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LOL I remembered how Robotech cartoon envision the furure

 Bobby Hostile wrote:
The Age of Darkness (or whatever followed the Jihad) had mixed companies of Mechs and vehicles taking over planets. Of course that was after Devlin Stone somehow convinced entire Houses and various warring factions to simply quit fighting. Cause, you know.... after 300 years, isn't that enough?

Are you basing your comments on actual BattleTech background and novels, or just the mess that the 'ClickyTech' game tried to introduce?

 Bobby Hostile wrote:
Military concepts such as drones and cyberwarfare didn't exist when Btech was thought of.

And yet somehow Technical Readout 3026, published in 1987 three years after the game was introduced had the Hi-Scout Drone Carrier.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Yeah, and that's part of the charm.

It's the future as imagined by folks in the 80's.

Basically:

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Zeerust

 Bobby Hostile wrote:
TIMHO, Btech needs are complete reboot (as was stated above). Military concepts such as drones and cyberwarfare didn't exist when Btech was thought of.

Yeah, Battletech very much is "the future according to the 1980's".

When I was younger I always thought it would be interesting if the Shadowrun technology and timeline (but not the metahuman/magic aspects) were ported over to Battletech's history. It would allow for the historical technology levels to advance beyond 1984, at least.

One thing Catalyst is doing right in my opinion is pushing the different eras as gaming options. If you don't like the setting of the contemporary 3100's story line you can play in the past eras of either the Succession Wars, the Clan Wars, or Star League. While that has always been an option within Battletech, newer books and products are identified by the era they support allowing players to skip products that don't pertain to the era they play in.

I pretty much stick to the Succession Wars and Clan Wars stuff. Most of the newer story just doesn't interest me.

A reboot, though... I just don't see happening. I think it definitely needs to be done, and Battletech would be better off as a result, but I don't think the developers are willing to alienate the fan base.

I would love to see the game evolve into a true miniatures game and drop the "beer and pretzels" board game tag. While it is awesome that you can play the game with a 25 year-old rule book and some hex-shaped pieces of paper, but that low-level buy in doesn't really support the game all that much. And that is a major problem with the current fan base. So many see the game as a board game first, with miniatures and other accessories as expensive and optional buys. While I won't argue that Battletech can be the budget gamer's dream, I can't help but feel that mindset is keeping the game from expanding beyond its small player base.

And then there are the miniatures themselves, which as others have stated are dated and the immensely large catalog of figures make it nearly impossible for retailers to stock even half of the range.

The game needs help, but it looks like Catalyst is at least trying something, so I am willing to see where they take things.

Looking at the upcoming releases, it looks like they're going to be doing stuff based on different points in time.

There's a few mentions of Victor Davion as well as our favourite merc companies. None of this "Dark Age" guff, so it's smack in the middle of real Battletech.

 DarkTraveler777 wrote:
One thing Catalyst is doing right in my opinion is pushing the different eras as gaming options. If you don't like the setting of the contemporary 3100's story line you can play in the past eras of either the Succession Wars, the Clan Wars, or Star League. While that has always been an option within Battletech, newer books and products are identified by the era they support allowing players to skip products that don't pertain to the era they play in.

This is the thing I love about BTech. Don't like the Jihad, or the ClickTech era? Fine. It can be Operation Bird Dog/Bulldog for all eternity!

 Ghaz wrote:

 Chillreaper wrote:
I haven't played BT for years...

I will be buying these miniatures!

If they can sort out the scale issues, even better; the Project Phoenix ones were stupidly huge.

BattleTech is actually a board game and can be played without the minis. While having the mechs in scale with each other would be nice, its not really necessary and I'm not sure how feasible it would be with the mechs ranging anywhere from 20 to 100 tons.

That might have hold water up until Alpha Strike, which is most certainly not a board game and uses the same minis.

And is the game the company is currently pushing.

 Albertorius wrote:

 Ghaz wrote:

 Chillreaper wrote:
I haven't played BT for years...

I will be buying these miniatures!

If they can sort out the scale issues, even better; the Project Phoenix ones were stupidly huge.

BattleTech is actually a board game and can be played without the minis. While having the mechs in scale with each other would be nice, its not really necessary and I'm not sure how feasible it would be with the mechs ranging anywhere from 20 to 100 tons.

That might have hold water up until Alpha Strike, which is most certainly not a board game and uses the same minis.

And is the game the company is currently pushing.

Hence why I only mentioned BattleTech and not Alpha Strike or A Time of War.

 Ghaz wrote:
Hence why I only mentioned BattleTech and not Alpha Strike or A Time of War.

Problem is, other than the ones from the starter, all the minis Catalyst is producing are for Alpha Strike (right to having card stats for them in the box), and these redesigns are tied directly to the new Alpha Strike starter.

But yes, you're absolutely right in that Btech doesn't have a problem with wonky scales. I myself am using RRT marauders, so... ^_^

 megatrons2nd wrote:

 Vulcan wrote:
The problem with Stackpole and BT is that he really doesn't understand the game... or if he does, he ignores it and writes cool stuff that can't happen in the game.

Although the worst offender for it will forever be the 'I Am Jade Falcon' maneuver, where a washed-up solhama warrior without even a bloodname to her credit manages to take out one of the greatest Mechwarriors ever to pilot a 'mech, in the clans OR the Inner Sphere.

But you can do that attack......if you are playing with advanced rules.


