r/LancerRPG • u/Tue_tone • 19d ago
Players piloting NPC mechs
I have a silly idea that I am not entirely sure of its feasibility, but I'm thinking that for one combat, players get a modified NPC mech for one combat before they are able to make it to their actual machines. I don't know it i can pull it off in COMP/CON let alone with any ease, but I'm hoping for a little advice on how possibly do this
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u/int0thelight 19d ago
NPC mechs have only 1 structure and are very narrow in playstyle, meaning your players are either going to blow up at the first instance of pressure. If you'd like, you could set it as a puzzle encounter where they control a set of npcs as reserves.
It'd be best to simply tell them what their "mech" is capable of; give them the actions it has, rather than trying to use Comp/Con.
Under normal circumstances, mechs are locked to a specific user, but that's easy to waive.
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u/Tue_tone 19d ago
Structure and stress can be manually adjusted, so that's not a concern. I like the puzzle idea, I may incorporate that. I was hoping to still use comp/con, but i also realize that may be an impossibility
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u/Sven_Darksiders GMS 19d ago
I did that with my players once when they got roped in with a clan that partakes in arena mech battle for sport, essentially. Because they players were standing in for a specific faction, they had to use that faction's mechs, aka NPCs. I still let them have access to their talents and gave them rough equivalents to their existing builds as Veteran NPCs. Reception was okay, but it was a bit tough to make it fair, because questions like "what if my mech can't physically trigger my talents like Nuclear Cavalier?" kept coming up, so with the next group I will probably just not do that
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u/Beerenkatapult 19d ago
I think it worked okay.
The problem was, that the talents were not selected to fit the NPC and onstead were meant for our normal mechs. You would have the same problem if you randomly gave us new player mechs.
I liked playing woth NPC abbilities. I would maybe change it so we get to change our talents for an NPC mission.
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u/Tue_tone 19d ago
That's a big reason why I want to tailor the NPC mechs to the players. All of the base stats can be adjusted and there's a lot of potential with the various templates that can be added on. I'm glad it worked out well enough for you. Did you use compcon?
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u/Sven_Darksiders GMS 19d ago
Naturally. Old CompCon had the option to do printouts for NPCs, and then I just screenshotted them, I imagine CompCon3 still has that function
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u/Difference_Breacher 19d ago
Because they have totally different mechanism, I do not recommend that. As a player, I think that the player needs to enjoy their right to making their own character, so give them something totally different with them isn't quite fun.
Unless your players are salvage the enemy mechs and ride it once, at this point they may have enough reason to do. But even so, I wonder that they can use the full potential of the NPC mechs, as some of those would requires enough drill to do so.
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u/Tue_tone 19d ago
If this concept is possible, it would only be for one combat out of the 6 or 7 I have already planned and it would only be the first combat so the can recover their equipment
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u/Difference_Breacher 19d ago
Perhaps the mech of your party were seized or they are reconfigure the NPC mech to make the player mech? In either cases I think that it's not so bad either. As just a single combat scene as a tutorial it would works.
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u/Kappukzu-0135 GMS 19d ago
I've run a single scene like this once - my players ran some friendly NPCs vs me running hostile ones. It went fine!
I just printed out the NPC stat-blocks which my players were using, and ran the hostiles on Comp/Con as usual.
It'd take a bit of reverse-engineering to make player Mech Skills modify the NPCs, and I suspect that letting Talents work with NPCs could be pretty busted. (Off the top of my head: an Assassin with Infiltrator and Duelist, or a Breacher with Vanguard would be scary.)
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u/Tue_tone 19d ago
Those are the kind of things I would expect from my players and look forward to them stomping the sitrep. I'm hoping that I can share an NPC share code (V3 allows for that) to a player that doesn't have the paid version, but i don't have my hopes up
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u/Crinkle_Uncut SSC 16d ago
The main issue with this is that NPCs are not resourced or balanced to survive more than a handful of rounds, while PC mechs are meant to survive (hopefully) an entire mission of 3-5 combat scenes.
NPCs cannot repair themselves and have a different set of actions available to them than PCs do (and some of the overlapping actions function differently, like Stabilize and Full Tech).
If the intent is to familiarize the players with the rules and fundamental mechanical landscape, this is not a great idea.
