I think the Nelson is really cool

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The Blackbeard is IPS-N’s aggressive solution to piracy: a front-facing, first-striking mech designed for environments in which combustible kinetic weapons are useless, dangerous, or likely to cause unnecessary collateral damage. With its distinctly slim frame, the Blackbeard doesn’t just look fast – it also has a reduced radar profile. This mech is hard to track and harder still to hit.
The Blackbeard range comprises two lines: the standard IPS-N/BB-L production line model, and the IPS-N/BB-Sk, a limited-release prototype purpose-built to house IPS-N’s SEKHMET-class NHPs.

Buy an ad. No seriously, buy an ad or learn to write a description that doesn't read like an advertisement. I'm being dead serious anon, this reads corporate.

>>98370423
>mud-and-lasers military science fiction and mythic science fantasy
So its basically Rebel Moon meets the Titanfall discord tranny groomer cabal? Sounds like giga-cancer hyper-aids. Have a bump you glorious lolcows.

>>98370439
>Albatross frame
Ngl it is pretty cool

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QUEEFTOPIA ANON
FILL THIS THREAD WITH WALLS OF TEXT
AND MY LIFE IS YOURS!

>>98370452
I pulled it from the massif press introduction to lancer, because i figure since theres no lancer general people might need a good intro.
If you want to buy an ad for it be my guest

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The Swallowtail is Smith-Shimano’s primary long-range scouting and fire-support platform, built for rapid and sustained ranging across hostile, volatile environments. Built for long-term sustainability, it can operate in unstable environs for months and maximize its survivability by adjusting its operating efficiency on the fly. Each unit has an integrated cloak and a suite of predictive choral intelligences that coordinate its highly developed sensor systems to rapidly simulate and predict tactical developments – sometimes before they even occur.
The Swallowtail’s base model, the SW-01, is one of SSC’s few mass-produced lines – the entry-level BELLA CIAO model. Built without a cloaking field and up-armored to address direct security requirements, the SW-01 is especially popular among the rank and file troopers of Constellar Security forces.

My last Lancer character was a clone of a Karrakin planet's prince, who had been created and raised by a conspiracy planning to replace the prince to take over the planet, and when they got exposed and stopped he ended up with no purpose in life, so he leveraged his main skill of mech piloting and ended up signing on for the campaign's plot.

I think my next one will be a survivor from a Union military campaign who's become disillusioned with what the Union claims to represent and is just out for himself until he gets pulled into the events of the GM's plot.

>>98370481
Is new guy gonna go AWOL or is he quiet-quitting in the pilot seat?

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The Saladin is a hardy and efficient platform for full-squad support shielding. Based on early defense-oriented versions of the Genghis, the Saladin became the stuff of Armory legend following the exploits of Harrison I “Fearkiller” during the Interest War.
Since its first iteration, the Saladin has proved successful in a defensive and support role; it has even become a mainstay among Union Department of Justic and Human Rights liberator teams engaged in emancipation and refugee escort missions, despite the ideological (and, often, tactical) friction between the Armory and the DoJ/HR. Records from these engagements indicate that the Saladin’s massive bulk alone was a comfort and morale boost to DoJ/HR troopers and their charges, many of whom referred to the mechs as “Big Sal”. Union-flagged Saladin pilots often report null balances on bar tabs following engagements in emancipated systems.

>>98370507
That campaign has wrapped up, so new character will be with a new story.

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>>98370464
Your call is heard and your life accepted.

>>98370423
All of this drivel is fundamentally lies or half-truths. Lancer is a game set in the far future, and there is a big powerhouse known as the Union, called hereafter Queeftopia, thats true. The rest is partial bull.
For a start, calling Cancer an 'RPG' is a stretch and then some. Its got the bare bones of being a skirmish combat sim game, but as for RPG content, theres basically nothing. Theres not even any proper rules for doing stuff outside of combat or out of your mech, to the point that the game just goes "yeah, uh, sure, you have whatever you need I guess". Theres no currency, but more on that later, no personal scale fighting, no rules for interactions with NPC's, nothing. The GM is expected to wing any of that and make it work, and in combat your pilot just magically vanishes if they have to bail or are not mounted up because "mech weapons are so powerful they would vaporise a human". I mean, sure, its the same in Mechwarrior... But that still has dismounted rules. I guess they must be a weird archaic relic, after all why would you want to play an encounter where your base is raided by commando's, or your raiding the enemy base, or you or the enemy are caught doing R&R and have to mount up fast, or you have to dismount to fight your way through a bunker complex to rescue prisoners... Nah, those sound boring, who would ever want to play them?
As for its claims to being a Mech game, well, no. Its not and never will be. Its based on 4e DnD, and has none of the hallmarks of a mech game. Theres no location damage, the only critical hits you can inflict are damage+ or all weapons destroyed, and those only after you have chipped through its HP pool. Theres no elements of classic mech combat, no destroying limbs or sections, no separate HP pools for locations, no critical hits, nothing. You could replace the mechs with generic fantasy characters and nothing would change.

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>>98371449
The lack of mech immersion goes deeper too. Cancer has an awful R&R system - 'rests'. You take long and short rests just like in DnD and during this time your mech magically heal-sorry, repairs up and fixes itself. This is all done due to the magic 3d printers that can just 'brrrrr' out new parts and new units in no time at all. Thats another thing, there is no reason to worry about losing your mech, after all, you can just print out a brand new one when your done, completely negating the whole concept of preserving your ride to fight on. It also removes the idea of having an ace mech paintjob or the such, as you have no reason to preserve your ride and it can be destroyed at any moment. Theres also no need to worry about spare parts, logistics, or salvaging for parts, as you never need to. Magic proonter go 'brrrr', new mech completed. Theres no reason to salvage enemy components either, you cant include them in your design and you cant scan them and proont your own, so you have no real way to acquire them, and even if you could and you could use the, there would be no point as the game suffers from the DnD "best build" flaw where each unit has one thing they are very very good at, and anything else they try to do they will be bad at. EG, you put a flamer on your stealth sniper for close defence, it wont perform well and will be a detriment to your performance, but if you put it on the dedicated flamer platform it will become the holocaust hammer and incinerate anything it hits. Same gun, different chassis. So you have no real reason to ever customise out of your mechs specific niche and decided components, unless you want to nerf yourself. And it doesnt end there, but the rest can wait for an indepth look at the setting. Anyway, what about travel and logistics in-universe?

>being this mad
lol. lmao even

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>>98371493
So, transport and logistics. You remember when I said theres no RP mechanics? Well heres another blow to the RPG claim.
Travel in Cancer is relativistic, which means its based in principles we understand. Because this is a grounded setting and totally does not have magic space stuff in. Or psychics. Or anything else like that. So travel takes time. A long time, a short trip between systems is roughly 100 years or so. So even if you turn around and head straight back, a minimum of 200 years will have passed on the planet you left, time enough for significant shifts in culture and technology (not that that ever changes), or entire revolutions to have happened several times. The NPC's your players knew are long dead and their 7 greats grandchildren will be greeting the PC's, meaning there is no reason for them to ever form connections in a system. This, of course, calls into question how the large, multi system, powers actually hold themselves together as theres no way to effectively send aid or reinforcements to another system. A rebellion has been over and the new regime installed for over a century by the time your suppression force arrives, and maintaining a war front is basically impossible as your having to send reinforcements out centuries in advance, to fronts that may not even be there by the time they arrive. Well, this isnt a problem for Queeftopia, more on that later. But for the rest of the powers it begs the question of how they actually hold themselves together and maintain control, let alone how they actually fight wars.
Of course, communication isnt held to these rules. Your comms are FTL and you can have a video chat with someone half a galaxy away in real time. This is important because without it the levelling/reward system for the game would not work

>>98371449
>>98371493
The mechs look fine but man, if even half of what you wrote is accurate, sounds like a dumpster fire of a game.

>10 posts in and the hate trolls are already spamming the thread

i really wish the mods would clean this shit up so we can actually have a lancer general for once. i swear to god these troglodytes come out of the woodwork for a lancer thread the second its posted like they can fucking smell it

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>>98371543
So, levelling. As I mentioned, there is no currency system. The game setting is meant to be Startrek+ levels of post-scarcity, which lets it be a communists dream. Well, apart from the none-Queeftopian states. But those dont count. Anyway, theres no rules for currency, and in the initial release a lot of players took umbridge with this, so the writers changed the rules so that now your super special operators have to earn the good stuff. You start with a basic shitmech and some gear, and have to earn goodboy points by doing jobs for Queeftopia in order to unlock more levels to gain better gear and chassis. Why does Queeftopia invest in the resources and time needed to send a bunch of operators and their 3d printers out to the depths of enemy space when all they have access to are shitboxes, when it literally has the best mechs in the game, including the Monarch, aka 'Macross Missile Massacre Madness'? Dont know, dont ask.
Anyway, to facilitate this, comms have to be FTL or the players would be unable to level up, so comms have to be FTL which the writers write off as being down to some quantum paracausial tech, which is Cancer writer speak for "timey whimey spacey wacey bullshit"
Theres also no ammo, now im remembering it, not even a shared pool across all weapons. You just attack, and big things like the Monarchs spam attack are once per encounter or once per long/short rest abilities.
Anyway, mechanically wise if you want a game that actually makes you feel like your in a Mech, try these:
>Mechwarrior 2nd edition
>Mekton Zeta
>Princess Wing
>Embryo Machine (RPG not the board game)
>Engine Heart (robots but its pretty good)
>Nechronica (reflavour the dolls to be bio mechs)
Sidenote, yes, the zombie loli game is a better mech game than cancer.

>>98371566
But I am discussing it? Its not my fault that its an abysmally bad system.

