BCZ Retrospective XVII: New Combination Upgrades

BCZ didn't introduce any new Extra Areas or Alternate Forms, so we're skipping straight to Combinations. I I tried to make new Extra Areas and new Transformation Upgrades, by the way, but they were kind of... Broken. That's a topic for another day, though.

So,Combiner Mecha. One of the many thorns in my side when trying to write a game that is both fun and also simple. I mentioned last time that the BCG version of the Combiner rules is very powerful and very flavorful, it was only missing mid-battle Combinations as a genre convention. This is where we pick up today.

Invincible Super Combination
Very, very late into the BCG development process (late enough that I knew we were going to be late in delivering the Kickstarter rewards), Super Combination was still the subject of much discussion. We kept going back and forth on whether it was worth it to sacrifice multiple HP pools and multiple attacks per round to make one super unit. The argument boiled down to two things: Whether your super robot army could replenish their resources by combining and the final Attributes of the Combined Unit.

This first issue was the trickiest one. Replenishing your Threshold, Oneshots, etc. is extremely powerful. If I balanced Super Combiners around, then I was stealth nerfing anyone who deployed precombined. I figured that many groups would rather simply do that, jumping straight to the payoff of their combined super robot than have to do the whole song and dance of battle in their weaker mechs while risking that one of them might explode. I didn't want to force that playstyle on them.

The second issue was simply a matter of numbers. Every time something about Super Combination changed, it was either too cheap at high Levels for the massive Attribute boost it granted or too expensive for the tiny Attribute bonus it granted at low Levels. This was just a matter of numbers though, so while it was certainly difficult, it wasn't a playstyle problem. Eventually one playtester suggested  adding a "Tax" to Super Combination that scaled according to the Level of the PCs to fix this problem, and I decided to make said "Tax" an Upgrade in itself... For the expansion.

There was a nonzero chance that baking this Tax into the core Super Combination rules would have unintended consequences and could break something. With only a few days until the final pdf files had to be sent to the printer to check for printing errors, I made the call to leave Combiners relatively underpowered (Yes, they were considered underpowered back then) and made a mental note to properly playtest Super Combiners with these additions in the expansion.

The story does not end here yet, however. ISC went through a few different versions, the stupidest being the one in which every Subpilot choose one of Might, Guard, Systems or Speed then gave that Attribute from their mech to the lead, resulting in a very flavorful insanely overpowered mess. The idea was that you could make the legs grant a Speed boost, the Torso a Guard boost, etc. But even when limiting this to 1 Area/Attribute per Subpilot and 4 Subpilots total, it still gave us Mechs with 20+ in every Attribute. We settled on a flat +1 to those four stats per Subpilot not long after the first few builds and never looked back.

And that is the story of ISC.

Universal Component
Universal Component (UC) had similar issues to ISC. We knew it was going to give Upgrades and Weapons, but we had to figure out if it healed both partners and if it granted any Attribute bonuses. The answer, by the way, was yes - sorta. The UC restores anything they've spent, but the lead doesn't. This encourages the UC to take risks and do combat on their own if they want to maximize the value they can get from their mech, but since they can combine with any PC (and if they go down the squad only lost 1 PC, not the whole Combiner) the risk of things going catastrophically wrong is much lower. You can still make a UC build that is pure support and deploys precombined, of course. It is probably weaker, but much safer as well as more generally useful.

That's it for both Combinations in BCZ. I'm okay with how they turned out, overall. There are some issues with Combiners where obviously the lead has the most fun out of everyone, but I don't think you can really fix that without giving each Subpilot loads of options and probably an element of chance, which would overly complicate a series of Upgrades that are already the most complex in the game. Ultimately, playing a Subpilot is for people who actually want to be a Subpilot, much like playing Healers is for people who enjoy playing them, not a role that people should be forced into.

As an anecdotical observation, I think that by now I've seen more NPC Combiners as Superbosses instead of actual parties with Combiner PCs. I'd be interested in hearing any experiences you may have with them!

Next: Design Flaws. Hooo boy.

