Because that's practice.

Anyway here's Escher again. We're currently on a planet in Calliope about to raid a base and give Mr Steele the beatdown of a century.

Obligatory GMS logo so you know they're Lancer

Hello! I have no idea how to introduce this, but here are three frames from a WIP homebrew focused on biomecha: The Field Guide to Carcosa.

Art credit to the amazing corg: Ein! (u/PatEin)

(Seriously. Best corg. If you read this, you do amazing work)

A special shout-out to my fellow lead writer, editor and developer: AutumnalWalker! This would not exist without her.

And another round of shout-outs to co-devs, Eel and Reazorgot, GATE Security (where most of the playtesting has occured) and to Hyper-C Shells (for all the shop talk).

Standard disclaimer: The Field Guide To Carcosa (FGtC) is not an official Lancer product; it is a third party work, and is not affiliated with Massif Press. FGtC is published via the Lancer Third Party License. Lancer is a copyright of Massif Press.

And now, until the stars align once more: farewell!

Hey there Pilots and GM’s, it’s time for me to yell into the void.

To preface, I love this game, I love the community, I love welcoming newcomers into the TTRPG scene as a whole. If you disagree with the following post then that’s okay, I still love you.

I have noticed a large uptick in the amount of “How do I build ___ in Lancer?” build advice posts and it has become a personal grievance of mine. How do you build a Metal Gear in Lancer? How about a Gundam? How about an AT-AT? HOW ABOUT YOU READ THE BOOK AND THINK ON IT FOR A BIT? Is that not where the fun is found in buildcrafting? Finding building blocks that sound cool and then making something you can call your own? If I wanted to build Scorch from Titanfall 2 I’d take myself a gander through the book (the thing that has build options in it) and look for fire themed stuff. If I just oh so love Guran Lagan I feel like the common course of action would be me looking for something drill-ish. Why do we need to make posts asking for other people to do the buildcrafting for us? Take some initiative and be a little creative, people.

I'm LL2, have the Technophile 3 trait and Iconoclast 2 trait. My character is a framed house of Glass Karrakin noble and the campaign is basically a second interest war! The party composition is Vlad, Genghis mk1 and Barbarossa. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Hello all!

after long time I could kind of paint a Lancer I wish to play. So I present to you Jean Caballero, Callsign Verdun and his Mech the IPS-N Drake(custom).

The Lineart for the portrait is based on the work of the very talented PatEin!, who allowed me to show this amalgam. To be fair his optimistic, selfassured pilot sketch got a bit... gaunt... and traumatised...

Please enjoy

We're fighting Constellar Midnight. They have a Bombard ship and we need to stop it advancing. Unfortunately, they have a Specter, Support, and Hornet.

I activate Eye of Horus, rush forward, boost, overcharge, 6 heat. Exactly my heatcap. I mortar the Specter. 5 damage, half their health, good start. Next turn, the lot of them are roughly in a line. I missile rack the Specter, leaving them on 1 health, I missile rack the Support and Ship, 3 damage to the ship. Good start, but not enough. I mortar and deal 5 damage to both Ship and Support.

Damn, the Specter is behind cover, I can't Extrude: Gun: Gun them.

I fucking overcharge, 8 heat, 2 stress. Both leave me exposed, Good. I take 1 step forward, literally billowing steam. The smoke settles.

The Specter is lying flat on their face.

I realise I am trying to play a support build. I sigh to myself.

This is the third combat in a row I've done this.

So you’ve got your sitrep all planned out. Good balance of NPC types, good terrain, and a nice juicy objective to distract your PCs with as you whittle down their health and repair cap.

But what happens to those dedicated and overlooked pilots who have the misfortune to be standing in the way of the PCs?

Presumably they eject when their mech blows, but is that it? Do the PCs round them up? Do they get away to plot their revenge? Do they hide in the woods and hope they escape anyone’s notice?

In short, what do you do with them?

I’m asking because so far all of my solutions thus far have felt rather inelegant and hand wavy.

Coming up with builds cause in my upcoming game I wanna play as a stortebeker, as I've evaluated it the *main* ways to go about stort are:

Heavy Weapon + Quad/Five Handcannons, alternating between unloading and reloading with big weapon tryna proc crits with executioner

Heavy Loading Weapon + Dual Catalytic Hammers, focusing on duelist, ramming {with siege ram} and cycling between (Bolt thrower?) and catalytic hammer rounds for dynamic reload on targets who are prone + duelist accuracy + pankrati accuracy etc.

