ʕ •ᴥ•ʔʕ •ᴥ•ʔʕ •ᴥ•ʔʕ•ᴥ•ʔʕ •ᴥ•ʔʕ •ᴥ•ʔ Six Bears

Lancer and its five W's

Who, What, When, Where and Why

Like I said in the higher level page, Lancer is a tabletop role playing game and setting. If you're taking the time to read this I would assume that you already have at least a passing intrest in the genre and may have even played a little. For those of you who have played a ttrpg in the past I would hazard a guess that your time was dominated by Dungeons and Dragons fifth edition or another runner up in the fantasy ttrpg like pathfinder. What I am hoping to do with these posts is to draw some attention to one of my favorite game systems and if only one group picks up this fantasic system and finds that they love it then I consider it a total victory. First things first though I think a little history on the project would be helpful.

Who?

Written by Miguel Lopez and Tom Parkinson Morgan. Miguel Lopez was the lead narrative designer of the setting and though he no longer works on the project he has moved on to working on Magic the Gathering. The other half of this team is Tom Parkinson Morgan a.k.a Tom Bloom a.k.a Orbitaldropkick. He is the writer and illistrator of Kill Six Billion Demons (another work that I would very much recomend). These two together constructed, in my opinion, a very compelling world that in their own words "is a future not forclosed on".

What?

I guess I should get a little into the reeds on what Lancer actually is. Do you like big robots? Gundam? Mecha in general? Well then this is both the setting and game system for you. In Lancer you're a Gundam pilot. You're piloting a one of a kind, custom built war machine fighting for any sort of cause. Freedom fighter? Easy. Corpo State mercenary? Simple. Government Sanctioned Anti-Tyrant Kill Team? Encouraged even. The world of lancer has so much space and so many stories to tell that as long as you have the gumption any story you can imagine has room in lancer.

Players in Lancer are well... lancers. While other mechs exist and they certainly have pilots (most of the time) lancers are a cut above the rest. Either through intense training, luck, nepotism or sheer grit the player characters are something special. Often times they're making the best of a bad situation doing what they can to do right by people who deserve it and help those that need it.

Lancer as a an actual game system though does good work in differentiating itself from other games in the genre. Built upons a light narrative rule set that allows player characters to be those cool guys that everyone wants to be without having a heavy, burdensome ruleset like other ttrpg's (*cough cough* DnD/Pathfinder/Gurps). This is paired with a compelling and extremely customisable mech building system that allows the players to tweak their builds to reflect both their characters and combat role in a easy to use but still crunchy tactical battle system.

When?

Lancer was crowd funded back in 2019 but that certainly does not mean that the project is concluded. While it has been slowed due to people leaving and joing the project/an actual pandemic the system has recived several official, first party expansions many community made ones. Going forward there are several expansions that are still being worked on but you can find the indevelopment rules and give them a try yourself!

Where?

Lancer is designed and published by MASSIF PRESS (← click me im a link). The core book for the players is free as a pdf and gives all the top level stuff needed for them to build characters. The paid version includes all the lore and game master materials including skeletons for combat encounters, guides for narrative play and templates for narrative and combat npc, including guidlines for how to modify them AND the modifications. You get this all told for TWENTY FIVE WHOLE US DOLL HAIRS, an absolute bargin if you ask me (Which I assue you would). Alongside the core rules there are several stellar expansion books that are well priced and are given out as pdfs (meaning you only have to buy them once and you can share them amongst your whole party).

Why?

So why play Lancer? Surface level, Big robots and cool fights. Something a little more than that? To steal an idea from Massif Press' website. You're playing lancers. The Cavalry. The vanguard for a better future that is at risk of being stolen away. There are big problems and the galaxy is going to need some big heros to solve them. Sure these problems are massive, so massive that even a group of big heros can't solve them, but helping those who need it sure does move us closer to figuring some of it out.