Looking at Heavy Gear Blitz: Help-a-noob thread!

[New Cult King]

I've done a search of this sub forum, and found an old discussion that was well and truly over my head, so I thought I'd start a new thread asking about the basics of Heavy Gear Blitz.

I'm very keen on either Southern, Peace River or NuCoal, and am leaning heavily towards NuCoal at the moment, purely aesthetically. But I have no idea how the game plays.

It looks like a small skirmish game, which is precisely what I'm after. But is it complex? Can anyone give me a basic rundown of the game, setting, and pros/cons of the factions?

This would be greatly appreciated

[rapterz]

I've tried to learn a bit about it. Its only complicated if modifiers are something you struggle with, but the mechanics are fairly simple if i remember correctly, its just for each action it modifies your capacity to shoot and the like. Models are a bit pricey in my opinion, at least the singles. Being only like 15mm is kinda pricey at 16.50. Lastly, you are right about it being small, with armies being the size of Infinity armies in model count.

[Gargantuan]

I usually play with 800TV armies and they usually have 10-15 models. The core rules are pretty simple to learn but there's a lot of stuff to learn so I recommend that you avoid indirect fire and electronic warfare the first few matches.

The army building system is great (you should download the army builder software, Gear Garage, on DP9's website), the rules are very cool and I love the miniatures so I definitely think you should try the game.

[New Cult King]

Cheers guys Do the factions differ much, gameplay-wise? Are they all well-balanced? I would only be playing against mates, so I'm not concerned about uber-tourney-balance-competitiveness, but do the different factions have distinct strengths and weaknesses?

[rapterz]

I don't think the game features army specific game breaking special rules. Its much like infinity everything has values and that's it. So yeah, I'd say its a decent deal balanced.

[Hicks]

Cheers guys Do the factions differ much, gameplay-wise? Are they all well-balanced? I would only be playing against mates, so I'm not concerned about uber-tourney-balance-competitiveness, but do the different factions have distinct strengths and weaknesses?

Haven't played much yet, but so far the game is fairly balanced in my eyes. Eden and Utopia are considered lees powerful if you use them as pure armies, but I never saw them in an actual game, so can't comment much. The one faction that can pose problems powerwise would be Black Talons. They are like the Grey Knights of the HG universe, you have very few of them, but they can have lots of command points and actions, they are very well armed, they are very stealthy and to make it worse, they can choose environmental conditions. They are not unbeatable though and loses are very painful for them.

I could summarize the factions I know this way, but keep in mind I haven't read the NuCoal book:

North: Specialist units
South: Generalist units
Peace River: Techier than the polar superpowers, but cost more
PAK: Old gears mixed with super soldiers and flying tanks
CEF: Flying tanks, super soldiers, flying mechs
BLack Talons: Always out numbered, never outgunned. Extreme use of stealth.
Caprice: Go where you want, good guns, fragile.

Of course, this game allows for many forces to use allies, so there is almost always a way to use all the minis you like into your force.

[New Cult King]

Hey that's awesome, thank you I love the idea of allies too, since I can't decide on a single faction.

I'm really looking forward to receiving my 2-player starter set