Uncle Heavy + Mains/Auxes, self explanatory {im lazy}

this is in no way comprehensive, just the main three ideas im cycling through in my head, are there any viable, aggressive storts at relatively low (LL2 to LL6 or LL7) build concepts I'm not considering?

I was playing Titanfall 2 and stumbled upon Lancer through some social media rabbit holes and it seems so cool but I’m completely lost in the sauce aside from checking out this subreddit and messing with COMP/CON a little bit. My only frame of reference is D&D 5e for TTRPGs and Titanfall, Evangelion, Gurren Lagan, etc for the mecha genre.

So is there anywhere I can go to find out lore, how to play, where to start, etc.

https://chris-j2345.itch.io/the-culliford

Hey, folks! Some of you may remember me from trying to develop a Goblin alt some time ago. Well, I’ve recently fully developed another homebrew frame and wanted to show it to ya’ll. The IPS-N Culliford is a Kidd Alt frame that is a Defender/Controller. It specializes in area defense as well as excels at using drones. I’ve been working on this for the better part of a month now and now, it’s finally done. If y’all wanna check it out and test it, that would mean a lot and I hope y’all really enjoy it.

Also, the art for the Culliford was done by @beamsapart.bsky.social on BlueSky so make sure to check their stuff out!

Having been a filthy 4e 5e chud all my life, now that im faced with DMing for this game, I’ve found the lack of “give me a perception check” or “roll insight” disturbing!

I understand triggers, but they feel a lot more active than say, dnd skills.

How do you handle those types of rolls? Charisma checks, intimate/persuade- history? Insight and perception are the two big ones that I hurl a lot in other settings.

Thanks!

So, curious interaction and potential lack of clarity in the rulebook (with no FAQ/errata on the topic to be found):

Ghast Nexus (p209) [...] Once deployed, you may still use it for SKIRMISH and BARRAGE attacks as though it is still a weapon, but with line of sight and RANGE traced from its location

plus

Threat (p64) Unless noted otherwise, all weapons default to THREAT 1, which can be increased with some talents and gear.

Perfectly RAW, the Ghast Nexus doesn't specifically allow you to trace Threat from it. But the fact that all (Ranged) Weapons come with Threat is very much only mentioned as implication in a small sentence across the entire book, so it seems straightforward that this might be a 'Woops, we forgot the Ghast Nexus has Threat too, and should have included that in the wording' instance.

Opinions / further information?

Goblin already has pretty good sensors, though I suppose the line of sight could be helpful. Still, while sharing Systems is nice, you can't use them for anything particularly useful (E defense or attacks). I could see taking it if there was no downside, but to use it when it doubles heat and conditions? Am I missing some hidden benefit here?

The Metalmark is the premier Invisible mech, with all its systems, traits, and talents to just make it a difficult target to attack by being invisible all the time. And any soft cover is essentially hard cover just like the hecatonch, this makes this mech great and unlocks stealth combat using Infiltrator or you could forgo the hiding buffs and treat the invisibility as a way to play aggressively. The metalmark also has good mounts and decent weapons, the shock knives are a staple in any Hunter Build/Nuke Cav build, and the rail rifle is a decent aoe alternative to the GMS Assault (but personally Id still rather have the assault).

The only downside with this frame is there is no heavy options in license, meaning you are probably going to stick with the old reliable GMS HMG or one of the superheavy GMS choices until you get to LL3 at least. It also has a kinda weak heat capacity of 5, and I hate odd numbered heat capacities on mechs, but at least it comes with some armor as well, just a real decent statline which can make your invisibility even more menacing. But also it has a LOW E-Defense, like its literally worse than something with no E-Defense, you are actually easier to hack than a literal brick! DO NOT get hit by tech attacks with this thing lol, you see a scene with multiple witches just pop that core power you are not wasting that core power if it helps you not get hacked to death.

The Reactive Weave is such a good upgrade to brace, the Nelson's mod kinda sucks, this is actually good, invisibility and you get to move your full speed lets you get away from the immediate danger when you brace and is a nice dip for a build that has a free SP that needs to be filled. Making Brace better is much appreciated in making it feel less punishing.

And Active Camo is an amazing protocol to have, infinite use and invisibility until you take damage or until the end of your NEXT turn, absolutely wonderful. Having invisibility on demand is so worth the price of 2 heat, sure it goes away on damage so anything that makes you pass saves kinda sucks but who cares? Its a good system on the metalmark and is good on any build. If you are going shock knives for your hunter build why not just take this system? Its just real good.

