Offensive Systems

Offensive systems are the weapons and tools a mecha uses to project force. Weapons are defined by their damage output, range, and resource demands (energy, heat, ammo).

Weapon Stats

• Damage - Base damage dealt on a successful hit, before armor and shields.
• Range - Min / Optimum / Drop, in meters. Same as personal weapons: penalty dice below min, no penalty within opt, -1 per drop interval past opt.
• Ammo - kg per shot and tech level. "-" for weapons that don't use ammo (energy, melee). Ammo is consumed from cargo, autoloaded unless stated otherwise. Reload is not an action.
• Energy - Power draw while the system is active (turned on).
• Heat - Heat generated by firing. For energy weapons, this is burst heat on top of the constant heat they produce just by being active.
• Boot - Turns needed to spin up from cold. Reboot after shutdown may differ (see Keywords). "-" means instantaneous.
• Modes - Attack modes the weapon supports (D/I/S/B, see below).
• Type - Laser / Ballistic / Missile / Melee. Determines basic behavior.
• Keywords - Special rules (rapid fire, armor piercing, etc.).

A weapon that is active but not firing still draws its full Energy cost each turn. This is the main tradeoff: powering a weapon costs you, whether you pull the trigger or not.

All weapons require a hardpoint.

Attack Modes

Weapon Types

Lasers - High energy draw, no ammo, high heat. Baseload heat from being active + burst heat on firing. The heat is your ammo: a laser can fire as long as your cooling can handle it. Pinpoint accuracy.

Ballistics - Low or no energy draw (autoloader/electric trigger), uses ammo, moderate heat per shot. Ammo weight varies by caliber and tech level.

Missiles - Low energy draw (guidance/tracking), expensive ammo, low heat per shot. The ammo cost is the limiter. Can bypass shields depending on payload.

Melee - No energy, no ammo, no heat. Uses the mech's movement and structure. See Mech Melee.

Heat and Weapons

When a weapon fires, its burst heat remains on the weapon as pending heat - if it is not removed by the next heat processing cycle, this becomes residual heat.

Ballistic weapons generate moderate heat from friction and propulsion gasses. Missiles generate very little (the heat stays in the rocket motor). Melee generates none.

Damage

Damage is a single number. Baseline formula used during system development:
Damage = 10 + 3 * sqrt(gun mass in tons). This gives 13 at 1t, ~15 at 3t, 16 at 4t, 19 at 9t, 22 at 16t. Individual weapons may vary from this curve based on their role and tech tier.

On a hit:
1. Shields activate first (see Shields).
2. Armor reduces remaining damage (see Armor).
3. Remaining damage adds to the hit sector's stress. See Sector Stress.

Keywords

TODO: expand this list with balanced keywords and bonus rules

Bonus Rules

TODO: weapon-specific bonus/malus rules, situational modifiers

Example Weapons

Debug Weapons

These use the baseline formula Damage = 10 + 3 * sqrt(mass) and are meant for system testing. Energy and heat are placeholders and will be iterated.