/btg/ Battletech General!

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>>50709495
PART TWO!: -

Field Manual Comstar.PDF
http://www.mediafire.com/file/ja3z2n1goe12623/Field_Manual_Comstar.PDF
8604 - The Spider and the Wolf
https://www.mediafire.com/?3d9brfrkj9vnhka
Aerotech 2 - Revised
http://www.mediafire.com/file/ivqhzog2wyoegxo/Battletech_35011_-_Aerotech_2_Revised.pdf
hexpacks 2&3:

Battletech Hexpacks
http://www.mediafire.com/file/3o59kirzzz6znac/BattleTech_Hexpacks.7z
also introbox stuff:
http://www.mediafire.com/file/l22yrlkk9buzuzl/BattleTech_Intro_Box_Set.7z

Historical War of 3039
https://www.scribd.com/doc/23569748/35014-Historical-War-of-3039

Mechwarrior 5: Mercenaries is coming, set during the Third Succession War.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gz8Y1V8gy1A&feature=youtu.be

Heavy Metal Archive (OLD)
http://www.mediafire.com/file/8so68gbw3yga4cb/2016-12-11_HeavyMetal-Archive-OLD.rar

Fan made TRO 3063:
battletechreader.blogspot.com/2012/09/the-fan-made-technical-readout-3063.html
https://www.mediafire.com/folder/8o30486fony5f/Fan_TRO_3063

... also Butte Hold

>>50709495
>>50709500
There are these two and that one Atlas in Christmas colors, and damn it I can't find any other Christmas BTech pics.
>sad mechwarrior

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Battlemaster (Bigfoot) in snow? I wish I had the full sized pic of this.

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More WarShips. Now featuring a Nightlord that's not completely retarded.

"Sibkin, I have had a brilliant idea! Let us create a WarShip that carries 150 'Mechs, so that we can kick the ground-pounders out in low orbit and watch them play Strana Mechty Roulette to see who will make it safely to the surface!"

"But the odds of Strana Mechty Roulette are one in six to fail. Statistically, ground forces attempting orbital insertion are as likely to burn up in the high atmosphere or crater into the ground as they are to safely land."

"I know! The ground-pounders can go couple with syphilitic surats! If we build the ship like this and constantly drop them from orbit, eventually they will all die and we will finally be a pure AeroSpace Clan, as was always intended by Kerensky and Stephen McKenna!"

"I like it! Let us do this!"

>>50709385

Total Warfare radically changed how infantry works. You used to be able to wipe them out wholesale very easily but now it takes a lot of effort to kill the little shits.

They might not move very fast but you won't want to go near them either. Aside from spotting duties or in cities they make good area denial tools.

I think they went overboard with the TW changes, though. I mean you do get the mental image of infantry going "INCOMING GAUSS RIFLE ROUND! FORM ONE STRAIGHT LINE IN FRONT OF ITS TRAJECTORY! HUP HUP HUP!" and all but with the speed those things go by at you're looking at bursting the eardrums of everyone close to its flight path, and the shockwave can stun, knock down, break bones and so on too. It might not necessarily kill all 28 dudes in a platoon on a hit but it's definitely believable that you'd incapacitate them for the remainder of the fight, which would be an effective "kill" any way.

>>50709789
>Total Warfare radically changed how infantry works. You used to be able to wipe them out wholesale very easily but now it takes a lot of effort to kill the little shits.
I have a policy. If the infantry hides in a building, that building is coming down from long range laser fire. NO EXCEPTIONS. It's my 'nuke 'em from sub-orbit just to be sure' rule.

>>50709768
That is the full sized pic.

>>50709453
Infantry discussion from previous thread...
>if you look at any description of combined arms like with the davion RCTs, they use lots of infantry to support their mechs/vees, but what I dont get how is how they support them.

>Sure, ambushing in cities and forest works, but most of the time you won't be getting those situations
I remember somewhere a story someone wrote where a pair of Phoenix Hawks walked into a trap inside a city where there were just hundreds of soldiers waiting for them in one built up area of town. Both mechs were Swiss cheese-d in seconds.

>>50709997

Meh. Get a Foot Platoon with FedCom-era AFFC kit for a DD of 2, arm them with M42 ballistics, and give them Clan Heavy ER Support Lasers. Viola, an infantry unit that does like 30 damage, basically loses one guy at a time to anything but Infernos, and can hit from 21 hexes.

Optimising 'Mechs is for chumps. This is the exciting new era of footslogger supremacy.

>>50710038
>an infantry unit that does like 30 damage,

>basically loses one guy at a time to anything but Infernos,

>and can hit from 21 hexes.

How horrifying!

>>50710038
>>50710292
Do note you can get most of the 30-ish damage and DD2 from a pure IS-tech FedCom unit AS THE DEFAULT WITH JUST THEIR ISSUED RIFLES.

FedCom got all the good infantry kit.

From the previous thread:
>>50709418
You're considering *just* C-Bill cost (which doesn't apply to Clans). Money means nothing to them. The availability of resources (which Endo Steel takes rarer ones) and manufacturing time (which Endo Steel does due to the need for zero-g manufacturing) are the biggest factors.

So as someone new to BT lore, what made the Blakists so successful? Was it access to SLDF tech and willingness to be complete shitheels (in the sense of ignoring the Ares conventions) in wartime?

>>50710558
It was due to the writers wanting to pull a massive deus ex machina to fit their own vision of events. They shoehorned in whatever they could to make that happen.

>>50710545
>Money means nothing to them

I believe Clan Diamond Shark disagrees.

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>>50710292

To whit, pic related.

It's not even fully bullshit. Clan ER H SLs aren't Encumbering, so you could put them in an oversized Motorised or Mechanised platoon and zoom them around at 3-5 ground MP. I just can't be fucked doing all this by hand.

But note that platoon BV. 211. Savannah Master swarms get fucked, for my next 2.5K BV custom game I'm showing up with 11 Federated Bullshit platoons. Spam 330 damage in 30-point lots from 21 hexes and unless someone is rolling a ton of Flamers or HMGs they're not gonna die.

>>50710383

>FedCom got all the good infantry kit.

Shocked, gambling, the establishment, etc.

>>50710601

I figured that might also have been the case. The Blakists did unnaturally well.

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>>50709635
>if you look at any description of combined arms like with the davion RCTs, they use lots of infantry to support their mechs/vees
I've looked through the Field Manuals and the Davion housebooks, and (except maybe battle armor) I don't see anything to suggest RCTs commonly deploy their infantry in open field combat alongside their 'Mechs and tanks - is there a particular passage you could point me to? If not, my guess is that the infantry digs into heavy terrain somewhere and lets the 'Mechs and tanks bring the enemy to them.

On the other hand, it is pretty useful to have infantry nearby to take control of enemy units who've powered down.

>>50710607

It's a bit of a tough argument.

It happened, so obviously it happened that way.

OTOH, FASA had a very different Jihad planned. It was going to be shorter, sharper, lead by Victor who would falter at the last and then be won by rampaging Ghost Bears*. So the WoB foreshadowing for buildup indicates they were going to have a force a mere fraction of what they pulled out of their asses during the Jihad. But the original plan wasn't carried out and WizKids went with a much longer and destructive Jihad in their backstory so things don't line up too well.

It does get explained, albeit poorly. "Oh, we had four hyper-tech worlds doing this stuff for centuries! Oh, everyone is a WoB ROM plant! Oh, nukes and bioweapons!"

Like most things in BT it's easier not to think about it, just accept it and move on.

*No really. It's in the picture, link: http://bg.battletech.com/forums/index.php?topic=11852.5;wap2

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>>50710764

I suppose it might help if I posted the screen grab.

>>50710383
>FedCom got all the good infantry kit.
Blakists get even better, and then you bring in the Manei Domini and load up the prosthetics and you reach the pinnacle of infantry cheese.

>>50710606
As a Feds played I like this very much.
>Cost: over 16 million
Whelp

>>50710853

All infantry costs are like that due to the multipliers.

Anti-'Mech platoons can cost more than a late-era XL-engined assault. I really wouldn't worry about the C-Bills, I just calculated it for the sake of completeness.

>>50710764
That makes WAY more sense than "we managed to find a fleet of WarShips bigger than the LA+DC's fleets combined, plus the personnel and supplies to man them" and "we also managed to nuke the capital planets of every major state + Outreach, successfully avoiding all intelligence assets like MIIO, O5P, Heimdall, Maskirovka, Clan Watch, etc."

For fuck's sake, they called it a "Jihad" to get on board with the post 9/11 environment. How much more blatant do you need it to be?

What you described is totally possible with a series of sleeper cells and an infiltration of the HPG network, weakening it through subversion. It's not outside the reach of the Wobbies pre-Jihad even.

>>50710601
>>50710607
Not really, nothing they got was unbelievable. The secret to their success was their ability to exploit all the dumb things in the BT universe we know about and the writers know about.

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>>50710807

MD implants turn infantry from "dangerous, but potentially avoidable" to "oh fuck they're everywhere and won't die".

>>50710764
>a force a fraction of the handful of divisions we actually saw in the first few years

>>50710909
>more warships that are almost all destroyers or corvettes, i.e. armorless in the Jihad setting
>it's somehow a stretch that they could find a few thousand people to crew these ships when they employ millions, if not billions of people

Christ, winter break is here

>>50710776
Yuck, that plan was utter shit. What we got was 10x better.

>>50710965

Here's the problem, though.

WoB's actual force at the start of the Jihad was almost double its FM listing, compared to TR 3067 saying they had formed at least one more division, maybe more (as in two or three, not twice as many).

Secondly, they and they alone magically got to turn their population and income into a large WS fleet. Also as shit as a lot of their ships might have been, any WS beats no WS, and it's not like many of the canon ships are well-designed any way so if it's shit v shit they're still doing well enough.

The frustration with it is that the WoB were able to ignore several conceits of the setting. Which, yes, gets explained away as SL caches, mothballed shipyards, centuries-old impenetrable conspiracies, Terra being riddled with factories rather than a low-output world it was stated to be (which is why Focht let it go, as far as anyone knew it was just a symbol and not worth fighting over), etc etc etc.

CGL, as much shit as I will hang on them for their manifold fuck-ups and general asshattery, did a remarkably good job of polishing the turd they were handed by the DA backstory.

But it's far from a seamless transition, and there are a lot of genuine reasons to call bullshit, especially in aggregate since so much has to go in WoB's favour to get to the Dark Age.

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>>50710945
>opponent rolls boxcars on an MG attack on MD infantry in the open
>burst fire damage halved
>no double damage in the open
>effective damage divisor of 3 due to implants and armor kit
>kills maybe two dudes
[BLAKE ELEISON INTENSIFIES]

haha butte hold

>>50710807
Well yeah, but you expect them to have god-tier kit because they've been hoarding all the tech and actually value the lives of their grunts, unlike the Successor States.

>>50710945
>reduces effects of Flamers
>reduces damage
>increases support weapon carrying capacity
>increases speed
say, you could make a MD unit with the two support weapons necessary to get the range brackets that would count as a single SW for movement

>>50711218

If Xotl hadn't betrayed the will of the Master, you could build assault BA with four Mauser 1200s and two anti-'Mech weapons on troopers with Pain Shunts and dermal armour.

And had them equipped with Stealth or Mimetic armour, for additional meme-worthiness.

>>50711253
>If Xotl hadn't betrayed the will of the Master
wat

>>50711313

Anti-personnel (read: Primary Weapons) were originally in a bit of a grey area with the TW/TM rules because they specified you could make *one attack* with your AP weapons rather than *attack with one of* your AP weapons each round.

