Prometheum5 wrote:
Have we seen CGL Ostwar art yet?

 cole1114 wrote:
I've loved all the rule changes, curious which ones you think are so bad they kill any enthusiasm to play?

Itxi wrote:

 cole1114 wrote:
I've loved all the rule changes, curious which ones you think are so bad they kill any enthusiasm to play?

Bear in mind that I'm a rep and have received advanced notice of some of the changes which I am not allowed to talk about. What I will say is that there is a change in direction; it is being seen as a game first and foremost and less as a simulation, so things will be a bit more abstract and possibly more streamlined, but imo less immersive and challenging from a strategic pov. Most changes seem to be in direct response to feedback from people new to the game (namely from reps running new player events etc) in order to try and onboard people quicker. I realise that this may be a massive plus to some people, but it's a distinct move away from what I love about the system.

In terms of things which have been revealed in the test packs, the location table changes are a big one. Being able to focus damage that easily is ridiculous and has massively increased the pace of the game and for us actually leads to more 'feels bad' moments than good. It also doesn't make any sense that there is no chance at all of hitting the opposite side.

I'm not a big fan of a lot of the changes to damage and crit effects, it seems like a poor attempt to patch the focussed damage resulting from the side table changes. And as I have said before, the changes to water are too much and most changes could be fixed with a few tweaks instead of what is being tested.

Lorcan Nagle wrote:
Episode 70



Guest: Josh Derksen, Aces Developer

News:
-PAX Unplugged is this weekend,
-CGL will have Aces, Guardians of the Four Winds and Christmas decorations for sale. Unsure if Kuritan forcepacks will be there.
-Quincy will be in the booth
-CGL will be streaming
--Friday
---Good morning with Rem and Quincy
---Leviathans updates, demo and AMA
---CGL Chat
---Quincy and Mike’s board game hour
---Quincy teaches Guardians of the Four Realms Jay Foster and friends
---BattleTech chat with Ray, Rem and Randall
---Aces chat with Randall and Josh
---Aces live play
--Saturday
---Good morning with Rem and Jason Hardy
---Demo team chat with Mike Ciaravella and team members on-site
---Fiction with John Helfers and authors
---Board Game Hour with Quincy and Mike Richie
---Kung-Fu Panda RPG
---RPG Chat with Jason and RJ Thomas
---Board Game Division update with Rem, Mike, maybe Quincy and Tommy Rice
--Sunday
---Good morning with Six sides of Gaming
---Aces live play
---Anarchy 2.0 live play
---Maybe Encounters?
---TBD
-The release schedule has a lot of issues still, Rem noticed a product that was already out with a future date so she’s reluctant to share anything yet.
-On Sunday they pushed out an update to the store. They’re launching some changes that will allow some swag items to come into stock. They’re putting up the top 120 SKUs as a test. This is the first step in fixing the international shipping issues too. Rem is hoping to share more at Pax in her chat with Loren
-BattleTech and shadowrun Christmas decorations will be up on the store, free with purchase.
-Mike Richie got bitten by a pony while in Germany, and then his plane home was delayed because it was hit by lightning. Wish him luck getting to Pax!

-BattleTech
--Out now
---Tales of the Bounty Hunter. The initial version was missing the credits page, that’s fixed now
---Aces is shipping to local game stores.

-XP Network
--Two weeks away from the launch
--The trivia quiz has been put together
--Newsletter went out today with details.

