Robotech Tabletop Games

[Lorindor]

As far as I know, no one has posted a thread (or in any other thread that I’ve seen) on the recent surge of Robotech tabletop games. I’m sure there are people here that would be interested though, so let me start this combined thread. People with Robotech and HG phobia may look elsewhere.

Five different companies have recently released or are planning to release Robotech board games, RPGs or wargames based on Robotech. That’s a lot!

 

SolarFlare Games

First out was SolarFlare Games which released their 1-on-1 strategic card game Robotech: Force of Arms last summer. Based on The Macross Saga, the players need to strategically place cards around a 3x3 grid of cards, which are read almost as a coordinate system. The attack and defend values of two cards placed at the edge of the grid are added onto the card placed where lines from them intercept in the middle of the grid. The cards are also placed face-down, which adds a guessing element to the game. Very strategic and I liked it a lot during my playthroughs.

More information: http://solarflaregames.com/robotech-force-arms/

SolarFlare is also planning to release a follow-up to FoA based on The Masters Saga. The game is called Robotech: Crisis Point and is similar to FoA, but the biggest difference is that the grid is now 4x4 (which opens up more strategic possibilities) and the inner grid is built up differently. The game is now available for preorder with an expected release in June. As a bonus if you preorder directly from SolarFlare, you get a preorder-exclusive standard deck of cards featuring artwork from both FoA and CP, as well as a mini-expansion to FoA (called Grand Cannon) and a free comic book. All this for 30 USD plus shipping, which is a pretty sweet deal if you ask me.

More information: http://solarflaregames.com/robotech-crisis-point/

Preorder here: https://bravefrontier.pledgemanager.com/projects/robotech-crisis-point/participate/

SolarFlare is also planning on releasing a cooperative card game for up to six players based on The New Generation called Robotech: Invid Invasion later this year.

More information: http://solarflaregames.com/robotech-invid-invasion/

They are also planning a deck builder game and a cardboard standee-based wargame (leaving miniatures to other companies), but there's not much information on them yet.

 

Kids Logic Games

Kids Logic are already making Robotech statues, but their sister company Kidslogic Games have the license to make a 6 mm scale miniature-based wargame (currently unnamed). There has been only a few previewed pictures of early sculpts so far, but those look pretty good (but I’m not so fond of some of the details that they have added to some of the mecha though). Unlike previous attempts (which we don’t have to mention), the minis will come as just one piece (or possibly a few). You can get more information if you join the Kids Logic Game Community on Facebook.

 

Strange Machine Games

SMG is another board game producer and they have made two Robotech board games: Attack on SDF-1 and Ace Pilot. I have sadly not played these games yet since my order is delayed, but especially Attack on SDF-1 looks impressive and Ace Pilot seems like a quite innovative game. They have also announced the plan to release another game similar to Ace Pilot based on The New Generation called Cyclone Run.

More information: https://strangemachinegames.com/robotech-board-games/

SMG also has the Robotech RPG license and are planning to release the first book with the main rules and setting for The Macross Saga later this year. After that, a book that covers the other two parts of the main series is in a planning stage. This RPG differs from previous RPGs by having a completely different rule system and it focuses on a more narrative and cinematic experience.

More information: https://strangemachinegames.com/robotech-the-macross-saga-role-playing-game/

A beta of the rules can be found on SMG's forums: http://forums.strangemachinegames.com/forums/

 

Battlefield Press

Battlefield Press is also making a Robotech RPG based on the Savage World system, together with SMG.

More information: https://icv2.com/articles/news/view/42291/robotech-gets-savage-worlds-treatment

 

Escape Velocity Games

Escape Velocity Games is, together with SMG, also releasing a cooperative game called Robotech: Brace for Impact. Information on this game is quite sparse right now, but it should be released soon.

More information: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/240006/robotech-brace-impact

 

(Full disclosure: I’m friends with the runner of SolarFlare Games and I’ve helped him with Crisis Point and Invid Invasion. I’m also a fan contributor to SMG’s RPG. I don’t get paid for any of this.)

[GabrielV]

I have Attack on the SDF-1.  And this is embarrassing, because I normally kind of dig complicated games (I like Star Fleet Battles, after all) but Attack on the SDF-1's rules made my eyes glaze over while trying to read them.  I don't really think it's that complicated, just very dryly and possibly poorly written.  

