Product Review: Heavy Gear 4th Edition

Hey Folks, we’re back with another product review, and hold onto your Butts, it isn’t BattleTech.  (Don’t worry, Ray knows, I'm not cheating on him), In the before times of the long long ago, we covered more than just BattleTech, and so I'm going to stretch a little bit and cover a Role-playing game, (Please Clap, your love sustains me).  Today we’re going to step outside our science fiction military simulation roots and cover….Heavy Gear.  

That’s right!  The pride of Canadian giant robot enthusiasts everywhere, Heavy Gear (and my absolute favorite game ever, Jovian Chronicles) are produced by Dream Pod 9.  I’ve been playing Dream Pod 9 for 20 years, and it’s one of my favorite game companies.  So, what is the actual what with Heavy Gear?

Note: This is the 4th edition of the Heavy Gear role playing game, released in 2023.  

So, what is Heavy Gear?  

Heavy Gear, the roleplaying game, is the story of colonists of Terra Nova.  Long abandoned by the Earth, Terra Nova has flourished for centuries without interference from the home world. However, things have taken a disastrous road as the long missing Earth has deployed its armies to retake the world by force.  Hovertanks and Super Soldiers do battle with the Iconic Heavy Gears of Terra Novan governments for control of the world.  Unfortunately, the Earth is winning.

There is light in the darkness however!  Secret armories are discussed in quiet places, and Terra Nova’s elite unit, the Black Talons are afoot.  A reckoning is coming, and these are the stories that you and your friends will tell for years.

So, What is A Heavy Gear?  

Credit: Eldon Cowgur

Heavy Gears are at their most basic, Mecha.  They are 4 to 5 meter tall combat walkers utilized by the Terra Novan to fight wars for centuries.  Each major faction on Terra Nova has a standing army filled with dozens of designs of Heavy Gears.

What is this game’s Core Mechanic?

Roll 6 sided dice, compare results.  Players will roll a number of 6 sided dice (A dice pool, if you will) equal to their skill rating (most of the time, there are exceptions) and take their highest result.  Depending on how well you roll on the other dice in your pool, you can modify your final result up or down.  (This determines base success or failure). From determining whether or not you succeeded, you also check your Margin of Success or Failure (MoS/MoF).  These determine how well you succeeded or how spectacularly failed at the dice check you rolled.  

Note: this is an iterative development of the Silhouette System that has been the core of DP9 games for the last thirty years.  

What is this game about?

At its heart, Heavy Gear is the story of a future war with advanced technology.  However, there are very human stories that are intertwined within that narrative, and Heavy Gear is the way you tell those stories with your friends.  You can run a lot of different styles of this sort of game.  Want to play a plucky group of mechanics fixing Gears to make sure the Earthers go home? We got you.  Want to be the oppressive agents of the Earth who’ve come to reclaim these lost colonies? Come right in.  Want to tell a story about regular folks just trying to get by in a world at war? Have a seat.  

Credit: Eldon Cowgur

Why should I buy this book? 

The book is chock full of some of the coolest art in the world.  There are some luminaries in the giant robot genre who contributed art to this book, and it has a very specific, very unique style of its own.  The game itself is easy to pick up, and it’s completely self contained within this book.  With a game that has a thirty year history, there is always that concern about needing to go back and dig up the “Lore.”  

You certainly Can do that with Heavy Gear, but it isn’t necessary.  If you’re looking for a game that gives you tons of options for telling war stories (with big honking robots), but don’t want to dig into something terrifyingly complex, Heavy Gear has a lot to recommend itself.  It’s offbeat, but in the best possible way.  

Crunch level (1-5)  I personally rate the rules difficulty of Heavy Gear to be a 2.  It’s basic math, and the dice are quick to resolve.  

Options level (1-5)  I rate Heavy Gear a 4 out of 5.  There are enough options between character creation and vehicle choices to keep players in new ideas for years.

Variety level (1-5) I rate Heavy Gear a 4 out of 5.  The mechanics support a GM taking the game in a lot of different directions, and as a result, players can find themselves in a lot of different situations from week to week, which I think is healthy for the length of a campaign.  

Pros: 1 book, (there are two additional published adventures for this edition of the game).  Easy Rules, Giant Robots.

Cons This is a niche game in a niche genre.  You may not be able to convince your play group to try something new.

Overall, I would absolutely encourage you to try Heavy Gear.  It’s a happy fuzzy place in my heart with easy dice rules and BIG ROBOTS.  What could possibly be the problem in that.  You can get a copy (in multiple formats Here from Drivethru RPG.  You can also visit Dream Pod 9 at their website here 

Note: The two art pieces here were done by Eldon Cowgur for the Heavy Gear 4th edition RPG. Please check out his other featured works at his site here