Discussion:
-Josh was introduced to BattleTech by Tommy Gofton, who told him it was a game he should be into and work on
-Josh only knew it from MechWarrior 2, and he only played it for like 5 minutes. He wasn’t a fan of the look and feel
-Randall taught Josh how to play Alpha Strike live on stream, and it got him more interested in the game and setting.
-Josh then thought about how he could apply the solo-co-op systems he’d developed for Star Trek Alliance and Snapships to BattleTech, and started with Alpha Strike.
-Randall and Bryn had played a load of tabletop games during the lockdowns and Star Trek Alliance was one of their favourites. Josh learned this later, that Randall was aware of his work and was confident Josh could do good work for BattleTech as a result.
-Lynnvander’s worked on a few games with CGL: Shadowrun SprawlOps, where they first worked with Dylan Birtolo, Super Camelot and more recently Shadowrun Takedown
-The pitch process for Aces began with Tommy, who Josh describes as the ultimate pitchman. Josh doesn’t know the whole story but he’s sure Tommy spent a bunch of time talking about it with Loren and Randall
-Alpha Strike is a lot more freeform than the other games Josh developed - X-Wing and Star Trek Alliance are flightpath games and use the same movement templates, Snapship Tactics also used templates, but Alpha Strike is just a measuring tape. With templates you can lock in optimal moves and build that into the AI.
-The open beta in the Kickstarter was about 2 months into development on aces. Getting public playtest that early was awesome and to figure out where the edges of the sandbox needed to be.
-The “big thoughts” around Aces are:
--Automated opponents
--The Narrative campaign. This wasn’t part of the initial ideas, but narrative is so important to BattleTech. It was a minor part of Star Trek Alliance or Heroes of the Aturi Cluster, but it’s much bigger here. Josh hopes that by the end of the campaign you’ll feel that this is really your company. Dylan Birtolo worked on the campaign’s structure, Russell Zimmerman did fiction, and John Helfers edited
-Contents of the box:
--7 mechs
--2 hovertanks
--Cardboard tokens for a selection of vehicles and infantry
--Cardboard terrain similar to the buildings in the Alpha Strike box
--4 feet of river templates
--A bridge
--Hills
--10 commander cards to determine the overall force behaviour
--Multiple role decks, each 6 cards.
-The units in the box are the forces of the enemy force in the campaign
-The story is early 3151, the players are a merc unit hired by the Alyina Mercantile League to dislodge the remnants of the 18th Falcon Regulars from a world
-The player force is 400PV
-The individual unit cards have the following components
--Order number to determine who moves first in the aces side
--Role, this matches the role of the unit
--Three behavior columns: aggressive, balanced, cautious. The first two have criteria to meet and if the unit doesn’t meet those, it goes cautious.
--The behaviour columns will have colour-coded target selections. The criteria for each colour is determined by the commander card.
--If you have multiple units of the same role, you can split the deck between them.
--The decks in Scouring Sands have been tuned slightly to favour the units in the set. The missile boat deck here is meant for slower units, while a missile boat deck in an upcoming set will be aimed at faster units.
-The second Aces set is Snowblind. Set in the Rasalhague Dominion, you’re attempting to secure a mech factory during the Dominion Civil War.
-The minis are primarily Ghost Bear second-line mechs, but you also fight pirates in the campaign. The new minis in the set are the Rime Otter and the Viking IIc
-Josh talked about the unit selection as being 4-dimensional Sudoku, between picking units that don’t have models yet, or variants that are visually different to the stuff that’s already out and preferably produced on or near the world the box is set on, and on top of that Josh wanted to balance weight classes and roles…
-There are 21-22 scenarios in an Aces box, and you’ll play 7-8 in a campaign. There’s one scenario you play no matter what but if you make different choices you’ll get different results
-Aces for BattleTech is being discussed but it’s early days still. Don’t expect an announcement any time soon.


