"New Mech skirmish game, Mechadrome" Topic

Hey folks

Just wanted to share the new game I'm developing, Mechadrome. It's like a gladiator arena skirmish game, with mechs, and a professional sports kind of theme as far as fluff goes.

I'm going for a 15mm scale, but the smallest Mechs will be the same size as your average 30mm figure, the light mechs are like 10 foot tall battlesuits. Medium mech models will be around 40mm tall and heavy mechs around 50mm, or about the same size as a Warmachine warjack for example. It's pretty much all mechs, so I don't expect to have infantry at all, I might do tanks or flying things much later, but I want mechs to be the focus. The rules are mostly the same as my western skirmish game, Blackwater Gulch.

I'm just starting to get sculpting done now and I have lots of concept art and info in my WIP thread over on Dakka Dakka here if you're interested.

link

It's still in the early stages, I'll probably wait until I get some sculpts finished before I do a real official announcement kind of thing, and I'm also waiting for the concept art for the last 2 teams. Just looking for opinions or ideas right now, so I'd love to know what you think :)

Also, if you don't want to click over to the other thread :) here's the latest version of the rules, just plain text right now…

gangfightgames.com/temp/mechadrome-test-v07.pdf

And some random concept art..

Terran Titans light mech

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Team Bushido heavy mech

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Redsand Raiders (martian) medium mech

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Aphid Swarmers Medium Mech

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Neat concept art.

Hmm, I've already got my mecha bases covered with Mech Attack and Alpha Strike, but it's always great to see another mech game.

Best of luck with your project.

Seems like 15mm Mecha is really taking off.

You definitely have my attention with the 15mm mecha.

thanks folks :)

Technically, it's a 28-30mm game as far as the rules go, that's how i designed it originally for my western game.. but I figured for mechs I can go with 15mm for the scale, but the minis would be the same size as a 30mm figure.

I have some sculptors working on the minis now and I'm also going to be sculpting some myself. Hoping to have the first round of sculpts done by around the end of January.

Very cool!

Hey folks

Here's the first 3D sculpts for the Team Bushido starter set. It will be 5 light mechs with a variety of different weapons. They are more of a melee oriented team, hence the swords and stuff.

There will be 2 different bodies,with legs attached.. one will be plain legs and the other with booster jets on the feets. The chest will be separate and that gets glued to the body to hold the arms in place. Then there will be separate heads & weapon arms, plus a missile pod for the top and also banner for the team captain. When they're together they will be around 30-35mm tall.

And you can click here to zoom it in to see the detail better.

So it's like BattleTech Solaris VII but with more believably sized mechs? Interest piqued

I would use that starter set for a 6mm jaeger type force

Honestly, I'm not too familiar with Battletech.. I played it a LONG time ago (like 20+ years ago), I just remember there was a hex board and sheets with all these little dots to color in when I was getting shot at. I'm probably more familiar with the video game versions that have come out over the years :) I just wanted to make a mech skirmish game where you can easily build your own mech with whatever weapons you want and then blow each other to bits.

The starter sets will all come with 5 light mechs and 5 pilot cards so you can jump right in with a team that's ready to play, or the rules will have everything you need to build your own mechs from scratch if that's more your style. Medium mechs and heavy mechs will be sold separately, and I think they will come with all weapon options and 2 or 3 pilot cards too. Or I might package them as separate melee and shooty versions, haven't decided yet.

and yeah now that you mention it, yeah they could be good for really big mechs for 6mm games, or even man-sized robots for 28-30mm games too :)

Although I will prolly try your version to, they will fit a 6mm force as real mechs(playing mech games, vehicles were small and infantry were like ants) to give a true epic feel

Here's the first shots of the Terran light mech sculpt :)

you can click here for the gallery image and enlarge it if you want.

The little man is for scale, this one will be a bit smaller than the Bushido mechs, it's more like an oversized battlesuit. He'll be 25-28mm tall, the bushidos will be more like 32-35. Anyway, he'll have a bunch of weapon options and a couple of different poses too. He's still not finished, a bunch of detail still has to be added and we need to finish the different weapons.