I asked for clarification because I was going to build a better Elemental suit using four Mauser IICs in place of a single anti-'Mech main gun to do more damage at the same ranges.

I didn't get the answer I was hoping for.

I don't really disagree with it very much to be honest. But the rules for custom infantry platoons let them do some real bullshit and I think it would at least help swing the pendulum back towards BA.

>>50711050
The TR doesn't say they *only* formed that many, it says they're playing obvious shell games and some folks estimate the two quad mech designs are built in quantities sufficient to equip one or two more divisions. You really need to stop trying to hoist that as an argument.

>>50711429

It doesn't say that for just the Quads, that's for all their new production, including the Gurkha, Vanquisher, and Shootist plus the lines they already had from ComStar.

Again, the initial plan was for the WoBM to be much smaller than the WK backstory needed it to be for the level of destruction described. But FASA's foreshadowing was for a smaller WoBM, in line with their smaller and less destructive Jihad.

>>50711521
Ok m8, whatever helps you after all these years.

>>50711521

gotta say though, while the inital smaller plan might have made more sense, i'm still a fan of the total chaos and "nuke 'em till they glow" of the WK storyline. might not follow proper logical progression given the setup, but damn is it fun.

>>50711546

I actually posted a screen grab of Herb saying what was initially planned. FASA's foreshadowing was for that, not Weisman's nearly 20-year sphere-wide WMD-athon that gutted all the Houses and led to the rise of the Republic of the Sphere.

>>50711654

I don't mind the idea itself, it's just that the execution is messy and inconsistent. The plot hooks were leading to one thing and WizKids gave us another. Just difficult to get the two to line up is all. CGL did about as good a job as possible under the circumstances.

>>50711654
Yeah, I'll never forget my first exposure to the storyline. "They used nukes?" I'd been so ingrained in the way BT warfare was *supposed* to be that I never considered the very logical possiblity that not everyone would always play by those rules. It surprised me in a way yet another shuffling of power/Succession War X storyline never could have.

>>50711755
I'm almost in agreement with you, except instead of "difficult" I'd say "impossible". It'd make more sense if CGL just discarded DA or made it another universe, rather than try and join the two.

More chaos is just natural. Let's face it, at the end of 3067 we have an end to the FedCom Civil War and there's no Clan attacks. It's a moment of peace. Unless something big happens, you'd be a period of stagnation punctuated by border incidents and small skirmishes, nothing major. It's why the Clans were thrown in at the end of the Fourth Succession War.

>>50711755
>I actually posted a screen grab of Herb saying what was initially planned.
... and? It was shit, it didn't happen, it's not an argument.

What the TROs say is this:

>Blue Flames have been sent in small numbers to all divisions of the Word of Blake Militia. The numbers produced, however, appear to be greater than what has been distributed— possibly by a large margin. This discrepancy has been noticed to some degree with all ’Mechs and vehicles produced by the Word of Blake since 3062. Some military experts believe this indicates that the Militia has formed at least one secret division and possibly more. With complete control of the Sol system and high recruiting numbers in the Chaos March, this is certainly within the realm of possibility.

>at least one secret division and possibly more
Literally all it says is at least one and possibly more. Not "only one or two". Christ I can't believe anyone still tries to use that TRO blurb as an argument.

>>50711654
The Jihad we got made much more sense given what we were working with. We're lucky it wasn't the rehashed "Victor does it again + more Bear shit in the woods" thing. As it was Victor got a prominent role and the Bears still did a majority of the ending smash, but it flowed better.

>>50711755
Nothing about the plot hooks fails to add up. The scale of war we were given doesn't fail to sync up with what had been written until that point, and in fact works a lot better.

>>50711985

On the other hand I do think everyone saying "Holy shit the last few years have been mental, what say we all agree to build up for a little while before belting each other senseless again?"

Another period of entente, like 3040-3050.

WoB's kind of in a now or never position in '67 though too. It doesn't want the Houses to have time to build up to full strength again, and a period of entente might lead to co-operation like the early Clan War so playing enmities off against each other might get harder.

>>50712291
Was it pretty much Cameron St. Jamais who caused the Jihad? I mean the Master wasn't there, right? So StJ had to make the call himself since he spaced William Blane (RIP in peace Blaney).

>>50712047
>at least one secret division and possibly more
>Literally all it says is at least one and possibly more.
>therefore there could only have been one more division beyond the FM listings

I don't think you understand what "at least" means.

>>50712558
I think you're confused or ESL.

>>50712047
>I can't believe anyone still tries to use that TRO blurb as an argument.
The first clue should be that FanPro published TR3067 in 2002, which all by itself almost guarantees that the book was trying to match up with WizKids version of the Jihad.

>We're lucky it wasn't the rehashed "Victor does it again + more Bear shit in the woods" thing.
But... that *is* what it was, they just dressed it up with Hidden Worlds and other nonsense.

>>50712622
>But... that *is* what it was
It's almost like I went on to write more...
> As it was Victor got a prominent role and the Bears still did a majority of the ending smash, but it flowed better.
So why did you even respond to that? Confusing!

>>50712466
>tfw we never even found out what happened to Blane for the first three years of the plot IRL
>When we learned what happened in a single line, it was both funny and disappointing.


As for the whole thing going on, it's much more of a generic clusterfuck.
>Was it pretty much Cameron St. Jamais who caused the Jihad? I mean the Master wasn't there, right?
What happened at Tharkad was a St. Jamais temper tantrum.
What happened at Atreus was punishment from the Master for Fake Tommy going off script.
What happened at Luthien was a misunderstanding. It was the old Tukayyid veterans faction of WoB trying to legitimately aid the people who knew the Clans were the greatest enemy in the middle of a rebellion
What happened at New Avalon was on St Jamais's orders as a follow-up to Tharkad as punishment for breaking the League

But the first couple Jihad books are so over the place that we still don't know how much of them are accurate. Like, they indicated LAW got nuked as a giant fuck you to the dracs for no reason, but that wasn't what happened at all.

>>50712758
I felt bad for Blane. I liked the guy, and most of the True Believer faction. Sucks they got so sidelined by the Toyama/6th of June types.

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Posted in last thread, but I'm keen to see other peep's counters and stand-up card mechs.

>>50712801
The Toyama's were honestly the most powerful even since Demona Aziz before St Jamais killed her. The True Believers were just the ones who could actually talk to everyone and act as mediators. So Blane made good sense as a councilor, but when shit got real, you knew they wouldn't let him call the shots.

God damn did the 3rd Division have a good track record though.
>tfw they even survived the meatgrinder at Dieron and escaped into the void

Never stop believing.

>>50712963
Somebody should post the picture of somebody using pennies and shotgun shells.

I have plenty of mechs though. If I have to proxy, I just something with similar weight and loadout. Like I might use a centurion mini as a stand in for a snake.

>>50712968
Maybe more powerful due to their machinations, but the True Believers were bigger up until around (or just before) 3067.

I'd have loved to see a WoB story in the Jihad where you get to read events from a True Believer's pov.

>>50710909
The concept of the 'jihad' had been bubbling away during the 90s

>>50713029
go easy on him, some people are joining are community that were born after 9/11 and don't remember the before time.

>>50713058
>people are joining are community that were born after 9/11

So we have a new definition for "trashborn", then.

>>50713058
I hadn't been aggressive or vindictive, just pointing out that they had been planning this prior to September 11.

I'm sure he or she is capable of dealing with opposing opinions.

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>>50713083
ok I laughed

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>>50710945

>>50713199
Now that is cool looking. Got some questions: what are the 'Mech and tank involved?
Are those all Word of Blake cyborg troops (Manei Domini, correct?)?
Are their names for their small arms? For RPG purposes.

>>50713358
It was some custom config for a Drac Sunder, the tank was a Bolla, the MD mech I'm not sure. Yes, those are MD troops being and fire with no fucks given.

Shimmy could give you more details, since he painted it.

>>50713029
Ok, allow me to explain (and for those getting salt in their panties, clean them before responding).

The concept of the Jihad didn't officially come out until after 9/11. FASA may have been working on a similar concept, yes, but it wasn't released until 2002.

They called it a Jihad despite the term appearing in absolutely no lexicons other than the Qu'ran. While there were Muslim extremists prior to 9/11, let's face it -- that event made them globally known and a household name. 'Jihad' had become well known and the world was aware of it. To use that term was just a blatant emotion-grabber. To pretend otherwise is to ignore global events.

>>50713058
For the record, I've been playing since the mid 90s. I remember when FASA ran it like champs. So ease off the cheetos, your salt levels are too high.

>>50713358
Those look like Mauser 1200 LSS'. Could even be Mauser 960s, but those were in short supply, which prompted the building of the 1200.

>>50713488
>someone defends you
>"ease off the cheetos"
classic /btg/

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>>50713518
reminds me of this

>>50713391
>>50713510

The Celestial is a Malak Dominus config.

>>50713488
Let's face it, the concept of 'jihad' was pretty well understood in the '90s by those that followed world security with anymore more than a passing interest.

Speaking of WoB, are there any sources for what all the factories on Terra were able to build up until the beginning of the Jihad? In models and variants, not really numbers.

>>50713843
Agreed I remember reading about yahoos in the middle east crowing about a holy jihad in the 90s. It was only 9/11 which made it a household word.

Which is unfortunate because jihad is a super common word in Arabic.

>>50713843
>pretty well understood in the '90s

The 80s, I'd say. That's when all those terrorist groups with "jihad" in their names sprung up. You had the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the Egyptian Islamic Jihad (usually sans the country designator), the Lebanese Islamic Jihad (a front for the Iranians and their Hez minions), etc. The last ones were probably the most famous, they were the ones who held all those hostages in Lebanon back in the day.

>>50713843
I'll agree to that. But consider that audience. Who does that contain? Military types, regular people with an obsession on those things. You ask the average person in the 90s what 'jihad' meant and you'd probably get a blank stare, or someone trying to decipher it on the spot. Most people don't care about it unless it's mentioned on the news or it's a hot-button item.

Don't kid yourself into thinking that BattleTech players are more educated or more well read than the rest of the populace. We run the gauntlet just as much as non-players.

The Jihad book came out in 2002, while it was still VERY fresh in everyone's minds. It featured a large explosion, damage, and a grinning madman on the cover. That was blatant pandering on emotion to sell it and capitalization on the hot-button item.

That, to me, is the worst part of the whole ordeal. They shoe-horn in a terrible idea and try to use emotion to capitalize on it and get people to buy into it.

>>50713932
>Hez minions
Not really fair. Shiites are uncommon in most Arab nations and it's only natural for a minority surrounded by groups that hate them to turn to the only (comparably) major nation that is Shiite majority.

Can someone walk me through how to use hidden units in megamek?

>>50713983

I think you're selling the old school BT guys short. Remember that tabletop was something very different to them, and much closer to the wargaming roots.

I agree with the premise of your argument. The term was chosen to illicit a response. But I think that had been cooking since(at least) the first WTC bombing. We knew well jihad and what it was. I don't even think you had to be an expert to be familiar. You just had to pick up a magazine every now and then.

>>50713983
>The Jihad book came out in 2002, while it was still VERY fresh in everyone's minds. It featured a large explosion, damage, and a grinning madman on the cover. That was blatant pandering on emotion to sell it and capitalization on the hot-button item.

Knigga, the first Jihad book didn't come out in game stores until 2006. We call it Forever 67 for a reason. Proper battletech was in a time freeze for years while Dark Age was in progress.

Also, FASA had a long history of modelling their stuff after old military groups and events. The Clans being Mongols is the most obvious and famous. Crusade and Jihad are familiar to anyone with any background in the history of the early first millenium.

