Big Fat Giant Robots (Patreon)

I've gotten really into Lancer lately, which is a fantastic Giant Mecha Tabletop RPG by Massif Press, and has some incredible diversity in the types of mechs and powers divided among a number of uniquely flavored manufacturers. And one of the things that starts happening any time I'm really enjoying a new system is I start homebrewing. And anyone who knows me knows I love me some good, well written kink homebrew, especially the expansion kinks. I think I enjoy it best when it's written so that you could almost slot it into the world without changing much. So of course when I started getting into Lancer I started brewing ideas for some fatty mechs, which led to me creating an entirely new Manufacturer for the game. Introducing the Mechs of Broad Horizons Enterprise.

BROAD HORIZONS ENTERPRISE

Broad Horizons Enterprise, or BHE, initially began its life as a relief-effort company focused on assisting places ravaged by conflict in re-establishing supply lines and the necessities needed to continue daily life in comfort and a semblance of return to normalcy in the aftermath of large-scale engagements. Many of these engagements would inevitably involve Lancers and their mechs, and eventually, through a series of transitions that are difficult to explain even in hindsight, BHE extended its reach into the development and construction of those same mechs, with a goal of creating a line of peacekeeping mech designs that were capable of more debilitating action, in addition to the standard offensive armaments most mechs are equipped with.

BHE Core Bonuses

Ablative Bulwark

The excess bulk of frames designed with this benefit in mind seems perhaps slightly cartoonish, but most of the structure is designed with redundant systems and framework in mind, primarily to obscure vital defense points hidden by the mech's bulk.

Areas of Effect from attacks stop at your mech. Any targets on the opposite side of you from the point of origin of the attack are unaffected.

Herculean Frame

The Herculean is a reinforced mech frame designed to drastically increase joint strength and allow the resultant machine to carry any level of burden, as well as to resist attempts to inhibit movement.

You can't be Immobilized, regardless of what system or weapon caused the effect. You also gain +1 Accuracy on all Hull Checks made to lift, drag, push, or hurl enormous amounts of weight.

Redundant Systems

Extra system equipment stored within a layer of biomechanical ablative tissue, playfully called 'fat cushion' by pilots and mechanics, ensures extra parts for on-the-job repairs of mech systems.

You gain +2 Repair Cap

Reflective Biomesh

Though it may appear an odd aesthetic choice to some designers, many pilots appreciate the rounded, squishy look that mechs equipped with Reflective Biomesh tend to have. And the efficacy in dissuading attackers is certainly nothing to scoff at.

1/round, when you are hit with a melee attack, you can use a reaction to inflict half of the damage of the attack back onto the attacker (round down, minimum 1).

Restorative Life-Support

A system of nutrient tubes and high-density restorative paste funneled into a mech's passengers helps sustain them whenever they take injury. Developers are still working on the calorie count of the paste.

The Pilot and any passengers inside the mech heal 1 Hit Point per round.

Absorptive Blast Shielding

A truly marvelous system that helps Broad Horizons mechs outlast others in combat by allowing them to convert energy into matter. Specifically it allows them to convert particularly critical hits into a layer of quick-forming, temporary organic padding to help prevent further damage.

Whenever you take Structure damage from an attack, prevent any damage that would carry over to your restored HP and convert it into Overshield (Maximum of 1+Grit).

MECHS

Only the first 3 mechs of the manufacturer are presented here simply to let me put this concept out sooner.

DIONYSOS

Controller/Defender

The Dionysos is perhaps the most iconic of the Broad Horizons creations. A command and control frame designed to debilitate and disorient its enemies, the Dionysos renders blurry the lines between enemies and allies. Lessened inhibitions and poor judgement strike the enemies of a Dionysos pilot as a battlefield slowly turns into a drunken brawl.

Core Stats

Size: 2 Save Target: 10 Armor: 1 Sensors: 10

HULL                                                  SYSTEMS

HP: 10                                               E-Defense: 8

Repair Cap: 6                                Tech Attack: +1

AGILITY                                           SP: 6

Evasion: 8                                     ENGINEERING

Speed: 3                                          Heat Cap: 5

MOUNTS

Flex, Heavy

TRAITS

Drunken Strikes: Targets damaged by Dionysos have +1 Difficulty on their next Attack Roll.