Also, I've been doing some sculpting of my own. First I started messing with a martian mech, but since I'm a noob it didn't come out so well. So I decided to switch to terrain and put together some building kits. The first one I'm working on is a bunker. This so far is only about half done, I have a lot of detail to add. it will probably come in 2 halves cut down the middle, so you'd get 2 halves to build a bunker. And other kits will be modular so you could just add 1 half to have a doorway leading into a larger admin building or something like that. Anyway here's what I have so far

Those are all really cool but I really don't like the conical hat on the Bushido mech.

Actually the cone hats are gone, except they will still be in the team emblem :) We're going to do something a bit different for Team Bushido now, since it's got a bit of an asian theme we're going for "robotic oni mask" heads :)

Great looking stuff you got here man!

More progress on the Terran Titans light mechs

You can also click here for the zoomed in gallery pics

Wow, very cool!

Been giving this a lot of thought now that I'm having things sculpted and things are evolving a bit. The original plan was to have a bunch of different teams, but each team would just be 3 different mechs, a light, medium and heavy.

What I'm thinking about doing now is changing things around to where the mech design is based on the pilot's race. So, all human pilots will drive a terran mech, all martian pilots drive a tripod, etc. Some teams will have multiple races though, but initially the first 2 teams in the game (Terran Titans and Team Bushido) will both drive the same exact mechs since they're all human pilots. They would just get different paint jobs and some different bits and weapon loadouts.

Doing it this way would make it much easier for me to get started, since it will require less molds and less sculpts. It also would mean my Kickstarter campaign would need a much lower funding goal which will be nice. Or would that make it appear more cheapy and boring since all of the mechs will be the same at first?

Not at all, in fact for me it would inspire confidence that you have set a realistic production goal. You can always run another one to expand the range.

new pic :) got the missile pod sculpted. There will also be a small blaster turret that can go up top instead. A blaster is a defensive weapon, kind of like a shotgun. It has +1 power against close range targets. The missiles though are all heat seekers, so you can shoot the baddies hiding behind buildings :)

Also showing the terran titans team emblem etched into the shoulder armor. Those are going to be separate pieces on the model, so we're planning to do a bunch of different types, we'll have the team emblems or we can do other things like rank insignias and other stuff like that.

The terran light mech is really coming together now that the weapons are getting done :) Here's a few shots with some new guns.

At the top we have a blaster pistol, missile pod and chaingun. The blaster pistol will probably be a swappable piece, so you can plug in melee weapons instead like buzzsaws, crusher claws or jackhammers. Or if the pieces are too teeny we might just make separate whole arms. Left & right versions of each of course.

Next comes an alternate chaingun design for when size matters, and a plasmagun. I might actually save the big chaingun for the medium mechs and the stubby one for lights, And at the bottom the boxy looking gun is the railgun :)

you can click here for the zoomable gallery version :)

New screenshots, here's some melee weapons :) Crusher Claw, Buzzsaw and Jackhammer

Next day or so I should get the siege drill arm done, and then the final poses, so on the minis they won't look like they're standing around bored. Then after that we'll get started on the medium mech :)

these look awesome man

Looking very good there. You able to show a15mm dolly next to it for size reference?

Right now it's just a 3D model, I haven't printed it yet or had the molds made but that will be soon. But if you want to get a good idea of the scale, if you scroll up one of the renders in reddish brown has a pic of a man standing next to it so you can see how big it will be. The light mechs are more like a 10 foot tall battlesuit, like the driver's feet would end around where the mech's knees are so he moves his legs to move the mech's legs. The medium and heavy mechs will be much bigger :) This mech will probably be around 30mm to the top.

I haven't decided yet, but I most likely won't be doing foot troops for the game, I want to focus on just mechs. I might expand to tanks and flying things some day though

I can't go to sleep now! When I look at this it screams neo Soviet.

Could always do a neo-soviet team :) The first 2 teams will be kind of neo-us-military and neo-japanese, both in these mechs just different color schemes and weapons and stuff. The martians will be the 3rd team though if we can get the models unlocked in the kickstarter.

those are looking very sweet.

And another quick pic, here is the siege drill.

And Dave is starting on the poses now. mostly just different leg positions. There will be 4 different poses so the starter sets can be all unique. Well, to start with there will be 5 light mechs in the starter sets, but in the Kickstarter when we unlock the medium mech stretch goal I'm going to have a bonus where every starter set automagically gets a medium mech upgrade for the team captain :)

Looking forward to these! Very cool design.

