Iron Kingdoms, Steamjacks. Looking for suggestions/example on building them for Genesys.

While they have all the properties of a vehicle, most (none?) have an onboard pilot, but they do have a control mechanism.

So, my first thought is make them non-pilot vehicles...

Iron Kingdoms has a large list of chassis, attachable weapons, and equipment.

Is there any current game conversion that might have something similar already in production? (mechs, robots, etc)

I would start with the Battletech thread . The tricky part is blurring that line between vehicle scale combat vs personal scale combat if you make them vehicles. You'll have to make their attacks be personal scale for sure and an appropriate armor rating too. Remember an armor rating of 1 for a vehicle equals soak 10, Armor 2 = Soak 20, etc. I would also look to see what they did in that thread for hitting different components too. That could help.

I would give the 'Jacks combat skills with ranks based on the processor (is that what they call it in IK? Cortex!) level or type. I would create a new skill or talent for 'Jack Marshalling or something.

I'm curious to see what you come up with, Grungyape!

Z

I know on the Genesys reddit thread there is a mecha hack in the works.

I wouldn't use them as vehicles.

First, they're controlled by built-in cortexes. They don't carry passengers, they're just big things. The cortex can be swapped out, but that can just be handled by saying it that skills and mental stats are tied to the cortex, while physical stats are tied to the 'jack.

They move at almost exactly the same scale as people. Even more importantly, they can stop pretty easily. Vehicles in Genesys tend to be things that require effort to slow down. Honestly you wouldn't really be gaining anything by saying they're vehicles. Unless you feel 'Jacks should be performing "Gain The Advantage," or "Evasive Maneuvers" (which doesn't make sense to me).

Just make them Sil 2-3, give them Soak 10+ (honestly Soak = ARM is probably not that far off).

In my mind, they remind me of overgrown Warforged, to reference another system, and I think that's how to best handle them as Kommissar suggested.

Because this adventure is basically taking a previously published IK adventure, and the 6 characters already released, I'm using them for my base. If this goes well, fingers crossed, I will continue the development. The exception being, for our adventure, Pog (gobber jack marshal) has a harness on his jack that allows him to ride it in most situations. Think Master Blaster.

Many of the jacks have set purposes, labor jacks are strong, not combat oriented, even if equipped with a weapon. Warjacks can be equipped with ranged or melee, but are not normally both. So the nice part is that Jack Marshaling and the cortex upgrades can enhance both jack skills and handling, perhaps even grant (specific) talents to a jack.

I would have thought they are just NPCs (or PCs) and statted as such. Since you don't ride them, why have them as a vehichle!?

I think I would do up a different critical table for them to keep in-theme with robots. Also you need to decide how important hit location is to you. You can either ignore it and just put things in the crit chart or if you think it adds that just right amount of flavor to your game you'll need a hit chart of some sort.

29 minutes ago, Darksyde said:

I think I would do up a different critical table for them to keep in-theme with robots. Also you need to decide how important hit location is to you. You can either ignore it and just put things in the crit chart or if you think it adds that just right amount of flavor to your game you'll need a hit chart of some sort.

Yes... because if you hit the boiler that's a problem, not just the battle at hand but long term use... that and things like shield arm (if it has one), attached weapons, etc.

53 minutes ago, chriscdoa said:

I would have thought they are just NPCs (or PCs) and statted as such. Since you don't ride them, why have them as a vehichle!?

And that's why I asked. While they are not specifically vehicles, they are only semi-autonomous robots, and still require a commander. Their armor and design could have been easily spec'ed as you might say an AT-ST. So I wasn't thinking of it as a vehicle per-say, but looking for how to best lay out the stats.

OK, first pass, reading from the IK book and using the descriptions of how chassis and cortex work... this assumes how they ship from factory, no personal modifications. Once the cortex is added to the chassis, the stats increase by the cortex values.

Keep in mind this isn't something every person has, nor can control, you should not be running into these (as an opponent) on a daily basis. Attached weapons and accessories will vary these stats dramatically.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1eZwFgDcNB5E1rUeyniCkVqgGJcSBFKNYj0FltZHf51Y/edit?usp=sharing

You could also give them increases to mental stats while being controlled by a warcaster/jack marshal. It seems like they can be given a routine to just repeat like an automated worker with no controller (in the fluff not the table top game) but I might be recalling that incorrectly. You can also work up to 'war jacks' from general purpose jacks which are arguably common in the grand scheme of things.

Just now, Darksyde said:

You could also give them increases to mental stats while being controlled by a warcaster/jack marshal. It seems like they can be given a routine to just repeat like an automated worker with no controller (in the fluff not the table top game) but I might be recalling that incorrectly. You can also work up to 'war jacks' from general purpose jacks which are arguably common in the grand scheme of things.

So I had noticed that in many of the books, most folks might have access to a modified laborjack, but the warjacks were still "mostly" in the hands of the military groups or your BBEG. I also noticed that by the time they went after these folks they were prepped with corrosive grenades, sleep grenades and heavy guns to combat the marshals or jacks. I'm hoping to keep to this theme, and help limit access by cost.

You can definately set just how 'steampunk' you want it to be by how much you make 'jacks' prevelent. little dog walking jacks, wood cutting jacks, etc. Could be fun.