Category: Playtest

MechaStellar VER10 Retrospective – Timeline Post

In this post we wanted to share a brief timeline of VER10. In the next post we’ll go more in-depth in some of the mechanics.

VER10 had a lot of iterative development, making small or minor tweaks to the core rules to either fix loopholes, broken combos we didn’t foresee, or just for clarity.  A lot of rules from 2024 survived all the day to 2026, with tweaks of course.  As a retrospective we thought it would be fun to look through each update and count which ones survived all the way till the end.

March 2024 – Begin VER10 DEV Playtest

May 2024 – Begin Closed Playtest

System Debuts

  • Core Mechanic for shooting lets attacker and defender both roll (VER4-9 had only the defender roll Evade vs Shooting)
  • Melee Clash now follows the same mechanic, overall attack gameplay was streamlined and much faster
  • Barrage / Bullseye and Dodge / Guard moved to Elite only abilities
  • All units can move twice by default
  • Rapid fire is now listed on the unit profile
  • Armor Save bonus was removed
  • Older Pilot Skills moved to the Climactic Events section
  • New Pilot Skills mirror their SRW inspirations with simplifies and more straightforward uses (+5 Hits, +5 DEF, etc.)
  • Mech Profiles moved from 6 per page to 4 per page, to improve readability with larger text areas
  • Machine guns and beam pistols got a Support ATK / DEF mechanic which encouraged having squads of units in close proximity
  • Auto-hit weapons of AA Missiles and Vulcans proved to be a big problem with the OG version of Finishing Blow.  This problem would come full circle when testing out small size units 2 years later with a new version of Finishing Blow.
  • Shields – Switched to a defense bonus at the expense of Evade dice.

August 2024 – VER10 Open Playtest

Starting off the roster we have Mobile Suit Gundam UC – One Year War (OYW), Gundam Wing, Mazinger, Getter Robo

The DEV version of VER10 had very low lethality with HITs vs DEF often had 0-1 expected hits with most weapons, and machine gun types averaging 3-4 Hits.  Because of this, the balance between Valor (bonus hits) and Zeal (bonus attack actions) was probably the best the game ever had.

As VER10 hit the open playtest stage and certain game elements became modified, the expected number of hits started creeping up.  About a year later, we noticed that Zeal was often the preferred skill for most high end units, beating out Valor.

SEP2024

  • Space Battleship Yamato Released
  • Combattler V, Voltes V and Shin Mazinger updated to VER10
  • Core Rules Updates –
  • Counter became universal on all units [Lasted most of VER10]
  • Finishing Blow became universal on all units.  [Lasted all of VER10]
  • Sensors now gave a boost to Defense as well as Offense [Lasted all of VER10]
  • Support Attack for E[X]plosives got stronger [Lasted all of VER10]
  • Momentum shifts went from M<3 to M<5 [Lasted all of VER10]
  • Zeal text was updated to avoid the gamey’ness of using zeal to them trigger a momentum shift [Lasted all of VER10]
  • Various points and VP adjustments. 
  • VP would later skyrocket near the end of VER10.  At the start the RX78-2 was 8VP (most units were 3-12VP), at the end it was 280VP (most units are 50-500VP)

October 2024

  • Updates to Combat Roles [Revised many times]
  • Added Unstoppable, Assault and Heavy Arms roles [Throwback to VER6, lasted all of VER10]
  • Updated size [Revised many times]
  • Updated HP Math [Revised many times]
  • Updated points for Shields [Revised many times]
  • Updated Indirect Fire
  • All units got +1 defense die [Lasted all of VER10]
  • Allowed the Power stat to be used to fuel weapons [Lasted all of VER10]

NOV 2024

  • Garmillas Fleet from Yamato added
  • Most of AEUG, Titans units updated to VER10
  • Dual Sensors added for Firepower and Sniper Types [Lasted all of VER10]

DEC2024

  • G Gundam Added
  • Updated the Wargames Supplement which included many unit upgrade rules
  • Core Rules Updates
  • Battle-Tested level added to Elite pilots for well trained but often nameless pilots [Lasted all of VER10]
  • Updates to Morale
  • Updates to Commanders orders