Cheers,

Kev

quick update .. Got some new sketches today, these are the Light and Heavy mechs for the Bionic race & Nexus Guardians team. These are just quick sketches, not done yet, but this is the look we're going for :)

I imagine the medium mech will be a cross between the 2 :)

I made a high res group shot render and got a couple different angles. This is what will come in the Terran Titans starter set. You can click here for the bigger gallery version :)

I'm still waiting for 1 more alt body with a different leg position, and the Team Bushido and plain shoulder pads pieces then I can send them all off for printing :)

Those are looking awesome! Nice work!

RebelMike
Rebelminis.com

Here's the Medium mech for Bionic race :) The light will be similar, just no arms and more snake-like and the heavy will be even bigger and meaner than this one. All bionic mechs will also have built in melee weapons with their tentacle blades so the Nexus Guardians will be more of a melee oriented team, but there will still be a good amount of guns too.

url=http://www.dakkadakka.com/gallery/583950-Bionic%20Medium%20Sketch.html]

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I'm also going to be getting the aphid artwork redone, so they will be more robotic instead of organic, but still have the same general look. They'll be like robot bugs, I guess kind of like 40K Necron tomb spiders or the cenitpede thingy from Forge World. I thought that would better fit the look & feel of the other teams

Wow, these are looking great!

Thanks :) And I just got more art for the Bionic mechs. Here's the light mech

And here's the Heavy Mech

Next I'll be getting the Aphid mechs redone to be robo-bugs rather than not-tyranids. So I should have that art done soon too.

Hey folks

I have the latest version of the rules done. This will be the "public playtest version". It has a lot of background and art added now. I'm in the middle of updating my website and you can download the rules there now. I don't think a direct link tot he PDF here will work since it's part of my blog software file manager thingy.. anyway here's the URL:

gangfightgames.com/mechadrome

I still have a lot of art and info to add to that page, but I should have it done over the weekend or early next week, then I'll be posting announcements all over the web to try and start building a buzz leading up to my Kickstarter campaign that will be some time in March :)

Also, I just got new revised art for the Aphid mechs, this is the Heavy mech, the medium and light will have a similar look & feel. At first I was going for not-tyranid bio-mechs, but I think the robo-bugs look will fit the game better.

The bionics are really awesome…and so are the rest.

And here's the new Aphid Light Mech :)

Some folks have asked to see all of the components that will be a part of the Terran Light Mechs. I will probably have my 3D prints in hand on Wednesay or Thursday, so in the meantime I did some 3D renders of every piece. Here they are :)

You can click here to zoom in.

Also, in other news, the new domain name is finally up and running, so you can just go to mechadrome.com to get my site, but also gangfightgames.com and blackwatergulch.com will also all take you there too like always :)

I'll take some photos of the 3D prints as soon as I get them. More to come!

I look forward to seeing the finished article, what the quality of production will be like, etc. I can't support the kickstarter – just too many bad experiences with games there – but if it's promising post-release then I'm sure it'll take off hereabouts. Good luck!

The drill and other tool attachments are really nice. Paint it safety yellow and you have a utility mech.

Yep, i expect to see lots of caution lines painted on too :) In the game's background, the whole sport started out with construction equipment. Some ship yard workers got drunk one day and thought it would be a fun idea to climb into their loader mechs and beat each other up. Then that changed into after hours mech fight clubs, and it just grew from there :)

The feel I'm going for overall is kind of a cross between football, nascar and pro wrestling, with guns :)

Minor update.. I just got the art for the new Aphid Medium mech. Here he is. I also updated the rulebook PDF on my site with the new art on the aphid race page.

I was hoping the 3D prints would have come today, but UPS decided to be slow. Oh well, hopefully tomorrow :)

Well I got the 3D prints today. They came out great, but they are smaller than I expected. They're actually exactly the right size, it's a 15mm scale game. I think I spoiled myself doing so many high res renders :)

Gallery link here

So, they are about 28mm tall without missile pods, 32mm with it. About as tall as a Space Marine, slightly smaller than BWG figures :) I couldn't get the shoulder armor to stay on, those are small pieces that you'll have to glue on, so that's why these guys look a little skinny. If you really love magnetizing stuff, these guys will be perfect for it :)

I've been getting a lot of requests about using these for dreadnoughts… I think the heavy mechs would be better for such a thing as they will be

I generally avoid minis Kickstarters, but I must say your may get my pledge.

The Public Playtest Rulebook has been updated! You can download it at Mechadrome.com.

