#Iphigenia at Midnight

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wheat ferry
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**It is thirty seconds to midnight.

You and a few allies are all that stand between the genocidal ambitions of a long-lost fleet and billions of lives. Against you in this task is arrayed all the might and fury of a star-spanning empire dead for five centuries, under the absolute control of Lady Iphigenia, the Queen of Crows; multiple capital ships and tens of thousands of mechanized chassis and troops, unflinching in their goal and unwilling to accept surrender. You are outnumbered, outgunned, and without reinforcements or time -

But you are not outmatched.**

Across three fast-paced, action-packed missions ranging from contested warship boarding in the void of space to dueling tanks on a rocket-powered train, Iphigenia at Midnight recounts the story of the Choral Coalition: A hastily-assembled group of disparate soldiers, mercenaries, drifters, peacekeepers, and revolutionaries fighting to prevent the specter of a war five hundred years past from consuming all life in the Choral system. Player characters will see their bonds as a unit tested as they delve into the Hell of war or form common cause around taking the fight to Lady Iphigenia with fellow fighters from different backgrounds, progressing from a narrative prologue in a city under siege to a climactic final battle in the stars above with entire worlds weighing in the balance.

https://img.itch.zone/aW1hZ2UvMzM1NzExNy8yMjQ0ODkxNC5wbmc=/794x1000/6GRj6J.png

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This module includes...

For GMs,

  • Three thrilling missions to take players from License Levels 6 to 9 over the course of eleven combat scenes, including prewritten and playtested opposing forces of NPCs and tactical advice for running each fight
  • Three new NPCs: The tactical reactor technician and Heat-based controller Morozko, the brutal biochemical artillery chassis Clademaster, and setpiece boss Iphigenia herself
  • Twenty-plus illustrations ranging from module NPCs to stunning vistas and desperate battles on a warship's hull
  • New rules for enclosed environments to represent the tight confines of a boarding engagement, including ceilings, walls, and openable doors
  • An expansion for narrative play in Lancer to allow more focused narrative / on-foot combat, taking inspiration from Massif Press's ICON, including two example "hardsuit combats" in the module itself
  • Substantial narrative material ranging from discussions of the module antagonists' history and motivation, to unique side missions and pre-combat content for PCs, to dissections of the Second Committee's poisonous ideology
  • Multiple narrative hooks and backgrounds for players to create characters already involved with the overarching conflict of the module
  • Details on the Choral Worlds' rich history, from their founding as a colonial satrapy to the modern day
  • Optional rules for high-mortality play
  • Tracklists and reading guides to emphasize the themes and atmosphere of the module
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For players,

  • The IPS-N Mitscher license, featuring both the titular Mitscher - a heavily armored, heavily armed jet-powered flying gunship that punishes its enemies with rolling barrages of munitions - and its alternate frame Steichen - a reconnaissance aircraft which singles out foes for surveillance and elimination
  • The SSC Swordgrass license, a vampiric duelist designed for deniable-operations agents, with a unique precognitive neural sync which allows it to dodge blows before they even begin
  • The HORUS Spectre license, a monument to the revolutionary Interstellar Solidarity Brigades which fearlessly takes damage in place of its allies and holds its ground even against overwhelming odds
  • The HA Haber license, an unvarnished relic of the Second Committee's biochemical weapons program which utilizes ancient TBK munitions to control the battlefield and destroy its opponents
  • Four new Reserves of ingenuity and battlefield salvage, whether paracausal artifacts or artillery shells
  • Twelve new pieces of Exotic Gear, ranging from superheavy anti-chassis rifles to supply drop beacons

Iphigenia at Midnight is fully compatible with COMP/CON for all game components - NPCs, player licenses, Reserves, and Exotic Gear - and through that, popular virtual tabletop tools such as Foundry. The player-side .lcp and the licenses .pdf are and will remain free to everyone.

If you have already purchased this narrative at the base tier and wish to get maps for it later, please see https://ash-and-gold.itch.io/iphigenia-at-midnight-maps.

**The clock has struck midnight. The Dead 628th splits in the void to find their targets, and the leviathan bulk of their ancient hulls blocks the light of distant stars. Shipmistress Iphigenia administers her murderous war from the depths of the SCS-BB Diana’s heart.

Take up arms. Join your comrades. Stop Her before it’s too late.**

Current version: 1.0
Current Licenses/LCP version: 1.7
https://ash-and-gold.itch.io/iphigenia

itch.io
Iphigenia at Midnight Maps by Ash and Gold

Custom map pack for Iphigenia at Midnight.

itch.io
Iphigenia at Midnight by Ash and Gold

A downloadable Lancer narrative about the ghosts of an imperial past

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@cunning dust @fluid salmon @slender forum @inland jungle @lucid musk @leaden hornet @plush cloak @pastel vigil @terse arrow @amber robin @dense meteor @vast lily @stray goblet @dusty portal @stuck bison @random ginkgo @languid flax

lucid musk
wheat ferry
slender forum
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ITS FUCKING OUT YEEES

lucid musk
slender forum
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congrats brother!!!

dusty portal
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hell yeah

vast lily
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O FUCK YEAH

random ginkgo
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LET'S FUCKING GOOOOOOOOOOOO

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WE BALLIIIIIN

slender forum
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You should be fucking hyped ya’ll Ash’s stuff is so so so good I’m fucking jazzed about the full release

dense meteor
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Nice.

wheat ferry
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I may now rest (until someone tells me I broke something or left something out)

plush cloak
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:3

terse arrow
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We are LIVE

slender forum
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Yeah we are!!

solid jewel
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"I released the thing" is when you start finding out all the stuff that's broken or left out

wheat ferry
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I definitely remembered to put all the sidebars I was planning on into the finished draft. Probably.

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I've got a big changelog spreadsheet and versioning this time around, so I should be able to put changes out pretty quickly.

solid jewel
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regardless, congrats, a module is a big undertaking

wheat ferry
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Thank you very much, it's been... nearly a year and a half of work
I'm real happy with how it came out, and I'm glad it'll finally be in the audience's hands

image.png
amber robin
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o shit

main ferry
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Oh hell yes

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I'm gonna dive into this so much tomorrow

stuck bison
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congrats ash!!!! I'll take a peek at this when I'm off work!

wheat ferry
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I look forward to y'all's feedback!

main ferry
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I definitely will look through and try and give some

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LL6-9 is perfect for the kind of content the players I usually run for enjoy, gameplay-wise

wheat ferry
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100% - I wanted to put out something that was high stakes but high flexibility, where you could take these kinds of "endgame" builds in and stress test them against some of the worst Lancer could throw at you

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I'm mostly comfortable with where I ended up tuning the combats, but I definitely want more eyes on attrition through the point crawl/random encounters in M1 and the big boss fights in M3

stray goblet
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OH SHIT IT'S REAL

solemn rapids
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these new frames have some Juice to em. i dig it

languid flax
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Yoooo hell yeah

abstract summit
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👀

little robin
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PEAK JUST DROPPED

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I LOVE THIS

dense meteor
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Just realized the De Payens is still a separate license 😔

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Still a very cool supplement though.

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Your ability to convey the dark vibes of a hopeless conflict is unparalleled.

wooden temple
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oh shit what is this 👀

wooden temple
slender forum
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Good to know my boy'll be from Patrae...

fluid salmon
cunning dust
wheat ferry
north bluff
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Took a look through the frames; gotta try and build something with them but ye gods are they pushing some buttons for me (in a good way)

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also took a peek at the hardsuit combat rules in the back of the book; seem like a nice little expansion on narrative combat at first glance

plush cloak
wheat ferry
north bluff
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Sure! This was the first pass I took at it; could definitely optimize it more (swap in ASURA and Auto-Hardpoints?), but am relatively happy with it on paper otherwise:

[ LICENSES ]
  HA Sherman 3, HA HABER 3
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  Superior by Design, Integrated Ammo Feeds
[ TALENTS ]
  Nuclear Cavalier 3, Siege Specialist 3, Grease Monkey 3
[ STATS ]
  HULL:4 AGI:0 SYS:2 ENGI:2
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:19 ARMOR:2
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:11 REPAIR:6
  TECH ATK:0 LIMITED:+3
  SPD:4 EVA:8 EDEF:10 SENSE:5 SAVE:13
[ WEAPONS ]
  Integrated: Fuel Rod Gun
  FLEX MOUNT: "Wonderland" Neurochemical Cannon
  HEAVY MOUNT: ANDROMEDA-Pattern Heavy Laser Rifle (SEEK/DEVOUR Canister Shot)
[ SYSTEMS ]
  Redundant Systems Upgrade x4, CBRNN Sealing, Gas Grenade Seeder x6, Armament Redundancy```
wheat ferry
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👁️ excellent
Airbursting Andromeda is a very funny combo

crimson zodiac
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"Here are the licenses you requested. I'm canceling your access to SSC's anime archives."

-- SSC SWORDGRASS @ LL6 -- [ LICENSES ] SSC SWORDGRASS 3, SSC Metalmark 1, SSC Dusk Wing 2 [ CORE BONUSES ] Kai Bioplating, Overpower Caliber [ TALENTS ] Duelist 3, Nuclear Cavalier 3, Skirmisher 2, Combined Arms 1 [ STATS ] HULL:2 AGI:4 SYS:0 ENGI:2 STRUCTURE:4 HP:17 ARMOR:0 STRESS:4 HEATCAP:8 REPAIR:5 TECH ATK:-2 LIMITED:+1 SPD:8 EVA:14 EDEF:8 SENSE:1 SAVE:13 [ WEAPONS ] Integrated: Fuel Rod Gun FLEX MOUNT: Assault Rifle MAIN/AUX MOUNT: Nanowire Saber / Parrying Buckler // Overpower Caliber [ SYSTEMS ] DOLOROSA-Class NHP x4, Nanite Microfabrication Flask x3, Flicker Field Projector, Reactive Weave

ONE PERFECT CUT

wheat ferry
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If you're invisible, they can't tell if you're actually teleporting behind them or if it's just sparkling movement

crimson zodiac
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for legal reasons since this isn't in the Teleporting region of space we have to call it sparkling movement

pastel vigil
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okay - i spent pretty much read the entire module front to back yesterday before i went to bed and. yeah. ash you cooked

pastel vigil
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I will say one thing in particular did jump out at me which I will spoiler for being Mission 2 stuff, specifically 2-3: ||I do find it particularly amusing that Achilles is apparently using specifically whitewash to regenerate, implying it is eventually finite, but like fuck are the players going to find the bottom of that in the time given||

wheat ferry
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||but it's Technically™️ mechanically possible to just brute-force the regen, so I called that non-explicit side good enough||

pastel vigil
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yep, that tracks

north bluff
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Was having a hell of a time figuring out a good build for the Spectre, but did managed to come up with this fella:

[ LICENSES ]
  HORUS SPECTRE 3, SSC White Witch 2, SSC Mourning Cloak 1
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  The Lesson of the Open Door, Improved Armament
[ TALENTS ]
  House Guard 3, Combined Arms 3, Duelist 2, Pankrati 1
[ STATS ]
  HULL:2 AGI:2 SYS:0 ENGI:4
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:19 ARMOR:1
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:9 REPAIR:6
  TECH ATK:0 LIMITED:+2
  SPD:4 EVA:12 EDEF:8 SENSE:5 SAVE:15
[ WEAPONS ]
  FLEX MOUNT: Ferrofluid Lance
  MAIN/AUX MOUNT: Chain Spear / Fold Knife
  HEAVY MOUNT: "Swansong" Homing Lance
[ SYSTEMS ]
  Lesson of the Fallen Mask, Sympathetic Shield x5, Camus’s Razor, Unsigned Instrument of Surrender, Pinning Spire```
dusty portal
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iph spoilers ||while i understand the reasoning behind why Nothing Ever Happens% isnt possible, i do think it would be funny to have all four crowsworn in a room||

north bluff
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The kit feels a little scattershot, in that it really wants something that will muck with enemy shots, but doesn't have a lot that provides as such.

wheat ferry
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In playtesting, low-LL Spectre players usually picked up House Guard and Bonded, but that was a common point of feedback with fast team comps that didn't want to stick behind it for cover/adjacency - it's a weird sort of alt-tank where, at higher LLs, I've seen people branching out into Big Sal and IPS-N frames to snag more HP and access to Resistance, since you're pulling attacks off of your friends a lot.

wheat ferry
dusty portal
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||achilles too lost in the sauce to show up||

pastel vigil
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Iphigenia at Midnight extreme ....

north bluff
pastel vigil
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we're so fucked

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also fully admit I did not read Swordglass until today

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welcome back waterfowl dance

north bluff
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Manual Reactor Override would be hilarious on NukeCav-powered builds sickos

wheat ferry
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Ayup

MRO Balor was something that caused it to get nerfed like four times in testing

north bluff
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lmao

pastel vigil
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of course it did

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love you Balor

wheat ferry
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the nefarious balor when things that shift from heat cap to health enter the room

pastel vigil
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i love free andromeda shots

wheat ferry
# north bluff I did play around with some Nelson licenses in an earlier attempt, but it came o...

Spectre's probably the guy I'm keeping a closest eye on out of the frames - the rest have very solid mechanical kits, in my opinion - because it's the first Defender I've designed and an attempt at filling a role I haven't seen before ("guy that gets stronger when you attack his friends, soaks hits with a big "shoot me specifically" sign). Some gameplay loops that've come out pretty well are "park in chokepoint with Instrument of Surrender, dome everyone who comes down the firing lane" and "move up slowly with Argonaut Shield and something like a hammer viceroy behind me," but of course getting this out into the Wider Public Eye should help find others by whacking at it with a stick some.

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low-LL testing is always nolongerstuff

pastel vigil
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yeah I feel that - the tyranny of public perception will find a way to break something

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probably good only like 10 people know about K-EP, means i can focus on my other projects in peace without constant fixing /j

wheat ferry
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brb breaking all your mechs

pastel vigil
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thats what bees is for

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bring bees into any test game and something breaks, guarantee

wheat ferry
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this is true!

dusty portal
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i have killed guns before

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i also broke the seeder last combat!

pastel vigil
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rest in peace Pulsar Array (what the fuck was wrong with you)

wheat ferry
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What did the innocent Seeder do to anyone

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(me checking if I have a Seeder anywhere important)

dusty portal
pastel vigil
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vs a mech that is immune to all involuntary movement

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eventually I gave up and decided the Seeder's role as an NPC is to not die out of pure spite

wheat ferry
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This is half of the Seeder's role normally, the other half is psychological torment

pastel vigil
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thats why i grabbed Hacker

crimson zodiac
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-- IPS-N MITSCHER @ LL6 -- [ LICENSES ] IPS-N MITSCHER 3, IPS-N Raleigh 2, IPS-N Kidd 1 [ CORE BONUSES ] Overpower Caliber, Reinforced Frame [ TALENTS ] Tactician 3, Centimane 2, Nuclear Cavalier 2, Stormbringer 1, Leader 1 [ STATS ] HULL:3 AGI:0 SYS:0 ENGI:5 STRUCTURE:4 HP:24 ARMOR:1 STRESS:4 HEATCAP:10 REPAIR:6 TECH ATK:-1 LIMITED:+2 SPD:4 EVA:8 EDEF:8 SENSE:10 SAVE:13 [ WEAPONS ] FLEX MOUNT: Rapid-Cycling Missile Racks FLEX MOUNT: Blackspot Targeting Laser HEAVY MOUNT: Cluster Bomblet Dispenser // Overpower Caliber [ SYSTEMS ] “Roland” Chamber, Spearfish LFCM x3, Personalizations

<<Authorization: Blaze. Readback.>>
<<Blaze. May God have mercy.>>

wheat ferry
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The SOD was one of my favorite weird Ace Combat weapons, so I had to stick it on a frame

Fortunately, runway-cratering bomblets also work on mechs

crimson zodiac
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I hope those enemy nuggets grunts know how to climb above 5 thousand feet.

cunning dust
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it is sad that the playtest party never found it to completion but i was so honoured to be a part of it

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ash if you ever run it yourself again, hands together, pleeease let me know

wheat ferry
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100%

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(basically the second Cael's free again)

shy schooner
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Holy moly the fluff written for these systems, weapons, and frames

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The stark difference between the cold and practical HA Haber, and the Horus Spectre

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There's a lot of really good parallels between this LCP's themes and the theme going on in the official campaign ||Operation Winter Scar||

little robin
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I will one day play the thematic masterpiece of Wallfower-OSR-OWS-Iphigenia at Midnight campaign

wheat ferry
north bluff
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It shows for sure

shy schooner
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Interesting, I could tell

north bluff
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those descriptions were the two where I instantly went dogcited

main ferry
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@wheat ferry the Swordgrass is so cool

crimson zodiac
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i like the haber with its clinically detached notes like

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"yeah i mean if you think about it we're not that much different from nanobot greywash attacks"

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and then it immediately swings into

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"AH YES MY BEAUTIFUL GARDEN. FOR GRANDFATHER NURGLE"

crimson zodiac
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"Do my children not deserve to eat, and live? Run, if you'd like. Man is not the apex of the food chain anymore."