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>>98371596
So, not that the mechanics are out of the way, what about the setting?
>JANNIES READ THIS
>THIS WILL CONTAIN REFERENCES TO POLITICS AS THE GAME ITSELF IS INHERENTLY POLITICAL. PLEASE DO NOT DELETE OUT OF HAND
Well, in the setting the largest super power, whom are also the good guys, is the gay queer mystery meat communist powerhouse we are calling Queeftopia. No, that is not a political statement, that is as it appears in the book. Queeftopia is full of magic 3d printers that cater to its residents every want and desire and never need refilling, they just paracausial magic matter out of thin air. This lovely nation of peaceloving peeps has decided that it is its manifest destiny to unite all of humanity under its queer communist paradise, and has launched attempts to do so. The problem is that all the nations surrounding it, far smaller powers without unlimited access to magical space proonters, dont want to be part of the big communist hugbox. They dont want the state mandated queer pride. They just want to be left alone, and according to the politics of the writers, this is heresy of the worst sort. So, these designated bad guys, guilty of wanting no part in Queeftopia, are set to fight against the overpowering might of the good guys. You would think they would have some technological edge or something that might help them? No, actually, they dont. They are just "resisting" despite being completely overwhelmed by Queeftopia, something the writers gloss over so as to give the players something to do. It does give an interesting bit of insight into the minds of these people though, they see a good setting as one where the designated goodguys have the overwhelming advantage and no reason to hold back, and can just beat up the bad guys with ease. Not much of a basis for a fun game but anyway....

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>>98371633
An interesting note, in the book the only depictions I can recall of masculine white male characters, or white characters in general, are those in the designated bad guy factions. Make of that what you will.
Anyway, remember >>98371543 when I said that the whole logistics thing isnt a problem for Queeftopia? Well that is because Queeftopia has a magic paracausial (remember what I said about this word?) AI that runs the entire Queeftopian empire. I call it Queefbot. Queefbot sits at the centre of the Queeftopian Empire and because its a paracausial AI it knows everything everywhere at all times, and its constantly running 100% accurate simulations, countless in number, selecting those which lead to the best outcome for Queeftopia. So, it always knows what to send where and in what quantities. It doesnt need to predict whether or not a system will be captured in 280 years, it knows already and at the appropriate time will reroute forces to where the new frontline will be so they arrive fresh and ready to continue the expansion of Queeftopia. It knows where to send reinforcements before the situation requiring them even arises, it knows who to designate for assassination before they are even born, etc.
It also is the reason you have to play as Queeftopian fighters. Because, you see, its always running these simulations, and any that result in a setback for Queeftopia are instantly flagged and ensured to never happen. So by all means, play as members of one of the minor powers fighting back. As per the writers own rules, your campaign never actually happens. Its a simulation run by queefbot which it then ensures never comes to pass. Boy, what player agency huh?
Theres some other fundamental issues with the games tone and theme too. For instance
>>98370423
>a mix of gritty, mud-and-lasers military science fiction and mythic science fantasy
is complete bullshit.

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>>98371681
The game is mud and lasers right up until you get to the psychic mech that uses psychic powers to rip enemy mechs apart and mindrape pilots, the quantumn half real mech thats fading in and out of reality all the time, the nanomachine mass, or the "Evangelion at home" mech thats meant to be an eldritch horror thats been converted into a mech and does funky stuff. I should note that all of these belong to the good guys, as do the flamethrower warcrime mechs, and they are noted for frequently be used to commit warcrimes on the civilians of enemies of queeftopia, which the writers treat as a good thing. You know, at least settings like Battletech have the sense to note that Firestarter pilots that go full warcrime have a very poor life expectancy if captured. But dont forget, Queeftopia are the designated good guys, and therefore anything they do is automatically justified.
Speaking of clashing themes, Queeftopia is a post scarcity communist utopia. But it also has megacorps. How? Dont ask, the writers wanted megacorps so we got megacorps, even though there is no reason for them to exist and no capitalist ecosystem to sustain them.
Theres also the issue with the mechs themselves. You see, in Lancer the mechs are not the war winners, or even the speartip. They are the colonial police force and the terrorist insurgents. The main fighting is actually done by spaceships firing hyper relativistic kill clouds at each other from solarsystems away, and mechs in these fights are an active detriment. Theres a 'game' for this combat too, but I use the term lightly, after all a 'game' where the opfor doesnt move or try any tactics whilst you do what you like isnt really a game.

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>>98371721
>Quarter to 4 in the morning
Fuck me, Imma wrap up now.
Some other bits, the mech design is all over. take this thread for instance
>>98370440
looks like some kind of junker from a bost apocalyptic setting, cobbled together from junk and salvaged parts
>>98370477
Looks like some kind of walking tank from an advanced far future setting, with a turret mounted high power cannon and a sleek, organic, design dotted with sensors. Also, the hands are weird and including the helmeted snipers tea is just faggy.
>>98370556
looks like some kind of near future power armour suit with a power/electronics backpack and a rifle of some kind.

None of these look like they come from the same setting, and if you didnt tell me I would have thought they all came from different ones. Im not saying that all mechs have to look the same, going back to Battletech there are clear differences between the various chassis. However there are common elements that tie them to the setting, even back in the OG 3025 stuff.
Cancer itself is a piss poor fantasy superhero skirmish game that pretends to be a mech game, written by people whom have openly stated their contempt for the genre, and whom want to use it as a way to push their ideology (note that they have no issue with the designated good guy whom shares their politics being overwhelmingly powerful in comparison to the designated bad guys and see no issue in committing massacres on 'bad guy' civilians) into the mecha RPG sphere. Its an awful game, and shilled here by a handful of sycophants whom want to further the colonisation of /tg/ and drive the old crowd out.

I will leave you with an image of Best Maid, Agent. Goodnight

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i like it, this is from my game im running today. the players are mercenaries on a planet thats been hidden away in the null blink space void of the long rim. a stellaris-style great khan is on the way and they are doing what they can to prep for when shit goes down. right now they are fighting one of the player's rivals in a raleigh vs stortebeker showdown thats involving their crew and the enemy's posse. had to pause in the middle of the fight to go to a wedding reception

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Developed on the proving grounds of the Armory’s Think Tank, the Iskander is a new specialist frame designed to bring gravtech area-control and breach capabilities to a mechanized platform.
A bulky frame, the Iskander fields a mix of kinetic and causal-energy systems that empower pilots to triumph in a wide portfolio of scenarios. The Iskander platform has no civilian counterpart: it is intended to be used as a frontline command and control platform, with an emphasis toward identifying and eliminating static explosive threats.

>>98371780
That looks dope anon. Are your players running as members of Mirrorsmoke or their own merc company?

>>98371780
how do you parse that map data?

like I can tell that there's levels w/ the 1/2 and the 3, some area effect for the red hexed areas, but the gigantic thing at the top, is that a ship or something on the battlefield?

>>98371566
I mean I've got more time now. I'm happy to post a lancer thread every now and again. People disliking lancer is a given and that's ok. Let them dislike it, they aren't hurting anybody by criticizing the game. I still have fun playing it though.

So uh, now that Queeftopia anon is done posting, any of the anons here wanna fact check him? I don't know lancer lore so genuinely I'm not certain how correct he is.

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>>98371877
thank you! the original tutorial mission was them with mirrorsmoke before branching out into their own mercenary band operating out of that corvette on the bottom, those MSMC squaddies on the left are boys they recruited into their group that act as pathfinders

>>98371885
youre good, its off of a map maker for lancer. those 1/2 and 3 tell you the size of the cover, the red areas are weird quicksand pits that seem to be partially biological, and the gigantic thing on top is a big ship of a church that had the original "prophetic visions" that lead have ended up leading everyone to this planet.

definitely one of the biggest issues that can happen especially at higher level here is the amount of aoe effects you have stacked on top of each other can make it very hard to track

>>98371936
I'm curious too.

>>98371969
>>98371936
post 1 has incorrect information for the rules, like for interacting with NPCs, fighting on the ground (you can mount an enemy mech as on foot for example), mechs can take limb damage, etc. Those are in the game, they just don't really like it

2/3 just complain about the setting, 4 is just confusing and doesnt really say anything, 5 complains about communism again, 6 again is complaining about the setting but doesn't really understand it because it has corporations in it, 7 is the summary which just repeats the main points.

you can just ignore it, generally speaking. The intro of the corebook kind of goes of the setting and its like, 'despite the efforts of the commies, the galaxy is gigantic and most people aren't actually part of it and so its very dangerous still'

The game is framed that you're part of the commie group that sends you out to save the world, but like, star trek does the same shit w/ the federation BUT THIS TIME ITS MECHS

>>98370423
What's a good general build for the Raleigh?

>>98371969
>>98371936
Shore

>>98371449
>Calling Lancer an 'RPG' is a stretch
You roleplay as a mech pilot in the far future. There are narrative out-of-mech roleplay systems, but it's up to the party to make the most of them. The RP mechanics themselves are very light this is true.
>The game just foes "yeah, uh, sure, you have whatever you need I guess"
No. This person misunderstands the concept of reserves and also the ubiquity of 3d printing is entirely dependent on what part of the setting you're playing in. License levels and 3d printing are an abstraction and in-universe facilitation of making it so that you can progress and continue to play the game. You can just scrap the license level system entirely if you want and just loot systems and weapons from enemies, it's very easy to do.
>There is no currency
There is a currency called Manna that everybody uses. I think they believe there's no currency because Union doesn't require manna to pay for basic necessities.
>out-of-mech combat
Doesn't exist in any meaningful way, beyond using skill triggers. This is true.
>it's not a mech game
This is the weakest part of their argument, they use other mech games to define what mech games are 'supposed' to be which is kind of stupid. If a game is about mechs and has mechs in it, and focuses on mech combat I personally consider it a mech game.

>>98372075
pt2
>>98371493
>rests are bad
Its a rules abstraction so you can play the game, just like it is in other RPGs. You can flavor it in some other way if you want. Your pilots have a moment to make field-repairs instead of sitting down and catching their breath.
>3d printers magically print whatever you want whenever you want
If you have access to one yes this is true. Usually at a base of operations or some kind of 'homebase'. You don't take them with you on missions.
>No concept of preserving your ride to fight on
that's the ENTIRE concept of a lancer sortie. resource management is the name of the game when you're navigating 2-4 full-on mech fights between full-repairs.
>no reason to salvage enemy components
I think his GM just didn't give him any exotic gear. Salvaging enemies for exotic gear like weapons/systems and re-stocking consumables like repair parts and ammunition for limited systems/equipment/grenades happens every game.
>There are meta builds
shocker. You can mix/match nearly every frame/weapon/system. Some will be less balanced than others. One of the flamer mechs best builds doesn't use a flame weapon btw.

is playing a hacker in lancer fun for someone who likes having huge amounts of action economy?