And so can the worst taking out the best, luck does play a role in the game. How often do you see a Savannah Master drop a Timber Wolf on the first turn of the game? I did it, of all the dumb luck, floating crit for first hit, center torso location and boxcars for the crit roll. Gyro and 2 engine hits later the big boy is down, the pilot KO'd do to a failed Dashboard check, and the Savannah Master ran from his buddies for all he was worth.

I have one about a SRM platoon bagging a pristine Atlas after a crit on the ammo storage on the 1st turn
I prefered Charrette over Stackpole. Stackpole liked balck and white characters too much for my taste, much like in his SW stories.

M.

Alpha Strike starter? Where?

 Graphite wrote:
Alpha Strike starter? Where?

All over here:

http://bg.battletech.com/forums/general-discussion/drop-pod-sequence-initiatedthree-two-one!-%28the-announcements-finally%29/msg1100925/#msg1100925

Apparently tentatively confirmed Clan Binary vs. IS Company.

 megatrons2nd wrote:

 Vulcan wrote:
The problem with Stackpole and BT is that he really doesn't understand the game... or if he does, he ignores it and writes cool stuff that can't happen in the game.

Although the worst offender for it will forever be the 'I Am Jade Falcon' maneuver, where a washed-up solhama warrior without even a bloodname to her credit manages to take out one of the greatest Mechwarriors ever to pilot a 'mech, in the clans OR the Inner Sphere.

But you can do that attack......if you are playing with advanced rules.

Those rules were written AFTER 'I Am Jade Falcon' was published, largely BECAUSE it happened in the book.

For the "IAJF" maneuver to work, Death From Above should also do IAJF damage - hey, you're JUMPING onto the enemy mech; you should do jump jet damage ON TOP OF 'charge' damage, yes?

But you don't.

And so can the worst taking out the best, luck does play a role in the game. How often do you see a Savannah Master drop a Timber Wolf on the first turn of the game? I did it, of all the dumb luck, floating crit for first hit, center torso location and boxcars for the crit roll. Gyro and 2 engine hits later the big boy is down, the pilot KO'd do to a failed Dashboard check, and the Savannah Master ran from his buddies for all he was worth.

I'll go you one better. First shot of the game was an LRM-5 on a Warhammer. ONE LRM hit, CT crit, MG ammo.... the ammo explosion that left a pair of smoking 'boots' where the undamaged mech had been standing. This was back in the BattleDROIDS era, by the by.

Yes, luck has always played a role in wargaming... but then, luck has also always played a role in actual warfare.

Sure, but I wanted to fight actual wars I'd go over the street to the recruiting office. I want to play games, which are the diametric opposite of war.

Nomeny wrote:
Sure, but I wanted to fight actual wars I'd go over the street to the recruiting office. I want to play games, which are the diametric opposite of war.

Well, luck is a big part of basically each and every other miniature wargame in existence not named chess or go, after all...

Actually, luck is a factor in Chess if you consider it in terms of mathematical game theory.

Nomeny wrote:
Actually, luck is a factor in Chess if you consider it in terms of mathematical game theory.

If you say so I'll believe you. More to the point, then.

Hi

Any realese date for the new models?Any idea if the will use metal or platic.?

I love the battletech universe , but the uglys , very 80' desing, mech models maked me to stay away.

saluti

Darth Visari wrote:
Hi

Any realese date for the new models?Any idea if the will use metal or platic.?

I love the battletech universe , but the uglys , very 80' desing, mech models maked me to stay away.

saluti

Nothing conclusive so far, I'm afraid.

They will release 22 re-reseens and apparently many/most of them will be included in the IS company coming with the Alpha Strike starter. That would indicate plastics, but...

Are we talking prepainted figures or will we be building and painting them ourselves? I'm game for either but I'd prefer unpainted (or better yet, coloured plastic that still allows for applied paint like the halo fleet game) but I could live with prepainted figures

Neither Catalyst or Iron Wind Metals does prepainted models.

 Ghaz wrote:
Neither Catalyst or Iron Wind Metals does prepainted models.

Excellent news, thanks

What scale is Alpha Strike? 'Cause if it's the smaller minis that Iron Wind made I'm not interested.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
What scale is Alpha Strike? 'Cause if it's the smaller minis that Iron Wind made I'm not interested.

From the Alpha Strike rules:

Alpha Strike uses standard BattleTech miniatures to represent units. The BattleTech Introductory Box Set comes with a set of plastic miniatures and Iron Wind Metals sells BattleTech metal miniatures in both sets and individual packs. Each unit employed in an Alpha Strike army is represented by its own miniature.

Master prototypes.

Those small minis were fore Battleforce. They are actually really nicely done.

Alpha Strike is a 'Child' of Battleforce, using some of the same mechanics but changing the focus from a strategic game to tactical.
Alpha Strike and 'regular' BattleTech (Total Warfare)use the same minis. Yes GCL is pushing Alpha Strike, but Total Warfare isn't going anywhere. Indeed, all units have to be created using Total Warfare rules before be converted to Alpha Strike.

There has been no official decision on the unseen lams. The 'Mk 1s" still exist and can be usable.

And CGL eventually gave in and put the LAM rules into Total Warfare for the last Jihad books.


And yes, Battleforce, that was it. Thank you for reminding me.

 Ghaz wrote:




Master prototypes.

That looks quite nice, all told

Hmm, I hope they'll be able to clean up the model correctly...

 Ghaz wrote:

Spoiler:

Master prototypes.

Yep, I like it.