Lancer (role-playing game)

Player characters are mecha pilots, and the setting is on the outskirts of a far-future, post-apocalyptic, technological utopia. allowing players to level up after each mission by hand-picking upgrades from any mech in the game. Players mix and match these upgrades to determine their mech's capabilities in battle, which can range from simple hammers and nailguns, to highly advanced AI and experimental reality-warping systems. By earning License Levels, players characters also learn new talents, which they can use to enhance the combat prowess of any mech they pilot. There are also rules for narrative play, although there are fewer mechanics regarding roleplay. Conflict in narrative scenes is determined by a die roll, with bonuses applied by relevant skills to increase the chance of success. ==Themes==

Lancer is set thousands of years into the future, when humans on worlds across the galaxy have been united by Union, a governing body with utopian ideals. Lancer uses these narrative descriptions to explore anti-capitalist themes, by demonstrating the callus and detached design process of the setting's weapons-manufacturing megacorporations. ==Publication history==

Lancer was first independently published by Massif Press in 2019 after a Kickstarter campaign raised over $400,000. In 2023, Massif Press announced a second printing, to be published as an illustrated hardcover book in collaboration with Dark Horse Comics. The second print run was released in July 2024. == Reception ==

Since its release, Lancer has received generally positive reviews. Polygon called it "perhaps one of the most mechanically rich mecha RPGs ever published" and "the gold standard for the subgenre." Lancer is commonly praised for its modular character creation system, its art direction, its worldbuilding, and its digital companion app, COMP/CON. One common criticism of Lancer is that its "crunchy" combat and wealth of character creation options can create a steep and intimidating learning curve. == ENNIE Awards protest ==

Lancer was initially nominated for the 2020 ENNIE Awards for "Best Electronic Book"; however, the creators later asked to be withdrawn from nomination, in protest against a 2017 ENNIE Judges' Spotlight award for an Advanced Dungeons & Dragons supplement named Blood in the Chocolate, published by Lamentations of the Flame Princess and written by Kiel Chenier, with art by Jason Bradley Thompson. In a public email to the awards committee, Massif Press said that the supplement contained "casual graphic sexual assault and racism." == Official supplements ==

• No Room For A Wallflower: A Lancer Narrative • The Long Rim: A Lancer Setting • The Karrakin Trade Baronies: A Lancer Setting • Operation Winter Scar: A Lancer Narrative • Operation Solstice Rain: A Lancer Narrative • Dustgrave: A Lancer Narrative • ''Siren's Song: A Mountain's Remorse'' • Shadow of the Wolf: A Lancer Narrative ==References==