Battlechat

  
Talking about the future of BattleTech here is a link to one of the Battlechats with Herb.

If you scroll down the page you find a more readable edited version to peruse and think about. I can see the logic in CGLs approach, but the cost is the loss on any real chance of updating BattleTech for the 21st Century. This is in spite of the fact that all the elements to introduce a new Starter Set exist.

My vision would be an introductory set with Quick Start Classic and Quick Strike fast play, which would go a long way to addressing the major complaints of new players coming across BattleTech for the first time, which are; that too much detail slows down play, and one can't field large numbers of units.
   

BattleTech 2.1: Uncool Rules

   

Again over on the Classic BattleTech Forum Herb.B is polling the members on the subject of "Your Top Ten Least Liked pieces of BattleTech technology?" Broken link removed.

First I have to to wonder why bother, as the sample size is going to be far too small to be useful, and the forum members are unlikely to be a truly representative selection of players? I must admit I really didn't get the question, or poll as such. For me there are rules that I like, or think work well, versus those rules that I don't like, because for me they don't work so well. Some are only mildly bad rules and I can live with them, some are so bad that I house rule from the get go.

Being an Old School Player of BattleTech, what sold me on the game was the fact that it would allow me to simulate the action sequences I saw in Japanese SF anime giant mecha show, which were/are cool. So, using the concept of the "Rule of Cool", here are the rules in BattleTech that I think are not cool.

1. Ammo explosion rules, and the various CASE rules, are so clunky as to be the first thing everyone I know house rules, so not cool. In fact the ammo explosion rules are a classic example of a broken rule in BattleTech, which is amply illustrated in the explosion of one ton of machine gun ammo equals 200 points of internal damage. My inclination is that an ammo hit equals the damage of the ammo. For example machine gun ammo would be two points, LRM 20 would be 20 points. Internal damage is always bad, but this plays far more reasonably (fun & cool), and would remove a lot of arguments for not carrying auto-cannons etc.

2. Not allowing mechs larger than 100 tons is so not cool. Giant stompy robots are cool. Bigger giant stompy robots have even more cool. Cool is good, rules that get in the way of cool are not good. Of course the reason these rules have never been codified is that there are some flaws in the engine table when they arbitarily shifted the mid-range engines power to weight ratios. As for the record sheets, again these can be adjusted as there is nothing intrinsically stopping one from doing so.

3. The quad mechs rules in BattleTech are so not cool. Quads are cool, quads with a torso and arms are cool, quads with a torso and a body with four arms are cool. Tripods with, or without arms are cool. Six legged mechs with turrets are cool.BattleTech  is about the rule of cool. Again the rules for having quads that can torso twist, or not (think choice of hand actuators etc for Rifleman etc) is relatively trivial. Record sheets can be adjusted so that quad mech legs are treated like biped arms with two sets of internal spaces. Allowing turrets for quads as their version of the built in torso twist. It's all cool.

4. One-Shot Launchers (SRM, MRM, LRM) rules are a complete waste of time, so again not cool. My reading of the rocket launcher rules suggests that the fix is in, but the will to remove useless stuff is lacking. I can see from an RPG perspective that one-shot launchers may offer more in-character role-play opportunities, but for BattleTech the boardgame, not so much.

5. Rules that break the basic premise of the game, which for me is epitomised by the basic rule of thumb that faster machines are harder to hit. So for me this means targeting computers, pulse lasers and any other clunky rules where the rules make it an advantage to sit and shoot, rather than fire an manoeuvre have to go, as they are just not cool.

6. The additional armour rules for stealth, hardened etc. are great for the RPG, but are a total waste of time for the boardgame, too much detail for very little added play value. So again just not cool.

7. All the electronic rules covering things like ECM/ECCM, Beagle probes, C3 Boosted, Master & Slave, Remote Sensor Launcher rules are just so not cool. All of this stuff needs to be folded into the basic premise that battlemechs are the ultimate warmachine of the future, and such detail should only rear its ugly head when playing the RPG.