Gimmick Out.

BCZ Retrospective XVI: New Support Upgrades

Support Upgrades were a little on the underpowered side in BCG, however this wasn't so much because the Upgrades themselves were bad, rather it was because the Action economy didn't favor them. The bulk of the work in improving them was from General Upgrades which meant I had to be careful not to make the next set of Support Upgrades too powerful - or else they'd go from slightly underpowered to flat-out overpowered. That's why the six new Support Upgrades in BCZ provide utility value instead of doing, preventing or amplifying Damage.

Dividing Field
One of my favorite things about the expansion was that it opened the floodgates to many new abilities using all sorts of wacky space tech that might as well be magic. The Dividing Field is inspired by the Dividing Driver from GaoGaiGar, it is more or less what the flavor text describes. The big difference between the Dividing Driver and the Dividing Field is that the former was used to create a battlefield where the mechs can go wild without causing collateral damage while the latter is used to get rid of annoying Terrain properties. It is useful, but not too powerful due to its reactive nature.

Remote Hotfix
I believe this was a Restoration back in an early BCG draft, but it was a very lackluster one - for reasons that should be obvious considering it is now back as a 5 MP Support Upgrade. It's not an efficient Antimaim by any stretch of the imagination but it's a nice option to have as part of a Support suite. You really want to have 4-6 Support Upgrades, and if you're not going for a build with a secondary tank or healer role, this could come in handy.

Targeting Disruption
Speaking of secondary roles, this lets you do work as the party's off-tank! You can now let the main tank breathe while they heal or defend by tanking yourself! From a long distance too! With that said, 5 Energy (or your whole Action) for just a -4 attack penalty to a single target isn't really all that punishing and the Enemy might as well ignore you just because you got the worse part of the trade. Maybe the penalty should be equal to your Systems? Or should this have instead been able to target multiple enemies? It is a little underpowered, but it is not terrible.

Blue Screen Virus
Speaking of trades that aren't very good, trading one of your Actions for that of a Grunt is, on paper, a terrible idea. However, depending on the specific kind of Grunt this can turn a battle by shutting down a Guardian of Steel, Jury-Rigger or another key Unit. It's not amazing, but it's a solid pick if you expect to fight intelligent Grunts often.

Cryogenic Blast
This is one of the few ways for PCs to create Withering Terrain and it comes with a patch of Difficult Terrain to make it stick. It's not amazing, but it is very annoying. Anything that can drain Energy is, in general, very good. The area effect is simultaneously a good and bad thing, because it can hit multiple enemies but you also have to be careful not to hit your allies as well. This is probably the worst result you can get with Transpatial Randomizer if your Systems stat is low, as it will hit you... And probably hit your friends as well.

Gravity Manipulators
There are many abilities that let you push people around as a secondary effect, but this is the only one whose entire point is repositioning Enemies. It can also reposition Allies or even yourself if your team is desperate for movement. It used to cost 5 MP but that made Support users the absolute rulers of battlefield positioning and let them do a bunch of free Damage every Round by knocking Enemies into walls or each other, so it got a cost increase. It is a lot less useful now, as moving someone 1-5 Zones is rarely worth an Action, so I'm not super happy about the change. I'd be less happy with the overpowered version, though.

That's all! Support users are amazing now and the new Upgrades give them some additional utility without bumping up their raw power to obnoxious degrees. The one thing I'm not entirely satisfied with about Support Upgrades is that most of their value comes from spamming 5 MP Supports to the point where some builds ignore the 10 MP Supports entirely. I wonder if the more expensive ones could have instead been cheaper so that they would be compatible with EWAC. For Upgrades like Electromagnetic Detonator or Fire at Will some tweaking would've probably done the trick, but for Blue Screen Virus and Gravity Manipulators it would be a lot harder to figure out how to rework them.

Next: New Combination Upgrades.

Gimmick Out.

BCZ Retrospective XV: New Mobility Upgrades.