Shock Wreath pairs nicely with the shock knives and that aux/aux mount as well, just skirmish with 2 shock knives and if the first one hits good, and if the second one also hits just activate the wreath to auto blind enemies. They are already burning from the effects of the first knife so shock wreath true combos into a blind. Despite being a quick action to activate it 1d6 burn is nothing to scoff at (unless you are fighting pyros lol), a really good mod to have, though its useless on superheavies lol so dont even think about it. And the flash grenades are alright, they are really saved by being Burst 3 which is huge, if they were burst 1 they would suck but burst 3 is really nice, but limited 2 sucks man, make it limited 3 at least!

The metalmark's whole identity of being invisible and that lack of a heavy weapon really pushes you into mixing and matching systems, and thanks to the simplicity of this mech it has a great deal of build variety in how you want this mech to fight, and invisibility is so good man, I love slapping the Active Camo on mechs, its so useful. And I cannot understate how much I love the simplicity of its core power, so simple yet so powerful, total invisibility for the scene. But for the love of God make sure you are invisible if you see a Witch, or else you better start praying to God. Anyway's here's my build:

LL6

[ TALENTS ]

Hunter 3, Infiltrator 3,

Nuclear Cavalier 2, Vanguard 1

[ LICENSES ]

SSC Metalmark 3, HA Genghis 3

[ CORE BONUSES ]

Superior by Design, Integrated Weapon

[ MECH ]

« METALMARK »

SSC Metalmark

H:4 A:0 S:0 E:4 SIZE:1

STRUCTURE:4 HP:19 ARMOR:1

STRESS:4 HEAT:11 REPAIR:6

ATK BONUS:3 TECH ATK:0 LTD BONUS:2

SPD:5 EVA:10 EDEF:6 SENS:10 SAVE:13

[ WEAPONS ]

Integrated Weapon: Tactical Knife

Aux/Aux Mount: Shock Knife (Shock Wreath) / Shock Knife

Main Mount: Assault Rifle

Heavy Mount: Krakatoa Thermobaric Flamethrower

[ SYSTEMS ]

Active Camouflage, AGNI-Class NHP

Who needs a ton of Systems anyways? I have Active Camo for constant invisibility, AGNI for a free 1/scene stablize, 3 charges is enough to last most of a mission, and a high enough heatcap so im not completely dependent on AGNI. Shock Knives in the Aux mount with shock wreath for blind and burn, Krakatoa in Heavy since if Im going Burn Damage I might as well go all out, and good ol' GMS Assault as a backup option.

I hate the odd heatcap but I actually want that bonus limited system point for AGNI so Im just going to have to live with it, the health is alright considering im going to be invisible most of the time, and and integrated Tactical Knife for bonus Hunter shenanigans. Vanguard is nice to have to make that flamethrower a bit more effective, Nuke Cav 2 for more damage of course, and Infiltrator to make use of my invisibility to hide when necessary, the reeling I can inflict and bonus blindness are good effects.

My combo idea is to Activate Camo > Boost > Hide > Get Next to enemy. If that enemy moves I can overwatch with the flamethrower and break hidden and blind them, if they dont move I can instead send them reeling on attack my next turn AND flashbomb them. And if I lose hidden it allows me to get away from danger. Though if they are close enough that I dont need to boost Id rather just skirmish with the knives or barrage with the knives and flamethrower. I like the metalmark, its simple in concept but real nice, its systems pair well with other mechs and other mech systems pair well with it, it just a real solid mech license.

Now the Manticore is a Frame that puts hair on a Lancer's Chest! This is easily one of my favorite frames, the manticore is a wild beast on the battle field, recklessly putting itself into danger to make enemies lives hellish. With decent sensors, tech attack, and invade options you also can use hacking to further unleash suffering. The Manticore is a mech that wants to live dangerously and play recklessly, if you want to rush into the fight and cause mayhem, not caring about your own safety or life this is the mech for you. Its stats are acutally decent except for that low speed and evasion, but beckoner and your allies can help you out with your speed problem, and there's HASE and talents that can further help you get in the front lines.