8. Protomechs that look like animals. Not cool unless you are five and think Transformer Beast Wars is the best thing since sliced bread. Don't get me wrong, Beast Wars can be cool, but it is just so not BattleTech, which is grey, unrelenting warfare over centuries, where the advances of the great powers on the interstellar scale look less than impressive. Remember the scene in the Black Adder Goes Forth episode Private Plane. The one where General Melchet shows Lt. George the one-to-one scale model of the 17 square feet of land that the last offensive captured from the Bosch. That's BattleTech!

9. Melee weapons on mechs, except on industrials, and even then they should be field expedient and appropriate to the task of the mech. Hate hatchets, hate swords, and maces even more. This is BattleTech not WH40K. Not cool.

10. Double heat sinks rules have no down sides. Not cool. I rather like the suggestion made on the CBT forums that when damaged that they could cause a critical hit on the usual 8+ on 2D6.

11. The way that the weapon ranges are explained are dumb. The way the rules explain extreme and line-of-sight are so not cool. The rules as written tie the game into unnecessary knots.

12. Infantry organisation rules. One mech, or vehicle equals a squad, and 3 to 6 squads equals a platoon. Why oh why oh why then make infantry based around platoons when every unit is equal to a squad. Then you can allow platoons of infantry to be created organically by choosing the number of squads in them as appropriate.

13. Anything that adds extra details needs to go into the RPG side of the game where it belongs. BattleTech needs to be streamlined, fast and sexy, because that is cool. At the moment BattleTech is a fat bloater who waddles from place to another, and that is not cool.

End of rant.

Disclaimer: All posts are condensed & abbreviated summaries of complex arguments posted for discussion on the internet, and not meant to be authoritative in any shape, or form on said subject, T&CA, E&OE & YMMV.

Pain & Weakness

There is a well known adage in the military that "pain is weakness leaving the body". If so, then I'm incredibly weak as I've been having a lot of pain recently. Without going into a blow-by-blow account of the last month, all I will say is that last week I was admitted to hospital due to pain in my breasts that the doctors deemed needed treatment with overnight IVF anti-biotics (QDS).

So, here I sit in front of my computer, after my morning nap, morning visit to the surgery for dressing, and afternoon nap, in a bit of pain (up to my eyeballs in pain killers) writing a blog entry. Normal service will take some time to be resumed...

As in any good story, the heroine's travail was a weeks worth of IVF anti-biotics, with an attempted aspiration performed on her right breast, which then led to another aspiration under local anaesthetic that then led to emergency surgery (emergency as in they brought forward the operation, not AFAIK to prevent life threatening problems, though as my temperature was spiking in anti-biotics at 38.3c, so I may be wrong).

I was released from the hospital on Monday this week with two "soft drains" in my right breast (yes, tubes in flesh where fluid comes out, very Baron Harkonnen from Dune, "your abscess is looking full and firm my lady") that require that the dressing be changed daily due to "soiling".

Not feeling up to much, but will post comments as I can.

PS: Missed the SWLWG, which was a shame as I intended to take Oliver to the show and get him some terrain for playing MWDA. This weekend my godson will visit and I have some MWDA mechs for him when he gets here. It is the little things that keep one's spirits up.
  

BattleTech 2.0

Having gotten back into playing BattleTech over the last couple of years, after a 16 year hiatus consisting of work etc, I'm not necessarily the worlds most experienced BattleTech player. The addition of new weapons and rules into the game over that 16 year period, has expanded BattleTech far beyond what was available in 1992 when I stopped playing. Though I had to chuckle a bit when I found out that the current line developers had rewritten the pulse lasers and targeting computers rules due to certain designs I wrote for them that appeared in the 3055 TRO.

I can't say I was completely innocent of pushing the boundaries, but there again I only designed what the rules allowed me to design, and IMNSHO the problems with a lack understanding the consequence of rules written by FASA is still a problem 25 years later, because largely it's the same crew writing stuff for the game.