-- HA HABER @ LL6 -- [ LICENSES ] HA HABER 2, HA Genghis 1, IPS-N Tortuga 3 [ CORE BONUSES ] Superior by Design, Auto-Stabilizing Hardpoints [ TALENTS ] Vanguard 3, Nuclear Cavalier 3, Combined Arms 2, Exemplar 1 [ STATS ] HULL:4 AGI:0 SYS:0 ENGI:4 STRUCTURE:4 HP:21 ARMOR:2 STRESS:4 HEATCAP:13 REPAIR:6 TECH ATK:-2 LIMITED:+2 SPD:4 EVA:8 EDEF:8 SENSE:5 SAVE:13 [ WEAPONS ] Integrated: Fuel Rod Gun FLEX MOUNT: Deck-Sweeper Automatic Shotgun // Auto-Stabilizing Hardpoints HEAVY MOUNT: Krakatoa Thermobaric Flamethrower [ SYSTEMS ] Local Sterilization Vent, HyperDense Armor, Rapid Burst Jump Jets, Personalizations

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RBJJs to help close in and move. When you get close enough pop your Slow systems and just wade in.

wheat ferry
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A build like this came up in playtesting at higher LLs, except they also threw on SCYLLA and Heavy Gunner

Very fun, everyone loves the Grave Warden Terminator cosplay

crimson zodiac
wheat ferry
north bluff
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One more build for the night, just because I'm not seeing a lot of cross-license play from the LCP itself yet:

[ LICENSES ]
  IPS-N MITSCHER 3, HA HABER 2, HA Gilgamesh 1
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  Auto-Stabilizing Hardpoints, Integrated Ammo Feeds
[ TALENTS ]
  Ace 3, Grease Monkey 3, Stormbringer 2, Walking Armory 1
[ STATS ]
  HULL:4 AGI:0 SYS:0 ENGI:4
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:19 ARMOR:1
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:9 REPAIR:7
  TECH ATK:-1 LIMITED:+4
  SPD:4 EVA:8 EDEF:8 SENSE:10 SAVE:13
[ WEAPONS ]
  FLEX MOUNT: Incendiary Grenade Launcher (SEEK/DEVOUR Canister Shot)
  FLEX MOUNT: Rapid-Cycling Missile Racks
  HEAVY MOUNT: Cluster Bomblet Dispenser // Auto-Stabilizing Hardpoints
[ SYSTEMS ]
  Gas Grenade Seeder x7, Spearfish LFCM x5, Emergency Repair Module x5```
wheat ferry
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oh that's horrifying

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airburst grenade launcher and five cruise missiles

cunning dust
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you know Pistachio Pete is always the one pulling every mechanic flawlessly and Kiri was getting her ass beat on the regular so maybe not her Lmao

north bluff
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I do think it's pretty silly that the Spearfish is a full 100 spaces of range when the largest map for LANCER usually clocks in around 40 spaces

wheat ferry
cunning dust
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I Think That Might Have Been Stafford I Wont Lie To You

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doing her damn best though

wheat ferry
dense meteor
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Hey Ash, is there any detail I should know about 383rd MSMC's encounter with the pirates near Coroneia apart from what's in the module PDF?

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I might be interested in turning that one into an actual encounter at some point.

wheat ferry
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It lasted for a good few years, off and on - whether HA was paying various other merc groups or just sending various deniable groups in from one corpro or another to be Definitely Pirates is unknown, there were probably some actual pirates in there since preying on shipping routes starting back up to Union after so long isolated was very good pickings, so on

The Coroneia raid was a heist of a full orbital transport ship of chassis due for distribution to Lebaea's royal cavalry regiments - a particularly enterprising group had infiltrated the shipping company, stole a copy of the register and travel plan as well as up-to-date IFF codes, and then used those to pretend like they were a customs shuttle checking the cargo before departure to steal it

The crew got a distress signal off in time, so the pirates sent out "don't try to fuck with us or we'll start spacing the actual crew," to which the 383rd responded "bet" and had one of their light cutters the next berth over drop out of its moorings on top of the transport to board it

dense meteor
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Metal.

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That's sick. Also is there any established names for pirate outfits or am I okay to start writing names.

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/is there any specific pirate crew naming conventions to keep in mind

wheat ferry
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My margin notes had Red Bird Brigade - junkers, exiles, drifters who make a living off of cracking corpro convoys and reselling the goods and Keystone LLC - definitely not Blackwater

dense meteor
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Lmao, okay.

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Yeah, makes sense.

wheat ferry
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otherwise, go wild

dense meteor
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I'm assuming Keystone is a mix of pirates and mercs?

wheat ferry
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Ayup

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The actually "these guys are just Legion in funny outfits" don't have names and they probably only show up like once if the players are too effective at spoiling HA's manufactured reason for needing Purview protection

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(I am sued for defamation)

dense meteor
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Lmao okay.

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I might use them for the surprise boss fights then.

wheat ferry
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As Bees mentioned during beta reading, there was an entire module you were supposed to have (Union investigating HA for being real slimy about this entire affair) and then Iphigenia dropped her TBK munitions on the table

dense meteor
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I'm assuming Keystone would feel very Blackwater/Wagner/Little Green Men

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Alright, thanks for elaborating, I'll update you if I have anything done.

wheat ferry
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Looking forward to it!

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(and no need to rush anything, this just sounds like a fun prologue to the module itself for your local)

dense meteor
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Yeah.

shy schooner
# 
[ LICENSES ]
  HORUS Hydra 2, HA HABER 3, HORUS Balor 1
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  The Lesson of the Open Door, Superior by Design
[ TALENTS ]
  Engineer 3, CYBORG 3, Orchestrator 1, Drone Commander 1, Stormbringer 1
[ STATS ]
  HULL:4 AGI:0 SYS:0 ENGI:4
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:21 ARMOR:1
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:11 REPAIR:6
  TECH ATK:+1 LIMITED:+2
  SPD:5 EVA:7 EDEF:10 SENSE:10 SAVE:15
[ WEAPONS ]
  Integrated: Prototype Weapon III
  MAIN MOUNT: SUPERHEAVY WEAPON BRACING
  HEAVY MOUNT: EA17 Special Payload Mortar
[ SYSTEMS ]
  PUPPETMASTER, Tempest Drone, Gas Grenade Seeder x5, Hive Drone, Rapid Burst Jump Jet System, Personalizations```

This was designed with "just how bad can I make the battlefield" in mind, when using the lingering cloud stance on the mortar.
wheat ferry
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watch this [makes the entire battlefield uninhabitable]

Control Haber is a really fun off-build

shy schooner
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Cyborg is from Castor & Pollus and is mostly a defensive dealie, while Orchestrator is from Burning Memories which interacts with enemy saves. I forgot that our GM lets us mix and match talents.

wheat ferry
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Ayup, I know Cyborg - it's a neat flavor pull for a Haber, 100%
Not sure I know about Orchestrator, but wrecking enemy saves is great versus the altfire and things like "save or get knocked back" from allies into gas grenade zones

shy schooner
wheat ferry
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oho, that's spicy.

dense meteor
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On my quest to strap the biggest rifle I can on a swordgrass for shits and giggles.

[ LICENSES ]
  SSC SWORDGRASS 2, SSC Death’s Head 2, SSC Swallowtail 2
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  Overpower Caliber, Superheavy Mounting
[ TALENTS ]
  Crack Shot 3, Siege Specialist 3, Skirmisher 2, Gunslinger 1
[ STATS ]
  HULL:4 AGI:2 SYS:0 ENGI:2
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:21 ARMOR:0
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:8 REPAIR:6
  TECH ATK:-2 LIMITED:+1
  SPD:7 EVA:12 EDEF:8 SENSE:1 SAVE:13
[ WEAPONS ]
  SUPERHEAVY MOUNT: Cyclone Pulse Rifle
  FLEX MOUNT: SUPERHEAVY WEAPON BRACING
  MAIN/AUX MOUNT: Vulture DMR / Oracle LMG-I // Overpower Caliber
[ SYSTEMS ]
  Manual Reactor Override, Core Siphon, Nanite Microfabrication Flask x3, High-Stress Mag Clamps, Armament Redundancy```
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Shit, I threw OpCal on the wrong mount.

wheat ferry
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Advanced Vampire Posting

dense meteor
# 
[ LICENSES ]
  SSC SWORDGRASS 2, SSC Death’s Head 2, SSC Swallowtail 2, HA Sherman 3
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  Overpower Caliber, Superheavy Mounting, Heatfall Coolant System
[ TALENTS ]
  Crack Shot 3, Siege Specialist 3, Walking Armory 3, Nuclear Cavalier 3
[ STATS ]
  HULL:4 AGI:2 SYS:2 ENGI:3
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:23 ARMOR:0
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:9 REPAIR:6
  TECH ATK:0 LIMITED:+1
  SPD:7 EVA:12 EDEF:10 SENSE:1 SAVE:15
[ WEAPONS ]
  Integrated: Fuel Rod Gun
  SUPERHEAVY MOUNT: Tachyon Lance // Overpower Caliber
  FLEX MOUNT: SUPERHEAVY WEAPON BRACING
  MAIN/AUX MOUNT: Vulture DMR / Oracle LMG-I
[ SYSTEMS ]
  Manual Reactor Override, Armament Redundancy, ASURA-Class NHP x2, Redundant Systems Upgrade x2, Core Siphon```
Ah, fuck it, it's mostly a meme build anyway, might as well just make it LL9.
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Mofo's speed 7 with a Tachyon lance.

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The I'll obliterate somebody and run the fuck away before you can retaliate

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Deletes somebody out of existence.
Leaves.
Refuses to elaborate.

wheat ferry
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Flying, Deathtouch, Lifelink

dense meteor
balmy rover
#

First off, can I say that I fucking love the lore on these licenses, especially the Spectre. It is simply peak. Second off, have my first attempt at a Spectre build after reading through the licenses:

[ LICENSES ]
  HORUS SPECTRE 3, HORUS Balor 1
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  Overpower Caliber
[ TALENTS ]
  House Guard 3, Drone Commander 3, Leader 1
[ STATS ]
  HULL:4 AGI:0 SYS:0 ENGI:2
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:24 ARMOR:1
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:7 REPAIR:7
  TECH ATK:0 LIMITED:+1
  SPD:3 EVA:10 EDEF:8 SENSE:5 SAVE:12
[ WEAPONS ]
  MAIN/AUX MOUNT: Chain Spear / Tactical Knife
  HEAVY MOUNT: "Swansong" Homing Lance // Overpower Caliber
[ SYSTEMS ]
  Hive Drone, Lesson of the Fallen Mask, Unsigned Instrument of Surrender, Personalizations```
wheat ferry
#

Thank you very much!

Opcal Swansong is a classic, big damage

north bluff
#

it was tempting, but I've found myself valuing Accuracy these days over raw damage

#

of course, then I go and make a build that doesn't have Accuracy on the Swansong vee

[ LICENSES ]
  HORUS SPECTRE 3, HORUS Gorgon 3
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  The Lesson of the Open Door, Improved Armament
[ TALENTS ]
  House Guard 3, Vanguard 3, Skirmisher 2, Leader 1
[ STATS ]
  HULL:2 AGI:2 SYS:4 ENGI:0
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:19 ARMOR:1
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:5 REPAIR:6
  TECH ATK:+4 LIMITED:+0
  SPD:4 EVA:12 EDEF:12 SENSE:5 SAVE:15
[ WEAPONS ]
  FLEX MOUNT: Vorpal Gun
  MAIN/AUX MOUNT: FRAGMENTATION LAUNCHER / Pistol
  HEAVY MOUNT: "Swansong" Homing Lance
[ SYSTEMS ]
  Anti-Surveillance Countermeasures, //SCORPION V70.1, SCYLLA-Class NHP, Lesson of the Fallen Mask, Mimic Mesh```
#

(Fragmentation Launcher is from GMS Crisis Catalog)

wheat ferry
#

SCYLLA Vorpal is fun

balmy rover
wheat ferry
#

Up to you! Things are a bit tighter at LL4 for a build, though frame trait redirect from a squishy ally into your wall of 24 HP A1 is a good way to get a HG3 proc.

#

as a nice-to-have

balmy rover
#

Yeah, I generally do my builds at LL4 because, if you're doing a campaign from LL0, you can probably trust that you'll hit LL4

#

Still, absolutely love the mech and the lore behind it

#

Put simply

#

... wait just a sec

#

Would... would Anti-Surveillance Countermeasures negate a Scout's Marker rifle?

wheat ferry
#

Ayup, you can turn off Marker Rifle Lock-On on an adjacent ally if the Scout fails the Systems save

balmy rover
#

oh my god it's so peak

balmy rover
#

Here's an LL6 version of the build, which I forgot to mention I rolled the name Bodhisattva of Broken Noses for:

[ LICENSES ]
  HORUS SPECTRE 3, HORUS Balor 1, HA Napoleon 1, IPS-N Drake 1
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  Overpower Caliber, Order of Leander
[ TALENTS ]
  House Guard 3, Drone Commander 3, Leader 3
[ STATS ]
  HULL:4 AGI:0 SYS:0 ENGI:4
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:25 ARMOR:1
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:9 REPAIR:7
  TECH ATK:0 LIMITED:+2
  SPD:3 EVA:10 EDEF:8 SENSE:5 SAVE:13
[ WEAPONS ]
  MAIN/AUX MOUNT: Assault Cannon / Nexus (Light)
  HEAVY MOUNT: "Swansong" Homing Lance // Overpower Caliber
[ SYSTEMS ]
  Hive Drone, Lesson of the Fallen Mask, Unsigned Instrument of Surrender, Stasis Bolt, Personalizations```
wheat ferry
#

C/C knows where it's at

balmy rover
#

Might shift a couple points from Engi to Agi for the speed and Evasion, didn't realize it had 10 Eva base

wheat ferry
#

He's a slow lad, given how bulky he is

balmy rover
balmy rover
#

Are there any plans to give the frames official art?

wheat ferry
#

There is! I have the art ideas planned out for when the funding's available.

