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 Vulcan wrote:
If you think BattleTech is bad, try Star Fleet Battles sometime. It's the poster-child for overly complex rules.

But it can be fun, to someone who doesn't mind crunchy rules.

I like crunchy complex rules... but not like that... not like that.....

 Vulcan wrote:
If you think BattleTech is bad, try Star Fleet Battles sometime. It's the poster-child for overly complex rules.

Star Fleet Battles, aka Recreational Bookkeeping...

I played a guy on a megamek (computer BT) campaign server years ago that knew zero about the BT background. He was a maths geek and loved the game as some kind of fun probability puzzle. He could play really well.

BT isn't a random event (luck) game once you understand the basic maths and the 2D6 Bell curve. Good maths nearly always wins.

It comes nearly automatically once it clicks. I'm not a hex counter by any means - I make "pew pew" sounds when I roll to hit my pulse lasers. So knowing the core mechanics of the game really doesn't suck out enjoyment - only improves it. I played for a while thinking "why am I so unlucky". Then I realised luck plays near zero part of BT just basic maths and I improved exponentially and my engagement with the game did as well.

Once you 'get' the maths you can then learn about tactics. Then the game starts getting really deep and interesting.

There is a certain amount of luck in Battletech. After all, the first turn through-armor critical taking out an engine or gyro or cockpit is a thing.

But yes, once you understand the probabilities and the math involved your game will improve significantly.

 Vulcan wrote:
There is a certain amount of luck in Battletech. After all, the first turn through-armor critical taking out an engine or gyro or cockpit is a thing.

But yes, once you understand the probabilities and the math involved your game will improve significantly.

I agree there can be low probability rolls that can swing things a bit. But they are major outliers that effect very few games. They just stick out in the mind.

I always thought of BT like poker. Luck is there but skill will nearly always shine through. I find it an immensely deep game. There is always more to learn - new tactics, new force builds, new twists to your movement or fire orders, learning about randomness (and avoiding it). A good opponent will also throw massive curveballs into the way you look at the game.

And the fun thing is once you get the basic mechanics there are a million ways to tactically play the game. The even funner thing is most of these tactics and play styles will work if used correctly. There are no 'auto win' builds, tactics, factions in BT. That makes for a very interesting game.

I agree there can be low probability rolls that can swing things a bit. But they are major outliers that effect very few games. They just stick out in the mind.

You should never play with our group. we have one guy that tends to hit the majority of his shots in the same general locations but can almost never confirm crit rolls. another guy who constantly kills his pilots(and anybody near him) through falls and ammo explosions. and people like myself that routinely head cap or confirm a half dozen or more through armor crits every single game. i have been playing since 1987 and very actively playing for the past 20 years or so.

The crit system is one of the reasons i never care about BV, battle tech games are incredibly swingy. i focus more on era and faction correct units, weapons and formations.

niall78 wrote:
And the fun thing is once you get the basic mechanics there are a million ways to tactically play the game. The even funner thing is most of these tactics and play styles will work if used correctly. There are no 'auto win' builds, tactics, factions in BT. That makes for a very interesting game.

There are a couple people at our FLGS which can somehow manage to consistently roll -1 the To-Hit number. It doesn't matter if it is a low number or high, it's almost always -1 the To-Hit number.

Then when we they DO hit, it's always on a location that is covered with Armor.

Then add in I have a tendency to roll 2s with PSRs (even when I have 2 Piloting), and Luck can affect a lot of things.

I strayed away from my Clan instincts and played pirates last night... I think I'm addicted to speed. Specifically - fast jump jets.

I was playing a pirate force trying to prey on isolated FedSun cities, assuming that with the Civil War in full swing the armed forces would be distracted. Well, turns out, a lance (+1 extra) of Islamabad Periphery March Militia were in the area and able to respond...

5k BV

2 Brigand 1s
1 Brigand X2
1 Hunchback 4G (the commander. thought the AC20 was intimidating enough)
3 Wasp 1As
1 Stinger 3G

vs
(don't remember any specific variants)
Marauder (enemy commander)
Panther
Wolfhound
Jenner
Valkyrie

Mission objectives:
Complete both:
1) Destroy 75% of the enemy forces
2) Destroy the enemy commander's mech.

Started off strong by having one of the Wasps skid on pavement, right off the map (RIP) and pushing the Stinger into a building... but the rest of the force advanced through the city using buildings as cover.

The FedSuns forces were uh, clearly not used to city fighting, as early on their Marauder slipped on pavement and crashed prone, and their Panther tried to jump on top of a 5 story building and fell down through to the basement.

Using my forces jumpjets and the buildings I was able to surround his mechs, trap them, and pick them apart with SO MANY tiny ineffective weapons.

This is also where I learned that Wolfhounds are uh, apparently very good at destroying lights. Because I sent the Stinger and a Wasp to take it down and the Wasp was annihilated as soon as it got into range. Needless to say, the Stinger decided to join his buddies in the main fight (this was on the outskirts of the city, most of the rest of the forces met in the center).

