Has Anyone Ever Given Their Players The Construction Rules In A Mecha Game?

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Rolando

Due to armor weapon mounts instead of arms is better.

To help with the absurdity of mecha in my setting I made all mechas TL9, meanwhile most vehicles were TL8 and spaceships TL9 with some TL10 components.

So mechas are advanced tech that don't translate to other vehicles...because of some advanced physics concepts that work in a mecha universe.

I'm undecided if the mechas will be retained, but the intent for my Harpyias setting is that most high-performance and/or combat vehicles use a combination of manual controls and a neural interface. The neural interface is necessary for the shields to work properly, and also allows for human intuition to be used to potentially bypass enemy shields, both of these being functions of the pilot's operation skill - typically Piloting*. As it turns out, the neural interface works a lot better for something with a similar body plan to the character than with something like a tank, giving a bonus to Piloting skill - or at least a bonus for purposes of operating or bypassing a shield. So it's harder to get past a humanoid mecha's shield, while a mecha has an easier time getting past an enemy shield.

*Roughly speaking, after the target attempts their Dodge, if the ship is still hit then the shield gets a defense equal to 10+Piloting/2 (plus any bonus for Combat Reflexes), except 17 and 18 aren't automatic fails (so having Shield Defense of 18+ means no roll is necessary - but shields can be depleted from multiple hits) and Deceptive Attack doesn't necessarily have any impact. On the side of offense, if Piloting exceeds your attack skill (or attack skill after accounting for Deceptive Attack), you impose a -1 to the target's Shield Defense for every 2 points Piloting is in excess... but if you're using Rapid Fire, whatever bonus you're getting to attack also applies to the target's Shield Defense. Additionally, only if you fail the Shield Defense outright will any of the potential hits get past the shield, and at a rate of only 1 per MoF. Rapid Fire often needs to rely on depleting a shield rather than bypassing it.


For other options from fiction, in Neon Genesis Evangelion the mecha were actually living creatures bound in metal, while in Gasaraki they were made from alien-tech synthetic muscle that could "learn" and worked a lot more effectively in a humanoid form; they were also rather low-density and could scale buildings to fire off rooftops, making them a lot harder to fight in an urban environment... although a lot of their success came from the fact they were brand new and OpFor had no idea what they were dealing with.

[rkbrown419]

Originally Posted by Rolando

Due to armor weapon mounts instead of arms is better.

To help with the absurdity of mecha in my setting I made all mechas TL9, meanwhile most vehicles were TL8 and spaceships TL9 with some TL10 components.

So mechas are advanced tech that don't translate to other vehicles...because of some advanced physics concepts that work in a mecha universe.

Mecha always require something to justify their use. Whether it be a neural interface system that works best with machines that are the same shape as the pilot or some rule of cool effect that allows them to deflect incoming fire with their built in melee weapons. They need something or more conventional military vehicles will easily take them apart.

[The Colonel]

I'm no great expert, but I don't recall a setting in which Mechwarriors are also Mech designers - customising and tinkering are common, but a full design and build not so much. Makes sense for the players - like their characters - to get the mechs they are issued with (or otherwise obtain) and then do the best they can with them.
Sort of like driving a fighter plane is exciting, being an aerospace design engineer has much less gamability. Of course, being a test pilot - which lies between the two - is well known to be exciting, but often for the wrong reasons. So is being issued a design that wasn't tested properly...

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Rolando

Due to armor weapon mounts instead of arms is better.

Normally that would be the case, but GURPS Vehicles had some fairly peculiar rules for turrets and arms that meant that an arm containing a weapon mount consumed less volume and surface area than a turret with exactly the same weapon.

[Kallatari]

Instead of using the full GURPS Vehicles and GURPS Mecha rules from 3E that are really complicated for anyone who doesn't like a lot of math and spreadsheets, you can use the much simpler rules from 4E's GURPS Spaceships. Those rules are much easier for players to use.

You'll want GURPS Spaceships, GURPS Spaceships 4: Fighters, Carriers and Mecha (which introduces Mecha), Pyramid #3/40 - Vehicles article Mecha Operations which gives more mecha options and examples, and possibly useful but not needed Pyramid #3/34 Alternate GURPS article Alternate Vehicles which has a few more drivetrains and ground performance rules.