Drinking Contest: Whenever Dionysos makes an Attack Roll, Skill Check, or Saving Throw with Accuracy, it can remove all accuracy from the roll and regain a number of HP equal to the accuracy removed this way. 

CORE SYSTEM:  Battle Jug

The Dionysos carries a massive, jug-shaped object filled with a potent sludge mixture of nanotech and lubricants which it can use both as a melee weapon and a support object.

Integrated Mount: Battle Jug

Main Melee, 1 threat, 1d6+3 Kinetic damage

On Critical Hit: The target is splashed with the contents of the jug which proceed to hinder it, granting it the Jammed Condition until the end of its next turn.

Active (1CP), Protocol: Take a Swig

The Dionysos douses itself with the contents of its Jug. For the rest of the scene, when you use your Drinking Contest trait with this protocol active, you regain hit points equal to the Accuracy on your roll without removing any accuracy, and your Drunken Strikes adds +2 difficulty instead of +1 to struck targets.

License I:

Weapon Overclock System, Disorientation Charges

Weapon Overclock System

Protocol, 1 SP

While active, all weapon attacks you make suffer from +2 Difficulty, but also gain +1d6 bonus damage of whatever the base damage type of the weapon is.

Disorientation Charges

Limited 2, Unique, 2 SP

Expend a charge for one of the following effects:

- Disorientation Grenade [Range 5, blast 3]

Targets in the area of effect must make an Engineering Save or be IMPAIRED and SLOWED until the end of your next turn.

- Disorientation Mine [Burst 2]

This mine detonates when a character moves adjacent to or over it. Characters within the affected area must succeed on an Engineering save or be IMPAIRED and SLOWED until the end of their next turn.

 License II: 

Dionysos Frame, IFF Scrambler, Submission cudgel

IFF Scrambler

Quick Tech, 2 SP

You force the target to make a Systems Save. If they fail, their systems can no longer tell the difference between friend and foe, and every action they take that targets an enemy has a 50% chance to be redirected to an ally within range of the action, if one is present. Flip a coin or roll a dice every time such an action is undertaken until the end of your next turn.

Submission Cudgel

Heavy Melee, Threat 2, 2d6 kinetic damage

On Critical Hit: Target must make a Hull Save or be knocked prone.

 License III: 

BACCHUS-Class NHP, Intoxication Wave

BACCHUS-Class NHP

3 SP, Unique, AI

BACCHUS is a particularly energetic and, in some respects, fun-loving NHP that is known to push both its pilot and its enemies to enjoy the battle for the sake of the experience and to see everything as a game for the enjoyment of the participants. Its ability to enhance the targeting parameters of advanced tech systems is impressive, but the NHP simply refers to it as 'sharing in the fun'.

Your mech gains the AI tag and the BACCHUS protocol

Limited 3, Heat 3 (self)

1/round, expend a charge when you perform a Tech Action that affects a single target to affect an additional target within range at the same time.

Intoxication Wave

2 SP, Unique, Full Tech, Limit 1,

Each target of your choice in a size 5 Cone must make an Engineering Save or be STUNNED until the end of your next turn.

AEGIR

Defender/Disabler

Hearkening back to the ancient days of naval warfare on choppy oceans and the dangers of being crushed by the rising tide, the Aegir is BHE's linebreaking bulwark, and it takes the manufactuer's unique approach to the battlefield to a new level. Complex Energy-to-matter transference technology built into many of the Aegir's systems allow it to turn the enemy and the environment around them into weapons for the Aegir's onslaught, evoking the feelings of crashing waves from the shifting landscape and suddenly bulging masses of steel and biomechanical material.

Core Stats

Size: 3 Save Target: 10 Armor: 2 Sensors: 10

HULL                                                  SYSTEMS

HP: 10                                               E-Defense: 6

Repair Cap: 4                               Tech Attack: -2

AGILITY                                          SP: 5

Evasion: 7                                     ENGINEERING

Speed: 4                                          Heat Cap: 6

MOUNTS

Main mount, Aux/Aux mount, Heavy Mount

TRAITS

Rolling Tide: The Aegir ignores difficult terrain, and whenever the Aegir moves through the space of an object or character smaller than it, it pushes it aside. Objects are moved to the nearest unoccupied space, even if they were anchored to the ground, and characters are moved to the nearest unoccupied space and must make a Hull save or be knocked prone.

