Here are some new rule ideas I've been thinking of. I'd like to get some feedback before actually implementing any of them.
1) Can't buy talents for lancemates.
Exactly what it says. You will not be able to purchase talents for lancemates, but they will instead come with their own pre-selected talents.
Idea 1: Every lancemate has a list of 5 talents; these are activated automatically as the lancemate gains experience. The alternative to this is to start lancemates out with all the talents they're ever going to get.
Idea 2: Lancemate-only talents. You can't give cyberware to lancemates, but cybernatic lancemates might be given a cyberwear talent (that the PC can't take) that would improve their stats as their Cybertech skill goes up.
2) GH2: Thrust costs energy
Using skimming, jumping, or flight costs energy points. The amount of energy taken should usually be within the energy recharge rate, so it won't be much problem unless your mecha is also firing a lot of energy weapons. Flight could be much more energy-expensive unless the mecha has a functional set of wings.
3) GH1 and GH2: Exact mass
Right now gears smaller than the master scale aren't counted in weight. Things could be changed so that mass is first calculated in SF:0 points, then reduced according to the master scale. This would end the "40 SF:1 arms of Kali" exploit.
4) Steady Legs
If a mecha has more leg points than it needs to walk, it gets a bonus to MV. There would be a +1 bonus for having 2x as many leg points as needed, a +2 bonus for having 4x as many leg points, and a +3 bonus for having 8x as many leg points. Of course there would be diminishing returns after a while as the mass of the extra legs cancelled out the MV bonus. The bonus doesn't apply if the mecha isn't walking.
