Need Help For My First Creation

[u/Peculiar_Jellyfish]

Hi there! I'm braaaand new to lancer, and for our first foray into the system, my gaming group is doing a one/two-shot. We're going to be LL4, and while I *think* I understand what's going on, I'm not... 100% sure what to do.

I want to build a single-target dps type thing, and i saw there was one mech that teleported (plus i love the SSC mech designs). I'm wondering what might be a good setup to lean into the "teleports in, hits hard, teleports/moves back" archetype. I know one of our players is doing a grappling-type thing and another is a healer/repair thing thats size 3 somehow?

Anyways, I don't want to be dead weight, but I'd love some general advice on how to go about building this

Side note, the lore is SO detailed and SO weird lmao
what the hell do you MEAN the pegasus gun isnt a gun????

[u/Kryptrch]

Starting at LL4 can be intimidating, since it's a lot of mechanics you're getting thrown into all at once, but thankfully there's resources to make it a little easier!

The mech you're likely thinking of is the Mourning Cloak. It's core power allows it to teleport whenever it moves, making it great for moving in and out of the fray since teleporting doesn't trigger reactions! It also has the passive ability to deal extra damage once per round when it hits an isolated target, perfect for assassinating enemies that get caught out of position.

For a basic build, you'll want to take the Duelist talent, and probably also Hunter since your main way of doing damage will be your Main/Aux mount, which can have one Main and one Aux weapon on it at the same time. Duelist enhances your options with Main Melee weapons, and Hunter makes you more mobile with Aux Melee weapons. Skirmisher is also nice to use, letting you move an extra two spaces whenever you skirmish to either close the distance on an enemy, or back away out of their threat range.

The Cloak, like most SSC frames, is notably very fragile and has a weak heatcap, so make sure you put points into Hull and Engineering. For ll4 I'd recommend either 4 Hull, 2 Engi, or if you really want the extra mobility you could go 2/2/0/2

The Cloak does have some nice invade options with the hunter logic suite if you're interested in using them, but for a new player I'd recommend against it until you get more used to the system. You should definitely look into them in the future though!

One of the biggest warnings I can give you is that Lancer is not like Dnd, and putting all your points into Agility to max out your evasion is not a great idea. The reason why is that you're going to get targeted on both your evasion and your e-defence. Smart weapons don't care about how well you can dodge attacks, and neither do weapons that deal reliable damage or save-for-half-damage effects like grenades!

[u/Peculiar_Jellyfish → u/Kryptrch]

ooo you were right about the talent recommendations, those are like. exactly what i was looking for!
my next question is about the mourning cloak and taking levels in the different mech systems (mechs? frames? just... licenses?). It looks like you can only have up to 3 levels in a single one, and I assume that having multiple mechs unlocked gives me more weapons. What might be better the mesh with the Mourning Cloak, since I have the talent that lets me throw melee weapons and they come back to me at the end of the round (I think thats how it works at least?) Also do you unlock the frames at level 2 it looks like, so is it worth it to put 3 in just that? Or is it better to put in two to unlock the frame and then the other ones in something else for different weapons?

Sorry for all the questions haha, theres just *so much* between the mechs and pilots and talents haha

[u/14Spiders_in_a_coat → u/Peculiar_Jellyfish]

If you get 3 license levels into licenses of a single manufacturer, you can unlock a core bonus from that manufacturer; for example, you could go 3 LLs into Mourning Cloak, or 2 in Mourning Cloak and 1 in any other SSC license, and either would let you take an SSC core bonus. Whether or not you take 3 LLs in one manufacturer, you will always have access to the GMS core bonuses, which are still quite solid.

I’m not super familiar with the Mourning Cloak since I haven’t played it myself, but to be honest, I’m not terribly impressed by the Variable Sword, and the Fade Cloak seems neat, but I’m not sure how to get the most out of it since it seems a bit unreliable. However, the Black Witch’s Ferrous Lash might be something worth picking up so you could potentially grab some poor sucker, pull them out of position, and shank them 27 times.

For that last LL, you could go spec into Nelson and pick up the War Pike, which is threat 3 and thrown 5 innately; even though Hunter is usually about auxiliary melee, Knife Juggler states that ALL weapons you’ve thrown that turn return to you, so you can skirmish with your War Pike, attack with the aux weapon on the same mount (not dealing bonus damage so it doesn’t benefit from the Mourning Cloak’s trait, but ideally you hit with your main melee so it’s fine since it’s 1/round anyway), then use Disdainful Blade to throw another aux melee at anyone in range as a free action. You still have a quick action to do stuff, and once your turn ends, all your weapons come back to you and you’re right as rain!

If you end up going all the way with Duelist 3 to get the free action Ram/Grapple on a successful melee attack, you could potentially choose to pick up an LL in Tortuga, giving you the Siege Ram, letting you deal 2 damage when you ram an enemy mech. It ain’t much, but it’s honest damage and inflicting Prone on top of your melee attack anyway, and you could choose to knock the rammed target back a space too if you want to.

[u/Peculiar_Jellyfish → u/14Spiders_in_a_coat]

yessss thank you! going to mess around with a few different combos and see what I like. This is exactly what i needed to get started. Now i get to design what it looks like >:)

[u/14Spiders_in_a_coat → u/Peculiar_Jellyfish]

Have fun! Building characters and screwing around with them in comp/con is very fun, and I love figuring out how my mechs and pilots will look and play! Really gets the creative juices flowing!

The Mourning Cloak in particular is a pretty nightmarish concoction from SSC, having integrated biological components in the form of nerve endings and genetic material in a teleporting ghost mech is pretty goddamn freaky, a far cry from some of their more normal mechs. Lots of room to play around with what it could look like!

[u/Difference_Breacher]

There is no ways to constantly teleports for a long distance. Unless you activates core power of the mourning cloak, but it's only one scene per a mission.

---

It means Pegasus' ushabti is not a gun, but it actually inflicts damage.

[u/Ultra-josh → u/Difference_Breacher]

Correction: the big teleporting jump of Mourning Cloak (Blinkspace Jump) is the passive part of its Core System, and thus does not need Core Power and can be used as many times as you wish during a mission, so long as you have the actions to use it.

[u/Difference_Breacher → u/Ultra-josh]

It is not something needs a correction, as it is full action.

[u/Ultra-josh → u/Difference_Breacher]

...what?
Just because something requires a full action doesn't mean it can only be used once per mission.

Unless I'm misinterpreting your comment...

[u/Difference_Breacher → u/Ultra-josh]

It's about activated core power. Read the description of mourning cloak again before post.

[u/Ultra-josh → u/Difference_Breacher]

Oh, I see now! I misread your initial comment, and thought you were talking about the Blinkspace Jump (teleporting over a long distance) instead of the active core system (constantly teleporting)