>Don't kid yourself into thinking that BattleTech players are more educated or more well read than the rest of the populace. We run the gauntlet just as much as non-players.
They're not more educated but you bet your ass that they have a disproportionate amount of military people. There's a reason brick and mortar stores love to locate near bases.

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>>50712968
>3rd Division

Pure thoughts and pure actions, ma nigga.

Do mercenary companies generally have their own jumpships, or do they charter them to carry their dropships?

>>50714286
Charter.
If your mercs have a JS, you will be called a Mary Sue by /btg/ and things will be thrown at you.

Most people here think unless your only stinger is missing an arm, your drop ship is second hand with half a tank of gas and your MG is outta ammo, you are pretty much ruining BT.

>>50714365

What, your mercs have a Mech and a Dropship? Don't worry, you're already ruining BT.

>>50714423

What do you mean you can afford to pay your staff? Battletech is ruined forever.

>>50714365

I'm not even going to lie, that sort of thing is why I haven't done any sort of posting or storytiming or sharing of screencaps from by AtB campaign. I'm playing the unit that I rolled up in a /btg/ thread as an example of FM:M(r) unit creation, so all of the rolls for units and the justification for having the JumpShip is a matter of record, and I'm STILL 100% sure that shit would be flung.

The, "my merc unit is less well-equipped than yours, so it's clearly better" is yet more hipster-style posturing that needs to die off with a quickness. There's a perfectly legitimate middle ground between the 15 year old with a merc unit that would turn the 3065 Dragoons green in envy, and the BattleTech hipster merc unit (from the TC or FWL, every time) with a half-dozen penniless guys armed with kitchen knives and a single Roryx SMG with 2 rounds of ammo to share between them.

>>50714423
>>50714449
HAHAH
you guys are great.

Serious reply to >>50714286
JS are incredibly rare and I can only think of 2 mercs with em (Kell hounds and WD). So anyone in reality would be chartering.

>>50714503
It's hard to read how serious anyone is here, it's kinda a running meme, and some people probably feel that way and honestly myself included know in canon it doesn't have to be that way but there's something rewarding about being so rough around the edges and just squeaking by.

So when I read the spamming of MS, I always take with an extra few grains of salt since sure some people are that die hard grogs, but I think most people like to shit post and run with a meme.

We seem to be a over all friendly mature group so I don't think many get mad it's just to stir the pot for some chuckles with friends.

>>50714509
>JS are incredibly rare and I can only think of 2 mercs with em

There's a ton of merc with JS. The two you're thinking of are the mercs with really large numbers of JS.

Also:
>GDL, ELH, 21stCL, Big Mac, Northwind Highlanders

All have JS (just off the top of my head), and all of them have multiple JS. A merc unit with a single JS isn't unknown, it's just uncommon. IIRC FM:Mercs says that something like 10% of merc commands have a Jumpship, whether owned or under their direct employ (chartering is for <one journey> and then there's no further relationship).

>>50714286
The utter majority of mercenary units barely hit company size. Some of them won't even have a DropShip, or at least not enough storage space to haul all of their assets around, so they'll have to charter that too.

Any unit with a smaller size than a regiment would be highly unlikely to have one, unless they managed to capture an old pirate Scout or Merchant.

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>>50712968
>>50714250

>>50714568
>It's hard to read how serious anyone is here, it's kinda a running meme, and some people probably feel that way and honestly myself included know in canon it doesn't have to be that way but there's something rewarding about being so rough around the edges and just squeaking by.

Yeah, I get it. It's just that there's levels of nuance to the argument and it annoys me that people are unwilling or unable to cop to it. There's absolutely nothing wrong with playing a "rough around the edges/squeaking by" merc unit. There's a difference between rough around the edges and totally hopeless.

As for the meme-ing, anytime somebody is shitting on a general playstyle that *ought* to be fine, it riles me. It's that whole Demo Agent thing: never shit on a playstyle you know to be legit just for grins or to make yourself feel better, because that's the sort of thing that gets people to walk away from the game. I've had to shut that down in person at cons (having vets playing in front of newbies and shitting on them is a *terrible* thing), and so anytime there's a chance that new players are reading that sort of thing and perhaps being influenced by it...well, it's just toxic as fuck.

>>50714580
>GDL, ELH, 21stCL, Big Mac, Northwind Highlanders

Good point. JumpShips and DropShips owned and/or operated by merc commands are rare, but they exist. It's the guy with a half-dozen Star Lords and a Fredsa they "totally salvaged from the Clans" in their homebrew merc unit that's the problem, not the merc unit with a Union, a Mule, and an Invader or Merchant.

>>50714503
>from the TC or FWL, every time
why? i like both those factions

>>50714116
Step 1: go into the rules and check the hidden units box of version 41.15 HU, and possibly later versions.

Step 2: no fucking idea, searching now. There must be a button somewhere but I can't find it.

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>>50714681

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>>50714633
>Any unit with a smaller size than a regiment would be highly unlikely to have one, unless they managed to capture an old pirate Scout or Merchant.

As a reference, here are the rules for creating a merc unit - which will be approximately company size in the VAST majority of cases.

To put things in perspective, if your CO comes out of character creation without a -4 to the roll to find a JumpShip due to Traits and Skills (Contact/Good Rep/Negotiation Skill/etc), you've screwed up very badly somewhere along the line. Which in turn means that you should be able to get a Merchant-class JumpShip on an 8+ at the absolute worst (TN 12-4 = 8+). Which in turn means that a starting merc company should have a JumpShip in at LEAST 42% of cases, as long as they're willing to drop 4 points of Cash Pool or go into debt a bit.

Getting a JumpShip isn't a given. But by the last set of published and functional rules we have for merc unit creation, it shouldn't be an extreme rarity, either.

>>50714633
>>50714509
>>50714365

Nice. Original query dude here, thanks a bunch.

I ask because I'm running a pnp game where the players are a mercenary company. Not quite set on date, yet, but I'm thinking either just after Tukayyid in 3052, 3057 or just before the Jihad happens in 3067.

>>50714878

Which book is that in? A Time of War?

>>50714757
>faith
but Blakism isn't a religion :^)

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>>50714946

>>50714923

FM:Mercs Revised.

Like I said, the last functional mercenary unit generation ruleset that was published. It works for ATOW characters too with only a tiny bit of GM tweaking (if the PC has an effect that clearly is intended to duplicate an effect that gives a bonus, but the name of the effect doesn't match, give them the bonus like a sane person).

Of important note: this ruleset was published BEFORE the retcon in the number of JumpShips available to the Inner Sphere. That retcon happened in TechManual, which was published about 5 years after this Field Manual. Which in turn means that the information in the Field Manual represents the pre-retcon, lower JumpShip numbers. If anything, merc units after the retcon would be MORE likely to have a JumpShip, not less.

>>50712963
I have a picture using the same counters, anon

They are so good, buy I would like them more if CGL did something MegaMek style

>>50714878

Way to quote a fanon source.

>>50714286
Most have droppers, but JumpShips are quite rare in units that weren't once house or SL, or sometimes pirate hunters

>>50714286
Usually they don't even have dropships.

Look at it this way. A dropship is worth a showroom fresh company of heavy mechs. A jumpship is worth ten times that. This is why the transport clauses in contracts are important. Otherwise, even with a Dropship, you're forking out 35K Cbills a jump in collar fees.

>>50714449
>tfw I always pay my men even if I only have 100,000 Cbills in cash reserve

I've sold mechs to make payroll before. Good support crew is too hard to get ahold of to ever treat poorly.

>>50715022
>Of important note: this ruleset was published BEFORE the retcon in the number of JumpShips available to the Inner Sphere. That retcon happened in TechManual, which was published about 5 years after this Field Manual. Which in turn means that the information in the Field Manual represents the pre-retcon, lower JumpShip numbers. If anything, merc units after the retcon would be MORE likely to have a JumpShip, not less.
This. After the retcon, aside from the fact that DS and to a lesser extent JS prices are nonsensically high, even more than they were in the fucking 3025 mad max days, it would be numerically unlikely from canon numbers for any given merc unit to NOT own an Invader-class JS

>>50715432
As I recall, the retcon wasn't attempting to make jumpships more common to mercs (or anyone else), but to make the numbers fit what we already knew about the Inner Sphere (i.e. it wasn't an attempt to increase jumpship commonality in general, but to actually have all the numbers catch up to what the fluff had already committed itself to).

>>50717155

Pretty much. Also to deal with the issue of FASAnomics where most planets are dependent on the import of food and other vital resource to stay viable, which was absolutely impossible given the listed ship numbers.

>>50714878

>
To put things in perspective, if your CO comes out of character creation without a -4 to the roll to find a JumpShip due to Traits and Skills (Contact/Good Rep/Negotiation Skill/etc), you've screwed up very badly somewhere along the line.

Or you just aren't min-maxing like a mofo and taking a crack at everything you can theoretically get your hands on. I mean the rules for the Death Commandos let them swipe entire regiments of Hatchetmen, Devastators, Tenshis, or Fafnirs the second those step off the production line but I don't think anyone other than Loren Coleman or the most rabid Xin Sheng advocate, but I repeat myself actually thinks it would work that way.

JSes seem to be intended to be rare, with the rules for getting them indicating the hardships involved. The rules make it possible to get around that to an extent but I'd contend the idea was to make it *possible* for a unit to start out with one if a player wanted, without actually speaking to how common such an event really is.

Especially when p. 31 of FM: M(R) says "JumpShips, however, remain prohibitively expensive. Though a fair number of commands manage to purchase their own DropShips, only the most successful can afford to buy JumpShips."

And the units listed in the Merc FMs and supplements? By and large the ones who are vastly more successful than the norm. Up to and including the Blue Star Irregulars, who literally do have a Fredesa they jacked from the Clans.

>>50717455
>Or you just aren't min-maxing like a mofo and taking a crack at everything you can theoretically get your hands on.

Have you ever rolled out a MW3 character? NEA's more or less right: if you have a character who's capable of being a mechwarrior, they're almost certainly going to have Well-connected and Contacts by simple virtue of having been through a Mech academy and going through a Tour of duty. If you started as a noble (like the vast majority of mechwarriors are), you get Title. And the Wealth and Good Reputation traits are spread absolutely all over the place in the lifepaths. And if you're a merc CO and you don't have Negotiation at at least a +3, you've profoundly fucked up, because being able to negotiate is a core component of the merc CO's job.

That's not min-maxing. That's creating a character who can actually do the job.

Start as a noble, because most warriors come from the nobility. Boom, there's the Wealth trait, just because you're Noble. You've got a 50/50 chance on the lifepath event to get even more wealth or the Good Rep Traits. Move on to military school. The most common result on the lifepath (7) gets you a Contact. Move on to a military academy to learn to pilot a Mech. I stopped looking after the Lyran schools...but it's not POSSIBLE to get out of a Lyran academy without Well-Connected and Wealthy. Fully half of them give you Good Rep on top of that, and by my look, about 4 results on each lifepath give you a contact.

We aren't even to Tour of Duty yet, and already it's basically a lock that our fictional character is going to have 3 Traits that give them bonuses. And again, a CO <should> have a good negotiation score, so starting with a +3 is not min-maxing at all. And negotiation makes a fourth, for the -4 to the roll he outlined.

Jumpships just aren't as hard to get by the rules as they are by the fluff, mang. Mercs aren't a bunch of powergrubbing munchkins solely on the basis of having <a> Jumpship.

>>50718143
>words words words

Anything that makes a Jumpship easy or possible for small-time mercs to get is minmaxing. There's no arguing that.

>>50717455
What's up with the Death Commando rules?

