Spicy Frame Zero - Pilot Leveling for Rapid Attack Beta

Pilot and Frame

First a special thanks to the Pilots/MoF0s who hang out on the Mobile Frame 0: University Discord with me.

Pilot Leveling for Rapid Attack

So this isn't a new topic but just my try at the idea of it. I will create a thread on The Hanger for discussion of my take on this concept which you can find here: Hanger Thread. What am currently presenting is semi refined version of the Pilot Leveling System with a set of options to try out.

Intent: The idea of Pilot Leveling is something new to try/switch things up if a group of friends are planning to play several games or some link games together in some fashion.

Aces: Each player/squad only has 1 designated pilot that is their Ace that can level up.
or
Big Damn Aces: ALL PILOTS ARE ACES and have the potential to level up.

Pilot License: Every Ace has their Pilot License on record and is how you will track their levels and abilities. Either use note cards or sheets of paper. A license includes a Pilot's name, their earned experience points (XP), their level (you could use ranks instead and start at level 0) and a identifying symbol or color(s) that are also on their frame.

Levels and Abilities: All Aces start of at level 0 with no abilities. When an Ace levels up to 1 they must chose a Specialization that will shape the rest of their abilities as they level. Each specialization is one of the frame systems and each weapon system range is a separate specialization. An Ace does not have to carry his Specialized System on his frame during a combat but without it they will not gain their specialized benefits.

Level 0 - Nothing
Level 1 - The Ace can reroll a one once per frame's turn on their specialize system's die.
Level 2 - The Ace can reroll a one on a white die once per turn.
Level 3 - A d6 becomes a d8 on the specialize system.
Level 4 - Special Ability

Special Abilities

Green: As long as you have a green system (not Sprint) when this frame is activated by another frame's attack you may move it behind cover if cover is one unit away. Minus one to your green die roll.

Blue: As long as this frame has a blue system the owner may treat the frame one unit bigger in all direction for determining if it counts as cover for another frame.

Yellow: As long as this frame has a yellow system when it spots a frame it may also had a spot of one on another frame that is up to two units away.

Red, Direct and Artillery: As long as this frame has it's specialized red system and damages cover using it's specialized system's range the owner may remove 3 additional pieces from the cover per successful damage. If the frame attacks through cover and does no damage to it than the owner of the frame may remove three pieces of cover.

Red, Hand to Hand: As long as this frame has a red system and fails to damage it's target during a hand to hand attack the frame gets to make 1 extra attempt at damage but needs to roll a 5 or 6.

Experience Points and Leveling Up

Battle Report: Players earn XP at the end of the game to distribute to their Ace(s). The amount earned is equal to the difference of their Victory Points and that of the player below them. The player at the bottom gains half the XP of the player above them.
or
Spoils: The other idea is an Ace scores XP when ever they captures a station or destroy a frame equal to their Score Per Asset; maybe lose half the Score Per Asset if the Ace abandons a station in the players control. XP is equal to the squad's Score Per Asset.

Each Ace can only level up one time between games.

Level 1 - 12 XP
Level 2 - 27 XP
Level 3 - 45 XP
Level 4 - 66 XP

Pilot Death

So if you want to add another layer making leveling even more precious you can have Pilot Death but this is certainly optional.

Non-Aces and Level 0 Aces don't have to worry about Death Checks.

Ejection System: Remove a White Die from your Ace's frame for the game to guarantee your Ace survives.

Experience Saves: When the Ace's frame is destroyed, roll a d6 to see if the Ace lives. To live you need a 6, add the Ace's Level to the roll.
or
Equalizer: When the Ace's frame is destroyed, roll a d6 to see if the Ace lives. TO live you need a 4 or higher.
or
Inconvenience: As above but you need a 3 or higher.

Ace Death: The Ace is dead, make a new pilot card with a new name. New Aces can inherit a previous Ace's colors/symbol.

Mobile Frame Zero: Scales, Sizes and Standards

First this is a 'living document'.

What do we mean by living document? Essentially as the game grows and evolves, so will this post. Any major/additions changes and I will re-post to the usual places but I don't think any feed sources will update.

Purpose: A reference/guide for players of Mobile Frame Zero series about scale, sizes and standards. This isn't official but pulls info  heavily from the Hanger (MF0 forum) via discussion and/or 'word of god(s)' and sometimes my own crazy thoughts.

Scale: a comparable value of in game size compared to our real world. The scale size is referring to how big is a human at this scale.

Size: rough size limits of a build given the scale of your game.

Standard: a suggested default or a possible assumption of limits.

Rapid Attack

Plate

Standard Format: 7p (p=plates) Scale, 10 studs (wide) x 10 studs (deep) x 12 bricks (tall) suggested max Size Also known as 'The Box'

You and your friends can set any scale/size for your games but some choices might cause you to have to tweak the rules when it comes to ranges.

In the community we generally refer to scale by plates (as in the smallest height of LEGO) with a number in front to indicated how many plates for example 7p. What is this referring to? People. 7p plates is roughly equal to a person (or 6p, or 4p, that is how tall people are).

Stud

Why do we care about that? Well, it effects the look of your cover/stations. With the reference of how big a person is (you), you know how to build everything else in relation to that.