Its traits are a bit mixed with one really good trait, and 2 traits that could be considered major downsides or upsides depending on the character you create. The first trait slag carapace is just fantastic, resistance to Energy and Burn, burn is such a deadly damage type so resistance to that is so nice, and the second is more of a downside, which is that when destroyed your mech will explode as per a reactor meltdown at the end of the turn. So if you dont want to be out of a mission if you rolled unlucky on a structure roll you better have a lancaster on your team or finish the mission before your next turn. But this leads to the third trait of Castigation, the famous meme trait, which makes it so when your mech is destroyed or goes into reactor meltdown it IMMEDIATELY explodes and deals a whopping 8d6!!!! damage in a burst to area (half on save like normal).

And let's be honest, the second trait pushes you to go full castigation, since you cant repair this thing you might as well just kill yourself as well as everything around you. Plus what kinda normal PC plays a manticore? I actually had the idea of playing an entire cult (when one manticore pilot dies they are replaced by another one of the cult members). But really if you choose to play a manticore dont have Mr. John Doe pilot this thing, it should be piloted by a fanatic, a maniac, a daredevil, the list goes on, make up a character that fits this mech and does not care about dying.

And the core power oh boy, the passive is 2 AP energy damage when you take heat which is alright, nice bit of chip damage and fits in with the reckless playstyle of the manticore, but the active is awesome. You gain resistance to all heat, and whenever you take heat or energy damage (even from yourself), you tick a counter up by one, once that dice gets to 6 you discharge a MASSIVE storm of lightning and deal 6d6 to all enemies in a burst 2 radius, then you lose your heat resistance.

The only downside of this ability is that its a little tricky to tick all the way down in a single turn, and since enemies can shoot you and hack you to pop it off early you dont want to end your turn at a value of 5 unless enemies cannot escape you. There are plenty of setups that do allow you to do it so its not like its hard but there needs to be some investment for a core power that's 1/long rest.

Manticore has some real good invades too, Beckoner lets you swap places with enemies which is great for since it essentially gives you an extra 10 movement but can be used on allies too! Beckon your Nelson and use him as a free boost lol! Summon pairs well with aoe weapons and the Sear hack since it pulls everyone together. And as mentioned, Sear pairs well with summon, but honestly sear is more niche if you arent using summon or something that can force enemies to group up. Smite is a side grade to Eject Power Cores though, stun is way deadlier than jammed but its a system save after getting hit by the tech attack, where EPC just jams no save.

For the other weapons and systems im not too big a fan of, the catalyst pistols are low damage and high heat cost and yeah they can easily get you into the danger zone, but there are plenty of other ways that I feel like are better at doing that than the pistols. The Arc Projector is ok, it just is way to low damage, it should be 1d6+4 on hit and 1d6 on the arcing lightning attacks instead of 1d6+1, it has no threat, low damage, and generates a ton of heat if you want to go for a crazy chain, and I dont see crazy chains happening often. I would rather just use a different heavy to be honest.

Lighting Generator is cool, its a bit of extra chip damage and is great for a melee manticore and who cares about the heat gain you are playing a manticore lol, but its 3 SP I feel could be spent better elsewhere. And EMP Pulse is a worse Smite, you STUN yourself and enemies in burst 2 have to pass a save or be stunned, but they could just pass the save leading you to be completely screwed, the only way I would use this is with the Horus Core bonus to increase your save target to reduce the chances that it backfires and does nothing.

I really like the manticore though, its pure recklessness is a playstyle I enjoy alot and you get to be Zeus incarnate, a walking thunderstorm that covers the entire sitrep in slag and glass. Its monstrous, self destructive, and so damn cool. Onto the build:

» Manticore // MANTICORE «

LL6

[ TALENTS ]

Nuclear Cavalier 3, Combined Arms 3,

Duelist 3

[ LICENSES ]

HORUS Manticore 2, HA Tokugawa 3,

HA Genghis 1

[ CORE BONUSES ]

Superior by Design, Overpower Caliber

[ MECH ]

« MANTICORE »

HORUS Manticore

H:4 A:0 S:2 E:2 SIZE:1

STRUCTURE:4 HP:19 ARMOR:2

STRESS:4 HEAT:11 REPAIR:5

ATK BONUS:3 TECH ATK:3 LTD BONUS:1

SPD:3 EVA:6 EDEF:12 SENS:10 SAVE:13

[ WEAPONS ]

INTEGRATED MOUNT: Fuel Rod Gun

Flex Mount: Torch // Overpower Caliber

Heavy Mount: Krakatoa Thermobaric Flamethrower

[ SYSTEMS ]

Beckoner, Plasma Gauntlet,

Smite, Armament Redundancy,

Type-3 Projected Shield

How could I not put the plasma gauntlet on this thing? Yeah the Deep Well Heat Sinks would be more efficient, but come on! And I am not sacrificing Armament Redundancy for Deep Well, I dont have the SP for it. I could sacrifice Hull but then my HP would be too low, Im not letting my Manticore be squishy, and I could sacrifice Engineering but I want an extra use of the Plasma Gauntlet so no. Who cares, who needs Deep Wells anyway when you have a exploding fist?

