ScrapYard Armory

After playing a few tracks in the Wolf and Blake Starterbook my friend and I have encountered an unusual situation. We have made our campaign a brutal sort. Our pilots can die during tracks, and in the event that we do not control the battlefield at the end of the track, we have to make a search and rescue roll to get our pilots back.

So what happens when the search and rescue crew come back empty handed? The missing pilots are instead recovered by the enemy and kept as POWs. After a bit of thinking blog poster Saxywolf and I came up with an extra track that can be added to either Starterbook campaign to provide a way to rescue those missing pilots. Saxywolf gets the lions share of the credit for this post.

Some of the top Mechwarriors are far too valuable to just leave behind.

Obviously this track is not for everyone. Your campaign may be much more lenient when it comes to pilot recovery. That is one of the great things about Battletech. You can make your games as hard or as easy as you like.

MISSION: POW Breakout

Leave no man behind!

GAME SETUP

The Defender places two mapsheets in any legal position. Place 2 + 1D6 medium buildings of Level 1 height anywhere on the battlefield. The Defender nominates one building to contain the captured Mechwarrior. Write the hex number down and keep it secret until the building is scanned.

Attacker

The Attacker is a portion of the player’s force. The Attacker may choose up to four units and may do so after the Defender has chosen their units. The Attacker may choose which map edge to enter from on turn 1. This map edge is then the Attacker’s home edge.

Defender

The Defender should be the same type of force that captured the Attacker’s Mechwarrior. Roll on the chart below to determine the Defender’s force composition. The Defenders must set-up first anywhere on the battlefield. The Defender’s home edge is opposite the Attacker’s home edge. Use the table below to determine the Defender’s force.

WARCHEST

Track Cost: 300 WP, At least one Mechwarrior must be captured in order to play this track.

Optional Bonuses

+150 Prepared Defenders: The Defender gets +1 to their initiative roll for the first 6 turns. One defending unit may begin hidden (TW p.259) anywhere on the battlefield outside 8 hexes of the Attacker’s home edge.

+150 Light Fog: +1MP to enter each hex if running or walking. +2MP to enter the last hex if jumping.

OBJECTIVES

Leave No Man Behind: Locate your captured Mechwarrior by scanning buildings (see special rules below). (Reward: 200)

Bloody Their Noses: Cripple or destroy at least 50% of the Defending force. (Reward: 150)

Reinforcements: Remove one unit from the Defending force. That unit enters the game on turn 5 as reinforcements from the Defender’s home edge. (Reward: -150)

SPECIAL RULES

Salvage

Salvage is not available for this track.

Forced Withdrawal

All forces operate under forced withdrawal rules this track.

Scanning Buildings

Scanning buildings is accomplished by having a unit with an operating probe within four hexes. A unit without a probe must spend two consecutive turns within four hexes in order to scan. Scanning is done in lieu of weapons fire. Multiple buildings may be scanned at the same time.

NEXT TRACKS

Follow the next track listing from the mission you completed just prior to taking POW Breakout.

Sometimes the Classic Battletech forums can run you into some curious situations. Case and point, I opened my big mouth a few months ago while discussing Iron Wind Metal’s recent price increase.

If you’ve been around the CBT block a few times you already know how IWM went a little overboard when they had the Project Phoenix ‘Mechs sculpted. I’ve put together a Marauder and can attest to how crazy they are. Even the new Archer is a pain when you have to go back to the TRO to decide just where the extra bit you have left over goes.

So anyways, Quigs chimed in on the topic which made me think.

Which will make the guys like me, who think assembly is the worst part of a mini, less likely to buy the new product. I’ve bought a few designs which I absolutely loved, got home, and opened the package to realize how long and arduous a process it would be simply to get to the painting part. My bits box is heavier then my fishing sinkers box because of that nonsense.

The plain and simple fact of the matter is that the people willing to go that extra mile to customize a miniature, still can if the mini is a single piece, it just takes them a bit more work. More work that the people who don’t feel the pressing need to meddle with everything they purchase don’t have to put up with by hopelessly fiddling with joints that don’t make a lick of sense.

So I just HAVE to say something back.

Give me all of your ‘Mechs and a case of beer [Quigs], and I’ll assemble and paint the lot of them.