Okay, they are brilliant, creative people, but none of them has the will, or desire to crunch the consequences of the rules as written, rather than the underlying intent of the rules. Heck, at some points I get this image in my head of the CGL crew as all rather left wing, vegetarian carrot crunching, social science majors, who hug plush toy cat girls when they go to bed at night. Seriously, what BattleTech has always needed is some hardcore "right wing" game design munchkins to break the game in every possible way they can. Someone who will go in, kick over the dustbins, take names and chew gum.

Having now ruined any chance of ever working for CGL let me tell you what I do. I only really play BattleTech with the introductory rules, using the Total Warfare rules as something one dips into to be able to use select pieces of hardware that are cool. Everything else is covered by house rules, with the aim being to keep the flow of the game going. To keep it cool. In my experience it seems to me that what new players want are games that they can play over a course of an evening, and that allow them to field a larger number of miniatures on the table. Something that BattleTech delivers rather poorly.

Disclaimer: All posts are condensed & abbreviated summaries of complex arguments posted for discussion on the internet, and not meant to be authoritative in any shape, or form on said subject, T&CA, E&OE & YMMV.

FASAnomics

Good old FASA economics lies at the heart of BattleTech, though some of you who might be reading this will probably go huh? 

FASAnomics describes the phenomena in the BattleTech game where the economic implications of game background decisions really don't make a lot of sense. However, I would have to say that since the game is based on giant battling stompy robots that make no real world sense, it is really the equivalent of quibbling over how many angels can stand on the head of a pin.

So why even talk about such a pointless thing?

First to kind of tell everyone that it is pointless, because believe you me, on the CBT forum these issues are discussed all the time. Mind you everything is repeatedly discussed to the point that one begins to lose the will to live. Furthermore, people never hesitate to tell you everything they believe with the full force of righteous belief delivered from high. 

I wonder how the CGL crew really stop themselves from screaming sometimes? 

There again what is the bottom line here? Money. You can only make money by selling product, and to do that you have to keep and expand your customer base. Want to know how to make a small fortune in gaming? Start with a large one. 

So, perhaps the screaming is all about the horror of losing money?

All joking aside, we also have the dual problem of CGL trying to square the circle. In this case reconcile the contradictions implicit within the universe, while at the same time not adding things to the BattleTech universe that is seen to be a retcon (retroactive continuity). 

Retcons really annoys the fan base, but it does look like the tail is wagging the dog at times, as can be seen in these threads.

Amount of Churn & Burn among mech Designs?

Master Unit List.

Does this all sounds a bit like tilting at windmills? One of my contributions to these threads was that of all things the Jihad provides the best agent for an invisible retcon. Saves a lot of work really. 

Standard answer, it got nuked. The end.

However, I'm reminded about the time when the story "Crisis on Infinite Earths" by DC was released. It was a multiple issue comic book plot-line that attempted to reconcile the timeline and alternate Earth stories, while at the same time removing inconsistencies and confusion. 

I understand from my friend Rob Hansen that since Crisis on Infinite Earths was published that DC have needed to repeat the process over again on two further occasions. Only going to show the futility of such an exercise in the first place; something largely driven by the fact that it is a shared universe with lots of different writers all contributing their unique vision to it. 

OTOH it sold a lot of comics, which makes money for everyone.

Well everyone apart from the readers, but their contract is to pay for stuff and be entertained.

Sounds a bit like BattleTech, but instead of various versions of the Flash, Green Lantern, Superman et al, we have various novels with different authors who stress different aspects of the giant stompy robot action.

This started from the time the very first novels were published. 

IMHO William Keith's version of the Inner Sphere is notably darker than Michael Stackpole's. The current Dark Age line has the further problem of different writers writing about the same character in a follow-on novel. 

For example, the first time we meets Anastasia Kerensky she is a sexy high maintenance risk taker and excellent mech pilot. Several novels down the line she now is portrayed sans-sexuality as a harridan, who is frustrated at every point either by the men around her, or by one of the two blond protagonists both called Tara that thwart her "evil" plans. Link.

