safest spots to stand on the holdout zone to hem the pcs in

Glad Smolder Charges worked well, I was tentative on them for a while but now I think they’re in a good spot

I think my question re: amount of burn is: If it were 4/6/8 burn, would they react differently? Because I think going lower than 4 at T1 will leave it a bit toothless

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I also didn’t see any mention of the Heat pressure from STC; how did players feel about the Napalm’s Heat generation?

ashen crown
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Hilarious idea:

I could give some of my NPCs from a simulation combat JAIL/BREAK, but because it’s a combat sim, the NHPs are just gonna go like “oh noooo, I’m cascading oh nooo this is so baaaad”

granite saddle
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One of the NHPs just uses it as an excuse to get their grievances out with their pilot and never mentions it again

"You didn't really mean that right ? 😭 "
"I have no idea what you're talking about."

ashen crown
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Hey it gives me a chance to test the Brigand Template because I have an addiction to mass templates OpFors lol

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The big “optionals to test” list unfortunately excludes Templates but whatevs lol

vagrant grotto
ashen crown
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I meant moreso “optionals to focus on” but in hindsight not many of them have been tested so that’s fair

vagrant grotto
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Yes, and I was pressed for time when I made the list

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I think all Anomaly weapons have been tested except for the overshield lash

ashen crown
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Oh damn that’s more than I expected

vagrant grotto
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Hunger is fine, knife’s gone under the knife, and memento culpa has been doing well in reports

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Feedback Lash has me concerned due to creating a secondary effect on hit

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Secondary effects are historically a PITA

vagrant grotto
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I think all the Anomaly techs need testing, I’m concerned about the high-impact abilities

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Like Blinkspace Expulsion

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Stuff that fucks with players/pilots is also a region of concern

ashen crown
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I don’t wanna give Anchors an optional that mucks with their action economy for playtest purposes, but also if I didn’t give them GravAmp I’d be betraying my code of “stay on theme”

vagrant grotto
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I know Grav amp is good

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It’s gotten positive feedback

ashen crown
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Could also give them Finishing Blow since w/ Brigand they could knock enemies prone a lot

vagrant grotto
#

If you need permission to break theme, there you go

ashen crown
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Unfortunately can’t really find an NPC in my Sitrep where Vandalize would fit well so that’s not getting tested. Could give it Commandeer or one of the equipment tamper techs.

Finishing Blow combos best + doesn’t impact action economy so I’ll probably go with that

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And I’m also gonna try something with Brigand’s Jury Rigged- I’m just gonna make every Brigand in the Sitrep have the same Jury Rigged HASE skill and see how that goes

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Gonna also test Surgekiller again since the last time I used it crits didn’t really proc, as well as JAIL//BREAK and Enforce Limiters. Including any of the other equipment tampers in addition to JAIL//BREAK seems like not the best idea to me since the overlap in impact feels pretty similar

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Since I’m using pretty much 0 PPG optional rules, I do think Enforce Limiters will be interesting to test and see if it remains consistently useful across rulesets

muted blaze
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Like... Some of the absurd Annomaly abilities I thinnk are fine being absurd?

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Like NPCs themselves seem like they should be balanced... But having a template which can vary from fine to wild I think can just be fun...

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Like "Oh no, my demolisher turned into a neutron start and it was ridiculously overpowered"

ashen crown
#

Yeah Anomaly feels like it’s power level should be inconsistent- it’s power budget entirely lies in “being unpredictable,” with its main trait being about not knowing what it does from the get go and it’s optional trait determining what it actually does

placid glacier
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I mean you bringing it up makes me think it could be funny to run a napalm with a fuck ton of tech attackers instead of a fuck ton of burn inflicters

sudden cosmos
#

Current thoughts on ultra anchor seem to be that it is very annoying to them

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Opfor is:
1x Ultra Anchor
1x Veteran Mirage
1x Veteran Rainmaker
2x Cataphracts (1 currently in reserve)
2x Hornets (1 dead, 1 reserve deployed)

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Rebake Mirages and Hornets with a reality anchor mirage is kinda funny

vagrant grotto
sudden cosmos
#

Me: (endearing)
The Party: (derogatory)

ashen crown
sudden cosmos
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It seems like a lot of their current frustrations is because of sensor lag on the mirage

ashen crown
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I’m using a Commander Mirage instead of a Veteran Mirage personally

sudden cosmos
#

posted too early

sudden cosmos
#

  • "mirage has a lot of synergy witht the anchor (too much)"

  • "now you know how it feels like when I have to fight a sunzi" and in hindsight, that feels like a bad thing for me to say about the lodestone and/or mirage

  • generally, rebake mirage and lodestone together seems to be the major pain point

  • Tom "I don't think anyone's going to be able to activate JK1 more than three times" Parkinson Morgan (the anchor was moved to the entire side of the map by 13 consecutive JK1 activations while grappled)

ashen crown
#

Did Ponderous not kick in?

vagrant grotto
#

doesn't kick in on Grapples

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oh

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fuck

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god dammit

sudden cosmos
#

JK1 is a balanced system with no exploits

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the atlas is prone and slowed rn too

vagrant grotto
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there's a reason I reworked it lol

sudden cosmos
#

Even the player thinks it should have a limit, but I'll only be able to do that when I'm free from playtesting hell

vagrant grotto
#

Tom's "intended limit" is 3 iirc

ashen crown
#

Having the 1 heat Penalty trigger per kick off seems like a decent alternative way to go about it if you don’t care about the “exacerbate micro decision number” issue Valk is tackling

vagrant grotto
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I don't like 1 heat on kickoff because it makes it stronger on HA frames than SSC ones

ashen crown
#

Also fair

sudden cosmos
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that means you've got a JK1 genghis or whatever

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  • "nullgrav motivator was fine." no thoughts. good zoning too for parties that don't have an EVA in their setup. fringe benefit for those that do. useless in zero-gravity combat, but there's other optionals bogotterShrug

  • "why would you not bring reality anchor as an optional? it feels like motile swarm"

  • "Magnetic reversal was actually useless in the opfor" (agreed-ish. map and its allies weren't doing it any favors, but )

  • newtonian amplifier has a lot of friction to its design with having to choose it versus activating/maintaining lodestone. maybe a build for it somewhere, but wasn't applicable here

  • As an ultra-specific ability, tectonic wave seems cool

  • "the anchor alone seems pretty cool" most pain was due to the existence of the veteran rebake mirage

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Anything specific you want me to ask them?

vagrant grotto
#

this is all really helpful for Anchor feedback

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How did they feel about Lodestone itself?