That I wouldn't mind giving to players to customize as it wouldn't drive me insane trying to proof read/approve the design, unlike trying to do so for something built with vehicles. I'd reserve 3E's GURPS Vehicles for things I built myself only, which defeats the purpose of sharing with the players.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Kallatari

Instead of using the full GURPS Vehicles and GURPS Mecha rules from 3E that are really complicated for anyone who doesn't like a lot of math and spreadsheets, you can use the much simpler rules from 4E's GURPS Spaceships. Those rules are much easier for players to use.

You'll want GURPS Spaceships, GURPS Spaceships 4: Fighters, Carriers and Mecha (which introduces Mecha), Pyramid #3/40 - Vehicles article Mecha Operations which gives more mecha options and examples, and possibly useful but not needed Pyramid #3/34 Alternate GURPS article Alternate Vehicles which has a few more drivetrains and ground performance rules.

That I wouldn't mind giving to players to customize as it wouldn't drive me insane trying to proof read/approve the design, unlike trying to do so for something built with vehicles. I'd reserve 3E's GURPS Vehicles for things I built myself only, which defeats the purpose of sharing with the players.

I considered designing a campaign roughly based on Vision of Escaflowne and made the start of a design system for Guymelefs (the mechs in that setting) using Spaceships. I'm pretty certain that text file no longer exists, but going off memory, I started with a basic, bare-bones design - an SM+5 vehicle with a Control Room, two Robot Legs, two Robot Arms, I think 3 Armor Systems (Iron, with the option to upgrade), and a power plant of some flavor (in the case of the guymelefs, this was an Energist, with multiple grades available). The armor was treated as Streamlined on account of being on a humanoid form (and indeed, targeting a mech from above should probably be at a penalty to hit, as they present a smaller target that way). With only 9 systems, and four of these being high-density (I treated Energists as high-density, just like armor), this made the 'melefs smaller, lighter, and faster than a default mech, as well as getting more DR per armor system (following the rules from the Pyramid article); I think I made them around twice as fast as what you normally get for two legs. Having additional Leg and Arm systems didn't actually increase the number of limbs the vehicle had - rather, they made the existing limbs beefier. For legs, this boosted their ST a bit (a total of 6 leg systems would have resulted in two legs of SM+1, for +1 SSR to ST - thus each additional system up to a total of 6 is +1/4 this amount) and also boosted Move as per normal; for arms, this simply boosted their ST in the same way as for legs. Having additional systems reduced speed based on how much heavier the vehicle was from the default; also, additional systems other than armor and energists required recalculating DR, as they made the mecha larger (thus a given mass of armor had to cover more surface area). Worn armor (as opposed to that which is built-in), weapons, etc simply counted as encumbrance.

If something like that sounds interesting to OP, I might be able to recreate at least a rough draft of that system. Note the relevant Spaceships books would be necessary to use it. I'd also need to know what sort of power plants your campaign will be using - high-density energists simplified things for my purposes, but those may not be appropriate for you.

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by The Colonel

I'm no great expert, but I don't recall a setting in which Mechwarriors are also Mech designers - customising and tinkering are common, but a full design and build not so much.

Many times, when the designers/engineers are major characters (whether they are also the pilots/operators or not), the designs tend to play very loose with physics. The designers are often Tony Stark/John Henry Irons types.

[scc]

So you can read up on Virtual Mekton here: virtualmekton.tripod.com but the TL;DR is that PvP Mech game that uses MechWarrior style piloting pods goes Yu-Gi-Oh big, at least among children. As in-universe PvP is the majority of the fights, customization is important because otherwise fights are going very samey and any option available to whatever Op forces I create must also be available to the players.

That said customization options will be locked until after the first tournament or two, and even thenthey only be able to change a Mechs loadout at fist, not full design rules, they come later.

[mlangsdorf]

It sounds like you have your answer: stock designs at first, then weapon loadout changes, then possibly more extensive redesigns.

You may want to recruit an avid player or two as a vehicle designer to reduce your work load, but there's no need to go full on design sequence for everyone.