Hydraulic Countermeasures: The Aegir has resistance to burn damage.

Colossus: Adjacent allied characters can use the Aegir for hard cover.

Slow: the Aegir receives +1 difficulty on Agility checks and saves.

CORE SYSTEM:  Energy to Matter Conversion Suite

The EMCS built into the Aegir allows it to convert ambient energy of any kind-thermal, solar, electrical, etc- into matter which it can use to further enhance its prodigious size and also augment its destructive capabilities.

Active (1CP) Protocol: Tidal Surge

For the rest of the scene, the Aegir's size increases by 1, and it gains the following benefits:

- Any weapons mounted to the Aegir that normally only hit a single target also make a secondary attack against all characters aside from the Aegir within a 1-radius burst of the target. These attacks can't deal bonus damage, and don't trigger this ability again.

- Each round at the start of your turn you gain an amount of Overshield equal to 1+your Grit.

License I:

Linebreaker Ram, Fluid Munitions

Linebreaker Ram

Main Melee, 1d6 Kinetic Damage, 1 threat, Loading

This weapon does not expend its Loading charge on a normal attack. Instead, when you use this weapon to attack, you can choose to expend its charge to boost up to your mech's speed in a straight line and then make the attack. When you do, the attack deals an extra 1d6 bonus damage and Knockback 2, and then must be reloaded as normal before the ability can be used again.

The base line of the weapon can still be used even while the weapon is not loaded.

Fluid Munitions

2 SP, Unique, Mod

Choose one CQB, Rifle, Launcher, or Cannon: They gain the Arcing property.

License II:

Aegir Frame, Matter Conversion Matrix, Wave-Swell

Matter Conversion Matrix

1 SP, Unique, Quick Action

Activating this system as a Quick Action, the mech can touch an adjacent Object of size 1 or greater, inflicting 1d6 AP Kinetic Damage to it and reloading weapon that has the loading tag.

Wave-Swell

2 SP, Unique, Full-Tech

Force your target to make a Hull Save. On a failure, the frame of the target is bloated and weighed down with excess matter, swelling and increasing the target's size without providing the additional efficiency required to operate at this new size. The target takes up the space of a mech one size larger than it, but still qualifies as the normal size for all other purposes such as grappling or knockback. This size increase also makes operation awkward; their attacks receive +1 difficulty, and their speed is also reduced by 1 (minimum 1). The target can repeat the save at the end of each of their turns, ending the effect on a success.

License III: 

 Broadside Cannon Array, Submersion Protocol

Broadside Cannon Array

Superheavy Cannon, range 10, 3d6+3 Kinetic Damage, Loading, Unique

On Critical Hit: You may immediately fire this weapon again without requiring an action or having to reload it. Any extra attacks provided by this property do not benefit from Bonus Damage, but do generate additional attacks on critical hits. After all attacks generated by this ability are dealt with, it must be reloaded as normal.

Submersion Protocol

2 SP, Unique, Protocl

As a protocol, you can submerge into the ground beneath you at the start of your turn. For the duration this protocol is active, your movement speed is halved (round down, minimum 1), and you cannot take any actions other than boosting, but you cannot be targeted by any effects or attacks and have resistance to all damage.

UKEMOCHI

Striker/Support

"How....Did that mech just -FEED- something to another mech? How does a mech even eat? What's food that size made of? What is even going on here? Why is it looking our way now?"

Core Stats

Size: 1/2 Save Target: 11 Armor: 0 Sensors: 8

HULL                                                  SYSTEMS

HP: 6                                               E-Defense: 7

Repair Cap: 8                            Tech Attack: +0

AGILITY                                         SP: 6

Evasion: 10                                    ENGINEERING

Speed: 6                                       Heat Cap: 4

MOUNTS

Main/Aux, Flex

TRAITS 

Mischievous Trickster: The Ukemochi has soft cover as long as it is adjacent to any object or character of a size equal to or larger than itself.

