"The secrets of PHILOSOPHY and THOUGHT..." - Patrick Stuart referencing a conversation with me.
A blog about Tabletop RPGs and other Weirdness.
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Saturday, December 25, 2021
"Gacha" Mecha Generator
This is a Mecha generator for Get into the Machine, Shinji! although much of it could be treated as a system-free Mecha generator. The schtick in this case (not that you have to play it this way), is that these Mecha are created by a corporation that sells their Mecha as "Gacha" capsules, like the old Japanese toy dispensers, or many modern videogames. If you wanted to do a more OSR-style Mecha game, this could be a cool framing device for that, where players start off with randomly generated Mecha, that even within the setting itself were Gacha. At the GM's discretion, you can give the players new Mecha or upgrades using a mish-mash of this generator or other ideas, I'm just thinking this would be potentially a flexible and fun starting point for a Mecha game.
I plan to eventually create a more robust version of this, I guess this is the proof of concept, so please let me know what you think.
I googled "Gacha Mecha" and found this.
And then players could create their own Pilot Abilities in addition to whatever normal character generation stuff for the pilots, or alternatively, you can have generators for that stuff too but this post is just doing the Gacha Mecha.
Head: Tank Cannon (Laser) Core: Armored Upper: Claw, Missing Limb (+1 Special: Combination of several Mecha) Lower: Hoverjet Special: Extra-Dimensional, Prehensile Tail
Hmm... I feel like "Extra-Dimensional" is what ties this together. It doesn't really have a missing limb, it's just that limb is in a different dimension to this one at the moment, rotated away from us in 4D. If it twists itself in 4D, it can bring multiple versions of itself into our reality at once in a weird snaking chain.
That's a cool way to interpret this combination. I am definitely a fan of the 4D stuff ;).
I'm moderately happy with the current state of this generator, but while I tried to make it generic enough to be open to interpretation in the way you've done here, I wonder if I would have been better off designing it in a more concrete but also more punchy and evocative way like with your You Don't Make Friends With Magnets (https://slightadjustments.blogspot.com/2020/06/you-dont-make-friends-with-magnets.html).
Those Mecha are just so immediately interesting, without any need for interpretation, but also the various parts are so evocative that one could easily just use it as a springboard rather than taking it as-is if they want to anyway.
I do kind of wish I had designed it more like that. I intend to develop this further so I may try to design it more so in that way in the next version.
Head: Tank Cannon (Laser)
ReplyDeleteCore: Armored
Upper: Claw, Missing Limb (+1 Special: Combination of several Mecha)
Lower: Hoverjet
Special: Extra-Dimensional, Prehensile Tail
Hmm... I feel like "Extra-Dimensional" is what ties this together. It doesn't really have a missing limb, it's just that limb is in a different dimension to this one at the moment, rotated away from us in 4D. If it twists itself in 4D, it can bring multiple versions of itself into our reality at once in a weird snaking chain.
Sweet.
That's a cool way to interpret this combination. I am definitely a fan of the 4D stuff ;).
DeleteI'm moderately happy with the current state of this generator, but while I tried to make it generic enough to be open to interpretation in the way you've done here, I wonder if I would have been better off designing it in a more concrete but also more punchy and evocative way like with your You Don't Make Friends With Magnets (https://slightadjustments.blogspot.com/2020/06/you-dont-make-friends-with-magnets.html).
Those Mecha are just so immediately interesting, without any need for interpretation, but also the various parts are so evocative that one could easily just use it as a springboard rather than taking it as-is if they want to anyway.
I do kind of wish I had designed it more like that. I intend to develop this further so I may try to design it more so in that way in the next version.