#

preview

image.png
#

(also interested in finding artists who might be able to do the pieces)

balmy rover
#

Quick question, when you use the Spectre's Only I trait, what happens when you are out of the attacker's range? Does the attack just fail?

wheat ferry
balmy rover
#

Ah, gotcha

#

Fairs

vale ingot
#

Is this official content backed by massif or no?

pastel vigil
#

it is third party

fluid salmon
#

…OH RIGHT I’ll need to update my own module

wheat ferry
#

inflicting edit disease on my mutuals

fluid salmon
#

(Ironbound Shadows includes ||a DOLOROSA-Class NHP in its supporting cast, and has a footnote crediting the now-deprecated original source||)

crimson zodiac
#

Oh fascinating

lucid musk
#

Ash and Gold cinematic universe

fluid salmon
#

Okay, this isnt an IaM Mech Build exactly but hear me out

[ LICENSES ]
  SSC SWORDGRASS 3, SSC White Witch 2, HA Gilgamesh 1
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  Improved Armament, Integrated Nerveweave
[ TALENTS ]
  Bonded 3, Duelist 3, Pankrati 2, Hunter 1
[ STATS ]
  HULL:4 AGI:0 SYS:0 ENGI:4
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:20 ARMOR:0
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:8 REPAIR:7
  TECH ATK:0 LIMITED:+2
  SPD:6 EVA:10 EDEF:6 SENSE:5 SAVE:14
[ WEAPONS ]
  FLEX MOUNT: Nanowire Saber
  FLEX MOUNT: Ferrofluid Lance
  HEAVY MOUNT: Legionnaire Battle Rifle
[ SYSTEMS ]
  DOLOROSA-Class NHP x5, Camus’s Razor, Pinning Spire, Emergency Repair Module x3, Personalizations```
wheat ferry
#

👁️ Dolorosa White Witch is insane (but kind of based tbh)

fluid salmon
wheat ferry
#

You can use Camus+Dolorosa to do Spectre cosplay kind of

fluid salmon
#

exactly! Bonded 3 to dare more targeting, plus base speed 6, integrated nerveweave and Nanowire Saber to remind NPCs who hit your friends that you are approaching their location

#

You are going to hit me whether you like it or not

balmy rover
fluid salmon
#

Funnily enough I only really chose the legionnaire battle rifle because I wanted a heavy weapon with good range to have the most overwatch threat, but the more I think about it I wonder if there's a bizarre synergy you could do between Gilgamesh and Swordgrass. They both quite like limited systems and have tools to get more health through their use.

dense meteor
#

||I'm very sorry||

wheat ferry
#

I can see Gilgamesh/Swordgrass, Swordgrass with thermal blade would be kinda spicy

solemn rapids
#

oh yeah swordgrass with emergency repair module sounds pretty cool

fluid salmon
#

Have we had much buildcraft for the Swordgrass in here actually? 🤔

#

hold on lemme cook a couple things

dense meteor
#

#1345259960539545680 message
This was mostly a meme build.

#

But it's a Swordgrass build. (Not very optimized though.)

#

And there was also this #oc-cantina message

#

I kinda wish Swordgrass had a heavy mount so I can throw a railgun or a Legionnaire BR on it, but I get why it doesn't.

wheat ferry
#

unfortunately, heavy mount and damage trait is Too Much Damage

dense meteor
#

Yeah, I get the balance.

#

The Tachyon Lance and Speed 7 is still funny though.

#

(It's LL9 but still)

wheat ferry
#

LL9 is allowed to be fucked up and weird

dense meteor
#

Aye.

solemn rapids
#

that's mario party territory

dense meteor
#

The fucked up thing is I could totally put more points in agi and get like speed 9 too.

#

That was only with two points in agi (plus no SSC core bonus either), the base Swordgrass has outstanding mobility.

wheat ferry
#

You'd be amazed how much weight you can save by having a reactor that can best be described as conceptually existing

dense meteor
#

Lmao

fluid salmon
#

Okay, so, GilgaSwordgrass

[ LICENSES ]
  SSC SWORDGRASS 2, HA Gilgamesh 2, SSC Metalmark 1, HA Sherman 1
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  Integrated Ammo Feeds, Full Subjectivity Sync
[ TALENTS ]
  Nuclear Cavalier 3, Infiltrator 3, Duelist 2, Hunter 1
[ STATS ]
  HULL:2 AGI:2 SYS:0 ENGI:4
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:17 ARMOR:0
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:10 REPAIR:5
  TECH ATK:-2 LIMITED:+4
  SPD:7 EVA:14 EDEF:8 SENSE:1 SAVE:13
[ WEAPONS ]
  Integrated: Fuel Rod Gun
  FLEX MOUNT: SOL-Pattern Laser Rifle
  MAIN/AUX MOUNT: Superthermal Blade / Parrying Buckler
[ SYSTEMS ]
  Reactive Weave, Emergency Repair Module x5, Manual Reactor Override, Nanite Microfabrication Flask x6, Sympathetic Targeting Spike```
#

Also, IPS-N Swordgrass, because it was funny

# 
[ LICENSES ]
  SSC SWORDGRASS 2, IPS-N Blackbeard 1, IPS-N Zheng 2, SSC White Witch 1
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  Full Subjectivity Sync, Fomorian Frame
[ TALENTS ]
  Duelist 3, Spaceborn 3, Brawler 1, Hunter 1, Pankrati 1
[ STATS ]
  HULL:6 AGI:2 SYS:0 ENGI:0
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:25 ARMOR:0
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:6 REPAIR:7
  TECH ATK:-2 LIMITED:+0
  SPD:7 EVA:14 EDEF:8 SENSE:1 SAVE:13
[ WEAPONS ]
  FLEX MOUNT: Chain Axe
  MAIN/AUX MOUNT: Ferrofluid Lance / Parrying Buckler
[ SYSTEMS ]
  Nanite Microfabrication Flask x2, Synthetic Muscle Netting, Total Strength Suite II, Pinning Spire, Total Strength Suite I```
wheat ferry
fluid salmon
#

its true!!!! We will never meltdown chat

#

I think there's a slightly saner variation where you could swap Reactor Override and Targeting Spike to Reactor Stabilizer, but I mean look at the Swordgrass you're not here for sanity

wheat ferry
#

You're here to kill

cedar kestrel
#

I've only just heard about this and reading through it I am in love

#

The Spectre especially has my heart

wheat ferry
#

Glad to hear it!

north bluff
#

Speaking of Spectres, I made yet another build to see what I could do with it, but I think I lost the plot somewhere and just made a Balor instead Thonk

[ LICENSES ]
  HORUS Balor 3, HORUS SPECTRE 3
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  Overpower Caliber, Auto-Stabilizing Hardpoints
[ TALENTS ]
  Combined Arms 3, Executioner 2, Centimane 2, Pankrati 2
[ STATS ]
  HULL:4 AGI:2 SYS:2 ENGI:0
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:25 ARMOR:1
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:5 REPAIR:7
  TECH ATK:+2 LIMITED:+0
  SPD:4 EVA:12 EDEF:10 SENSE:5 SAVE:13
[ WEAPONS ]
  MAIN/AUX MOUNT: Nexus (Hunter-Killer) / Nexus (Light) // Auto-Stabilizing Hardpoints
  HEAVY MOUNT: Nanobot Whip // Overpower Caliber
[ SYSTEMS ]
  Unsigned Instrument of Surrender, Swarm Body, Lesson of the Fallen Mask, Personalizations```
wheat ferry
#

The Balor has evolved to also consider nearby attacks candidates to be immediately eaten

north bluff
#

Part of me is really debating if I really need Unsigned Instrument of Surrender, since it only affects enemies upon entry, but Immunity to Knockback or other involuntary movement effects is kinda huge for a Swarm Body build, so I think it stays

dense meteor
#

I should make an angelswordgrass with a shotgun.

#

For no particular reason.

dense meteor
# dense meteor I should make a~~n~~ ~~angel~~swordgrass with a shotgun. 
[ LICENSES ]
  IPS-N Tortuga 1, SSC SWORDGRASS 3, IPS-N Caliban 2
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  All-Theater Movement Suite, Overpower Caliber
[ TALENTS ]
  Duelist 3, Combined Arms 3, Vanguard 3
[ STATS ]
  HULL:4 AGI:2 SYS:0 ENGI:2
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:21 ARMOR:0
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:8 REPAIR:6
  TECH ATK:-2 LIMITED:+1
  SPD:7 EVA:12 EDEF:8 SENSE:1 SAVE:13
[ WEAPONS ]
  FLEX MOUNT: Deck-Sweeper Automatic Shotgun
  MAIN/AUX MOUNT: Nanowire Saber / Parrying Buckler
[ SYSTEMS ]
  DOLOROSA-Class NHP x4, Hardpoint Reinforcement, Nanite Microfabrication Flask x3```
# 
Fighting til' the wars won
I don't care if Union won't take me back
I'll throw away my faith, babe, just to keep you safe
Don't you know you're everything I have?
And I, wanna live, not just survive, tonight```
dense meteor
dense meteor
#

@wheat ferry Hey, I've been wondering about how Nanowire Saber's special attack interacts with Duelist. If you make multiple attacks (against multiple characters in the burst) as part of the action, does Duelist's +1 accuracy apply to all of the attacks or only the first one?

#

I'm assuming only the first one, but I'm just curious.

dense meteor
# dense meteor ```I'm a SWORDGRASS with a shotgun Fighting til' the wars won I don't care if Un...

I would like to announce that the meme build is now an actual character.

  Mercenary, LL6
[ SKILL TRIGGERS ]
  Airborne's Audacity (+4), Apply Fists to Faces (+4),
  Assault (+4), Get Somewhere Quickly (+4),
  Show Off (+4)
[ GEAR ]
  Assault Hardsuit, Medium Signature,
  Light Signature, Frag Grenades,
  Patch, Extra Rations
[ BOND ]
  THE FOOL
  Powers: ALL-IN, STROKE OF LUCK,
  RESCUE
***
[ TALENTS ]
  Duelist 3, Combined Arms 3,
  Vanguard 3
[ LICENSES ]
  IPS-N Tortuga 1, SSC SWORDGRASS 3,
  IPS-N Caliban 2
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  All-Theater Movement Suite, Overpower Caliber
[ MECH ]
  « MUZZLE FLASH AS AN ANGEL'S HALO »
  SSC SWORDGRASS
  H:4 A:0 S:0 E:4 SIZE:0.5
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:21 ARMOR:0
  STRESS:4 HEAT:0 REPAIR:6
  ATK BONUS:3 TECH ATK:-2 LTD BONUS:2
  SPD:6 EVA:10 EDEF:8 SENS:1 SAVE:13
[ WEAPONS ]
  FLEX MOUNT: Deck-Sweeper Automatic Shotgun // Overpower Caliber
  MAIN/AUX MOUNT: Nanowire Saber / Parrying Buckler
[ SYSTEMS ]
  DOLOROSA-Class NHP, Hardpoint Reinforcement,
  Nanite Microfabrication Flask```
wheat ferry
#

Hell yeah, very cool.

Also, yeah, just the first attack with Fowl's Feathers.

lucid musk
# 
  Ace 3, Stormbringer 3,
  Heavy Gunner 3
[ LICENSES ]
  IPS-N MITSCHER 3, IPS-N Drake 3
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  Sloped Plating
[ MECH ]
  « KEEP THEIR HEADS RINGING »
  IPS-N MITSCHER
  H:4 A:4 S:0 E:0 SIZE:3
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:21 ARMOR:2
  STRESS:4 HEAT:0 REPAIR:7
  ATK BONUS:3 TECH ATK:-1 LTD BONUS:0
  SPD:6 EVA:12 EDEF:8 SENS:10 SAVE:13
[ WEAPONS ]
  FLEX MOUNT: Concussion Missiles 
  FLEX MOUNT: SUPERHEAVY WEAPON BRACING
  HEAVY MOUNT: Leviathan Heavy Assault Cannon 
[ SYSTEMS ]
  Spearfish LFCM, Aegis Shield Generator,
  Tattletale VALD, Personalizations```
#

Ring ding dong
Ring-a-ding ding ding dong

wheat ferry
#

Ah yes, the rip out the entire underside and put a chaingun in school of thought

#

Approved

lucid musk
#

keep their heads ringing actually refers to the tinnitus the pilot inevitably gets after firing a burst with the chaingun

#

imagining this one as a ground attack version of this stupid creature

t4idazsn9ys31.jpg
wheat ferry
#

landing lights: blown out
nose gear strut: warped
pilot: injuries not service-related

now we're gaming

lucid musk
#

Test pilot V. N. Kondaurov described the first firing of the GSh-6-30А: "As I imposed the central mark on the air target and pressed the trigger to shoot, I heard such noise that I involuntarily drew my hand aside. The whole plane began to vibrate from the shooting and had almost stopped from the strong recoil of the gun. The pilotless target, which was just making a turn ahead of me, was literally disintegrating into pieces. I have hardly come to my senses from unexpectedness and admiration: This is a calibre! Such a beast! If you hit something — it will be plenty enough [to wipe it out].

dense meteor
#

The hills are alive with the sound of BRRRRRRRRRT.

wheat ferry
#

pov: you're on a CDF search-and-rescue boat

lucid musk
#

hope the flyboys are up to date on their SEAR training

hearty mica
#

i just finished my first read through and mannnn, this shit is so good

#

idk if ill ever get to run or play through this, but just as something to read, it is good

wheat ferry
#

Thank you! Small benefit of my writing style being very prose-forward is that it can kinda be read like a short story.

lucid musk
#

iam bad end

av5lac0wmgmc1.jpg
inland bluff
#

Finished my second read through, deep thought were made into anthrochauvinism and how it affects those serving under seccom.

Although I'm not too sure if some of the sitreps are too spicy...namely achilles.

Haven't checked the map yet so not sure how convenient the tbk caches are...but even withou achillean resistance it's still an ultra ronin with argus armor and superior frame, with a decent uptime of rebound as an ultra. The immunity to jam further cements it's output

#

I suppose burn and some form of AP plinking could do the trick...kinda ironic that the seccom mech is not that good against burn...

wheat ferry
#

for reference, there's a lot of caches

#

in the playtest, the team ||backed him into the middle corner into the size 3 cover and kept wailing on him by having a genghis keep him grappled in the fire zone||

#

||I'd say ACHILLES is one of the harder fights in the book as written due to just how much damage an Ultra Ronin puts out given multiattack scaling starts coming up in T2, so he's also one of the guys I'm looking for playtest data on to see how it goes with various team comps||

#

in the end it's supposed to be a difficult module and I did favor making it harder, so it remains to be seen whether that was an overcorrection and, if so, to what degree - that's what y'all are for!

inland bluff
#

🤔

wheat ferry
#

Aye, but the Genghis just kept throwing him back in since he's ||not immune to being moved, just to getting perma-immobilized so he doesn't get to try to get out||

#

Ferrous Lash is also a big pull for that fight (which I think is mentioned in the advice section?)

inland bluff
#

don't ultra ronin have a speed of...5 atop boost?
sunzi or celestial shackles I can see working, grappling...figure I'll see if I can give mission 2 out for a spin and try to grab some friends...

wheat ferry
#

He doesn't have to stay in the zone to proc the mechanic, you just have to get him into it

inland bluff
#

yeah but you still need to put him back into the zone the second round, and he could just...gtfo and run for the backlines?

#

I'll come back later with proper data because my arguments are still a bit whiteroom

wheat ferry
#

Ayup, I'd appreciate it!

undone sequoia
#

Not even including gameplay related content, an absolutely fantastic read.
Stellar module

wheat ferry
#

Thank you very much! Glad you enjoyed.

pastel vigil
#

Yeah reading was a treat and has me wondering if I should even try and run this

I'm really on the fence on whether I'd be able to actually do all the characters and scenes justice. but its tempting.

#

that and it'd be an excuse to draw more maps

#

because I have no clue how to hex and I don't intend to start now

#

oh, on the topic of maps: I do like how there is absolutely a story behind the 1-2: Decksweepers map.

wheat ferry
#

It did turn into 1-2: All-Choral Marathon Competition for a bit

#

(except the running track kept getting interrupted by the PCs getting jumped by SecComm security mechs)

#

Artificially shortening it mostly fixed that problem for team comps with an average speed of 4+ and some willingness to boost, but unfortunately it does mean that snap to grid is uh

No Longer Particularly Functional

(and I am not enough of a Map Knower to get how to fix it)

pastel vigil
#

you're telling me people struggled to run the length of 69 (nice) tile wide map?