Newest changes were:

1. Mech's Power attribute now effects ranged weapons, instead of just melee weapons. All standard mech weapons add +1 to your Mech's power, and all heavy weapons add +2.

2. Terrain rules were updated. A covered target now gets a +1 shields bonus, a concealed target now gets a +2 bonus.

3. Added rules for Free Agents, who are pilots driving unique mechs who can join any team and also rules for All Star games where you can use pilots from any team or race.

3. The following new upgrades were added:

- Assault Mech – Combine 2 melee attacks into 1 big roll, like Salvo for shooting. Has to be either basic attacks, or 2 of the same melee weapon.
- Recon – If you have line of sight to an enemy, it won't get a cover bonus if your teammates shoot him, and concealed targets will only get a +1 shield bonus rather than +2.
- Infiltrator – You are always considered concealed when you're in cover.
- Strider – +1 speed, light mechs only.
- Last Laugh – Your escape pod has a hidden missile port, when your mech blows up and your pilot ejects you can get free shot at whoever blew you up, treated like a missile pod attack.
- Deflector Shields – If you get shot and make a successful saving throw you can deflect the blast at any enemy within 6".
- Combat Drop – If your Mech has Booster Jets, you don't deploy with the rest of your team. On the 2nd game turn you can land anywhere on the board. Landing uses 1 energy, so you can use remaining actions to attack or move into cover or anything else.

I'll be finishing up the rosters for the Terran Titans and Team Bushido shortly, but in the meantime you can just build your own mechs for test games :)

Next up .. master molds for the Terran Light Mechs are being done now. I hope to have master metal minis in hand next week. Dave is going to start sculpting the Terran Medium Mech next week. It will look mostly like the light mech, only 40mm tall and a little beefier, but all Terran mechs will have that same overall look to them. The medium mech will have space on top for 2 missile pods or small turrets up over the shoulder, rather than 1 in the middle.

Since I've decided to have a medium mech included in all of the starter sets, and in light of the fact that there's a bunch of higher profile mini/wargame kickstarters going right now, or about to launch, I'm wondering if I should push everything back and do my campaign in April? The bills are adding up from all of the preliminary work, I'd like to start sooner rather than later, but I think it might be better to wait since the starter sets will be more complete. But even pushing it back I don't think I'd have metal mediums to show off or paint by April anyway, we're probably still going to have to rely on screenshots. I probably wouldn't have Medium minis ready for paint until mid-late April. So I'm kind of torn. It might be better just to stick with mid-March and if we don't fund every mech on the list, I can always do a 2nd campaign after the rewards from the first have all been shipped out (not before :) ).

Little preview of something else I'm working on :)

I'm doing the 3D sculpting for these wall panels myself, kind of teaching myself 3D modeling in the process. I was working on that bunker before, but when I scaled it up to fit the size of the mechs I had done, it felt too big and too plain, but I might still have that printed and produced.

Anyway these would be resin wall blocks that are around 2"/50mm tall and 40mm wide.. there will be a bunch of different designs, like windows, doors, plain walls and more, and you can glue them together however you want using the smaller connector walls and corners between each bigger panel, and those are 10mm wide, so there will also be 50x50 flat roof panels too. These are also about 5mm thick, I can make them thinner but I want to make sure they won't warp easily.

I have to finish the first set of walls and get them printed and molds made before I'll know what they will cost, so I'll if I don't finish them before the campaign is done I'd just sell them in separate kits afterwards in the pledge manager or something like that.

I'm also going to have other terrain options in the campagin though, I'll have some ruined walls and prefab plastic buildings from Proxie models along with some road blocks and barriers too :) Hoping to work with Proxie later on on some custom walls and other stuff, but it will take a while to get that sorted out so it wouldn't be done in time for the campaign.

Here's the first WIP for the Terran Medium Mech.. bottom half shows the size in relation to the light mech.. this one should be about the size of a space marine terminator, maybe slightly taller.

Still a lot more detail to add especially in the shoulder area, those will wrap around and cover up the front a bit, and the missile pods will get updated a bit. He'll have all the same weapons as the light mech, but we'll also be adding a blaster turret for the top, RPG style missile arms and an optional blast shield for the cockpit to give your mech +1 armor :) Those will get shrunk down for light mech versions too.

So here he is, you can click here for the gallery version to zoom it in and stuff