JAN2025

  • GoLion (Voltron), GoShogun, Brygar and Baxingar added to the roster
  • Converted Gundam X and G Gundam to VER10
  • MechaStellar VER10 Gameplay Example added featuring Zeta Gundam + Guncannon vs Gouf Custom and Gundam GX-9900 [This example is now painfully out of date.  Please forgive us ='( ]
  • Added rules if you break the 10d10 dice cap [Lasted all of VER10]
  • Updated Target Lock to be bonus dice
  • Updated Crash
  • Updated Boost
  • Updated starting Momentum
  • Units with multiple pilots like Combiners and Warships, now have pilot traits always active instead of the previous “choose 2” gimmick.
  • Size HP bonus revised again
  • Captain’s Orders updated
  • Warships can now use Focus & Iron Wall [Lasted all of VER10]
  • Moved “Improvise” from Pilot Skill to “Events”
  • Removed reroll from most weapons
  • Removed VP penalties from Simple Battle
  • Updated various upgrade traits

FEB2025

  • Updated Turn A Gundam to VER10
  • Gundam Build Fighters rules updated to VER10

MAR2025

  • Converted many G Gundam fighters to VER10
  • Updated Finishing Blow to be roll d10s for potential 1000 DMG
  • Added Retaliate as a Counterattack option for VER9 feel
  • Updated Climactic Events and Battlefield Hazards module

APR 2025

  • Gundam SEED added to the roster
  • Zeal became limited by the current Round to prevent alpha strikes [Lasted all of VER10]
  • Revised AOE weapons again

MAY2025

  • More Gundam SEED units
  • Converted Secondary Objectives to VER10

JUN2025

  • More Gundam SEED units
  • Warships got a massive force multiplier update
  • Updated VP again
  • Updated HP again
  • Updated Finishing Blow again

JUL2025

  • Gundam SEED Stargazer added

SEP2025

  • Updated Battle Damage to VER10
  • Updated Starting Momentum [Lasted until the end of VER10]
  • Updated Finishing Blow again
  • Armor Saves back to 3 dice
  • Massive balance patch to HP, Move, Sensors to move everything to a base of 4, i.e. Move 4″/8″/12″ etc. and complete updating of points, weapons, etc.

OCT2025

  • Gundam SEED Astray added
  • Rebalanced Warships & Large Units
  • Updated many pilot traits to have a base of Hit on a 3+ or DEF on a 3+ [Lasted all of VER10]

NOV2025

  • Added Aura Battler Dunbine
  • Added a flow chart for rules summary

DEC2025

  • Added more units for Dunbine
  • Rebalanced all small size units and also warships

FEB2026

  • Added in the long awaited Char’s Counterattack (Jegan and Gearas) to the Roster
  • Added Dancouga to the Roster
  • Added a Squad System
  • Retooled Support Weapons
  • Returned Counter to be Elite only
  • Armor Saves back to 5 dice
  • Updated Finishing Blow again [Lasted almost until the end of VER10]
  • Added in “Elite Levels”
  • Changed what counts as “Elite Upgrades” and thus affects Elite levels
  • Added a speed upgrade
  • Massive change to HP and VP
  • Allowed for certain weapons to go above the 10d10 attack dice cap [Eventual deathknell for VER10]

MAR – JUN 2026

  • Added Dangaioh and Zeorymer to the roster
  • Added Nu Gundam and Sazabi
  • Issues identified by an all-star player involving small units, trait stacking, counter + finishing blow dominating the battlefield
  • Extensive playtesting of small size units and finding the limits of the current VER10 design space with regards to number of attacks and Finishing Blow.

MechaStellar VER10 Playtest Request

We’re working on VER10 with a planned release around November or December. Our number one question has always been why are dice rolls for Shooting and Melee so different so the goal for this update is to have Shooting and Melee use the same attack mechanic. Likewise for Evade and Melee Defense.

So when you shoot you will roll d10s, every 5+ is a Hit and every 10 is a Crit. The defender then rolls Evade and every 5+ is a successful Defense. Melee is also getting updated to be faster. The current Shooting / Melee / Evade stats are being updated to provide bonuses, for example, you might have a Shooting bonus of +4 Hits, a Melee of +5 Hits and an Evade of +2 DEF.

There are some other updates going on as well, including an update to the Mech Profiles so that will take a lot of time to update.