>>98372095
pt3
>>98371543
>The setting doesn't have magic space stuff in it.
It has magic space stuff in it, which allows for FTL travel between blink gates and FTL communication via the omninet.
Sublight travel takes time, yes.
>How does the government keep itself together
They build blink gates in their territory, also remember that communication is FTL.
>Technology doesn't change
It does. There's even lore references among the mech frames talking about how old/new some of them are.

>>98372106
pt4
>>98371596
>The game setting is meant to be star trek+ levels of post-scarcity
This is wrong and tells me they didn't read past the first few pages of the book. Your basic needs are guaranteed and you pay for everything else with a currency called manna. This also only exists among the core worlds within union, which is one nation among several.
>Those don't count
The entirety of the game takes place outside of the core worlds, again I don't think this person read the book.
>You start with a basic shitmech
The Everest is considered one of the best mechs in the game
>You level up with goodboy points allowing you access to more frames/weapons/systems
This is true.
>There is also no ammo
This is wrong. Resource management is a huge deal in this game. Unless they're talking about ammo for your basic weapons like machine guns? Lots of systems have a limited amount of ammo like grenade launchers, missile systems, limited-use firearms, etc. Like I said earlier, resource-management is the name of the game for Lancer.

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>>98372119
pt5
>>98371633
>Union is the gay queer mystery meat communist powerhouse
Pic related is from one of the writers. This gay-communist-paradise interpretation is fan slop.
>3d printers cater to its residents every want and desire
didn't read the book
>3d printers never need refilling
didn't read the book. They absolutely need refilling and union gets a large chunk of its raw materials and natural resources from the Karrakin trade baronies.
>Union is the biggest baddest nation,
They're the biggest. Are they the baddest? debatable.

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>>98372132
pt6
>>98371681
>the only depictions of white characters are in bad guy factions
section 1. Pic related.
>Queefbot
Again, didn't read the book. He's confusing MONIST-1/RA for GALSIM. RA is a paracausal god-like entity that murdered a city and disappeared a celestial body before strong-arming humanity into accepting an ultimatum to leave RA alone and stop pursuing immortality.
GALSIM are AI prediction machines Union uses to help manage their territory thats true. Most cities have an AI that runs day to day infrastructure operations and resource distribution.
>you have to play as part of union
didn't read the book, you can play as any number of factions. The book goes into depth on a few of them. One of them is a mercenary company called Mirrorsmoke that specifically works and operates purely by war profiteering, the book even gives you plot hooks for working as Mirrorsmoke pilots.
>Your campaign never actually happens
intentional misinterpretation of the book. GALSIM predicts multiple timelines. The book starts at year 5016, so any campaign you write past this time is a canon timeline. If you set your campaign before 5016 then you might want to be mindful of canon (if you even care? idk who would.)

>>98371681
Yeah, it's like all the characters are deliberately designed to be as ugly and repulsive as possible. The art doesn't help, but they're all some shade of gender-ambiguous brown.
If you look at the cast of a typical Gundam series, the characters are distinct and attractive. They don't all blur together into slop.

>>98372160
pt7
>>98371721
>The game isn't mud and lasers
this is a valid criticism. Despite Lancer's claim to be mud and lasers It's much more soft sci-fi than hard sci-fi.
>All of these magical mechs only belong to the good guys
Again, didn't read the book. Harrison Armory and Horus are not good guys. Other nations have access to such technologies/magic as well.
>Warcrime mechs doing warcrimes is justified because they're piloted by Union
They managed to miss the biggest plot point in the entire game. Union SecCom committing warcrimes is what led to their collapse and the rise of ThirdComm. The book goes out of its way to explicitly state that warcriming is bad, especially for current Union pilots.
>Artillery from space is king of the battlefield and mechs don't really help with space combat being conducted at relativistic distances
shocker.
>Mechs are a glorified police force
Mechs are a special operations force used when you don't want to saturate an area with space artillery. You can call it a police force if you want.
>Mechs are not war winners, or even the speartip
When boots hit the ground they absolutely are. Artillery is great at destroying shit but it can't hold street corners, aquire mcGuffins, or extract VIPs. This isn't even a lancer issue, I don't think you understand how warfare is really conducted.
>The space game criticism
valid. The space game is meh.

>>98372075
>You roleplay as a mech pilot in the far future.
By this logic monopoly is an RPG because I roleplay a scottish terrier landlord in between dice rolls

>>98372132
>commies lie through their teeth to further their propaganda's spread
Many such cases

>>98372185
pt8
>>98371776
>none of these mechs look like they come from the same setting
This is really much more of a subjective criticism, and I'm confused that mechs made by different manufacturers looking different to each other is surprising to you.
>Lancer is a fantasy superhero skirmish game with a mech skin
This is true.
>A few sentences of complaining about ideology pushing and dislike of the authors
This is valid, but is less about the game itself and more about out-of-universe complaints.

>>98372197
>I'm confused that mechs made by different manufacturers looking different to each other is surprising to you.
Yeah bro, it's just like IRL where KelTec has their distinctive gridded grips and simplistic designs while Heckler & Koch made the HK416 out of the processed, still-screaming flesh of unborn war orphans from the NeverRealm™, where All That Never Was And Never Shall Be accumulates.

Or maybe you're just a fucking idiot.

>>98372099
I'd say so. The goblin and minotaur are memed pretty hard for this.

>>98372208
>is a sci-fi fantasy mech game
>surprised there's a variety of sci-fi fantasy mechs
Its ok anon, this is a safe space. Feel free to continue lashing out.

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The Vlad is the second iteration of IPS-N’s legacy Yi-Sun-Shin model, first made famous by Albatross pilots in the Celestine campaign during the fall of the Second Committee. With the wealth and quality of data generated by the Albatross in that conflict, IPS-N produced the Vlad, a power plant- and frame-upgraded spiritual successor to the Yi-Sun-Shin and deserving of a new line designation.
The Vlad, as the Sun did before it, shares much of its design philosophy and ancestry with IPS-N’s early asteroid-mining frames. Many of its standard armaments take inspiration from the early efforts of resourceful miners to convert tools into improvised anti-piracy weapons; likewise, its frame emphasizes redundancy, toughness, and component universality, allowing it to operate with outstanding self-sufficiency for long and/or dangerous deployments.
Heavily armored, the Vlad suits a frontline role where it can absorb fire from dangerous targets while lining up the perfect shot.

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>>98372220
You can have experimental tech that still feels part of the same setting, you blithering retard. A great example of this is AC6, where the ALLMIND and Rubicon Research Institute parts have a much more organic look to them compared to the other industries because AM and RRI where experimenting with direct mind-to-mech connections and/or using coral and coral-bonded humans as their base.

Even Destiny, which is one of the main sources that fat fetish faggot Abby aka Tom Bloom aka tummylover ripped off doesn't have their fucking screaming psychic meatguns produced by human corporations. Those are all looted from ancient evil civilizations or created by a psychopath who studied said ancient evil civilizations and learned how to stuff their dark gods into rocket launchers.

My point being that your different corporations shouldn't look like they were developed by completely different species. It's fucking retarded.
>>98372229
I like how the guy could pass for one of Abby's mechs because he has no fucking clue how to draw mechs.

>>98372238
I think your problem is that you've got a defined box of what a mech ought to look like and you don't like that other people will accept mechs that exist outside of that box. Sorry that happened to you anon.
I get it though, if you don't like the mechs then you don't like the mechs. That's perfectly alright.

>>98372246
I think they're just bitter that the mechs are cool as fuck in lancer

>>98372075
I read through your response and appreciate the effort. However, a lot of the substantive criticisms aren't really addressed or glossed over. It sounds like there are no real rpg mechanics outside the mech. The queeftopia anon is obviously being hyperbolic to an extreme degree, but that doesn't mean the critiques aren't valid and present.

Saying it's a rpg just because you're assuming a role leaves out the g, for example. Or, as another example, you said there were way of getting into a new mech.

What do you like about the game, anon?

>>98372254
Eh, I’ve seen cooler. The suits in Lancer are okay in a vacuum, but overall they look like fantasy knights more than they do actual Mecha.

>>98372246
>weaselly little passive aggressive whinging
Every time
>>98372254
At best they look like shit tier Warframes, but most of the time they look like some kind of shoestring budget Chinese bootleg version of an Ultraman villain

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Posting in a commie thread.

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>>98372593
Sorry anon, its hard to take you seriously.

>>98372333
I addressed points I thought were wrong, or were worth pointing out as especially valid. The rest of their post was correct. Lancer isn't for everybody and that's ok. I wanted to set the record straight as best I could.

I like lancer's tabletop gameplay. Enough of the minutiae of mech combat is abstracted away leaving only the fun parts. I like mechs but I'm not interested in taking the time to count how many rounds are in each machine gun, or individual HP pools for every weapon, system, and limb. I really like the mixing and matching you can do with lancer and I feel that the huge build variety is legitimately one of the best parts about it. Sure, there's meta builds, but there's a whole lot more that are almost as strong and remember, this is a team game, you're gonna be solo-ing the encounters no matter how good you build your mech.

I also really like the setting and roleplay. Personally I don't need a list of skills and speech mechanics to roleplay as a mech pilot. Functionally you're doing the same thing youre doing in any other roleplaying game, "I do X like this and try to convince Y to allow us access to Z mcguffin". You have skill triggers to help you with this.
A lot of people prefer more structure and I don't fault them for that.
The setting for me is the best part. I don't give a shit about the commie union whatever. All the stuff about the different corporations, nations, organizations/factions is super cool to me. Solving the mysteries of MONIST-1/RA inside the chassis of a mech sounds especially cool to me.

I think a lot of the criticism for this game stems out of a knee-jerk reaction to the idea that commie faction is written as the good guy faction and most people aren't able to get past this fantastical aspect of this fantasy game, as opposed to the plot holes of the setting and the light RP mechanics, or not liking the fact that the mechs have different design language.

