Is the compulsion to paint a ComGuard force just a universal Battletech experience?

RAD New World features a number of firearms, from black powder muskets to gas-operated, automatic rifles. Simpler guns are commonly available in most settlements and more complicated ones can only be found in the most technically advanced places... With correspondingly high price tags!

Of course, there are abilities that allow characters to make full use of all levels of weapons as well.

Thing is though, the high price and higher level requirements for fully automatic weapons makes them unsuitable for entry level characters... So why bother having them in the core book?

Time to do that kill your darlings thing and trim some fat! I'll remove the advanced firearms and associated abilities, slap them into player handbook two, and use the freed up space for more dynamic abilities with lower tech gear.

Hey, I had an idea. Ever have a hard time making your weathering or damage look naturally chaotic?

Roll a few times on the hit location table and paint where the damage would fall.

Steel Vipers, Gamma Galaxy

Not thrilled with these. The edge highlighting was done when I was too tired to be clean about it and it shows. I also thought doing snake scales would be fuuuuuuuuun. Got another five to paint in this scheme (Timberwolf, Nova, Puma, Locust IIC, and a Mad Dog) before I can call it all done.

Step 1: decide to make tea. Step 2: put kettle on, decide which delicious tea you'll have. Step 3: when kettle is done, apply hot water to tea. Step 4: return to whatever you're doing. Forget about tea. Step 5: rediscover tea when it has evolved a sentient life of its own. Step 6: apply sugar and microwave until nascent life is destroyed in boiling hell water. Step 7: enjoy tea.

Pop quiz, your 'mech may depend on it!

Just finished up helping a new player make a character for an upcoming playtest. Got some good feedback, first and foremost was that I need a better character sheet. The usual spots hit well (mutation selection was a highlight) and the character gelled together nicely. I think the order of selections needs work, but I'm not sure what can be made better to be honest. So many parts are interlocking, it's tricky to place one before the other.

As it stands, you assign attributes, pick a species, select an edge, then pick mutations, skills, and abilities, then assign level points, and lastly buy equipment. Can probably prepare some equipment packages to speed up the buying process... Suggested kit for a mechanic, a diplomat, a fighter, that sort of thing. The problem there is the sheer variety of possible roles a first level character can get into! A fighter for example might be a swordsman, unarmed brute, pistolier, rifleman, grappler, heavy armor knight; there are a LOT of choices.

Anyway, took about 90 minutes to make the character, with banter and some technical problems. He seemed pleased how the options came together. Then we had a good laugh when we realized that he's made a psychic Tangela.

All mutants end up pokemon. It's just how things are.

The Black Marauder resembles an MAD-3R Marauder with flat black paint, although its shape supposedly looks somehow "wrong" and its "proportions not quite right", too sleek yet of terribly imposing bulk and with too-smooth angles. It has no serial number and no other factory markings whatsoever.

Its presence seems to grow larger when sight is obscured by darkness, fog or smoke, incidentally circumstances in which it seems to perform markedly better.

In some instances the 'Mech was—always inconclusively—described to move in ways that are impossible for a Marauder (or any 'Mech), including one tale where it was said to have turned its "head" by bending its long snout just forward of the arm joints and revealed a maw with rows of serrated teeth.

Last commission piece done!

via

Finally done with repainting the Krevakh dynasty court.

There were, uh, problems discovered upon waking up. No worries though! The technomancer, Sulcanos, was really good at grafting canoptek parts onto damaged nobles. Good as new! Definitely! Everyone is happy! This is fine! This is better!

If not sourcebooks, a novel or two would be great.

As someone else pointed out, you can run BT without mechs. There are rules for vehicles, including info on primitive armor and powerplants.

Random Battletech Question

So, as I make my way through Battletech lore via youtube videos, I find that it bugs me that discussions of the Age of War need to say that many of the records from the time period have been lost due to the conflicts going on at the time.

I understand that this is a necessary handwave cuz the devs haven't released a ton of info on the period, or on the consolidation of the Inner Sphere into what we know today, etc. And I understand why, since after all there were no BattleMechs and thus you can't play in that era.

Still, it bugs me, both because I don't quite buy the handwave, and because I want that lore! Granted, I don't play so...

(I know they did a mini-sourcebook for the Age of War)

Am I alone in this?

A gift for the wife for Valentine's day that ran late... Working wire around them to mount them to earrings is proving haaaaaaaaaard.

First round of commission work is done! A pair of FWL lances done up in their custom militia colors, for 42 bucks. You can't even buy two boxes of unpainted IS mechs from Catalyst for that total!

Next up is a whoopin' 10 Clan mechs and a Black Marauder.

Get in on the cheap prices before I get busy!

All you have to do to immediately make an adventuring guild interesting is take them back to how guilds worked in the past.

An adventuring guild is an organization that will break your knees if you try to do adventurer shit in their town. Want to join? Gotta pay dues. Prices for odd jobs are set, as are operational standards and even hours of operation. Deviations from standards will be met with fines or banishment from the guild... And you best believe that the guild will decide what qualifies as adventuring, and that definition will change to whatever's convenient for the current guild masters if the ruling nobles don't step in.

Player characters or protagonists should view an adventuring guild the same way a single entrepeneur trying to open a corner store looks at Walmart. It's monopolistic, powerful, and entirely willing to crush opposition at every opportunity.

why they always gotta give an overview of how adventurer guilds work in isekai stories it's never any different from the thousand other isekai stories

rest assured I'm going to be bothering you long term after i figure out 3d modeling in a way I'm proud of

Fantastic! I'll keep a slot open for ya!

Yehaaaaaaaaaaaaaw. Two folks have decided to partake in mini printing! And one's a custom job! A good start, if I do say so myself.

Pictures to be posted upon completion.