Robomeck RPG Commentary Track Part 2

Robomeck RPG Index

Questions

Let me try to hit a few specific issues with the Robomeck RPG rules.

Why did you . . . ?

. . . change the names of everything?  I’m trying to avoid problems with Harmony Gold.  As much as they’ve mismanaged their IP, they’re very protective of it.  They’re not Godzilla-level jealous of their property, but they’re right up there.  (As the old joke goes, the only thing scarier than Godzilla is his lawyers.)  Not to mention, somebody else, Strange Machine Games, picked up the rights to the Robotech RPG during the lengthy development cycle of my game.  I’m trying not to step on any toes.  Also, since I’ve changed the names, technically this isn’t Robotech.  Therefore, if you wish to call my material non-canonical Robotech, I can agree and say (in an Italian accent), “It’s a not-a my universe, monkey-boy.”

Why is the Level limit set at 6?

The math breaks down at higher levels.  That’s all there is to it.  At least I’m honest enough to admit it, unlike certain gaming companies.  If you want to go higher, you were warned.  This game really isn’t meant to be used for long-running campaigns anyway.  It’s about a multi-generational conflict, probably requiring new Characters for each separate era.  Characters topping out in level should be moved into command roles and not be involved in day-to-day combat.

What’s up with the Rank system?  Why doesn’t it advance with Level?

I had no end of angst trying to write up this section.  You have no idea how much time I wasted.  Not only am I not ex-military or a military expert, the people who made the series apparently weren’t either.  I had some real trepidation about writing about rank and authority, but if your Characters are military, then they will have a rank. 

Promotion is also an issue.  Tying rank to changes in Character level will likely not produce a satisfying gaming experience, especially if your Players are a bunch of goofball idiots and playing their Characters in the same fashion.  Further, I’m not putting in mass combat rules with this game, so there’s no point in advancing Characters beyond squadron leader anyway.  A game featuring the politics and personality clashes of high command rank could make for a fascinating game.  You’re on your own with that though.

Robotech showed enlisted troops piloting mecha.  While various mecha were the backbone of the military in these conflicts, I find it unlikely they’d give a private a multi-million dollar fighter plane for anything other than a good washing.  Being a combat pilot today is a big deal in requirements and training, and their jets don’t even transform.  Your Character is the elite of the elite (unless you’re a rebel pilot who somehow picks up the piloting skill in the field, sigh). 

Armor Class includes ½ level? 

There are other RPG’s that add level to AC, one of the Star Wars RPG’s for example.  This came about when I figured out why mecha combat doesn’t really work for an RPG.  While your DnD Character can increase in HP and attack modifier, but your AC only goes up if you recover or buy better protection.  With mecha, only your attack modifier goes up with Character level.  However, your sixth-level Character is not much better than a first-level opponent if you’re both in the same mecha (same HP, same AC). 

The Palladium rules had combatants rolling for their attacks and their defense, instead of using AC.  (The attacker had to at least roll at least a natural 12 to get a hit, I think.  It’s been a while.  That did keep combat more honest, but still totally random.)  My own experience with such systems is that it produced very unpredictable results.  For a practical matter for an RPG, it’s hard for Refs and Players to gauge encounters having no idea what’s going to happen.  The Characters’ mecha had to have much superior MHP and firepower to ride out some poor rolls. 

I went with an AC solution only after I’d come up with the idea that it would increase in the level with Character.  Only allowing ½ level came about after I’d done the math, otherwise higher level combatants would be unhittable (which was how that Star Wars game worked).  Finally, I had to limit the levels themselves to keep the math workable.  The base AC for mecha sometimes adds the dex bonus and ½ level.  Bulkier more immobile mecha may only have ½ level added or just a base AC.  This represents a tradeoff for mecha that have more armor and perhaps HP versus more agile mecha.    

Why did you introduce the possibility playing a Zentraedi Character and then just hand-wave it?

I felt like I had to put it in because it was canonical.  I really didn’t want to because the source material is more than vague.  Dana Sterling appeared to be a normal human, so being half-Zentraedi apparently doesn’t do much for your Character stats.  But Bowman from Macross Plus (yes, I know that’s not Robotech) was clearly alien with definable features and attributes.  I don’t know if he had two micronized Zentraedi parents or one human one. 

