Auto Assault Profile Preview - Biomeks

Forget about surly dwarves and aloof elves, Auto Assault promises to be a different kind of online role-playing game when it launches later this year, one inspired more by Mel Gibson's Mad Max than J.R.R. Tolkien. In Auto Assault, you will take to the dangerous highways and byways of a postapocalyptic Earth, where three races battle it out, road rage-style, for supremacy.

The main focus of the game is the high-speed combat, which takes place in vehicles that you can customize and upgrade. Auto Assault features plenty of eye candy in the form of an almost fully destructible environment, meaning that if you can see something, odds are you can blow it up. When you're not battling it out on the virtual wastelands, you can pull into town and hang out with your fellow players, buy the latest upgrade, and receive new missions to pursue.

There are three races in the game: humans, biomeks, and mutants. We've already profiled the human faction, and in this preview we have the details on the biomeks, who are part machine, part human. Keep in mind that these details are subject to change, as the game is constantly being balanced for gameplay purposes.

Biomeks

The biomeks have embraced technology and intellect to adapt to "the alien contamination." Like the mutants, biomeks have little concern for the effects of the contamination. They commonly replace vulnerable body parts with powerful biomechanized prostheses, a technology that traces back hundreds of years to their original military ancestors.

They hate the humans for their treacherous and evil cleansing operations from the past. Their regard for mutants is not much better. To biomeks, mutants are simply dangerous religious lunatics who must be killed before they kill biomeks. Simply put, from a biomek viewpoint, the entire world is against them. Therefore their cultural philosophy is to put the entire world under their control--by any means necessary--before they become extinct.

Biomeks, as a general rule, prefer concrete fact to vague emotions and the concept of spirituality. As a result, they see little use for religion and dramatics and are rarely motivated by sensationalism or emotional appeals. It is one reason they often replace so much of their physical bodies with machinery; to them, it is the most logical and advantageous method of adapting for survival. Their cyborglike design lets them inhabit extreme climates that most living things would find excruciating or unbearable.

In hazard mode, Biomek vehicles transform into robotic juggernauts of destruction. Typically, this takes the form of a mechanized walker. The hazard mode is controlled via a computer chip--known as a transformation chip--installed in the vehicle's hazard-kit hard point. The transformation chip dictates how the vehicle will transform and what capabilities will be available to it. Hazard-mode walker meks are capable of mass destruction through the use of their main gun and secondary weapons. In addition, any opponent foolish enough to get point-blank with a mek will likely get stomped underfoot with melee damage. When hazard mode concludes, the mek transforms back into the original vehicle.

Biomeks also have the following racial advantages:

Environmentally Oblivious
Biomeks are less affected by contamination or biohazards, and they take less damage from them than pure biologicals do.

Tough
Biomek vehicles generally have the most hit points of any of the three races.

Synchronized
Due to their robotic natures, biomeks work extremely well in groups, with many skills that chain or network between allies.

Hazard Meks
The biomek vehicle hazard mode consists of transforming into hulking mek forms, with massive destructive powers.

Offensive Specialty
Corrosives and Fire

Defensive Specialty
Versatile

Character Classes

Terminator
Terminators are built for one purpose: destruction. They are the biomek heavy soldiers, trained to unleash chaos and fear upon the enemy. Their hazard forms are spectacularly terrifying to engage. Terminator skills include armor efficiency, which increases resistance to all damage, and damage synch, which adds corrosive damage to your weapons for a short time. Moreover, more damage is added with each ally found in the damage synch chain.

Class Traits
• Heavy assault vehicles
• Frontline combat role
• Can use all types of weapons and armors
• Combat is a primary focus; tech is a secondary focus

Constructor
Constructors provide the biomeks with construction and reconstruction capabilities in the field. That does not mean they cannot put up a fight. In fact, they can construct a wide arsenal of simple robots for offensive and defensive purposes. Constructor skills include nanoscrambler, which deploys a ground-burrowing defensive turret system that can stun nearby enemies, and rexor, which can restore a destroyed vehicle to operational status with partial hit points and power.

Class Traits
• Combat utility vehicles
• Support and trapping roles
• Useful for indirect combat and battlefield repairs
• Tech is a primary focus; theory is a secondary focus

Mastermind
Masterminds are by far the most efficient and well-organized character class of biomek culture. Their job is to synchronize the operations of others. Multitasking efficiency also allows the command of a vast array of semi-intelligent, autonomous robotic meks. Sample mastermind skills include MG-mek, which launches a fast-moving, lightly armed mini-mek that attacks enemies, and perception patch, which launches a patch of support nanobots to temporarily increase an ally's perception attribute

Class Traits
• Sporty command vehicles
• Command role
• Brings leadership abilities, combat experience, and summoned numbers to the battlefield
• Theory is a primary focus; perception is a secondary focus

Agent
Agents exist to observe and eliminate any potential threats to biomek system operations. They are very hard to detect, and they possess a wide selection of techniques to disable and destroy. Agent skills include nanoinvisibility, which causes vehicles to become invisible, and catalyst.virus, a crippling attack that reduces the target's resistance to corrosive damage. In addition, the catalyst.virus can spread to nearby mechanical targets.

Class Traits
• Light-duty vehicles
• Special-ops role
• Masters of hit-and-run stealth tactics and creating chaos
• Perception is a primary focus; combat is a secondary focus