What about Size? Well, we are talking about the volume that your frame takes up and out point of reference here for measurement is a stud for width and depth while using a brick for height so 10 stud (wide) x10 (stud) deep x 12 bricks (tall). We refer to this simple as The Box.

Why this box? Well the best two reasons I can give is 1) the rules work well with your frames not breaking the Size suggestion and 2) This is the general assumption Soren used when making the iconic MF0 frames.

Brick

As for 1) I mean, the bigger you get out of the box the easier it is to get shot while gaining no real benefit besides look factor.

So at 7p Scale using the The Box the rules work very well and you have a nice scale to work with when it comes to building stations and your cover.

The Box

Box Checker

Visualizing 7p Scale

As we discussed above 7p is how tall a human is on the battlefield but what does that mean to everything else? Let's basic down to the most basic by starting with average human height at 5'10" (1.8 meters) but lets just round that to 6' (1.8 meters and humans will be taller in the future anyways).

6 feet/ 7 plates equals 0.86 feet ( or just over 10 inches, 0.26 meters. I say 10 inchs or 0.25 meters for simplicity.) per plate.

So there is the low end, but let's take this to another common reference in the game: the chub. The chub is roughly 21 plates tall meaning it is a rough 18 feet tall or three times taller then the average human. That seems about right and fits well into the default setting for MF0 (of course feel free to make your own setting).

So we have people, the plate, the chub but what about THe Box?

(a lot of adjusting is about to happen to keep math easy) The brick is 3 plates tall and just over 2 plates wide giving as a rough height of 30 inches or 2.5 feet (0.75 meters) and a width of 21 inches  or 1.75 feet (0.50 meters).

That makes The Box 17.5 feet (5 meters) long x 17.5 feet (5 meters) wide and 30 feet (9 meters) tall.

Hope this helps.

Breaking Down Further

If your interested in smaller scales such as 4p and below then you should checkout No B.S. Just A.B.S. 's entry about Scale as well.

-So You want to Play Minifigure Scale

Before I begin I will say this is just my opinion/research and has not yet been play tested. Anyone who takes this and tries it out please let me know how it went BUT Joshua tweeted a bit about the basics ideas I had and tweeted back this:

@Shades_Corvid A minifig with a hat or hair would come out just right, then! Your other scaling makes sense to me, too.
— Joshua A.C. Newman (@JoshuaACNewman) January 8, 2015

 Take that as you will.

7p Ruler

14p Ruler

So I sized up the minifigure (12 plates) and started the math to figure out the scale and how things would need to change. Short answer is it got complex and what I would call silly. So I came up with this instead. Just double the scale and everything else then just call it minifigure scale.

So yes, 14p scale(5 inches per plate)  is what I think minifigure scale should be with the minifigure is two plates short just like the microfigure is one plate short. With that though everything needs to double as well.

Minifig Standard Scale: 14p, 20 studs x 20 studs x 24 bricks suggest max size.

The Ruler: Still 8 units long but unit is now 10 studs long. With that adjust play area (about 9 feet wide) and ranges with that in mind.

Cover: Now Begins at 6 bricks or higher. Stations are still not cover.

Stations: Stations are now 8 studs x 8 studs.

Cover Damage: Remove 12 pieces instead of 6 and I would stick with 2x2 brick as your common minimum size of piece and have 1x1 bricks used sparingly.

14p on the left, 7p on the right. The top of the open hatch should be equal to a 14p Chub.

LEGO Star Wars Microfighters AAT Review for MF0

Original Review System by Mantis King

The Box

So Microfighters Star Wars Week! So when these sets hit the shelves I was very excited for Intercept Orbit because I thought maybe we have some pre-built stuff here. Of course we aren't going to leave out Rapid Attack in the reviews. Let's get started!

Instructions

Starting with the AAT (Which stands for Armored Assault Tank) which does not look like a great set but that turret looks like it could be transplanted onto a frame or station. Side Note: I love this droid soldiers from the clone wars! Let's crack this egg open and see what we got.

Can you build some sort of creation right away?

I built a very awkward looking frame but I sort of like the 'head'. I think there is some good stuff for some stations in here too. So a +5 to our scorecard.

How was I satisfied with this blurry pic? Maybe I should fire the photographer...

Is it below, at, or above the golden ratio? (Ten Cents Per Part)


So all the sets for the Microfighter Star Wars are $9.99 but of course have different part counts. Our AAT is $9.99 with 95 pieces which gives a price per piece cost of 11 cents per part. This above our ratio but only by a penny. That is pretty good for a Star Wars set I believe. -10 points from our scorecard.

Parts 1

If you can't build a frame right away, or choose not to, does it have parts you should be able to put into use right away? 


Yes! I think we have plenty of parts that can see use for both Intercept Orbit and Rapid Attack in this set. +5 points to the scorecard.

Parts 2

Does it have more than a handful of immediately useful parts?

+5 points to Gryffindor , no wait, I mean to this set. So yeah, we easily have several useful parts for some micro spaceship and robot building!

Total: Over all we have a +5 for a B+ which is better then I thought.

With a little bit of modding one might be able to use this mostly as is for a tank in Rapid Attack though you might be pushing pass the 10x10 space.

With Droid