So I've decided to switch the adaptation of the original Gundam I'm running from Savage to Genesys. I'm really happy with how streamlined the system is in comparison.

I'm still working some of the details out but here's what I have so far;

Since the focus is on using mobile suits, I'm keeping the melee and ranged skills as just that. No heavy or light.

I'm going to be using three main skills for piloting a MS; Driving, Piloting, and Gunnery.

* Driving for anytime your MS is walking.

* Piloting for anytime your MS is moving using it's rockets.

* Gunnery for using your MS's ranged weapons.

* For melee attacks you'll use either Driving or Piloting depending on if the MS is standing or in the the air/space. It will be considered a combat check for those situations.

Mobile suits will be able to use the Reposition manuever at speed 0+.

Beam weapons are something I'm going to have to work out still. My initial thought is to give them the Breach and Sunder qualities. Something with and anti beam coating would get the Reinforced quality.

What about leaving melee as melee but limiting it's max stat to drive/pilot?

39 minutes ago, Darksyde said:

What about leaving melee as melee but limiting it's max stat to drive/pilot?

So if I had melee 3 and drive/pilot 4 I would use my melee 3, but if I had melee 4 and drive/pilot 3 I would treat my melee as if it were still 3?

I can see the merit in that approach. My one big problem is it makes someone who is good at melee combat in person also good at it in a MS. Which I don't think should necessarily be the case.

45 minutes ago, Tesoe said:

So if I had melee 3 and drive/pilot 4 I would use my melee 3, but if I had melee 4 and drive/pilot 3 I would treat my melee as if it were still 3?

I can see the merit in that approach. My one big problem is it makes someone who is good at melee combat in person also good at it in a MS. Which I don't think should necessarily be the case.

I've never watched Gundam, but in some mecha anime (and in the Pacific Rim films), mecha mimic the actions of their pilots. In these scenarios, I would think piloting and driving would be less important than melee - meaning someone who is good at melee combat in person would also be good at it in a mech .

Again, however, I've never watched Gundam, so I can't speak to how it is done in that setting.

3 minutes ago, Simon Retold said:

I've never watched Gundam, but in some mecha anime (and in the Pacific Rim films), mecha mimic the actions of their pilots. In these scenarios, I would think piloting and driving would be less important than melee - meaning someone who is good at melee combat in person would also be good at it in a mech .

Again, however, I've never watched Gundam, so I can't speak to how it is done in that setting.

Gundam does not following that style of control. (There are technically some exceptions, but they aren't important to this game.)

The mobile suits are controlled more like a fighter jets or helicopter.

1 hour ago, Tesoe said:

Gundam does not following that style of control. (There are technically some exceptions, but they aren't important to this game.)

The mobile suits are controlled more like a fighter jets or helicopter.

Fair enough.

What if you split Gunnery into Gunnery(Melee) and Gunnery(Ranged)?

You could even do:

Mech (Heavy) (Intellect) this is big ordinances used over long distances, your typical shoulder mounted big gun

Mech (Light) (Cunning) this is your small weapons mostly mounted on a single arm

Mech (Melee) (Agility) this is all mech attacks that require direct contact, from swords to punch’s

Ranged (Agility) this is any ranged weapon used by a person outside a mech, pistols to anti tank rpg’s

Melee (Brawn) this is any personal scale melee attack, from a two handed sword, axe to a punch or kick.

30 minutes ago, arMedBeta said:

What if you split Gunnery into Gunnery(Melee) and Gunnery(Ranged)?

I had considered creating a new skill for it like that.

The reason I settled on driving/piloting as the melee skill was that it made sense to me that the better you were at manuever, handling, and controlling your MS the better you would be at swing bits of it around in a way that inflicted harm on the enemy.

I didn't expect it to be all that controversial, but you all are starting to make me second guess myself with everyone commenting on that specifically.

Thanks for the comments so far everyone. It's food for thought if nothing else.

7 minutes ago, Richardbuxton said:

You could even do:

Mech (Heavy) (Intellect) this is big ordinances used over long distances, your typical shoulder mounted big gun

Mech (Light) (Cunning) this is your small weapons mostly mounted on a single arm

Mech (Melee) (Agility) this is all mech attacks that require direct contact, from swords to punch’s

Ranged (Agility) this is any ranged weapon used by a person outside a mech, pistols to anti tank rpg’s

Melee (Brawn) this is any personal scale melee attack, from a two handed sword, axe to a punch or kick.