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like, as a defender/tank tool paired with the Anchor's natural stats

sudden cosmos
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Vanilla lodestone seems fine to them. One thought it was a bit too similar to aegis, but we talked about it and it fell into kensei-ronin territory (aesthetic similarity instead of mechanical)

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Liked shooting through the field to damage/hack it and overheat it to get rid of the shield

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Restating that reality anchor feels like motile swarm. Mandatory optional unless you're gonna ignore lodestone and go for newtonian amp and mag reversal

vagrant grotto
#

interesting

sudden cosmos
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(odd that they feel like you've gotta ignore lodestone to get value off of those, though somewhat inclined to agree with newtonian amp)

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Generally saying that it felt very puzzle-like

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Most of the frustration was caused by it playing with the mirage

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"oh god. if we weren't putting athena on it all the time, you could have put dataveil on the anchor"

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(seems like most of their issues were with mirage ngl)

vagrant grotto
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noted on Newtonian is hard to fit in

steel apex
vagrant grotto
# 
REALITY ANCHOR
Trait
All characters affected by LODESTONE gain IMMUNITY to INTANGIBLE. In addition, they may target and affect INTANGIBLE characters and objects, and they may be targeted and affected by INTANGIBLE characters. Lastly, allies in line of sight treat spaces in LODESTONE’s area as valid destinations for teleportation, which cannot be redirected.
#

this optional in tandem with Mirage

steel apex
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Yeah, I'm just (selfishly) approaching this feedback from the angle in conjunction with the rebake mirage being what's causing the issue

vagrant grotto
#

yeah it's just some force multiplication

steel apex
#

it's unfortunate because I'm not sure how to square that particular circle on either of our respective ends: you shouldn't have to balance your stuff around someone else's, and I'm not really sure that I'm ever going to be making further rebake changes

vagrant grotto
#

yeah no it's fine

sudden cosmos
#

From my perspective, the mirage rebake didn't do anything that a vanilla mirage wouldn't have been doing either, apart from sensor lag

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And not because sensor lag is bad. I mean like, vanilla mirage doesn't have sensor lag, so the two can't be compared

#

Even so, after a bunch of griping and realizing they could make the mirage stop being so annoying by turning off the lodestone, they handled it like you usually handle mirages

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Just a really strong synergy between the two that was stuffing their party in particular, imo. Not a general problem.

ashen crown
ashen crown
steel apex
#

If the Anchor itself had more teleportation then I'd be more inclined to agree, but I actually think that if anything, Reality Anchor stands out a bit for not really having much to do with what else the Anchor NPC itself is doing

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It fits as a sort of "optional disruption" element similar to Null-Grav Motivator in that it's a tool in the toolkit you can select or not as you choose, but I'm not sure I'd peg it as an optional that ought to be baseline

ashen crown
#

The mirage pairing probably exemplified things. If I was testing Reality Anchor it would be threefold for me due to also testing the Lurkers and the team having a Metafold Carver Swallowtail and Realspace Breach Zheng

#

However I am not doing that so

#

It’ll be a good test to see how the Anchor functions when you see the type of team + OpFor where it’s optionals would absolutely murder, and then declare “okay let’s see if it’s functional if it lacks them”

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As a contrast to what Isa’s team had which was seeing how effective those optionals would be in their ideal circumstances (results: extremely)

sudden cosmos
#

I guess they figured I'd always be running an anchor into a sunzi to try and stuff it, or I'd be building it as a centerpiece for an opfor and try to leverage it

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Which, to be fair, that's 2/2 of the instances I've tried to use an anchor, but I don't see that being every time I use an anchor

muted blaze
#

Zappy - Elite capacitor
Capacitor + drones are annoying but cool
Was a force multiplier on the drones

Good change for team synergy

Smallest liked the mesmerist, Narcissus on the objective is really cool. Good design
Mirror images - A bit weird that on hit, it doesn't clear anything. But it makes sense from a mechanical perspective but it's a little strange
Doesn't break on hit like pathfinder, but might be wrong with that

Hall of mirrors - Not noticed once, drone was invisible.

Vulture - Did a sick ass play that missed ;-;
Reloading sniper was neat
Magpie routines, doesn't have a round or turn limit - found odd by reCaste

Competitive edge - love it, really cool. Works well with these objective types (Snistle)

Atlas: Weird heatgunner atlas felt strange and could have been played better but was fun.

Personal opinion: Never was relevant, but having a 1/round brace ON TOP OF an existing brace feels quite potent on top of their high evasion and boosted stats. A resistance trait is good but it feels like it should be shut down by immobilise or slowed.

Reactor stabiliser is neat

Caliban: Thoughts echo first time playtest
Speed changes good. 5 Speed felt right
Made mistake in not doinng ram change

Personal feedback: Didn't feel like a caliban (mostly vibes based). One caliban trait came up during the whole combat (Smacking the zealot against the wall), could have been more effective as a zheng or even everest

#

Minotaur:
Smallest: Not seen a CRB minotaur played... Aggressive systems sync with accuracy is nice, if that missed it would have felt bad.

Valk: Felt more comfortable taking hits due to structure changes,

Personal opinion: Felt fine... Zealot got solo'd but like... Yeah that doesn't feel like a frame is overpowerd but the fact the ultra didn't have much counterplay against it

Snistle - Occultist was a bastard, hate the occultist. They can be dealt with but the fact they can come back so easily was a problem. Ate up Atlas reactions

Ultra Zealot:
Size half zealot is strongg because it's easy to break LOS
Undying faith - Very effective but survivorship bias. Because it exists, IT needs killing so not much died afterwards. That's why there was such an activation tail.

Grunts alongside zeal: Didn't feel like much, outside of a minor gotcha which was nullified by knockback one. Liked concept of it. Would hurt a lot more in a party of full of superheavies. Undying grunts is interesting. Universally grunts are risky anyway.

Veteran Kensei:
Felt good, Pommel strike is a LOT of knockback, really threw Snistle. Didn't do anything out of the ordinary outside of the ordinary. It isn't bad but it's quite strong because it does a lot of damage, knockback

It was extremely funny being launched 5 spaces to OTHER point - Caliban got calibaned

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Vulture:
Breaking shit to get other peoples stuff is cool. Breaking something that was VERY relevant this combat to my own detriment. Block LOS dust cloud is cool.

I personally felt the armour was good. Countered aux builds, but like... Personally think having the armour is good for survivability because it needs to outlive it's allies. Feels weird because breaking it's own stuff is situational for situational buffs which vary from godly to mid. Not necessarily a bad thing, potentially high skill floor high skill ceiling.

Occultists: - BASTARDS x2, Diviner darts feel "kinda wack" and apply resistance and shredding. Resistance and shreding felt like "I NEED TO TARGET THESE", fatal clash couldn't be used because there was always a drone nearby to be dealt with. Not as much as a problem, but moving 2 as an action is fine but jealous flock feels like a lot. Shred was felt a lot, resistance too.

