A Game of Teamwork, Harmony, and Big Giant Monsters from Space

This game is my personal RPG love letter to Gunbuster, Majestic Prince, Vandread, and of course, Voltron. It’s a story of awesome mecha pilots who must learn to get along with each other long enough to combine their robots together and defeat Big Giant Monsters from Space (or wherever else your group decides they’re from).

The root of the game is an open-ended collaborative story experience, with each player acting as both the guide to a single character and an architect in the creation of the world. There is a Game Master player as well (we call him “Coach”), but in Gattaibushido the players have a good deal more creative authority than you might expect. Every new game world is built fresh by the group playing it, and the particulars vary so wildly that no two groups will ever likely be playing the same world.

The mechanics of this game are heavily inspired by my prior game, Motobushido, changed so the core rules more closely fit the new theme. The core tools are a couple of decks of playing cards (instead of dice) and a number of helpful (but not absolutely necessary) tokens of any kind. The cards create a constant awareness of continually-escalating scenario stakes; the more the team acts and causes trouble, the closer the inevitable Big Giant Monster gets to totally wrecking their day!

Playtest Rules

Gattaibushido:FUSION! is currently open to the public for playtesting. You can download the current updated PDF draft of the playtest rules here: DOWNLOAD HERE

Current Version: Alpha v1.4, 2016-10-02

CHANGELOG

Additions Still Pending

• expanded Power Weapon Qualities
• expanded Coaching guidelines
• expanded Big Giant Monster powers
• expanded Threat powers and examples
• printable sheets

Currently in Design:

alpha v1.5 (est. release 2016-10-??)

• Begin rewrite of intro section to match presentation, ease into concepts
• further work on Charge system
• NEED NEED NEED to balance out what effects increase Charge Range, and which ones increase Safe Range. Remember, a +1 to CR is worth TWO +1s to SR.

Current Releases: Alpha Stage

alpha v1.4

• Restructure of core commitments
• Expanded Evolution information
• Added “Grand Tier” evolutions
• added Charge-Up system
• “Strike Range” mechanic replaced with twofold “Difference Range” mechanic

alpha v1.3

• Robo techs and descriptions overhauled, new added
• Rumble Position Techs tweaked
• added power weapon techs: sniper
• added clarification for out-of-combat power weapon tech usage
• added fun stuff to the team salute
• bingo-like tweak to determining initial team resources
• added +Triggers
• further expanded glossary
• additional typos and corrections

alpha v1.2

• expanded glossary definitions
• improved and clarified the First Contact
• simplified First Contact character templates
• expanded character creation options and clarifications
• consolidated and clarified Assist actions
• changes to Blue and Purple profiles
• initial extended plans for printable sheet components

alpha v1.1

• typos corrected
• early sections reorganized
• character creation process restructured, expanded
• robo-summoning clarified
• robo drawbacks added
• base robo techs removed (new customizable power system pending)
• locations and collateral added
• tarry mechanic added

alpha v1.0

• Initial Release