>>98373774
> I think a lot of the criticism for this game stems out of a knee-jerk reaction to the idea that commie faction is written as the good guy faction and most people aren't able to get past this fantastical aspect of this fantasy game, as opposed to the plot holes of the setting and the light RP mechanics, or not liking the fact that the mechs have different design language.
Nta, but for what it’s worth, the creators do wear their political leanings on their sleeves to the point it makes it hard to disassociate it entirety from the product. But then again, I personally think that the mech designs are a bit too confused on whether they want to be organic or inorganic and are stuck in an uncomfortable inbetween, and a lot of the fluff clearly exists to patch the plot holes rather than solve them such as the 3D printing and the “paradausal” shit they stole from Destiny. That and the “every game is a simulation” thing that’s meant to be a silly nod to how every table has its own setup unintentionally comes off as saying “these guys will never be taken down and any scenario at your table saying otherwise is a fake”.

I’m basically saying that as an outsider, they seem to need another edition for Lancer to iron it out mechanically and fluff wise, and that I might be inclined to run CAIN instead.

I haven't played Lancer, but to me it seems like it was designed to be played online and with a computer. Is it any decent over the table?

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>>98373774
>its hard to take you seriously
Trust me, it's MUCH harder to believe abbydon aka Tom Bloom aka tummylover's drawings are meant to be giant robots even when he adds pilots for scale.

>>98373802
That's fair. If you don't like the mechs then you don't like the mechs. I don't think you really need to get hung up on the GALSIM simulation thing. Union isn't the only one doing it. Harrison Armory has their own version, MONIST-1/RA blows GALSIM out of the water, and the Aun have their own MONIST entity they worship.
You can just have RA nuke GALSIM in your game. They put that paragraph of the simulations in the book as an attempt to make everyone's adventures a canon event. It is easy enough to use the aforementioned HA or MONIST entities to outsmart GALSIM in a non-simulated timeline and fight Union if you want.
I mentioned it before but the core book gives you plot hooks to play as non-union military pilots. You can play for the corpros, mirrorsmoke mercs, independents, the Aun, or your own faction.

>>98373858
I play it with my buddies on the table. You probably should have a computer or tablet with you when you play it though, COMP/CON makes the bookkeeping a lot easier and saves a bunch of time.

HORUS Pegasus
HORUS Artillery Frame
Compendium Entry
The Pegasus pattern group first appeared following the start of hostilities between Union and the Aunic Ascendancy in Boundary Garden, a distant sector of distal space away from the Galactic Core. The timing of this outbreak may be related to the pattern group’s defining weapon, though skip-drone couriers from Union forces reported no encounters with the PG in Boundary Garden; instead, the Pegasus appeared in the Dawnline Shore, a stretch of colonial Armory space opposite Boundary Garden.
The Pegasus appears to address HORUS’s need for a pattern group with extensive kinetic combat capabilities: by marrying the best targeting systems, subroutines, and weapons hardware in the HORUS codebase, collectivists have designed a PG that boasts a tremendously low identify/time-to-kill (ID/TTK) ratio in all theaters where kinetic weaponry is viable.
As with many HORUS pattern groups, the Pegasus fields a signature weapon system: the Ushabti, a hostile impulse anti-corporeal weapon that operates with complete ignorance of even the most basic underpinnings of physics and thermodynamics. As such, it qualifies unambiguously as a paracausal weapon. The Ushabti’s precise function remains unknown to Union and Harrison Armory scientists, though radiological and gravitational signatures captured in the aftermath of the weapon’s use point toward a relationship with the Aunic Firmament. Studies are ongoing on Ras Shamra, the Armory’s chief research world, and in satellite campuses across the Dawnline Shore.

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>>98373915
Forgot pic.
Look at him. LOOK AT HIM

>>98373921
>I'm a geth stalker that BRAAAPS black holes, heheeheehe
Thanks, I hate it.

>>98373866
Yeah if you pick the mech that's described as a hardsuit being worn rather than a giant machine being piloted it looks like a person in armor because it's a person in armor.

>>98373884
>If you don't like the mechs then you don't like the mechs.
Where did they say that? This is the weird disingenious bullshit you do that makes everyone know you're a slimy creep with an agenda.

>>98374071
Relax. Im just acknowledging that their criticism of the mechs are understandable. I don't think the mechs are confusing, but I also don't fault them for thinking they are.

>>98374092
Good sir anon, I will make it clear that I did not say “confusing”, I said confused”. I know Tom Bloom’s design work. And I watch my fair amount of mecha shows. And I’m calling them confused because his attempts to apply his design philosophy of super stylized and heavily detailed giants is counterintuitive to the context of giant robots. Especially considering that the fluff is trying to state these things are printed off of a template en masse for military purposes. The over exaggerated level of detail works against it, along with how much they’re all clearly mimicking giant living beings instead of robots with their poses and faux musculature. Even Evangelion and Aura Dunbine’s Aura Machines look more believable robotic than these guys. Tom Bloom’s a good artist, but I think their particular choice of artwork is working against their attempts to make this a science fiction kind of setting.

>>98373774
>everything is political
>except for my political propaganda, that's just innocent fun
God you guys are as obvious as you are slimy

>>98373774
>individual HP pools for every weapon, system, and limb.
That IS the fun parts of mech combat. You may as well just be a DnD fightman if your mech can't keep fighting after its limbs or main cannons get blown off.

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>>98374171
Ok i apologize for misunderstanding, but it really seems like its coming down to "I don't like the way he draws these mechs. They don't look like mechs to me."
I respect that.
>>98374204
You're confusing me with a tankie.
>>98374215
Your weapons and systems can get blown off in lancer. Here's the structure damage chart. The individual limbs and systems dont have HP pools though.
If thats something you really like about mech games then more power to you.

>>98374266
>You're confusing me with a tankie.
If the boot fits.

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The IPS-N Lancaster is a mil-spec variant of an older IPS-N civilian terrestrial, inter/outer-hull transport and maintenance chassis, streamlined for use in any theater. The Lancaster features multiple redundant systems and sophisticated interaction projectors to ensure pinpoint accuracy when engaging with delicate systems, whether damaged or intact.
Lancaster pilots often adopt roles as sappers and engineers in frontline support. Sometimes ridiculed for piloting the old-fashioned frame by newer, untested pilots, veteran Lancaster jockeys know the truth: the Lancaster is one of the most reliable and well-made mechs out there, indispensable on any serious long-range mission. Not every mission is won with bullets, lasers, and bombs: without the engineers and their Lannies, few of those hotshots would come home alive.

>>98374276
That's an ill-fitting boot but uh, sure.

I doubt anyone here cares but from later works (and the author's own acknowledgement in the CRB but people don't care to read it) the portrayal of Union in the core book is a diagetic history. It is literal Union propaganda except for like page 10.
Additionally the whole 'if you deviate from """canon""" its just a simulation is not even in the original book but Battlegroup, the fucking naval combat spin off, and is presented as a literal footnote 'hey go crazy you can always just call it a simulation if you want'.
Mechs have a stat called repair capacity. The rests are you taking spare parts with you and fixing shit up in between combat. The extent you care about that is your business, but its not a game trying to simulate threading a bolt in and that's perfectly fine. If you want to roll to chew your characters food you have brain damage.
Lancer is a fun crunchy psuedo wargame and is barely an RPG. I don't personally consider that a flaw but rather WHY I enjoy it so much but it is definitely a problem for a lot of people.
The politics of it are massively overstated despite the author and typical playerbase's leftyness. The game is peak as cold blooded mercs or pirates.

ayo is a dey a dump random paragraphs from da book to keep this bumped lmao I lmao at they/dem lifes lmao

>>98372246
>I think your problem is that you've got a defined box of what a mech ought to look like and you don't like that other people will accept mechs that exist outside of that box.
NTA but I think it's an issue with setting cohesion. I find it really strange playing with my Sherman and my friend has an Angel from Evangelion with the mimic gun. If HORUS was an NPC faction it wouldn't bother me, but it does.

>>98374331
I agree its a jarring juxtaposition. Lancer suffers from mismanaging expectations. It claims to be a mud and lasers game when in fact it has eldritch horror deities and a smattering of manufacturers making mechs ranging from space-truckers to evangelion.
This understandably puts people off who take the game at face value. People shouldn't be required to read a bunch of the lore to understand the setting.

>>98374295
That still makes it stupid, because the book doesn't offer any kind of opposing perspective to Union as the unequivocal good guy paradise, with barely anything else saying otherwise. If Union is supposed to be flawed, writing the entire book as Union propaganda is retarded because it barely even hints at what its setting is actually like in any capacity whatsoever.

>>98374359
I think Tom & Miguel acknowledged this awhile ago. I know they wanted to do a second printing that changed a lot of how the book was organized and presented information about Union. Ultimately they didn't and instead are thinking about a Lancer 2nd edition in the future (5+ years)

>>98374424
Ah yes. You can take the man out of WotC, but you can't take the WotC out of the man. This really is glorified D&D.

>>98374359
It is bad writing and a bad idea I completely agree, and it's not until the Long Rim book you get much counter perspective. Tom definitely screwed up and that's a fair criticism it just isn't the same as what the sperg rants about every thread.

>>98374557
Adding onto this, they got through exactly one faction book for the space monarchists and it was great. Then Massif just never finished expanding on any of the corpo states that actually are the main actors of the setting. Like so much of the main settings story is about the pending war between the Barony and Purview (Basically an authoritarian America if it were a gun company), published a rough draft, and got side tracked by a million other projects before every finishing. Setting is cursed by the authors fucking ADHD, but despite the political criticism the most fleshed out faction is the fucking dune feudalists.

>>98374580
Agreed.
My favorite faction are the Aun though. I want to see Metat Aun duke it out with RA

Have any of you run operation solstice rain? Its billed as the 'new player intro' to the game, but i also read that it will body you if you don't know what you're doing

>>98372160
>section 1. Pic related
That's not a white character though.
Did you grab the wrong pic?

>>98375428
>white skin
>blue eyes
>not white
Bruh am I on /pol/ right now?

>>98375445
>white skin
You're trolling right? He's mestizo as fuck.