#

preposterous

#

as someone who once got put onto a 70x70 map myself: jesus christ

wheat ferry
#

simply run faster clueless

#

(first playtest group had three SSC mechs, which skewed the results)

#

Also, if you do end up running it, absolutely let me know - I'm also interested in figuring out what story-related stuff I can add to help GMs out now that it's people running it who haven't spent awhile rotating these folks on the contemplation rotisserie

pastel vigil
#

but yeah I'd definitely pass some word along

#

I'm still stuck in Winter Scar hell so gotta finish that before any plans

wheat ferry
#

reconus osr-ows-iam sequence...

pastel vigil
#

I am NOT bringing the OWS party to IAM

#

thats for certain

#

Fireteam Brooklyn would make an absolute farce of everything

#
  • shark woman
  • blue collar miner
  • half-awake computer whiz
  • soldier man who only knows soldiering due to plot reasons
  • ex HAAT
  • blinkspace scientist briefly turned adventure game antag, is now on parole after being caught
wheat ferry
#

inshallah the trauma beam will curse them all

pastel vigil
#

it'd turn the first two to ash like i openned the ark of the covenant and the remaning four would be at each other's throats

dusty portal
#

i think levin would be fine :)

pastel vigil
#

i'd def want to sit down and cultivate vibes with people in general to get a party that works out well with the premise and stakes

#

buuuut again, we'll see. not only do i gotta finish the OWS campaign but i have so many other projects besides i need to be doing

#

hoping pushing squad kits to itch gives me the drive to actually tackle the Price of War Field Guide content instead of plucking at mechanical stuff all day

wheat ferry
#

boppin
When you've got the mechanical stuff Out There, it's a lot easier to say "alright, now I can write fluff while other people playtest my things"

#

The other big driver for a lot of IaM early narrative content was wanting to do a prologue where the PCs could settle in and "get" the vibes of their team and the world around them

pastel vigil
#

i should probably run some playtests again tbh, I had plans to tweak some stuff too so maybe after that would be a good point to do so

#

Dumas is getting a test course at the moment, so, I get to tweak that

#

and we'll see if anyone picks up the Elmo up and coming.

#

i love my 11 trait child

wheat ferry
#

Aye, doing the tweak round and then scheduling three combats with "each player must take at least one level in one of these Licenses" was how I did a lot of stuff here

pastel vigil
#

For the "does this break on contact" I did just a oneshot at LL6, 3 license levels in chosen mech mandatory

#

but for more indepth review, yeah, i'd wanna run a three back-to-back combat

#

theres phases to testing, turns out

dusty portal
#

mhm

inland bluff
#

Hey guys, what were your groups party comp?

wheat ferry
#

The first PT group was Swordgrass/Worldkiller Genghis/Emperor/Enkidu/Dusk Wing

inland bluff
#

thx

solemn rapids
#

well that's an exceedingly Normal group of mechs isn't it

fluid salmon
#

Yeag it was a pretty normal party

#

I would not be surprised if part of the reason the secondary objectives were born was because over half of us were freaks with questionable allegiances

pastel vigil
#

how disparate the side objectives are is really fun tbh

wheat ferry
#

You would never stab your teammates in the back to finish a side objective, surely

fluid salmon
#

Well I wouldn’t obviously, but that perfidious Armories boy is looking mighty sus…

#

(Better take care of him, just to be sure)

wheat ferry
#

See, normal party filled with only the most normal people

#

(The joke we had is that "five minutes after ||killing Iphigenia,|| whoever survives is going to be trying to kill each other")

#

Good, Bad, and the Ugly final standoff

inland bluff
#

Hmm...morozko's chimneystack javelin, can you hack them to detonate them in advance? both for the npc side and pc side?

#

I mean yes usually you can't hack deployable...but this one have a hcap and edef ig?

#

oh wait morozko literally have a detonate button

wheat ferry
#

Ayup

inland bluff
#

ohno

#

one of the pc, after hearing they're up against tbk sqaudron

#

showed up in lancaster 3 kidd 3 lancaster

#

how can I inflict burn when faced against the almighty wholesome power of whitewash sealant and damping station

wheat ferry
#

Step 1: cry (I did this with my Worldkiller)
Step 2: Kill the support first

inland bluff
#

nah he's a 26 hp chonky boi

#

reinforced frame and sloped plating

#

they took the 'this might be slightly upgunned' caution very seriously, it would appear

wheat ferry
#

Ayup, my philosophy with IaM was frontloading "this is designed to be seriously hard, bring your A game" and people brought that shit

lucid musk
#

Reading this on the Gallipoli

hearty mica
#

Iphigeniaposting

wheat ferry
#

real.

cedar kestrel
#

I just want to say I'm slowing getting a group together to try and run this on Foundry, I'll definitely share thoughts once its done (I am allowing some third party content for fun so I'll make sure that some things are taken with a grain of salt)

wheat ferry
#

Very cool, glad to hear it!

#

We're also getting cross-promotion from Magnai of the Oronir tribe :^)

image.png
tacit magnetBOT
#

FFXIV mentioned

inland bluff
# 
similar to a slimmed-down version of the modern IPS-N Tortuga, bearing an officer’s revolving pistol upon the thigh-plating and a bulky omninode over the back – and a massive boarding shield leaning upon his leg, battered and scarred with the signs of battle...```
The slim tort with bucket head, mono eye, revolving pistol:
image.png
cedar kestrel
#

IPSN totally whistling innocently, totally not taking old SecComm designs and making it their own

wheat ferry
#

They would never do that 🙂

#

Just look at the Mitscher, a conpletely legally different design

inland bluff
#

Also the Steichen (vague wavey gesture)

cedar kestrel
#

"Orignal design, donut steal

#

||also also Harrison totally not doing the same with what they want on their side quest||

inland bluff
#

On a side note, the people I grabbed for the IaM campaign was the player and gm from this other campaign (referred as the first campagin since it's going to be a LL0-LL5 one) I'm in. Considering IaM starts at LL6, and the first campaign is also about rehabilitating effort on a Seccom devastated planet (and of course armory poking their nose in), we decided to do a little duct tape on the backgrounds

#

Anyway, he also enabled the IaM resources, and I'm now doing this on LL4

« WORST OF ALL POSSIBLE WORLDS »
-- HA HABER @ LL4 --
[ LICENSES ]
  HA HABER 2, SSC Monarch 2
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  Overpower Caliber
[ TALENTS ]
  Heavy Gunner 3, Grease Monkey 3, Field Analyst 1
[ STATS ]
  HULL:4 AGI:0 SYS:0 ENGI:2
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:20 ARMOR:2
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:9 REPAIR:6
  TECH ATK:-2 LIMITED:+1
  SPD:4 EVA:8 EDEF:8 SENSE:5 SAVE:12
[ WEAPONS ]
  FLEX MOUNT: Sharanga Missiles
  HEAVY MOUNT: Gandiva Missiles (SEEK/DEVOUR Canister Shot) // Overpower Caliber
[ SYSTEMS ]
  Gas Grenade Seeder x4, Armament Redundancy, Expanded Compartment, Personalizations```
wheat ferry
#

opcal airbursting gandiva is a traditional pick, very spicy

inland bluff
#

ah, but also airburst heavy gunner because both the airburst halving and the hg halving don't stack

wheat ferry
#

That is an interaction I was considering patching out, but it hasn't broken anything yet so we ball

slender forum
cunning dust
inland bluff
#

nearly ending 1-1 by now

#

Gallipoli's fighter squadron have decently stripped off a structure from 3 of the PC

wheat ferry
#

🫡

balmy rover
#

Had a thought last night about some funny stuff with the Spectre and just realized I should probably make sure it works like I think: the Only Me frame trait works with drones as well since they are considered Characters, correct?

wheat ferry
#

Are drones characters instead of a seperate category? Genuine question.
Because yeah, I see what you mean with taking a gamble on just redirecting 20 AP at a Scourer or something.

pastel vigil
#

drones are indeed characters

wheat ferry
#

videogames
you know, I figured someone would've caught that earlier in playtesting if it was a thing lmao
I'll tack a "mech" onto the trait for 0.3.0, much appreciated

#

It would normally be cool for you to take hits for your drones/deployables/etc but unfortunately Lancer has a bunch of things that scale grossly away from player HP and I should mind that

balmy rover
#

So I should probably utilize it under that RAI ruling rather than RAW, I guess

#

Oh well, was a very funny combo to think about, especially since someone else is bringing the Hydra alt frame for the one-shot we’re planning

#

I will say you don’t need to worry about deployables, since those are not characters the way Drones are explicitly defined as such in their tag

wheat ferry
#

Yeah, I/my PT people were probably thinking of deployables and just forgot Drones got that specific exemption but were still targetable by things like Melt

#

Yeah, RAI anti-object things in Lancer get wild scaling and, as funny as it is to potentially do "coinflip: kill yourself or kill the NPC" that doesn't seem like something I want to incentivize

balmy rover
#

Ah, I see what you mean now

#

I don’t tend to peak at the GM-facing side of things very often

wheat ferry
#

yeah, otherwise I'd 100% be down for that

balmy rover
#

What is the specific wording on Melt, actually?

wheat ferry
#

it is unfortunately explicitly an attack 😔

image.png
#

Bunker Buster optional for Bombard gets dodged because that's an add-on to an attack, not an attack itself, so you can't snag it

#

Thermal Charge from Breacher is a grenade, not a ranged attack, so that also gets dodged because you can't snag it

#

... lmao it's only Melt in CRB NPCs that breaks the Spectre

#

that's fucked up

#

and there's no Scourers with Melt in the IaM opfors so we probably just never thought of it, that's incredible

balmy rover
#

Bruh

wheat ferry
#

I... will have to figure out how to deal with this

#

Because cutting out taking hits for your drones (cool) because of one NPC optional rubs me the wrong way

balmy rover
#

Understandable

#

You might check the other 1st party sups and see if there something else that messes with it

wheat ferry
#

It's the only "does a huge amount of damage to Drones" that's explicitly a ranged attack

#

I may just leave it up to the GM to say "no, that's dumb" if it ever comes up, then

balmy rover
#

Understandable

balmy rover
#

I have had a series of visions regarding the Spectre's art. I do not know how solid you ideas are, nor how purpose-built you want it to look, so feel free to discard these if you wish, but I felt the need to throw them into the ring regardless.

First is the idea of having a "This Machine" reference somewhere on the chassis or, especially, the long rifle. Theoretically easy to fit in with what you mentioned a few weeks ago as the basic concept for the Spectre's art.

Second gets a little more complicated: with this being largely a weapon of revolutionaries and the downtrodden, it stands to reason their industrial capacity would not be very strong to begin with. Thus, I suggest parts of the mech be "repurposed" from other Defender mechs or mechs of comparable size, especially those from IPS-N, SSC, and HA. For example, one forearm could be from the Tortuga, a pauldron could be covered in hastily-repaired shield projectors from a downed Saladin, and a leg could be a visibly up-armored salvaged component from something like a Monarch.

That's what I've got for now, I'll post more if I get another brain blast.

wheat ferry
#

aye, that's sick as hell
fits with some ideas I've had as well - I wanted it to have a distinctly repurposed or partially rebuilt look to it, as if it's been put together out of salvaged parts and surplus

balmy rover
#

Yup. Also, battle damage is a must

balmy rover
wheat ferry
#

so yeah, I'd rule it as "the template itself doesn't move, you just yoink the attack"

balmy rover
#

Thanks, just wanted to make sure

inland bluff
#

Hey, uh, is there a prototype on what mission 3's map? I guess I could do 3-2 with NRFaW's hell gate mission map, but 3-1 description confounds me when I read it

wheat ferry
inland bluff
#

🤔

wheat ferry
inland bluff
#

ok, thx, and the grid scale of map

#

is roughly how much hex?

wheat ferry
#

ayup, same as all the others

inland bluff
#

thx👌

pastel vigil
#

Oh, I actually remembered a question I wanted to ask in respects to Hardsuit Combat: are Strengths and Weaknesses publicly visible to players, or designed to be completely hidden?

#

Even if its just a case of "heres the listed Strength and Weaknesses but you don't know the effects" - I've not been too sure how to represent them, if at all, or if players just gotta find out the hard way every encounter

wheat ferry
#

I ran them as just public information once you hit the encounter

#

It's fuzzy, because it's still fundamentally narrative - if it fits, you can even do things like a purely-narrative scouting phase where you figure out what the effects of a list of Strengths and Weaknesses are

pastel vigil
#

yeah thats why I was unsure - I could see it going both ways, with requiring trigger rolls to suss out effects or just being able to go

#

oh. thats a rocket launcher.

#

and do the math

wheat ferry
#

Ayup
Were it me, I'd do either "it's all on the table" or "you get a list of what they're called and can use Spot/Investigate/Read a Situation/etc before the combat to try and figure out what they are"

pastel vigil
#

makes sense - I might honestly suggest clarifying that being the case, with the idea that hiding Strength/Weakness effects obviously might tweak the difficulty of a set encounter

#

but either way the answer works

wheat ferry
#

100%, I'm throwing that in my 0.3.0 changelog

pastel vigil
#

I've been thinking on running my players through a Hardsuit Combat as part of Six Months Later in Winter Scar

wheat ferry
#

👁️
Excellent place for it, let me know how it goes

pastel vigil
#

I shalt

#

just gotta cook the encounter up

balmy rover
# 
[ LICENSES ]
  HORUS SPECTRE 3, IPS-N Drake 2, IPS-N Raleigh 1
[ CORE BONUSES ]
  Overpower Caliber, Order of Leander
[ TALENTS ]
  House Guard 3, Leader 3, Crack Shot 3
[ STATS ]
  HULL:4 AGI:0 SYS:2 ENGI:2
  STRUCTURE:4 HP:25 ARMOR:1
  STRESS:4 HEATCAP:7 REPAIR:7
  TECH ATK:+2 LIMITED:+1
  SPD:3 EVA:10 EDEF:10 SENSE:5 SAVE:13
[ WEAPONS ]
  MAIN/AUX MOUNT: Assault Cannon / Hand Cannon
  HEAVY MOUNT: "Swansong" Homing Lance // Overpower Caliber
[ SYSTEMS ]
  Lesson of the Fallen Mask, Unsigned Instrument of Surrender, Personalizations, Argonaut Shield, Aegis Shield Generator x2```
*Bodhisattva of Broken Noses* (yes I'm reusing a name sue me). Torn between Order of Leander or Reinforced Frame
#

Or Sloped Plating

wheat ferry
#

Reinforced Frame would go pretty hard here

balmy rover
#

Right? I don't know what the math looks like comparing Sloped Plating to Reinforced Frame, though I do like the idea of having 2 Armor especially with the Argonaut, but then there's also the Order of Leander which is great:

image.png
wheat ferry
#

Order of Leander is very thematic, I think the math generally works out that RF > SP if you're not mostly using SP to help negate Reliable through Invisibility memes

balmy rover
#

Zamn, that's what I figured

#

Though I hadn't ever heard of the Invis meme idea

inland bluff
#

It appears that my PC are kinda expecting me to up the ante for difficulty

#

they are kind of disappointed when I don't land the veteran ship on the escort target to contest it

inland bluff
#

1-2 feedback: the shortened map's EDZ feels too tight to cram in 4 grunt berserkers, an elite spite and a breacher

wheat ferry
#

Your players long for the difficulty mines

#

What d'you mean by too tight? You should be able to fit them across all of the ingress zones if you split them up.

inland bluff
#

oh wait you can't puppet into skirmish with grunt zerkers

#

nvm

#

guess I was being the dumb one

hallow heart
#

finally reading IaM and got hung up on this passage at the start p.9 about the army legionnaires, which world is it talking about maybe im just misreading

SPOILER_image.png
wheat ferry
hallow heart
#

Got it, ty! I figured but was worried I missed a mentioned planet

wheat ferry
#

No worries

balmy rover
#

God I really wanna test out Bodhisattva

#

I feel like the ideal situation to test it out is a full mission, though, with multiple scenes

dense meteor
keen crow
#

Iphigenia

#

"We attempted to translate her appearance into Chinese, it seems something was lost in translation"

inland bluff
#

totally legit, totally real, and totally appearing at the table

keen crow
#

"So we gave her a protrait, close enough"

#

yeah totally an olive

inland bluff
#

olive skin at it's finest form...

keen crow
#

"Hey! Someone missed her medal!"

wheat ferry
#

oh my fucking god

#

yeah, basically canon tbh

keen crow
#

"Gaze upon this superior corpus, created in mankind's bygone golden age"

wheat ferry
#

speaking of canon things, albeit more seriously:
some excellent visuals/inspiration for Missions 2-3
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pfoav-12t10

YouTube
Sam White
Killmaze

In the labyrinth of tunnels beneath the underslum - mercenaries, gangs and vagabonds skirmish over the treasures of the vast industrial runoffs. Some become legends, amassing wealth, power and influence, others are not so lucky.

