Mechs are Back

While I am still working on weird west rules and have setup for test games, THIS time the distraction was my son's fault - he found some random Alpha Strike boxes in a local hobby shop. He plays a lot of Mechwarrior Online/Battletech 5 with me on PC

So we painted them up and were off to the rules cupboard in the shed.  

I'm not a huge fan of Alpha Strike - which always seemed to miss the mark for me. For fast-play rules, it seemed to retain a LOT of complexity and modifiers while losing too much of the cinematic flavour of Battletech. 178 pages is probably not fast play or 'lite'. That said, Alpha Strike works out of the box.

Like 40K, it's obvious the universe and not the rules are the drawcard. Find 10 Alpha Strike players and you'll find 10 different house rules, so I'm not alone in the feeling the rules need to be 'fixed.'   Even the most basic stuff - one of the most common critical hits on the crit table is "nothing happens." FFS - I rolled box cars (3% chance) to get here and now I get to roll again just for a high chance of ... nothing? It's just bad design.  The issue is that 'fixing' things often messes with the balance. Changing and smoothing the dice rolls probably screws light mechs. Making deadlier crits might harm heavier mechs. 

For all its faults, Alpha Strike IS Battletech and comes ready-to-go with dry erase stat cards.

OG Battletech delivers, but is just so 80s gluggy I wouldn't inflict it on adult friends let alone a 10 year old. Recording 100s of hits - that's why I own a PC. 

Heavy Gear recently went through a 'simplification' which also missed the mark for me. It's just roll d6s against a number (say 4+) to count successes, but.... you can add or remove dice AND change the target (to say 3+ or 5+) AND sometimes extra dice that exceed the result can add to the result. Add that to the fact there might be (checks notes) 61 combat modifiers...  it's really not that simple either. On the upside, there is usually only a handful of hitpoints to record - albeit no heat rules if you wanted to use it for BT.

Both these games are (like Infinity) written by I presume frustrated RPGers who made a wargame. This is obvious when you compare how similar they are to a genuine RPG, Lancer. 

Lancer annoys me by using symbols instead of words (if you have 250+ pages of rules, there are ways to save word count besides replacing the word range with a weird line - like, say the 150 pages worth of fluff...). That's needless obscurity. It also seems overly fixated on elemental damage types (fire, electricity etc). But it is an unapologetic RPG, so.... *shrugs.* My copy was free so I suspect it is the older 1st edition.

While Lancer is squarely aimed at Gundam, it's got got all the mecha bells and whistles including heat, which is incurred by taking extra quick actions (shots, speed boosts etc). It's also better on recording than BT although that's a low bar to step over: basically you have say 8 HP but once they are gone you roll against a "crit" table which might kill your, stun you or remove weapons etc. If you have a hero mech you might have 3 crits i.e. you can repeat this process a few times, i.e. you get to take 8HP + a crit, and you only die on the 3rd one. Basically, potentially up to 24HP...  Whereas a "grunt" mech probably dies on the first crit (8HP) which is more cinematic - heroes last longer. However you could perhaps change it based on size rather than pilot, so a assault mech has 4 crits, a heavy 3, a medium 2, a light 1 etc etc.  These rules are some of the most interesting for ideas and I recommend adding it to your collection.

Steel Rifts. This uses dice to record hitpoints. I.e. a medium might have d6 armour and d6 structure. Like Alpha Strike, weapons have a power value. They roll on d6 and any 3 or less score a hit. This time there is only 5 combat modifiers, not Alpha Strike's 18. Each hit reduces the dice i.e. a 2 damage hit means you flip the armour d6 from the 6 side to the 4 side. It's very minimalist and is actually a wargame. The key rules could probably be fit on 3 pages. It's like the author knows how to explain things to others. I did find it a bit bland; but if you want to get your mechs out on the table this gets a recommendation. 

In comparison the others (BT, HG, Lancer) are more interested in the fluff: their approach seems to be if the rules clarity needs to be sacrificed in the name of fluff/backstory, so be it.

Clarity > Fluff 

Something I've been thinking of when fiddling with my Weird West adaption is what Savage Worlds (a RPG!) does right. It doesn't focus on the fluff, but the in-game effect.  For example, both fire damage and poison damage might have the same effect - i.e. a persistent status say causing an extra damage roll next turn.

They don't need separate rules "Poison" and "Fire". A single rule "Persistent Damage" or whatever. We've just halved the special rules. You can attach what flavour fluff you want to it elsewhere...

"The gunslinger fires deadly poisoned bullets that cause great suffering in her prey" you can stick this in the character description or whatever, but next to the weapon you just put "Persistent Damage".

"The flaming sword Belial cleaves undead in two, their pyres serving as a warning for their necromantic brethren" Again, the blurb can go elsewhere - but the weapon stats merely need to state Persistent Damage. Simples!

What does the weapon or item DO? What range? What damage? Anything special i.e. armour piercing? This should be as clear and succinct as possible, sharing rules with similar effects rather than making up uniquely named but identical rules for each weapon.

For example, in Alpha Strike, both the Energy and CASE abilities means ammo does not explode. 

In other words: It's the same rule. 

Let's make a single rule and call it "Safe Ammo." But because Alpha Strike is so wedded to its fluff, they use twice as many rules names than they need. 

 

Most RPG rules are laid out like a game of "hunt for the useful information"... 

I reckon for 95% of RPG authors, the 'rules' of actually playing in their imaginary world are an unfortunate necessity that gets in their way of spewing out more fluff.  Their motto: ...Never use one word when you can use ten; plus a paragraph of fluff...

....ok rant over, while I am in my rules cupboard...

Gamma Wolves. Another actual wargame. The same author as Steel Rifts - this one is a bit more complex. I love the post-apoc-mecha 'game world' which helped give me ideas for my homebrew post-apoc-WW2 tanks 'game world.' A bit heavier on recording. Pilots and mechs can accrue 'stress' which allow pseudo BT heat. It has more interesting mechanics - you can sacrifice shooting successes to aim for body parts; when hit, you get a free reactive short move; and there is the 'war clock' - a countdown caused by stress/ammo use etc that forces all mechs to withdraw- acts like whole force morale. I think I've seen this war clock mechanic in horror/zombie games - never mecha ones though! I like the idea and I've used something similar in my modern air combat games (where fuel/ordnance reserves are a big deal). 

I'd recommend Gamma Wolves as 'interesting' but I'd say Steel Rifts is slicker and quicker if you just want an excuse to push mechs around on the table.

Proof for the doubters: I'm actually still progressing on my weird west theme.....

Verdict: Well I continue to work on my homebrew rules, but despite my grouching I'm first bringing out the Alpha Strike quick-play rules: main reason is they came with printed dry-erase mecha cards all ready to go; but I have Steel Rifts on standby...