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Rules Clarifications

A topic by DennyColt created Jul 29, 2023 Views: 395 Replies: 10
Viewing posts 1 to 3

-I initially assumed that shields would begin combat at their max value, but there's a throwaway line of text that says enemy units begin at maximum shields unlike pcs. This should probably be clarified somewhere earlier. Also do they drain to 0 at end of combat, or can they carry over?

-I think it would be useful to have a sidebar detailing all your base resources and how/when they refresh, and how they begin/end sessions and combat. You detail how synergy does this quite well, but armour/integrity, bond, strategem refreshes, and shields could all stand to be in the same place imo.

-Also I don't think Episode is defined anywhere? I assume it means game session.

-I think you don't count yourself as an ally but that's not spelled out.

-If you equip two of the same item the stat boosts and strategem uses stack, right? Knight frame implies that. eg. Equip a titanium shield in each hand for +4 arm, +2 soak, +6 max shields, and 4 uses of shield bash?

-'Generate syn across all allies' means divvie it up like a roll does?

-If you would gain more synergy from a single action than your max syn, the excess is lost with no chance to spend it?

-Kinetic regen tallies all damage dealt in an aoe I think. Does it count status effects you cause as well? (Like triggering burning, or charged) If you deal 2 damage and then separately deal 3 does it activate?

-Uncontainable and weightless steps both specify 'phase' for their free shift/boosts. Does this mean both ally phase and enemy phase? Also there are a couple places where enemy actions say they take place during the ally phase that I think are misprints. Pg. 37, non-boss units get 2 actions per allied phase.

-When you pick the 3 starter parts for a fresh mec, can you pick a two handed weapon?

-Interventions that have you roll dice generate synergy right? And also trigger bard core? That seems hella strong if you use a cheap intervention that doesn't need a trigger to activate, like volt knife

-Combining the last two, I'm pretty sure the most powerful starter mech is universal access staff, adaptive boots, and bard core. You're generating an average of 20 synergy with a single basic attack plus intervention, and also 4 shields a round.

-I'm fairly convinced that torque/computers are the strongest stats to buy up because they combo on their own, they have easy access to their neighbor's combos, and they're based on doing things you'll want to do anyway.

-The example starter mec has its stats wrong, the mec skill tree seems to sometimes forget that a mec has a base point in things. Dur and Fin should each be 1 higher

Developer

Hiya! Firstly thank you so much for the feedback! It's stuff like this that helps every version get clearer and cleaner - My replies in order:

> So Shields always start at zero at the beginning of combat and I somehow neglected to mention this anywhere! I've adjusted the intro to Shields line but I really like your side bar idea! (I think it'd go well with an FAQ page I'm adding in Ver 0.14 that covers things like empty equipment slots) - As for whether or not they carry over depends on if you preform a Synergy Dump (pg. 29)

> Yeah Episode generally means "session", however I keep this vague so that if you have a long arc of things happening that make more sense for one episode across two sessions ((or like me have run 8 hour sessions that more consist of 2 episodes) it's not as restrictive - I'll add a line somewhere to clarify this.

> Correct! I'll add a clarification for this somewhere.

> Yep! It all stacks! This is getting added to the FAQ page I was talking about.

> Yes! Any time SYN is generated (unless explicitly said otherwise) it gets divided up as usual. ((Will also get added to the FAQ Page))

> You're only able to generate SYN for yourself if you've built into it with stuff like Kinetic Regen or Optimize. In the event that you do you'd treat it like Overflow SYN (also addressed on Pg. 29)

> The Perks are (eventually) getting an index that spells out all their weird interactions. In an AoE you roll DMG once, that DMG is the DMG you'd regain SYN from ((ex: You hit 3 enemies in an AoE and roll 15 DMG - You'd gain 2 SYN and each enemy would take 15 DMG)) - If say one of the Enemies were Charged and then switched to burning (adding another 5 DMG), you'd gain 3 SYN!

> Yep! That means they can happen once per phase (Enemy and Ally) giving a total of twice per Turn Cycle. Also that is absolutely a misprint and a good catch! Curious as to where the other ones are ((This is why I need to not write after an 11 hour shift at work like I am now haha))

> You can pick a two-handed weapon (and it only counts as one part) - This makes them especially valuable for a starter MEC!

> You're right! Granted you'd only be able to do this once per turn cycle (twice with unrelenting) and wouldn't be doing a lot of DMG with it ((and also sacrificing your options to use Interventions to defend yourself) - Bard Core has gone through a LOT of iterations and likely may see more. One change you may see is that +4 SYN going down to +3 (or maybe even +2). The majority of Steel Hearts was playtested with 4-5 Players, in which that extra 4 SYN helps but isn't felt quite as hard because each player is only getting one.