Q&A:
-What new game mechanic would you like to add to Aces in the future? They’ve made sure to have different factions, different minis, different biomes, so there’s going to be a lot of options, a lot of cross-compatibility and the potential to make your own scenarios. The main thing that got cut he’d love to do is AeroTech. At Kerenskycon he asked everyone how many of them had used AeroTech in Alpha Strike and no hands went up. He says if you’ve never played it, bust out your Shilone and give it a shot. He’s got a design for an AeroSpace deck but it didn’t make sense for any of the boxes. They’ve talked about whether cards will be available outside of box sets. Josh thinks yes, but they’ll be different decks than the ones in the box. New commanders, fine tuning of existing decks, missing roles and the like.
-Will card sets from future box sets be compatible? Absolutely. You could even mix and match the cards from the same roles in different sets though it might make the unit unpredictable. You could mix and match cards from different roles - sniper and missile boat work well together, for example.
-“Get closer to” does not say include attack range. But that means a unit could move behind a building. Is that correct? There’s actually an icon to specify keeping line of sight that is on most units with a get closer to instruction. Some other units will be more cautious and hide, but Josh isn’t sure if they’re in Scouring Sands.
-Is there a rough timeline for the second box already? When they deliver an Aces set to catalyst it’s almost ready to go, Josh even does the graphic design (after guidance from Dak). He feels Snowblind is about 95% ready to go from their end though he’s not sure how far along minis are. Rem reminds everyone that it still needs to get onto the production schedule and things can fall behind
-After the first four boxes, what faction would Josh like to use? They initially pitched one box, then the narrative discussion happened, then they pitched three boxes, then Randall noted there are four ilClan books and it became four boxes. Along the way various worlds and factions were discarded. Josh would like to do other eras, and mentioned Word of Blake as a faction.
-Are there plans for digital add-ons like additional campaigns or missions? The Focht Network and Six Sides of Gaming guys are playing with a format they call Aces: Legacy where you’d do a three-scenario mini campaign in a single day at events. These would be original adventures, and presumably eventually published as PDFs
-Any update on replacements for vehicle salvage boxes? They’re awaiting a reprint of the boxes
-Will there be any product announcements at Pax? Maybe. Randall would often just pop some stuff on the table and go through it to Rem’s surprise, but he’s dialing in this year so Rem isn’t sure.
-Will future aces releases past the first four be tied to campaign books? Good question. At present there’s two separate development teams on those lines, but Josh would like for Aces to dovetail more into other products
-Will we get an aces deck for the Raven Alliance Khan? They’re the enemies in the fourth set! It’s them fighting the Davions on the Outworlds border though.
-Will there be a priority Paul Clarkson card in Aces? It didn’t make it, but there is a priority target token you can give to him.

 Miguelsan wrote:

Itxi wrote:

 cole1114 wrote:
I've loved all the rule changes, curious which ones you think are so bad they kill any enthusiasm to play?

Bear in mind that I'm a rep and have received advanced notice of some of the changes which I am not allowed to talk about. What I will say is that there is a change in direction; it is being seen as a game first and foremost and less as a simulation, so things will be a bit more abstract and possibly more streamlined, but imo less immersive and challenging from a strategic pov. Most changes seem to be in direct response to feedback from people new to the game (namely from reps running new player events etc) in order to try and onboard people quicker. I realise that this may be a massive plus to some people, but it's a distinct move away from what I love about the system.

In terms of things which have been revealed in the test packs, the location table changes are a big one. Being able to focus damage that easily is ridiculous and has massively increased the pace of the game and for us actually leads to more 'feels bad' moments than good. It also doesn't make any sense that there is no chance at all of hitting the opposite side.

I'm not a big fan of a lot of the changes to damage and crit effects, it seems like a poor attempt to patch the focussed damage resulting from the side table changes. And as I have said before, the changes to water are too much and most changes could be fixed with a few tweaks instead of what is being tested.

The change in focus worries me. Btech is about little robots exploding in interesting ways, making it more abstract to play faster is the wrong approach. If you want larger, and faster play Alpha Strike instead, don't try to bridge the gap between Btech, and, let's say, X Wing styles of play.

M.

 Miguelsan wrote:

The change in focus worries me. Btech is about little robots exploding in interesting ways, making it more abstract to play faster is the wrong approach. If you want larger, and faster play Alpha Strike instead, don't try to bridge the gap between Btech, and, let's say, X Wing styles of play.

M.

 Kagetora wrote:

I'm genuinely curious...has anyone ever seen BTech as a game with "tactical depth?" I haven't played in a while, but when I did, the entire game boiled down to a few simple rules.

1. Maximize your opponent's rolls to hit you.
2. Minimize your own to hit them.
3. Present the profile to your opponent with the least chance of taking catastrophic damage/lucky hit kills.

 Kagetora wrote:

I'm genuinely curious...has anyone ever seen BTech as a game with "tactical depth?" I haven't played in a while, but when I did, the entire game boiled down to a few simple rules.

1. Maximize your opponent's rolls to hit you.
2. Minimize your own to hit them.
3. Present the profile to your opponent with the least chance of taking catastrophic damage/lucky hit kills.

Even when we were playing multi-day/weekend-long battalion-on-battalion games, everything ended up revolving around these few points. It wasn't any more complex than that, despite being fun and all of us having a good time. You knew the "to hit" and location damage tables by heart, moved each mech on the board to its best advantage as far as speed/terrain, and accomplished those three tasks.