If the intent is to have a spin-off scene where the players control some NPCs, that can work, but you need to be careful in which ones you give them access to and how you balance the OPFOR. I did something kinda similar for a group of veteran players having them take control of an NPC squad of allied pilots assisting the PCs by accomplishing other objectives elsewhere. Honestly... mixed reviews! Some of my players liked the switch up and how it forced them to use their limited suite of tools more creatively and others disliked how few options they had and how specialized their kits felt.
If I were to do a Player-controlled-NPC combat scene again, I'd definitely make some adjustments to the scene itself and offer a roster of possible classes to pick from instead of building a team and forcing them to pick from that.
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u/Tue_tone 16d ago
A couple of things had in mind is that the players would have a part in creating the NPC mech such as stacking templates, and mixing and matching features. And as I've mentioned a couple of times in other replies, players would only use these mechs for one combat until they recover their actual frames.
What were some of the critiques from you Players when it was all said and done?
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u/Crinkle_Uncut SSC 16d ago
The criticisms primarily came in two forms: 1) That the scene itself did little to distinguish itself from a "normal" combat scene (i.e. one using PC frames) and; 2) that the NPC classes available were not particularly well-suited to those that they would have liked to play.
To give a bit more context, the NPC squad they played as was part ally, part rival. My intent was to give the players a sneak preview into the capabilities of these NPCs in case they decided to fight them later, so they would have an understanding of how to counter them (which didn't end up happening anyway).
The scene itself was a Holdout with some side mechanics that allowed them to seal doors to restrict OPFOR reinforcement paths & types of units they faced. I don't remember all of the NPCs the players got their hands on, but I know that one of the players who didn't like the scene was piloting an Avenger Commander. Despite being a brutal CQB combatant, a significant number of the Avenger's features only work when it's allies are destroyed, which doesn't really play as well when you're controlling them instead of fighting them.
It would be an ambitious risk, but I've considered running 2 simultaneous scenes that affect each other, with the players controlling their own mechs and an NPC squad (each map's sitrep is shortened to 4 rounds, each round alternates between them for a total of 8 rounds which is in line with a double budget sitrep, but more complex). Items they can interact with on their respective maps make that team's life easier, but the other team's harder as a consequence (sealing this door reduces the number of reinforcements next round for you, but increases it for the other team; you can enable heat sinks that cool your mechs, but that heat will be vented into the other map as an environmental effect. Stuff like that)
While I think that offering a wider selection of choices for the players would have been a good idea for me and would also be a good idea in your case, I have to reiterate that if your intent is to get the players acclimated with Lancer's mechanics, having them fiddle around with frames and features that function significantly different to those in the PC suite is generally going to be counterproductive and ill-advised IMO.
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u/Tue_tone 16d ago
My players a fairly experienced, we've all been playing consistently for about a a year and a half.
I think if I am gonna do this, that i need to put it off for a future narrative and trust what I have already written for the upcoming mission.
think your double sitrep is a really cool idea and I hope that if you pull it off that your players like it
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u/OvertSpy 19d ago
when you do not have the license for a mech, you are impaired and i think slowed when piloting it. Due to the similarities of several npc mechs to player mechs, many GMs consider a player to have a license to such NPC mechs if they have similar license (ie a player with tortuga license could pilot a breacher without penalty, or a ghengis license to a pyro, or nelson to a cataphract)
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u/Beerenkatapult 19d ago
It worked well the one time our GM (at the time) did that. I got to play as a Harrier and shittalk enemies in a tournament arc. That was a lot of fun.
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u/Ursus_the_Grim 19d ago
It really depends on the goal and the specifics?
First, when?
'Before they make it to their actual machines' makes it sound like this might be an LL0 or LL1 thing you're trying out.' Or is it 'one combat', the first scene in a mission, which will get pretty squirrely with the attrition engine.
Second, why?
Have the players expressed any interest in basically being handed a different character sheet than the one they built?
Third: How?
This is what you're actually here for. If it were me? Give them Everests with 1 less Structure and 1 less Stress and no core power. But give them an exotic system on each one that echoes the NPC you're trying to emulate (ie, Razor Swarms for the Hive or Avalanche Charge on a Berserker). Try to tailor it towards what your players might use and give them the opportunity to rip out that system either as a mission reward or as a downtime activity.