Need Mecha

[garrowolf]

I need some Mecha for my Fusion Age game. I am thinking about GitS Multiped tanks mostly. They need to be non-humanoid mechs. I am thinking about Heavy Gear for the smaller mechs.

Any ideas?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

You're looking for minis? What kind of scale do you want? (Love Dream Pod 9 stuff, FWIW.)


My first thought for multiped vehicles would be AT-43.

 

[SKyOdin]

Well, I have been playing a lot of Lost Planet 2 recently, so I have to recommend the designs of the VSs (Vital Suits) from that series. They are very down-to-earth, practical designs for the most part, but are still varied and cool. They include bipedal walking designs, quadruped tanks, exoskeletons, transforming hover-bikes, and fancy helicopters. You can find images and brief descriptions by clicking on this link, then clicking on the image of the mech on the right. (Warning, that site is Flash heavy). Alternatively, you can YouTube some images of the game.

What other parameters for mechs are you looking for? Are you mostly looking for compact ones, or do want large mecha as well? What kind of weaponry are you assuming for your Fusion Age setting?

 

[garrowolf]

I like the look for these mechs in Lost Planet 2. I will look for more pictures of them.

The weapons are mostly railguns, particle cannons, missiles, and lasers. I am leaving blasters to the next tech level. Energy weapons are more common on space ships but they are used on the ground as well.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Heh- due to trying to help you, I've helped myself!

The Karmans from AT-43 are all apes with tech...about as good as I'll ever get for my BBEG Dr. Zeus from my (sadly defunct) Supers 1914 M&M campaign.

Dr. Zeus: I've decided that he'll be a super-intelligent orangutan who was once a lab animal at the Cavorite Academy. His intelligence was radically increased by one of the Academy's instructors, and to stave off further experimentation upon himself, he killed the scientist and escaped...but not without getting a few supplies.

In my mind, he is going to be a recurring villain- intelligent and resourceful. He may be caught, but he will often escape.

Appearance: This large male ourangutan has a taste for stylish leather trenchcoats, especially in a natural brown leather. Over his eyes, he wears brass pince-nez modified for his simian physiology, but he has a flip-down darkly tinted visor. His hands and feet are covered by large black rubber gloves. The top of his head is covered by a glasslike dome which reveals a brain too large for his skull. He speaks like Mojojojo from Powderpuff Girls.

Powers & Equipment: With the equipment he stole from the lab (and subsequent thefts), he has made a portable lightning gun and grenades based on the technology created by Nicola Tesla. His trenchcoat has some armor plating in it. His visor prevents him from being blinded by flash attacks, including his own. He is phenomenally strong- bench around 2000lbs- and can move about in trees just as fast as he can run.
<snip>

My problems: I want Zeus' lightning gun to fire multiple inaccurate bolts in a cone from the gun's business end. Near as I can tell, this would be a Blast with Autofire and Line or Cone AoE, but I can't figure out how to make the bolts inaccurate- ideally, target selection in the cone would be randomly determined. Would that be Uncontrolled? Limited?

I want to do the same thing with his grenades, except with Burst AoE.

Both should also produce blinding flashes of light.

They're not perfect, but they'll do, I suppose

Rackham Store - Mentor Freezer

or

Rackham Store - Yetis

 

[garrowolf]

Hahahahaha
That's Great! It sounds like a fun game!

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Thanks...

Personally, I'd love to be in a Fusion Age campaign- I've never been in one. They're kind of a rarity in SF gaming.

Which actually gives me the opening to ask:

What kind of roles for players are you contemplating? What kinds of adventures?

I ask because even though I found both Bova's & KSR's novels to be quite engaging, exciting roles are not necessarily abundant. Most of the characters are scientists, pilots, and über-wealthy investors. And saboteurs posing as one of those. And most of the adventures occur in cramped ships, satellites, and equally cramped surface vehicles or bases.

What is your vision?

 

[garrowolf]

Actually it would have so many campaigns it would be ridiculous!