This entry also has just another two Upgrades and they're honestly pretty basic. They have a shared history in that I knew I was going to make them from the first day of making BCG, but figured their niche nature should keep them to an expansion book. And that's 

Maritime Module

The underwater version of Antigravity, for those times when Terrain Specialist (Underwater) isn't enough. Maritime Module is secretly one of the most powerful Upgrades in the game because it makes you immune to deep sea pressure and also to phase through underwater walls. The wording is the same as Antigravity except for it only working underwater, and Antigravity can fly over Impassable Terrain, so... Yeah, another thing to keep in mind for the future. It turns out that making a deliberate effort to keep text the same (I thought it would help people memorize it easier and minimize confusion) for abilities that work in very different contexts isn't the best idea.

Zero-G Module

It's Antigravity but in spaaace. The things I pointed out with MM above also apply to Zero-G Module, except it is even stronger because (unlike underwater) space settings are expected to have space stations and asteroid fields and weaponized meteors. Hell, you can even no-sell a black hole with this thing, if you go by the rules as written. What was I even thinking? Obviously, these things won't happen in a remotely serious game and the GM will raise an eyebrow anytime someone even brings them up, but the purpose of good rules is to minimize the amount of rulings that GMs have to make. I'd be embarrassed but, frankly, the sheer absurdity of what this Upgrade enables is way too funny to me.

And that's both Mobility Upgrades! I knew there weren't going to be many of them in the expansion, as they are basically "General Upgrades that I want to be Maimable for balance reasons (and themed around making you more mobile)" and the list of things that apply to that criteria is quite tiny.

Next: Support Upgrades

Gimmick Out

BCZ Retrospective XIV: New Restoration Upgrades.

There are only two Restoration Upgrades in BCZ and they come with a sidebar that explains their function: They're mostly meant for Combiner Subpilots. Combiners in BCG were already very powerful, but the Subpilots of the 3rd Component and beyond didn't have many options to use. The lead would attack, one of the subs would Maneuver, and everyone else would, like, maybe Boost or use a Support? It wasn't an exciting job to have. Now they have two more options which, while not particularly powerful, do succeed at making them more versatile.

G-Charger
The G-Charger was originally either a Restoration in the core book or a Support Upgrade, I forget which, and it was extremely niche. Cranking up your Energy output is, as I've pointed out last time, very exploitable. The part that wasn't good at all about the G-Charger was that it used up your Turn to do so, making it largely useless to anyone except Subpilots. Worse, it was confusing, people would pick it and expect to get an Energy boost for one Turn, then be disappointed when they learned that wasn't the case and scratch their heads or fume at what a waste of points this thing was. I brought it back for the expansion because A) Extremely niche and potentially confusing abilities are the expansion's thing. B) I realized I could write sidebars to explain the purpose of particularly quirky things. Anyway, the G-Charger is ok. It's not amazing, because there aren't that many ways to abuse having tons of Energy, but it's very handy with Boost Powers and against Energy debuffs.

Reload
The Resupply Upgrade used to be cheaper, had a Range of 1 and only spent one use at a time. Much like G-Charger, that wasn't very good. Though at least it did something for single-pilot Units, unlike G-Charger. When Resupply was made more powerful (and also more expensive), I figured that the expansion could have a weaker Resupply exclusively for Subpilots that had the old functionality. Like G-Charger, this is the kind of ability that was saved by the expansion being much more okay with extremely niche abilities that need their own sidebar to explain them. Again, like G-Charger, it's not super duper good or anything, but it is almost always better than Resupply for the purposes of a Combiner and that's all it needs to be.

And that's all for today! A part of me wanted to have more Restoration Upgrades in BCZ, but there wasn't a lot of design space left for them (G-Charger is already pushing it, to be honest) and if I was only going to come up with mediocre abilities then I figured it would be better to not force more into the game at all.

Next: A similar story for Mobility Upgrades!

Gimmick Out.

BCZ Retrospective XIII: New Active Defenses.