To me, miniature painting is an art and I don’t see it as manual labor in any way. In either case, it’s awesome that CBT does not require minis to play anyways. But if it was not an option, I would not like the game half as much.

Well, a few weeks ago before the holidays Quigs delivers the case of beer and a heap of miniatures to my door.

That’s A Lot of Pewter!

So here I am, with over a battalion of miniatures ready to be stripped, built, primed and painted. I’m honestly excited about this opportunity to practice. Like I said earlier, miniatures are not required to play the game but if they were not an option, I wouldn’t like Battletech half as much.

So over the next few months I will be (hopefully) making progress on these miniatures. I will post whenever I get a mini done. Looking at it all, I think I may have underbid with that single case of beer. Live and learn.

Tip of the Day

Pinesol. Pinesol is amazing at eating through old paint. I’m going to have to buy another bottle myself. The first soak did not succeed nearly as well as I had hoped.

Strategic Operations is out now in PDF form at least.  For those of you wondering if this new tome is worth the money, I’m providing my humble opinion in this review.  This is a huge book to be sure, so I’ve broken down my comments by section.   Enjoy!

General Rules

The first few sections of the book are devoted to some lesser known yet useful rules covering both the mundane (Moving Cargo) to the hotly requested (Search and Rescue).  While not every gamer will take to every rule, some will be the missing link for gamers looking for a nagging answer to their peculiar gaming quandary.  Yeah, we’ve got a rule for that now…

I am very disappointed in the fatigue, morale, and linked scenario rules.  They are, except for the occasional proof read edit, a direct copy-paste from Combat Operations.  There is no value added in these rules for anyone who already has this FanPro product.  I wish they would have at least provided some additional innovation to make it fresh and unique.  A brief example in the same flavor of those provided in the Starterbooks would have gone a long way.

In order to use these rules, players will have to put pen to paper and patch all of the holes before they fire the first round.  Otherwise, players will find themselves arguing intent of the rules mid game.  There is no faster way to kill the fun in any game when you have to take a station break for rules arbitration.  This has nothing to do with a lack of creativity on the part of the player base in case you were going to suggest.   Beer and pretzels, enough said.

The Linked Scenario rules could have at least had an example to convey the intent of the writers and play testers.  This stuff was play tested right?

Advanced Aerospace

Aerospace combat, the way it was meant to be played.  Strategic Operations ushers in the true embodiment of deep space combat with Warships, Dropships, and Fighter Squadrons.  These rules are a gem and I can’t wait to try them out.  For the Aerospace enthusiast, this section alone is worth the cost of the book or PDF.

I have already commented on some of the advanced rules that were provided as previews.  With the full picture in place, I am now very anxious to get some Warship action on.  I hope more people in the CBT community feel the same.  It is the only way we will be seeing more games promoted by the Demo Team.

Maintenance, Repair, and Salvage

I’m honestly not a huge fan of AccountTech.  That’s why we have the Warchest system after all.  However, I’ve given the rules a good read.  They are about as detailed and complete as we the players are going to get.

Just a little snippet if I may;

It is recommended that players reserve optional rules for situations where each player is responsible for only a small number of units.

Translation: We are not responsible for those who would run an entire company (or more) using these rules.

All through this section there are plenty of good examples that flesh out the rules presentation making it palatable.   Very well done all around.  I might be tempted to run a force using these rules but would probably be more interested in creating a tool to assist in the record keeping instead.  The extra flavor text in the examples make even the most mundane rules, such as those involving the acquisition of replacement parts, fun to read.

Orville fails the Availability Check and swears that next time he buys a new fighter, he’s going to buy Free Worlds League.

Battle Force

BattleForce is a fast play rules system to fight large scale Battletech universe games.  We are talking Battalion versus Battalion for a normal game.  Regiment on Regiment becomes the new long format.

The rules are solid, providing a way for players to integrate every form of Battletech unit in their games.  This includes Warships and Fighter Squadrons by the way.  That recreation of Case White you’ve been thinking about running all of a sudden is looking more and more feasible.

The real kicker that is going to make it easy for players to give the game a try is the included playing counters.  These are available for free from the Strategic Operations product page.  Once again the developers at Catalyst have shown quite a bit of good will to the players.  They have clearly presented a strategic image for the game.  You get a sense from reading the rules the grand scale that BattleForce is.