(In Macross Plus, Robotech forces were still fighting the Zentraedi in deep space, protecting human colony worlds and fleets.  The UN Spacy in the show was looking to replace their current fighter craft, which were already a significant upgrade over Macross-era fighters.  Perhaps the Zentraedi automated factories have been accumulating battle data and upgrading their forces.) 

Also, the Zentraedi basically disappeared from Robotech without much explanation after the Macross episodes.  Dana appeared to be an absolute unicorn.  It was almost implied that she was the only one of her kind on earth, but she seemed fully human.  Between that and her heroic parentage, it sort of explains how she became an officer in xenophobic Leonard’s army. 

All of the full-blood Zentraedi may have gone off with the Expeditionary Force, perhaps along with any other human/Zentradedi offspring.  Earth human society might not have been ultimately accepting of a race that razed their planet to the ground and so encouraged them to leave.  I think in the original Macross material, Breetai did take the Zentraedi off into space, which kind of explains his absence during Khyron’s last attack.   

I view the Zentraedi as being a bunch of clones with a very limited lifespan.  That would seem like the way the Masters would have created them to keep control over them.  They would have also taken steps to ensure that even their high-ranking officers, who were much longer lived, could not have survived long without some sort regular treatment controlled by the Masters. 

My take is that the full-size Zentraedi have all passed away by the time of the Southern Cross’ war with the Masters.  (Zentraedi in suspended animation elsewhere in fully Protoculture-fueled facilities could still be around.)  Micronized Zentraedi would probably last longer, but still not a usual human lifespan.  For this reason and others, I didn’t bother stating out the REF Zentraedi mecha.  It didn’t seem worth the effort. 

I think any human/Zentraedi offspring would not actually be half-Zentraedi, but would instead be fully human with some minor common traits, like odd natural hair colors.  (Dana was a bleach blonde to more fit in with human society.)  Perhaps there were actually several “half-breed” offspring on earth, but only Dana stood out because she was famous.  Full Zentraedi offspring, assuming they’re micronized, might be closer to human than Zentraedi.  Alternately, their genetic code might too inbred to viably reproduce.  It depends on how many different clone series there were and how different they were from each other.  This whole issue is a giant “I don’t know.”        

There are other alien race possibilities.  After the war with the Masters, it seemed imply that there were large numbers of Tirolian citizen refugees.  Even their warriors would have no reason to fight without the Masters guiding them.  While they were clones, they were of a much more advanced sort than the Zentraedi.  Careful mixing in arranged pairings kept their race from becoming inbred and degenerative.  Of course, most of these people may have been wiped out after the Invid Invasion which came shortly after, but I could see survivors.  How these Tirolians would differ from regular humans would be up to you. 

As for the Sentinels races, I suppose that could be interesting, but I don’t care and have no interest in adapting them.  Who knew the Haydonites were actually villains all along (as per the Shadow Chronicles movie)?  Actually, I think I remember that they weren’t a playable race in the Palladium Sentinels source book, so that may well have been a possibility from the beginning.       

    

If you liked the Shadow Chronicles movie so much, why isn’t it part of this game?  You also mostly ignored The Sentinels.

I didn’t think much of the Sentinels, either the video of what was produced, or the novels, or even the comic books.  I didn’t think Invid Inorganics, REF Destroids, or REF Zentraedi mecha were worth trying to stat out.  I didn’t find their designs or functions interesting.  The Shadow Chronicles movie, on the other hand, I loved.  I may be in the minority on this, but I thought it was ripping cool, fun adventure.  I was thrilled to see some new Robotech animation, especially with all the jaw-dropping mega-scale scenes (specifically the Expeditionary Fleet heading for earth, the Invid response, and the arsenal of Neutron-S missiles). 

However, the mecha and the Haydonite craft were so overpowered, I didn’t think I could safely insert them into the game.  Yeah, an Alpha/Beta with a Syncro-Cannon is cool, but I’m not comfortable trying to stat it out.  I wasn’t even comfortable with stating out a Syncro-Cannon, which I never adapted from the Palladium rules to begin with (at least I think it was in those rules, maybe not).  It’s more of a plot device anyway.  You couldn’t let the Players have one to keep.  I couldn’t resist putting in the Cyclone rail gun from the movie though.  Also, trying to account for the Haydonites being able to shutdown and overload Shadow tech was going to be a problem.  I’d either have to ignore it or figure out some way to roll against it (which wouldn’t have worked either). 