After that, the dice rolls decided. This game has never had (in my experience) a great deal of "depth" when it came to tactics. Strategy, yes...but that's what you chose to bring to the table and make work together within your limits of tonnage and/or BV.

I'd have always picked BTech as a strategically "deep" game, based on the options you can bring and put on a tabletop before a game. But actual "tactics," i.e. what you do with said forces? That's always been largely dictated for you based on the first choice. The rules make it so.

Doesn't make it a bad game, and, in fact, it's one I love. But I was never enamored with the actual tabletop play. As such, will a few rule changes really render the game "unplayable," as some here seem to be asserting? Or will you simply have to alter simplistic tactics to account for the changes?

Again, genuinely curious as to opinions on the matter.

Itxi wrote:

I mean... pretty much every game comes down to something like this when you get that reductive? The tactical depth comes from the choices you make and how they play into those rules you listed. Do you pop smoke or use the lrms to try and do damage? Do you risk overheating to try and get some more shots in? Do you keep your vehicles hidden until the enemy get into a better range bracket? Battletech has tons of these choices and they all have aspects you have to balance, such as heat gen or decreasing your own chance to hit.

It may be easier to answer if you can give some examples of what you consider to be good tactical games

 Kagetora wrote:

Itxi wrote:

I mean... pretty much every game comes down to something like this when you get that reductive? The tactical depth comes from the choices you make and how they play into those rules you listed. Do you pop smoke or use the lrms to try and do damage? Do you risk overheating to try and get some more shots in? Do you keep your vehicles hidden until the enemy get into a better range bracket? Battletech has tons of these choices and they all have aspects you have to balance, such as heat gen or decreasing your own chance to hit.

It may be easier to answer if you can give some examples of what you consider to be good tactical games

To a certain extent, you're right...most games do boil down to simplicity. BTech, for example, is about 75% strategy (what mechs you pick and your overall plan, i.e. am I going LRM-heavy and trying to stay at range, do I want to brawl up close and personal, or whatever), and 25% tactics (actually moving the mechs on the board and rolling dice). That's a pretty common breakdown, at least in my head, and a lot of games are like that (old WFB comes to mind readily, for example).

Then there are games where what you bring to the table is largely constrained, or even dictated to you. Wargods pops into my head...every faction is essentially the same, with only a point or two of difference on the stat lines. Heru and Typhon are slightly better in a block-on-block fight, Basti are better with a bow, but overall the sides are so similar that the pre-game strategies are limited, and the tabletop play becomes more of a factor in the overall game. Old-version Necromunda followed this pattern as well, provided you had a bunch of people playing Gangs (as opposed to Spyrers or Ratskins). Everybody was...human. Everybody had access to the same number of units, the same equipment tables, same guns, etc. How you played them took on a bigger percentage of the overall feel of the game, even if that was basically by default, because your strategic choices were forcibly limited, rendering them less of the overall percentage.

But in a game with hundreds and hundreds of things to pick and choose from to build your forces, i.e. BTech, 40k, WFB, etc., the initial pre-game strategy becomes so much more important that it overshadows the actual tactical gameplay. So, when it gets reduced to those simplistic elements that lie at the core of most of these games, it's much more glaring.

I dunno, it's just my opinion, obviously. I've played so many games over the last 35 years that said opinion is pretty well cemented in me though. And I'm NOT bashing BTech or anyone who plays it. I love the game. Along with WFB, 40K, Necromunda, Mordheim, Epic, Wargods, Dark Age, Confrontation, and a bunch of others that have come and gone over the years. They all have their charms.

But the original comment about killing the enthusiasm of an entire club of BTech players because the rules changes were ruining the "tactical depth" (my words, not the original poster's who spoke of the "strategic pov," which I believe is just a difference in terminology between us) struck me as odd, so I asked the question. Now, if the proposed rule changes are fundamentally altering the game, and for the worse? That's a horse of a different color. And, again, it'll just be an opinion, as others may view said changes more positively, even thinking they improve play. I've no idea about that, as I am not in the loop, as it were.

I am following with interest though.

However if you feel that autocannons taking two crits to disable is worse than the change from Warhammer Fantasy Battle to Age of Sigmar and stripping the game of its unique detail, fair enough.

Itxi wrote:

However if you feel that autocannons taking two crits to disable is worse than the change from Warhammer Fantasy Battle to Age of Sigmar and stripping the game of its unique detail, fair enough.