>>98375445
calling a hispanic person "white" is such a cope

>>98374284
>Lannies
Lmao
Lannietrannies

>>98374266
Yeah, it treats them like Injuries in DnD rather than something you can specifically target.

Not that targeting subsystems in Lancer is even a viable tactic since you can't scavenge and loot downed mechs on account of LOICENSE faggotry.

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The Monarch is SSC’s groundbreaking lesson in how to design a fast platform for the delivery of missiles and other self-propelled ordnance. Ready to mount ground-to-ground, ground-to-air, ground-to-orbit, and all-theater missiles and guidance systems, the Monarch can be customized for any payload and any target distance.
The Monarch’s large size often leads pilots to underestimate its agility. SSC's rigorous design requirement of one designer per 10 Monarch printings is a mark of luxury in Union’s Core world post-scarcity environment. This emphasis on purposeful scarcity is all that prevents the Monarch from achieving total battlefield dominance. The Monarch is commonly deployed in mixed line and fire-support roles, though field tests of a less resource-taxing MicroMonarch mid- to close-range model is underway. The Monarch is part of SSC’s BELLA CIAO line of combat chassis.

>>98375942
Oh right, the Objectively Best Mech According To Lore whose only reason its limited is because of loicenses. Real cool lore, that.

>>98375946
You don't like the monarch?
I think the monarch is dope lol

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>>98375955
He kind of looks like a rejected Kinnikuman design

>>98374266
>The individual limbs and systems dont have HP pools though.
Your claiming that I was wrong to claim cancer has no critical system, then you post this joke whilst completely failing to add that to even roll on this table one has to first chip through the mechs hp pool.

>>98375445
If that's a white person then I am W*lsh, and I ken that's not true for a fact. Post a white person whom is both not obviously queer and not trans and part of Queeftopia. I will wait.

Full tearing down of the rest of the trancer cope rebuttals coming tonight if I have the energy after work.

Questions for other players/GMs
Is it normal for combat to take multiple sessions to actually complete? Or is it just my table?
I want to enjoy science fantasy mechs but my experience with the system has not been the best either to bad luck, the system feeling like a slog, or the fact each table ive been at has had hyper autistic trannies that bog things down in one way or another.

Rounds take so long that I end up planning my next rounds in advance like Im watching a chessboard, and it just gets boring, even with what RP there is to fill the time.

Genuinely I have thought about doing a Stars Without Number mech-centric thing over Lancer.

>>98376487
>full teardown
Be my guest

>>98376506
That depends. Is each individual turn taking ages because the players are morons, or is the combat itself taking too long because it's being run as a killbox where you fight to the last man? Shit turns into a slog if you don't follow the advice to stick to very short objective-based skirmishes with a pretty strict time limit before the players succeed or fail and enemies disengage.

>>98376506
Its pretty common for combats to go slow for new groups. There's a lot of rules and systems interactions. If you're the GM You can speed things up by having a good grasp of what all the NPCs in your can do so that your turns are lightning quick. Also encouraging players to plan their turn in advance will help, but the learning curve will be steep for a new player no matter what you do. Starting at LL0 helps with this as well because the more complex systems are unavailable until later.

>>98376513
Leaning towards the latter, though one of the players tends to rules lawyer and backseat. We do have objectives, but those objectives also tend to push us to kill everything because they're rushing our objectives, enemy backup arrives, which draws out the combat as there is no time limit that I recall, and we end up having to beat the enemies back until we score enough points to get our win condition. If memory serves our group of 4 scraped by 8-10 ish kills while trying to ensure our exfil. The rank of the mooks i dont recall but I believe the GM said they were one or two ranks above what we would be typically facing, but managed to handle them

>>98376516
Thats fair insight, thankfully I am not the GM. But ill pass that along.

>>98376545
Yeah, that definitely sounds like a recipe for a drawn-out slugfest, especially since once you're on the back foot and trying to eke out as many advantages as possible of course people are going to play slower and try to be more tactical. Sounds like the GM needs to ease up a bit, and definitely needs to reread the section on sitrep that explicitly states round limits. Even for extraction it's capped at 10 rounds.

Any Anon has the LANCER Map Creation Tool they could share? Thanks in advance.

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>>98372029
>(you can mount an enemy mech as on foot for example)
>no reason to salvage enemy components
How so? PCs and NPCs use WILDLY different rules and numbers. "You can't homebrew it" it's not a good answer, because you can avoid any criticism with that. Something is unbalanced? No problem, just homebrew it so it's balanced. There's a mechanic missing? Same deal. And so on.

> mechs can take limb damage
What queefanon and others say with this is how while systems and weapons can be damaged, there is not damage to stuff like limbs, targeting systems, etc that affect you negatively. While having hp for every part can be problematic, lancer doesn't even have the basic stuff, attacking an enemie's let's say weapon or systems can't be done, and viceversa.

>>98372075
>The game just foes "yeah, uh, sure, you have whatever you need I guess"
>There is no currency
Either you are being obtuse or not undersating his points. What he means is that you don't have a playable currency to buy stuff like ammo, parts, guns, whatever, and the game is designed to always have access to whatever you need in your licenses. If you get Drake 1 and wanna have and Argonaut shield, you'll always have access to it, you never have to worry in the long run of it getting broken, missing it or anything. And this leads me to
>No concept of preserving your ride to fight on
He means keeping you mech alive. Yes, you can't fight without one, but in the long run there are no consecuences of losing your mech. When you get to a printer you get a new one without any problem. You mech in lancer is disposable, losing it doesn't have any weight. Pic related.

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>>98376821

>>98372197
>>98372208
>>98374331
>>98374345
>>98372238
You can't have wildly different designs and be cohesive. See the super robot wars franchise. You have 70's super robots, modern real robots, kaijus, overly designed and simple stuff. And everything fits because they tweak the art so everything has some common points, same with the character art, specially in the old games. They also so some changes to lore and world so stuff feels connected (like in Alpha 1 making the Excelsior from gunbuster the same class of ship as the Macross)
Lancer has a serious identity problem, as others said, and it shows in stuff like the art.

>>98372341
They seem afraid of being seen as robots. Most mecha are designed as knights and the like, but are still robots. See a gundam's head, they are a samurai's kabuto helmet.

>>98373921
>>98373933
Baby's first strange mecha (same with the rest of Horus). I've seen much wilder and terrorific stuff in niche anime and games than those. Lancer fans really don't care about mecha. The impossible gun's effects are also VERY underwhelming (same as the itano circus (divine punishment) on the monarch, how do you make that boring?!)
Also bargain bin MP Eva.

>>98375955
It made an itano circus boring. What a shitty core system. If the divine punshiment was something closer to a magic missile from dnd instead of a 1d6+4 damage on a save it would be more useful and fun to use.

>>98374295
Okay then explain this to any Lancer fan who will screech at you if you criticize Union. The Lancer community has gotten so far out of the hands of the devs because one of them, I forgot which, got a big boy job at WotC and left everything to fester for years. Lancer is basically abandonware, or like the Doctor Who wilderness years.

>>98370464
Oi, at least this time they made their own containment thread instead of a stealth general. Leave them be in their pen.

>>98377365
People always criticize Tom for LANCER but I struggle to hold the grudge. He’s a married man with at least one son who seems to be getting raised well, and has moved on years ago from LANCER to Johnny Appleseed the indie game community with fun but ultimately mediocre games.

>>98374295
>it's in-universe propaganda!
Wow, that's a shitty way to write your setting doc. It might work for 40K where you have multiple codices to paint something closer to the accurate picture, but when you're writing a guidebook for a TRPG you need to clearly delineate between in-setting beliefs and out-of-setting objective knowledge, as well as all the maybe's and if's for GMs to use as plot hooks.

Even fucking Exalted can get this right despite their scuffed book layouts, what's Lancer's excuse?
>Additionally the whole 'if you deviate from """canon""" its just a simulation is not even in the original book but Battlegroup, the fucking naval combat spin off, and is presented as a literal footnote 'hey go crazy you can always just call it a simulation if you want'.
I've never read Battlegroup, it's explicitly something from the original book. The retarded upjumped @grok the Union worships simulates bad ends, which is any campaign that ever harms their precious snowflake Union.
>The politics of it are massively overstated
They're baked into the very book and it's made by culture war zealots that I have no desire to support since they want to enfaggen all the things I like. Besides, the mechanics aren't even worth pirating over.

>>98377365
Theres a reason I didn't put that discord in the OP. I like the game, but the fandom is straight up aids. Discussing the game here is so much better because at least we are allowed to acknowledge the game's flaws and voice critiques.
>lancer is abandonware
Miguel got released from his contract and Tom confirmed they're working together on lancer again. Wallflower part 2 is in development hell but it *is* being worked on. I just wish Kai Tave wasn't such a chucklefuck, dude can't write for shit.
>>98376858
What lancer mechs do you like?

>>98377418
Can I convince you to play lancer if its with non-faggots? I'll run Operation Solstice Rain for the thread, or we can play as HA or Mirrorsmoke and go fuck up Union

>>98377586
Running Lancer is inherently faggotry. And no, I've seen the game's mechanics in action and I have no interest in that fucking slopslog.

When a game about high school girls defeating evil aliens with the power of friendship and gerobis and piston grapple combos is better at capturing the "feel" of mecha than your shitty DnD fork, you need to think about what you did wrong and then preferably kill yourself.

>>98377416
I just think the fact that he sold out so hard and left things half baked in a bad state. The time to smooth out Lancer's issues was a year or two after it came out, but he cucked himself out of that for a payday. Having a family isn't the issue, fucking up a product is. But honestly? Good for him, if I was getting that much money offered I would have done the exact same thing. Him being a commie just makes it more funny/ironic.

>>98377567
My issue with Lancer's community is how drastically it took ideas from the game and ran with it in a direction that doesn't really work. Now things that the community thinks are core to Lancer, things like the utopian setting or HA being fascists or all the half baked unpublished modules, are as core to its identity as what's in the core rulebook. Which also does a bad job at describing the setting but that's besides the point. They've filled in holes with a hodge podge of what they assumed/wanted the game to be. And now? That's just what it is until they publish Lancer 2 in what, 2035?