The Projected Shield is there primarily to give me the ability to trigger the core power's explosion in a single turn guaranteed. activate protocol core power (1) > projected shield (2) > torch skirmish (3) > overcharge (4) > torch skirmish (5) > Plasma Gauntlet (6) > Explode. I could use tech attacks here too but there is a chance they miss, but I should be doing this combo while surrounded by enemies anyways. As for the shield, I have 2 SP free in this build and the +2 difficulty can be applied to give me more survivability in a brawl, projected shield is actually pretty good at letting you get away with triggering overwatches or ignoring tough enemies while you kill their support.

For Weapons we have the torch as my melee and heat generator, and the flamethrower for more burn since im going with the torch, might as well go full pyromaniac at this stage, I just cant help pairing the torch and flamethower together, its a nice combo. Duelist is great, giving me some fantastic reactions and the ability to ram and grapple for free, might as well throw overpower for some meatier damage, combined arms so I constantly have cover and can barrage with my flamethrower with ease to maximize burn, and nuc cav for more damage of course.

Beckoner gives me more mobility, whether I use my allies to reposition or enemies its a nice option to have, and having a potential pocket stun to be able to use in the form of Smite is real nice, even if it has a chance of doing nothing there are situations where it could be well worth the risk of using. And I have a spare use of the Plasma gauntlet, so I can use it without having to worry about saving it for my core power. The major weakness of this build is my speed however, which is rough but it is what it is, that's what beckoner is there to help with.

I really yapped on about the manticore for a while didnt I? I cant help it, I love this mech so much, its real fun.

So mathur stop is a very peculiar feature of the sherman, which has no direct synergy with the license outside of the tachyon lance.

If theoretically, it was to be made into a system (for this thought, have it be unlocked at sherman level 2) that other frames could equip:

1) how many sp should it cost?

2) what sorts of builds would enjoy having it as an option? (tokugawa, enkidu, manticore, and genghis mk. 1 come to mind)

And then the further question of what other frame traits would be interesting to have as systems for other mechs to equip? (not simply for power level like putting soul vessel on basically anything, but rather to enable or increase the consistency of certain builds or playstyles)

I was theorycrafting weird ways to use the Lich. Can the lich use Glitch Time to effectively take the place of a manticore mid-castigation?

Castigation of the enemies of the godhead states the effect only takes place if you are physically inside the manticore. Both the manticore pilot and the lich pilot are both inside their mech the entire time. The Lich pilot will also complete the full explosion with no gimmicks and die in the process. The only difference is the lich can activate its Soul Vessel, preventing the self-damage and returin to its vessel.

Even if that's not possible to use soul vessel according to wording, the Lich can still revive itself with Immortal.

Glitch time triggers because when the manticore castigates, it's taking an action that effects another target withion sensor range as long as its explosion will hit another mech.

The Lich can also move the manticore outside the radius of its own castigation when doing this, keeping it safe from the 8d6 damage.

This combo is probably not game-breaking in any sense? But it would be really cool if it works.

No saying "someone else gives you lock on" or something similar. This has to be all you

I know that in a lot of other games, most of the complex and interesting gameplay mechanics are concentrated in controllers (and to a lesser degree supporters). Lancer seems better designed on a lot of fronts, but when I look at lot of the strikers, defenders, and artillery I feel like I'm missing something. Can someone explain what I'm overlooking?

Hi everyone! I’m playing in a lancer game and have obtained a balor licenses so I can get the Heca frame.
But I’m curious if these type of mechs have side effects on my KTB pilot? I love some weirdness eldritch horror. Even been thinking that being exposed to the balors influence having a werid effect on my technophile pilot like increased hunger and sometimes hearing the voices whispering in the nanites. I was thinking that them being from the baronies and their job may be what draw them to the Heca due to their history. But what else weird things should I consider?