BRIGANDS: Pretty good spammable, more spammable by pirate. Didn't feel like pirate. Prone on crit was good but less oppressive than bonus damage on crit.

#

Overcharge change makes a lot of the nasty saves a little safer.

Overcharge: Feels good with the DD288, feel more confident in firing it to sack heat to reroll if you don't get the hit.

First time using it in action, seeing it in play. Snistle really likes it. Feels way nicer to use it. It's a nice change. Same as using repairs to recharge it.

Structure change: Didn't interact with it. Not many comments. Lets Smallest FEEL like they can play more dangerously, because normally she has to play more concervatively. We love snake eyes. Being applied to enemy sides feels nice for an ultra to not go down immediately. 2 Days ago, ??? lasted 2 structure. Wolf spider drone felt like it melted previously.

1 Stress for all: Snistle really liked it, Felt it was very cool. It makes direct risk of stuff like self heat MUCH MORE EVIDENT, rather than "eh, I'll probably be impaired". It gets rid of the "infinite heat cap state" of when someone is melting so they get 6 billion actions before they die. Heatgunning ultras to death is also glad to be gone, because they got heatgunned twice. Heatgunning to expose is cool. Makes them feel toothless.

Mesmerists: Can ABSOLUTELY lock people down, and if it targets the right person, they struggle... Otherwise

Put asterisk on it, can break LOS to stop it being a problem. With vet trait, it feels SLOW to generate mirrors, especiallyy as they lose them faster. But IDK how it would have been to just gain mirror images if it didn't have it.

Brace: Smallest - Saving brace, didn't use it. Had to get rid of mentality of "brace is bad, don't use it"

#

Sorry for the spam, but here's the write ups I got after the session valk

umbral sluice
#

Damn I didn't realise just how much I said

vagrant grotto
#

Some folks have more to say, others don’t wanna say as much in talks but follow up privately

#

Thinking about Jealous Flock reducing the drone count per action to 1

#

Words are at a premium for that optional though

muted blaze
#

Part of my brain says replace it from scratch

#

Or buff a drone with it as a quick tech in sensors or something... Maybe throw overshield on it too? Random thought

#

QT, buff a drone, give it overshield and make it's effect more potent... Then it dies next turn, idk

umbral sluice
vagrant grotto
#

I mean you heard me too lol

#

Get me to go off on game design and I won’t stop lol

muted blaze
#

CONVERTED TO D/D288 FAN

vagrant grotto
#

I’m just happy Jockey Atlas was a hit

muted blaze
#

It just works

umbral sluice
muted blaze
#

So snistle had other build ideas:

  • kobold, self immobilise as QA, become immune to knockback and prone because kobold forge clamps don't care about adjacency when clamped
#

So you can't ram them offf

vagrant grotto
#

Thanks for reminding me to touch Forge Clamps

muted blaze
#

Lmao thanks

#

And FA to contested check to kick a rodeo atlas off is somewhat absurd

#

Like a ram should be fine

umbral sluice
#

What happens when you TSS1 an object you're clamped to

#

Is it quantum clamp status

vagrant grotto
#

Ram it off vs its huge evasion or contested check it

muted blaze
muted blaze
#

Not even guaranteed

vagrant grotto
#

Someone can crunch the numbers on Contested Check and Tier vs Evasion

muted blaze
#

Like, sure... Vs pilots it's a check IG because rodeo is silly... But another contested check VS an accuracy probably gonna beat it atlas as big... High chance of failure and it's a FA

#

But idk that's just base CRB being silly

#

And also that's purely ✨ vibes ✨

vagrant grotto
#

It’ll be fine

muted blaze
#

Yeah

vagrant grotto
#

Just kill the atlas

muted blaze
#

It mostly shatters if atlas is gonna be imm involuntary movement

#

Which is rare...

#

Like, a hive counters a rebake atlas

#

Run into a swarm, difficulty on burn checks, gain soft cover and burn off the flees

#

It's literally electric smoke from titanfall

vagrant grotto
#

Honestly happy with how a lot of stuff ran today

#

Most of the issues came down to Drone interactions, everything else was tolerable at worst and manageable at best

ashen crown
vagrant grotto
#

Lancer as a combat system doesn’t recognize the underlying fiction of “I am clamped onto a rock” and thus Forge Clamps “breaks” when you break adjacency to the thing you clamped to

#

You can’t clamp onto a rock thrown by Total Strength Suite 1, you can maybe forge clamp onto something and get carried away by a grapple or Cable Winch or something and retain immunity

mild trail
#

ah, WiFi Clamps

#

pain

vagrant grotto
#

Like, in the fiction it clearly makes no sense

#

You have to post-hoc justify the RAW

granite saddle
#

If you're touching the clamps, would you consider making them cover more involuntary movement ? 'cause right now they kinda feel sad imo; I never even considered them because of how limited they are.

#

Most of the really bad involuntary movement optionw that you'd care to stop aren't knockback, and it feels weird that pinnig spire is better than the clamps in that regard

vagrant grotto
granite saddle
#

Good.

#

The removal of quantum clamps feels like a worthy trade to recieve An Actually Useful Effect

vagrant grotto
#

When I get to Kobold, it’ll probably be a license + frame workover yeah, though not as intense as Atlas’s

#

In the License it’s mostly QoL stuff like Seismic Ripper ignoring Line of Sight, swapping Seismic Ripper for Purifying Code (it’s lore accurate and puts tech earlier in the license) and augmenting Forge Clamps

umbral sluice
#

so, out of curiosity, what do you think Kobold's issues are as a frame? I have some of my own takes but i do kind of want to hear yours first

vagrant grotto
#

Its repcap is super small, its defensive invis trait is hard to activate in any map that wants you to move, and its CP is micromanagement to the extreme

#

So like most of this is a quick fix from me

#

Bump the repcap, change Mimic Carapace to End of Turn instead of Start, and require Terraform blocks to be adjacent/continuous (maybe with a Size 2 wall as consolation prize)

#

I admit I have a soft spot for build-a-wall effects from my time in dnd, but I’d deffo require the wall be contiguous

umbral sluice
#

i think my biggest things with the Kobold are
a. 2 repair cap, nothing deserves 2 repair cap
b. the direct antisynergy with the licence that Mimic Carapace has, seeing as there are multiple tech suites and weapons and it seems to imply you don't want to attack
c. the somewhat irritating amount of micromanagement that is building terrain, though i admit my bias here is because i do not like editing the map on vtts

#

i wonder if you made Terraform Efficient but just had it be idk, like a height 1 line 4 of cubes?