Another name given to the phenomenon of story discontinuity on the CBT forums "is that the character took the stupid pills."

It is what you get when you have writers who are interested in their own vision, and their own character archetype having to write about established characters written by other writers. So in one book the leader of one house is shown to be a genius, yet the story unfolds to show that he or she has got it so wrong that they are really more stupid than a very stupid thing. 

Making a character look stupid is a bad thing to do to another authors creation. Got to have a common vision of the universe for this to work, and that means people do things because they believe it is the right thing to do. IMNSHO best to leave the other writers character alone, or only obliquely mention them in passing, rather than showing the reader your version. 

YMMV on that opinion.

Coming back to the whole future history of the BattleTech Universe, the thing is that I can go and read a history book and get one perspective and some data. Later on another history book will come along and give another perspective and perhaps new data. Afterwards there is a synthesis of both perspectives that shows error in both the data sets. 

This is fine with historical facts. 

However, the BattleTech universe is fictional, and there are no historical facts, just fiction. While we live in a world where the last major world war had villains who wore black, and who did monstrous things, but if you are writing a story as fiction people are going to say that this is a tired old trope. Link here.

So, on one hand you can retcon anything, just because you can, but OTOH why even bother? 

I mean, at the end of the day BattleTech is just a game. The simplest non-retcon retcon that can be done is to just say that the figures are wrong, because the in character source got them wrong. Have source books with facts as seen from one perspective, but the novels should not be seen as reliable canon, as they are they are character points-of-view. At the moment novels are a canon source of data, whereas I would see them as "in-universe" self serving hagiographies.

Take the problem that the population numbers too high. 

Simple answer, ComStar made a computational error in their census. Still too high? The House Lords were subject to errors from poor accounting practices. The real figures? No one knows since all the computer records have been lost in the wars.

Perhaps it's time for a post Jihad census story? It would make the basis for a good novel. 

No really. The plot would be about the characters finding out that population levels have been falling for centuries, but everyone high up has just assumed that the figures they were working with were right, and that evidence to the contrary was a glitch. 

People on the ground never had the time to worry about the consequences due to having to face the fact that property values dropping from mech invasions, and the Jihad. It would be a dark tale that would put the consequences of three centuries of war at the heart of the story again.

I can dream...

Recon 09.20.10 AAR

Dan, otherwise known as Monkey Doctor on the CBT forums came around for a game at my place. We set up the terrain board through the simple expediency of laying down one tile of our choice, starting at opposite corners, which made for an interesting challenge in and of itself. Placing certain tiles required that one thought about the next adjacent tile and the need to match up with it. At the end of placing 15 tiles we rotated a couple around so that we got the maximum use of the terrain feature on the tile. We were using one inch equals one hex for the game, and therefore the table was the equivalent to a 30 x 50 hex map.

The Scenario Recon in Force

The primary objective was to get one mech over to the others sides baseline, and roll 8 or better on 2D6, to successfully observe the enemy rear line. We then said that the objective from this was to withdraw all your mechs off the board. Victory points based on the mech battle value (on hindsight not the best choice).A draw was any result within 10% of each others scores, a marginal win at 50% or better, and a total victory if the result was more than 100% more than your opponent. All pilots were standard pilot 5, gunnery 4 skill.

Initial Deployment of Forces 

You can see the deployment of all the mechs in the above picture. Nearest mech on the table, this side, are my lance.

Starting with a Wolverine WVR-9XP, which was a custom 3132 level 3 Clan tech mech worth 2508 bv (move 5-8-5, armour 182 points). Loadout 1 x ER-PPC, 2 x ER SLs, 1 x Streak SRM6, 2 x ER MLs all wrapped up nicely with a target computer.

Next along was a custom 3025 Inner Sphere level 1 Battlemaster BLR-1PJ worth 1779 bv (move 3-5-3, armour 248 points). Loadout 2 x LLs, 6 x MLs, and 1 x SRM6.