>>50718143

There's a difference between getting a somewhat organically created character, which is what the system is intended to do, and /just so happening/ to leave chargen with all the advantages necessary to start putting together an above-average starting Merc unit.

>>50718345

They're each allowed to select any two IS-manufactured 'Mechs, regardless of where they were made. The rules aren't even specific about eras so it's arguably possible for them to be rolling deep in Stealth Pillagers back in the 3rd and 4th SW, even if that would be abusive of the intent. It's meant to represent the DC being able to swipe some things and being dedicated to getting the best the CapCon has to offer but IME it is used for bullshit purposes and should have been restricted to "Anything available to the CC or Inner Sphere General, plus FWL during Sun-Tzu's engagement or the Trinity Alliance/MoC as appropriate" rather than simple carte blanche.

>Type in bicycle symbol, no U-turn symbol

Way to go, legacy Captcha.

>>50718524
>There's a difference between getting a somewhat organically created character, which is what the system is intended to do, and /just so happening/ to leave chargen with all the advantages necessary to start putting together an above-average starting Merc unit.

As long as the player making the character is aware of the advantages necessary for your latter scenario, then it is outright impossible to stop it.

Unless the CO in question shouldn't be able to influence the makeup of their unit whatsoever?

>>50718524
>They're each allowed to select any two IS-manufactured 'Mechs, regardless of where they were made.

Oh, and yes. We totally agree on this. The Death Commando acquisition rules are complete and total bullshit. IIRC they can also be used to grab Clantech Mechs (which are manufactured in the IS) during the 3rd Succession War era as well. The instance I saw of it was used to grab a Hellstar (IS faction, made in the IS) for a game where each player was supposed to have a lance totaling 200 tons in 2950.

I know CGL can't into errata, but I wish they'd issue a direct errata for that specific passage.

>>50718578

>Unless the CO in question shouldn't be able to influence the makeup of their unit whatsoever?

I'm fine with that but it's a matter of degrees.

Leaving Chargen with all the bonus traits sets of my munchkin radar, which goes into screaming overdrive when said character turns around and creates a merc unit with a JumpShip.

I'm not really interested in having a knock-down, drag-out fight over whether it is or should be possible. Just saying that whether it's possible or not the fluff indicates it should be very much a rarity.

>>50718524
That's when you invoke GM fiat and dicksmash their forces. Don't tolerate that kind of minmaxy munchkin shit. If you want to be an uberboss munchkin, go fucking play Munchkin.

>>50718524
>There's a difference between getting a somewhat organically created character, which is what the system is intended to do, and /just so happening/ to leave chargen with all the advantages necessary to start putting together an above-average starting Merc unit
The thing is, most characters who would reasonably be leading a mercenary unit WILL end up picking up some of those traits in chargen as an inherent part of becoming the kind of person who ends up leading mercs. Hell, a character who rides the paths to be a merc leader and DOESN'T pick up some of that stuff is the kind of person where it ends up being 'unrealistic' that this schmuck is in charge of anything

>>50718721
>Just saying that whether it's possible or not the fluff indicates it should be very much a rarity.

Oh, certainly this is an issue. The rules don't match the fluff in the slightest.

The Campaign Companion "rules" go the opposite way. To get a Jumpship there requires (IIRC) a roll of 9+# of collars. If the Jumpship is rare (not addressed; but all Jumpships are rare, aren't they?), there's an extra +2 penalty. If you're prior to the Clan Invasion, there's a +2 penalty. If you aren't a formal military unit there's another +1 penalty. The CO can do nothing to modify this number.

By my math, that means at best that it is mathmatically impossible for a merc group to get a merchant or Invader Jumpship, and you have to roll boxcars to get a 1-collar Tramp. This is just as stupid as the FM:Mercs ruleset, just in the other direction.

>>50718721
>Leaving Chargen with all the bonus traits sets of my munchkin radar

I guess you'd have to ask if the player in question had any control over it. In MW3, if you go Nobility->Military School->any Lyran Academy, and don't wash out, you're guaranteed to end up with Wealth 2 and Well-Connected, and you'll have Good Reputation in what looks like about 70% of characters, all through no input of the player. And the CO who lacks the Negotiation skill is like having a D&D wizard who can't read (you're completely fucked once you get to game play; no negotiation skill? No contracts.), so he's going to have a decent Negotiation skill. And there he's got half the traits. The only decisions from the player were, "play a sterotypical Lyran MeckJock", and "take the skill that gets you jobs as a merc".

I have a hugely difficult time blaming the player for any of that, which is what your "munchkin radar" comment sounds like you're doing.

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>>50718843
>Hell, a character who rides the paths to be a merc leader and DOESN'T pick up some of that stuff is the kind of person where it ends up being 'unrealistic' that this schmuck is in charge of anything

So...

What you're saying is that a character is a min-maxing unrealistically skilled munchkin if he does have the skills to make him a merc leader. You're also saying that the character is a mary sue unrealistically lucky schmuck if he doesn't have the skills to make him a merc leader.

It's like the character in question can't possibly win or be good, no matter WHAT they do.

>>50718524
>Stealth Pillagers in the 4th SW
Could they have succeeded in their Kathil raid?

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>>50712963
>Posted in last thread, but I'm keen to see other peep's counters and stand-up card mechs.

I posted mine (>>50709479) last thread, but here are some counters people could actually use.

>>50718888
>What you're saying is that a character is a min-maxing unrealistically skilled munchkin if he does have the skills to make him a merc leader. You're also saying that the character is a mary sue unrealistically lucky schmuck if he doesn't have the skills to make him a merc leader.
>It's like the character in question can't possibly win or be good, no matter WHAT they do.
If you listen to shitposters, that's exactly true, double hitler. But if you don't, then you can actually enjoy things

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>>50718918

... and here's the other half.

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>>50718888
>It's like the character in question can't possibly win or be good, no matter WHAT they do.

Good, young padawan, good.

Would there be a way to do those cut outs alone for printing? Or just looking at. I adore that art.

>>50718843

Some, yes. All? Maybe not. Then deciding to make the attempt for a JS is another choice, and if you actually get a hold of a JS the effects are *enormous.*

You get a big boost to your Dragoons Rating, which means better contracts. And not only are you getting paid more because you have a ship, you aren't paying collar fees every time you go somewhere.

>>50718850

One of the problems I do have with the FM:M(R) rules is that what's good for generating a merc unit would be good for the admin side but not necessarily combat leadership. So you wind up in a situation where, yes, an archetypal Lyran is a great choice for starting commander... but their combat skills are gonna be for shit and they stand a high chance of getting stomped because they aren't up to it tactically.

Which is a weird dichotomy, but that's the ruleset for you.

>>50719039
I would just suggest that 'NPC' merc units, IE the majority would be simply more conservative than PC units, and would often simply not be willing to risk the money you burn on rolling for a JS, even if an OOC observer who knows the odds knows they'd likely get one

>>50714946
Faith is just a belief that is in the absence of, does not require, or goes in the face of contradictory, proof.

I have faith that delicious bacon shall cleanse my body and save soul, but it is not my religion.

>>50719039
But then you have to pay to maintain a dropship, secure spare parts, fend off raiders, etc.

Instead of being a fag assblasted about players happening to get one, just treat it as an adventure hook.

>>50719551

My current merc unit expanded from a bit over a Lance back in 3030 to its current incarnation of two assault-heavy reinforced regiments of custom designs with full DS and JS support and billions of C-Bills banked if I want to expand.

I'm well aware of the system allows for.

It's just that the rules skew for GDL-type success rather than Wilson's Hussars-type hard scrabble units.

I get why they leaned in that direction because it's no fun to generate a unit then get irrevocably fucked straight off the bat but it does lead to a fluff v crunch clash. Especially since you get a massive feedback loop from having tech support or transport assets that snowballs into bullshit levels extremely fast.

I just wish that they'd toned certain things down, and I don't think the systems have been fully play-tested. Which is no surprise given FASA and especially CGL's stances on that.

>>50719666
The big issue is how transport costs go. Either you own a dropper and holla holla get dolla, or you don't and are irrevocably fucked forever.

>>50719666
>that snowballs into bullshit levels extremely fast.

Not him but only if you win all the time. My GM puts me in unfair situations on purpose just to see how I'll try to think my way out.

Like one contract I took was supposed to be a quick retrieval of a relic Wolverine with some advanced tech that the Humphreys found on a Capellan border planet. Maybe fight some light garrison forces, maybe. I show up and less than two days into the mission, a Warrior House shows up with the same mission. I succeeded but lost good machines since I was on the run the whole time against a far superior force. The pay didn't even make up a fraction of my losses.

Then in the current assignment that was supposed to be a fairly easy garrison gig out on a bumfuck independent Marik world, wound up having several major attacks because a Star League cache was discovered there bringing in the vultures. I drove them off and did pretty well in salvage. But because the capital and the militia got pretty tore up, an internal faction that was always giving me problems since the day I showed up finally got control of the planetary government. They decided to attack me under the pretense that I breached my contract, categorized me as a pirate and called in a detachment of Free Worlds Gaurds to crush me through some kind of backdoor deal I haven't unearthed yet.

So I lost my base, most of my supplies and a quarter of my machines in a fighting withdrawal, and had to go into hiding on the far end of the continent with the old government in exile.

The goal right now is basically a guerilla campaign to keep the Guards scattered, rallying rebel support, raiding supplies and sneaking someone into the HPG station to get the real story out.

>>50719876
>or you don't and are irrevocably fucked forever
Not really. Costs for transport are not terrible as long as you budget for it. The cost to rent a collar for a jump is just a little more than a single ton of LRM ammo. Plus, that's only if you have to pay for your own transport. Lots of contracts provide transport.

>>50720011
>Costs for transport are not terrible as long as you budget for it
Hard to budget for the fact that it's easy for them to cost more than the entire fucking contract pays, especially when you consider how outreach is actually fucking horribly located for the vast majority of contracts

>The cost to rent a collar for a jump is just a little more than a single ton of LRM ammo
They actually doubled that for no reason in campaign ops, recently

>>50720065
You don't go to Outreach. You just go the closest hiring hall. Even every provincial capital offers jobs. Anything past a few jumps and it's not worth it unless you plan to move the unit operations long term, have transport covered, or have your own ship. You're not supposed to go galavanting across the whole sphere normally as a merc.

Each jump is one to two weeks anyway so long hauls eat up a lot of time which is terrible for business.

>>50720119

>You just go the closest hiring hall.

Which is physically on Galatea or Outreach depending on the era. And in the novels mercs usually go back there between contracts to rest, refit, and look for their next job.

Granted this is incredibly dumb in action and I headcanon it into units having offices on Outreach or Galatea and transmitting them to the unit's base via HPG, but you can still wind up in situations where you are on, say, Robinson and your next contract is at the JF/LA border which is over six months away and you have to pay for not just transport costs but everyone's salary that whole time.

If you can get something within a few jumps then great but that's not always possible.

>>50720119
>You don't go to Outreach. You just go the closest hiring hall
That would make sense, but the lore really doesn't go that way
Which is kinda the crux of this problem anyways, that what mercs do in the fluff simply isn't feasible under the rules unless you own your own transport
>You're not supposed to go galavanting across the whole sphere normally as a merc.
You kinda are, because the simple fact is that the places where the work is are a long fucking way from where the hiring is done.

>>50720185
Those are the mercs out of options and looking for their next break or the very wealthy ones training or kicking around. Even in your example, Robinson is the capital of the Draconis March. If you can't find a Feddie contract to go snakehunting there, you aren't any kind of merc.

Somebody coming off a Robinson gig would realistically either be moving toward the Drac border, or the core worlds for some Chaos March action or to the Periphery for some pirate hunting.