Trying something new, combining a bunch of recent concepts into a slightly more narrative project, hope you enjoy!
...

▶ Play video
balmy rover
#

Oh yeah, have a token for the Spectre I just whipped up. AMR to represent the Swansong, of course.

Spectre_Mk_1_Token.png Spectre_Mk_1.PNG
wheat ferry
#

Hell yeah, strong energy on this guy

balmy rover
#

It’s admittedly a little hard to tell, but I did use several different kinds of components to make it

cedar kestrel
#

Does anyone have a reference for the Interpoint hex guide handy? just want to be able to read these maps while potentially trying to recreate them in Foundry

balmy rover
#

Didn't realize it was possible to be more obsessed with the Spectre than I was, but my first time driving the thing proved me wrong, even with numerous delays and the session taking something like five hours for one combat scene due to that, extremely new players, and several people having dropped out by the end of things.

#

I can't wait to use it in a full campaign

wheat ferry
#

🙏

wheat ferry
dusty portal
#

hey i have feedback for the hardsuit combat, this should be defined as a 9 or less because i just saw someone get a -1 in hardsuit combat

image.png
wheat ferry
#

oh my god

#

Fixed

#

sorry to that poor bastard

dusty portal
#

get below a 1 and become immune to all consequence, easy as

wheat ferry
#

The universe simply takes pity on you

cedar kestrel
wheat ferry
#

Oh!

The only color-coding on the maps that's relevant is explained in the top bar of each sitrep above the opfor. Otherwise, the rest should be in the readme for the maps folder.

#

(usually, the relevant color-coding is blue for things like player DZ, red for enemy DZ / ingress zones, so on)

cedar kestrel
#

ah okay!

pastel vigil
#

okay now I'm here: yeah hardsuit combat rules are actually really fun overall, we had a blast crawling through it

dusty portal
#

yeah!

#

the guy who rolled a -1 survived

pastel vigil
#

my only comment ultimately is that I maybe lowballed hard in how hard I could of punched - 6 Players vs 3 clocks was very one sided even if it was engaging. I probably would of A: upped the Clock lengths a bit and added extra strengths there and B: had another "secondary" pressure clock to make it 4 v 6

#

but thats just me thinking in retrospect

wheat ferry
#

I'm really glad to hear things worked out well! Yeah, since stress pressures compound into other things like Burdens as they do, I'm wary of making hardsuit combats too hard on people - once we have a bunch of playtesting, I might come back and hit up some "this is a recommended balancing guide" sort of things.

pastel vigil
#

yeah for certain

#

but just reflecting on the numbers i was like "yeah players could of took 1 or 2 more stress here and there"

#

and i think having another clock to act could of helped spread it out more evenly rather than asher just getting 4-stressed

#

alternatively: strength which just "Elites" a clock and allows to act twice

#

could have also worked

#

but again i do not think my experience would be typical because damn 6 players is a lot

#

lmao

wheat ferry
#

yeah lmao

#

We Shall See™️, what I'm happiest about is that y'all had fun

pastel vigil
#

will say though, really puts the 1-5 combat into perspective

#

curious how that mathed out

wheat ferry
#

Depends on how much players pushed their rolls or used bond powers to try and nab extra repairs throughout the point crawl, really

#

Heavy security hardsuit my beloved

pastel vigil
#

yeah i was eyeing that with "3 stress attack" in combo with the marines' "2 stress attack"

wheat ferry
#

Yep

#

It's optional for a reason, and the thing I've been eyeing for that was just toning down the Marines slightly

wheat ferry
#

went back to this and did a bunch of practice rolling today: 0.3.0 will have some changes that tune down the damage slightly while still keeping them spooky

#

I was biased by the affection of players for heavy hardsuits 😔

pastel vigil
#

lmao

#

that tracks

#

we had a mix of assault and stealth hardsuits for ours

wheat ferry
#

The solution I came up with was "just yank their damage by 1 and then tag the extra damage onto a crit success"

#

so if the proto-caliban you're trying to tangle with on foot gets the drop on you, then it's really going to fuck you up no matter what you're wearing, but it won't do it all the time

pastel vigil
#

yeah that works

#

its how I tackled it with the "X kinds of action are Risky" thing

#

but making it crit for attack similarly works in just making it not omnipresent

wheat ferry
#

ayup

#

fits into different narratives - is it their weapons or their defenses, sort of thing

pastel vigil
#

Rooftop Surveillance as a Strength was very much a "if you fuck around too much the rooftop snipers and their drones catch onto your and light you the fuck up"

#

but if you like, jumped out of an alley and fucking shanked a officer at the crack of dawn

#

thats free game

#

not that the players did that. they kind of just went "fuck the snipers" and brute forced it anyway by sniping back

#

but yeah, def different narrative decisions

dusty portal
#

opening move was standing on a rooftop and vaporizing a CO with lightning, so, yeah

wheat ferry
#

no plan ever survives contact with the players

inland bluff
#

some quick random thought before 1-3 actual:
the clademaster identifies itself as an artillery, but the rack of optional usually requires ot to stay at sensor 10, which is kinda sriker range.
pre sighting beacon and gas canister could work as advance prep. but the optional reaction requires you to actively stick within range 10 of ppl. also corrosive bombardment being sensor tied instead of weapon tied like sniper's deadmetal feels a bit weird.

giving the vet prying claw is a very nice approach to jumpscare and surprise. but feels pretty one trick pony with the limited 1. personally considering instead allowing the vet squad to be grapple capable, still a surprise, but a more reusuable one that spooks off player with it's presence than the jumpscare of prying claw

#

would get back with 1-3 post mission later...

inland bluff
#

cute

#

turns out having 3 striker is pain

#

the calendula yeeted the sekhmet everest into the void with ajax, who proceeded to dump 58 kinetic on ajax with nanocarb

#

then, another guy double tapped the breacher with double hmg for 28 and killed him with the structure roll

wheat ferry
#

Sekhmet nanocarb everest is an absolutely terrifying phrase

#

Good strategy from the players

wheat ferry
cedar kestrel
#

Excited for session zero this Sunday, get everyone on the same page and hyped up.

At the risk of some of the players spying on me here, i was homebrewing a Lil something to connect them to albatross without being directly from albatross.

The Whydah / Whiskey Jack program: based on if i want to go for the brood parisitism or interspecific feeding analogy, the program is where those individuals rescued by or wishing to aid albatross, but don't meet their makteba's criteria, work as their ears, keeping tabs on particular issues for Albatross to keep their eyes on and wings spread. Only one of the means in which albatross has their near-miraculous arrivals. Just in this case the lance was probably not aware of the retaliation fleet and so Albatross does not have time to get there (thus it's up to them to contribute to the defense i their stead)

We'll see if they like this idea or want to go a different route.

wheat ferry
#

Excellent - Albatross is another great candidate for a player group. The doomed last charge from the relativistic knights works well with the themes™️.
Looking forward to hearing more!

cedar kestrel
#

Party update: Every likes the ideas of being 'Jays', so we'll be going with that, where a party of Jays + 1 Albatross Loyal Wing on loan are present for the operation.
Whats funny is we have 2 "Hoplite" esque pilots (the Albatross player hasn't read the module / The normal 'Jay' player has read the module, and specifically wanted to do so for OC reasons)
2 NHP Pilots who each separately have Deep Sea themes
And lastly an asocial girl shipborn girl who flips a switch when handling a rifle

I'm also working on a seperate 'Albatross' side quest involving finding the wreckage/data of an Albatross Knight that was part of a force that had intercepted the fleet with Iphigenia in command but before 'things went wrong'. Obviously the attack was repulsed XD

For rewards honestly some of the Farfield-Ablatross exotic gear seems like a good fit for that.

wheat ferry
#

Awesome. It's really cool to see new side quests being added as well - the side missions were some of my favorite things I wrote for the module as an intersection of mechanics and narrative, so I'm pleased they're also extensible to other elements of the same concept.

Timeline-wise, ||Iphigenia was put to sleep after the civil war on the fleet, after which the entire thing coasted on silent running towards the Choral Worlds while slowly decelerating - unintentionally masking their approach - so you'd probably want to set the Albatross assault beforehand. I can also see that as being an inciting incident for the conflict: sure, the Albatross are dead, but there's some damage, some dead personnel, the hardline loyalists onboard in command are being increasingly unhelpful and acerbic, and it boils over.||

#

Deep sea NHPs is also very fun, especially in relation to ||generally being around Iphigenia / especially two of the Eidolon phases if they go that route - there's a familiarity there, a call for the ways of the waves and the dark places beneath||

cedar kestrel
#

That's exactly where in the timeline I was thinking ||along with the a final recording of the last albatross promising something prophetic about not just the fleet itself, but something that leads Iphigenia to first recognizing the evil done to her / that she commits as a result||

wheat ferry
#

prophetic moments are a time-honored trope

cedar kestrel
#

Oh also I asked what their lance name would be and Fool's Errand/Errant seems to maybe be the favourite

wheat ferry
#

"We're Going To Die (positive affirmation)"

cedar kestrel
#

Rifle lady is thinking of going with the oleander.

Mission 3-2 might be a special parallel for them now >:3

wheat ferry
#

"Oh yeah? What's the difference?"
[dead silence; the implication whispers "presentation"]

wheat ferry
#

👁️

image.png
inland bluff
#

hmmm, looking for advice as a new gm
all my pc are flat strikerish people without stealth or hidden
should I remain true to the goal of playtesting the sitrep and keep the lesser sight and all
or should I swap them out to more active veterancy traits.
also, how do cqb training work with captive spike? wouldn't 'can't be grappled' null the captive spike entirely?

wheat ferry
#

I wouldn't think so - it can't be grappled, not not do grapples. The interesting thing is whether "immunity to Slowed" cancels out the "the Marine becomes Slowed" from the Captive Spike, which I believe I ran as "yes" during playtesting.

#

As for the optionals, it's up to you! If you think it'd be beneficial to your group's experience to swap some things out, go ahead; I'll just make a note on my end if that ends up affecting the feedback on the sitrep.

wheat ferry
#

Hello everyone!

I've been nothing short of thrilled to see the fantastic reception that Iphigenia at Midnight has received from the wider Lancer community - having a passion project of mine obtain widespread attention and interest has been incredibly rewarding, as well as hearing stories from various groups planning on or already playing through the module. However, I'm not done yet! This represents probably the most major update you'll see during this early access phase before the addition of art, and could only have been made possible by the fantastic Lancer RPG Template by Valkyrion: a clean layout in the style of Lancer's own first-party modules.

Other changes have been made to some mechanical elements of the module and its attached licenses, which are enumerated below.

Thank you for following the project - onwards and upwards!

#

0.2.0 -> 0.3.0 Changelog

  • Added explanation for how much players should know about Strengths and Weaknesses in Hardsuit Combat
  • Elaborated on the flatcar design for Scene 3-1's map
  • Fixed the description for the Supply Cache Beacon saying "repair capacity" instead of "repairs".
  • Hardsuit combat failure changed to 9 or less instead of 1-9
  • Clarified that the HORUS Spectre's Only I trait doesn't change the location of template attacks
  • Removed teleporting from the HORUS Spectre's Needle and Thread System, as this interacted unfavorably with the HA Sunzi
  • Clarified that the Morozko NPC's Coolant Hose weapon can be chosen to be fired in either of two template modes when an attack is declared
  • Hardsuit combat in Scene 1-5 adjusted to smooth out the inflicted Stress curve
  • Clademaster NPCs get +1 Energy damage baseline on their optional Chemical Sprayer to clarify what damage giving them optionals like Deadly is intended to add
  • Clademaster NPCs are now Size 2 to appropriately match Worldkiller and Haber scaling
  • Accomplishing 1-5 permanently locks open all Bulkhead Doors on the Gallipoli as evacuation protocols start
  • Fancy-Looking Official Layout time!
  • The above means various things have been added and shifted around, in the vein of minor details like "adding two-word titles for Prologue encounters"…
  • … and more major things, like "each mission now has a few sentences of GM briefing describing the mission, in the style of the first-party modules like NRFaW".
  • Also, some phrasing/grammar edits. We have en-dashes now.
pastel vigil
#

aha, you got got by the sunzi jumpscare too I see

fluid salmon
#

Fuck yeah, this is looking spiffy!

#

Continually loving to see this project grow and evolve, even if my head’s usually a bit too buried in my own sweatsmile cannot wait to crack the new update open isra_stars

wheat ferry
# pastel vigil aha, you got got by the sunzi jumpscare too I see

Another group got back to me about "hey so we had a sunzi 3/spectre 3 and every time I tried to get someone in melee the sunzi just teleported them back to themselves" so I scrawled out "teleport" and replaced it with "move ignoring engagement and reactions"

pastel vigil
#

the classic

#

bees got me to pre-emptively change an NPCs functions after reminding me how Sunzi teleport works, which was funny

#

"no you can't yoink them across the map the second the keep picks them up by the scruff of their neck"

wheat ferry
#

safe harbor is both one of the funniest traits I've ever worked with as a player and hands-down the most hair-tear-out-est as a homebrew writer

pastel vigil
#

ironically its often anchor which drives me up the wall more

#

but thats like, frankly, because its such a random trait in the grand sum of things, that i forget it exists every time

#

and so just waste knockback vs sunzi

wheat ferry
#

anchor was surprisingly useful in the insane crack shot superheavy rifle sunzi build I made in the past

pastel vigil
#

either way, glancing through, yeah this is def shaping up - i do like that 1-5 has actual effect for victory besides just being "did you do enough, no? heres a pity mission"

#

some of the formatting is kind of scuffed (the seccom flag on page 28 especially, true to character, looks like its trying to eat the text) but thats document work for you, its fucking rough

#

took me far too long to crunch the squad kit doc in the way it looks and frankly i don't know if i have the guts to do that again when/if i do the Price of War full guide

wheat ferry
#

Aye, I'm also thinking of adding another modifier for victory that dunks the random encounter chance afterwards, but we'll see

It needed a little something extra and "yeah you can get through all the doors" was a neat bone to throw

#

real

yeah this took me three days of work as it stands and I'm still going to end up paying a professional layout person to finish it when we get there, I just wanted to get this in the right shape

pastel vigil
#

definitely yeah

#

does make me wonder if the hardsuit combat lists would look better as tables, honestly, but in either case its def cleaner

fluid salmon
#

Layout is quite a thing to hit with wrenches, yeah sweatsmile its a skill Im still learning

dusty portal
fluid salmon
#

Even so, man does it feel worth it

pastel vigil
#

i was happy with my work by the end but it does make me go "maybe i should just pull a suldan next time"

fluid salmon
#

Oddly, Ive kinda grown to appreciate the constraints it creates when Im editing. I will die wrangling sidebars one day though 😭

wheat ferry
#

I could give it another shot, see how it cleans up

pastel vigil
#

yeah that'd do it

#

lmao

#

i think the triggers at least work fine for bullet points but the equipment is where i was like "yeah that might work"

fluid salmon
#

hm, taking a peek, Id definitely agree

#

The presentation difference between the two means the gear lends to a table better, too - triggers are framed more as suggestions, whereas gear is codified rules

wheat ferry
#

Ah, I see what you mean with the flag now, when I squint at it

#

I think I can fix that just by slapping an extra newline in front of it

fluid salmon
#

you could also play with the line spacing of the paragraph before it if its in-line

wheat ferry
#

I'm not sure why some text just likes disappearing into other elements

fluid salmon
#

(ive done this a lot)

image.png
wheat ferry
#

usually happens at the bottom of boxes, I've noticed

wheat ferry
#

I have also done the added reward for 1-5, which should hopefully finally make it pretty rewarding in its own right for non-narrative or "oh no we've basically lost" reasons

#

not that the random encounters are too difficult, but they are attrition

#

the half-table suggestion was also great - if I column break it so that the Equipment table has its own page, it's a reasonable concentration of Table to have if I keep triggers as a list

#

not going to push this as an update yet but the dejankification will be in 0.4.0 whenever that comes out

inland bluff
#

do hardlight count as environmental burn for achilles?