> This is an awesome early game support build that you could easily stick with and flesh out! If the clarification you needed was "does this work like this?" - yes it does! Especially strong in smaller groups where that 20 SYN is getting divided between fewer people ((granted you'll have less health between you all). Would pair vvv well with a melee DPS who can dump all that SYN into some heavy hits.

> I'm not sure what the clarification you're looking for here is? But it does sound like you've got a good TOR/COM build in mind!

> Lordy this is such a good catch - I just pushed an update to the download files, thank you so much for seeing this. ((And thank you again for all the feedback! -- Sorry for any spelling errors in this reply, it is very late and my brain's a bit fuzzy from dealing with customers at work all day))

Thanks for the reply!  

For the Syn overflow, if you're rolling a basic attack of 30 (9 from a stat, 6 from a gravity, 4 from a feedback detonation, 8 from the overclock amplify, and 3 from a bond) dice with all the tor/com perks you're getting ~14 Syn for yourself. Since Syn overflow specifies ability to spend Syn before you receive more, you then shoot up to 12 and lose the 2? Or are you allowed to spend it at instant speed before it overflows, on say shields or boosts?

And that reminds me, if you target multiple enemies and only elemental detonation some of them I assume you roll the dice separate?

One last thing, does the burning condition deal damage if synergy/tension is spent to remove it, or a 'once per phase' ability? Or is the only way to safely stop burning to let an ally extinguish you? 

Developer

Thank you for all these awesome questions! ((It's really helping me flesh out this FAQ page with a lot of common "edge cases"))


In that instance you'd be allowed to either Boost or Shield at Instant Speed! ((Or even crack a Flash Action and have 2 SYN left over which is something I've seen Playtesters pull when they're rocking highly self optimized endgame MECs))

AoEs only ever roll DMG once - If you caused an elemental detonation, that dice boost applies to the whole AoE! ((It's why elementalists really benefit from AoEs!))

For Burning Players can safely remove it from themselves with SYN or an ally using any variety of Actions. If you take a Once Per Allied Phase Action and have burning that will still proc the DMG though. Likewise burning Tension is another way to safely remove Burning.

Sorry for bumping this, but I had my own question that I think fits here. I just want to double check, do Risk Dice generate SYN? There's a chart on the character sheet that suggests yes, but I don't actually see this explicitly clarified in writing anywhere. Might be a good thing to add?
Anyways, I'm enjoying reading the book so far, easily worth the price, optional or not. I'm hoping to give the system a test run with my group soon. Looking forward to the finished game!

Developer

This would be a great thing to clarify! The answer is actually no - Only Skill Dice the players roll to deal DMG will ever generate SYN. Thank you for saying something! I'll definitely add a clarification into 0.14!

Thank you, good to know! Plus now I have an idea for a cool passive if I ever create a homebrew MEC Class! Something like... Daredevil Core: [[Passive]] : Risk Dice generate SYN. (Feel free to use that if you want.)

Actually one other thing, if the Dual Core takes up 1 Core slot and 1 Fabled slot, and in return, you gain 1 Core slot and 1 Fabled Slot... isn't that a net zero? You're not actually gaining anything from the Dual Core itself... Unless I'm misreading that. There might be a benefit if it can act as a dummy Core for the purposes of a Core Break... but I don't know what happens when you roll a Core Break with two Cores. Might be good to have a rule for if/how redundant/bonus parts break, since the Asura Core also gives bonus slots.

Didn't mean to find another thing to nitpick, just kinda stumbled onto that by accident. Sorry!

Developer

It is absolutely a net zero! (and yeah I give players the mercy of that part breaking instead of the actual core) - This (ostensibly gag part) is one of a handful of Fabled parts that are based off the three campaigns I ran ((I'm planning on breaking them out into their own category eventually)) the dual core in particular was built as a result of a hilariously failed operation by a PC trying to make their own Fabled part with an inept science crew. He'd joked about wanting to make a dual core to scam people earlier in the campaign and so his vision was later realized ((an immortalized in print))

Oh, that’s great actually, love that! Learning that that was intentional gives the moment of confusion a good payoff. I’m thinking about writing a scene where someone tries to sell this to my players. See if anyone takes the bait. Thanks for the response!

It'd also be appreciated if you clarified with Risk Dice counted towards the various ways a Strategem might count dice, such as 2 of a kind, Odds, etc. I assume the answer is no but I didn't find the text that clarified that.

Developer

You assume correctly! I'll add it to the ever growing list of patch notes