In the meantime we’re going to get some playtest rules ready for Version 10.

Leave a comment below, shoot us an email or contact us on social media with your favorite series (from the current roster) and two favorite units so we can work on getting those updated with the new layout.

Example 1 Favorite series Gundam 0080. Favorite units: Alex and Kampfer.

Example 2 Favorite series Great Mazinger. Favorite units Great Mazinger and the Great General of Darkness.

Playtests – 5 Shot Weapons

We ran a large number of playtests with five shot weapons to evaluate if we could include this suggested change without breaking game balance. You can read more about it in this previous post here.

In this series we had some asymmetric warfare with two 500pt units (Eva-01 and Big O) vs 1000pts of Zeon grunts (Zaku II, Dom and Gelgoog) with a few skileld pilots mixed in.

The extra shot made the game very dangerous for the two 500pt units. Big O was eventually take down by bazookas and great positioning in most games, while Eva 01 usually survived but once Berserk had a hard time chewing through most of Zeon’s forces.

In this series we had a cross era game with the same force from Zeon vs the Titans from Zeta Gundam fielding the Hizack,Marasai and Asshimar.

For some highlights, in the top left photo a Skilled Asshimar pilot with Barrage made 8 shot within Sensors range and landed 6 out of 8 critical hits, annihilating the Dom before it got to take a turn.

In the bottom photos we have an Asshimar jet forward while transformed as a UFO causing some havoc then transforming and punching a Gelgoog next Round before ultimately being cut in half. On the bottom right is a Hizack who managed to survive 2 rounds while surrounded.

This playtest series used units from Mazinger Z as well as a streamlined version of the Defend the City rules to spice things up. These are the Go Nagai Robot Collection figures.

With base 5 shots on most weapons things got very deadly with all the firepower units on the field. The Doublas M2 in particular were pushing out high volumes of shots as well as Venus A in return. Most of these games ended up being bloodbaths.

The highlight was when Boss Borot stole a weapon, which was Garada K7s horns and then proceeded to destroy him with them.

This game series with our Mobile Suit in Action (MSIA) figures had Mudrock and a basic Guncannon vs Char’s Zaku and a skilled Dom pilot.

The 5 shots were nice with Indirect Fire, but the enemy team had a high enough movement that they could get within shooting range rather quickly. Over a few games Mudrock folded pretty quickly after pressure was applied by Char’s Zaku, the extra shot with bazookas is extremely powerful.

Closing Thoughts

While all of these games using base 5 shot weapons were fun, we can’t deny that they have become remarkably more lethal with more games being over by Round 2 or Round 3 which is a bit premature. For about 2/3 of these games we also played with a draft revision with a nice bump up in HP but that still was not enough to slow the destruction going on in each game.

While it was a good suggestion I think if we want to implement this suggestion we would have to rework a number of weapon profiles to be considerably lower damage and/or further increase HP on unit. Something to think about.

Evaluating suggested weapon upgrades

We had a suggestion last month about raising the number of shots on weapons. Here’s a draft of what weapons would look like if we moved everything up to base 5 shots or higher.

  • Machine gun R24 Shots 8 RF+4H DMG200
  • Beam machine gun 24 Shots 6 RF+4H P4 DMG200
  • Beam Pistol 16 Shots 5 RF+1H P5 DMG300
  • Beam Cannon 48 Shots 5 RF-2 P5 DMG400
  • Beam Sniper 48 Shots 5 RF-2 P6 DMG300
  • Beam rifle 32 Shots 5 RF+1 P6 DMG300
  • Beam carbine 24 5 RF+3 P5 DMG300
  • Railgun 48 Shots 5 RF-2 P3 DMG400
  • Artillery 48 Shots 5 RF-2 P1 DMG500
  • Bazooka 32 Shots 5 P3 DMG 700
  • Missile pod 32 Shots 6 RF+3H P2 DMG300
  • Missile Salvo 48 Shots 5 RF+1H P3 DMG400
  • Fire support 48 Shots 10 RF-4 P2 DMG300
  • Micromissiles 40 Shots 10 RF+6H P2 DMG100
  • Needle Missiles 16 Shots 10H RF+10 P2 DMG100
  • Grenades 16 Shots 5 RF+3H P3 DMG300

There are a lot of things to like about having that bonus shot. It makes playing long range games a lot more viable and makes rapid fire not as huge an increase in overall shots. The downside is that the lethality of the base game gets high enough that a lot of things are being immediately one shot, including higher point units like the Hyaku Shiki. So there are three options to fix this.