I also have Robotech: Force of Arms.  I didn't really like it.  It's a case of it's not my thing.  I was expecting a card battle game with a lot of back and forth play.  Instead I got something where each player plays all their cards (most of them in secret) and then you see the results at the end of the game.  But it was only 12 or 13 bucks, so whatever.  The cards were nice, though, so I'll give them another shot with Invid Invasion.

I'm interested in the RPGs.  I'll probably end up picking up both.  However, I am worried about the SMG version, as I've read their using the McKinney novels as primary reference material (and I imagine the Savage Worlds version will be the same or very similar fluff as well).  I'm not a fan of the McKinney novels at all, or anything introduced in them.  I had hoped Robotech fandom was done with them since they had been decanonized in the early 00s.

 

[Lorindor]

 

However, I am worried about the SMG version, as I've read their using the McKinney novels as primary reference material (and I imagine the Savage Worlds version will be the same or very similar fluff as well). 

I'm not involved in the Savage World version, so I cannot speak for that, but no, the McKinney novels are not the primary source for SMG's RPG. But they are liberal and are cherry-picking stuff from different sources (including older ones) and tries new spins on some things. This RPG is primarily meant to be fun to play. It doesn't set out to be the super-detailed tech manuals that the Palladium 2E tried to be and many things established in that RPG will be changed (but then again, it never was canon to begin with). I can assure you though that there won't be any thinking caps, Shapings or chanting children in the RPG.

[TehPW]

wouldn't you be better serving the customer base by waiting until 2021 (when the IP rights have been removed from HG's hands)? Robotech had it's day when Reagan was alive & well, DECADES ago. Now? Id rather play a game in the Macross Deculture realm, thank you.

[Einherjar]

Too many people from the Palladium days got royally screwed for this.

[Lorindor]

 

Too many people from the Palladium days got royally screwed for this.

What do you mean?

[Dynaman]

 

What do you mean?

Palladium's kickstarter promised a LOT and delivered very little.

I don't know what it has to do with the games listed here since the only relationship between the companies is both are licensees of Harmony Gold. 

[Einherjar]

 

I don't know what it has to do with the games listed here since the only relationship between the companies is both are licensees of Harmony Gold. 

I thought these games only became possible because Palladium screwed up so bad that they lost the license around the same time as they were first announced.

https://www.polygon.com/platform/amp/2018/3/2/17071612/robotech-rpg-tactics-kickstarter-disaster-palladium-books

[Seto Kaiba]

Hard pass for me... no offense, but the idea of supporting Harmony Gold and Robotech while they continue to block all Macross licensing is profoundly distasteful.

That said, since it was free, I did take a look at the Strange Machine Games Robotech: the Macross Saga RPG open beta a while back.  I know it's only in beta, and I honestly doubt that Strange Machine will get more than one book out of it, but I was completely unprepared for it to be at least as embarrassingly bad as Palladium's first effort back in the eighties.  Zero utility for converting the game to a Macross setting, IMO.

 

 

Palladium's kickstarter promised a LOT and delivered very little.

Yeah, but in all fairness "over-promise and under-deliver" has been Palladium's SOP for a very long time.

It wasn't a new development in their failed tabletop game Kickstarter, that was just a particularly public expression of the company's cardinal sin that riled an unusually large crowd as an inevitable result of them already having the customer money in hand rather than faffing about wasting their own.

 

 

I thought these games only became possible because Palladium screwed up so bad that they lost the license around the same time as they were first announced.

https://www.polygon.com/platform/amp/2018/3/2/17071612/robotech-rpg-tactics-kickstarter-disaster-palladium-books

Yup.

Edited March 11, 2019 by Seto Kaiba

[Lorindor]

 

Palladium's kickstarter promised a LOT and delivered very little.

I don't know what it has to do with the games listed here since the only relationship between the companies is both are licensees of Harmony Gold. 

Yeah, I know, I was a backer. And yeah, they don't have anything to do with Palladium (thankfully). SMG's game will actually be modern and playable. And I've only heard good things about Savage Worlds (but I don't really know any details).

 

I thought these games only became possible because Palladium screwed up so bad that they lost the license around the same time as they were first announced.

Well, the board games are and have always been on a seperate license. So they are unrelated. SMG's first game was announced on SDCC 2017 (or earlier), meaning at least in July 2017. Palladium announced the loss of their license on February 28, 2018, and it took affect some time in April or May. Of course, HG probably knew that they would need to find a new RPG/wargame maker earlier than that, but they would of course not be able to breach a contract.

