Field Guide to Ir'Sath

[keen escarp]

Ir'Sath is a young, geologically active world which is dreadfully poisonous. For millennia, unmodded humans could not live there. Yet it developed life of its own, and Smith-Shimano Corpor used that as a template to create a population for it. They lived in semi-isolation until they were invaded by SecComm forces in its waning days. They repelled the invasion with their tanks, and tried to avoid the tide of progress. But they couldn't hold off forever.

This Lancer supplement contains a homebrew manufacturer, Rainstars Engineering Co-Op. It has seven mechs and six core bonuses. There is also a license and an alt frame for each of the major manufacturers (IPS-N, SSC, HORUS, HA), and new talents.

It also has a new mechanic - talent gear. These special systems let you focus your talents even further, giving you extra options to make your mech unique.

This supplement is under active development and playtesting, and its story is being developed as well.
https://zemyla.itch.io/field-guide-to-irsath

[velvet pilot]

noting down for later looking

[scarlet radish]

Reading through the pdf. It's pretty neat!

[woven iron]

I agree; this is neat. Is there any reason (in- or out-of-universe) why you went with bread products as the license names?

[keen escarp]

In-universe: Mechs are vital, but also foreign. So they're named after foreign breads, which are also vital.

Out of universe: I had originally planned to make them named after the Spacechem bosses, and you can still see some of that DNA, but Zach Barth said no. Bread was the first replacement to come to my mind.

And it's a good thing too, because I had to utterly scrap one of them. Kill your darlings and all that.

[woven iron]

That's pretty cool

I'm curious about the flavor text on Touch of the Sun; why iron-56? That's the most common isotope. Is there something I'm missing, or did you just pick an isotope and I'm reading too much into it?

[keen escarp]

It's the most stable isotope, and thus can't be modified by the muon fusion gun.

[woven iron]

Oh, so it's saying "This makes things useless by making it heat death levels of stable"

Hell yeah

Man if the Host were a Striker I'd have some corny catchphrase like "Give them this day their daily dread"

[woven iron]

What's the threat/damage on the Tinsel Bee Sting?

Also I had to look up the tinsel butterfly because of that frame and I gotta say that's one of the best-named animals I've ever seen

I adore the flavor of the Chuul

[keen escarp]

How the fuck did I not include that, and how did it not error at me?

It's 1d6 explosive, 1 threat. I'm going to hopefully gather up all these easy mistakes and release an 0.0.2.

[unkempt lark]

Guess I’ll chime in with what I read into the Klabautermann:

It’s got a very evocative visual design but feels disjointed in mechanics and flavour.

Mechanically it feels like the frame and its license equipment lacks synergy - every piece interacts with a different mechanic. There’s plenty of examples of license components going off on a tangent from their core theme but I feel like it needs something binding it together

Similarly with the flavour - it’s a lot of competing superstition ideas, which feels a little lacking in connective tissue on its own

You really might have two or even three licenses worth of ideas here if you focus in a bit more