Re: How to Build a Mecha, LEGO Brick by LEGO Brick

[Dimitri 0]

General and Technical Data

 

Model number: 1

Code name: Ultimate Infinitity Strike Aegis Gundam

Unit type: GUNDAM!!!!!11

Manufacturer: ME

Operator: ME

First deployment: Whenever I feelz like it!

Capacity: Me

Height: 500meters

Weight: 74 KG

Construction: Metal, duh!

Power plant: Ultimate black hole powa!

Equipment and design features: Indestructible, never runs out of fuel, automatically kills all other mobile weponz! An it can bee invisble!

Fixed armaments: Purple lightsaber

Optional hand armaments: 16 x Draggon unitz

                                                      32x Nuclear warheads, stroed in sholderz

 

Technical and Historical Notes

Madeby me! It's uncopyable and undefeatable! Ha! I is da best, [CENSORED]!

 

 

So what's so bad about this you ask? ((And if you actually are seriously asking why, I should gank you right now and put you out of your misery. Not only that, I'd be doing the world a favor by eliminating your genes from the gene pool.)) Everything...

 

Now, if you want to know how to custom build your own machine without looking like the above, you've come to the right place.

 

First, the model numbers. These are hard to come up with, for sure. The general rule of thumb is to use the model number of the mech you're basing your design on. Like, if you made a GINN Melee Type, you'd take the GINN base number, ZGMF-1017, and add some to it's actual number. So maybe your GINN is ZGMF-1036. If you have an original design, feel free to makeup your own number. Start with a sort of acronym, like VIML for "Vector Industries Mobile Labor" and add some random numbers, like 231. VIML-231 Doesn't look too bad, does it? If it's a prototype suit, follow the same rules, but add a P or E to the end for "prototype" or "experimental", so VIML-231P. Not too hard, eh?

 

Code names? Just come up with something cool. Avoid words like Shadow, Lightning, and Strike, since they're very over used. Some exceptions are all cool though, like if your Gundam is all about spitting out lightning, by all means go ahead and use the word! Most of all, have it be similar to your suit's specialty. "Swordwaltzer" is a great name for a graceful melee-sword type, but it it just has sniper rifles, heavy armor, and missiles, it doesn't sound right. Get my drift?

 

Unit types. A lot of you will be tempted to say "Mobile Armor" or "Mobile Suit". Please don't. This zone describes your weapon's special purpose. Sniper? It's a "long range assault suit". Machine gun heavy? Call it a "heavy assault suit". Don't worry about being creative, just don't be bare bones. If anything, put in "All-purpose suit" if you can't think of a specific purpose. Other different types could be civilian models, racing mobiles, etc.

 

The manufacturer should be a military force or a private industry. If you want, make up a name.

 

Operator... Use your name, and not the word "me".

 

First deployments are always a hard thing to deal with. Most times, "Unknown" is an acceptable answer. Let's face it, we don't have a perfect sense of time in RP...

 

Capacities should include humans and cargo. Keep in mind a mobile suit will NOT have much room for more than two people. A heavy mobile weapon however, might be able to hold many, depending on it's purpose. A salvage armor Example will hold only one person, maybe, but it can carry a lot of cargo with it.

 

Height and weight... This part always hurts my brain. If you have a suit, your size is between 17 and 21 meters, most likely. Your weight will be proportional, at about 80 metric tons, give or take ten depending on height. Don't include optional weapons in the weight calculation, but do include armoring. Light armor suits weight less than heavy suits, obviously.

 

Construction is a hard one too. But just have this be where the suit was built. It'll often coincide with who built the suit.

 

Power plants should be pretty easy. "Ultra-compact energy battery; Energy output unknown." Will show up on every non-nuclear Gundam. Let's face it, Gundam isn't big on alternate fuel sources. It's AA's or uranium... Unless you want to go low-tech and use a methane power cell... Eeek...

 

Equipment and design features... YES! The fun stuff! First, every suit needs sensors. Usually, you'll be going with standard sensor arrays. They rock enough that they're in common use. If you want additional sensor types, say sonar or heat sensors, make sure to mention that. Commander-class and recon-class sensors often come with a large backpack set, so be willing to know you'll be sacrificing speed and weapon slots for powerful sensors. Also include things like mirage and virus colloids, phase-shift or trans-phase-shift armors, and such. Non-weapon equipment goes here, whereas weapons go in later.

 

Fixed Weaponry is where the hardmounted items go. Your CIWS cannons, energy shield projectors, shoulder mounted missile pods... All of them go here. You can only have a certain number or items here. If you're making a custom MS, you get 5 weapon slots. These also count for optional weapons, so watch out! Keep in mind, you can have multiples, like 6 CIWS cannons, so long as they're fire-linked. Fire linked weapons count as only one weapon. Missile pods that fit the sametype of missile count as one as well, so you can have, say, 24 "Hayate" missile launcher tubes stored on your MS, so long as they're all for the one type of missile.

 

Hand weapons are actually anything detachable. A rifle, beam swords, or even shoulder-top cannons or back-mounted missile packs. So long as they aren't an integral part of the MS, they go here. They follow the same rules as the fixed weapons too. The same weapons, like beam sabers, can group together to take up only one slot. Also, you can have AS MANY weapons here as you want. But you can't bring all of them to battle. Say you have three of your five slots dedicated to fixed items. That leaves you two weapons to bring. So maybe you want your beam rifle and your riot shield. Cool! Or maybe your dual SMG's and beam sabers. Again, righteous. but you can't have your shield, your rifle, your sabers and your SMG's. That's called overloading, my friend, and mobile weapons don't like it one bit. Just ask Mr. Zaku...

 

"My arms fell off... I'm gonna go cut my wrust now 'cuz this makes me emo... Oh wait, I can't... I HAVE NO ARMS!"

