Justification and Degree of Difficulty

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If it’s not clear this and the earlier idea posts are written by someone who plays the game and thinks about game design, but not by someone who has any real input on current or future deign. Despite supporting some web resources for DP9 I have zero input on game design. This may be a good thing.

Importantly I recognize that some ideas have more impact than others and, to be honest, I like certain ideas better. I think all have value as pointing out ‘friction points’ in the system, but some are better fixes than others. I’ll admit my idea to make drones more interesting has a lot of arguably undesirable overhead.

Overall, I’d argue Orbital Insertion is both easy and desirable. Cameras is easy, but doesn’t really fix a problem. From the Skies and Droning On try to improve a weak aspect of the rules, but they’re also somewhat complex: i’d pick the air strike change over the drone work, if I was given a choice between them.

This change is much more complex and fixes a problem that, I admit, is partially perceptual.

Stating the Problem

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A relatively common concern in the current Heavy Gear Blitz 3.1 ruleset is that the big tanks can be underwhelming. There’s a few reasons for this, but the one I am discussing here is the low speed of the vehicles.

In “Heavy Gear Blitz” the main Northern and Southern battle tanks (the Aller and Visigoth) have a listed speed of 4. Things at this speed or slower include:

• Verder (An Aller variant, essentially)
• Artemis (Same, but for the Visigoth chassis)
• Infantry on foot (Basic Infantry can move the same speed as the tanks; some elites can go faster!)
• Field Guns designed to be moved with the ‘Towed’ trait
• Buildings

“Things that are faster” is, of course, a much longer list. This includes some of the most elite infantry, the even larger tank that is Utopia’s Gilgamesh, the Gear-Striders, and similar.

So essentially the main battle tanks are slower in play than nearly everything and this feels wrong. They feel off compared to real-world imagery of modern armored vehicles as fast for their size.

A Philosophy of Movement

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However, a point to ponder is that movement in a tabletop miniatures game isn’t meant to be pure, straight-line handling. ‘Movement’ represents certain abstractions based on what the game attempts to model. Heavy Gear Blitz abstracts quite a bit, as it simplifies movement types and turns in an effort to make the game fast and fun to play. Requiring extensive bookkeeping or calculations to move a model isn’t fun generally (and I played Car Wars years ago. The current rules are tuned to be playable and fun, and any changes need to accommodate that.

Statistics

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Let’s look at some numbers:

Values in italics are calculated based off formulas from DP9-001, p120:

• 50 m scale hex MP X 6 = speed in kilometers per hour
• Speed in kilometers per hour/6 = 50 m scale hex MP

The Aller and Visigoth’s Tactical statistics are taken from the books Northern Vehicle Compendium Volume 2 and Southern Vehicle Compendium Volume 2.

Similarly, the Hunter, Jager, and Jaguar statistics were pulled from the first volumes of the vehicle compendiums. The fastest movement mode is shown.

The Top speed for Heavy Gear Blitz rules is the vehicle’s listed movement rate times 2. Notably this does not include bonuses for movement on roads and similar.

Note that wikipedia states the M1’s speed is limited by a governor. The listed numbers are used as exceeding this will cause drivetrain damage and other issues.

Speeds Compared to Earlier Editions

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Th chart shows that the Aller and Visigoth were slowed down between the older material and the current edition of Heavy Gear Blitz! In earlier editions the Hunter and Jager were slower than the main battle tanks but became faster for the newer game. As I suggest earlier, this is presumably due to abstraction and game balance: The old rules assumed 50m hexes while the current game assumes a more detailed tabletop scale. Also, unit cost is important, as the cost of a Visigoth that is also as fast as a Jager would probably make it even more impractical.

Speeds Compared to a Real World Example

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A modern tank would be much faster than the Aller or Visigoth but the true speedsters of the setting would race past it. I’m assuming the theoretical Abrams in Heavy Gear Blitz would be assigned a speed of ‘G:6’ based off these numbers.