#

or is it explicitly terrain tied

wheat ferry
#

ayup, terrain

#

hardlight shield's still equipment

pastel vigil
#

gee wonder what this could be

40f1f77e225cc63cbe5b098b3608489b.png
wheat ferry
#

👁️

#

the ominous biochemical leak:

pastel vigil
#

having it splash on the mech but have it not care because Insulated was definitely a thought i did not have going into it but i'm glad it struck me

wheat ferry
#

It walks forward in a cloud of steam and radiation; each heavy footfall sends another shudder through the deckplates as bracing-pistons sink into place. Out there, through the haze, you can see an iridescent chemical slick pooling across its upper surface from the ruptured barrel of its mortar and then boiling off in sterilization-vent heat, giving a soap-bubble sheen to its mourning shroud.

cedar kestrel
#

Session 1: Narration galore, begins later today

cedar kestrel
#

session was done, much encounters were had. Somehow I messed up and said the bombers had only dropped leaflets and I decided to stick to that for the duration. A slight mercy :3

But they had their meeting, asked about the compliment, are very concerned about who they are actually fighting since its been like 500 years (an astute observation, lil grasshoppers) and asked about trying to detonate the tbk weapons on the Diana to stop it and also about the chance that Iphigenia is already cascading. (tldr; you wouldn't get out alive and probably still irradiate the planet below, if you even get to the Diana, and while we don't know if she is cascading, it doesn't change the current objectives, but if she is and you can exploit that, then go nuts)

Then I've given them their side missions afterwards, of which they got their main Albatross mission, to find out what exactly happened with the doomed attack of Loyal Wing Rokumuro Soma in order to give his story a closing and give proper honors. Along with the Union, Freelancer, and CDF missions, should they want to pursue it.

Our "Baymax but a Dodecahedron" NHP showed interest in Union, our true Alabatross Helena gave a bit of interest in the CDF mission, but only secondary to the Albatross one, and both Mircalla and Anneliese showed interest in the Freelancer mission, Anneliese because apparently they stole a bunch of stuff from SSC so maaaaaaybe they could use that data to blackmail their debt away, but show clear confliction given their present company, but Mircalla is more so interested in the data itself rather then who gets it. So that'll be fun to see where that leads if they go down that route.

#

now i just need to get the VTT all properly set up so they can actually play it in two weeks beelz_sweat

wheat ferry
#

god bless

I'm really glad to hear that everything went well! Also glad that people are asking the main "wait hasn't it been 500 years? what gives" question without any prompting, the Mystery is Set Up

cedar kestrel
#

One person had the theory that maybe they just raised a new batch of people like a generation ship

#

but another pointed out that in the sheer scale of relativistic travel it is possible that there are other remants of SecComm that haven't been directly eliminated, popping up like roaches.

But yes very glad they got into that line of questioning

wheat ferry
#

Anything else that stood out, if anything?

cedar kestrel
#

Nothing of particular note.

I will say I liked their reactions to the propaganda leaflets and the tbk Loadout on the Diana :3

wheat ferry
#

Excellent. Looking forward to hearing about next session, then!

inland bluff
#

One of the players briefly tested the Haber, it was, as expected before the test, pretty busted.
overcharge heavy melee into pankrati enjoys the +3 burn twice with minimal heat, and then overwatched with a friendly puppet for another +3 burn
The combination of a heavy mount and unlimited +3 burn for a minimal heat cost is pretty much...heavy mount toku.

#

and the proposed solution was to slap a 1/round limit on the bonus damage as well, or move the 1/round from the res ignore into the bonus dmg.

#

could also just directly reuse TBK munition trait from Mk1 then as well...

pastel vigil
#

ah, good ol' "heavy mount with easily accessible bonus damage trait" will do that, huh

#

personally i entirely forgot it scaled to mount size, but that adds the story up quick

#

1 heat does not buy 3 burn, that much is true at the very least, and drawing comparison to the Big Three heavy mounters with additional damage sources:

  • Monarch gets to deal 3 non-AP within Range 15 if it gets a Crit, but can't be same target. 1/round.
  • Manticore deals 2 AP whenever it takes Heat, 1/round, but is only Range 3
  • Caliban uses 4 entire gates before it gives you damage (1. use an attack with knockback, 2. hit the attack, 3. knockback sufficiently into an obstacle, 4. fail a save). also 1/round

Haber by comparison is kind of winning the trade in terms of accessibility (no round or range restriction, just needs to hit), target (it isn't forced to split damage), and potency (3 burn I would rate as closest to the Caliban here, which gets 1d6 non-AP, but otherwise is stronger than both the 2 AP and the 3 non-AP)

wheat ferry
#

well, that's admittedly disappointing. I'd had hoped that if it got this far without the damage trait breaking anything I knew of then it'd have been fine.

pastel vigil
#

it is kind of amusing that it had got this far lmao

wheat ferry
#

I suppose I can do flat +2 Burn no matter the mount size 1/round, but that's with a bit of a sigh because I liked the uniqueness of not doing that.

#

Still, it's on the list™️ now.

pastel vigil
#

tbh, there are other potential angles at least besides that that could be a bit more dynamic

wheat ferry
#

Yeah, but reminding me that Executioner Heavy Melee exists kind of makes me go "welp"

pastel vigil
#

thas executioner baby

wheat ferry
#

yep

#

Every single Haber playtest pilot from here to eternity used some kind of artillery ranged weapon

pastel vigil
#

and if not that, Heavy Gunner will enter the frame (which is a bit healthier but yeah)

#

but thats why i'm kinda like, frankly

wheat ferry
#

yeah, heavy gunner had an action cost

pastel vigil
#

restricting to ranged only would not be a bad thing

#

its an artillery mech after all

wheat ferry
#

🤔
I mean, that would make it line up neatly with the rest of the data I have on hand, aye

#

I had a HMG Heavy Gunner Haber once, but that ended up being fine because it had to split targets and the damage was tied to a conditional effect it spent a quick action for

#

Ended up being kind of like the rest of the control tools in its kit

pastel vigil
#

as for the "flat heat for flat damage 1/round" it works but i also get it being a bit bland. that said, you could twist that framework too to lean into the area control aspect of the Haber licenses (and core power) a bit more maybe

#

take notes from something like Annihilator, or similar - lean into "Heat for area of effect"

wheat ferry
#

That was in early design docs, but it was antisynergistic with the Mortar and so it got cut before release

#

adding AoE to the AoE turns out a bit odd

#

For the moment, what I could probably do is just go slow and tack a "ranged attacks" on

pastel vigil
#

depends on the implementation, but i can understand that

wheat ferry
#

try to keep the identity I like

#

that said, I may still have to tack a 1/round on anyway if someone tries to roll up with ASURA and Overcharge. I'll sleep on it, I suppose.

pastel vigil
#

worse case scenario i could try find a way to test just that

#

i do definitely think now i processed it 1 heat for 3 burn is an incredulous trade either way - and as mentioned, scales very well with extra attacks (even ones that only deal half damage get 2 burn for 1 heat, which is still a good trade) - and i do think that needs to be rectified a bit, but ultimately its your shot to call in the end

wheat ferry
#

Hm.

#

1-2-3 for 1-2-3?

pastel vigil
#

was kinda my gut feeling, yeah

wheat ferry
#

Then cut the heat-self on the mortar to 2 from 3

#

feels like a good way to go

pastel vigil
#

it has the heat cap to throw that weight around but still runs risk of just going overboard otherwise if it leans to heavy into it

wheat ferry
#

yeah, it neatly cuts off the asura+OC thing because then you just explode your reactor on the spot even with some sbd investment

#

I'll take an additional 9 heat today clueless

pastel vigil
#

also maintains the flexibility which i think benefits the core anyway

#

light nexus are good for setting up infection, in a whiteroom

wheat ferry
#

ayup, someone made an oracle lmg haber once

#

I think I looked like I bit into a lemon when I saw an undermounted heavy slot with that in it

pastel vigil
#

oh my god

#

yeah been there

wheat ferry
#

thank you for letting me rubberduck about it, I'm actually quite happy with that

#

discovering other interesting things in the process

image.png
#

All set, I'll give it until the start of May and then if nothing else crops up I'll just push this and some other small things with the module itself as a short 0.4.0 or 0.3.5

inland bluff
#

There is also the option where instead of applying more burn, we make the burn stickier, taking a leaf out of the clademaster's kit for smth like 1/round force people to roll twice and choose worse result or 1/round impaired when slapping burn on ppl (works well with the mod and double down on the threat posed by the airburst canister)

#

would still fit the theme of persistant burn mech?

#

or a flat -1 to engi EONT (?)

#

or 1/round when you slap burn on ppl force them to use your save target instead of engi check at the end of their next turn

wheat ferry
#

That's definitely an option, aye - I'm just reluctant to change what I know works since the Haber's ~2 years old at this point and doing a major revision on the main trait would basically mean tossing the data I've had during that time.

#

If I was doing a "make burn stickier" option, it'd be "Enemies with your Burn use your Save Target to clear instead of a check"

solemn rapids
#

that doesn't sound unreasonable although it might be kind of overhead-y, like if you have multiple sources of burn on the battlefield having to track the haber's burn specifically could tangle some people up

wheat ferry
#

Ayup, I come from a wargame background so it's the sort of thing I tag in my head as "stick a little token on the guy's base if you get burn on him"

solemn rapids
#

yeah the infection token on the core power is an elegant way of handling that

pastel vigil
#

paint is done and. yeah. i'm feeling it.

SPOILER_434ad6464f45f9707c7dc8a90d311198.png
#

this is gonna be fun to spring during an encounter

wheat ferry
#

oh that fucks

main ferry
#

👆

sleek jungle
#

It's glorious.

cedar kestrel
wheat ferry
#

||Think it's a Vestan Clademaster for her Winter Scar game||

pastel vigil
cedar kestrel
#

AH!

cedar kestrel
#

If all goes well

Scene 1-1 this sunday

inland bluff
#

today, 2-1

#

the melee everest ran headlong into the zone

#

I took out the jam pylon and the bastion grappled him

#

all is well, until he take a aceso to start swinging again

wheat ferry
#

the melee everest has fallen into the trap designed for melee everests!

#

god bless

inland bluff
#

also, on a side note, the toku gibbed the ace

#

structure traumaed into no remaining system on the ace and therefore no launcher

#

the ace proceeded to cook the toku through with fragsig

#

a jolly table all around I say

wheat ferry
#

Excellent, glad to hear all's well

cedar kestrel
#

Took a bit, but I managed to finnagle Foundry and the session to a ready state for this session
NPCs are up. Map Uploaded. Lancers (mostly) added.
Players are able to join and interact.

2 More Days

wheat ferry
#

It Begins

inland bluff
#

haha, turns out getting grappled by a bastion and stuck in a jamming pylon wasn't that good of a deterrence for the melee everest

#

I blame aceso, despite my repeated attempt to strip the shield off the everest, the lancaster finally managed to make the ev begin a turn without jam

#

the sitrep proceeded to be shredded in an spectacular fashion.

wheat ferry
#

Can't always stop 'em, but you can slow them down!

#

Looks like your players have a great composition

inland bluff
#

aye

#

small condolence is I manage to strip off an asura charge, 2 stress and a structure as attrition

#

although with lancaster being lancaster and they all tooke grease monkey

#

eh, count what you have ig

wheat ferry
#

Pfftha, quad grease monkey - well, yeah, treasure your blessings.

cedar kestrel
#

Session went well! Alas we were all getting use to how to use Lancer Foundry so we were a bit slow, we've only got through 3 rounds of it before one of our players had to conk out because it was 2am where they were, but here's the sitrep at the moment:

image.png
#

Both Bombard and Rainmaker got their weapons blasted off of them

#

The Scourer is getting bullied by the Polemos/Caliban hybrid, and the Spectre reflected all the shots from the Archer when it first came in because it procced its trait.
The Orchis with its nasty 18 evasion just avoiding all damage but however doing chip damage when actually hitting (so far)

That said, its first move was moving the Breach Ram then boosting, then then rammed the barricade into the 2 cataphracts, which knocked them into the size 3 terrain and proning them both.

#

However, the disarmed Rainmaker and Bombard are basically trying to fly/ram the Taraxacum to try and hold it down.

#

debating between arriving with the hive or the mirage for the start of 4th round reinforcements

wheat ferry
#

Haha, glad to see my scruffy little map sketches getting some use. Poor combat air patrol getting their weapons blown off them.

It is an objective sitrep, so the Orchis has the right idea! Looking forward to hearing more.

wheat ferry
#

very cool Haber kitbash!

#

made by @karmic radish

pastel vigil
#

fuck yeaaaah

#

thats real good

wheat ferry
#

"factory standard because all the paint got melted off of it over deployment" is peak Haber aesthetic

solemn rapids
#

what a nice looking gardener 🙂

karmic radish
#

It certainly is

inland bluff
#

oof, I got scammed by myself. turns out 10 as effective height doesn't apply in zero-g

#

I could have scrapped off more with the solo ace at the end of 2-1

#

shame I didn't realize zero-g means I could strafe at height 30

inland bluff
#

I am perfectly sane and stable, also slightly roiling at the whoever it might be to add the system that appearantly have the effect of
"on the first turn you gain +4 speed, on second turn you gain +2, on third turn +1 and the system is destroyed on the fourth turn"
to their homebrew and thought it was a perfectly balanced design with absolutely no broken effect with pankrati people

wheat ferry
cedar kestrel
#

Tomorrow
Wrapping up Mission 1-1
Will they succeed in getting the boarding ram onto the Gallipoli

wheat ferry
#

Good Luck, Brave Soldiers

cedar kestrel
#

Mission Complete: At the Start of Round 7, the Taraxacum managed to get clear using previously set up verticality shenanigans on Round 5 to finally make their way to the objective location, with plenty of shenanigans occurring in between.
However, the lance has taken some rough damage. the Taraxacum, Polemos lost 1 structure each, and the Spectre lost two, rendering both of their weapon mounts down. These last few rounds were much harder on them.

Next session we will make rest repairs, and they will decide what they will target next, the Flight Deck or the CIC Bridge.

#

All Veterans but the Hive were eventually taken out, and the Hive was sniped with crack shot and only had LoS to space one, allowing the Taraxacum their final dash

wheat ferry
#

👁️ hell yeah, good attrition but good work from the players too

#

Surely they can assault the bridge directly, nothing bad could come from this decision

cedar kestrel
#

:3

inland bluff
#

tsk, homebrews

#

and suldan

#

roasted achilles to death

#

half the activation was spent cleaning exposed

#

the morzoko was jumped to death, same as the barricade

#

the time I decide to do instinct mode instead of cleaning exposed, only managed to scrape off one structure while got structured twice on my end, total misplay

wheat ferry
#

Oh hey, clearing Exposed was actually used? Very nice!