The included counters are going to make things very easy to get started.  Bravo.

Miniatures Rules

The miniature rules as presented are a straight copy-paste from the free edition available online.  They even reused some of the pictures that debuted in the Battletech Compendium: The Rules of Warfare.  Other pictures were updated, why not all of them? Since this is already provided free, I don’t see the value here.  When the book was pushing the page count, why would they add in these rules that are already provided elsewhere?  Catalyst could have used that space for something new, like a Linked Scenario example or two.

The last quick addition to the book, and seemingly the cherry on the top of a wildly varied sundae of Classic Battletech goodness is the Quick Strike rules.  Essentially, take two parts Miniature rules, one part BattleForce, and a dash of Click-Tech MechWarrior, shake well and serve chilled.  These rules can make an excellent bridge for converting players.  Makes me very glad I already have a healthy selection of MechWarrior figures.

Verdict: BUY

Strategic Operations will be one of the best volumes out of the Core rulebook set.  If you had to choose between Tactical or Strategic Operations, go with Strategic Ops.  I imagine the average Classic Battletech player will find Strategic Operations rules they will use much more frequently than those provided in Tac Ops.

This one was worth the wait despite it’s flaws.  Here’s hoping that Interstellar Operations can bridge the gap to truely large scale warfare in the Inner Sphere.

To celebrate the release of Strategic Operations, and the included advanced aerospace rules, I took a bit of time to make two deep space maps using a combination of GIMP and Heavy Metal Map.

I’ve included each map in three different formats depending on your needs/wants.  The first is a PDF for printing on your normal everyday printer (8 1/2 x 11).  Also included are both High and Low resolution JPEGs.

Please let me know if a different hex color would work better. I’m open to suggestions to improve!

ScrapYardArmory – Deep Space Map 01

Printable PDF (1.27MB)

Low Resolution JPEG (2.47MB)

High Resolution JPEG (7.71MB)

ScrapYardArmory  – Deep Space Map 02

Printable PDF (1.55MB)

Low Resolution JPEG (2.70MB)

High Resolution JPEG (8.53MB)

I’ve gotten a few requests for a tutorial on how I make bases for my Mechwarrior figures.  Well, I’ve finally put all the pieces together and made a video.

And by the way, page 387 in your Strategic Operations points out that Mechwarrior figures make for great miniatures games.  The only drawback of MW minis?  No hex base.  With a few dollars and some time, you can have all the hex bases you will ever need.

Quick Strike rules anyone?

AeroTech is dead.

In its place, Strategic Operations is promising to be one of the most drastic overhauls in Battletech history.  I’m talking of course about the brand new ECM/ECCM rules preview.

While some may say the ECM/ECCM rules are optional, I disagree.  Glancing at the Strategic Operations table of contents, the entire section dealing with Warships is just “Advanced Aerospace Combat, General Rules”.  If you are playing with Warships, you are playing advanced rules.  There is no checklist in the compiled tables, as in Tactical Operations.

Mark my words.  The who’s who of Classic Battletech Warships will all be using these new rules.  All of them.  Bracketing Fire, Emergency Combat Heading Operations, and Capital Missile Bearings Only included.

Your New Best Friend (in space)

External hard points, page 217 in your Tech Manual.  Hard points come free on all Aerospace fighters.  They are meant to carry various bombs and the occasional TAG.  However, based on some curious non-answers from select developers on the forums, as well as the lack of canon Aerospace fighters fielding ECM/Active Probes, I expect some new hard point mountable equipment in Strategic Ops or perhaps a separate ruling.

Carefully crafted forces with overlapping ECM fields and peppered Active Probes will be the kings of deep space.  Combined arms is going to matter even in space now.

But Who Will Play It?

If they write it, there is no guarantee that very many people will play it unfortunately.  Space battles with Warships and even Aerospace fighters to some degree have always been ignored by the community.  Catalyst does not need people to fall in love with Warships to sell Strategic Ops.  There is always Battleforce and the highly anticipated Repair and Maintenance rules to bring out the wallets of the traditional ground pounders.

Hell, I asked the question at GenCon if there would be additional support for Aerospace battles from either Catalyst or the Demo Teams.  They said no.  Not so bluntly of course, but the meaning was clear.  The developers at Catalyst have no say in what games the Demo team play.