The Active Defenses (ADs) in the core book are good enough to cover the needs of most PCs. That meant I had to come up with new niches for them to explore in the expansion. I sat down and took note of things that they were good or not great at, both from a conceptual and mechanics standpoint, and made a conscious effort to shore up those weaknesses. The results are below:

Learning Computer
When I was writing BCG I knew that I didn't want an Active Defense that denied Tension. Tension is the backbone of many of the game's coolest mechanics and denying Tension would make the game less fun for everyone. With that said, the idea of an AD that got better with time stuck with me, so instead of denying Tension I figured I could make Tension be the Defense bonus in the expansion. The result is Learning Computer, an Upgrade that is probably a little underpowered (spending 2 Energy as a reaction without the ability to cut down the cost to 1 for a weaker version is harsh). It sits in the awkward place where it would be too good at 1 Energy but at 2 Energy it takes way too long to get better than Custom Defense. It is a good idea, just needs some tweaking and fine-tuning.

Reflecting Barrier and Repulsion Field
When I first wrote Custom Defense, it let you choose between Melee and Shooting and Absorbing Armor was for Beams and non-Beams. They got changed to let you choose between all four options for gameplay reasons. I wasn't able to come up with a good Beam/non-Beam AD for the expansion, but I had some ideas for Anti-Melee and Anti-Shooting ADs. Both of these are a bit lacking on the defensive side, but the utility value is pretty great. Repulsion Field is generally more useful, but spending 1 Energy to do 3 Damage is a very good deal.

Attack Absorbers
This was the last of the ADs in the expansion that I wrote. I was short on ideas for defensive abilities, so I flipped the idea on its head and thought of making an AD that granted an offensive benefit instead. It doesn't have much of a story because it... Was always okay. It does what it sets out to do. I think it could afford to be a little more generous and make it grant an Advantage against all Enemies. There's the possibility of stacking Advantages for an absurdly strong attack after surviving a round of focus fire, but it's quite expensive in Energy terms and the mediocre Defense bonus it gives doesn't help you actually survive that round of focus fire, so it should be okay.

Dispersion Aura
The first version of this Upgrade was called Aegis Barrier, costed a flat 5 Energy and provided a 10 Damage shield like that of Absolute Barrier in a Range equal to your Systems. The idea was that it was an Absolute Barrier that you could share with the team but was less flexible due to the static Energy cost. You know, because Absolute Barrier is a totally balanced ability that everyone should have access to at all times. As you may be able to guess from the previous sentence, this was extremely broken. One playtester made a graph showing how you could space out units in a defense matrix formation to make all participants provide 10 extra HP to each other, basically giving all of them 40 HP on demand and it made me scream on the inside. Now, I'll admit was actually trying to add some counters for artillery and artillery + technique builds in the expansion, but this was the wrong kind of counter - the kind that made the game unplayable. The new Dispersion Aura grants a powerful, effective Defense boost against multitarget attacks and lets a designated shieldbearer unit protect its allies with it, but doesn't do anything about the other 75% of Weapons. It is a perfect partner to ECS from the core book as well.

Organic Barrier
I like this, it provides great utility value for healers and other support-oriented units, even if it is a very dangerous design. Organic Barrier lets you stockpile your resources from one turn towards the next, which is extremely exploitable in the majority of games that have such mechanics. If I was aware of this, why did it go to print, then? Well, I thought I'd keep it in check by not having any energy sinks that could be used offensively in the game. What were people going to do, put up an Absolute Barrier for 30 bonus HP every other Turn? Psshhh. It was a good idea, except that I forgot Chain Explosion was a thing in the game... Ooops! To be honest, I still think the problem here is Chain Explosion rather than Organic Barrier, and would rather do away with the former than the latter.

I quite like the new ADs in general, the worst thing I can say about them is that Learning Computer is underpowered and Organic Barrier lets people pull off crazy Chain Explosion combos. Reflecting Barrier and Repulsion Field are some of my favorite AD designs and the kind of thing I'd like to do more of in the future. Organic Barrier is another one I'm very fond of, but I understand better now just how careful I have to be with that kind of mechanic.