   

What’s up with the so-called “Support Characters?”  They’re sort of like actual Characters, but not.  Why aren’t they full Character Classes? 

I had no end of trouble with the non-combat Support Characters.  There had to be Support Characters in the game.  The Characters really need to be able to interact with people outside of their squadron or rebel cell.  However, the non-mecha pilot Player Character classes from the Palladium rules never made any sense to me.  It’s like having a Barkeep class in DnD.  (Characters are always interacting with them, but they’re not adventurers.)  So, if the NPC classes aren’t going to be a Player Character options, there was no point in making out a full classes for them.

This set up the conundrum of making up NPC Character classes for Characters that shouldn’t be involved in combat because they’re really only narrative tools.  I went through a few possibilities.  I settled on giving them static stats and FP.  So, they are functional and will have some survivability.  You can change the stats or upgrade them as you will, but really the only things that matter are their main skill bonus and their relationship with the Characters.

The stats are necessary.  You might not try as hard to save Minmei, if you didn’t think she could actually be killed in play, only by GM fiat.  But, these NPC’s are very fragile. The compromise was giving them FP, which gives them some survivability, but still leaves them mortal.  Play them carefully.   

Mecka Damage?  Mecka Hit Points?  Mecka Armor Class?  Really?

As if the concept of hit points and armor class is somehow credible by comparison.  You do need to differentiate between personal combat and mecha combat damage.  This wasn’t my first choice (or second, or third).  It was cop-out to fall back on the Palladium Mega-Damage system.  I apologize.   

Ultimately, it’s an RPG.  It has to be playable and give the Characters a decent chance of survival.  Any system more realistic is going to impinge on one or both.  Could you make a more realistic mecha combat game?  Yes.  It would involve hit location charts for each mecha and each mode of that mecha.  The irony would be that the game would be unplayable.  You’d have to destroy your “realism” with Fudge points or some other meta-gaming to avoid having only unhappy players.

Damage should cause lessened mecha capabilities like slower speeds, stuck in current mecha transforming mode, loss of detection, and loss of some weapons.  Unfortunately, this game got so complex even at a basic level, it was going to cripple it adding those kind of details.  Keep in mind also how varied the mecha are.  It’s hard to apply even the most general rules, much less mecha-specific ones.

It would seem to be more fun in a narrative sense to have the mecha suffer crippling, but not destructive damage, but ask the Players in the middle of a dogfight if they want to keep track of what still works on their craft.  (Never mind the Ref having to keep track of all the enemy combatants.)  This is probably the reason why RPG’s that feature hit location charts never catch on.  It is so hard for the Players and the Ref to run combat with a bunch of gimped combatants. 

Really this kind of game should be more narrative-based than stat-based.  Dogfights should be creatively described by the combatants and reflect their Characters’ personalities and emotional states, rather than just rolling a d20 plus some mods.  I don’t have enough experience in those types of games to try and make up one.  The Strange Machines game, from what I’ve skimmed from a playtest doc, does seem to work with that idea.  Go play their game.

Missile Volley damage seems kind of weak.

I stripped away four layers of different and conflicting rules for mecha combat while writing out the final version.  I finally made the decision that I had to reduce the amount of MHP and M-Level damage to avoid the ridiculous and era-incompatible MHP bloat that plagued the Palladium rules.  Weakening volley damage was crucial to that.  Missile volleys threw everything out of whack.  This was the only solution that didn’t involve essentially rewriting the Palladium rules, exactly as they were.  At that point, I would have quit, since I despised those rules. 

The problem here is really the mecha themselves.  You would never design an RPG combat robot with 60 missiles.  Missiles were supposed to give the human mecha a chance against waves of enemy troops, but some enemy mecha also have clusters of missiles too.  You could allow for missiles to be used as anti-missiles.  Unfortunately, this creates a mess for the Ref and the Players, who will be meta-gaming each other in their missile usage.  If you have to have a logical-sounding explanation to the diminished damage, say the initial missile explosion prematurely detonates the following the missiles and lessens their damage.   

Did you at least consider using the Advantage/Disadvantage mechanic?

I like it, but it’s not OGL.  Theoretically, you can’t copyright rules, only their presentation and certain trademarked terms.  Theoretically.  I decided to steer clear of using 5e-type rules, which I’m not that familiar with anyway.  (Indeed, this entire exercise has been predicated on disguising the actual source material.)  The Called Shot rule was as close as I got to it.