It was a game long game of cat and mouse with the Marauder, because I knew if I let it draw a bead on any of my 25ish ton mechs they'd be mission-killed pretty much instantly. I was lucky enough with initiative rolls that I usually had the last moves and could respond to his movements. 6MP Jump Jets are a dream on a heavy urban map, omg.

The game ended when my Hunchback finally showed itself to the Marauder. Assuming we'd blast each other to bits but I'd put enough damage for the rest of the swarm to finally take the monster down, he rolled bad LB-X clusters and spread his huge amount of damage over too many surfaces of the Hunchback, and the AC-20 knocked the Marauder over and did the final damage to the CT's inner structure.

At the end of the game, I had captured his Jenner pilot, and the Wolfhound and Valkyrie withdrew.

I had 2 Wasps, all 3 Brigands, and the Hunchback left. And now all I want to do is spam jump jets all day and use crappy light mechs to chip down monsters.

Fast light spam can work in heavily built up terrain, but not so well on open ground.

 Vulcan wrote:
Fast light spam can work in heavily built up terrain, but not so well on open ground.

Yea, I figured. I've been thinking "if there was just woods and plains between us, I would've been toast from turn 1". None of my mechs were fast enough to cross open ground in 1 go. It was purely the jump jets making navigating city streets a breeze. Still wildly fun, though. Going to need to find a way to uh, set up more city games...

Don't underestimate Woods. They are the most common form of cover a Light can seek to have. And if you can get in to Heavy Woods with a high TMM... *muah* that's the chef's kiss.

And yeah, Wolfhounds were designed to counter the Panther and Jenner, the most common Mechs of the Draconis Combine. But they can't Jump, so if you can get THEM to Skid...

 Rihgu wrote:

 Vulcan wrote:
Fast light spam can work in heavily built up terrain, but not so well on open ground.

Yea, I figured. I've been thinking "if there was just woods and plains between us, I would've been toast from turn 1". None of my mechs were fast enough to cross open ground in 1 go. It was purely the jump jets making navigating city streets a breeze. Still wildly fun, though. Going to need to find a way to uh, set up more city games...

It's worth remembering stuff like Phoenix Hawk, Exterminator, Griffin, Shadow Hawk, Wolverine, Grasshopper, and Victor all have similar city maneuverability... and way better armor and firepower.

So one of the guys wants to make a dedicated house lance for each faction so he was trying out a Kurita C3 lance so i put my 10th Lyran guards up against them.



Force allocation-
My opponent.
.cyclops (master)
.katana
.grand dragon
.spider.


My force-
.Cerberus
.gunslinger
.tempest
.talon.

It was a good fight with my gunslinger being knocked out by pilot shock, by the end it was a damaged katana and mauled spider facing a talon and the Cerberus. both hardly damaged, so the Kurita force withdrew.







The second game was introducing a new player to 3d terrain rules.
His force-
.warhammer
.thunderbolt
.wolverine
.phoenix hawk

My force-
.bushwhacker
.night sky
.RAC typhoon
.AC20 typhoon.

It turned into a very tough fight with only the RAC typhoon surviving to the end and withdrawing in defeat.








Now something completely different-

Refreshing ourselves with Aero Tech II-

Had a clan force
.Mckenna
.liberator
.conqueror
.York



the other side-
.Mjolnir
.feng huag
.avalon
.tatsumaki



The game started strong for house Steiner, scoring multiple hits to the clan liberator's bridge. but even so the clanners got their revenge with the liberator hitting most of its return fire the next turn even with the big +4 penalty

The york and tatsumaki were the first ships to go down followed by the Feng and conqueror.

With a crippled liberator and facing an untouched Avalon backing up a very capable Mjolnir, the clan Mckenna decided to fight again another day

One bad thing about woods....you can set them on fire to deny a tactical advantage...for both sides..

 Jihadin wrote:
One bad thing about woods....you can set them on fire to deny a tactical advantage...for both sides..

Only if Fire rules are in force. Otherwise, all you're doing is just clearing the Woods.

Set up a little desert outpost table.

the table-





My first game was an inner sphere battle with my 10th lyran guards doing some "heavy scouting"

My force-
.fafnir
.atlas S2
.viking 2
.battle master 4S

My opponent was running-
.atlas
.nightstar
.flashman
.thunderbolt.

Since it was a desert setting this lance aside from the battlemaster was very heat neutral and packed loads of gauss.heavy gauss.

after legging the flashman and pilot killing his commander in the night star through crits. he surrendered.





The next game was a raid mission and since both of use favor hells horse. i decided to break out my blood spirits units we both ran novas with a support star of toads.

My side-
.blood asp
.blood kite
.crimson langur
.stalking spider
.blood drinkers protomechs.