What do we want to see?

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My ideal image for the game is that main battle tanks should be capable of of fast movement at times. In open terrain they can and should have advantages. They’re hindered in urban combat and unable to use their straight-line power. In built-up environments, this would suggest that people trying to hold a town would want to set up barriers and otherwise make it difficult for heavy armored vehicles to move in, but these would have minimal impact on Gears or Infantry.

A Solution, but with Caveats

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A possible solution for this would be to implement a system where Top Speed is harder to obtain and may have side effects. I’ve outlined a rough draft of this as a concept below.

1: The Movement Stats

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First, let’s assume we’re switching from MR (Movement Rate) listed with the current notation (“W/G: 6”) to something with a single bit of additional detail: (“W/G:6/6”). This isn’t splitting the movement up by movement types, but stating that a Top Speed move is the specified move (in addition to the first value).

This is done so that some vehicles can remain constant (most Gears, to be honest) while Tanks, vehicles known for ‘fast’ modes (Nagas, Ferrets and descendants) can receive a bonus. There’s even a possibility for some vehicles to be assigned a value like W: 5/3. Possibly the Mammoth or some other unit that is unlikely to really go much further if pushed.

The Aller and Visigoth might be “G:4/6” which should be interpreted as “If the tank chooses to move top speed, it will move a total of 10 (4+6) inches.”

2: Redefining Terrain

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The next step is to redefine terrain a bit. The lowest ’layer’ of terrain would be some sort of classification. Essentially, the board is divided into three classifications:

• Open: Representing barren wasteland, rolling fields, and broad roadways (highways or similar)
• Built Up: The ‘default’ for towns and cities, or similar terrain such as clear areas assumed to have lots of minor obstacles and risks.
• Difficult: The most risky terrain is probably what’s left after a lot of conflicts. Very dangerous with multiple hazards and risks to vehicle crews.

Implementing this would probably lead to additional terrain changes.

Representing this would be interesting: It would require some guidelines that may be more or less difficult depending on the terrain collections various people have at hand. An idealized terrain configuration for this setup would likely be a bulls-eye set of concentric circles ranging from Open at the edge to Difficult in the middle. Add to this a few multi-lane clear roads to extend Open through the area.

These three would likely be applied to the existing ‘surface’ terrain types.

This is a more realistic configuration.

3. Movement

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With this change, when a model selects Top Speed a Piloting roll is required. If passed, the model receives the Top Speed modifiers and may move the normal move and the Top Speed movement. If failed, the model receives the modifiers but can only move the basic speed.

The Pilot roll is modified by various traits much like any other roll:

This table is written with Gears in mind as the ‘middle’ of the setting. Infantry and Cavalry have a slightly easier time Gears, representing those unit’s increased nimbleness in urban terrain.

One thought is that this is rolled based off the terrain the model starts in, so charging into that dense urban chaos is easy… But getting free may not be.

Desired Result

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The intent, again, is that heavy armored vehicles can move freely with haste if they’re staying otu of built-up areas. Gears and smaller units can be more daring.

Expansions

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In addition to the probably prohibitive amount of play-testing this would likely incur, there’s a few ideas to further expand the idea.

Additional Traits

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Additional traits for specific bonuses, similar to Precise for weapons, are an obvious option. Some units could also gain a bonus, for example Infantry and smaller Power Armor might gain an effect like easy or free Hide actions if in Difficult Terrain.

Enhanced Structures

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Another thought is to have certain ‘standardized’ terrain pieces that can be selected when building a force that project a radius or other defined shape. A somewhat complex version would be to have a base piece (like the current Housing Module) and allow it to place two other small pieces on small bases (28mm round based Water Condensers, Solar Panels, or Windmills) with specified rules to create a small ‘zone’ that has an effect applied.

Disclaimer

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I’ve done work for Dream Pod 9 but this is my own thoughts and in no way represents the company. I am not being compensated for this article and used images without permission.