#

but yeah i do think i mostly agree with your points there

vagrant grotto
#

Yeah maybe I’d add a clause that mimic carapace ends early too if kobold stops being adjacent to terrain larger than itself (via forced movement or terrain destruction)

#

I’ve become more bear-ish on efficient cores as of late tbf, and am now starting to think the real juice is starting with no Core Power unless you packed a Core Batrery (and making those exceptionally valuable/hard to get)

#

(Or a neat terrain feature like a power weapon in halo)

muted blaze
#

Efficient core... Make a singular size 2 cube

#

Is it good... Probably not... Probably only good for proccing unicomp

#

Nerf unicomp

umbral sluice
#

i am so extremely conflicted on unicomp

#

because on one hand, it kind of doesn't exist on non efficient frames

#

from my experience

#

on the other hand, my Unicomp Orchis spent 1 single repair for the entire 4 scene mission

muted blaze
#

It abuses the attrition game, turns an efficient core from "I do a cool 1/scene thing" to "I heal and also do something else"

#

Basically depending on the Core power cost, a free or quick action for both primary parts of a stabilise with no cost

vagrant grotto
#

Unicomp should probably be 1/mission tbf

muted blaze
#

It turned my efficient core users into using their core powers for nuke cav heat management

vagrant grotto
#

Like that was the OG intent before Efficient existed

muted blaze
#

That's my home rule for it

vagrant grotto
#

Yeah that works

muted blaze
#

Both my efficient players went "totally valid" and unequipped them

vagrant grotto
#

lol

#

Honestly yeah unicomp is niche af otherwise

#

Because so many Cores are protocols you want at the start of the scene

muted blaze
#

Unless you're like... "I won't heal here because I'll pop core next combat"

vagrant grotto
#

That’s an anti pattern imo

muted blaze
#

Yeah

#

Or if you're Sisyphus gaming

vagrant grotto
#

Just let someone repair for free once

#

There we go

#

Bump repair cap

#

That’s what Unicomp should be

#

The repcap CB

ashen crown
muted blaze
#

I used seismic ripper once and it was funny, I blew up the window of a space elevator lmao

vagrant grotto
ashen crown
muted blaze
#

I'd argue it's about as good as rangertail invis from a vibes perspective

#

In terms of freedom atleast

#

Rangertail is easier to proc I think... It ends it's turn in a soft cover area and it thrives

#

As valk would say, moisturised, in it's lane, flourishing

vagrant grotto
#

Yeah I’d just slap something similar on Kobold and call it a day

ashen crown
#

That, and before fixes it can’t destroy its own terraform terrain with any immediacy

vagrant grotto
#

Aight well, I could say “10 ap for each space caught in the line”

muted blaze
ashen crown
#

I mean. It is a full action

muted blaze
#

Lemme read the darn ability

ashen crown
#

I just feel like it should be more than “Siege Spec 1 but it’s a line” if it’s a full action is all

#

Especially if it becomes rank 3 equipment, which tends to be slightly stronger than equipment at the other two ranks

#

…. Okay I’m reading the ability again and I forgot it did 2d6 explosive (coulda swore it did less) so that’s egg on my face

muted blaze
vagrant grotto
#

It’s dealing AOE heavy mount damage yeah

ashen crown
#

Yeah with that considered that’s fair. In which case I guess nerfing the Terraform HP makes more sense than buffing the Seismic Ripper damage

#

Like that’s Pinaka Missile level damage

vagrant grotto
#

IPSN is the Hull manufacturer but GMS is the repcap manufacturer

ashen crown
#

“Our mechs can’t be knocked down. What makes yours special?”
“Well they never stop getting back up.”

muted blaze
vagrant grotto
#

Good

#

In other news, yet another reason for Squeezing Rules

muted blaze
#

Not in your house rule doc 😤

vagrant grotto
#

grumbles while writing notes in the bug tracker

#

I suppose it may be time to put my sitrep template to use

#

Put Squeezing and Interact into PPG

umbral sluice
#

What would squeezing work like? I imagine either slowed or slowed + difficult terrain

ashen crown
#

Technically it’s both

#

Iirc squeezing characters are treated as prone… or maybe I’m getting the rules confused with someone else’s

umbral sluice
#

Also inb4 we get the Manipulate trait in lancer for Interact that triggers overwatches (don't actually do this)

vagrant grotto
vagrant grotto
muted blaze
#

It's only used in exemplar

vagrant grotto
#

But nah reactive strike is widespread in lancer

#

Scylla is the only case of hitting in reaction to object touch

umbral sluice
# vagrant grotto Don’t tempt me

i mean in concept it's cool but i think it would play extremely different due to the prominence of higher threat weapons when compared to pf2e reach

vagrant grotto
#

That too

#

And the fact that everyone has Overwatch

umbral sluice
#

like reach 10 feet is already not common in pf2e let alone past that

vagrant grotto
#

And everyone has a reaction every turn

#

I’m fine limiting it to specific features

umbral sluice
#

yeah

opaque crescent
#

any units that desperately need feedback?

ashen crown
#

In terms of units:

  • Anchor
  • Capacitor
  • Ghost
  • Kensei
  • Occultist
  • Prism
  • Vulture
opaque crescent
#

ty ty

vagrant grotto
#

Thinking about playerside full techs again

#

I think adding the Accurate tag was simple but still has the issue of “all or nothing”

#

I’m considering Miss effects now, akin to what I did for the old version of NARCISSUS Override where the hit determines the duration

steel apex
#

i.e. Markerlight still applies Lock On on a miss

#

things of that nature

#

I think, imo, I prefer this to "accurate full techs" though I can see the argument that tech stuff in general doesn't do much with tags to begin with so idk if that's just me being set in my ways, but on the whole I tend to value consolations or "something happens anyway" over more "it's all or nothing still, but you get a nudge"

#

SLAVE SYSTEMS : Make a tech attack against a hostile character within Sensors. On a hit, they immediately take two Quick Actions or one Full Action of your choice from the following list: Boost, Stabilize, Improvised Attack, Grapple, Ram, or activating a System of your choice. The target counts as taking these actions, though you choose the actions and targets if relevant, and any activated systems count you and your allies as allied characters, and characters hostile to you as hostile characters. On a miss, choose only one Quick Action.

vagrant grotto
#

But yeah I’d shift away from the Accurate tag on full techs in general I think. Starting to have ideas for Last Argument of Kings too, but nothing solid

steel apex
#

My idea for that was that on a miss, you mark the target, and the next time you use LAoK against them you can consume that mark for +1 Accuracy and +X additional burn

#

so basically if you hit, great, they go up, if you miss then it's akin to kinetic compensator on the Demolisher