Splitting mech scale ranged weapons into heavy and light was a consideration. I decided to keep it one skill just for simplicity. The when I thought about how you would aim and fire a weapon like that conceptually it seemed like someone good at moving their mech's limbs around, getting a target lock, and firing would be just as good at it wether they were using a mech sized rifle, or a mech sized bazooka. And that kind of sitting in an operators seat and gaining a target lock with a mobile weapons platform skill set would also apply to an anti aircraft turret, and a spaceship main battery, and most other large vehicle weapons. So I settled on continuing to use gunnery for all ranged vehicle weapons, including mobile suits.

Fair enough.

The important thing is that not everyone in a mech feels the same. If you only need Gunnery and Driving to operate a mech and 80% of the game is in mechs then everyone will focus on only those two skills.

If those two or three are split into 6 that use 2 or 3 different characteristics then pc’s are going to all have a very different flavour

edit: if only 20% of the game is in mechs then smaller numbers of skills is good

14 minutes ago, Richardbuxton said:

Fair enough.

The important thing is that not everyone in a mech feels the same. If you only need Gunnery and Driving to operate a mech and 80% of the game is in mechs then everyone will focus on only those two skills.

If those two or three are split into 6 that use 2 or 3 different characteristics then pc’s are going to all have a very different flavour

edit: if only 20% of the game is in mechs then smaller numbers of skills is good

That's a fair point. I hadn't thought to much on it because my players were fairly inexperienced and already diversifying in other ways. But you make a really good point.

Thanks again everyone. This thread is giving me a lot to think on.

I wouldn't call it contriversial but I think some of us (I'm guessing gm's) kinda default to limiting things in some way that improve two different things with one stat increase. It isn't always needed but sometimes it can make some skills just way more 'powerful' per point. At least that was my motivation. Not that I see anything instantly wrong with your original plan it was just the first thing that popped in to my mind. Kinda of the same thing when you pointed out you didn't want someone good at mecha melee to be good at hand to hand melee which is understandable.

19 minutes ago, Darksyde said:

I wouldn't call it contriversial but I think some of us (I'm guessing gm's) kinda default to limiting things in some way that improve two different things with one stat increase. It isn't always needed but sometimes it can make some skills just way more 'powerful' per point. At least that was my motivation. Not that I see anything instantly wrong with your original plan it was just the first thing that popped in to my mind. Kinda of the same thing when you pointed out you didn't want someone good at mecha melee to be good at hand to hand melee which is understandable.

I can totally get that. It seems thematically appropriate to use your piloting skills for melle to me though. Same reason I would use those skills if someone wanted to make their mech waltz.

Makeing it dance requires understanding your suit's weight distrabution, acceleration, stopping distance, turn radius, structural tolerances, and basically everything else that comes from being good at piloting it. And sword fighting with it also requires that same knowledge and skills set.

Where as being good at Kung Fu or boxing outside the mech would be a different skill set and knowledge base.

Just like being a good sniper in person wouldn't necessarily translate over to being good at using your suit's targeting systems to make long range attacks.

8 hours ago, Tesoe said:

Where as being good at Kung Fu or boxing outside the mech would be a different skill set and knowledge base.

Would you say kung fu and dancing should use the same skill? (Serious question.)

5 hours ago, Simon Retold said:

Would you say kung fu and dancing should use the same skill? (Serious question.)

I could see an argument for it, but no. They're both a different sets of learned and memorized paterns of movement. Same reason you have different skills knowledge skills for geology vs oceanography.

I've been running a Genesys game in the UC Gundam setting, here is what I've done:

Skills:

-Gunnery is for big guns (e.g. MS Bazookas, ship guns, and man portable heavy weapons)

-Ranged (Personal) is for all personal scale weapons (pistols, rifles, etc.). Since I expect personal scale combat to be limited, I'm fine with consolidating its related skills.

-Ranged (MS) is for all MS sized weapons that aren't bazookas/cannons (so beam rifles, machine guns, wrist mounted weapons, etc.)

-Brawl is the same for personal and MS scale (and uses Brawn when fighting in the suit)

-Melee is the same for personal and MS scale (and uses Brawn when fighting in the suit)

-Pilot(MS) is its own piloting skill for suits

-Pilot(Vehicle) is for any other ship in the setting.