Elusive Beauty: Ukemochi does not trigger Overwatch from enemies as long it does not have the Locked On condition.

Fragile: the Ukemochi has +1 difficulty on all Hull checks and saves.

CORE SYSTEM: Biomechanical Sustenance

The Ukemochi can manufacture biomechanical aid packages that it shapes into the form of food items that it creates, and which it allows its allies to 'eat', letting it use its energy efficiency to assist its allies in winning the fight. It can also produce similar items which have a detrimental effect to any mech unfortunate enough to 'ingest' them.

Give Sustenance

Active, Quick Action

Provide an Adjacent ally with sustenance, granting them a Feast Die. The Feast die is a D6 that can be expended to add to the roll of any Attack, Check, or Save. One character can only have a number of Feast dice Stored at once equal to 1 + their Grit, can only spend one per roll, and lose all Feast dice stored at the end of the scene.

Poisoned Bounty

Active, Quick Action

Force an Adjacent enemy to make an Agility save or consume a tainted sustenance, making them Impaired until the end of your next turn.

Bountiful Harvest

Active (1CP), Protocol

For the rest of this scene, Give Sustenance and Poisoned Bounty can affect valid targets within your Sensor range, and you can use both abilities in the same Quick Action.

License I: 

Severance Blade, Gift of Boiled Rice

Severance Blade

Auxiliary Melee, Threat 1, 1d3 Energy Damage, Accurate

On Critical Hit: The Severance Blade carves off a piece of the target's armor, Reducing the target's armor by 1 (minimum 0) until the target uses the Stabilize action or undergoes a Full Repair.

Gift of Boiled Rice

2 SP, Unique, Drone, Quick Action

Rice Drone (Size 1/2, 5 HP, Evasion 10, E-Defense 10, Tags: Drone)

This Rice Drone can be deployed to a free space within Sensors and line of sight, where it stays and can be eaten from by any of the owner's allies with a Quick Action, providing the following Benefits:

- +1 Accuracy on their next Attack, Check, or Save

- If the ally currently has any number of Feast Dice, they regain HP equal to the number of Feast Dice they are currently storing.

The drone can be deployed to a new space or recalled as a Quick Action.

License II: 

Ukemochi Frame, Swift Escape Protocol  Gift of Fish

Swift Escape Protocol

2 SP, Unique, Protocol

You may only move or teleport until the end of your turn; you can take your standard movement, boost, and similar abilities that grant movement, but may not attack or use a system that does anything but move or teleport you. In exchange, you may boost more than once as a quick action this turn, ignoring the normal rules about not taking the same action more than once in a turn, and attacks made against you until the start of your next turn have +1 Difficulty. 

Gift of Fish

1 SP, Unique, Drone, Quick Action

Fish Drone (Size 1/2, 5 HP, Evasion 10, E-Defense 10, Tags: Drone)

This Fish Drone can be deployed to a free space within Sensors and line of sight, where it releases a Burst 3 area with the following effects:

- Allied characters can cover double the normal amount of space with their movement while within the area, meaning someone with speed 2 can cross 4 of the spaces within the drone's area.

- Hostile characters treat the area as Difficult Terrain, and if they end their turn within the area they must make an Agility Save or fall prone.

The drone can be deployed to a different space or recalled as a quick action.

License III: 

 Silkworm Lash, Gift of Wild Game

Silkworm Lash

Main Melee, Threat 3, 1d6+2 Kinetic Damage, Accurate

On Critical Hit: Target is Immobilized until the end of your next turn.

Gift of Wild Game

2 SP, Unique, Drone, Quick Action

Game Drone (Size 1/2, 5 HP, Evasion 10, E-Defense 10, Speed 6, Tags: Drone)

 This Game Drone can be deployed to a free space within Sensors and line of sight, Where it then immediately moves up to its speed toward the nearest hostile character and, if it is within range, attempts to attack them with its Antlers. It repeats this process at the start of each of your turns, constantly moving towards and attempting to attack the nearest enemy.

Antlers

Main Melee, +Owner's Grit, 1 Threat, 4 Kinetic Damage.

The Drone can be recalled as a Quick Action.