#

it's hard to give LAoK consolation heat because while you'd think that would make sense, if you overheat someone close to cap, they can end up blowing a stress and wrapping back around to low heat

#

which defeats the purpose

vagrant grotto
#

Noted, I was thinking “half burn” and then a rider for “while burning, become easier to hack”

steel apex
#

you want them to have high heat BUT not go over, and so it's either bodge some weird wording to prevent them from going over cap or just coming up with a way to cash additional burn in some extra way

#

Half burn seems sensible, but I'm thinking in terms of like...how high do you really push NPC heat caps before using it? That's getting more into "does LAoK need more tweaking than simply a miss rider"

#

Turning it into something that makes the target easier to hack is interesting, I might even consider broadening that out to "all attacks against the target get +1 Accuracy while they have the burn on them" like a sort of super lock on

ashen crown
ashen crown
opaque crescent
umbral sluice
#

As if Chomolungma didn't do enough heat already 😭

ashen crown
#

Could also be as simple as "Impair on Miss, Impair until Burn Cleared on Hit"

#

Where the on miss effect just gets its duration tied to the burn on a hit

#

Impair is impactful, but also general enough to not be stacked with a wide swath of control effects + be debilitating in a more reasonable way, and it augments the burn itself

granite saddle
vagrant grotto
#

Change to Slave Systems/Daemon Possession idea I'm floating:

Daemon Possession: Make a tech attack against a hostile character within Sensors. On a hit, on their next turn, you choose one of their quick actions at any point in their turn, chosen from the following list: Boost, Grapple, Ram, or Activate (Quick). On a miss, they decide when you may choose their quick action. Although you choose the action and its target (if relevant), they count as taking the action.
#

And Predator/Prey Concepts:

Make a tech attack against a hostile character within Sensors. On a hit, they immediately Skirmish or use a Quick Tech action against a different character or object of your choice as a reaction. Although you choose their target and weapon or Quick Tech action, they count as attacking and taking a reaction. On a hit or miss, the target cannot take reactions for the rest of the turn.
granite saddle
vagrant grotto
#

I figure why does OSIRIS get to have all the fun

granite saddle
#

I'm always the guy reminding people of it when talking about involuntary voluntary movement too

#

Though I will say, P/PC feels really meh on a miss. Especially compared to the alternative

#

Oh wait rest of current turn ? Yeah that's really bad. It's basically single-target disengage, which isn't really a compliment

vagrant grotto
#

P/PC miss effect needs some work yeah

granite saddle
#

I mean, it'd not useless I'll give it that. Just. Rough.

vagrant grotto
#

yeah. Considered denying Reactions until they start their turn but then realized that's hella strong vs. Archers and Sentinels and other Overwatchers

granite saddle
#

Ig "consume their overwatch" or something maybe ?

velvet cairn
#

Which NPC has P/PC

granite saddle
vagrant grotto
#

I'm breaking my rules to houserule-post my playerside stuff

velvet cairn
#

Oh, minotaur

#

Err, now that I think about ot

#

Although you choose their target and weapon, they count as attacking and taking a reaction.

#

Does it just fail if they can't take a reaction

vagrant grotto
velvet cairn
#

Like if your target is grappled

vagrant grotto
#

yes

#

that's RAW

velvet cairn
#

Is this long wording just for allowing slave systems (and by extension ppc) to bypass involuntary movement not trigging reactions?

#

Seems weird that the goblin Horos1 wording wasn't used

vagrant grotto
#

Yes

#

it's that you control their action

#

and HOROS 1 is its own kind of wordy as hell lol

velvet cairn
#

HOROS1 is very clear though

#

Admittedly the one part it falls flat in is the interaction with heavy frame

granite saddle
vagrant grotto
#

Yeah no I don't think it is

granite saddle
vagrant grotto
#

You are making a Full Action tech attack in order to make another attack that deals middling NPC damage

granite saddle
#

Ig with multiattackers out of the picture, yeah tru

velvet cairn
#

Inherently it's ceiling is very variable depending on who you're forcing to make the attack

If you target someone like nonrebaked Specter ronin operator it gets silly

vagrant grotto
#

Honestly, at this point I'd say "you can get them to attack no matter what but they have accuracy or difficulty depending on the hit"

#

and then slap a 1/scene per character on each for safety

granite saddle
#

Eh. Idk. It probably works better, and it's not Yet Another Non-condition effect, but that still feels... Idk.

#

Oof

#

Not sure about that one on both. Probably, but uh...
We're reaching my limits on "3am balance wisdom" so I guess choose the version you like best and run (or get someone to run) a playtest for it

vagrant grotto
#

valid

#

honestly having 2 heat and impair or slow on miss wouldn't be outta line IMO

#

they resist the effect but it's grinding their gears to do so

granite saddle
vagrant grotto
#

noted, i may be down to run a game this weekend

#

I'm taking a long weekend this upcoming one so I may have some free time

granite saddle
#

If I get my shit together, I might run something myself too, but I'm in a self-care(do nothing and chill) kinda mood so don't bet on it too hard.

vagrant grotto
#

mood

granite saddle
#

Last thing for tonight : mind approving/veto-ing this nickname for me on here ? I've had the idea for a while already but want your approval first.

vagrant grotto
#

lollllll

#

go for it if you want to

granite saddle
opaque crescent
#

on the topic of running games, I'm looking at maybe setting up a playtest sometime soon, probably this weekend or next depending on availability

#

and i'm also working on getting valk's structure and one stress for all working as a foundry module but shhh no one has to know yet

velvet cairn
#

Oh yeah

#

The players loved the doppelganger Operator

#

They thought I just cross classed the raptor rifle at first onto a scout platoform

#

But then someone said

Wait, why is it no longer invisible

#

They had an absolute freakout because of OSR memories

#

Dropped everything to dump damage into it

#

Idk

I love operators and wish they had the "Only one operator may be present in a scene" limitation

#

So that they can be run at full power/deadliness

vagrant grotto
# 
Forge Clamps
You sink the jaws of your clamp into an adjacent object or piece of terrain of Size 1 or larger. You become Immobilized but gain Immunity to non-teleport involuntary movement and Prone. This effect ends if you’re no longer adjacent to the original object or terrain or if you release the clamp as a protocol.
#

hopefully that's de-jankified enough

ashen crown
vagrant grotto
ashen crown
#

Ah lol

vagrant grotto
#

it's 2 heat + impair on miss for P/PC and 2 heat + slowed on miss for Slave Systems/Daemon Possession