[Einherjar]

 

Well, the board games are and have always been on a seperate license. So they are unrelated. SMG's first game was announced on SDCC 2017 (or earlier), meaning at least in July 2017. Palladium announced the loss of their license on February 28, 2018, and it took affect some time in April or May. Of course, HG probably knew that they would need to find a new RPG/wargame maker earlier than that, but they would of course not be able to breach a contract.

It rubs me the wrong way that this is essentially jumping ship from one long term investment project once helmed by experts in the RPG/ war game/miniature industries that didn’t work out to a whole bunch of them at the same time and hoping against hope that some of them will pan out.

[Dynaman]

 

Yeah, but in all fairness "over-promise and under-deliver" has been Palladium's SOP for a very long time.

I don't keep track, has Pallidium done a Kickstarter before?  There is a wide gulf between promising something and not delivering if you did not take someones money and doing the same AFTER taking someones money.  

[Seto Kaiba]

 

I don't keep track, has Pallidium done a Kickstarter before?  There is a wide gulf between promising something and not delivering if you did not take someones money and doing the same AFTER taking someones money.  

I wasn't speaking strictly in terms of Kickstarter, it was more a general comment on Palladium Books's attitude towards customer relations.  Kevin's regular news posts tend to have a distinctly distant relationship with objective reality.  He gets worked up easily and will often end up energetically hyping products that don't exist yet, making grandiose promises he can't keep, and missing his own self-set release dates by entire years while professing all hands are working hell for leather continuously.  Right now, IIRC he has a book that's like 80-90% reprinted material that is still over a full calendar year late and counting.

Basically, the fundamentally dishonest, self-destructive behavior you saw on Kickstarter was business as usual for Palladium... he just had already had your money this time, so he could prevaricate all he wanted without consequence and eventually give in to temptation and try to exploit the Kickstarter funds to line his own pockets and bankroll other products.

[Lorindor]

 

It rubs me the wrong way that this is essentially jumping ship from one long term investment project once helmed by experts in the RPG/ war game/miniature industries that didn’t work out to a whole bunch of them at the same time and hoping against hope that some of them will pan out.

I'm not sure how PB could be considered experts in RPG making. They made one game system in the '90s and have milked that format since. I personally consider their system utterly outdated and unplayable. I only used their books as tech manuals, and even for that they were inadequate. They are also clearly not experts in wargame making - in that case they would have been able to actually make a complete wargame.

[Einherjar]

 

I'm not sure how PB could be considered experts in RPG making. They made one game system in the '90s and have milked that format since. I personally consider their system utterly outdated and unplayable. I only used their books as tech manuals, and even for that they were inadequate. They are also clearly not experts in wargame making - in that case they would have been able to actually make a complete wargame.

Honestly, I don’t know much about that industry.  But I do know you and a lot whole lot of other people collectively gave PB so much support over the years, and over a million dollars just in the last decade, despite their flaws, got burned, and now hoping people are willing to do it again for other companies that might do it better.

[Seto Kaiba]

 

I'm not sure how PB could be considered experts in RPG making. They made one game system in the '90s and have milked that format since. I personally consider their system utterly outdated and unplayable. [...]

With a little bit of judicious houserule-ing and streamlining, Palladium's system is eminently workable... it's just bloated from decades of skill list expansions and unclear verbiage.

Strange Machine's system, however, is a train wreck severe enough that I found a few new bosons in the wreckage.

 

 

[...] They are also clearly not experts in wargame making - in that case they would have been able to actually make a complete wargame.

In all fairness, that had significantly less to do with them not being experts at wargame-manufacture than it did with Kevin being Kevin.  

Kevin went into RRT thinking he was an old pro who knew everything there was to know and puffed up on false confidence from the unexpectedly large take on Kickstarter.  He got overly ambitious with design requirements for the miniatures.  He vastly underestimated the cost of every phase of the project because it never occurred to him that there might be parts that needed to be reworked or that shipping big boxes of miniatures overseas would cost more than slim softbound books.  He similarly overestimated demand for the game based on the strong fan response on Kickstarter, and pillaged a huge sum from the budget for retail stock in order to line his own pockets on the assumption it was going to fly off the shelves and pay back that stolen investment with interest.  When the dust settled, Kevin's brilliant management skills left the project upside-down to the tune of over $650,000 (US) with a mountain of unsellable inventory collecting dust in Palladium's warehouse and Kevin himself scrambling to find someone willing to loan the company that massive sum so they could finish... which never materialized before HG terminated his license.