 

Tech and history notes. Yay... Boring, right? WRONG! This is where it's all at. This is where you get to brag about how awesome your MS is. From it's wicked paint job, to it's unique weapons, and even down to the sweet, sweet sound system, you get to explain it all here.

 

And remember, mecha have feelings too. You wouldn't want someobody to write your biography and say "S/He sitson the couch and eats tater chips all day while watching Oprah. The End." Would you? Maybe (insert your character's name here) commissioned it as a reward for achieving Major. Or maybe you and some Junk Guild buddies unearthed it and restored it. Get creative. Just remember, you can't build one from scratch without major technical and industrial backing, AKA HELP!, but you can play a part as a primary designer, or someone on the build team. Fixing an old or wrecked suit takes less time, but still needs a lot of help. So justmake sure you credit the team, even NPC's deserve some love!

 

NPC's :"REALLY!?"

 

No.

[Black_Magic 0]

This guide is really well done...

 

Except, my real problem with designing an effective Mobile Weapon comes in with assigning its armaments appropriately. Usually I mount useless technology or underpower it immensely (many of my scrapped Prototype designs could logically be shot down by the average GINN or Dagger).

[Dimitri 0]

Oh, yes... I can see that happening. I'm a fan of over-powering a mech, just becasue it's easier to say "That's too much" than to see underpowering. Then, once you see what's overpowered, you can see how to fix that, usually by taking said overpoweredness off and replacing it with a standard item. Another good way to look at it is to contact a mod ((I'm sure Winders would be pretty helpful in this aspect)) about it. They'll be able to give you some advice on balancing out your custom.

 

When it comes to making sure you have the right weapon for the job, just try and use common sense. Are you going to mount a beam revolver on a DOM? Of course not, you're probably going to use that power to mount a beam bazooka or a dual-chaingun pack. Same thing with a Murasame clone. You're not going to add a beam bazooka to it because it would interfere with it's trasformation modes and slow it down immensely. Instead, you'd probably want to add a battle rifle to it for medium range combat, where the Murasame lacks ability.

 

So basically, when it comes to coming up with features, just remember that you want to further your suit's purpose as much as possible while maintaining balance. Light armaments for salvage pods, heavy weaps for assault mechs, mirage colloids and close-in weapons for stealth and so on.

 

Another thing to remember is that it's not the mech that determines a winner, it's the pilot's use of that mech. Make sure it fits your character's personal style. You're not going to want beam rifles and bazookas if you're tigger happy, instead, you'll want missiles and machine guns. Gone samurai? Have some swordness, remember to pack a shield so you can get close-up with less worry, and pack some speed as well.

 

In an RP, I've taken down a Gundam with a Zaku Gunner. Okay, the Zaku died too... But you know what, it's still a decent trade off. ((It was either Kaizer or Kai Hiwatari, both were present in the battle. I got one, the other hacked the Zaku to bits after the one-for-one deal. I think I was known as Sakata on that board.)) But how did I do it? Well, the beam rifle was useless. The Gundam got that thing out of the way pretty quick. But it did get trapped in a pyramid of grenades thrown by the Zaku ((A standard Zaku has four grenades)) which took out an arm. From then on, it was just melee skill, Tomahawk vs. Beam Boomerang-Saber-thingy. When he threw it, I was able to get in close for the headshot. His head-mounted CIWS cannons got me at the same time.

 

So yeah, don't be discouraged by an under-powered design. If you catch the flaw before hand, go ahead and correct it. If you already got the mech approved, you can just the mods for some add-ons, through the standard mech customization style or whatnot. Or you can work with it and try to find creative ways to utilize your current loadout. In fact, the most satisfying feeling is when you turn a flaw into a strength by using that flaw to your advantage.

[Kaizer 0]

I remember that fight I think, it was on Falko-sama's old site; though neither me nor Hiwatari were using gundams, simply customized commander use mobile suits (Arbalest for Kai and Gemini for me).  It was still an awesome move though, and I think I kinda shoved a modified Ginn sword into your suit afterwards  .

 

This is a good guide you've written here, and its making me think that we might have to gather up some of the old guides from SEED RPG and other sites for here at Advent Destiny.  A more extensive help section will hopefully (note the use of the word 'hopefully') reduce the number of questions people have, and make everyone's lives a little bit easier.

[winders 0]

Ho ho! I took on Kai and Lillium at the same time IN THEIR GUNDAMS with my Gundam

[Dimitri 0]

I remember that fight I think, it was on Falko-sama's old site; though neither me nor Hiwatari were using gundams, simply customized commander use mobile suits (Arbalest for Kai and Gemini for me). It was still an awesome move though, and I think I kinda shoved a modified Ginn sword into your suit afterwards .

 

This is a good guide you've written here, and its making me think that we might have to gather up some of the old guides from SEED RPG and other sites for here at Advent Destiny. A more extensive help section will hopefully (note the use of the word 'hopefully') reduce the number of questions people have, and make everyone's lives a little bit easier.

 

Okay, so it wasn't a Gundam... But it was an awesome MS. Add in a nuclear reactor and it would have been... XP

 

Anyway, thanks for the compliment. I just think I over-do it when it comes to stuff like this...

[Valiant 96]

I remember that fight I think, it was on Falko-sama's old site; though neither me nor Hiwatari were using gundams, simply customized commander use mobile suits (Arbalest for Kai and Gemini for me).  It was still an awesome move though, and I think I kinda shoved a modified Ginn sword into your suit afterwards  .

 

This is a good guide you've written here, and its making me think that we might have to gather up some of the old guides from SEED RPG and other sites for here at Advent Destiny.  A more extensive help section will hopefully (note the use of the word 'hopefully') reduce the number of questions people have, and make everyone's lives a little bit easier.

 

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