In essence, the success of Aerospace warship battles depends on players like you and I to play it, like it, and demand the same from our local Demo team members.

That’s no slam dunk.  And besides, I’m not totally sold on the potential ECM/ECCM tracking nightmare.  I imagine that the best Aerospace players will be able to go into their own Ikaruga trance and just “see” the ECM field on the table top.  That’s a bit duanting, but then, perhaps we all shouldn’t rush out to replay Case White as our first Aerospace game either.

I own both of the Starterbooks and I believe they are great products for both new and old players alike.  If a Fasa era unit specific scenario book and the Chaos Campaign rules got it on, the Starterbooks would be their offspring.

The Starterbooks are designed to be played with one player as one of the headline units and the other playing the opposing force.  It is an easy conversion to make it possible for two players to play against each other.

Starting Off and Running the Tracks

Each player will be playing one of the factions within the Starterbook.  While one player is playing a track, the other will run the opposing force.

From my experience, the generic tracks presented in both Starterbooks are meant to be won.  The difference maker in the overall campaign is being able to win with the optional bonuses and without taking too much damage.  Losing an important ‘Mech or pilot can drastically change the course of the campaign.

Meanwhile, the opposing force still has a stake in the track.  Since their own force will inevitably face off against the same ‘Mechs and pilots, it is in their best interest to ensure they receive the most damage possible.  And just maybe, they can keep them from achieving a full victory every once in a while.

Facing Off

Within each book, there are Dustup or Touchpoint tracks that put the two units against each other.  This occurs once in Sword and Dragon and three times in Wolf and Blake.

When one of the players gets to one of these combined tracks, it’s time to battle.  Follow the track instructions, using each player’s force as available units.

In Sword and Dragon, the final Dustup involves one company from each force.  Each player picks his best twelve ‘Mechs to face off.

In Wolf and Blake, the first two Touchpoints use limited units from both forces while the final Touchpoint is similar to Sword and Dragon, a company on company epic battle to prove who is the best command in the Inner Sphere.

When there are optional bonuses that affect the battle, both players should agree to use them or not.  A simple solution is to require both player’s to want to bonus for it to take effect.  Or, if both players would like a little variability in their game, they can dice off optional bonuses (1-3 this bonus is in play, 4-6 it is not).

Resolving the Time Continuum

When the first player reaches a Touchpoint his force pauses and waits for the other player to get the the same track.  This brings up some potential issues.  It would not be fair for the other player, who knows the state of the opposing force, to play unlimited additional generic tracks to bolster his force to an unbeatable level.  On the other hand, when one force has the obvious upper hand, it would likewise not be fair to force the other player to join the Touchpoint without at least an opportunity to get his force back into fighting trim.

With this in mind, agree with your opponent beforehand how many generic tracks are acceptable before the opponent must enter the combined track.  In the Wolf and Blake campaign I am playing in now, my opponent and I have agreed on one track before being forced to play a Touchpoint.

End Game

At the end of the campaign, there are several ways to determine the overall winner.  Here are a few ways to go about it.  If you have your heart set on having a clear winner of the campaign, agree with your opponent before the campaign begins what victory conditions are going to be used.  Use one, best out of three, or make your own (Please share if you do make some new victory conditions though!).

Warchest

Add up the Warchest point value of each player’s remaining force including their current Warchest balance.  The higher final Warchest wins this victory condition.

Final Battle

Whoever wins the final Touchpoint/Dustup in the campaign wins this victory condition.

Unit Cohesion

Count up all of the ‘Mechs and pilots in each force that started the campaign.  Whichever force retains more original ‘Mechs and pilots wins this victory condition.

Have Fun, Standard Answer Number One

Above all, have some fun.  Sometimes it is not who wins and loses, but how you play the game.  The journey is better than the final destination.  The Starterbooks are worth many many hours of gaming fun.  Enjoy the ride.

Litko Aerosystems is a gaming company specializing in creating tokens for use in popular board and miniature games.  Recently, Litko added a new custom token option to their online store.  I decided to pull the trigger and conjure up some tokens for use in Classic Battletech.