Essentially, Ranged(MS) is the ranged(light) of the setting, and gunnery is ranged(heavy). Genesys is intended to divide the major weapon group into two variants, and then have a single skill for the other type. Ranged combat shouldn't key to only one skill. Melee on the other hand, is almost universally only one type of weapon per suit, so it really could be handled with just one weapon skill.

I'm fine with the melee skills mapping to the same across in-suit and out of suit, as normally it just doesn't happen, and the one time it did happen in the show, both combatants were able to hold their own for a bit, despite never having been seen fighting with swords on foot. Note also there really aren't that many times where you have to make piloting checks. Really the best way to avoid your concern that characters good at MS melee might be good at ground melee is to limit the existence of melee weapons. Just don't let them get a sword or a battleaxe, and just say their option for ground melee is a knife that's damage = brawn and crit rating 3. Then you won't have to worry about PCs taking knives to gunfights.

For Mobile Suits, I reworked the vehicle rules a bit:

-Mobile suits ignore speed and silhouette requirements for vehicle actions/maneuvers (and generally are Sil 3)

-Mobile suits count as being at their max speed at all times, but are not required to perform the forced move that other vehicles are subject to.

-Mobile suits instead move by performing a move maneuver, with the distance in range bands they move equal to the forced move table -1 band (so a speed 2 MS moves 1 band per maneuver like a normal character, and a speed 3 MS moves 2 range bands per maneuver). This is intended to represent the rapid nature in which MSs can transition from moving at full speed to stopping.

-Mobile suits use the pilots brawn rating for melee/brawl checks, as well as any other test brawn is related to (while this may seem unrealistic, it still is often how Gundam feels; burly MS pilots tend to come across as stronger suits)

-Mobile Suits treat other Mobile Suits as non-vehicle targets (Hamstring shot is also banned in this setting)

-Mobile Suit pilots can use personal scale talents (such as Dodge) to avoid attacks against their suit. Essentially the pilot considers themselves to be the suit for any rules interaction.

-Between MSs, Gain the Advantage has been turned into an opposed piloting skill check, with handling added as boost/setback as appropriate.

From a hard mechanics standpoint, these rule changes have been pretty solid and easy for my players to get. The intent really was to make MS combat feel as similar to normal personal scale combat as possible, while still also having the system reflect PCs being able to get out of the cockpit.

The main issue I've had is properly statting out suits, and coming up with an interesting narrative.

I've also added some Newtype related mechanics (SW Force rules lite), and reworked the equipment acquisition system to better reflect the nature of the game (PCs aren't buying suits and such, they requisition components and upgrades)

6 minutes ago, Kommissar said:

I've been running a Genesys game in the UC Gundam setting, here is what I've done:

Skills:

-Gunnery is for big guns (e.g. MS Bazookas, ship guns, and man portable heavy weapons)

-Ranged (Personal) is for all personal scale weapons (pistols, rifles, etc.). Since I expect personal scale combat to be limited, I'm fine with consolidating its related skills.

-Ranged (MS) is for all MS sized weapons that aren't bazookas/cannons (so beam rifles, machine guns, wrist mounted weapons, etc.)

-Brawl is the same for personal and MS scale (and uses Brawn when fighting in the suit)

-Melee is the same for personal and MS scale (and uses Brawn when fighting in the suit)

Essentially, Ranged(MS) is the ranged(light) of the setting, and gunnery is ranged(heavy).

I'm fine with the melee skills mapping to the same across in-suit and out of suit, as normally it just doesn't happen, and the one time it did happen in the show, both combatants were able to hold their own for a bit, despite never having been seen fighting with swords on foot.

For Mobile Suits, I reworked the vehicle rules a bit:

-Mobile suits ignore speed and silhouette requirements for vehicle actions/maneuvers (and generally are Sil 3)

-Mobile suits count as being at their max speed at all times, but are not required to perform the forced move that other vehicles are subject to.

-Mobile suits instead move by performing a move maneuver, with the distance in range bands they move equal to the forced move table -1 band (so a speed 2 MS moves 1 band per maneuver like a normal character, and a speed 3 MS moves 2 range bands per maneuver). This is intended to represent the rapid nature in which MSs can transition from moving at full speed to stopping.