#

I was like "you know, I should let Capacitor Charges be used for more support-y things when writing this" while not entirely sure how much it'd come up

inland bluff
#

nnrly

#

stabalize from achilles

#

the morozko died on round 1

inland bluff
#

so they uhhhh

#

popped everest core

#

went an entire circuit around the map, around achilles blocking the map

#

and jumped my backline

#

still, the clean exposed would have come in useful

#

given how I had to dump 2 activation just to clean exposed

wheat ferry
#

Well, at the very least the players are going just as hard as expected

#

Godspeed brave soldiers

inland bluff
#

Making the map for 3-1, and I had I idea: instead of making a central sightline...we could make the tank start on the tracks and shoot the PC from the tracks (with 5 base speed it only need an extra boost here and there to catch up with the train), leaving the inner portions cramped. it's easy to get LoS on the car to the track, and vice versa, but not from the car to the other side of the car

This is to trouble the melee player, and force them to either navigate the dangerous/difficult terrain, or to get on the track and be open to every npc on the EDZ side of the car having clear sightlines to them

#

Something like This

image.png
wheat ferry
inland bluff
#

firewalker 1-1 and firewalker 1-2 for the session after the next.

image.png image.png
pastel vigil
#

ontos my beloved ...

wheat ferry
#

GO MY MINIONS

wheat ferry
#

speaking of art... 👁️

image.png
terse arrow
#

hype hype hype

solemn rapids
#

oooo

pastel vigil
#

subaltern art is gonna be choice for certain

wheat ferry
#

making the visual key has been surprisingly fun - a lot of stuff riding that sort of Forever Winter into Helghast into Destiny line of worn, blocky, utilitarian, but bleeding aggression

#

I think this is one of my favorites - ancient, ancient Destiny 1 concept art, but I looked at it and went "this is a SecComm patrol" pretty much on the spot

Destiny_Concept_Art_31b.png
pastel vigil
#

oh yeah i can see it

#

its got the right drab tone to it

wheat ferry
#

bonus:

# 
A kite shield-shaped insignia; inside it, a hammer strikes down from the starry heavens upon a cluster of large redwood-like trees, tossing aside those it hits and cracking the earth beneath in a single jagged line towards the point of the shield.
pastel vigil
#

also: semi-related, but kinda wish i had the foresight to save the Pyro from the last RecOWS scene for this upcoming one now that I decided what I'm doing as a Veteran Trait for the Clademaster

#

RecOWS spoiler if players chance on this ||Cheshire Grin Trait Hostile characters within the area of Pre-Sighting Beacon only remove half of their marked Burn when they make a successful Burn check.||

wheat ferry
#

oh that got an evil smile out of me without even thinking about it as I read

#

excellent.

pastel vigil
#

We're all mad here.

wheat ferry
#

I should go back through and make sure the NPCs are Rebake-compatible out of the box at some point. Hm.
Stretch goal for eventual crowdfunding, maybe - make an appendix PDF of rebake-y versions of the three included NPCs

pastel vigil
#

i think at a glance they should be fine, Veteran is like the biggest thing seeing that has bespoke options (and even then it has generic ones). Ultra interactions might make things different but thats less to do with the NPCs and just a generalism

#

really though i've just been having fun cuz, yeah, Veteran Traits was a choice idea so i've been making them for every non-standard NPC i've been using

#

made like, 4, for the Price of War NPCs

#

they really elevate encounters in a subtle way

wheat ferry
#

Aye, I think the biggest change would probably be to Her Carrion Ladyship herself and her retinue because of how Ultras get reworked - but I could see doing rebake reworks for parts of the modules with a little asterisk that those aren't playtested

pastel vigil
#

yeah that tracks

wheat ferry
#

actually, you know what'd be funny

# 
Pilum Overcharge Coil
Morozko Veteran Trait

The Morozko may fire its CHIMNEYSTACK Javelins into spaces occupied by hostile characters. Deal 4/6/8 Kinetic AP to the character and subtract damage dealt after any reductions from the Javelin's HP, then place the Javelin adjacent to the targeted space.
#

woe! direct impact

pastel vigil
#

oh that is fun

#

i almost feel it shouldn't be AP just so the reductions effect comes into play more but yeah

wheat ferry
#

I was thinking Brace at first and then realized hm. bracing low damage probably won't happen, but also

pastel vigil
#

right yeah

#

brace no workie

wheat ferry
#

either way, that's just me dashing off a quick note, I assume I'll do something more in-depth Later™️ but folks can feel free to use this as a little addition

inland bluff
wheat ferry
#

I used some of the Brigador Killers soundtrack for M3, which might also be a good pull

wheat ferry
#

relevant to module content

slender forum
#

ooh I've seen this

pastel vigil
#

by the way i have to throw this out before i literally forget when i wake up but: out of curiousity, how much examination/testing have the IaM player frames gotten, individually and in total

wheat ferry
# pastel vigil by the way i have to throw this out before i literally forget when i wake up but...

Excellent question - I've passed them for review by a bunch of people specifically and through the homebrew channels on this server. In terms of testing, the breakdown's something like...

  • The Swordgrass is the most popular by far, featuring in three campaigns and two runs of the module. It's also been in a few one-shots, two of which I ran it in myself as part of explicit homebrew testing (one of which caused the parry mechanic to take on its current form).

  • The Haber is the second-most popular, appearing in two campaigns (one of which is one I'm a player in, currently active) and one module run. Also a good few one-shots, more than the Swordgrass since it's been around for longer.

  • The Mitscher's been in one campaign and a handful of one-shots, including ~2 explicitly for homebrew testing; my notes say that one of those resulted in nerfs to the missile systems.

  • The Spectre has been the least popular, featuring only in a few one-shots and pick-up games (though I believe someone also had a Spectre on their party for a module run). This is also why I was reticent to change Needlestitch for so long, because nobody actually did run a Sunzi with it (but eventually I just figured I'd preempt the thing).

I definitely need to reorganize my old testing notes from when these were individual LCPs.

wheat ferry
#

an addendum to this: I am absolutely still interested in people testing these frames and giving me feedback, I will consider anything I receive in that regard - the module itself may be in open playtesting, but I consider the same for the mechs.

pastel vigil
#

yeah I was curious because I'm planning to run some Price of War tests myself and was thinking of also testing some of these alongside - theres a few things that kinda raised a brow at a glance rereading them (yes, i reread through IaM because my net was dead, sue me) but i also want to take it through their paces to see if my thoughts are right or not

#

some thoughts might be harder to test, mind

wheat ferry
#

Feel free, I'm acutely conscious of how limited formal playtesting for, well, anything is - hell, that's how we found "oh, haber melee executioner is busted, we just never knew because no one ever took melee haber"

pastel vigil
#

yep

pastel vigil
#

I already gave Haber examination so yeah, i might run it (though i'd need to update my docs or whatever, forgot the changes you did post discussion or if they even got pushed to main)

Mitscher is on my list without a doubt but again, will have to check any updated stuff if it exist.

And Spectre is also on the list ... but not because of the Spectre itself. I'm more worried on the license gear at a glance, mainly in that I think it might be very inexcessible to someone not planning to take Spectre

#

hence why the test there is going to instead be "okay, you get the license but not the mech. figure out how to make it work" most likely

pastel vigil
#

I actually looked at Needle and went "wait a second, Final Secret is that you?"

wheat ferry
#

I cannot allow Bees to get ahold of YOU TELEPORT AND TELEPORT AND TELEPORT

wheat ferry
#

Mitscher and Spectre are current

#

for the license, I recall White Witch/Spectre and Orchis/Spectre being in builds people came up with, actually

pastel vigil
#

bees is my ace card for "instantly break something"

pastel vigil
#

and I think in the case of Fallen Mask its a hard sell to grab a 2 SP system that does not even function when you take it without the presence of another system (of which none in the Spectre license does the job, ironically) or a specific frame

#

Swansong has the same issue but at least works outside of the conditional as a fairly heavy-handed long-range pseudo-HMG, and typically mounts are easily to finangle around anyway

#

its one of those things that makes me wonder if Fallen Mask unironically should just be 1 SP ala Omnibus but it'd still fall into the issue of "theres nothing in Spectre that activates it besides the Spectre itself"

#

so yeah, i'm going to throw it to the wolves at some point and see what my players can make of it

wheat ferry
#

I'm sort of the philosophy there that it's a good thing in that regard for Fallen Mask because resourceless HP regen is so strong - thus, Put It On A Tank and incentivize the tank to get shot, redirect attacks, absorb hits, etc

#

is it more constrained than usual for Lancer licenses? Absolutely, but this is why we test things

pastel vigil
#

yeah I think thats also a part of the problem, with both it and Needle and Thread

#

they're both extremely good ... but not at low license level

#

just because Grit scaling is Weird

wheat ferry
#

there's very little in Lancer that lets you do player-side scaling in a reasonable fashion 😔

early, early design before I showed it to anyone had it tied to Hull briefly, and then I went "but why though" and just slapped Grit in there, which seems roughly in parity with how a lot of other 1p scaling systems do it

pastel vigil
#

I don't actually think Fallen Mask is actually that strong is the thing, same with Thread and Needle (which if I had to be frank I think is robbery)

#

at LL2 (ealiest you can take them) thats 2 Overshield or 1 HP which are both kind of just negligible - in the latter, you get more HP from the +2 HP the system gives, and in the former you can do better with a Rank 3 non-Limited talent; at LL12, suddenly thats 7 Overshield which is a lot more respectable and can eat attacks, and 6 HP which is the same as the regeneration of a Hull-built Balor

#

its an immense swing that you can't really actually balance for funny enough, and largely that means I tend towards the LL6 and below side of things in which case "yeah they're kinda anemic for most of your time with them"

wheat ferry
#

Aye, I'm coming at the balance from the LL range of the module (6-9, 6-8 for actual play), which means it's a little more on the Interesting side, I think?

pastel vigil
#

which may be a component of the perception of its value, aye

wheat ferry
#

These are numbers it's fairly easy to change (I've seen Grit+X a number of times and I've used it myself), however, fortunately

pastel vigil
#

does honestly just make me think that Fallen Mask could be a flat value (or another case, flat + half grit) but Thread and Needle should absolutely be on par at least with the other limited Overshield systems I think, even if its only 2 SP instead of the usual 3. I think "slightly more one-shot overshield effect" could justify that vs the others which usually have an effect that runs for the entire Overshield length

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but I'm just spitballing on observations more than not and what my own gut feeling says based on just homebrew and table experiences

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I've always found Grit to be really weird as a balancing lever ... which is even weirder considering it gets used a fair bit. +SP, +HP, +To Hit, it factors into a lot of baseline stuff. just also happens that theres a big range between "0 to 6"

wheat ferry
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It is weird but "fuck it we ball" has generally been my answer there

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(I'm also glad you brought up SP cost because "you may need another system to run this on an OOL frame" is exactly why it's 2SP instead of 3)

pastel vigil
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yeah the more damning thing is the license doesn't have that other system to me, the SP I can see the argument for depending - its not like White Witch which has Camus' Razor or Sympathetic for easy hooks into Retort Loop

wheat ferry
#

As I mentioned earlier, the Spectre's gotten the least testing out of the group, so I'd be happy to see if any of these numbers do seem to need tweaking and then poke around in the viscera a bit to smooth out the "oh huh this is painful at low LLs" thing

pastel vigil
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yeah I will probably be doing LL6 if I do test stuff

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just because thats the comfortable test benchmark I use

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"full license and 3 other licenses of your pick" works well for diversity while keeping true to the mech itself

wheat ferry
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definitely, I think most testing has been LL6 or LL8 - people picking the license up and Bringing It To Their Game has been scattered around everywhere, but that's that

pastel vigil
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I have a 4 week campaign hiatus legit on the final scene (screaming) so maybe I'll use the spare time to do test games

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keep myself sane

wheat ferry
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Lancer for the Lancer withdrawal

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I really appreciate it, and keep me updated - like I said, I'll probably push the Haber changes tonight

pastel vigil
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awesome, that'll be helpful at the least

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I'm probably going to run PoW and IaM seperately but will keep you notified when tests do occur

dusty portal
pastel vigil
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i had to pre-emptively nerf the keep because of this

dusty portal
#

good to know your mental model of me is doing good work

wheat ferry
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bees_digitaltwin.sim

wheat ferry
#

0.3.0 -> 0.4.0 Changelog:

  • Minor layout changes to fix a little text jank
  • Scene 1-5's victory rewards now also lets players treat rolls of 10-19 on the random encounter table to get elsewhere on the ship as a 20+
  • Adjusted the armor, weapons, and equipment lists in Appendix B to armor, weapons, and equipment tables
  • Haber nerf: additional burn trait now is for ranged attacks only because Executioner exists, the Heat cost to use the trait now also scales with the mount size/amount of Burn added
  • The Haber's EA17 Special Payload Mortar now is Heat (Self) 2 rather than 3 to account for this change
  • For some inexplicable reason, the Haber and only the Haber had its lcp No Data image for the (currently not extant) art link to an imgur upload instead of the standard comp/con No Data image; this has now been fixed
  • Added some little setting-dressing details like accent colors for CDF identification and types of hardsuits in SecComm use
  • Corrected date on the "What is anthrochauvinism to the Deimosian?" sidebar's in-universe quotation
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And I'll leave anything else up 'til testing (and I solidify my own thoughts on the matter).

pastel vigil
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👁️ very well

inland bluff
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hm, this could probably keep a check on the multi atk haber I've been seeing around in the group for now

wheat ferry
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Definitely should be the case! Unfortunately, walking into Mission 3 resulted in worsened capabilities 😔

wheat ferry
pastel vigil
# wheat ferry I also do want to circle back to this (if you have time) - you mentioned your co...

Well ... its less to do with the license necessarily and more to do with the fact that, if you'll let me slightly mean about it: the Mitscher is just kind of generically strong but in a manner thats kind of boring and one note?

It's very comparable to the Monarch of all things, and does shuffle things slightly in terms of stats, but also just gains +3 Repair Cap, +1 SP and a better mount set up (Double Flex + Heavy vs Flex + Main + Heavy). It loses 5 Sensors which is impactful, and -2 to Tech which ... doesn't matter as much? And 1 Speed is not a big different either.

It has the ability to passively fly which is a big game changer, but it doesn't feel properly costed for because of this. Autonomous Targeting Array really is just analagous to Seeking Payload, and while obviously weaker, its just kind of generically applicable to most everything: Target has armor? just do bonus damage. Has armor? do AP. Smart ironically is the odd one out here because it just increases your chance to hit on low E-Defence targets ... but you're already consuming Lock-On, so next to the two other choices that just Do More Effect (which is why I feel they compete with each other - 1d3 damage and AP are in a similar ballpark, when you do the math) it feels less necessary.

Even the Core Active is more or less "get a free reload 1/round" which is kind of wild, honestly, even if I do think its an interesting component to it overall. That really spikes turn-to-turn damage output.

#

so yeah, it can kinda just carry more Stuff, even slightly, fly more or less unimpeded (especially with + to Agility checks) and then just does one thing to do More Damage

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but thats just my cursory glance at it in the end

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if your practice noted otherwise then yeah, go nuts, but thats been my gut feeling. I do think some of the license stuff is slightly powerful (Cluster Bomblet seems cracked for being an AoE reliable that makes difficult terrain while still outputting heavy-tier damage) but nah it was mostly the frame

inland bluff
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the budget barrage button in Mitscher 3 is a funny one.

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On the one hand, limited 1 and 4SP (mostly 4SP)
On the other hand, Siege Cannon without the ordnance, range or the heavy mount

pastel vigil
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yeah Spearfish is just The Super Grenade so didn't really register too much to me. its def. within reason

wheat ferry
# pastel vigil if your practice noted otherwise then yeah, go nuts, but thats been my gut feeli...