 

 

Honestly, I don’t know much about that industry.  But I do know you and a lot whole lot of other people collectively gave PB so much support over the years, and over a million dollars just in the last decade, despite their flaws, got burned, and now hoping people are willing to do it again for other companies that might do it better.

That's Robotech. 

"Yeah, we f*cked up this time.  And the time before that.  And the time before that.  And the time before that.  But this time'll be different, honest!  It's gonna be great!  We'll sell gangbusters!  The best is yet to come!"

[Lorindor]

 

Honestly, I don’t know much about that industry.  But I do know you and a lot whole lot of other people collectively gave PB so much support over the years, and over a million dollars just in the last decade, despite their flaws, got burned, and now hoping people are willing to do it again for other companies that might do it better.

True. I was a RRT backer. I also realized that it's different to back a crowdfunding project and to preorder a product, so I was patient for a long time. Now it's pretty clear, though, what an incompetent company PB is. I don't hold any loyalty to any company, I just like Robotech.

The main difference here, though, is that there are not any crowdfunding for these new products. You can thus wait for reviews so that you don't buy a pig in a poke and still don't miss out. Like almost any other product.

 

With a little bit of judicious houserule-ing and streamlining, Palladium's system is eminently workable... it's just bloated from decades of skill list expansions and unclear verbiage.

That's of course subjective. We have a different RPG tradition in my country, so that affects my opinion. I just want more from my RPG experience than endless, micro-managed battles. Or go through endless skill lists...

 

Strange Machine's system, however, is a train wreck severe enough that I found a few new bosons in the wreckage.

You realize that you are reviewing a work in progress? 

[Seto Kaiba]

 

That's of course subjective. We have a different RPG tradition in my country, so that affects my opinion. I just want more from my RPG experience than endless, micro-managed battles. Or go through endless skill lists...

Believe me, we're on the same page on the micromanagement and seemingly endless skill lists...

Not sure who these licensees think is going to buy these board and card games though.  There aren't exactly a lot of Robotech fans left, and they're pretty well-scattered... which was one of the bigger problems for RRT.  They can't exactly depend on the old RPG's saving grace of fans buying it as a reference work, and board games for licensed properties tend to be kind of a for-fans-only thing in my experience.

 

 

You realize that you are reviewing a work in progress? 

Pretty sure I said as much, yeah.  

[Lorindor]

 

Not sure who these licensees think is going to buy these board and card games though.  There aren't exactly a lot of Robotech fans left, and they're pretty well-scattered... which was one of the bigger problems for RRT.  They can't exactly depend on the old RPG's saving grace of fans buying it as a reference work, and board games for licensed properties tend to be kind of a for-fans-only thing in my experience.

Well, I know Force of Arms sold pretty well. Enough to release an expansion and Crisis Point at least, with more still planned. SMG have released two games and have even more on the way. So I would say it sells enough. Besides, the risks involved are not really that high in this industry. 

Miniature-based wargames is something entirely different though, since is requires many expensive molds. Kids Logic seems to focus on less molds and the minis will probably be better products than the RRT minis (mainly because they will not need as much assembly). Since they are a Hong Kong-based company, they also have an more international perspective that PB never had. The US market might not be big enough, but there are plenty of Robotech fans in China, South America, Europe and Australia.

And I wouldn't say that licensed boardgames are necessarily just for fans. For example the Battlestar Galactica boardgame is probably more popular with general boardgamers than Battlestar Galactica fans. A good game is a good game.

 

That said, since it was free, I did take a look at the Strange Machine Games Robotech: the Macross Saga RPG open beta a while back.  I know it's only in beta, and I honestly doubt that Strange Machine will get more than one book out of it, but I was completely unprepared for it to be at least as embarrassingly bad as Palladium's first effort back in the eighties.  Zero utility for converting the game to a Macross setting, IMO.

Well, I've already written a couple of thousend words on the sequel, but if it comes out of course depends if the first one sells enough. 

As for the criticism of the system that you have, tell SMG. They listen to feedback. But making it possible to convert the game to the Macross setting isn't really their main goal, I can tell you.

Edited March 12, 2019 by Lorindor