MSRBC does have offices on most major planets and Comstar to an even greater extent before them because it was every HPG.

Yeah, the JF/LA border should be outside the purvue of the average merc in the Draconis march.

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Not really pertinent to the current discussion, but which version of this 'Mech would /btg/ prefer? I was fiddling with the idea of a Light 'Mech with an ERPPC/LB 5-X combo, and it evolved into this. I am a bit torn between these versions. I feel like the 6/9/6 version is better overall, but thought I might ask. I was also considering one that drops a ton of LB ammo and some armor to get the ERPPC back, at 5/8/5.

>>50720308
6/9/6, for sure. Gotta go fast with that XL and ammo bomb.

>>50720249

>Those are the mercs out of options and looking for their next break or the very wealthy ones training or kicking around.

No, in the lore it's everyone at all levels, from wealthy large units like the 51st DPJ to smaller less solvent ones like the Black Thorns or Wilson's Hussars. It's just that it really doesn't make sense to do that when playing a campaign due to transport costs and still needing to pay everyone's salaries.

>If you can't find a Feddie contract to go snakehunting there, you aren't any kind of merc.

Or because the RNG/GM hasn't spit up anything locally for you to do. At which point your options are to sit around and hope that changes in the next cycle or take what's on offer and try not to go into too much debt getting to your next station.

It certainly makes more sense if mercs get offered jobs nearby since they can establish a rep in the area and it helps with their operating costs but the fluff for most units and in the novels typifies the Merc experience as taking one job on one side of the Sphere and then humping your shit back to Outreach before taking your next job on the other side of the Sphere.

>>50720308

Speed is probably going to be more valuable than armour given how light the machine is and the use of an XL.

I would also suggest using paired standard PPCs. There's enough mass to go 6/9/6 with two of them (or later, 4 L-PPCs) with 5.5 tons of armour. With LPPCs you can go to 6.5 tons of armour and a DHS, or Stealth armour and an ECM Suite if you really want to be a dick.

>>50720331
Wilson's Hussars actually typify what I'm talking about. Read their original entry in the Mercenaries Handbook. They have their own dropships so transport isn't as bad, but they literally go running around through the periphery looking for work. They don't scurry back to Outreach after every job.

The Merc halls are the big offices, but they are by no means the only place to get a job.

>>50720308
Neither really. It doesn't do very much damage for 15 tons of guns.

>>50720318
I had this thought.

>>50720365
Well, pairing PPCs defeats the purpose of the machine, which is to be a flexible, ranged combatant. Now, I think it'd be a really good variant though, and quad LPPCs, well I don't need an excuse to strap those to anything; I love LPPCs. That's two votes for speed.

>>50720389
Can't please everybody. Thanks for the feedback though.

>>50720687
My point about the weight is it seems like a job for a trooper medium, rather than a light that you're looking to be flexible. It's got an XFE and ES, but packs all that tonnage into two weapons. Meanwhile, a speedy light with more speed and lighter lasers might be more effective at being flexible. My opinion of course.

>>50720771
>ranged
Well, this is kinda the crux, for me anyway. I don't picture this thing brawling, though a version that turns it into a mini Uziel 8S would be fine too. I had considered it as a 40/45t design, but I have a think for Light 'Mechs so I kinda forced it a bit, I guess. I wanted it to be a small, flighty sniper that can duck and weave and hit and run and not eat a ton of BV. I like the idea that it can hate on vees and VTOLs at range, which is where the flexibility comes in (or how I tried to convey it). As a light, stabby 'Mech, it falls flat. It's more of a direct fire support/vee/VTOL killer that is hard to lock down. Or, at least that was the aim. I also may or may not have a thing for the LB 5-X so that might have crept into it too. Also like giving the ER Large Laser some design time too, since it tends to be maligned compared to the ERPPC.

>>50720838
>I also may or may not have a thing for the LB 5-X so that might have crept into it too.
I'm a big LBX-10 guy, but the 5 is starting to grow on me, too. It's a nice way to get away from optimization and more into the realm of fluffly suboptimal stuff

>>50721583
The LB 10 and 5-X are both wonderful weapons, in my opinion. The 5 can be a bit hard to justify over an LRM5 in several situations when firepower is the main concern, but as an alternative light tank gun, or as something to use against vees/Aero assets, it's pretty good. The nice part about the cluster rounds is that they aren't useless against other targets like Flak, so you aren't "wasting" bins on overspecialization. The tradeoff is losing the other AC ammo types, but it really depends on what you want your design to do. I've got a custom JagerMech I like that uses both LB 5-X and LAC/5s so it can literally do anything regarding autocannon specialization/utility.

>>50721704
I kinda like the 5 on some heavies as a secondary utility weapon. Like, I have a marauder that I quite like that is basically a -3R+ with one, and it's quite nice for exploiting holes made by the PPCs and dealing with non-mech targets. But yeah, it really shouldn't be a primary weapon outside of specialist units and cheap tanks. I've also got this weird triple-5 Marauder which I kinda imagine as a competitor for whatever the hell market the Malice was designed for

>>50721704
Flak has errata so it hurts everything now, though it does it in 5 point clusters so the big ACs aren't hole punchers when using it.

>>50721865
I can see it doing work on a MAD. The mad scientist in me wants to make one with dual Blazers and an LB 5-X now.

And yeah, it's really THE best gun for cheap-ass small tanks, if not a LAC/5.

>>50721955
Oh, I had no idea. Huh. Well that's different. The cluster thing is kinda odd though. That sort of defies some logic though Battletech does a lot of that already. I guess it's to keep it from giving the LAC/5 access to the LB's cluster ammo, since that would kinda kill the whole reason for the LB 2 and 5.

>>50722037
>The mad scientist in me wants to make one with dual Blazers and an LB 5-X now.
I think you'd need an XL to do it, but it'd be a fun -M model

>>50722037
If anything it's probably so people won't just take flak all the time instead of standard ammo, since if they did full single hit damage there wouldn't be much reason not to.

But not being able to exceed most thresholds with 10s and 20s is an unfortunate loss. And is just another reason I think T-Bolt missiles need SAMs to fill that role.

>>50722070
You can do it with an SFE if you use Endo Steel. It'd have 16 DHS, 2x Blazer, 1 LB 5-X with 20 cluster shots, CASE, and 12.5 tons of armor. If you want 11.5, you can be heat neutral while walking and firing everything.

>>50720119
>>50720185
>You don't go to Outreach. You just go the closest hiring hall.

Or you don't go to Outreach/Galatea/whatever the big mercenary planet is in your time or a hiring hall at all, but have your own people permanently in place on Outreach/Galatea/etc. to handle the contracts. It's much, much cheaper to send details on contract wrangling through HPG than an entire unit. And once the boss (on deployment with his unit somewhere), the unit's negotiation team (on the merc planet) and the employer's reps (on the merc planet) are in agreement, the negotiators sign the contract and forward it to the unit.

In fact, I think even the second Black Thorns book did this, although it may have been sending Jeremiah fucking Rose's sister to Outreach to do contract-hunting since the entire outfit was on deployment at the time.

>>50722282
Always keep one scout at a hiring hall. Not only can they wrangle contracts, but you can also scoop up machines and freelancers down on their luck at bargain basement prices.

Way easier to ship a couple dudes half a dozen jumps than the whole unit. This goes double for personnel since passenger berths are so much cheaper than cargo tonnage or collar fees.

>>50722137
Good point. I forgot endo a lot because my thinking is always geared towards refits rather than factory products

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>>50722302
>Not only can they wrangle contracts

And intel. You don't want to end up like that one mission in MW2 Mercenaries, where your unit is hired for a sweet garrison contract and it turns out to be a trap.

Also, I looked up both D.R.T. and Double Blind since I thought there was a "remote" hiring there.

In D.R.T. it was indeed Jeremiah fucking Rose's sister who was packed off to Outreach to hunt for contracts. However, shipping one person is still cheaper than shipping the entire unit, and this was due to necessity, i.e. the Black Thorns were a Mickey Mouse unit during their first contract and could not leave any one their people back on Outreach. The contract was negotiated via HPG, signed by Rose's sister and the unit shipped directly from Borghese to DC space. Note that the Black Thorns were originally planning to come back to Outreach after their contract ran out, but even Jeremiah fucking Rose and her sister knew it was cheaper to ship directly to the new destination.

Also Hanse H. Davion, I can't bend my brain around this:

>"For the seven pilots currently on the roster," Priam continued, "you have an incredible twelve BattleMechs. The centerpiece of these are the four OmniMechs that the Black Thorns captured from the Jade Falcons. They are, I believe, a Masakari, two Mad Cats, and a Dasher.

A Warhawk and two Timber Wolves? For the fucking Black Thorns?

In Double Blind, Avanti's Angels shipped from one contract in the Chaos March (on Arboris) to another in the same region (on New Home) without passing Outreach, and they negotiated the MoC contract using their scout/second negotiator who had stayed on Outreach just for contract hunting. They got shipped out to the Periphery on a Canopian jumpship that was passing through New Home.

And I'm still butthurt the Chaos March didn't go on for longer. It was one of the funnest places and eras to play mercs in.

>>50722308
Nothing wrong with that. I just didn't think of it as a field refit, so opposite issue.

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Hey /btg/. I can't remember if I showed you these or not. I feel like introtech games are really painfully stale, and started churning these out to spice things up for the various demo games I might do in the future. If you've got any C&C for these cards, I'd be glad to hear it...

(1/4)

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>>50722604
I opted not to include
-Prototype TSM and Anti-TSM (Because they're going to be drawn at random, and while prototype TSM isn't so bad, it'd be cheap to not have Anti-TSM missiles, but anti TSM missiles are really limited in scope and include smoke rules that would bog things down all the more)
-Endo Steel P (Since I'm trying to make more of a hard-and-fast field refit feel, something that gives extra tonnage to play with would be too complex)

(2/4)

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>>50722632
As you can see, rather than having players have full customization freedom, I'm offering them the ability to nix certain things in favor of something else. The Ferro Fibrous card is more of a "Buyback the armor you scrapped" card.

I'm not sure how many of each card a player could take, but the general idea would be to have players randomly draw cards from the deck and apply them to their mechs. In some cases, they won't be able to use the cards because of incompatibility with their mech roster - call it a Quartermasters' snafu, or luck of the draw, or new toy syndrome... whatever...(3/4)

>>50722671
Lastly, I included a couple of cards here that normally would need other units to be in play, but instead treat them as one-time use cards. Also, I have cards specific to whether a player is in the role of the attacker or the defender. Since these will be used for scenario games rather than simply "my-dudes-vs-your dudes", there likely will be an attacker and defender.

Other cards I'm considering adding:
-Vehicle Support (Something cheap and light, like a Vedette or Striker)
-Spotter Plane (Card that spots any target until someone successfully shoots at it (haven't figured out a fair TN yet, probably assuming medium range and requiring an AC2 or AC5))
-Pit Trap (A hidden "building" that is a 2-level basement and CF of 5)
-Strafing run (Equivalent to two medium lasers, up to 5 hexes in a row. One-time use)
-Binary Laser Retrofit.

I was also thinking about having a second set of cards to represent "Star League Cache" resources, but they can only draw half as many cards as these ones. They would use proven tech rather than prototype.

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>>50722733
Typed too long. Forgot to choose the image
(4/4)

>>50722632
>Comverted
Well, found my first typo. I should zoom in while typing.

>>50722876
Were you educated by Capellans by any chance?

Just jokes friend, we know you weren't.

Otherwise you wouldn't be able to read.

>>50722517

>A Warhawk and two Timber Wolves? For the fucking Black Thorns?