Next was a custom 3025 Inner Sphere level 1 Thunderbolt TDR-5PL worth 1326 bv (move 4-6-0, armour 208 points). Loadout 1 x LL, 2 x SLs, 1 x SRM2, 3 x MLs, and 4 x LRM5s.

Finally on this side, was a Spider SDR-7K2 Inner Sphere level 2 3132 era mech worth 886 bv (move 8-12-7, armour 90 points). Loadout 1 x ER LL.

Opposing me were Dan's mechs. Starting with the nearest which was a Inner Sphere level 2 Valkyrie VLF-QD1 3062 era mech worth 878 bv (move 5-8-5, armour 96 points). Loadout 1 x ER ML, and 1 x LRM10 with Artemis IV. Represented by a Wasp proxy miniature.

Next was an Inner Sphere level 2 Enforcer ENF-5D, 3050 era mech worth 1308 bv (move 5-8-5, armour 161 points). Loadout 1 x LB10X, 1 x ER LL, and 1 x SL. Specified mixed cluster and standard ammo.

Next along was Inner Sphere level X Warhammer WHR-9S 3067 era mech worth 1653 bv (move 4-6-0, armour 208 points). Loadout 2 x ER PPC, 2 x ER ML, and 1 x Steak SRM6.

Finally, Dan's Inner Sphere level 2 Pillager PLG-3Z 3058 era mech worth 2697 bv (move 3-5-3, armour 307 points). Loadout 2 x GR, 2 x ER ML, and a Guardian ECM. Represented by an Awesome proxy miniature.

First Objective

The above picture (probably turn 3) shows my Spider (hard to see but at the top, roughly in the middle of the frame), having made it to Dan's deployment zone, and I've successfully rolled 8+ on 2D6. The problem for me, at this point, is my left flank where Dan's Pillager and Warhammer were in firing range of both my Battlemaster & Thunderbolt, and if I turned around and ran for it I was going to lose both mechs. On my right flank my Wolverine was facing the Enforcer & Valkyrie, and I really want to stop him getting either mech to my side on the board to make their recon rolls.

First Mech Down

On the right hand side of the above picture you can see that Dan's Valkyrie has been destroyed. He had lost initiative this turn so was at a disadvantage. He ran past my Wolverine and hoped that his speed, and the threat from his Enforcer, would be enough for me concentrate on it. I ignored the Enforcer, and blew the Valkyrie away in one combat round.

On the left hand side of the picture you can see my Thunderbolt, which was being fired on by the Pillager and being hit by 15 points of gauss rifle goodness in the right torso. This would motivate me to move the Thunderbolt for the next five/six turns to do a "run Forrest run" manoeuvre. My Battlemaster has closed the range on the Warhammer, as I really needed to spam him with my six medium lasers to stand any chance against him, and I had pretty much reconciled myself to losing the Battlemaster, as it was too slow to get off the table.

Second Mech Down

In the turn prior to this one, I had said to Dan that my objective was to get all my mechs off the table, and that perhaps we could both agree to withdraw. My Spider had withdrawn off table, due to having lost its only weapon, and having served its function of dam fast nuisance mech. Also, because discretion is definitely the better part of valour. However, Dan chose to carry on, as he feared I would rip his mechs to shreds if he turned to leave.

So, by the time of the above picture, Dan's Enforcer had led my Wolverine a merry chase across the board and I had been unable to stop him from making a successful recon roll, in spite of him having to take an extra turn to do so due to repeatedly firing and failing to finish him off. This meant that it was now down to the damage points we could inflict on each other, for either of us to have a chance of getting anything better than a draw, thus making the likelihood of a victory very uncertain.