  1. Return Critical Hits down to 1s on shooting and 10s on Melee
  2. Rebalance HP and give each unit additional HP
  3. Do nothing and keep weapons balanced the way they are

For #1 this would definitely solve the lethality issue in most cases. The downside of removing this is that it makes cross era play more difficult. To use Hyaku Shiki as an example again, it has an extremely large Evade value (higher with an Ace pilot) where 1s and 2s are essential for a grunt unit to threaten it.

For #2 this isn’t super hard to do but it doesn’t solve the problem for all weapons, for instance a bazooka is still likely to accidentally one shot some units with a base of 5 shots.

For #3, well, things are working well as they are but I know there are still some issue where long range fighting runs into some issues when shooting at units with shields and decent evade.

As someone who likes crits, and how those can influence the narrative, I’m leaning towards #3 or #2 myself.

VER9.4 Playtests – Dodge / Guard / Counter

Below you’ll find some recent playtest photos for testing out VER9.4 which will be updating how pilots work, taking a lot of their Momentum driven abilities and turning them into passive abilities instead.

Now, when a mobile suit is the target of a shooting attack they can choose to Dodge (+1 Evade) or to Guard (+1 Block). When they are in Melee they can choose to Counter (+1 Hit) or Guard (+1 Block).

Continue reading “VER9.4 Playtests – Dodge / Guard / Counter” →

Playtests – Captain Harlock The Arcadia of my Youth

I had the downstairs 8ft table setup for a 2v2 2000pt each 40k game not too long ago. While the table was cleared off and setup for gaming I thought it would be a great time to get in some test games with Captain Harlock’s ship, The Arcadia, on a grand table befitting such a grand ship. Below the great are photos from various tests.

Continue reading “Playtests – Captain Harlock The Arcadia of my Youth” →

[MS] Battle Report – GaoGaiGar vs the Zonderized Federation Lunar Base

This is one of the many test games we did for GaoGaiGar in the last several months. For this series of games the setting is a SRW style Earth with multiple factions. This is a sequel to this GGG battle report.

The narrative was that the GGG organization failed to capture the Zonder machine lifeform which escaped into space and began to transform an Anaheim Electronics lab into a Zonder metal plant. The Lab housed several older Gundam and GM Types for testing as well as several newer prototypes which were zonderized and used to fight the GGG + J-Ark Team.

Below the break you’ll find a write-up for the battle report as well as an after action report and MechaStellar designer commentary.

Continue reading “[MS] Battle Report – GaoGaiGar vs the Zonderized Federation Lunar Base” →

Battle Report – Federation vs Zeon Grunts 1000pts

This is a battle report using the MechaStellar Rules for a series of games we did testing out changes to HP, Evade and Shields. This is the first series where we focused on grunt units without any Ace Pilots bringing as many cheap and useful units as we could.

Check below the break for a really fun battle!

Continue reading “Battle Report – Federation vs Zeon Grunts 1000pts” →

Battle Report – Federation vs Zeon and Getter vs Mazinger 1500pts

This is a battle report using the MechaStellar VER 9.2 Rules for a series of games we did testing out changes to HP, Evade and Shields. This is the second series, where we took the forces from the first series and then added one super robot each, this way we could also test out the modified close range weapons like Tomahawk boomerang and Rocket Punch.

Check below the break for a really fun battle!

Continue reading “Battle Report – Federation vs Zeon and Getter vs Mazinger 1500pts” →

Playtest Photos – Melee Overhaul 2

Here’s another short playtest report focusing on Super Robots and their Gundam Fight counterparts. We have Getter Robo G and Great Mazinger each 750pts on one team. On the other we have Combattler V, Gundam Maxter and Bolt Gundam, each 500pts.

We are using the SRW module here, so double HP, more Armor Saves, Rally and Knockback for Super Robots.

Continue reading “Playtest Photos – Melee Overhaul 2” →