 

Let’s talk about Grapple!

This rule deserves its own special section.  Quick, how did Grapple work in ADnD?  Yeah, that’s right, you don’t know, even if you owned and read the books.  You took one look at that section and you skipped over it because it looked unnecessarily complex and had nothing to do with how you played the game.  Go back and look at the retro-clones; they just hand-wave it.

It gets worse.  There’s ADnD Grapple complexity and then there’s DnD 3.0 Grapple.  The rule for this one non-essential combat situation runs for an entire page.  If you weren’t grappling in the previous two versions because you didn’t understand it, no doubt you house-ruled “No grappling,” in this one.  I can see the game table now.  Player: “I grapple.”  DM: “You die instantly.”

Grapple is almost a microcosm of trying to make up this Robotech game.  The intent of 3.0 (I assume 3.5 worked the same as I can’t imagine the game designers ever wanting to work on that section again) was to precisely define in the rules a combat situation that had any number of variables.  It’s a lot like figuring combat between robots that can completely change their configuration.  The entire raison d’etre of the Pathfinder rewrite was to “fix” the Grapple rule.  I’m not kidding.  The game designers always mentioned it first as a deficiency in the rules.  (The purpose of the upcoming second edition of Pathfinder is to “make money.”)         

Okay, so why all this attention to a rule that isn’t used?  Is it not used because it’s too complex or too vague and could lead to arguments?  No, combat in DnD and DnD derived RPG’s (which is just about all of them) is really only designed for lethal combat.  This is because the original rules were based on tabletop wargaming rules.  However, all of the inspiration for DnD was based in heroic fiction where capturing combatants and non-lethal fighting were common situations.  This tension has always undercut the game a bit.

You end up with two schools of thought in RPG’s.  In one, it’s a brutal combat slog that doesn’t produce a satisfying narrative for adventuring (in other words, WOW).  In the other, you’re weaving a tapestry of interactive storytelling that isn’t really supported by the rules you’re playing by (in other words, Vampire: The Masquerade).  If you think this is just my opinion, even Gary Gygax said it was a flaw in the original game that it didn’t entirely support the tropes of heroic fiction.  (I’m sorry I can’t footnote a quote here.  I do not remember where I read that.)   

Yeah, you thought Grappling was just some minor optional rule here didn’t you?  You didn’t think it was worth a whole essay.  This brings us back to this game.  I spent a bunch of time thinking about grappling and unarmed combat in an attempt to add these forms of combat because capturing people and getting into non-lethal fights should be part of it.  If you think back to the series (and just about any other sci-fi genre shows), these situations come up all the time.  If you’re coming up with adventures for this setting, these minor rules can hopefully give you more options for play.  You will need Player buy-in for this mind-set change.  They’re not going to be used to not fighting to the death.  I think it will be worth the effort.

Your mecha commentary isn’t canonical at all.

Once, I had taken offense to someone on the Internet calling for Rick to be tried as a war criminal over authorizing the use of Neutron-S missiles.  (As if a group of Players wouldn’t be using those things first and asking, “How much XP for killing all of the Invid on earth?”)  I wrote a couple pages about it and posted it on the message boards at the official Robotech website.  Needless to say, I was flamed in a line-by-line manner.  (Little wonder I don’t hang out there.  Have you noticed that you need a login just to get on to the website?)  Were those posters correct in flaming me?  Probably, maybe, meh. 

I’ve come to the ultimate conclusion on Robotech that (and hear me good): There is NO true canon!  The novels, the comic books, the art books, and any other outside source is just an opinion, even the ones written by the people working on the show.  The series itself, by virtue of being three unrelated series stitched together, is not internally consistent.  The original source series themselves were created to be dramatic and entertaining.  Carefully presenting their established settings with consistency was of secondary importance, if that.  Heck, Macross was originally conceived as a parody.  You can still clearly see it there in certain aspects of the show.

[Robotech is like trying to make a “new” show out of combining episodes of Andromeda, Farscape, and Stargate: SG-1.  Hey, they’re all science fiction shows and even share some of the same actors.  It could work.  No matter how good a job you do on it though, things are never going to match up cleanly.  Even on the individual shows themselves, while they kept their continuities fairly tight, they changed their minds about some concepts as the shows went along (or openly wished they could).] 