There are four custom token sets available from Litko.  Three of them include 10 tokens for $6.99 while the fourth includes 20 token for $19.99.  Each set includes a limited selection of shapes to make your tokens.  I found the 20 token set to have the shapes I thought would work well so I went for that despite the higher cost.

After ordering I took note that custom products can take up to three weeks before even being shipped.  My wait was far less.  Placing my order to receiving my tokens took exactly two weeks.

The tokens come from Litko looking a little dull but the company offers some great advice for brightening them up.  I put crayon to token soon after getting my sampler in and the results are very noticeable.

I bought an assortment of tokens I thought would be appropriate for Battletech ground and aerospace combat.

• Arrows with ‘Mech/Vehicle/BA numbers for target declaration
• Pilot roll reminders (be honest, how many times have you skipped them by accident?)
• Aerospace screen markers
• Aerospace rolled tokens
• Aerospace evasive action tokens
• Tactical Operations POWER UP tokens!

I thought at first that the tokens were fairly small.  But once I got them on a mapsheet with miniatures, they did not seem so bad.  The tokens are of good quality and I think they should easily stand the test of time so long as they are not haphazardly dropped and lost during games.  (Keep an eye on your cats out there!)

For ground combat, these are not going to vastly improve your gaming experience.  However, with Strategic Operations around the corner, I can think of several great uses for aerospace games.  Deep space can be confusing with Warships and fighters fighting it out.  These tokens may be just the thing to keep your games orderly.

These tokens are a bit pricey.  I paid $26.04 for my 20 tokens including shipping.  You can save money with Custom Token Set 1 or 2, but not all shapes and not all colors are available in each set.

You can get around the shipping issue by combining your order with friends.  Rustle up some interest and make a big mixed order to get everyone what they want.

Overall, I am very pleased with my purchase and now that I know what I am getting into, I will absolutely be making future orders.

The Good

• Good quality
• Looks awesome on the mapsheet with minis
• Custom means something, your imagination is the limit

The Bad

• Shipping makes them a potentially pricey product
• Not all shapes and not all colors available in each set

The Ugly

• They Make Nukes!

The Luthien Turning Point e-book is the first of hopefully many PDF only releases by Catalyst Game Labs.  I’ve been looking forward to this series since it was announced at GenCon.  At $5, this offering is very nicely priced.

Luthien begins with a brief but energetic fiction piece that illustrates the sadistic methods of the Word of Blake on Luthien.  I don’t see their tactics as much different than Condition Feral but the presentation is different.  It is obvious who the antagonist is and who the reader should be rooting against in this battle.

The Word of Blake are the New York Yankees of Classic Battletech.  They have all the best technology, the best warriors.  I have two favorite factions now.  The Free Worlds League and whoever is fighting the Word of Blake.

As well as providing a gorgeous planetary map, there are mapsheet tables which describe the appropriate CBT map to use in scenarios or tracks based on the terrain on Luthien.

The Combatants section gives a brief overview of all of the forces fighting on Luthien.  There are twenty two forces in all.  Included for each force is a color unit logo, experience levels, and force abilities to add additional depth to your games.  The force descriptions are geared specifically for generating units to be used in the included Chaos Campaign tracks.

There are six Chaos Campaign tracks, all dealing with specific battles between the feuding Draconis Combine factions with notable interjections by the Word of Blake and Clan forces.

While the tracks are entertaining, they are not as coherent as previous offerings from DotJ and JHS:3070.  The recommended forces are varied and it will take some noodling on the part of a game master to meld them all into a single campaign playable by a single faction.

The tracks also show the continued evolution of the Chaos Campaign system.  We saw one iteration in the Starter book series.  The Luthien tracks remove details of force composition (% deployed by player and % of opposing forces) instead leaving it up to the players to come to an agreement.

Optional track bonuses also introduce some different elements.  Prior examples of optional bonuses dealt more with environmental effects that would work against the player’s attempts to complete his objectives.  There are times when these additions work well and others where I am left confused.  I’ll explain.

Blitz! requires the player to exit one of his units off the opposing force’s home edge before the fourth turn.  Not only does this bonus encourage diverse force construction (Fast ‘Mechs anyone?) but also makes achieving the track objectives more difficult because the player will be removing a portion of his force early on in the battle.  Blitz is an innovative and effective optional bonus.