Clan Invasion contracts, man. People bitch about

>muh fiat

a lot where the Thorns are concerned but their run is pretty representative of what a PC unit that has successes at that time would look like.

They also lose like a third of the unit on each contract, so it's not a string of bloodless wins either.

If you want to complain about units during the Clan Invasion getting an unreasonably wealth of gear I suggest venting your spleen on the Kell Hounds (Luthien salvage plus co-production with the Wolves-in-Exile), Northwind Highlanders (salvaging the better part of two full Clusters on one contract alone), or Blue Star Irregulars (salvaging a bunch of Clan 'Mechs and getting their own god damn Clan WarShip).

The Thorns are barely even a blip on the radar compared to other units, but they get page time in novels rather than SB descriptions of their cheese, or having Stackpole or Pardoe writing them.

>>50723214
>They also lose like a third of the unit on each contract, so it's not a string of bloodless wins either.

If they'd lost the whole unit, maybe they'd be slightly less mary sue. Maybe.

>>50723214
>Clan Invasion contracts, man

In 3056? When even MHB3055 stated that employers start with "you get no salvage rights to Clan stuff" at the beginning of the negotiations?

And it's not just the Warhawk, two Timbies and the Fire Moth (which I left out because that's actually reasonable salvage) - they actually claimed EVERYTHING the Green Birds left behind. They only managed to put together those four out of that mountain of salvage. Without any techs.

To put this in context: Camacho's Caballeros have precisely one Clan 'Mech - Col Camacho's Timber Wolf, which was given to him by the Dracs partly because his own ride was shot to pieces, partly because Camacho's daughter died fighting the Jags.

Avanti's Angels, who have fought the Clans (and fought hard) for years, only had Clantech weapons, not a single Omni or other 'Mech.

Meanwhile, the Black Thorns, on their first contract, somehow manage 100% salvage rights for Clan stuff, after getting involved in a dispute that involved them shooting up the planetary militia? Yeah, nope.

On top of this, Jeremiah Rose's two SL coolant suits and the custom laser pistol are just side mentions.

And I forgot that Rose not only had the two SL suits, he also had a Star League neurohelmet. Which he'd somehow managed to nick from C* after he ragequit the Com Guard. I guess the Comstar QM department isn't keen on checking that you return everything you had on ticket once you leave.

>>50723324
They got killed off during the Jihad due to writer oversight, so there's that...

>>50723386

>In 3056? When even MHB3055 stated that employers start with "you get no salvage rights to Clan stuff" at the beginning of the negotiations?

Borghese was desperate to get anyone they could and didn't have the desire or ability to take salvage any way. If the Thorns were negotiating with the FedCom for that contract then sure, but they weren't.

The "planetary militia" were actually more like robber barons and IIRC in league with the faction of the planetary parliament that wanted to hand the place over to the Falcons. Either way the winning side was pissed at them.

>>50723428

While this isn't an entirely unreasonable complaint it still pales in comparison to the Helm Core, revolutionary BA manufacturing, Clan-tech production facilities, and, again, Clan WarShips that other merc units got.

Rose having some kind of inheritance would have made more sense.

>>50719133
>re·li·gion
>rəˈlijən/
>noun
>a particular system of faith and worship
heh, ok kid

>>50719998
> it's a "/btg/ has a merc campaign in the League" episode

>>50723465
Re: the salvage, in that time period the FedCom would still be on that like hawks. I forgot the year, though: Main Event takes place in 3055, not 3056. And somehow they manage to maintain those four Omnis despite having no techs (the contract specified planetary repair facilities, but I hardly believe a backwater like Borghese would have stuff to manage Clan tech or techs to maintain it).

The planetary militia, incidentally, were not the all people of that pro-Clan faction. Even Rose mentions that the militia probably doesn't know what's up.

I think the point I'm trying to make is, no matter how bullshit fiat the Northwind Highlanders stuff, etc. is, having a brand-new understaffed unit (IIRC Main Event actually gave the Black Thorns a Dragoons rating, might have been C) score a 100% salvage deal and then run four Omnis still on their first contract is just as bullshit fiat. The fact that Jeremiah Rose tries to be the ultimate 90s "hard man" type who somehow manages to steal two SL suits and a neurohelmet from Comstar just makes it even more so.

>>50723577
Perhaps look up the definition of faith to see why one can have faith without religion.

>>50723459

Eh. I'm the guy who actually likes the Thorns and in all seriousness that doesn't bother me.

I mean, they were stationed on Galedon when the Curse broke free. Dying there in that, or when the planet was hit by the Ravens or nuked to kill the Curse makes a lot of sense, and while the Thorns did get two novels and an SP it's not like they were Gray Death Legion/NWH/ELH/Kell Hound-style movers and shakers who get shoehorned into every metaplot going regardless of how much (or little, mostly) sense it makes.

>>50723655

>Re: the salvage, in that time period the FedCom would still be on that like hawks.

Except that the FedCom has no say in it because they weren't part of the negotiation process. If anything they'd be grateful to the Thorns because they stopped a border world from being handed over to the Falcons.

>Main Event takes place in 3055, not 3056. And somehow they manage to maintain those four Omnis despite having no techs (the contract specified planetary repair facilities

The unit has some tinkerers. Which is actually very common in the fluff for mercs, to forestall that argument.

As for the salvage more generally, my impression was that Boghese was stalling to try and get FedCom protection and throwing around ridiculous terms just to get anyone to bite. They were as desperate for a merc unit as the Thorns were for a contract, and neither really expected anything to come from that clause.

And seriously, four Clan Omnis as salvage for a PC unit on their first hit-out isn't the obscenity you're proclaiming it to be either.

My first contract netted me, among other salvage, an Achilles and a Fortress, the latter of which I promptly sold for *four hundred million C-Bills.*

I learned that lesson early on. If you have salvage rights, go after the enemy's aero assets.

Salvaging 'Mechs and vees is a chump's game.

>>50723998
>while the Thorns did get two novels and an SP

I think it's bloody shameful that the Thorns got those whilst Avanti's Angels (like the Thorns a small merc unit that gets the shit kicked out of them, but with actually likeable people) got only one novel.

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>>50722137
I like this guy, but once again I like almost all the MAD (and Wolverine) variants

What about an LB5X variant of pic related?

>>50724213

Conversely, I found the Angels insufferable and the notion that their special unit citation would be recognised Sphere-wide ridiculous, to say nothing of the fiat powering Camacho's Cabelleros.

Opinions are like arseholes and all that.

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>>50724225
Just so happens that I'm the guy who made that... Here's the LB5-X version. While I was at it, I did the obligatory energy weapon and heat sink upgrades and slapped a fresh coat of ferro on it. I even got the torso gun to be a PPC this time!

>>50712645
Sorry for being indirect. I should've asked outright asked "So what's smoother about it?"

>>50724391
You are a good person

>>50724403

Not him, but I'm guessing that the Clans getting involved earlier and staying there rather than an 11th-hour save from the Ghost Bears out of nowhere helps a lot.

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>>50724225
>>50724391
Or, if you prefer ERMLs, there's this flavor.

>>50724225
>>50724391
>>50724448
The reason for two versions is a lack of sleep, mostly. I put together the first one as a 3050 upgrade, then 0.001 picoseconds after posting I went "Oh, derp, no LB5s in 3050!" Besides, the ERMLs work better from a heat efficiency perspective. You may notice they didn't get any upgrades that took them out of field refit territory.

>>50724557

There's also no ER MLs in 3050.

The FWL doesn't invent them until some time after 3055, but I don't recall the exact date off the top of my head.

>>50724607
Right, but they are around by the time the LB5 was being fielded. The first one had MPLs because I was going for the TRO 3050 "What medium lasers? They all go pulse now!" aesthetic.

>>50724669

Ah, OK.

>>50725497
There simply is not enough mech art that is chibi, cute, holiday focused or snow-related. The majority of the art I have seen centers around cute Mad Cat or Urbie pics.

>>50725497
That ASF reminds me of that plushie Marauder someone posted a few threads ago.

>>50726033

Know a girl on FB that does a bunch of chibi stuff. I can post if you guys want. I don't care much for chibi style, but it's OC.

>>50726082
For an old fart what does chibi mean?
And OC please do post.

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>>50726097
Chibi is like small, or the Japanese SD (Super Deformed) style. Think big head, kind of normal body. If you ever seen mini Gundams, or the show Samurai Pizza Cats you kind of have a good idea.
Kind of like this pic.

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>>50726097

Cartoon/anime style.

>>50724557
>>50724607
>>50724669
With regards to the tech upgrades and their re/discovery, I've always felt some seemed off. Maybe some folks will disagree, it's cool I don't mean it in a "it's shit" fashion.
But to me, stuff like the light gauss rifle would have fit the Dracs better, what with their familiarity with captured Clan gauss rifles and penchant for unique (some would say garbage or unwanted) variants and designs. Things like the ER Large Laser would, to me, make more sense coming from the FWL since LRM and Large Laser refits have been their thing for like a century at least. Just seems to me to be more the angle of tech development they'd take. But that comes from playing too many strategy games, perhaps. I feel the same way with things like C3, perhaps being more appropriately discovered by the FedCom as the logical conclusion to their RCT programs, or by the FWL as an attempt at a force multiplier while building their own combined arms legions and worrying about the FedCom RCTs pouring over the border.

Anyone else here feel the same about some techs?

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>>50726097
Another good pic.

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>>50726097

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>>50726097
One more just because I wanna.
Although I wonder if this Crusader variant (Armored Valkyrie) would torso bomb in chibi style as well. I need to know these things!

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>>50726097

Unfortunately, it looks like she had most of them on her tumblr, which appears to have been deleted.

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>>50726183
Hell, we also need more silly stuff in BT as well.

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>>50726212
Damn I thought I had a bigger version of that than just the thumb.

>>50726208
hahahah that's awesome. I'm so doing that this weekend.

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>>50726097
This too.

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Time for more homage mechs.
I like high heels.

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Is a Rifleman Arrov-IV refit even worth it?

>>50726917

Davy Crockett-IV says yes.

Also good for AA duty and that's the Rifleman's job.

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>>50726736
>Time for more homage mechs.

I think I've posted all of mine at one time or another, but this one I only posted once when there was a discussion about Metal Armor Dragonar.

>>50724380
The only really fiat type bit about the 'lleros is Cassie Suthorn. And she's a bit damaged goods (but maybe not as much as she probably out to be). Otherwise they're not exceptional for the most part, and many of them end up dying, including a lot of named and likeable characters.

>>50726955
Very nice. Even though the mechs on that show was weird, I had a good time watching it. I watched it with HK (Hong Kong) subs where they kept calling people "uncle" and had a few other silly affects that made the show more memorable to me.

Refresh my memory: are the power packs used by laser rifles and the like rechargeable or are they "single use and toss" style affairs? I've looked at most of my Mechwarrior stuff and I haven't spotted a reference.

>>50728363

According to TRO 3026 they're rechargeable. They have several types of chargers (kinetic, solar, fusion) listed in the TRO for that express purpose.

However, the few times laser infantry get detailed in the fluff, they're either using charge backpack units, or they drop their mags and either forget about or don't use a dump pouch.

So it's reasonable to go whichever direction with it will be more interesting for your players.

>>50728363
All of them are rechargable unless otherwise explicitly noted. There's a series of rechargers listed in MW3/ATOW and Lostech. They all have recharge rates that are dependent upon their types. HC ones charge slower than regular packs, but QC (quick charge) packs hold less charge. Clan packs have the best of both worlds.

>>50728443
>>50728430
Cheers. I wonder if I 2E ever mentioned rechargers, since I played that game for a long time and can't remember if it did.