#

does this mean that !V! Minotaur can deterministically Immobilize someone while using Daemon Possession? yes, next question

ashen crown
vagrant grotto
#

I also limit Daemon Possession to 1/scene per character though

ashen crown
#

Let Minotaur live a little

vagrant grotto
#

!V! Minotaur can activate Metafold Maze as a free action on a Full Tech

#

got that one from Kai

ashen crown
#

Oh I forgot oops- the !V! didn't register for me mentally

velvet cairn
vagrant grotto
#

yeah it's a house rule

vagrant grotto
#

bullet: dodged

ashen crown
#

You know that is something that occasionally irks me about Lancer effects but can't really be dealt with- sometimes the "on miss" or "weaker" effect is preferable

vagrant grotto
#

there's a reason I purposefully made it a "worse Fragsig" effect

ashen crown
#

Ofc ofc

vagrant grotto
# 
Forge Clamps
You sink the jaws of your clamp into an adjacent object or piece of terrain of Size 1 or larger. While clamped, you can only move with the chosen object or terrain; otherwise, you are immune to non-teleport involuntary movement and Prone. This effect ends if you break adjacency with the original object or terrain or if you release the clamp as a protocol.

Trying a wording that lets you ride the TSS1 rock

ashen crown
#

Hey how come neither version of forge clamps factors in the possibility of the terrain being destroyed?

#

Now technically that is breaking adjacency however if you wanna make it so you can TSS1 ride the rock

vagrant grotto
#

if the terrain is destroyed, you're no longer adjacent

ashen crown
#

Just make the object destruction end the effect while adjacency is forced while the effects is active

vagrant grotto
#

because it's gone-zo

#

Teleports are also relevant

ashen crown
#

Ah right I forgot about teleporting

south cypress
#

Are there any effects that can teleport an object/terrain segment? If so, would you teleport with the thing you're Forge Clamped onto when it teleports?

vagrant grotto
#

I don't think — gets shot by Anomaly's Realm Warp

#

I'm removing the TSS1 taxi

ashen crown
#

I thought that'd be the case

#

I honestly don't think the TSS1 taxi even worked in the first place due to the fact that Forge Clamps only ensures yourself against involuntary movement, not the object, so moving the object breaks adjacency and ends Forge Clamps

vagrant grotto
#

yeah exactly (except RAW Forge Clamps only looks for "is it destroyed")

ashen crown
#

Could also be interesting to key Forge Clamps into the Reworked Object Manipulation rules but that then mandates tables who wanna use these Forge Clamp reworks need to use those rules.

However to that I say "There's probably like... 3 other Forge Clamp reworks out there you don't have to shop here"

south cypress
ashen crown
#

See for that stuff like Forge-2 Emplacements stop being TSS1-able

#

So it's like a molotov cocktail- you throw it and boom, different problem!

south cypress
granite saddle
#

*Zheng starts its turn*
*Lego Star Wars video game building sound starts playing until end of turn*

vagrant grotto
#

Aight I pushed my Kobold changes though I don't have a version update yet

#

also haven't touched Terraform yet but my laptop is low on battery so it'll have to wait

#

but looking at my Player Mech HASE spreadsheet, according to my sheet's standards the Kobold is pretty damn close to Everest's "total HASE" if you just bump its repair cap from 2 to 4

ashen crown
#

I say this very arbitrarily, but if a mech's sensors are less than 15 then a repair cap of 2 is criminal imo

vagrant grotto
#

In my books, a Repair cap of 2 is always criminal

#

Yes, even Death’s Head

#

Assuming the artillery is gonna not engage with the rest of the fight is an unhealthy outlook IMO

#

If I had my way, no mech would have fewer than 4 repcap

steel apex
#

I think the issues that exist with repair cap and divergent values are, in part (not total) a product of it costing 2 repairs to regain one structure and then everything being pegged to that

#

going from 2 to 4 baseline repair cap is saying "you can, sans any hull, patch 2 Structure/Stress" so at this point my question is more "why not just cut structure/stress repair costs in half and then fix your values to that instead" and now a Repair Cap of 2 makes more sense

#

you have basically two "fractional" costs in the game, one of which is in-combat stabilize repair and the other of which is fixing busted gear, and my stance on having to do the latter in general is "this sucks and I would happily ditch it" and for the former, I feel like you could find a better way to do a Second Wind equivalent

#

IF there was a more robust framework for spending repairs the way D&D 4E used healing surges I would be more copacetic with pumping repair cap numbers up and being like "yeah this tracks," as it stands I feel like the big problem is more than patching up between battles is very costly, and I say this as an attrition lover

#

(three costs sorry, one repair to fix your HP back up to full, which feels like a nuissance tax more than anything else)

#

I've had a lot of discussions/arguments with jas before on the merits/demerits of attritional structure versus "each fight is self-contained," and I like that lancer HAS an attritional structure to it because it raises feelings of tension across missions and tangibly rewards good play...if you're playing well and everyone's firing on all cylinders then you earn yourself more breathing room and opportunities to play harder later on, BUT I do think certain elements of lancer's attritional structure feel like they're holdovers from 4E but in ways that don't line up to other aspects

#

You also had to spend healing surges during short rests in 4E to regain your HP, for example, but also a "low" number of healing surges for squishy backliner controllers was like 6, and you never had to repair structure as you simply had one HP bar

vagrant grotto
#

Yeah no I’m an attrition sicko too in this regard

steel apex
#

so I would strongly consider ditching "you gotta patch your HP post fight" and just make THAT automatically happen

vagrant grotto
#

I did make a bit of a half baked house rule that made repair costs cheaper, in my PPG appendix

steel apex
#

like yeah it makes the Balor and Gilgamesh marginally less special, who cares

vagrant grotto
#

Yeah no Balor having that trait was mostly to prevent folks from drawing out a fight to get regen by my understanding

steel apex
#

then I'd probably really strongly consider if 2 repairs per structure/stress is actually well costed or not

#

like yes, if everyone has Replaceable Parts then the GMS mechs lose some swag, but after years of people doing the GMS to other manufacturer transition and hitting a brick wall when their first repair cap bill comes due, I'm increasingly of the mind that it might be better if everything just worked that way by default

#

give the GMS mechs something else if you have to

vagrant grotto
#

This is what I currently have in PPG:

image0.jpg
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And like, yeah it’s all number tweaking, chances are the numbers need shaken some more until they land in a pleasing shape

steel apex
#

Here's my wacky idea, since people were griping about it elsewhere: instead of Replaceable Parts, give every GMS mech Universal Compatibility as a trait instead

vagrant grotto
#

Now we’re cooking haha

steel apex
#

this is PROBABLY not actually a good idea, BUT it does take it out of the general core bonus pool since people mostly seem unhappy that you can combo it with efficient core powers

vagrant grotto
#

Wouldn’t be a perfect fit for my house rules since I make Everest’s core power efficient, but I can appreciate the direction this is going

velvet cairn
#

People were mad about efficient unicomp?