Next: New Restoration Upgrades

Gimmick Out!

Introducing Dai-2-Ji Battle Century.

Join the Evolution!

In November of 2014, I launched a Kickstarter to fund Battle Century G and Battle Century Z, aimed at creating a universal mecha system that had cinematic action, fast combat and depth of gameplay. Since then, more than 5,000 gamers just like you joined in the fun by playing the new Battle Century G and Battle Century Z rules and providing feedback, and the rest is gaming history. Now, almost 4 years later, it's time to put the lessons of the last almost 4 years to use and evolve the game once again. It's time for Dai-2-Ji Battle Century!

Dai-2-Ji Battle Century, or "2nd Battle Century", is the evolution of the game. It combines Battle Century G and Battle Century Z and steals ideas from many better games made in the past 5 years to move the game forward in new and exciting ways. As we count down the days to the 2nd Battle Century Kickstarter, I'll be revealing more information on the following topics (and more!) on the Gimmick Labs blog:

• Power Levels 6 to 10, to accurately let you represent the likes of Demonbane, Getter Emperor, Ideon, Doraemon and Ginguiser.
• Remote Weapons with their own turns and stat blocks.
• Ten pages of Design Flaws to squeeze every bit of MP you can for your death machine.
• Deathblow users gain a bonus to saves vs Fear, Transpatial Randomizer now has three new possible results called: Limited Wish, Wish and Yuzurenai Negai.
• Official One Year War sidestory campaign setting with ten unique Gundam prototypes meant for Amuro that your PC can use.
• Compatible with your GGG and BCG books (GGG and BCG adaptation rules modules sold separately).
• An innovative "GM May I" system to let players come up with their own Improvised Weapons and Genre Powers on the fly.
• Designed to make you feel the way you did when you were twelve and Gundam Wing was on TV.
• Four hundred pages of rules to memorize if you want to make a character that doesn't suck.
• Pink fuzzy mascot Player Characters with adorable speech quirks.
• Featuring Dante from the Devil May Cry(tm) series.
• PCs make three dice rolls every time they get hit to avoid death and have to keep track of every drop of fuel, bullet fired and grain of sand clogging their joints.
• Instead of rolling Initiative, Rounds are divided into PC and NPC Turns.
• A houserules chapter full of blank white pages so you can truly make the game your own.
• A random character generator with the Lifepath(tm) system to create PCs with as little as forty dice rolls, deciding everything from how many family members have died of dysentery to whether they speak in anime references, bad puns or internet memes, leaving nothing to the imagination.
• A competitive PvP BattleCenPla tournament scene to find the best BattleCenPla builder and pilot.
• Stock art plus repeated art pieces from previous books.
• Scanned PDFs without bookmarks and with the printing, copy and paste functions disabled.
• Designed for exploration and roleplaying unlike all those other games centered around combat in which roleplaying is impossible. 
• Seven Actions per turn: Offensive, Move, Utility, Setup, Power, Reaction and Interrupt.
• Pilot stats tied to Mecha stats.
• A constant trickle of new books with a handful of worthwhile additions to the game in each every few months, ensuring you have to buy all of them.
• True to Super Robot Wars.
• Character designs by Tetsuya Nomura to ensure a pleasing ratio of belts and zippers to every other piece of clothing.

2nd Battle Century Products

All 2nd Battle Century Playtest PDFs will be released as FREE downloads exclusively at this blog. But because I really like money, I'll also release limited-edition print versions of the 2nd Battle Century Playtest System Reference Documents, 2nd Battle Century Playtest Mini-Campaign, and 2nd Battle Century Playtest Battlemap Pack for players and Genre Masters seeking the ultimate playtest experience. These print editions can be preordered from the usual avenues and all preorders will receive a 5% discount because I just love you all so much. These products will be available in softcover and hardcover formats, and TRUE FANS (like you!) will buy both.

