Heavy Gear
Most people live in the northern or southern polar regions where temperatures are more acceptable to human life, and other terrain types such as forests, grasslands, swamps, and jungles can be found.
However, the Gears provide a mix of capabilities that prove effective as the setting/game rules typically allow victory through maneuver warfare and place less emphasis on raw firepower and armor.
A new dictatorial government on Earth attempts to re-take its former colonies by force using its own advanced war machines such as hover tanks and armies of purple skinned GREL super soldiers (Genetically Recombined Experimental Legionaries).
In this war both the North and the South cooperate to fight off the Colonial Expeditionary Force, which during their first defeat and withdrawal abandon many personnel (both human and GREL), who eventually settle Terra Nova and form the city-state of Port Arthur.
As of 6132 AD (TN 1936, local calendar), the Confederated Northern City-States (CNCS) and the Allied Southern Territories (AST) are recovering and rebuilding from the War of the Alliance.
Despite the looming common threat posed by the eventual return of Earth's colonial armies, the polar superpowers have great fear and animosity for each other, an analogy of the real world NATO and Warsaw Pact, while the independent City-States of the Badlands simply try to survive the crossfire.
The political situation on Terra Nova has three major nations of the north polar region banding together to form their alliance called the Confederated Northern City-States to oppose the Allied Southern Territories from the south pole.
A large nation known for its devotion to the major religion of Sorrento Revisionism based on the teachings of an early wandering desert colonist prophet named Mamoud.
An industrial power that puts a price on everything, including buying and selling votes in their political system, and has a keen interest in exploiting the untapped resources buried in the sand and rock of the Badlands.
Indeed, the WFP requires a person to be a reservist in the Protectorate armed forces in order to be elected to high office, and only military veterans may vote.
They are openly free with many individual rights of expression, a high level of art and culture, and legalized vices, but with the major exception of freedom for political dissent.
This nation is home to Paxton Arms, one of the few independent corporations outside the two polar regions to build military hardware, including Heavy Gears of their own design.
The Peace River military also tries its best to defend other badland nations from encroachments by either polar League, but is often stretched thin to cover such a vast area.
Over one-hundred thousand human officers and GREL (Genetically Recombined Experimental Legionaries) super-soldiers were abandoned by the Earth fleet concentrated on Port Arthur.
From here they have established a nation for themselves, and benefit from the high technology of the Colonial Expeditionary Force (CEF) hover tanks, and GREL infantry to safeguard their territory.
Small facilities of human habitation known as Oasis Towers are spotted around the Badlands at any available surface, or shallow wells of water, and small-scale agriculture can even be attempted.
Many Rover bands even operate Heavy Gears salvaged from forgotten battle fields, stolen, or even bought on the open or black markets.
This flexibility affords the Heavy Gear many of the advantages of an infantryman, such as the ability to traverse difficult terrain and make effective use of cover, while at the same time having the resilience and firepower of a light armored vehicle.
The use of the alternate movement systems afford a higher speed and increased fuel efficiency on roads or flat terrain, and reduce wear on leg joints when traveling long distances.
However, the wheels sacrifice maneuverability and cannot be used in rough or soft terrain due to their relatively small size, requiring the Gear to switch back to walker mode.
Each book features highly detailed plans and cutaways of the machines, along with flags, insignias, maps and other visual information to help players' immersion.
Northern military combat machines are typically shaped with rectilinear right-angled armor plates, and are usually named for predatory mammals such as bears and large cats.
[2] The project never got past the planning stages, however, and on August 9, 2010, Steve Jackson Games announced that they were relinquishing the rights to Heavy Gear back to DP9.
In May 2023, Dream Pod 9 announced the coming of the official 4th edition rules for Heavy Gear, funded by crowdfunding to raise money for production and art costs.
The intention of this change was that the miniatures bear a closer resemblance to the original hand drawn illustrations, that they have a greater range of possible poses, and that unit recognition is made easier for overall improved gameplay.
Faced with the loss of the BattleTech-MechWarrior property, Activision's Production Executive, Frank Evers (CEO), spearheaded the acquisition of the video game license in 1995.
The producers' original intent was to start the series with a mecha-combat tournament held between the villainous Vanguard of Justice who are like the Legion of Doom and the honorable Shadow Dragons (representatives of Terra Nova's Northern and Southern armies respectively) like the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, but after the resolution of the tournament storyline rising tensions would lead to war between the North and South, which would in turn be followed by an invasion from Earth trying to reconquer its old colony planet, forcing the North and South to join forces for their own survival.
Worries that having the villains from the early episodes (the Vanguard characters) suddenly working with the heroes, and shifting from a tournament-styled competition to all-out mecha warfare, would have been too confusing for their targeted age group led to a decision to not use the war storyline.
The series starred the voices of Lukas Haas, Vanessa Estelle Williams, David DeLuise, Ed Hopkins, Clancy Brown, and Clyde Kusatsu with Charles Shaughnessy, Greg Ellis, Karen Maruyama, Keith Szarabajka, Nicholas Guest, Jim Wise, Sarah Douglas, and Tom Kane.
"[13] In Issue 13 of Arcane, Jim Swallow reviewed Heavy Gear Duellist's Handbook, and commented that "There's plenty of source material for campaigns, with data on NPCs.