His side
.timber wolf
.gargoyle
.mad dog
.summoner
.epona/enyo

Since we were using full rules his units ignored 1 point of my movement mod. and my unit got its faction all elite pilots with strict zellbrigan. as well as a bonus to initiative based on how many turns in a row i win (which i never did )

our two commanders dueled an entire one turn with me hitting with a single LRM 15 from my blood kite scoring a through armor crit that game him 2 engine crits and forced him to withdraw. my commander then had to sit around the entire game as no other mechs were available to engage. since i was fighting HH we were in a bit of a pickle as he considered his tankers deserving of Zell and my side did not. so we both chose not to risk breaching it because alpha galaxy is strict honor and the spirits are even more strict.

his mad dog took an ammo crit that forced him to withdraw from engine damage. and as i had bulked up my battle armor on the objective he decided to call the game as it was going on 1 am.

CatalystGameLab wrote:
We have been hard at work updating our community guidelines. These guidelines will be in effect across all platforms that are operated by CGL.

We will have more information for the community in the coming weeks.

Has there been an inciting incident to trigger the need for this statement, or is it just something that's been coming for some time?

Maybe something from Topps, or someone in HR throwing a fit about something or other.

Sounds like a "CYA" incident happened and they're trying to get ahead of it

I find points 2, and 3 reasonable. Nothing out of the ordinary for a corp to want for their corporate media.

Point 1 is problematic due to point 4. A reasonable person would think that being an donkey-cave is not the right thing to do, alas we have many unreasonable persons after all. Even more, the mods can be just as unreasonable as the regular forum members, and the way I read point 4 is "If we feel like banning you, we will, and you can go take a walk" thus I'm pretty sure that when insult X is hurled to person A mods will be fast as an upgraded Locust to the ban, but when it's insult Y against person B they won't lift a finger. Arbitrariness will be the name of the game.

Point 5 puts in place an appeal system, but my experience with appeals to the same organ that banned you almot never work if only due to the natural inclination to defend your own side.

In short, I see stormy weather ahead for the company, but honestly the only thing I want from Catalyst right now is that they keep producing miniatures. I stopped consuming fiction long ago.

M.

Edit: One of the Btech Discords I'm member of mentioned that there were mass bans in X, formerly known as Twitter, suggested by the reddit gang. Cannot say if it's true as I don't use X.

There's still ongoing 'fallout' over Blaine Lee Pardoe in some corners of social media.

Point 3 is causing some concern, with some people thinking a crackdown on 3D printing is coming.

Well something is going on, as there are a couple of people posting things like

“I would like to cancel my pledge, recent actions by your company are disturbing and I do not feel your values are compatible with mine.”

On the Kickstarter comments section. Seems like that particular statement is not likely to end in refund.

The funny thing about the 3D printing is that most of it currently either created locally or are reconstructions of Mechwarrior units, which CGL does not have IP access to.

 Flinty wrote:
Well something is going on, as there are a couple of people posting things like

“I would like to cancel my pledge, recent actions by your company are disturbing and I do not feel your values are compatible with mine.”

On the Kickstarter comments section. Seems like that particular statement is not likely to end in refund.

At this point of time it might be difficult to cancel the KS. Hell, I don't even know if KS allows for a refund in their terms of service. But if the kerfuffle continues long enough it might chill down the next KS, and I'm not sure if Catalyst is at the stage of being to operate without a KS every couple of years, or if, like Reaper, their business depends of a big influx of money every X months while regular sales just keep the lights on.

M.

In general KS offers no refunds themselves, that's on individual creators to uphold. In general its hard because much of the money is often spent on development (which is the intent of a KS) so there isn't some golden pot of cash.


Many firms will offer refunds because its good customer support and community relations and all, but I don't believe they are required. Part of the risk with backing a KS is the potential for your money to be lost.



Sometimes you can get a chargeback through your bank (esp if you used a credit card).

@Charistoph


The only 3d printed mechs i have are for ones that were never created or no longer exist, like the doom courser, or original stompy grand crusader etc... otherwise i get them from ironwind or catalyst. the vast majority of my collection is ironwind, but then i have been collecting them for something like 30 years.

 Flinty wrote:
Well something is going on, as there are a couple of people posting things like

“I would like to cancel my pledge, recent actions by your company are disturbing and I do not feel your values are compatible with mine.”

On the Kickstarter comments section. Seems like that particular statement is not likely to end in refund.

Are there many comments from people asking what actions they're referring to?

 Miguelsan wrote:

M.

Edit: One of the Btech Discords I'm member of mentioned that there were mass bans in X, formerly known as Twitter, suggested by the reddit gang. Cannot say if it's true as I don't use X.

If there were, it's because those people broke the rules of Twitter? It isn't like CGL can ban people from there. They're blocking some of the usual concern-trollers that seem to have cropped up since BLP did not have their contract renewed.


There's currently a pants-on-head daft campaign of accounts saying things similar to what Flinty observed, mostly from relatively new Twitter accounts that have bought blue-ticks to get their commentary boosted.

Then probably I misunderstood block for ban. As I said I don't use Twitter, nor have an account, so I thought that like in FB the owner of the account can delete delete messages posted on their timeline or block somebody for posting anymore.

M.