-Mobile suits use the pilots brawn rating for melee/brawl checks, as well as any other test brawn is related to (while this may seem unrealistic, it still is often how Gundam feels; burly MS pilots tend to come across as stronger suits)

-Mobile Suits treat other Mobile Suits as non-vehicle targets (Hamstring shot is also banned in this setting)

-Mobile Suit pilots can use personal scale talents (such as Dodge) to avoid attacks against their suit

From a hard mechanics standpoint, these rule changes have been pretty solid and easy for my players to get. The main issue I've had is properly statting out suits, and coming up with an interesting narrative.

I've also added some Newtype related mechanics (SW Force rules lite), and reworked the equipment acquisition system to better reflect the nature of the game (PCs aren't buying suits and such, they requisition components and upgrades)

Nice, glad it's working for you. I'm also treating mobile suits as silhouette 3, and I'm also having mobile suits treat each other as non-vehicles. Although I hadn't yet put it into words. I'll have to remember to do that.

I'm also allowing personal scale talents to apply to mobile suits. Mainly to prevent rules bloat, and it makes sense to me thematically. Hamstring came up in conversation with a player and I'm allowing it for now. I can think of plenty of time in the show a pilot fired in front of an enemy MS to stop it dead in it's tracks.

I think I'm also going to ignore the silhouette and speed requirements on manuever and actions. I definitely am for reposition.

I'mprobably going also to change reposition so you can move range bands based on a speed rating. So it works more like human movement. I haven't settled on that yet though. Still debating it.

I'm thinking of having rocket jumps and other uses of the backpack rocket engines work like the flying creature movement rule. Not 100% married to that yet either.

Thought I'd Post a little of what I've got converted. Comments, critiques, and feedback welcome and encouraged.

Zaku II

Silhouette: 3
Speed: Ground 3/Space 4
Handling: Ground -2/ Space +3
Defense: 0
Armor: 6
Hull Trama Threshold: 16
System Strain Threshold: 12
Control Skill: Driving & Piloting
Compliment: 1 PIlot
Brawn: 4

Heat Hawk : Damage +3, Critical 3, Range (engaged), Breach 3, Sunder, Vicious 1

ZMP-50D 120mm Machine Gun: Damage 8, Critical 3, Range (Long), Auto-fire

Sturm Faust: Damage 20, Critical 2, Range (Medium), Breach 2, Inaccurate 1, Limited Ammo 1

FF-S3 Saberfish

Silhouette: 3
Speed: 5
Handling: +2
Defense: 0
Armor: 2
Hull Trama Threshold: 10
System Strain Threshold: 10
Control Skill: Piloting
Compliment: 1 Pilot

4 × 25mm Machine Gun: Damage 2, Critical 5, Range (Long), Auto-fire, Linked 3

12 x Missile Launcher: Damage 5, Critical 3, Range (Extreme), Blast 10, Breach 3, Guided 3, Limited Ammo 12

Anti-Ship Missile: Damage 20, Critical 1, Range (Strategic) Blast 5, Breach 2, Guided 3, Limited Ammo 2

Type 61 Tank

Silhouette: 2
Speed: 4
Handling: -2
Defense: 0
Armor: 8
Hull Trama Threshold: 10
System Strain Threshold: 10
Control Skill: Driving
Compliment: 1 Drivier, 1 Gunner, 1 Commander

150/155mm Smoothbore Cannon: Damage 9, Critical 3, Range (Extreme), Linked 1

12.7mm Machine Gun: Damage 10, Critical 3, Range (Long), Auto-fire, Personal Scale, Pierce 2, Vicious 2

Solid stuff! The Zaku II having a different speed and handling depending on whether or not it's dirtside or in space, I like that a fair bit. Its stats overall look pretty good!

Things I think could get tweaked: The non-mobile suit vehicles are a little too good compared to the Zaku, particularly with the Type 61 and its survivability. If a Zaku II pilot succeeds on an attack roll using the 120mm with a single Success against a Type 61, they'll have to do that 9 more times in order to mission-kill the tank. A Type 61 rolling the same way will knock out the Zaku in four hits.

Honestly I'd just drop the 61's Armor a fair bit, and it'll probably fit what we see in the show(s) just fine.

The ranges seem a little long on some of the non-Zaku weapons, but that's probably just me quibbling. Spotting the Guided property does raise another question:

What are you going to do for rules pertaining to Minovsky physics? That could be some interesting stuff, right there.