2nd Battle Century Playtest System Reference Document
The evolution of Mecha RPGs begins here! This 420-page rulebook contains everything you need to create and advance your 2nd Battle Century character from level 1 to 10, as well as hundreds of new and updated traits, upgrades, weapons, powers, and Genre Master rules necessary to run a complete 2nd Battle Century Playtest season! Explore the farthest reaches of the galaxy with a brand-new deep space robot unsuited for doing anything else, or convert your favorite existing characters to the new system using rules that are clearly not meant to work together! With little to nothing in the way of interior art, the books are full of text walls on nearly every page, making the 2nd Battle Century Playtest Rulebook your gateway to the future of Mecha RPGs. The only thing missing is your money playtest feedback!

2nd Battle Century Playtest System Reference Document Special Edition
This is the exact same thing from the paragraph above but given its own entry to make it seem more special! This deluxe special edition is bound in faux leather with metallic deboss cover elements and a bound-in cloth bookmark. The perfect way to prove that you are a TRUE FAN of GGG and Battle Century G!

2nd Battle Century Playtest Mini-Campaign
This book consists of a series of mad libs anime plots you've seen a hundred times already! You can recycle scenarios until the end of time with none of your players ever noticing! This Mini-Campaign also includes prewritten enemies and operations you've already seen in Battle Century Z, except some of the descriptions are different so it's totally new! You will have hours and hours of fun with your group, doing the same thing you've been doing for years with a new coat of paint in this 42-page softcover collection of five scenarios designed to introduce the 2nd Battle Century Playtest rules in a guided shared playtest experience coinciding with regular surveys and feedback from players just like you, which I'm going to ignore because I already was going to do whatever I wanted anyway!

2nd Battle Century Playtest Battlemap Pack
Playtest the new 2nd Battle Century rules in style with this collection of battlemaps with hex grids and square grids (the latter of which uses brand new mapping technology compatible with 1:1 diagonals, 1:1.5 diagonals and 1:2 diagonals) featuring five key operation areas from the 2nd Battle Century Playtest Mini-Campaign! Featured setpieces include a colony drop for the Gundam fans, a space Vietnam trench battle for the Votoms fans and an empty map with nothing but fog of war that was really cheap and easy for me to make! These portable, affordable maps measure 24" x 30" unfolded and 8" x 10" folded, because I'm a dinosaur who refuses to adapt to the infinitely superior metric system.

Next: Introducing Battle Century H, the 18+ splatbook for mature audiences only.

Gimmick Out.

BCZ Retrospective XII: New General Upgrades.

Boy, it was a good thing I took that break. You wouldn't believe how much of a trash fire February was if I told you. Before we start with today's business and resume the retrospective, let's play a game! Guess which of all these PC components burned out or broke down during the last 30 days and needed to be replaced:

• Motherboard
• Power Supply Unit
• Hard Drive
• Monitor
• Keyboard

If your answer was "All of the above", then congratulations! You guessed right!

This time of the year is, almost always, a miserable experience. I cannot describe how much summer hates me, only that the feelings are mutual. Fortunately, now it is March and the Season of Suffering is over. The odds of my computer imploding when the power goes out are dramatically reduced and I can actually sleep more than 3 hours at night. I have upgraded from feeling constantly fatigued, anxious and uncomfortable to the mere existential despair of a meaningless and short stay in this crapsack world. It's great! I'm pumped to write about nerdy game design stuff!

So, we begin BCZ's Mecha chapter with General Upgrades. I said a while ago that Chapter 1 of BCZ had three main goals: To give more tools for the less powerful PC builds, to allow for a greater variety of PC builds and, lastly, to mechanically represent PC concepts that didn't have rules support in the core book. I believe that the General Upgrades are the clearest example for all three of these things. Let's have a look at them:

Defensive Technician and Master Technician

The story of these two can be summarized in four acts:

1. Problem #1: Most Techniques are underpowered.
2. Solution #1: Create an Upgrade line that makes Techniques stronger.
3. Problem #2: This makes the few Techniques that are already decently powerful into absolute monsters.
4. Solution #2: Make the Upgrades more generally weaker but stronger if used with the weakest of all Techniques.