And I completely forgot that TRO3026 had personal kit as well.

>>50728430
>>50728443
What's each faction's infantry equipment like? Primarily inner sphere. I know the Clans will have uber IIC best everything, even for cannon fodder.

>>50728692
FedSuns have some of the best, really beaten only out by ComStar/WoB. Followed by either the Lyrans or the Kuritans, then the FWL, followed by the Capellans. In ATOW there's listings of armor kits for each major nation. Of course that's assuming line troops, not specialists with special kits like the DEST's circle visors and sneak suits.

Surprisingly the Clans aren't the best, while they have an excellent infantry corps they focus on training over equipment.

FS has made some big updates lately with infantry weapons. But every House has some kind of signature weapon or specialist.

>>50726155
Star Colonel Edward Elric, is that you?

>>50728831
I figured Kuritans would be at the bottom.

>>50728915
There's a pretty wide gap in the armor ratings, most of the non FS, CS/WoB, and Clan armors are fairly even. Some provide better protection area, some provide slightly better protection values, but some of them are encumbering, so it's fairly subjective beyond the huge gulf that the first three establish.

>>50728831
One of the reasons that the FedCom kit is the best is the AToW/MW to tabletop conversion makes having underbarrel grenade launchers extremely important in determining the damage for infantry weapons (guess who has under barrels on their service rifle) and also only uses the torso armor for determining what the BT-scale armor damage divisor is (guess who uses strong torso armor but weak limb armor, which means they don't have to worry about armor being encumbering (which is -1 MP, making your normal rifle platoon now just as mobile as a heavy weapon platoon))

Considering infantry weapons, which nations are pretty much the all-AK47s, all-the-time factions? Is it the periphery and bandit types? Militias?

>>50729059
Periphery and bandit types.

Also keep in mind that most nations still use slug-throwers, as they're cheaper and easier to maintain than energy weapons. Clans and CS/WoB are notable exceptions to this.

>>50729059
That's... flexible. Take the TK assault rifle. In the early GDL novels, the infantry component Carlyle's Commandos (not a very big merc unit) used them, and they were described mostly like the H&K G11 rifle - really rapid cyclic rate bursts, high mag capacity, small HV calibre rounds. Then comes Lostech, where the TK is described as "inferior to standard assault rifles" and mostly makes me think of the G3.

However, most of the armies still have slug throwers as the general issue weapon since they're cheep and cheerful.

>>50728599
I believe the 2E Companion does.

>>50729162
I really have to bang my head against my desk: I went through the 2E main rule book, and the rechargers WERE there - just not in the weapons section, but in the "tech gear" bit with the repair kits and the like.

>>50729108
>>50729148
Thanks a bunch fellas.

>>50726155
Aff star colonel for you always aff

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Requesting opinions, would you ride this circa mid-3050s?

>>50730871
>no CASE

Nope

At least give it ferro to get CASE and a bit more armor.

>>50730871
no
nonononononono
needs more armor, it's the 3050s you can afford DHS

>>50730949
Yep, that's the bit I was worried about. The gunhammer was my idea for a run of the mill merc simply switching his shot-off PPC arm with one holding a LB-10X and calling it a success. CASE and FF would be ideal, but probably out of his reach.

>>50730871

It's a Warhammer. So yes.

>>50730949
>>50730959

Is there EVER an excuse for not driving max-armor Mechs with CASE'd ammo in all locations?

>>50731035
Hilarity?

>>50731035
G2g fast

>>50726161
>With regards to the tech upgrades and their re/discovery, I've always felt some seemed off.

Yeah, absolutely. Although I can't see a reason for the Dracs to get it the LRG; the FWL should have got it, as they did, due to their focus on range, or the Lyrans due to their Gauss expertise.

I've always felt that each faction should either have one field they are particularly good at, or they have one philosophy that motivates most of their advances.

So either you would say "The FWL is the best at missiles - they introduce MMLs, alternate ammo, ELRMs, produce clan LRMs natively in the 3140s, etc" or "The FWL likes range - they start off with ER lasers and LBX ACs, then move on to LGRs, ELRMs, ERPPCs, XPulse, HVACs, maybe even HGRs as an attempt to make a long-range AC20." These aren't hard rules; going with the first, the Dracs might still introduce MRMs, for example, or going with the latter you could get the FWL making VSPLs, which are better at short range but have a longer max range.

Right now there's a sort of mix of the two, and some factions are way more favored in terms of new tech at certain periods.

C3 is one of the biggest offenders - it REALLY should have gone to the FWL, IMO, due to their WoB connection, emphasis on team fighting, and need to hit accurately at range. I also would have accepted the FWL using c3i after the Jihad, but for some reason it's gone forever.

>>50731182
>The FWL is the best at missiles

Missiles and large lasers. I still think that the FWL should be really keen on advanced missile and LL tech - whether ERLL or LPL.

>C3 is one of the biggest offenders

And this is my other big pet peeve. The army with the focus on honourable one-on-one duels going practically overnight to teaming on enemies? I'm a long time Drac and Teddy K is A-OK but Teddy C3 is such as paradigm shift that it would fit the FWL (often vaunted) combined arms stuff much better.

>>50731035

No.

Which is why basically all actual canon mechs are irredeemable shit.

>>50731182
>using c3i after the Jihad, but for some reason it's gone forever.

Blame Cincy. They're probably at fault for just as much stupid shit about the franchise as CGL is. They knew the writers are a bunch of thin-skinned shitheels, and yet Cincy showed them up at Gencon anyway. Way to spoil everything for everyone else forever, fucksticks.

>>50731332
The Republic is using it based on the Comstar stuff they captured and the Blakist stuff they've decided to start manufacturing again.

You know, I've often wondered if there's some secret part of the Republic that's Blakist. Even their "Terra at war" flag is a broadsword hanging down like the old WoB symbol. All the old jokes about Stone being a Blakist plant might actually be true. Didn't he even kill David Lear when he woke up?

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Greetings grogs, am question:

Airbrushing for BT minis y/n? BT oldfag, minis newfag asking about preferences, advice, etc. Recently snagged a nice kit for next to nothing, looking for reasons to use it.

Can we also discuss how shitty current minis are and when/if we'll get sexy sculpts?

>>50731182
Oh the reason I'd see the Dracs getting it is because of their proximity to the Clans. I can more believably see Teddy C3 saying "See that Clan gauss rifle? Make one comparable in weight to it." Might be a YMMV thing but it simply clicks more to me.

>>50731593
>Even their "Terra at war" flag

Where can I find a pic of this?

Also I would love the RotS forever if it went full "Terran Hegemony" mode.

>>50731957
It was only described in Sword of Sedition IIRC

https://www.reddit.com/r/battletech/comments/5iivui/prototype_classic_locust_stolen_off_the_demo/

>>50731929
I can't see the Dracs going for a plinking weapon. HPPCs, sure; same damage, with downsides (heavier, fatter, worse ranges). But LGRs? No way.

>>50732188
wackrabbit is an idiot, it's probably just in his loot bag or something

>>50732188
>reddit
Not even once.

How often the Battletech miniatures get updated ? Do you still use the original ones or did they release anything new recently ?

>>50731593
>Didn't he even kill David Lear when he woke up?

David Lear was dead before he went to sleep, nigga. You're mixing up the entire fluff. Sometimes, after waking up, he thinks David is alive

>>50732218
I mean they were big on the Dragon so I see it. Makes more sense to me than the FWL ever did. Fluff-wise it adds up better too.

>>50732671
Shimmyseen minis SOON

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>>50732671
>>50732916
Other than the occasional rare update of single miniatures, they pretty much don't get updated ever. Crappy 20 years ago? Crappy today.

The "new classics" "shimmyseen" "newseen" release might be the only significant line update they've ever done. Can someone else confirm/deny that? (Assuming phoenix doesn't count, as those were forced).

>>50732999
A few years ago they did those resculpts to a chunk of the 3055 mechs and those that were popular designs with dull monopose figures.

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>>50732999
They get many resculpts, actually. It just happens they don't change much

>>50733072
This. Most of the 3025'ers including the unseen in just their unseen iterations including the battledroid days have at least 3 sculpts.

The 3050 Omnis all have 2+ sculpts.

And so on. But they can be pretty radically different.

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>>50726161
A lot of that tech stuff literally makes no sense.

Like the Lyrans discover the XL engine in 3035 and the Suns don't get access to it until 3048. Literally what the fuck.

Or the Cappies developing TSM in 3050 when the Suns had a head start on it.

>>50733183
The tech recovery retcons are all garbage. Best to just ignore them.

>>50733072
>Those front three Zeus's skinny legs
What at they, the 80 ton version of Carl Lewis?

>>50733318
That's the 5th edition box set plastic. All those suffered from various deformities from the moldmaking process.

>>50733253
The tech loss is even worse to begin with

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Thoughts on the some of the first wave of the Inner Sphere OmniMechs and how you'd fix them?

Chiefly concerned with the:
>Raptor
>Black Hawk-KU
>Sunder
>Avatar
>Firestarter
>Owens
>Blackjack
>Strider

I'm also interested in which configurations /btg/ thinks are best.

I have an upcoming match with a guy playing Clanners and I'll be using some of these.

>>50733685
Personally I'd take all the designs that arent too great and make 'em a bit less that way, but that's just me.

>>50733685

The base chassis for those are reasonably solid, the usual quibbles over fixed equipment (including CASE) or optimal unit tonnages aside.

The two biggest culprits for derp are the Owens for its fixed EW array when pod-mounting it would be much smarter and allow for far more flexibility, and both the Strider and Owens using SHS.

Some of the configurations need tweaking, especially the ones that mount standard A/Cs instead of ER PPCs, LB-X series, or GRs.

>>50733685
>I'm also interested in which configurations /btg/ thinks are best.

Usually the Bulldog ones where they slap in captured clan pods.

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>>50732999
Pretty much this.

Catalyst and Battletech are constantly putting out new minis. IWM has been really hit or miss compared to other minis companies, but for better or worse, we're stuck with them because FASA burned every bridge on the way out and sold their rights to everyone, making it a real pain in the ass for Catalyst/Wizkids to do much of anything. Overall though, the new stuff they put out is mostly good, but will be pretty much all for Dark Age.

The downside is that there's still a sizeable proportion, if not the lions share, that operate on the 3025-only mentality, which usually just means "I bought my books thirty years ago and I'll be damned if I'm going to pay money for things ever again". That means the lions' share of players still slogging around with miniatures from before 1995, and refusing to acknowledge anything from after the clan invasion - if even that far.

There are those of us who like keeping up with the newest materials, and those who won't pay money because it's not Fasa's Robotech simulator from 1987 anymore.

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>>50733072
Typically when another company resculpts something they invest the time/money to improve the design.
RP/IWM has a history of resculpts that don't do much but fudge around with proportions or pose.
Along those lines I don't find the majority of Battletech resculpted minis relevant.

For a new player that can clearly see most Battletech minis are shit, there's almost no hope for an improved line. Hence, Warhansa minis selling well.

>>50733685
Owens and Strider, as said by someone else, WHY SHS? WRRRYYYYY? Hair pulling time.