On the other hand there is Grudge Match, which requires the player to destroy the opposing force’s commander.  This to me is not an optional bonus but another objective all together.  It does not make sense NOT to take this bonus when one or more of the actual objectives involves destroying a significant portion of the opposing force.

While I have my qualms, I am a fan of the Chaos Campaign system and welcome any addition to the mix.

Moving on, we are treated to two unique ‘Mech variants and four warship record sheets using the updated style.  Both ‘Mechs look like beasts containing mixed technology.

Another notable cookie in the Luthien book is the prevalence of Strategic Operations material.  There are exact page references included which leads many to imagine, along with several tweets, that Strategic Ops is very close being out in PDF and soon after our hot little hands.  (Just in time for the Holidays!)

That’s not all.  There is a complete multi-page battleforce map of Luthien, all hexed out and ready for the revised planetary assault rules.  This map will be very useful not only to the Jihad era but also those interested in replaying the Clan assault on Luthien during the Invasion era.

The big question on my mind is whether or not the e-Books will be successful.  I’ve already bought mine, but are the rest of the CBT faithful going to follow suit?  I hope so.  I would love for the Classic Battletech community to send a clear message to the powers that be that this kind of product is a welcome addition.  If the Jihad era books do well, we can expect to recieve additional e-books from different eras.  And that is something to look forward to.

After a long wait, the folks at Catalyst have made good on the promise they made in JHS:3070.  The Warchest rules are finally available online for free.

For those of you not in the know, the Warchest system, originally designed by Ben Rome and Paul Sjardijn, debuted in Dawn of the Jihad as a simplified campaign system that revolved around a particular event.  Unit creation is flexible and event resolution is left open enough to allow for a wealth of replayability.

I’ve played through one campaign (DotJ) and have just started another and I have to say I am pleasantly impressed.  It allows for flexible force construction and scenario generation.  It is just simple enough for casual gamers to get interested while leaving the door open for true account-tech lovers to go as nuts as they want.

This release is a huge boon to the community created Warchest tracks available at the CBT forums.  I have plans to pull together a series of tracks based on the War of 3039.  All in good time.  There is a lot happening lately.

The free download is just almost a copy paste from DotJ except for the formatting and artwork.  All of the tables are mostly the same.  One difference I noticed was the way the Technology Rating was presented.  The new PDF gives a formula to calculate the Technology Rating of your unit prior to the start of the campaign.

DotJ originally left it up to the player’s to assign themselves a Technology Rating.  Effectively it was a way for players to self adjust the difficulty of the campaign.  The new rules provide a formula to calculate your unit’s rating based on the percentage of technology in your starting force.

Some Issues, Some Solutions

Not all is perfect.  I have a few issues with the rules based on my experiences running through Chaos Unleashed from DotJ.  Here is a quick run-down and some possible solutions.

• Pilot upgrades may be under priced

I suggest adjusting the price of upgrades.  Going from an Inner Sphere standard (4/5) would cost 10 and 8 points as printed.  However, the next step would double the cost.  Thus going from a 3/4 to a 2/3 would be 20 and 16 points respectively and so on.

Also make sure pilot skills never get further than two levels from each other.  That is, a 2/4 pilot is kosher, but a 1/4 is just plain wrong.  Keeping a balance between piloting and gunnery is going to keep your pilots from getting too munchy.

• Salvage is highly valuable

Salvage is a huge boon to those able to take advantage.  Some prudence on the part of the Game Master is needed to make sure the player’s war chest does not get too far out of whack.

Check to make sure each track really deserves salvage.  Defensive and stand-up fight situations make perfect sense.  However, recon missions, fast attacks, and other tracks held in hostile territory are not going to offer the time or support equipment needed to properly salvage much of anything.

Per the rules as written, salvage is supposed to be sold at half-value.  I missed that line myself on my first read of the rules.  Makes a huge difference.

• While you can buy battlearmor and protomechs, there are no costs to repair them

An easy fix.  Based on ‘Mech and vehicle repair costs, I suggest the following prices.  Battle armor repairs cost 2 support points per suit.  Protomech repairs cost the same as vehicles, tonnage/2.

Just keep in mind that a destroyed battle armor suit needs to be replaced.  Repair only makes sense if it took non-lethal damage during a track.

Chaos Campaign is a free download so get out there and take a look.  It is definitely worth your time.