Reply To: Battletech vs Heavy Gear Blitz vs Heavy Gear Silhouette

[koraskiParticipant 1981xp 2]

I think the army boxes are pretty much all you’d need to play. I don’t recall ever seeing a HG game with more than 3 or 4 squads of 3-5 gears each. I recommend downloading the quickstart rules and the full “living” rulebook which are both available for free. You could easily proxy some space marines for Gears and try the rules out.

I mainly played the original RPG which was pretty simple compared to something like D&D. I have but never played the newer Silhouette version. I also played the original HG wargame which was clearly intended as an alternate to BT. It was played on a hex map and used carboard standees like the original battletech box game did. I liked it a lot and it tied in with the RPG flawlessly. The first edition of the Blitz rules turned it into a true tabletop wargame and seemed decent but I am in no way an expert on them. The new (second?) edition of Blitz is pretty different from what I can tell, but still a true tabletop wargame, ie no hex map.

The campaign books are very narrative. I also recommend the Story books if you are really interested in the lore. In brief, humans colonized the planet (Terra Nova) then for poorly known reasons Earth abandoned all its colonies and the people were left to their own devices. There were 2 “Interpolar Wars” which were basically world wars on Terra Nova plus 2 different invasions by Earth forces. There’s political and religious strife between and within the Polar federations. There are mysteries surrounding ruins and artifacts from (or possibly before) the original colonists. It is a very rich story that progresses over time.

<<EDIT>> I just realized I may not have answered your question very well. There were 2 editions of the original HG RPG followed by a 3rd edition that used DP9s universal RPG ruleset called Silhouette. In addition there was a boxed tactical boardgame very similar to the original BattleTech box game that had rules for playing out Gear battles and was compatible with the 1st and 2nd edition RPGs (similar to how Mechwarrior RPG and BT work together). Later they created Heavy Gear Blitz as a true wargame. That lasted for many years but recently they have moved to a 2nd edition of Blitz which is the current rule set. I don’t know if the Blitz rules are compatible with the Silhouette RPG rules or not.