Fanboys trying to “fix” issues in the continuity or explain the logic on the show have engaged in a HOPELESS task.  Virtually any argument you make referencing the series as a source, can be refuted by someone also using the series as a source.  (Hey, tell me what happened to Dana’s little brother.  He’s canonical.)  This is why the Shadow Chronicles movie was not entirely well-received by the fans and why the Sentinels would have gotten the same treatment had it been made.  Anything and everything following the original series will be non-canonical in some fashion. 

The Robotech series was not logically consistent, so anybody following it up will have to pick and choose what details to work with and what to ignore.  This will irritate fans who disagree their choices.  Anyone who thinks the show has a sacred canon is only using parts of the series supplemented by extra-canonical sources and their own pet theories.  There is no true Robotech canon. 

So, no, this game isn’t totally accurate.  It’s not trying to be.  My commentary is just for fun and trying to explain the unexplainable in this show.  Given that this game is an unauthorized knockoff, who cares?  Use what you like, disregard the rest.  Feel free to make up your own “canonical” game.  Good luck reconciling everything and detailing the lifecycle of a Flower of Life Pollinator.  After you finish and post your game, be aware that I and a bunch of other fans will be trolling you as well. 

                    

Why was this game so hard to write? 

I’m just asking myself this question.  Writing game rules is hard, mostly because those sneaky Players are always trying to figure out a way around them.  No matter how much hand-waving and fiat the Ref allows himself, the Players will always be more clever.  (Regrettably, this doesn’t usually apply to figuring out traps or puzzles or difficult situations with obvious solutions.)  This is because the Players, through their Characters, have more invested in the game.  The Ref can lose NPC’s left and right and keep playing non-stop.  The Player loses their Character and they’re out until the Ref lets them introduce a new one.  Possible Character death is a good motivator for brilliance.

In writing rules, you have think like a Player.  How do I get around this?  How can I use this to my advantage?  Can I twist the wording of the rule to my advantage?  A rule too specific ends up being useless, because it only applies in narrow situations, or constricts free-form play (which defeats playing a table top RPG altogether), or won’t be used at all (grapple).  Rules too vague will be broken by clever Players every time forcing a rewrite or a house rule. 

 

So in your opinion, was Rick Hunter a war criminal for ordering the use of Neutron-S missiles on earth?

Look, I know where this argument came from.  You’re trying to equate this to the end of WWII in Japan.  That’s a whole another issue, where the argument still doesn’t make any sense.  But if you need a rationale over the use giant missiles in Robotech, read on.  (This is just the executive summary of what I originally posted on the forum, by the way.)

Since the REF wasn’t being governed by any earth authority by that point, they had to make the decision themselves about what to do about the Invid occupying earth.  The possible human cost of an REF invasion of earth against a rejuvenated Invid after several failed attempts was probably unacceptable, but so was the thought of losing earth permanently with its people enslaved.  Remember, their experience with the Regent showed the Invid to be world-conquerors.  They had no reason to trust that the Regis would limit herself to just taking earth.  Any Invid were a threat.  

The development of Shadow technology, however gave the REF some chance of conventional victory.  The co-development creation of the Neutron-S missiles gave them an ability to end to Invid threat altogether, but they’d have to write-off earth and its population to do so.  It was like two different camps were working on a solution (with Haydonite “help”).  The compromise was a full-scale invasion supported by Shadow technology with the Neutron-S missiles held in reserve.  (If there was no “compromise,” they would have used the missiles first.)  If this invasion failed, the REF and other human colony worlds would have been left wide open to Invid retaliation.  The Neutron-S missiles would then have to be used. 

So to answer the question, no, Rick isn’t a war criminal.  If for no other reason, who would try him?  There was no authority on earth to do so and they would be the aggrieved party.  Presumably Rick did not make the decision alone for the REF.  Rick was not some kind of dictator of the human dispora.  There had to be a governing council with the REF after the loss of earth to the Invid (if not before, given the distance between earth and Tirol).  They would have to approve of the war plan.  Rick surely must have advocated for a liberation plan, but whatever form of the final decision, he’d follow it through because he’s a soldier.  This council would not be indicting itself to go after Rick as a war criminal.  Perhaps the Invid could sue him.  The Regis would have devolve some Invid to create lawyers.