Not all Techniques are on an equal level, and it was pretty hard to come up with upgrades that would moderately buff Zweihander and Missile Massacre ones without breaking the game when combined with Ground Zero and Reactor Overdrive. It may seem obvious in hindsight, but it actually took me two or three passes until I realized I could simply take away the drawbacks of Zweihander and Missile Massacre. It may not be the most elegant solution, but it is a practical one. Should there be further supplements, expect more abilities that synergize specifically well with underpowered Upgrades and Weapons, calling them out by name.

Portal Generator

In my first list of "Things I want in the game" that I made during the early planning stages of the expansion, portals and teleportation were near the top. The very first version used to cost very little Energy (1 or 2) and had a Range equal to your Systems. It was hilariously broken, increasing the range of all your weapons by your Systems and letting you have the perfect positioning for all of your area of effect weapons, most notably: Bursts and Lines. It took a few passes until the current version, which is still very useful even though it is something like ten times more expensive.

Power Conversion

Support specialists were weak in the core book. They were very versatile and could trivialize fights with Boss enemies, but they struggled to keep up with all the other PCs in most non-Boss scenarios. There were many reasons for this, but eventually I noticed that one of their big problems was that they didn't get any benefit from Tension, a free resource that every other build could make use of. Power Conversion was my first attempt at solving this issue and it went to print without any changes. It makes it a lot easier to play a Support specialist, who are very hungry for Energy, and lets them take other Upgrades and Powers that suit their role such as Jury-Rig or I Have Control. This may be my favorite General Upgrade in the expansion.

Versatile Model

One of the problems with point-buy systems is that they encourage you to get very good at doing one thing and only that one thing. In the case of BCG, that means the system wants you to use always the same one weapon in the same circumstances. You can be very good at melee brawls, an amazing sniper, or... Mediocre at everything else. I didn't like that. Versatile Model is an attempt to encourage PCs to diversify a little and to make a niche for medium-range units that don't depend entirely on duels or sniping. It also helps represent generalist units with many weapons, like most protagonist suits in anime series where everyone else has a specialty. It is not a very flashy Upgrade, but it's just strong enough to get the job done without risking being overpowered. I like it a lot.

Extreme Body

I was making custom Upgrades and Weapons for a game I was running, and in this game one of the PCs could transform into a wereshark with powers based on various sea creatures - echolocation like a dolphin's, electricity like an eel's, ink like a squid's, etc. I think you can guess where this is going from that introduction. I wrote an Upgrade that could be used to represent electrified skin and I liked it enough that I decided to make it part of the expansion later. I think the only thing that changed from the first version to the one that went to print were the Energy cost and the "you can't fly to avoid this ability" reminder text, because it was underpowered in all but the most all-in duelist builds.

Maneuverable Transformer

In core BCG, you Transformed either to adapt to your current Terrain or to switch stats from a mobility/defense form to an attack/range form. Either way, once you made the change, you rarely had much reason to go back to the other one. Maneuverable Transformer encourages Transforming units to behave more like Valkyries, changing forms constantly just to outmaneuver and throw off enemies. It used to grant both an offensive Advantage and a defensive Disadvantage at the same time with every activation, but that was a little too good for builds that arguably already could get Terrain specialist and Flight at no Energy cost. The offensive and defensive bonus were worth around 10 MP each, and the flexibility of having the one you need most is juuuust good enough to make it worth the 15 MP cost.

Nanopaste Skeleton and Superior Integration

I have written at length about how the Antimaims (the abilities that mitigate or heal the effects of Maiming) were the hardest part of the game to balance. It should come to the surprise of absolutely no one that the expansion needed to include a few extra ones to fix the weaknesses of the ones in the core book. Nanopaste Skeleton is a weaker Invincible Alloy that PCs can use until they can afford the stronger antimaim. Superior Integration is the opposite, a stronger Integrated Weapons that PCs can take once they've outgrown it and picked up a few extra Weapons to make use of it.

