The Red Corsair is a new twist on the Turning Point PDF theme. For the first time we have a full fledged campaign somewhere between a standard issue Turning Points PDF and a Starterbook (ala Wolf and Blake and Sword and Dragon). I’ve been excited to get down to reading this PDF but have not had the time until recently. I hope you all will excuse the late review.
Jason Schmetzer is at the helm for this ambitious PDF product, lets see how it all comes together!
Unexpected Guests
The opening fiction is slightly longer than typical and exciting. It well frames the situation on the ground and the confusing nature of the events surrounding Natural Selection. Having not read the novel in question, I only have this PDF to piece the story together and it does the job well.
Atlas
Rather than a single world being summarized as in previous Turning Points, the Red Corsair takes place over five planets stretching between the Federated Commonwealth and the Clan Wolf Occupation Zone. Each planet has it’s own Terrain Table for added authenticity.
Each planet description is an important part of the story-telling and should not be skipped especially if you have not had the luxury of reading Natural Selection. The Red Corsair is turning into the cliff-notes version of the full length novel.
RAT
Full Random Assignment Tables are provided for the Kell Hounds, ClanWolf/Corsair, and Militia/Other. This important addition brings this PDF much closer to a full length Starterbook.
The Path of the Corsair
In one short page the entire story is laid out from beginning to end in dry fashion. If you have ANY intention of reading Natural Selection beforehand, skip this section (or better the entire PDF) and move on to something else.
What a story. It has all the trappings of a page burner, too bad I have now ruined it for myself. Not all is lost though. My BattleCorps subscription keeps me well stocked with fiction to read!
Personalities
After the story is quickly summarized, the personalities complete with illustrations are brought to life with additional detail and interesting bits of information.
As an added bonus, there are brief snippets of RPG information for each of the three main players. They are not anything near a complete record sheet but enough to capture the most important details. A good GM can fill in the blanks if they ever had to urge to run a Corsair RPG adventure or in any way mix RPG elements into the Turning Points Campaign.
Combatants
Thank goodness they continue to use a sane method of skill level as presented in HTP:Galtor and not the ever confusing number system devised for the other Jihad Turning Point books.
Each unit is given an experience, RAT, an optional ability, and some notes that give additional flavor to the unit. A tried and true formula for the TP series.
The Red Corsair Campaign
The campaign is broken up into two parts familiar to owners of either Starterbook. There are the generic missions and the Touchpoints. The generic missions are the appetizers to the Touchpoint main course. I’ll touch on each separately.
For generic missions, we have four, Strike, Defend, Assault and Interdict. The first three are tracks taken from the Starterbook series with a slightly different mix of optional bonuses and objectives. Each retains the flavor of their predecessor. I noticed an interesting change to Strike. The building scanning objective was taken down a notch in difficulty. In Wolf and Blake a ‘Mech without a probe must spend two turns scanning. Now the requirement is only 1 turn. Probes give you an increased scanning distance.
Interdict is the only completely new addition to the wartrack party and I like it. It has very interesting objectives (I’m looking at you Interdiction) and challenging bonuses. It’s a welcome addition to the Chaos Campaign tool chest and I will be very interested in playing it out to see how well the mission flows.
Next up are the Touchpoints, six of them including one aerospace. Each Touchpoint takes place on (or near) different planets during crucial points in the Red Corsair story. Assuming you take only 1 generic mission between each Touchpoint, you are looking at 11 to 12 missions for the entire campaign. That will make for a very healthy campaign that will keep you busy for several gaming sessions. This PDF is looking more and more worth the $8 price tag.
The Touchpoints are a tad disappointing but not without their stars. I loved the Not So Fast objective which places a premium on destroying targets under specific circumstances. That said, the majority of the objectives involved some variation of “kill the other guy”. The optional bonuses were very often confused with optional rules. In my mind, optional rules and terrain are just that, optional, and should not be an add-on for bonus points during a campaign.
There is something to be said though about making the missions match the canon. When you are crafting campaign stops along a predetermined story arc I can understand how history may become inadvertent shackles. While not the most diverse and imaginative tracks I’ve read, the story behind them is so enthralling that I can’t help but forgive the lack of creativity and instead bask in the knowledge that there now exists an easy way to live the story instead of just reading about it in a novel.
Record Sheets
Two record sheets are provided for the unit commanders of the Corsairs and the 31st Wolf.
The Red Corsair pilots a custom BattleMaster (using unseen art for the ‘Mech image!) littered with Clan technology. It’s a very dangerous combination of long and medium range energy weapons which will have to be bracketed to avoid serious overheating.
The Wolf leader pilots a Man ‘o War which remains characteristically under armored and under armed to make up for the above average speed on the assault class Omni. The weapons mix of 2 PPCs and 2 Streak-6 make for an excellent combination. Open up holes with the PPCs and then fill them in with the SRMs.
And All the Rest
I really liked the Red Corsair and believe it is worth the slightly higher price point. This PDF is an excellent campaign for any gaming group and works well as a tool for Demo Agents or established BattleTech groups.
Even after reading through the whole PDF I was relieved that there still were a few questions left hanging. While the PDF holds many spoilers there are some interesting anomalies that are never fully explained. Perhaps Natural Selection will be the next BattleTech novel I get my hands on with the hope that there will be a few answers within its pages.
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