This feels like a disingenuous statement if you've read my previous comment. I said that a lot of the changes are ones that we like (the autocannon changes being some of them). But things like trivialising water are very negative to me, I enjoy the decision making of movement, especially when difficult terrain is involved (similar to your statement about a map lousy with hills), saying that the difficult elements are being removed just because players find them difficult is a worrying justification imo. BSPs are also hated at my club due to them oversimplifying the game, and most comments I have seen online agree, the only positives about them have been that they are useful for objectives or for GMs who want to add 'mooks' to a game.

I feel like anything else I could say would be just repeating myself. Because the other major change which I disagree with has not been revealed yet, along with other things which are on the horizon.

Teejay75 wrote:I'm watching a little of the PAX livestream. A few things they've mentioned so far. Force Manual Mercenaries is either being loaded on a ship or already on a ship. Tentative release will be in January. FM Steiner and FM Invading Clans are looking at a Spring and Summer release. Rem emphasized that all release dates are very tentative and subject to change. Two new map packs are coming. Volcanic and Glacier. There will also be BFM versions of these. There will be a series of 8 Fire and Ice battlemats. The Camacho's lance box will have a swayback. The clan wolf support star will release next year. Includes Orion IIC, Glass Spider, Phantom Prime, Lobo, and Ice Ferret D. Everyone has asked Randall when they will make a No Dachi model. Illician Lancers will be a B&N. It's coming in Spring. Camacho's will be in Fall. Lancers will include two new mechs. Ostwar and Scarabus. They had a rough sketch of the Viking IIC. Snow Blind should be heading to the printers soon. There will be two Gothic force packs. Hoping for Spring next year. There will be a Leopard class map scale drop ship. It comes with a base for Aero Tech's new rules.

Fat Guy wrote:From PAX: The 'Mechs From Aces Snow Blind will be Fire Moth G, Arctic Cheetah A, Rime Otter Prime, Mongrel A, Nova Cat B, Kingfisher C, Grizzly 3 and Viking IIC.

 Miguelsan wrote:
Leopard class, Leopard class!

 Miguelsan wrote:
Annoys me a lot that the Ost-box is B&N exclusive again. For players in the US it might be a bit annoying having to go to a shop, or order through them, for the rest of us it's infuriating that we are locked from the release for who knows how long.

Pax BattleTech News:
- 21st Centauri Lancers Out at Barnes & Noble
- Force Manual Mercenaries: Release probably January, currently en route to America
- Force Manual Steiner: Next Up (2026...)
- Force Manual Invading Clans: Cover Done (2026...)
- Brush Wars: Operation Guerrero Coming (End of November, PDF)
- More Brush Wars coming over 2026
- Once there are enough of them, We might get a Physical Brush Wars Collection
- Hot Spots Draconis Reach Coming (Summer...)
- Map Pack: Volcanic and Glazier (Coming Spring)
- Volcanic Spring, Glazier Summer
- BFM and Neoprene Sets coming: If you get all 8 Neoprenes, they will be bigger than the BFM
- BFM Spring
- Neoprenes Spring and Summer
- Grand Titan: Camacho Caballeros Force Pack Coming (Falln 2026)
- Hunchback 4P will be in the Camacho Caballeros Force Pack (Laser Disco)
- Orion IIC: Clan Wolf Support Star
- Clan Wolf Support Star will also come with Glass Spider, Phantom Prime, Lobo, Ice Ferret D
-Clan Wolf Support Star (Spring or Summer)
- Force Pack Kurita Ranger and Command Hopefully January (Maybe February)
- Illician Lancers: Barnes & Noble Exclusive (Spring)
- Illician Lancers comes with the Scarabus and OstWar, along side the OstRoc and Ostol
- Viking IIC Preliminary Sketch
- 2 Gothic Force Packs of Aboms are coming (Spring)
- Leopard-Class Map Scale Drop Ship inbound (Spring)
- The Special Base that comes with the Leopard-Class Dropship is part of the new Aerospace Game/Rules
- Aces Snow Blind (Summer...)
- Next GenCon will be the Release of the new Battletech Rule book, replacing Total Warfare and Battlemech Manual
- Force Manual ilKhan Updates Q1 2026
- Remastered Union Dropship (Spring 2026) with new Base
- New Overlord Drop ship no date yet
- Force Pack Steiner Will not drop in 2026
- Force Pack Marik and Liao Eventually, Someday, Confirmed by 3025
- Bug Force Pack Still pushed back (Within the next 18 Months)
- Force Manual Comstar is not in the plans currently, Maybe one day
- Reinforcement Packs in the plans (Box Set Exclusive Mechs)
- Uziel Planned for the Summer 2026
- LAM Force Pack before 3025 Confirmed