steel apex
vagrant grotto
#

Honestly now that I think about it I might allow GMS mechs to repair equipment when they stabilize to restore HP, in my PPG house rules

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Since System Trauma is more frequent in my case

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If I was mostly using CRB I’d probably lean towards your proposed Unicomp approach

velvet cairn
#

Then again it's the same vein as brilliance/initiative/that saga brace trait

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Where you only need it once a scene, but that one time is all you need

vagrant grotto
#

Adding an action-free turbostabilize to your 1/scene Ultimate Ability is pretty solid, actually

velvet cairn
#

I still feel weirded out by Lycan's core being efficient though

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But that's just the logistical part of me talking

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"hi yes we bolted back on your explosively jettisoned armor" before the start of the next scene

vagrant grotto
#

Gonna declare that as off-topic to the thread

velvet cairn
#

As an extra cost, or is it

vagrant grotto
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It would not

velvet cairn
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"I spend 1 rep to heal, I get a mount repair as a bonus"

vagrant grotto
#

Yup

velvet cairn
#

I guess Toku is going to appreciate the 'normal' 1 rep sys/struc/wep/stress changes

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Specifically with Exbatt

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Now it only costs 2 rep instead of the kings ransom of 4

muted blaze
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Attrition is weird in lancer

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Because in an ideal world I'd like to have my players always end a mission on no repair cap

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With alternate structure rules you can go into a final fight down a structure (or stress)... But I find frequently it's either everyone's a ok and fine, someone ends a mission down a repcap or two... Or everyone ends it with all their resources being utterly minced

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And I'd like to alleviate it... But, but I have hard combats but because a lot of the time they're so objective oriented the players struggle but they do a very good job on not being harmed in the first place

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Am I bad? Maybe... But this could also easily be a consequence of other house rules and rebalancing (Maria's structure... Rebakes meaning the combats aren't "obliterate the PCs with a rainmaker that kills them all"

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Or it's just a GM skill issue

velvet cairn
vagrant grotto
#

Stuff where players set the pace and choose when to rest/full repair

muted blaze
velvet cairn
#

Like

If I have to go into a fight with the choice of a missing mount or a missing structure, and because of each costing 2 repair I can only pick one

I would take structure 90% of the time because not doing so would lead to a failure cascade

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Since each missing structure makes it easier to roll a 1 or a systrauma

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At least with the proposed 1 rep cost struc/system I get to think to myself

"Okay, I genuinely fucked up to have to had reach this point with literally nothing left to bail me out"

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Instead of 2/2's "Well I got structured once despite my best efforts, there goes 2/3 of my repcap"

umbral sluice
vagrant grotto
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Pretty sure Al usually uses Maria’s from #1062222891342647366

muted blaze
#

One unfortunate thing when it comes to my perception of Attrition and balance, it's twisted by house rules because I've gone "yeah fuck that noise" so long ago that the old structure tables seem to me like a distant memory

vagrant grotto
#

I mean at this point I favor the current consistency

CRB tables are swingy, which means attrition rates are swingy

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Taking 1 structure could mean costing anywhere from 2, 3, or 6 repairs to come back, depending on Luck™

muted blaze
#

Where I'm used to Taking structure is 3 on a bad day

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Takingg structure is 0 repcap, BECAUSE OUR PAINTJOB IS BEING SCRATCHED WITH THIS ONE!!!

vagrant grotto
#

Anywho, looking to add finishing touches to the homebrew Kobold this week, as well as taking sights at Goblin

muted blaze
#

Reduce goblins base HP

#

"Why would you do that?"
"Funi"

granite saddle
vagrant grotto
#

And the LCP JSONs but you’ll need to manually zip the lcp yourself

granite saddle
#

No clue what that means but that's a problem for future me.

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Also, quick aside : with the new GMS CBs, while intrusion package just seems... bad to me (for the price of a whole CB at least) I genuinely would have taken Autonomous coordination last time if not for the "the drone is deployed adjacent" part. Would you consider testing it without that restriction tonsee if it's fine ?

vagrant grotto
granite saddle
#

Right, not the target audience then
<- doesn't even know how to open a foundry game despite having bought it like, months ago

vagrant grotto
#

And you can deterministically turn off its ability to help allies for a round

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Anything that specifies “ally” will be affected

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It’s potent vs PPG stuff especially

granite saddle
#

Fair, it's just. Eh. I'd have to test it.
Would the Impaired being able to affect the tech be too much ?

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/gen

vagrant grotto
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Try it first. I haven’t seen it in action. I just ported it from Maria’s rules

granite saddle
#

Also, fair.

#

Would love me a Save Markerlight combo, but what can ya do

muted blaze
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Throw it on a commander to be unable to use it's abilities (It has abilities?)
Throw it on any support to stop them doing anything

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It would stop priests, supports, aegis', mirages, etc from doing anything

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And defenders can also have a harder time depending onn the ability and NPC

vagrant grotto
#

It deterministically shuts off Lodestone and Zeal for a turn without needing to overheat the target

#

If Anchor already went this round it’s SOL

granite saddle
#

I guess my main gripe is that usually, controllers are to busy doing damage control on the agressive part of the OpFor to have the time to bother with the supports, but that's probably skill issue so.

vagrant grotto
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Depending on reading it could potentially turn off Ghost immediately too

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Peeling buffs from the opponent is controller energy

granite saddle
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Oh it is, do they actually have the time to is the question.

vagrant grotto
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The perpetual question in tactics-based elfgames

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“Do I have the action economy for this”

granite saddle
#

And for Autonomous coordination ? Also "test before" or "test without then add back if necessary" ?

vagrant grotto
vagrant grotto
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I want to see how Maria’s stuff works without my direct meddling

granite saddle
vagrant grotto
#

Okay that’s 1 quick action

granite saddle
granite saddle
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But yeah no I see how it's good as long as the rest of the team can take some of the load off the controller's shoulder.
Turned me around on it, well done.

#

Still think Coordination shouldn't be adjacent for drones but I'll just test that myself then 😈

ashen crown
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For Valk-style Sitreps, I forget, is the recommended “# of points til victory” equal to twice the number of scorable objectives or twice the PC count?

vagrant grotto
muted blaze
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Surely it should be whichever is lower of the two

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hrmm, that made me think

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I'm curious how the sitrep I made for combat 1 would have gone if it was "remain adjacent until objective until EOR or end of current turn"

vagrant grotto
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I don’t know, maybe? I think forcing us to get all 6 would’ve been fine too

muted blaze
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It heavily incentivised alpha striking and not caring about long term plans if you were fast enough

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Requiring people to stick would have forced more long term concerns and strategy

vagrant grotto
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Yeah that’s true; incentivizing different strats is fine tho

#

Sometimes you wanna blitz sometimes you wanna take it slow

muted blaze
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...

