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I’ve decided to run a homebrew game using the Mechanoids invading Earth. I’m gonna use the Invasion Trilogy story as a template, but with a few alterations.

In my Palladium Megaverse, the Mechanoids have conquered their home galaxy and the six adjoining galaxies, and now they’ve set their sights on our Milky Way. But here there is no Beyond The Supernatural/Heroes Unlimited/Ninjas & Superspies/etc. Just plain Earth. In a way this is similar to “Independence Day”, but with Mechanoids.

At the moment I’m still deciding whether to do it with MDC Mechanoids vs SDC Earth, or have both of them SDC or MDC. But even before I do that, there’s the question of scale. If I have a mothership just appear even near Earth, it’s pretty much game over, but that’s the whole point of the mothership.

So instead I’m gonna send in a “Battle Cruiser”. At 19km long and with at the very least 100,000 Wasps, plus 2 Spider Fortresses, I think it can give Earth a run for its money.

Plus I’m also toying with the concept of a timeline in which the Mechanoids (at least a scout ship) happened to arrive on Earth in the past, tying it in with the Roswell incident (again, like “Independence Day”) This is more for my background and to lay it on the players as the game/campaign progresses.

But I do have a few questions or some things I’d like to point out.

So, Mechanoids hate all humanoid life. Anything with 2 arms, 2 legs and a head (tail notwithstanding). So does that mean they wouldn’t bother say a race of intelligent insects? Or perhaps a race of centaur-like people?

Another thing is their “power crystal” harvesting. Do they only run on power crystals? Is that why they harvest planets and suns? And if so, would it matter what kind of life or civilization existed on that planet or system? They would just do it anyway, right?

And, looking at the Mechanoid Mothership, at the tail end they have a tower with sections labeled as “Diplomatic Embassies”, “Alien Diplomat, Medical, Housing & Environments”. Strikes me as odd considering they’re hell bent on conquering the universe. Any thoughts or explainations?

Anyway, just a bit of rambling on my end. I do hope to see any official product regarding the Mechanoids, but in the meantime, I’ll be crafting a special stew with Palladium’s ingredients.

Peace!

Mechanoids despise all humanoid life, but some non-humanoid races (insect, reptilian, ect.) may find some 'favor' with the Mechanoids, the less they appear to be humanoid (an arachnoid race, say, like the Tholians from ST-TOS, would be spared as long as they served The Mechanoids in some capacity, such as slaves).

The 'power crystal' seems to be their main power source, or at least efficient enough for their technology to run on. They may have abandoned nuclear power-sources in their past as being too inefficient or just too costly for their resources.

It makes sense to have such "Diplomatic Embassies" on their ships, as they do travel around the universe & are most likely to encounter races with technology equal to or superior to their own. Also, finding allies with similar dispositions ("We hate those stupid monkeys SO MUCH!" "You do? So do we! Let's team up!") puts less strain on their resources....and they can always get rid of them later on.

Find & pick up Rifts Sourcebook 2: The Mechanoids. New designs, new Mechanoids, and the Abberant offshoot make some good reading. Having a 'Mechanoid Civil War' play out may add some spice to your campaign.

socom242 wrote:So, Mechanoids hate all humanoid life. Anything with 2 arms, 2 legs and a head (tail notwithstanding). So does that mean they wouldn’t bother say a race of intelligent insects? Or perhaps a race of centaur-like people?

If they're not technically humanoid or humanoid-ish (say, mermen or rahu-men, races with minor differences), then they're probably safe.
Unless they're seen as allies of the humanoids.

Another thing is their “power crystal” harvesting. Do they only run on power crystals?

The mechanoids themselves seem to, although their robots are nuclear powered (as per Rifts SB2).

Is that why they harvest planets and suns? And if so, would it matter what kind of life or civilization existed on that planet or system? They would just do it anyway, right?

Unless they had allies on that planet/system.

And, looking at the Mechanoid Mothership, at the tail end they have a tower with sections labeled as “Diplomatic Embassies”, “Alien Diplomat, Medical, Housing & Environments”. Strikes me as odd considering they’re hell bent on conquering the universe. Any thoughts or explainations?

Maybe for non-humanoid species?

Like Bookwyrm stated, the Mechanoids Rifts Sourcebook is a great resource.

The original Mechanoid Trilogy book III had as an allied race of the Mechanoids a race of insect beings. They were utterly non-humanoid and thus considered to be a valid race to partner with. This pretty clearly shows us that they are fine with races that are not humanoid (hence the embassy).

Sounds fun!

I run Rifts / Mechanoid Space hybrid games. What time period of Earth are you having them invade? 1950s would be fun, but considering that Mechanoids: Invasion happens in the far future with psi and fusion guns, I can't imagine Earth tech surviving long.

Perhaps the Mechanoid battleship crashed into Earth? Then Man would have homefield advantage somewhat as the Mechanoids would have a harder time stripping the atmosphere (aka their step one tactic) with a broken ship.

Personally, I run it using Nightbane (modern day) or Chaos Earth (future).

Spinachcat wrote:Sounds fun!

I run Rifts / Mechanoid Space hybrid games. What time period of Earth are you having them invade? 1950s would be fun, but considering that Mechanoids: Invasion happens in the far future with psi and fusion guns, I can't imagine Earth tech surviving long.

Perhaps the Mechanoid battleship crashed into Earth? Then Man would have homefield advantage somewhat as the Mechanoids would have a harder time stripping the atmosphere (aka their step one tactic) with a broken ship.

Personally, I run it using Nightbane (modern day) or Chaos Earth (future).

Years ago I set up a game, never got to run it, that was the Mechanoids invading the Heroes Unlimited Earth, complete with aliens from Aliens Unlimited and Galaxy Guide. I figured even with SDC Mechanoids and reduced numbers they needed that kind of power level to have a chance.

What are you going to give them in terms of equipment or vehicles to allow a PC to be able to hurt a giant psionic cyborg?

Warshield73 wrote:

Spinachcat wrote:Sounds fun!

I run Rifts / Mechanoid Space hybrid games. What time period of Earth are you having them invade? 1950s would be fun, but considering that Mechanoids: Invasion happens in the far future with psi and fusion guns, I can't imagine Earth tech surviving long.

Perhaps the Mechanoid battleship crashed into Earth? Then Man would have homefield advantage somewhat as the Mechanoids would have a harder time stripping the atmosphere (aka their step one tactic) with a broken ship.

Personally, I run it using Nightbane (modern day) or Chaos Earth (future).

Years ago I set up a game, never got to run it, that was the Mechanoids invading the Heroes Unlimited Earth, complete with aliens from Aliens Unlimited and Galaxy Guide. I figured even with SDC Mechanoids and reduced numbers they needed that kind of power level to have a chance.

What are you going to give them in terms of equipment or vehicles to allow a PC to be able to hurt a giant psionic cyborg?

A young Japanese singing ingénue? (sorry, couldn't resist)

Warshield73 wrote:What are you going to give them in terms of equipment or vehicles to allow a PC to be able to hurt a giant psionic cyborg?

If you use Mechanoids as SDC, then Nightbanes do just fine going toe to toe.

If you use Systems Failure humans, then its gets nasty (like Mechanoids: Invasion or Homeworld). In those cases, I would probably modify down the number of Mechanoids or cut their SDC to make it work like ID4 or other modern invasion flicks.

I was thinking about how Splicers would be a good match. Like a reverse version of Pacific Rim.