"Giant Mecha"

[sniffies]

Since I loved the idea proposed by Yakk so much, I'd like to hear everyone's thoughts on implementing such an idea in whatever level campaign... I think my players would love it, and surely most would.

Here's the original post:

This is a tricky problem. Like many tricky problems, it can be solved with Giant Mecha.

Give the lower level PCs giant mecha (well, large sized). These Mecha grant significant bonuses to those riding them.

Each Mecha is bonded to a particular person, and cannot be unbound until at least a century after the riders death. The lower level PCs find them.

The Mecha provide weapons and implements. These act as +3 weapons and implements (superior weapons and superior implements). Each acts like a suit of +3 magic (superior, masterwork) armor and a +3 neck slot item. Pick ones with good properties. Each of them also comes with 1-3 other items "embedded" in them. (superior implements arrive in AV2 I think?)

Some have shields.

While wearing the mecha, items in the used slots do not work. Superior weapons/implements/armor embedded do not require feats to use.

On top of that, each mecha should come with stuff on par with a few (optimized) feats worth of power.

As an example of something worth 2-3 feats worth of power:
Lock On Target: Once per round when you hit a target, the target becomes Locked On until the end of your next turn. You have combat advantage against Locked On targets and they are vulnerable 5 against your attacks.
(basically wintertouched+lasting frost)

In addition, the Mecha boosts all stats (str, dex, con, int, wis, cha) of the wearer by +4 while wearing it, and grant an additional +3 item bonus to all defences and attacks and damage and initiative and some skills (basically, trained ones).

Each mecha contains 2 daily and 2 encounter powers aligned with the attuned users power source. Either homebrew one, or pick a good level 5-13 or so one.

The mecha are all large sized, except maybe one of them (the sneaky character?).

Customize the mecha for each PC. Do this without them knowing about it ideally. When they reach the mecha room, each mecha only activates for the appropriate PC when touched.

The lower level party finds these mecha. Have them curb stomp an encounter much like one they just finished, but twice the size, right after finding them, so they get the scale of the power up.

The threat is somehow tied to the mecha. Maybe someone is trying to awaken the tarrasque-scale mecha to conquer the world.

Now, have the lower level characers in their mecha do an adventure with the higher level characters. At the end of the adventure, destroying the boss also disables the mecha, and the two parties go their separate ways.

Split XP evenly, which will result in the lower level party skyrocketing in level.

The mecha are naturally magitek from the dawn age, and are much degraded, which is why they only boost the PCs up to low paragon tier in power.

Monsters when facing a huge party should have their damage output doubled and HP halved to keep combat apace. Use the "standard" encounter budget for the oversized party, but make it difficult for foes to focus fire (they come at the party along more than one flank, etc).

Balance:
Note that the above, while seemingly haphazard, is designed to boost a level 3-4 character up to level 10-12 in power.

+4 to all stats +3 item is +5 to all rolls. A +3 magic item is roughly +2 better than what a level 3 character has. So +2+5=+7, which is enough to boost your character's d20 roll modifiers to something on par with a level 10 character.

Similarly, a level 10ish character has roughly double the HP of a level 3 character. Halving damage does almost exactly that.

The extra encounter and daily powers in the mecha help make up for the lack of power progression. The "feat equivalent" abilities make up for the lack of feats. The superior weapon/implement/armor are basically bonus feats that are easy to explain.

Oh, and becoming large size is ridiculously strong. Your [W] get bigger and your close bursts are abusive (grant the caster-types an extra feat-equivalent or two because of this). You could make the close bursts be like you are riding something, but I say go for the abusive option -- the world will end, or the mecha will stop working, by the end of the adventure.

Everything is relatively rough, but should work out reasonably well.

Now, the lower level PC will gain levels faster than the higher level PC, but the higher level PC starts getting paragon path stuff (which is a significant boost) and access to more paragon tier feats. And the +3 items the armor has match the items the party will find, making it harder for the mecha PCs to gear up.
Future plot:While I think "saving the world" should require destroying the mecha, this can just act as a way to deal with balance problems with the above model.

Given access to the ancient mecha magitek, wizards and sages can maybe replicate a variation. If the PCs are like "this is awesome but why did it end", you can reintroduce it with different mechanical effects, now that the details are ironed out.

x2 HP is probably the biggest problem, as keeping that in sync with the other things you need to level up is tricky.

[Yakk]

So the basic problem with what I wrote above is that it was very tightly crafted to upgrade level 3-4 characters to around level 9-11 competence. For any other pair of levels it doesn't quite work.

The basic problem is the "take half damage when you are in your mecha", mixed with fixed modifiers to your attacks and defences. +7 to your attacks/defences corresponds to a +7 level swing: double HP corresponds to doubling your level and adding 3 (roughly).