>>50733685
>Raptor - Lots of gun-tonnage for its' size. Surprisingly no variant with C3 means it doesn't see much use by me.
>Black Hawk KU - Easily one of the best already. Mostly made to be the IS answer to clantech, so the clan variants of the Nova that are kind of meh end up being equally meh on this.
>Sunder - Love the look, but the XL engine makes it really fragile, and high speed makes it very BV-costly.
>Avatar - XL engine, but the BV is generally really low. Maybe because of the XL, or because it looks like a threatening clan mech... it always manages to be the first mech people start shooting at.
>Firestarter. Hit and miss. The Prime is dead weight since flamers are dead weight and you never need that many, but the alt configs are often pretty nice to have. I stand by the OB, and I think it's the OC that is the omnimech version of the Vindicator...
>Owens: Not that fond of the original configs, and I would have imagined that they'd put DHS on something that was already expensive via omnitech but having a high speed omni with C3 and TAG is handy.
>Blackjack: Initially thought dual UAC5s would be garbage. Tried it. Kind of like it now. Also that knife-fighting loadout of quad MLs and quad MGs is pretty sweet. other configs frequently come in handy. I wish that there were configs other than the B with a C3 slave.
>Strider: The Commando to the Strider's Locust. The ugly little mech that could. Surprisingly durable due to CASE and SFE in a world of XLs. Would be pretty nice if it had DHS but muh drac tech. I frequently use the D-config with pulse lasers and C3. The later versions that use Streaks work better with the punitive SHS, and being jump capable makes the F config very nearly a good mech.

>>50734052
Self-correction: There is a D-config of the Raptor that has C3, but that really limits my options for one, Compared to the "Everything has C3" Owens... and it's no surprise why I didn't buy a raptor until much later in the game.

>>50734052
>Strider: The Commando to the Strider's Locust
Second self-correction: ...to the Owens' Locust

If not for all the edge and trollan gaems on the chans, an edit button would be welcomed.

>>50731734
>Airbrushing BT Minis.
>If you have an airbrush, why not?

>Sexy Sculpts
Buy the latest minis.
Updating the look of 3025 means the 3055s now look old. Updating the 3055s make the 3058s look old... Repeat ad nauseum, and do it without MWO whale monies, while dodging angry oldbeards whose blue-blistered minis no longer match with the lore.
See >>50733840

>>50731035
If it's a field refit and you're going by the RAW, you're not getting CASE. OTOH, max armor is a standard for any custom refit.

So on another topic, who's good for commission artwork? Considering getting a piece done.

>>50735367
Plog. He'll do TRO scale work for 30 or 40 dollars. Shimmy is too expensive.

>>50733840
Why is BattleTech almost unique in having so many players refuse to move on at all from things that happened 20-30 years ago?

>>50735487
How expensive is 'too expensive'? I know ShimmeringSword has done work for CGL, so they can pay quite a bit for work.

>>50734052
>Raptor
It's an omni, anon. Just put c3 on it.

>The Prime is dead weight since flamers are dead weight
You'll change your tune in the not-too-distant future, wink wink nudge nudge.

>>50735538
IIRC, the /btg/ro people said that the pieces he did for them were 60 dollars. And those are sketches.

>>50735487
>>50735538
Shimmy lowballs his CGL prices, iirc. He charges non-CGL people more. From what Muninn said in the IRC a while ago, shimmy charges 2 times what plog does for less complete work.

But hey, at least he's not White, who charges double what shimmy does or more.

>>50735492
ClickyTech. No other minis game has produced an offspring that nearly killed the main game.

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>>50735492
>Why is BattleTech almost unique in having so many players refuse to move on at all from things that happened 20-30 years ago?

I think because of what initially drew us into the game, and what keeps us there. There's something really nostalgic about the Unseen that were the genesis of the game in the 1980's, and how they are still a part of the game. There might be updated designs for them, but they were the primary attractor in my initial love for the game and what still keeps me coming back.

Also, because the companies that have made Battletech over the years have kept the rules very similar between them - it's nothing like the upheavals that Games Workshop fans have gone through over the years.

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>>50735367
>So on another topic, who's good for commission artwork? Considering getting a piece done.

Are you nuts? Who has time to draw any more?

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>>50735551
>It's an omni, anon. Just put c3 on it.
That's customization.
Campaign games, yes, sure, why not.
Pickup games, which are my bread and butter, nuh-uh.

>>50735492
Because Pathfinder/3.x just hasn't had enough time to cross that bridge yet.

>>50735487
>Plog
Now I want to know what he'd make the Unseen look like if allowed to re-design them for this new rollout.

>>50736186

Probably similar to Shimmy, except more blocky.

Which would work for a few things, like the Thunderbolt.

So in fiddling with the newest version of Against the Bot, I've found that my Atleast Itsnot containing save *is* compatible with it, and doesn't kill Java. So expect to see his kills break 1k.

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>>50733874
Mmm, dem mwomechs from slavlandia...

>>50737107
Clearly, what's needed is a novel-length battletech fanfiction entirely about the life and career of Atleast Itsnot and his mercenaries

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Okay I have three questions I want to split into two posts.
One, and this one might ruffle some feathers, but with the partial wing assemblies and improved JJs and such, is it possible to create a dedicated Airmech without the transformation abilities in the future? I know the speed might make it rage inducing, but it's been bothering me about the possibilities of this in the future. It'd be less expensive than a regular LAM and still have the capabilities of the Airmech.

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>>50738657
Two: with the advent of three-legged mechs as well as the standard four-legged mechs, will we ever be able to have six-legged mechs? Pic related. I really wanted a 55-ton six legged mech someday.

Three: - Is there a dedicated RPG-like weapon in battletech with a sufficient punch like a real Russian RPG? I know the shoulder mounted SRMs do some damage, but I'm talking like a 20 pound round. I'm thinking that's about the weight (approximately) of a regular SRM round when you divide 100 individual missiles into a metric ton, so is there a launcher that can fire a single reloadable SRM with the two-point damage spread?

>>50738677

Heavy SRM Infantry weapon.

>>50738657

>One, and this one might ruffle some feathers, but with the partial wing assemblies and improved JJs and such, is it possible to create a dedicated Airmech without the transformation abilities in the future?

Possible? Maybe. Game-breaking? Almost certainly. Something I never, ever want to see? Definitely.

>2 legs bad, 3 legs weird, 4 legs good, 6 legs better

The problem with adding legs is that it just gets stupid. Beyond that you would start having to allocate additional internal structure for the extra limbs and larger cockpits for the crew, quads don't have to pay extra because there's still four limbs but tripods do. A hexaped would have to pay at least a 20% premium on internal structure plus the twin cockpit. And you'd need to do another hit location chart for that shit.

>RPGs

20 lbs is less than 10 kgs. And there are infantry weapons like that, the heavy gyrojet weapons or heavy SRMs depending on the approximation you want to make.

>>50738657
Isn't much logical reason it couldn't be done, but it certainly won't happen.
>>50738677
Similarly, seems to be no reason six legged mechs couldn't be done, but I don;t see it happening. There just isn't any significant benefit I could see over quads, you'd get a little more space and armor potential, but you'd have more structure weight for those extra two limbs, and have to spend more tonnage on armor to protect them.

>I know the shoulder mounted SRMs do some damage, but I'm talking like a 20 pound round. I'm thinking that's about the weight (approximately) of a regular SRM round when you divide 100 individual missiles into a metric ton
As far as weight goes, that's already how it is. Standard missiles weight is the same per missile for infantry, mechs and BA, specifically 10kg for an SRM and 8.3 for an LRM.

I figure the inferior range of infantry models would be a matter of launchers not able to have as nice targeting systems due to size/weight issues, as to why the damage doesn't add up, that is because who fucking knows. Though a likely reason is crunch, and that the way infantry work there means a single weapon doesn't matter much, it's all about the massed power of the platoon.

>>50738657
>>50738677
>Partial-Air Mechs

In-universe possible? Totally. Rules possible? Over a lot of dead bodies.

>Hexapeds

The main question is what would they do tripods and quads don't?

I would love to see more exotic mech body-forms, like three or four arms, hexapeds, quad mechs with a torso and arms, arm-legs, and so forth.

>>50738805

>as to why the damage doesn't add up, that is because who fucking knows

Infantry construction rules came a long time after rules for infantry. And they had to be backwards compatible with existing infantry.

Not that it matters much if you want to break the system, like the Federated Bullshit platoon up-thread. Which itself isn't as bullshit as the rules truly allow for, but handily displays the god damn horror show they created with their asstarded infantry construction rules when that's like 60% optimised, tops.

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>>50738677
Have this instead, anon

>>50738726
>>50738729
>>50738805
>>50738870
>>50738967
First off, thanks so much guys.
Second, I see your points about the Airmech and the six-legged mech. It would be a chore to do record sheets for a six-legged one, no matter how much I would like it.
Third, the SRM, I guess the damage not adding up is just an unpleasant fact of a messed up system. I would have figured it would be easy to carry a 10kg (22 pounds I think) round and do 2 points of damage, but I guess we have what we have.
And that quad posted was really nice. Thanks.
Thanks a lot guys.

>>50739052
>It would be a chore to do record sheets for a six-legged one, no matter how much I would like it.
FWIW, IMO it's not a record sheet issue so much as a gameplay issue. After all, we now have quadvees...

>>50738932
>Infantry construction rules came a long time after rules for infantry. And they had to be backwards compatible with existing infantry.
Stock TW infantry platoons was made with the TM rules and aren't backwards compatible though, rifle platoons being the most notable since they became capable of throwing out twice the damage they used to be able to, whole laser platoons got similarly nerfed.

SRM platoons as it happen do perform similar to their BMR versions, but that doesn't strictly require weaker SRMs, their rifles could have been weaker and the SRMs stronger.

If anyone has the original 3050 record sheets handy, could that anon check what they listed as the MAD-5M's LB-10 ammo?

>>50734052
Just noticed while reading your post but does the Owens not have CASE? If so that surprises me equally with not having DHS.

>>50739544
Ammo (LB 10-X). None of the ammunition in that book was listed as slug or cluster, and newer books only note when the LB-X cannon ammunition is Cluster. It's up to you to declare at the start of the game anyway.

>>50739548
The original 3058 omnis were fluffed as the developers being unsure that they could pod mount CASE, so the designs that have CASE have it fixed. And since a bunch of them didn't have a real need to CASE the ammo, there was no point making it part of the chassis.

>>50739612
>None of the ammunition in that book was listed as slug or cluster

Yep, this was what I remembered. I think I've used the -5M only a few times with slugs, usually it's a ton of cluster.

>>50739644
It needs the cluster damage more than the slugs anyway, since it's got 2 LPLs for hole punching.

>>50739612
>The original 3058 omnis were fluffed as the developers being unsure that they could pod mount CASE

So why not attempt it and find out? :^)

>>50739668
Because (a) fuck you gaijin, this is a Drac operation and (b) they found out later they could, but figured pilots wouldn't complain about having CASE already.

>>50739648
Precisely this. I think all the time I've used the slugs was when there were no explosive hostiles and I thought it more important to chew through the armour and internals ASAP.

Also cheers for checking the RS. One of these days I'll reorganise my storage so I can get to my box of RPG stuff.

>>50739680
>(a)
I guess that stands
>(b)
I suppose. But it seems a waste of space to have them hard mounted.

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Finally getting back to business in TTS. I can now do the MWO mechs with proper materials. I was going to add 4 new camos, swamp, alpine, aquatic, and dazzle. Dazzle is the furthest right

>>50738967
Is this Matt's take on Ghost in the Shell's little tanks?

>>50739839
Reminds me more of the one from the 1st film. Especially the 'eyes'

Bump limit approaching
New thread
>>50739885

>>50734052
The Blackjack's fixed jumpjets are one of the few cases of hardmounted equipment on an omni that I think works. On a medium like that I think being able to jump around is always useful.

>>50738657
Due to space limitations you cant really fit partial wing and IJJs even with clan tech. There just simply is not enough space without being able to mount jets in the arms. Although there are WiGE protomechs