My Thunderbolt by this time (having pretty much run all the way across the board) had turned around to face the Pillager. After previously reaching the hill (on its right rear side in the picture), where I had able to use the terrain to block line-of-site, and turn to face the Pillager without being shot at with no modifiers. I was then able to advance the mech to the cliff face you see it at here. My intention at this time was to climb over the hill and get the hell out of Dodge. I had lost count of how many gauss rifles rounds had just missed me as Dan's Pillager had shot at the Thunderbolt every turn bar one by this point. Lucky for me, dam unlucky for Dan. By this point in the game the Thunderbolt had earned the nickname "Forrest", as it seemed rather apt.

Finally during this turn, I got a rear shot on the Enforcer from my Wolverine, at the same time as my Thunderbolt laid some large laser love, and LRM salvo on it, which finished it off, so they claimed a joint kill.

Meanwhile the Warhammer and Battlemaster had been slugging it out. First with the Warhammer coming down the hill, then retreating back up the hill, while I followed him up for some close combat kicking goodness. We both did Alpha strikes at one point, which left me slightly hot, so my Battlemaster jumped behind the Warhammer as it was my only viable option for an effective move. After turning to face me Dan Alpha striked the Warhammer again, whereas I took the chance on surviving and only returned fire with some of my medium lasers and the SRM2, getting a critical hit on the Warhammer's hip actuator to add to its misery. As you can at this point the Warhammer had fallen over due to shutting down after his Alpha strike.

Third Mech Down

The shutdown Warhammer was easy meat for the Battlemaster, which used medium laser spam and the SRM2 to "crit" it to death. I also started to take advantage of the opportunity to cool down whilst doing this. Dan's Pillager had manoeuvered to prevent my Thunderbolt from having an easy shot at it, and took the opportunity to send loads of love down range at the Wolverine, for two turns, missing with all but one gauss rifle round, which hit my left torso. Dan called the Wolverine "lucky", which then became its nickname.

Fourth Mech Down

As you can see here, my Battlemaster had spent two turns running down the hill while the Wolverine and Thunderbolt poured the love onto the Pillager. "Lucky" my Wolverine was shot at again by Dan's Pillager, which had missed again. Whereas the return shot from "Lucky" hit the head of the pillager for wince inducing 15 points of, oops headlessness ventilation.

Damage Report

All Dan's mechs destroyed.

My Spider took 44 points of damage, which include 2 points of internal center torso damage. It also had one engine hit, and one hit on the ER large laser. A suggestion that it be nicknamed "Colander" was resisted. "Forrest" the Thunderbolt took 15 points of damage to the right torso. Meanwhile "Lucky" the Wolverine took a total of 38 points of damage across the torso's and right arm. Finally, my Battlemaster 134 points of armour damage, and 19 points of internal structure damage (left & right torso's). Proving yet again that a Battlemaster just has that certain je ne sais quoi?

Learning Points

Don't use assaults and heavies for a recon in force mission. Battle value seems to work okay. You must have well defined retreat options in pick up games. Due to the victory points for mechs being based on their battle value, it actually made sense to stay and duke it out. Had the the victory points been based on their tonnage, then there would have been less incentive to kill mechs. Hell, maybe no victory points for killing mechs might have been better still? Just points for achieving the scenario goal, and for retreating mechs off board, might have been better?

Summary

Unfortunately I lost count of the number of turns we got through in the six hours that the game took to play. We were having fun, it seemed to go at a reasonable pace to me, but if I had to guess then it lasted around 14/15 turns, which seems low on retrospect to me, but this is nearly two and a half turns an hour with eight mechs on the table. So not too bad. Towards the end I had certainly slowed down a bit, but I never felt that the game was slow as such.

Anyway, my first game of BattleTech in about 20 months, as it was for Dan too. We were both a bit rusty with the rules, but we are both keen to run a campaign, as neither of us likes pick up games where there is no incentive to conserve forces. The miniatures on the terrain worked really well too and seems to makes for a more relaxed game, as you can't count hexes, you need to be laid back about the odd half inch, and firing arcs are not so easy to judge etc.

I hope you enjoyed this After Action Report? See you all on the bounce.