Lorcan Nagle wrote:Friday



Good morning with Rem and Quincy
-Sunday will be pre-recorded content
-They have 200 copies of Aces: Scouring Sands and are taking bets on when it’ll sell out
-They went through the schedule for Saturday
-Rem and Quincy discussed the food in the place next door to the con centre, apparently it’s good!
-Following Mike Richie’s travails in Germany (bitten by a horse, plane hit by lightning), Bryn accidentally drenched his head in soy sauce while at dinner earlier this week
-They chatted about Barkeep’s Bones, the next Quincy’s Tavern collaboration game. The last version Quincy played was at Origins, they’re playing the newest version after the con this evening.
-They have Guardians of the Four Winds for sale
-There are board game demos happening in the booth, and BattleTech, Shadowrun and Leviathans games running in a CGL demo section
-Quincy has sent in the edited manuscript of Book of the Lost Bard and is waiting for the next steps
-Quincy would love to do a children’s storybook, he has an idea about one called Goblin’s Stew based on a song he’s made
-Any new mech minis? That’s for Randall in the BattleTech Q&A
-When will the My Hero Academia kickstarter be live? No idea yet, they’re still working through approvals in Toho for various assets and elements. They’re trying to remain flexible to make sure it’ll be done right.
-Rem brought Quincy through the high concepts of the MHA game

Leviathans updates and AMA

Board Games: How it’s Done

Quincy and Mike’s board game hour

Quincy teaches Guardians of the Four Realms to Jay Foster, Steve Wrigley, Kyle Shire,