At level 3-4, (3.5*3+3 = 10), and (3.5+7 = 10.5), so the two line up.

The rest (extra powers, feat-equivalents, etc) was just to finish off the rest of the gap.

The goal was to let some low levels fight along side high levels at rough parity.

For a real game, I can think of a few approaches.

One of them would be to treat the "4e character" you build as your "in mecha" character, and scale everything (the size of squares, the size of monsters) appropriately.

How you'd handle your out-of-armor character becomes a challenge, but if the scale was significantly different (say, Pacific Rim sized mecha), you could use a completely different system out of mecha, and basically say that mecha scale opponents are not conventionally defeatable environmental hazards when not in a mecha.

Another approach for more modest sized mecha would be to somehow arrange for a ~+5 to ~+10 level power swing in mecha. +10 level power swing is almost as bad as the Pacific Rim case (try facing a level 15 solo as a group of level 1 characters). A ~+5 level power swing is interesting, in that it is possible to face the same foes both in and out of mecha, but you'll really miss the mecha when you don't have it on.

A fixed power swing like +5 could be handled through a mixture of item bonuses, enhancement bonuses, an encounter and daily attack power and a utility power (all if which scale), some feat equivalents (large size, with bigger [W], is worth at feat or more), and some "item" property power equivalents, and some system of temporary HP generation or something.

...

A completely different approach would be to make PCs into elites when in mecha. So your level (and hence NADs, ATK rolls and AC) doesn't change significantly, you instead take more damage and deal more damage. This is similar to a +4 level swing in power, but it means you can face exactly the same foes.

One way to approach this would be to build a "mecha character" with powers and a class, and simply add them to the PC when in the mecha. Give the "in-mecha" character 2 standard, 1 move, and 2 minor actions per round. Halve all damage the PC takes when in mecha. It would probably take some tweaks, but it would work.

Combat would sadly be quite slow, as you'd basically be doubling your party size.

To deal with that issue, we could emulate the power of a 2nd class but do so in time-efficient manner. Something like an essentials class. And we give damage boosts that do away with the need for a 2nd standard action/2nd minor action.

Ie, imagine if your mecha has a set of boosts. Some are encounter, some are daily, some are at-will. These boosts can be added to any attack that hits. This is roughly as powerful as making the encounter/daily powers reliable, but removes the need for an additional attack roll on them.

In effect, you build a "vampire" style class (few, if any build choices per level) or an "essentials" style class (slayer, thief) that boosts the damage/effectiveness of a given class.

[MunkeeGamer]

I was in on the original thread that had this idea and I support it heavily. This just so happens to coincide with the NA Aion 4.5 patch release which added the Aethertech class on 1/29/14. A class whose primary weapon and abilities are entirely based around an awesome mecha. If you have any interest in MMOs, it's worth looking at because it's a semi-revolutionary idea.

The picture is huge.
http://www.daevasreport.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/4-5_aethertech_2.jpg

Given the way refluffing works in 4e, I would love to create an existing race/class combo that has relatively mecha-esque features and just refluff. Something like Bugbear Barbarian using oversized weapons and charging around the battlefield refluffed as a super strong mecha with Aetherjets. Or a Twinstrike Archer Ranger Frost Cheese refluffed as an gatling gun artillery mecha. Hunter's Quarry is renamed Target Locked. Oh man... I like it.

It may offend some people's sci-fi/fantasy barrier but I don't personally have any such barrier. Bring on the steampunk and magitek. >:D

[sniffies]

From a lore perspective, I think that any campaign which allows artificers could fluff this idea in with little hand waving.
As for me, I plan on having an artificer NPC/merchant who happens to make big and better "things" each time the PCs encounter him, eventually resulting in giant mechs...

The buildup could be quite fun, as there could be quests for parts, special order weapons, etc.

Now, mechanically speaking, would it not be appropriate to have the mechs be refluffed warforged of large size and significant level? So, taking a set of level 10 PCs and throwing them "inside" the level 25 warforged ought to make for a rather epic story arc. The math is where I'm lacking experience, but what I am suggesting is to ignore the PCs entirely and focus only on the mech stats. If the mech "dies", the PC is now effectively invisible until they do something to draw attention (such as firing the still-working cannon-arm of their destroyed mech).

Experience would be total fluff, up to DM discretion.

[tensai_oni]

A group of friends of mine played a giant mecha game using 4th ed rules. Mechanically, they were just different characters, with different stats and classes depending on whether players are in or out of their giant robots. On-foot they were Heroic tier, in mecha they were Epic tier, 10 levels higher.

It was a custom setting, not fantasy.

Link (http://plothook.net/RPG/forumdisplay.php?f=1729)