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>>98377567
I like the Everest, even if it's the basic option. I am a sucker for a basic unit that can become a beast in the right hands, like the Rx78 Gundam.
The Balor is cool, at least in concept, I like nanomachines, but reducing them to just DoT is quite boring too me, there's a lot of intesting stuff that you could do with them.
The Drake is cool too, an it's art doesn't make my eyes bleed. Beeefy, tanky and a large gun.
Barbossa is awesome too, I like big robots, and the railgun is cool too, I dislike the charge mechanic tho. At least it's a BIG attack. The closest we'll have to the Satellite Cannon I guess.

Apart from these... I don't really like the other ones or feel apathy towards them, specially the art and presentation, it drives me away, even if I see archetypes I could like. I guess HA is the one that I dislike the less, at least visually. I have a varied taste for mecha designs (King Gainer, Big O, Gundam, FMP, Getter Robo, Zoids, Macross, Go Nagai's stuff...), but I can't stand Tom's designs.

>>98377626
Oh I guess I thought you were here because you had some interest in lancer.
>>98377639
2035 sounds right, if ever.

>>98376785
Yeah can do. At the gym, will post in a bit

Lancer is one of the worst victims of "just throw together a bunch of shit you think is neat with no thought put to whether these go together or contribute to a fun game", and the killing blow being that they don't care much about mecha so you don't even at least get a super cool grab-bag of mecha tropes.

They made a scifi setting where mechs fight each other with swords in space... but also space combat is relativistic and BVR.
You fight the good fight on the rim... against independent states for the super power that is functionally impossible for them to even resist.
You're doing epic supportive direct action to help the disenfranchised... almost solely in combat encounters with a flamethrower.
All the art is of gritty scarred mercs in a rustbucket... but there's no money and the mechs are always in perfect shape with brand new parts.

>>98378008
Yes.
Wanna play? I've got a foundry server set up

>>98378127
I'll bite, yeah

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>>98372075
Ahh yes, a queeftopian responce. You know, I love it when they engage and actually try to fight back.
Spellings gonna be shit, I worked an 11 hour day today, something the average cancer fan will never be able to comprehend. Working that is, they do 11 hour circle jerk sessions all the time.
>You roleplay as a mech pilot in the far future.
"Roleplaying" is not something anyone whom has looked into cancer will ever associate with it. RThe game is almost entirely devoid of actual RP mechanics save some vague rules that where clearly thrown in as an afterthought. I can grab any number of a large variety of RPG books from my shelf right now and find detailed RP rules in even the lightest of systems. Cancer is very much a skirmish game.
>There is a currency
Ag yes, how could I forget, the universal currency (because of course all the vastly different nations with vastly different cultures with centuries of individual development and isolation will totally use the exact same currency, dont think about it) that was tacked on in that one official expansion that the writers actually got round to finishing, how could I forget. Perhaps because it wasnt in the core rules. Ah well.
>This is the weakest part of their argument
How so? In what way do the 'mechs' in Lancer actually differ from, say, fantasy hero's in dnd? What mechanics are in place to give you a semblance of piloting a mech as opposed to just being an elf archer or tiefling warlock?
>they use other mech games to define what mech games are 'supposed' to be which is kind of stupid.
There are multiple different examples of game sin the mech genre, all of which manage to give a simulacrum of actually piloting a mech, with mechanics and combat rules that simulate what mech combat would feel like. Cancer mechs feel like dnd characters. They move, act, and fight like dnd characters. They take damage like dnd characters. They feel like dnd characters

>>98372099
Action economy and hacking are two different things in lancer. You can build a mech that does both, or just one or the other.

For the most part, hacking is like a control mage from 4th edition dnd. Forced movement, impaired movement, impaired actions, debuffed stats, vulnerability and very occasionally mind control style forced actions. Hacking also deals damage in the form of heat which can force meltdowns and be just as deadly as bullets. In the right build you can make an enemy mech go from zero to meltdown very quickly.

There are also a handful of hacks that can be friendly or pseudo friendly

Lastly, while some frames are better than others, every mech can hack, and you can build any mech to have at least some degree of tech attacks and invades if you want. There are even some fun hybrid builds like the hacktuga which is one of the more frequent crossovers

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>>98379753
>If a game is about mechs and has mechs in it, and focuses on mech combat I personally consider it a mech game.
Lona RPG is now a mech game, because im calling it a mech game. I will now post all about the adventures of my loli mech as she tries not to get her armour penetrated by the monster mechs. Its okay because I say its a mech game.
>>98372095
>cope over rests
Lets actually talk about a mech game. I am going to use Battletech as my example. In Battletech there are defined R&R rules, including the time needed to replace armour, fix weapons and component, reload ammo, etc. In a Battletech campaign I have to prioritise what I want my techs to work on as I may not know when the next attack is coming, or I may know but not have time to get my mech fully repaired. I have to choose and make compromises that will affect how it performs in the next fight. In Cancer I just refill my HP pool, reset my X per rest abilities, and scribble off some "critical" damage. Wow. Its almost like im playing dnd and not a mech game.
>If you have access to one yes this is true. Usually at a base of operations or some kind of 'homebase'
So, magic 3d printers exist and players have access to them, I am glad we agree
>resource management is the name of the game when you're navigating 2-4 full-on mech fights
Wow, JUST like dnd, you have to manage your X per rest abilities and your spell slots. How fun, how mecha. Meanwhile if your mech gets knocked out its no biggy.
Anecdotally, I remember shooting the cockpit out of a Thunderbolt during a Battletech campaign. My opponent was unable to repair it for the final game, leading him to be down a major hitter. Sadly he lacked the magic printer to BRRRR out a replacement.
>I think his GM just didn't give him any exotic gear.
I refuse to play Cancer. Reading the rules was bad enough and I refuse to do it again. The lore section is one of the most mindnumbingly boring things I have ever read. It almost made Pride and Prejudice fun

>>98379814
Oh and I forgot, mechs that are good at hacking are also usually good at defending against hacks, and having at least one person on the team who can hold their own against an enemy hacker and not just sizzle their cpu the second a witch shows up is just as valuable as all of their offense and control capabilities.

The best team in lancer is a balanced team that compliments each others weaknesses. Think of it like a mech anime like 8th ms team gundam, you have the front line guy, the artillery, the coms guy, etc, and a group with obvious gaps in role is just asking to have those weak points exploited

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>>98379840
>Salvaging enemies for exotic gear like weapons/systems
Is a key part of Mech games, I agree
>and re-stocking consumables like repair parts and ammunition
Another key part, no arguement
>happens every game.
Which game? Because in Cancer it doesnt, the rules outright prevent salvaging and theres no actual R&R rules. Just "long rests" and "short rests" in which things magically restock themselves. You must have been playing Battletech, Or Mekton.
>Meta builds exist! Wowzers!
Gee timmy, you act like this is a good thing. Why do you advertise unlimited customisation of ones ride if in reality, its basically got one or two useful builds and the rest are pants? And why oh why does this reek of 3-3.5 dnd. Again. Of course, you dont have to play a meta build, just like you can always play a gunslinger or a two weapon fighter in Pathfinder, but dont get sad when your hopelessly outclassed in combat. Of course in Pathfinder you could have other strengths that come to light in roleplaying, but Cancer kind of shuts that down. Its a primary skirmish game, people playing weak builds are going to suffer.
>>98372106
>It has magic space stuff in it
I was being sarcastic if you couldnt tell. I ken it has magic in it.
>>98372106
I forgot about blink gates. Not that it changes much for an invader, good fucking luck maintaining a war front across a multiple century logistics chain. Actually, it makes war even more retarded as the defender can happily respond to any threat whilst the attacker is stuck throwing waves of meat at the target... Thankfully Queeftopia is an overwhelmingly powerful all domineering nation with Queebot to direct it, so it just autowins.
>Technology... CHANGES!
Not in the span of a sublight travel it doesnt, and thats a few centuries.

>>98379901
>>98379840
>>98379753
nice blogpost

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>>98379901
>>98372119
>This is wrong and tells me they didn't read past the first few pages of the book.
Entirely correct. Again, the entire economy of not! mana was shoehorned in after players complained that there was nothing to fight for or earn, to give an additional incentive to goodboy points. Queeftopia is also not "one among several", its a gargantuan power house thats larger than its next few competitors combined.
>The entirety of the game takes place outside of the core worlds
Which changes nothing and is a wonderful attempt to deflect. "Uhhhh, our post scarcity communist utopia DOESNT COUNT because... because... because... Well the game doesnt take place in it thats why!"
>The Everest is considered one of the best mechs in the game
Lorewise its competing with psychc nightmare mechs, the monarch, gravity controlling supermechs, monarchs, singularity shitting reality warpers, living nanomechs, and the monarch. All of which supposedly shit on anything else in the setting. Well, not the Monarch because its actually only for green pilots teehee that means its actually bad, ignore what it does with a trained pilot at the controls.
>Resource management is a huge deal in this game
Pffftttt. 'scuse me, got to go fetch my sides back from orbit.
WHAT resources? Your X per rest abilities? In Battletech I have to track ammo expenditure per weapon, and the cooling capacity of my mech vs its heat buildup each turn, and thats not counting the stuff in the baggage train or R&R time or money. Where in Cancer do you have to track your supply of 120mm AC5 shells, 180mm AC20 shells, and Long Range Missiles, or Machinegun bursts? You dont. Theres nothing TO track in cancer, save some dnd like abilities that auto refresh when you 'rest'. Mekton Zeta is rules lite by Mech standards, and it tracks ammo per weapon and location armour/damage. I think it does fuel too, for jumpjets, IIRC.
>For shiggles, an actual Lancer pic this time

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>>98380032
>>98372132
>Pic related is from one of the writers.
Someone already posted the famous open statement from the creators about cancer being a game about spreading commnism through force in space, and anyone here can crack open the pdf and take a look at the art or read up on Queeftopia. You can stop lying now.
>didn't read the book
TL: "NO STOP IT STOP IT STOP POKING AT THE HOLES IN MY IDEOLOGICAL TRASH STOP DOING IT"
>They absolutely need refilling
Cite me. I dont recall them ever needing anything. I remember a cancerfag many threads ago writing up some headcanon about them needing resources and saying it would make the Queeftopian push to expand make more sense, but that was his headcannon. Meanwhile IIRC the official lore is that they use paracausial magic to shit matter into reality from some 18th octagonal dimension or something.
Maybe the writers decided to edit that in in the wallflower expansion to try and excuse the Queeftopian crusade. IDK, im not interested in the patched on excuses
>They're the biggest. Are they the baddest? debatable.
They are the biggest faction and are on an ideologically driven expansion to assimilate all other factions, and destroy any resistance. Yes, inspite of the writers bleating insistence to the contrary, Queeftopia are the bad guys. Ironic isnt it, that so-called "anti fascists" always act like and idealize fascists that would make the Nazis look tame.