24 minutes ago, Cannibal Halfling said:

Solid stuff! The Zaku II having a different speed and handling depending on whether or not it's dirtside or in space, I like that a fair bit. Its stats overall look pretty good!

Things I think could get tweaked: The non-mobile suit vehicles are a little too good compared to the Zaku, particularly with the Type 61 and its survivability. If a Zaku II pilot succeeds on an attack roll using the 120mm with a single Success against a Type 61, they'll have to do that 9 more times in order to mission-kill the tank. A Type 61 rolling the same way will knock out the Zaku in four hits.

Honestly I'd just drop the 61's Armor a fair bit, and it'll probably fit what we see in the show(s) just fine.

The ranges seem a little long on some of the non-Zaku weapons, but that's probably just me quibbling. Spotting the Guided property does raise another question:

What are you going to do for rules pertaining to Minovsky physics? That could be some interesting stuff, right there.

Thanks for the feedback!

I'm planning for the guided quality to not work in Minovsky particle field at combat density. And maybe reduce the rating in a weaker field.

The team, three players in Zaku IIs, went up against four Type 61s in the last session. Hitting was more of a problem than killing, but the hits did feel a little soft. I'm thinking about dropping the armor down to 6 or lower. Maybe as low as 4. Also thinking about dropping the main gun down to 7 or 8.

Figuring out the armor of the RGM-79[G], RGM-79, and RX-79 [G] are troubling me as well. Luna Titanium is supposed to be pretty much immune to something like a Zaku machine gun. The titanium alloy of the GM is pretty strong too.

Beam weapons are something also. Thinking about maybe using the light sabers from the star wars games as a base. With beam resistant coating reducing the breach rating.

10 hours ago, Tesoe said:

Thanks for the feedback!

I'm planning for the guided quality to not work in Minovsky particle field at combat density. And maybe reduce the rating in a weaker field.

The team, three players in Zaku IIs, went up against four Type 61s in the last session. Hitting was more of a problem than killing, but the hits did feel a little soft. I'm thinking about dropping the armor down to 6 or lower. Maybe as low as 4. Also thinking about dropping the main gun down to 7 or 8.

Figuring out the armor of the RGM-79[G], RGM-79, and RX-79 [G] are troubling me as well. Luna Titanium is supposed to be pretty much immune to something like a Zaku machine gun. The titanium alloy of the GM is pretty strong too.

Beam weapons are something also. Thinking about maybe using the light sabers from the star wars games as a base. With beam resistant coating reducing the breach rating.

The most obvious thing to do with Luna Titanium and its cousins is to come up with a renamed version of the Cortosis quality from Star Wars and make machines that have it immune (or at least resistant in the case of the coating) to the Breach quality. You have hit upon something with the in-universe relative invulnerability of LT to regular old machine gun fire, though, and I'm not quite sure how to muddle past that. Make Breach more common, and thus LT more dramatically useful? Give mecha with the Luna Titanium quality extra Armor against non-breach weapons? Just give them more Armor, straight up? That'll take some fiddling.

I think you've definitely got the right idea with the beam weapons. High damage, high breach, low crit rating. Maybe Limited Ammo as a balancing tool?

5 hours ago, Cannibal Halfling said:

The most obvious thing to do with Luna Titanium and its cousins is to come up with a renamed version of the Cortosis quality from Star Wars and make machines that have it immune (or at least resistant in the case of the coating) to the Breach quality. You have hit upon something with the in-universe relative invulnerability of LT to regular old machine gun fire, though, and I'm not quite sure how to muddle past that. Make Breach more common, and thus LT more dramatically useful? Give mecha with the Luna Titanium quality extra Armor against non-breach weapons? Just give them more Armor, straight up? That'll take some fiddling.

I think you've definitely got the right idea with the beam weapons. High damage, high breach, low crit rating. Maybe Limited Ammo as a balancing tool?

Ah, I didn't know they had cortosis in the RPG. I need to take a look at that too. Thanks!

Alright then! I decided to convert mobile suits into one page character sheets with all the relevant info on weapons and gear there at the players finger tips. For easy reference in play. Just note which pieces of gear you're using, and you're good to go. Tell me what you think.

And here's the Gouf. I could get more detailed with each variant of each mobile suit, but I don't think its worth it to my game to stat out each version of a Zaku. So with that same mentality I'm using this for both the Gouf and Gouf Custom.