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What if there were 8 capacitors 🤔

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Not zappy's

ashen crown
# vagrant grotto Pc count

That does make sense, but like I’m dwelling on it. If there are 3 objectives regardless of PC count then more than 3 players will cause the minimum number of rounds til the end of combat to increase.

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Which could be good depending on design intents, but could also be perceived as a negative

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  • a higher enemy count may increase the odds of getting all objectives claimed in a round so that may already be a natural counterbalance

Both of these points of contention need to be addressed in playtest tho

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For a control where both sides need to score it makes more sense because that buffer for the enemies is more valuable than the reduced round minimum, but for other sitreps it’s hard to say

vagrant grotto
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3 is good target

ashen crown
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3 objectives does seem like the standard, so if you go off that it takes 2 rounds minimum to complete with 3 players, 3 rounds minimum for 4, and 5 rounds minimum for 5 players (since the maximum number of points scorable per round is 3). I don’t know if that’s a positive or negative, it really depends on testing.

muted blaze
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As I found out the hard way, if theirs too many points for objectives, players can and will decide it becomes a death match instead

ashen crown
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Yeah so scaling off of objective quantity screws over lower PC groups, meanwhile scaling off of PC count screws over higher PC groups

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Scaling objective quantity over PC count would be the best solution (always have one less objective than the player count) but then that increases GM burden when it comes to varying map design, which for folks with unstable group counts or who run public games w/ differing groups may be unfavorable

muted blaze
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Wing it, vibes innit

vagrant grotto
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Okay polling for interest in a Sunday game at 2pm US eastern

muted blaze
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Hodliday 😔

umbral sluice
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next Sunday I'll be busy unfortunately, theme park

vagrant grotto
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Nice

#

If I don’t get folks I’ll just be playing spider-man no biggy

granite saddle
#

is that the same time as usual ?

vagrant grotto
granite saddle
#

then I should be good yeah

dapper goblet
#

I think that'll work for me if there's a slot

vagrant grotto
dapper goblet
#

Would have to read all your player-side houserules though lol

vagrant grotto
#

Lol they’re not that intense (I think sweating )

dapper goblet
#

Im borderline illiterate 😎

opaque crescent
vagrant grotto
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That makes 3 interested

granite saddle
#

If this does end up happening, I'm bringing reactor stabilizer Vlad as agreed last time, right ?

granite saddle
#

Also, what's your stance on the Kraul Rifle ? With you removing all of the easy ways to counteract inaccurate and the fact the weapon's use case is attacking people who aren't prone (to prone them with the reaction), it looks to me like you just never hit with it. Not like the damage is particularly good either.

vagrant grotto
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Also: the goal can be to keep someone prone

vagrant grotto
#

Autostab is a mod, sure, but I haven’t really touched Vanguard yet

#

Mostly because tweaking talents drives me up the wall

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But if you’re concerned, try it out

granite saddle
#

I mean. Range 8 no threat CQB. Not really the target audience for Vaguard but I see your point.

granite saddle
vagrant grotto
#

Guess we’ll never know videogames

#

The Drill calls

granite saddle
#

If it's any consolation to you, I do intend to try your Saves Atlas at some point, so maybe.

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Only question now is do I go WW for The Good Shit™, or 2 more HA LLs for Stasis shielding...

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I guess I can see what the potential team looks like first.

vagrant grotto
#

Stuff that’s pending but won’t make the LCP until Thursday at best:

  • Eject Power Cores replaced with something akin to Witch Chain
  • OSIRIS changed to a counter + cash out system
  • Goblin getting a tech nerf but durability buff
  • Exemplar 2 changing trigger conditions from Ally in 3 to marked target in 3
opaque crescent
#

i'm drawn to Lancaster or Sunzi because they have Valk reworks

granite saddle
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If the Reactor Stab Drill ends up being an issue, I think slapping a quick and easy "In this case, the heat generated by overkill cannot be prevented or reduced in any way" on the drill's special effect could do the trick.

granite saddle
vagrant grotto
opaque crescent
vagrant grotto
muted blaze
#

DD288 Mech surfer atlas

sudden cosmos
#

If there's still slots I can do Sunday playtest stuff YesYes

vagrant grotto
muted blaze
vagrant grotto
#

That makes 4

#

Thread incoming

granite saddle
vagrant grotto
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Witch chain doesn’t compel you to return

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But I’ll tweak horos 3 if it’s an issue

muted blaze
#

Can you pull a what you did to the balor licence and just swap the LLs you get stuff at

vagrant grotto
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Point is that Jamming on-demand needs more drawback, I have decided

vagrant grotto
granite saddle
#

Just didn't want you to accidentally forget about HorOs III is all

vagrant grotto
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Plus also @muted blaze the bigger issue for me is not “how gated is it”, it’s “what do we do when we have this”

vagrant grotto
granite saddle
#

Perfect then

muted blaze
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Slapping someone with a chain And a celestial shackles on the same target 😩

vagrant grotto
#

Jamming is very rarely not good, and you always wanna smash that Duat button so you can get Stun and Dominate

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If I keep the effects the same but scatter the pieces to the four winds, the issue will remain once all the dragon balls are reassembled

granite saddle
opaque crescent
vagrant grotto
# granite saddle ~~Also I don't get this one~~

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#

Point being if I add that clause to Drill specifically for Reactor Stabilizer I’m just slapping patches on patches

ashen crown
#

What does !V! Reactor Stabilizer do again?

vagrant grotto
#

So you can overcharge at heatcap, become exposed and overheated, but not take 1d6+4 energy damage while exposed in the process

opaque crescent
#

On that note, just checking a thing for implementing One Stress for All, it's only stabilize that clears exposed and overheat, right? No any other source of cooling works?

vagrant grotto
ashen crown
vagrant grotto
#

Tokugawa notwithstanding

opaque crescent
ashen crown
#

I mean… in all honesty it doesn’t seem that bad? For something like Combat Drill

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Like yes it is mitigating the big consequence of damage but you’re still exposed and all

#

It’s niche-ish

opaque crescent
vagrant grotto
#

It’s insurance against blowing up your face. Water tried it with Displacer 0 Eng Swallowtail a few weeks back

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And like, it was fine, they were still doing damage control to not die afterwards

opaque crescent
#

here's how that swallowtail went

image.png
vagrant grotto
#

They used Stasis Shielding to get Resistance to counteract the exposed

ashen crown
#

It does introduce a weird new strat of “overheat looping” tbh