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>>98380100
>>98372160
>section 1. Pic related
Thats a mezzo-latino. You can cope as much as you like, there is not one picture of a Queeftopian pilot whom is white in the books. Unless you can find one whom is white, masculine, and not trans or queer. As I challenged you to earlier, please find the image and post it here.
>He's confusing MONIST-1/RA for GALSIM
"No no no, hes confusing this [garbled handwavium nonsense] for this [garbled handwavium nonsense]"
I am not. Queeftopia has Queefbot at its centre that, translated from the mess that is the writers own words, ensures that they win. Always and forever. If your game results in a loss for Queeftopia it is automatically retconned into being a sim run in and countered by Queefbot. This is not a misinterpretation as the writers outright state it in the book.
As for the other thing, wasnt that the big scary thing that came after humanity found a data package that went all "biiiggg and spoookkkeyyy" after it was decompressed because "ooh more came out than went in" or something? I cant remember half the twaddle in there.
>>98372185
>Again, didn't read the book
"NO STAP IT STAHP IT STAHP IT"
>Harrison Armory and Horus are not good guys.
Harrison Armoury are the designated 'badguys' whom are desperately trying to hold back the overwhelming waves of the queer communist horde. They are the definition of 'good guys', and it helps that they are depicted as white westerners. I may disagree with Hitler, but I will die in a trench alongside the SS to hold back the rainbow brown soviet horde, and I genuinely cannot understand how your lot fail to understand this.

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>>98380194
>>98372185
>Horus
Cant recall much, IIRC they did a bunch of paracausial research so all their mechs are paracausial nightmare machines but actually they are really underwhelming in game despite the lore glowing them up. Also Cancer needs to cool it with its meme-word. There is only so much you can get away with before it becomes spam.
>They managed to miss the biggest plot point in the entire game. Union SecCom committing warcrimes is what led to their collapse and the rise of ThirdComm
And yet the fanbase loves warcriming civilians and the game happily gives you these warcrime toys and says "go problemsolve" with zero repercussions. Again, Battletech has plenty of lore regarding what happens to captured pilots of a warcrime mech, with the best case typically being a bullet to the skull and gods help you if you are female. Cancer.... Doesnt. "oooh maybe dont do it just in case" but at the same time there is nothing anyone can do to stop the Queeftopian horde so it doesnt matter, and theres no repercussions for ejected pilots anyway.
>shocker
Whats a bigger shocker is that he whom holds orbital supremacy has won. Good luck concentrating ground forces to resist, your going to get obliterated. After the orbit is controlled its just a matter of mopping up those few scattered forces it wasnt worth wasting sots on, and suppressing the locals.
Again, Battletech came up with a way around this including political conventions on the use of WMD's and orbital bombardment, and on the few occasions these where broken Humanity either nearly reverted back to the stoneage, or entire worlds suffered horrific damage and degradation. This means ground forces are vital, and warships are also rare due to attrition and naval dockyards being prime raider targets. So, mechs become essential to take and hold planets and are key in actually capturing them rather than being a mopup force and coloonial police.

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>>98380291
I also missed out on the out of mech rules. Again, thers none, and the answer of "bruh you can just 3d proont equipment" falls flat on its face, especially when you also claim here >>98372095 that these printers are also not available to the players outside of their bases. So how does your pilot magically have the gear they need on hand? Obviously its not from their convenient little cockpit printer is it? The rules for man scale are barebones and fail to mesh with the mech scale rules. They also leave out the usual RPG stats like skills, abilities, talents, traits, etc. All the good stuff that helps build a character and make them more, mechanically, than just a 2d sheet of paper.

>>98372029
This is some lovely cope. If you cannot directly refute the points made then you lose by default, and no, vagueposting does not count. Scurry back to your groomer discord.

>>98377395
No. No containment thread. This is a toehold on /tg/. If you let it stay and fester it will grow and spread as it is used to spread the colonisation attempts and turn this board into another one of their conquests. It has to be burned out like all infections do, and the rancid rotten corpse that is cancer poked ad prodded till it splits and everyone can see the maggots.
If your wondering why call it cancer, its not just because I like the cavalry type known as Lancers, its because the game and its fanbase are them selves a form of cancer. An ideologically driven tumour determined to metastasize and infest every aspect of this hobby. A rancid, reeking, rainbow coloured cancer that will not stop until it controls everything and has driven those it has deemed as 'wrong' out, and in doing so it will kill the hobby. But thats fine, it wont care, it will have won, and will go on to infest new hobbies and kill them too. The line has to be drawn, the chemo taken, and the scalpel prepared. The gate has to be kept.

Anyway, a short break now, then ill have a crack at the designs.

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>>98380367
So, the designs. As true mecha fans, Tom and co have done a wonderful job of designing a series of interesting and distinct but also clearly setting relat- relat- set... Ah hell, I cant keep a straight face.
The designs are all over, and look utterly whack. Also, as another anon pointed out they are often shown as worn or used, despite them being 3d printed prior to each deployment. Anyway.

>98370440
looks like some sort of post apoc mech built from kludged together parts and scrap

>98370477
This is an Infinity TAG with weird little hands, its sleek, has sensors, and is highly advanced

>98370556
You are not convincing me this is not a guy in power armour. The hip and groin profiles are too human to be a mech, not to mention the musculature

>98371877
This is a guy in power armour with spooookkkkyyyy magic. AKA a scifi warlock

>98372229
Looks like a mech, has an anachronistic knight look to it. Bar the gun it could be from a fantasy mech RPG

>98373866
Literally a guy in power armour. Again.

>98373921
"No son, we have Evangelions at home". Seriously, this is an Evangelion with a severe case of singularity haemorrhoids.

>98374284
I actually like this one, for the most part. Needs some minor changes and the removal of the arms. It looks like something from the near future with a slight hint of Maschinen Kreiger

>98375942
Either its a Nomad jump troop unit that got lost on its way to Bakunin, or its a mobile suit at home, I am not sure which.

The big tell here is that ALL of these look like the come from different genres, and some of them dont even look like mechs at all. If they did not come from Cancers book then I would be convinced they came from several different settings or where fan creations. There is nothing to really unify the designs or tie them to the setting. I turn again to Battletech where, inspite of centuries of war and RnD, there are themes that are common and serve to tie the mechs to the setting.

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>>98380510
Battletechs mechs differ from era to era and faction to faction, but they are all tied together by common design elements and also look like actual mechs, whereas in Cancers case half the mechs look like people in costuimes and there is a weird lack of identifiable mechanical components, and there is only so much you can get away with the "muh dust cover" claim. IIRC theres a Horus mech thats basically a guy in a hood and cloak, it doesnt even look vaguely mechanical. Not that those powerarmour like 'mechs' above look like mechs. Turns out chubby chaser Tom should have been focussing on the mechanical detail more and his fat fetish less, but thats what you get when you have a setting written by people whom openly despise the genre and only want an 'in' so they can start infesting it with their ideology.

Anyway, to sum up again;
The game is fantasy superheroes wearing Mech suits and plays nothing like a mech game
The setting is space communist power wank with a load of stuff that either falls flat when examined, or is propped up by stacks of handwavium
Its a vector for the ideological cancer that threatens all IP's and hobbies
Its awful and you should play one of the many better mech RPG's made by people whom actually like and understand mechs
Have another Agent pic. She is best maid and wife material.

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>>98372132

>>98380743
Of there is one thing I have learned in life, its how to tell when a communist is lying. They are speaking.

>>98373858
my group played with pen and paper, its definitely playable. you'll probably want tokens or cards of some kind to track heat, structure damage, status effects, limited charges, etc, the game has a lot of frequently updating conditions.

we ultimately ended up going halfway, playing around the kitchen table with a grid and miniatures and real dice, but using comp/con on our phones for mech building and status tracking. its digital glossary also is very handy.

i also personally liked using a square grid rather than hexes. hexes get goofy to measure movement and straight lines at the points. not impossible, just easier with squares in my opinion

mods can you clean up the polfags and avatar paragraph spam?

this is why we cant have a fucking general

>>98379753
None of these are good rebuttals
>>98379840
More cope about it not being a mech game.
I thought you were gonna do a full teardown
>confirms they've never actually played it
Ok i don't really need to read the rest. You put a lot less effort into this than you did the first time, 4/10.

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Kek. Roger that anon. Good talking to you.

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Dear Space Commies,
My fireteam just LL9 and our GM has decided to introduce some new homebrew. Among the proposed changes is one that allows the GMS mount Core Bonuses to "upgrade" a mount if you install the bonus on a frame that already has three mounts. I will be using this to do the coolest thing ever, and that is mounting a Tachyon Lance on my Toku. This leaves me with a flex mount to play with. I have the fuel rod gun for a "proper" gun already. What would you mount in your flex mount if this was your mech? Two Shock Knives? Two Catalyst Pistols? Torch? Something else entirely?

>>98381108
It's probably dumb as hell but might I suggest the Vlad's nailgun to staple a bitch to the floor before you use the tachyon lance to turn their entire zip code into plasma?

>>98377586
NTA but I played Lancer with good folks and with a custom setting to avoid the canon setting and we still hated it. I just think the combat mechanics aren't that good, 2nd-rate skirmish game held up by normies who think it's great for the virute of not being 5e and because they don't know of anything better. I strongly recommend avoiding the game to anyone on the fence.

>>98381108
Tachyon Lance is gonna eat your whole turn so you're only firing the flex mount with an overcharge so definitely wouldn't take a self heat weapon. Decksweeper or nailgun and vanguard 3 to protect your exposed ass is probably the best option.