Pulling Field

The lack of tanking mechanics was a common complaint in BCG. You could Duel enemies to draw the attention of one of them and after that the best you could do was pray they didn't have a way to Disengage without using an Action. Pulling Field jumps on the gravity manipulation train flavor text of many of the new abilities in the expansion to justify punishing Enemies that attack your allies with Disadvantages. This is, arguably, much more useful than the free Attack you get from being ignored in a Duel, because it actually protects your allies where free Attacks just punish enemies after they've already hit your backline. Moreover, it doesn't force you to split your MP between offense and defense just so you can punish enemies effectively. I like it.

Skirmisher Frame

This used to give you an offensive Advantage and a defensive Disadvantage for each 5 Zones moved during your Turn. To put it politely, this was bananas. Boosted Lance already has a reputation of being nigh-unstoppable in games with large battlefields, no special Terrain, and no enemies with Speed debuffs. Imagine if it had  +2 to +4 to each Might Test and +2 to +4 Defense on top of that! The new version works well for units built around maximized Speed but also goes well with any build that likes to stay at medium range while moving around the battlefield. Like Versatile Model, this helps to represent anime conventions that don't fit the usual RPG molds of "stay in one spot and swing sword" or "stay in one spot and fling projectiles".

Internal Fortification

I've said before that BCG can suffer from being a bit too close to a game of rocket tag. This Upgrade helps mitigate that issue and enables proper defensive builds to withstand as much as double the amount of punishment when at sufficiently high PL. This ability is so handy to have around after PLs 2 and 3, that it was baked into the Oldtype Feature to make it easier for NPCs to access it.

Limit Engine

Probably the coolest Upgrade in the entire book. It is very strong and comes with a hefty MP price tag and dangerous conditions for making the most of its power. Limit Engine was originally called Spiral Engine and was created as part of a short Gurren Lagann blog-only supplement. Because it grants both Energy and Tension, which are used to power up all sorts of Super Robot hijinx, it is a perfect fusion of flavor and gameplay. This is my other favorite General Upgrade in the expansion and the competition within my heart between this and Power Conversion is a fierce one.

Warp Step

Would you believe me if I told you that my first idea for a teleportation upgrade was to let people use Systems in place of Speed ON TOP of all the extra effects that this thing already gives you? It was a very good pick for a sniper or a build with Artillery Frame. You could teleport anywhere you wanted and blow up everything with perfect positioning, like Zeorymer. In that way, the Upgrade was very true to its flavor, but the idea of replacing one stat with another was terrible and I was told as much until I removed that part from the Upgrade.

Transpatial Randomizer
I think that Transpatial Randomizer was a commission, but I can't find the design notes to confirm. The way I remember it, the request was worded in such a way that it made me think of a Rod of Wonder from D&D. I wish I could recall the specific details, but when I thought "Make something random happen" I immediately thought "Oooh, tables of randomly-activated unique effects! Or tables of randomly activated Powers! Or Support Upgrades! There's so much potential here!" I ended up going with a table of random Support Upgrades, as they're the single most varied category of abilitise in the game and using all of them would make for a sufficiently complex and wacky table with plenty of results. It is a really cool Upgrade... But, unfortunately, it is too good. All Support Upgrades are balanced so that they're worth spending an Action. That means Transpatial Randomizer gives you a free Action every Turn for 2 Energy and 20 MP. I bet on the inherent randomness of the Upgrade to balance it. In theory, one third of the time it would give you something useless (or a hindrance), one third of the time it would be mildly useful, and the last third of the time it would be a huge boon. In practice, you only felt like you were wasting your Energy with one of every five activations or so, while the other four were half good and half great. This should probably cost 2 more Energy to make it more of an investment. Some games would balance something like this by adding results that punish the user, but that's not how I roll. Other than that, I quite like Transpatial Randomizer, it's a pretty elegant take on the idea of making something random but fun happen.

Whew, that's two thousand words about the General Upgrades of Battle Century Z. I did say this would probably be the longest post in the series! At any rate, it's good to be back.

Next: Active Defenses.

Gimmick Out.