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how big of a change was made to the robot hero class between 1st ed revised and 2nd ed?
can the 1st ed revised class be combined with the robotics material from the AU and AUGG books?

Depends who you talk too...

Essentially they are the same, build a robot with a set budget.

The major changes of note are a few more items to buy, combat bonus/skill selection are slightly changed (one can pick a Pilot with Robot Piloting skills).

My biggest beef, and some thing I've fixed with house rules (but I find justifiable with what was done in Rifts Source Book One with the Robot O.C.C.) is that the A.I. must be a purchased item and the power plant of choice (micro fusion reactor) was significantly increased in price!

The GM's Guide mentions this a bit and says lower the Power Plant price by 1.5 million and or add 1D4 million to budget. But I prefer to go with the Rifts Source Book One mentality and that is select you Brain (A.I., Neural or Transfered) as a free item (i.e. the price list is for other Power Categories (Like Hardware) getting thier hands on a A.I.) and reduce the fusion power plant to the original Revised Edition price (1.5 million cheaper). This 3 to 5 million savings offset the budget problem and I find it makes things run better.

Another item of note is the P.S., P.P. and Spd are not fully specified anymore as being required to be purchased for each individual limb. So if your tight on budget buying speed <period> covers the speed for both (or all six? legs), PS is for the entire robot and covers legs and arms, PP covers both arms. However PP is still not a listed attribute for robots, and they recommend using the Bionic prices for it.

ah. i do have a minor dilemma then. i've been writing a robot character (an advanced AI), using a kludge of the HU1R rules and the frame reconfiguration gear from AUGG (which i beleive is technically a HU2 book)

my problem comes from combining a humanoid frame with a vehicular frame. i bought the legs, with the speed desired for running. but in vehicle mode, it doesn't come with a spd attribute, apparently you have to buy an engine. nor is there an option to run the vehicle on the robot powersupply. (i'm using a super-solar, but thats not an option for the wheeled frame...)

needless to say, i'm trying to figure out if i have to pay for a gas burning fuel injected motor for the alternate mode (which seems redundant), or if there is a book legal way to have an electric car option...

I would suggest looking in the Super Vehicle section for vehicle upgrade and engine options.

so if i pay for a fuel injected engine, and just say it's an electric drive running off the super-solar batteries, i should be good?

i've been writing this up in hopes of entering the current contest, so i'm trying to be as "book legal" as possible given my limited HU Library...

if i knew who to PM about the issue, it would help. get an OK for this particular solution..