>>98372119
>The entirety of the game takes place outside of the core worlds, again I don't think this person read the book.

The problem is so much (tedious) text is devoted to the workings and structure of this utopia which you're not intended to actually play within and then AFAIK the game just expects you to make up your own setting "outside the core worlds".

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I haven't read through all of queeftopia anon's posts here but one thing I don't think he mentions from a quick skim is how Lancer has the worst writing/prose of any TTRPG I've ever read.

Like putting aside the world building or how it functions as a ttrpg setting or the politics or whatever else you wanna talk about, I don't know how ANYONE can defend the insanely padded out, pretentious, overly long and rambling way the book is written.

Like take a look at pic related. Let's analyze how this is written

>"It receives guidance from Centcomm and pushes them as command imperatives to administrators, who then work with local rulers and governments to find BEST-FIT INTEGRATION based on local conditions"

A good chunk of this shit is padding things with synonyms. You could make this nearly a third as long by trimming it down to:

>"They receive commands from the central government and work with local rulers to fulfill them."

Can you imagine an entire book of this shit? The simplest shit taking eons and paragraphs to say because the writers refuse to trim everything and it's all written in this wordy, pretentious, techno-beuracratic purple prose that takes a morbillion years to say fucking anything?

I genuinely don't know how anyone can defend this. Even if you like the high concept of the setting I don't know how you can read this shit and not immediately be put off.

>>98381590
most of the words are rulesjank but chapter 6 goes into world building, other planets of interest, and factions, etc.

>>98381622
last anon literally just said there wasn't enough info to run the game, now this anon says that the extra lore information is such much


contemp society has a really big stick up their arse about reading stuff, hence the fact that he's not read any of the other posts here because its such much for him

>>98381622
The fluff writing is definitely dogshit. I got a few paragraphs in and started skimming it instead to get the key info. I like the concept of the setting though, as well as the combat, and treating mech building like a big bucket of Lego.

>>98381639
>last anon literally just said there wasn't enough info to run the game, now this anon says that the extra lore information is such much

I think you're retarded if you don't realize how these two posts are compatible. Hint: one is saying that too much text is wasted on a utopia that you can't have a meaningful conflict in, the other is about how too much text is wasted on a utopia you can't have a meaningful conflict in.

It's also not just about "reading" or not, it's about the prose being ass. "Purple prose" can be fun at times if you have like cool metaphor or chuuni bullshit, but everything in the book is written in this "business and bureaucracy" lingo, endless dry mind numbing walls of text that are as rigid as possible and repeat themselves with endless padding and the most pretentious choices of words possible, and ultimately exist only for sucking the cock of a place that the game doesn't even take place within. Is it no wonder most people think Union is intensely hateable?

>>98381660
>>98381639
Like, sorry to double post but I gotta ask you, do you REALLY read that pic-related post and go "wow this is so RIVETING! It's so interesting and exciting to read about what color of beige the glowies wear across 5 paragraphs padded out with synonyms! I'd very much rather be reading this than an actually good sci-fi novel!"

Because if "yes" I genuinely don't know what the hell is wrong with you. I'm not sure I've ever read a ttrpg book or setting with moment to moment prose and word-smithing this is atrocious. It's just actively viscerally unpleasant.

>>98381687
>sorry to double post
you aint

>I'd very much rather be reading this than an actually good sci-fi novel!"
its no worse than reading dogshit posts on /tg/, so i don't really care.

i think that section gives a good example of how the bureaucracy of the union works, how representatives are placed / viewed on outsider planets, how the union thinks of themselves, and how the admins are created.

its like a free NPC to use for your adventures who are union reps on whatever planet you're on.

>>98381760
Again, the issue is not with giving this idea for an npc. Or reading, or even how much text there is. You could have twenty paragraphs or one paragraph, that's not the complaint being made. For someone who complains about people not reading, you don't seem to be reading or understanding the meaning of what people are saying.

The criticism here is not how much text is there is, it's that the actual moment-to-moment WRITING is dogshit. That's why I keep saying purple prose. This shit is padded out, full of double or even triple unnecessary synonyms, dry and stiff, and pretentious as shit. If I submitted this crap to an actual book publisher or editor they'd probably have a stroke, this is like the first kind of thing a serious professional writer warns you not to do (hint: even Shakespeare has something to say about this). In fact calling it "purple prose" is probably an insult to the nobility of purple prose. At least Lovecraftian indulgent chuuni rambles are having fun describing in the indescribable horribleness and are entertaining to read. This shit is written like an insurance statement, but without the content.

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>>98375955
It needs wings to be cool. It also does not have nearly enough missile launchers in its art

>>98381622
Man, I was a better writer when I was 13.

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A good comparison piece writing-wise is this page from Embryo Machine, which fleshes out all the core shit from a faction and region previously mentioned in the history section of the setting.

Notice how everything it talks about conveys important information, real shit to run an adventure with. The tourism industry and refugee crisis can easily paint a picture for the sights and sounds you'll see, the economic problems and hardline/middleground conflict gives you plenty of room for real storylines for players to interact with, etc. All this within a single page (and through a non-professional translation of the original Japanese text, too).

Now if the writers of Lancer's wrote this, each paragraph on this page would be multiplied x5 to say essentially the same thing, and would include the most pretentious sounding names they could look up in a dictionary to describe the different wings of the church or tourism industries bureaucracy. "To govern each region the churches gobledook branch sends a sub-altern to take in regional conditions and find a best-fit command resolution alongside local partisan rulers for an equitable economic resolution factor asdiofpudsjvlkajsd;valkjsdf"

I legit have never seen guys who seem to think "bureaucracy" and talking like one is sexy and cool the way the Lancer writers do. [Insert joke about commies here]

Tourist here: what's the assessment from a self-insert power fantasy angle? Is Lancer a nice place to isekai in and have a harem of GMO catgirls and NHPs? Is it easy to lie about war crimes as you crush your foes? Is the setting's overall politics the only thing "familiar" to an insert?

>>98381855
>>98381622
They're both really boring. Its what happens when nerds with pretensions of political knowledge write bullshit and get caught up in the minutia. No one gives a shit about any of that. Scifi games are plagued with this kind of drivel.

>>98381881
Making gmo catgirls goes against the human right laws of queeftopia. The biggest navy in the galaxy will teleport to your ass and bombard you with space magic bullshit beams for being too based.

>>98381881
>can you isekai w/ a harem of NHPs
Nobody's stopping you anon, except maybe >>98381960 but he doesn't play so feel free to go ham

>>98381881
Just have fun and play another game. Don't bother with this dreck.

>>98381881
As long as you fluff up a reason for the mechs to exist and be easily available you can ignore literally all the set dressing. The game is 90% mechanics and even those mechanics are mostly D&D 4e with normal missiles instead of magic missiles.

>>98381957
I think if you can't see the difference between a page that wastes 6 paragraphs (SIX, and that could've easily been trimmed down to maybe 1 or two with better writing while conveying all the same information), and a page that gives you everything you need to know about an entire region and setting in one single page while setting up plot-hooks for an actual game (and does it WITHOUT annoying beuracratic techno-babble speak), then you are probably a coping faggot desperate to defend your shitty game by going "errrm, ummm, all ttrpg setting writing is bad chuddy no one cares!"

One is objectively more boring than the other, on a level that breaks the scale.

>>98382093
>6 paragraphs to give you a concept for a single npc that may not appear in most games

>>98381760
You don't pay money to read dogshit on /tg/, unless you're a 4chan pass mark. And I absolutely will mock anyone who types like some wiki-poisoned retard here too, so your pithy attempt at snark fails at every level.

>>98381831
Is this supposed to be a mech? Lancer is NEVER beating the dude in a suit allegations.

>>98380367
>. It has to be burned out like all infections do, and the rancid rotten corpse that is cancer poked ad prodded till it splits and everyone can see the maggots.
Larp

>>98381590
I've heard it described as "imagine most of the rulebook going over the inner workings of the EU when you're supposed to play foreign legion soldiers in Africa".

>>98382048
>the game is 90% mechanics so you can ignore the lore!
>oh btw the mechanics are dry as stale dogshit too, teehee~
...who is this game even FOR?

>>98381639
>last anon literally just said there wasn't enough info to run the game, now this anon says that the extra lore information is such much
Clearly you lack reading comprehension.
All that lore about how weird and what color uniform Union administrators wear is wasted space on a game about shooting mud farmers far away from any Union clerk. It actually reminds me of Curse of Strahd, which has ton of lore for stiff like Wizard of Wines and no clear way or purpose to get all this information to the players. Thus pushing out stuff that actually matters to the players out of the book.

>>98382567
People who hate mecha anime and media playing a mecha themed tabletop rpg.

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>>98381639
im the anon running a campaign currently and the core rulebook plus most of the karrakin one are indeed hot garbage for providing easy to digest info on the shit players will actually be interacting with session to session. bizarrely the long rim book is the best one for this as it provides you a list of factions for the area, their strengths, and hooks for each one of them. but they they decided to do away with this for the baronies rulebook and go back to giving you shitty OC donuts to talk to.

i think its the real reason lancer is declared as the "gay space communism always wins" game because there are pages and pages of dredge that show the writers are obsessed with their star trek federation ripoff and almost nothing for what players might encounter out in the frontier where things are actually happening. fans of it miss the fact their gay utopia is actually being held up by the serfdom in the baronies and the industrial powerhouse the community likes to reduce to "the problematic space nazis we ban people for saying are cool in our discord"

Lancer commits the worst sort of RPG sin; it looks cool but is incredibly boring to play.

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>>98382657

Don't look at me, I prefer to play Battlegroup.

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>>98382657
its a lot of fun when it clicks for everyone, combats are never static because theres always an objective to get to or push, enemies knocking you around or you them, and a bunch of aoe effects that keep the battlefield dynamic. no plan ever survives first contact which is a good thing, and like others have said the more a team can synergize when things go sideways the better (for example minotaur going from subpar to godly once you have anyone that grapples on the team).

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>>98382778
How is it every bad forced meme that comes out of this game somehow makes it seem even more miserable than I previously thought possible?