First off, thank you for your frank feedback. I appreciate honesty, and I want to make changes while I can if they're necessary.

Cluster Bomblet came out of its first tests - where it didn't have Reliable, according to my notes - underpowered outside of Core Active turns; thus, it received Reliable to make it less feelsbad to be firing off Heavy Loading and potentially not hitting with it. The general idea with the Mitscher is that you want to Lock On and Skirmish most of the time, allowing you to swap between Loading weapons to keep uptime while dealing bonus damage or punching through armor, and so most of the time there'd only be one target you can get real accuracy on in the Line template. Reliable was the best way to ensure that you did something to everything in the Line.

In the context of that, the Core Power, first - I agree the Reload is powerful, but I kind of wanted it to be. Frankly, otherwise, with the amount of loading weapons in the license, players just take RSU basically 99% of the time. Loading, and the DPS penalty that is Stabilize, does that to a mech. It felt like the most interesting way to do the large effectiveness increase for a scene that is common for non-efficient cores, and in the context of the long missions in the module - 3-4 combats - it not being efficient tends to smooth the curve.

Much the same for ATA - I understand where you're coming from with the options seeming interchangeable, but players seemed to enjoy having the options, if that makes sense. One especially liked playing alongside a spotter Chomolungma who gave them Lock-Ons and Scans so they could reactively choose which option was best for their specific target - in the abstract, I agree that it doesn't matter much, but in practice just being able to choose things is something I've gotten positive feedback on for player engagement and teamplay.

#

When it comes to the base stats of the frame, however - I think that's very interesting feedback, and I'm looking at that closely. Repair Cap is the way it is because the size and the Flying mean that it's a massive and obvious target for much of the NPC roster, while the SP is to fit more than one of the SP-eating missile systems in the license. The mounts were to enable auxslinger Mitscher, in a Raleigh sense, but I've only seen that once - I could very easily drop down to the Monarch mountline or Main-Main-Heavy while still being compatible with all in-license equipment.

I think that lowering Repair Capacity is definitely a thing to look at as well, but I'm a little reticent to pull the trigger on that.

When it comes to the baseline thesis - strong, but in a boring way - I also understand that, but I'll also bat back at you with "I'm not sure how much of that I could realistically change while staying within the guidelines of a design whose lore is boring and efficient".

It's a drone; an armored incarnation of the banality of evil. It shoots things, it shoots them well and while flying, and then leaves. I'd be curious as to what I could add onto that to make it more interesting, but the ATA options and making it a pure flying frame (no grapples, etc) were the main areas of distinction I saw.

I hope this has also been illuminating into my own design process and what I've seen, as well as what I've been considering changing.

pastel vigil
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yeah no absolutely, and on that note I will say any info you got on the basis of testing obvious overides anything eyeballing it

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If I had to be more concise - I don't think it being straightforward or even boring is necessarily bad (and keeping it simple works out for something already fairly dynamic using flight), just it kind of has the Answer To Most Everything in a way thanks to ATA.

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Like I said: If no armor, pick damage. If armor, pick AP. If too evasive, do smart. No real weakness or even decision making there, just tick to correct box for the correct problem

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not that Monarch doesn't get a good bounty from Seeking Payload, but its kind of keyed a lot more strongly into just being Armor Defeating - making sure damage dealt sticks - with Seeking mostly being the means to the end

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Has one job, does that job well

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Flexibility is a good way to twist it, just I think the options themselves are too obvious for what they're meant to be applied for, if that makes any sense

wheat ferry
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Mm. Fair enough. I'll give that some thought, but no changes immediately jump out at me

pastel vigil
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aye, I'd wanna run it through paces first before saying more

wheat ferry
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Understood, and thank you again for the thoughts

dusty portal
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i should play a mitscher.

wheat ferry
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horrifying sentences

thick reef
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Pilots, I'm gonna be running a oneshot and will be allowing the use of IaM mechs. If any of you are interested, please apply in the listed thread.

wheat ferry
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Very excited for this, I should be able to be around at that time too if folks have any questions

idle raven
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Question regarding the Haber: Does the Onboard Biochemical Synthesis trait apply cumulatively or separately? (ex. Krakatoa: would it be 3 heat for 3 extra burn on 4 targets or 12 heat for 3 burn each? )

wheat ferry
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May, on hit, per character hit.

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("... When the Haber hits a hostile character with a ranged attack, it may...")

idle raven
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So if I were inclined I could apply 7 burn on 4 targets but take like 12 heat in exchange?

wheat ferry
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Theoretically, yeah. If you want to toss burn around you're paying X/character for X burn.

thick reef
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And we'll be running another playtest oneshot cause I couldn't find a way to make Clademaster work with the LL6 combat. This one I will be prioritizing newer players when selecting applicants, but apply anyway

wheat ferry
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my awful artillery child's time shall come

inland bluff
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feels like there's not much of a distinction to a bombard ngl

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same bulkiness (ordnance SH), shorter range, no diff, less damage on groups

pastel vigil
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tbh its immensely different to a Bombard in actual niche

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If anything the Clademaster is closer on paper to the Rainmaker

inland bluff
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a mixture of both

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javelin and atlas missile I see

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flare drone and the blast arcing SH artillery too

pastel vigil
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negative, I'm talking about Missile Pods funny enough

inland bluff
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MPod have range 20, don't take up a full barrage, and don't have ordnance

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don't really see the similarity

pastel vigil
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not the point

inland bluff
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the point as what? reliable scrapes?

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and Rainmaker for a full action can do jav + Mpod, which is way higher an output than, well, the cannon

pastel vigil
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Rainmaker is a long-range attritional platform, meant to give multiple characters consistent plinks of damage over the course of the encounter. Missile Pods allow this by being easy to use turn-to-turn, indirect and reliable.

The Clademaster, similarly, is there to ablate multiple characters using its Reliable Burn, while also forcing players out of position under the threat of the Pre-Sighting Beacon that makes it even more reliable as a weapon. It's about consistency rather than raw impact

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again, just going "yeah its like Bombard" is just kind of reductive and misses a lot of how the NPC is actually meant to perform and encourage

inland bluff
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2 burn isn't going anywhere, not when everyone is lugging around 20 hp

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or at least, my pl never skipped hull day

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and marching an extra 10 space compared to bombard is pain

pastel vigil
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And thats why, in those cases, you'd want a Sniper instead, right?

inland bluff
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15 range and 10 sensor to deploy the drone is way to close for a 3 speed

pastel vigil
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Or hell, a Bombard, even. its a different use case. Just because they're both Blast doesn't mean they're the same thing

inland bluff
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bombard just flat out does the job of attrition already

pastel vigil
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nnnnot really; Bombard does the job of forcing players to keep moving and not group up, but otherwise is really bad at attrition if players know what they're doing

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turns out, 5 damage at +1 Difficulty as a full action is really bad

inland bluff
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I have yet to be unable to catch only 1 in a blast 2

pastel vigil
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you may as well, but its not going to optimal, which is the point

inland bluff
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so it's at least 7+7

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9+9 if I feed another npc into the bombard circle after they finished moving

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that, or they have to spend the rest of the battle with at least some 5 space around each other and scatter out

pastel vigil
#

in either case, Clademaster absolutely has its own niche apart from the Bombard in mechanics and on paper; whether it fulfills that niche is a different question, and one that needs testing (which I hope to actually do eventually)

thick reef
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I personally see if different enough from either since it's the only artillery NCP that plays with Burn, we'll see how it goes during my Sunday game

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Combat I'll be using is one I've used before and I plan to have the Clade replace the artillery NPC I usually use for that combat

wheat ferry
#

📝

inland bluff
# 
This rail rifle clearly shares a lineage with the magnetic weaponaries currently patented by the SSC, perhaps it was actually designed by SSC in that era as well?
Nevertheless, it's a simplistic and robust weapon. The parallel capacitor design is designed to discharge in quick succession, firing multiple rounds at high velocity. But it can also simultaneously discharge, and launch a heavy slug of similar exit velocity, formed by a stack of the metallic rounds partially fused together, retaining kinetic profile at longer ranges, albeit with larger recoil. Essentially allowing it to perform two role in one package. 
A noticeable departure from the standardized model is a hardwired coldcore tap. Allowing it's operator to dump the power directly from the core, bypassing the limit of the capacitors, to supercharge the accelerating rails for a surprisingly powerful shot from a mech scale weapon. It speaks volumes for the weapon's design to be able to not only withstand, but also be comfortable with prolonged usage in such a manner.

Wrote some fluff and reskinning for teucer's LMG/Ranger Rifle/SCL
Yes I'm going to give Teucer an SCL
the SCL is just Teucer overcharging the rail rifle rusty style and pull a line 20 shot in flavor.

wheat ferry
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😌

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I believe they can be trusted with a SCL

inland bluff
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yeah I'll probably translate it to a 12 range self heat 1 heavy rifle that can be fired as if a superheavy weapon. which will deal extra damage and self heat, becomes a ordnance line 20 attack that deals up to 20AP to object before attack rolls, and unloads itself afterward

Normal shots with the heavy rifle don't unload itself

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||that is if they are like super impressive in the double ultra fight||

wheat ferry
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might want to spoiler tag that last line

inland bluff
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tru

wheat ferry
#

that said, makes sense - I encourage GMs to homebrew a little for their own table and help make the combats more their own

thick reef
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Morozko was a pretty cool NPC to use, I deployed it as a reinforcement next to the Haber who had no idea it was Immune to Burn which wasted one of its turns, and then I got them to fail the zero-point save to keep us linked, then with my other quick action I threw out the Chimneystack in the path the Pegasus and Tortuga were planning to move through. I had a Mirage on the field so I had it frag sig and warp sensors the Haber for +5 Heat which the Morozko farmed for the capacitor charges

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one extra warp sensors for 8 capacitor charges then I had the Morozko dump it into the Tortuga, exposing them, then manually detonating the Chimney for 8(x2) AP energy damage to the face

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very satisfying to pull off, but also very challenging to make all that happen. If the Mirage wasn't there I don't think I would have been able to cash out so well

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It's a very technically demanding NPC to use I feel, which isn't bad, but I worry that a lot of GMs won't know what to make of it or how to maximize its use

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another thing we observed in the playtest was that the Haber was already in the dangerzone when they failed the Zero-Point save, so they kinda got the best of both worlds with being in the dangerzone and also not having to worry about overstressing

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It's also a lot of set up to cash out on the Morozko's abilities, and Zero-Point just has so many saves attached to it too. I feel like you could get away with removing the systems save to link the Morozko to someone, they point at a guy in sensors, they're linked, and now they have to decide if they want to heat themselves up or not

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and removing the link should be a systems save instead of an engineering, since I would want to link myself to someone with a high heat cap, they probably have good engineering stat too

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the coolant hose is also just super wordy, what I like most is the changeable patterns on attack, but all the on hit/crit stuff feels too much, this is already a very wordy NPC, I don't think the weapon needs to be so complex to distract the GM on what Morozko needs to be doing with its turns

wheat ferry
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I haven't gotten a ton of feedback on people specifically liking the on hit/on crit effects, so I may drop the on crit and just do -speed on hit

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I'm really glad that it gave you a solid play, the Morozko was definitely designed as a technically challenging NPC to use that rewarded GMs who planned ahead (as well as a counter to types of popular NukeCav builds, as that talent is... very good)

thick reef
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it definitely felt like it was made to fight Habers, and it worked

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but I do feel that the number of saves it's forcing is just too much

wheat ferry
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Very fair. I'm reluctant to take off the save to create a link since "you can't gain heat" is a very powerful control effect

thick reef
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This is true, nothing else in the game can do this (which is a great niche for Morozko), but because having someone fail the zero-point save feels so integral to its existence, I think you could get away with it

wheat ferry
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I could take the "save for half" off of the "deal damage with charges" effect, potentially

thick reef
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maybe lower the sensors to 8 for starters

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Also the last sentence in Zero-Point, when you clear an ally's exposed, is it also supposed to clear all their heat?

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cause if I have a 1 stress NPC who is 10/8 on their heat cap, they're exposed, but clearing the status wouldn't remove the fact that they're over their heat cap, which is why they're exposed

wheat ferry
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... Ha, I forgot to account for 1 Stress NPCs since the combat with a Morozko in the book is paired with a boss.

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Excellent point, thanks - I think I'll do Mathur Stop and say you clear Exposed and drop them to half of their Heat Capacity

thick reef
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heck yeah

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I didn't get to use any of the optionals, the Morozko I deployed had Laevateinn optional (fucking great flavor names for the systems by the way) but I didn't have enough available actions to deploy it

wheat ferry
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Ayup, I've observed that it tends to be action-choked, which I did have down in my notes as a wayto potentially buff it

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(letting it spend CC as Free Actions)

thick reef
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not a bad idea, but that still ties back to that Morozko lives and dies by its ability to farm CCs, and the only way it can get those is by getting someone to fail the Zero-Point save. And if someone rolls lucky, the Morozko lost almost all of its setup turn

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which is fine that it needs CCs to do it jobs, but I think something you could do with the optionals is give it other ways to farms CCs. Maybe when someone overcharges within sensors it can gain CCs from the overcharge as a reaction or something

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idk, that's just spitballing, but that's the biggest hurdle I felt when I was using it was that I needed someway outside of what the Morozko had in its toolkit to farm CCs

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which is why I turned to the Mirage for heatdumping the Haber

wheat ferry
#

Ayup, Mirage or Witch + Morozko is powerful synergy

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For now, what I think I'll do is remove the On Crit from the Coolant Hose and do the above-mentioned fix for the zero-point thing

thick reef
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I think a very self-sufficient Morozko would be like a Tier2 Veteran with Hacker and Limitless, so then I could freg sig people myself for +4 heat -> 4CCs, and the overcharge will give me more actions to work with

thick reef
wheat ferry
#

How'd the Haber feel? I think that's the only PC homebrew you had in the party.

thick reef
#

very destructive, which is fine for a burn mech. Malk is gonna write up some notes but I remember the main thing he said was onboard biochem seemed to incentivise using the larger/heavier weapons. The math seemed to work out better for him

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as for fighting it, I fought it while the CP was active, and it ended up killing my barricade and mirage. It took a Goliath and Leech to really disable it for a while

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I didn't have any glaring issues with it though, there was a pegasus, tortuga, and nelson on the field and I think it scaled fine with those mechs

wheat ferry
#

Excellent! Really glad to hear that, especially after I was inwardly going "hm, maybe I should change that" about my clarification on the multi-target rules earlier this week.

thick reef
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I definitely think it could use some more playtesting (especially on that core power), but I liked fighting it

wheat ferry
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haha, yeah, cascading effects are very strong (and "may I have more playtesting" is the eternal cry of the homebreweer)

also, with respect to the Clademaster discussion earlier today: I think I will be changing it to Sensors 15 to match the range of the weapon

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more I rotated it the more I went well, alright, this feels fine

thick reef
#

I wasn't gonna say anything until after my Sunday game, but I was also thinking that

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I also think the weapon can be Range 20. Artillery NPCs are really interesting because of how exagerated they feel. The average effective range for all non-artillery NPCs is around 10, where the minimum range for all artillery NPCs is 20

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Sensors 15, weapon range 20 feels very artillery coded, everything else I want to try in combat before I come to any final thoughts

wheat ferry
#

I do want to keep it range 15 for now since it's bulkier and better armored than the other artillery NPCs, which I feel incentivises it pushing up somewhat

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also my main reason for matching the ranges was mental overhead again, in the end

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still, I may be colored on this since I keep putting players in tight rooms and corridors with them, so we'll see!

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Thanks a ton for the feedback, looking forward to next game - feel free to use Sensors 15 on the Clademaster

thick reef
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you got it*!*

wheat ferry
#

ah, right - I also did change both zero-point saves to Systems saves

pastel vigil