I'm already running my Shadowrun games in this setting instead. Magic exists but instead of Trolls I have Large Cyborgs. It is enormous fun.

I could run a Heavy Gear game on Mars where everyone is a mercenary.

I ran a brief game of FBI agents investigating a crime in an underwater colony involving Cthulhu-esque entities causing madness.

I ran on a version of small ship owners rebelling control by megacorps in the Main Belt.

I ran a brief game of space spec ops in the Eugenics Wars for one friend.

I am trying to set up my game so that I can run any kind of game in any kind of setting that someone may want to play with no preparation needed.

 

[SKyOdin]

Thanks...

Personally, I'd love to be in a Fusion Age campaign- I've never been in one. They're kind of a rarity in SF gaming.

Which actually gives me the opening to ask:

What kind of roles for players are you contemplating? What kinds of adventures?

I ask because even though I found both Bova's & KSR's novels to be quite engaging, exciting roles are not necessarily abundant. Most of the characters are scientists, pilots, and über-wealthy investors. And saboteurs posing as one of those. And most of the adventures occur in cramped ships, satellites, and equally cramped surface vehicles or bases.

What is your vision?

I for one find a huge amount of inspiration in Japanese mecha anime. Pretty much all of Gundam, as well as dozens of similar series, count as Fusion age in terms of setting. Even if you don't want to have giant robots running around, they are a great example of how you can have epic space warfare without ever leaving Earth's orbit. They also show that space stations and space ships don't need to be cramped. It was Gundam that introduced me to space habitat designs like the Stanford Torus or the Island Three habitat (AKA the O'Neill Cylinder), neither of which can really be described as cramped.

I think the issue is that the Mars trilogy and Ben Bovas work (i presume, since I haven't actually read it) are a particular genre focusing more on a broad-scale look at the process of colonization and terraformation, rather than simply telling stories in a Fusion age setting. There is a big difference between the Mars trilogy, which covers the entire colonization of Mars over a period of centuries, and the story of Zone of the Enders, which covers a Martian uprising against Earth rule during a period of only a few years in the middle of what could be considered the "Blue Mars" era. While in the former all of the main characters are big scientists and politicians, in the latter the protagonists include various teenage space colonists, a Callisto miner, various young soldiers, a kid who spent his entire life on an interplanetary passenger ship, and the Fusion age equivalent to a trucker with a dysfunctional family.

 

[garrowolf]

well I have specific ideas for mechs that I want to use. I don't like a lot of large robot anime because it never made any sense to me. I can see the use for a mech on the ground but only if it stays below a certain size. Otherwise it is a large target. I like the kind that are more low to the ground like some of the multiped tanks from GitS.

My main problem with them is when you have them replace every other major kind of vehicle of a certain scale. Most of the time it seems like it would make more sense to make several smaller vehicles that don't loose some much internal space to massive amounts of articulation. For example instead of having one large tall mech that walks slowly around have 6 or 8 smaller tanks that drive much faster and carry the same amount of weapons on them but are able to scatter and are harder to hit because they are close to the ground.

I would rather have the tanks. They would be individually cheaper and easier to service. A loss of one is not that significant. They move faster and hide better.

Now I tend to want smaller and faster mechs in concert with lots of other craft. I like the idea of a couple of mechs working with troops in power armor on Mars.

I would never have mechs in space. I can't see the point. Yes you could use them for moving cargo but why not simply have a few cargo tugs with manipulators around and keep the fighters just as fighters. And why make them humanoid? People have no trouble having vehicles that don't look like themselves up till now. Why think that we would need it in the future?

Anyway, I wanted to have a setting that would continue around in the solar system and not leave so quickly in these settings. Most settings get a FTL engine way too early and take off immediately. I think that we will expand out into the solar system for centuries before we leave. I want to have a setting with huge numbers of people and commerce and shipping. Star Trek always felt empty to me because there were so few non-starfleet ships moving around their planets. What about all the starliners if nothing else?

The Fusion Age could go on for 50 years or for hundreds of years depending on what you want for your games. I will eventually explore both directions.