BattleTech chat with Randall
-21st Centauri Lancers forcepack
--Out at Barnes and Noble now. Released to general retail in six months
--The Jade Hawk has separate wings that can be glued in place or left posable
-Force Manual: Mercenaries
---Either on a ship or soon to be on a ship
---Probably releasing in January
--Other Force Manuals
---Steiner should be next
---Out next year
---Invading Clans after
----They had the cover for Invading Clans, showing mechs fleeing a Mad Cat (presumably the scene on The Rock in Lethal Heritage)
----Out next year
--Brush Wars: Operation Guerrero
---Long in the making, a series of PDFs chronicling many of the smaller conflicts in the BattleTech universe
---Operation Guerrero is subtitled Volume 3, part 1. Should be out at the end of the month
---Might be collated into a print release down the line
---Cubby added in chat that there will be Touring the Stars and Spotlight on PDFs that link into the Brush Wars ones
--Hot Spots: Draconis Reach
---Cover shows a Wasp and Stinger advancing in an ice field
---Mercenary campaign that lets the players fight their way along the Draconis Combine/Federated Suns border in the ilClan era
---Hopefully Summer release
--Map Pack: Volcanic and Map Pack: Glacier
---At print now
---Volcanic should be out in the spring, Glacier in the Summer
---Pushing the boundaries of what they can do in the game. They want to have more unique environments that are still playable
---16-map large environments for both map packs
--BFM: Volcanic and Glacier
---Spring release
---The overall map setup for Volcanic and Glacier is so big the BFM doesn’t cover the whole image like the desert airbase, say
--Battlemats: Fire and Ice
---8 neoprene mats
---One thing they learned from the Savannah/city maps were that the city ones didn’t let you do the full BFM image from the paper maps with a single set, so they worked to give ways to display the whole scene
---Spring/Summer release
--Camacho’s Caballeros forcepack
---They showed the Grand Titan line art, as debuted in Big Red’s video
---Hunchback 4P
---Barnes and Noble exclusive, Autumn release
--Clan Wolf Support Star
---They showed the Orion IIc line art
---It’s “mostly done”, spring/summer release
---Glass Spider, Ice Ferret D, Phantom Prime, Lobo
--House Kurita Forcepacks
---Hopefully releasing in January,
---Ranger Lance: Chimera, Avatar, Panther, Venom
---Command Lance: Rokurokubi, Shiro, Akuma, Grand Dragon
---The process for selecting units is Ray, Randall, Anthony and Marco have big lists of minis they want to do where they discuss (often heatedly)
--Illician Lancers Command Lance
---Barnes and Noble Exclusive
---Will be out in the Spring
---Ostwar, Scarabus, Ostsol, Ostroc
---Randall will hopefully have a sample to take photos of by the end of the year
--Viking IIc rough sketch
---It hasn’t gone through the process yet, but they wanted to show it off
---It’ll be in Snowblind, the second Aces box
---Snowblind will be set in Dominions Divided like how Scouring Sands was set in Tamar Rising
---No cover yet as the new units haven’t been finished yet
---Going to print in the not too distant future. Should be out next year sometime
--Abominations forcepacks
---In production - two packs to cover all of them.
---No art available yet
---Hopefully out in the spring
---In hindsight it would have been a good idea to have them out the same time as Gothic, but they weren’t sure how it’d be received so they decided to be a little cautious. As soon as it was in people’s hands they were deluged with people asking when they’d get the minis
--Msp scale Leopard DropShip
---Because the Leopard was redesigned for 3025 Centenary edition, they could do a mini of it
---It comes with a 3-hex wide base, which will be used for the new AeroTech rules
---Spring release
--The new rulebook should be out at Gencon, replacing Total Warfare and the BattleMech Manual
---The public playtest is still ongoing!
--Force Manual IlClan updates? Randall thinks they’re in layout. Hopefully early next year.
--House Liao Force Manual? There will be a Liao force manual, it’s just a little ways out
--When will we get a plastic Karnov? It’s on a list, Randall can’t say where it’s at but it’s slotted onto a list
--Will there be a homeworld Clans Force Manual? Not any time soon
--Atlas III mini? Not on a list yet
--Will we be getting reissues of the map scale DropShips with the same base as the Leopard? The Union will be out next year, and it’ll be remastered to the 3025 art. Overlord is further out
--Any update on the regional hubs? Rem is going to try and get Loren, Talon and ross onto Tuesday Newsday to talk about it
--Is Leviathans secretly the new AeroTech rules? No.
--Any update on the Steiner forcepacks? Nothing yet, hopefully they can give an update next year
--Will there be reprints on older forcepacks? There was a massive reprint, they should be on a ship or on one soon.
--Marik, Liao and forcepacks? Can’t talk about them yet, hopefully at Adepticon
--Bug mech pack? It’s on a few lists but it keeps getting pushed down when they have cool new ideas
--ComStar Force Manual? Randall doesn’t think it’s slotted in yet.
--Why is the Regent the best mech and when are we getting new variants? It looks fantastic and it’s a beast of a design, and a variant in the summer.
--Any chance of getting the mechs from the box sets in forcepacks? There are plans for this
--Uziel mini? Next summer
--Leopard CV? If the Leopard sells well enough
--Can we get the base for the new Dropships separately? They’re looking into it, but the new DropShips will have a way to fit onto the base with a gimballed ball. So you’d have to mod the old minis to fit them
--Will there be a LAM forcepack? Eventually.
--Will Randall dye his beard purple for the Marik forcepacks? Yes! Purple bird strong!
--Will there be a mechs of Shrapnel forcepack? Randall hadn’t thought of that. He likes the idea but it’ll be a long ways yet.
--Will CGL still produce single-pack resin minis now they own IWM? That’s a little up in the air.
--Will there be more salvage boxes out soon? They’re part of the same reorder
--Aces Salvage boxes? No. Salvage boxes are very hard to do at a production level so it’s not practical to do them for a single box
--Will we see more pilot cards outside of the forcepacks? Probably not. The level of resources you need to put into them it outsized for what you get out of them.
--Downloadable Aces roster, campaign log and sortie logs when? Hopefully by the end of the month.
--Status of the next Continuum box? Rocket and Rayguns is the placeholder name, it might remain to release. It’s well into development, they’re on track to send it to production by the end of next year. They intend to release a Contiuum box roughly every eighteen months. --They’ll continue to have people who aren’t working on other products assigned to it. They should have more art to show off by the summer
--Any news on the MechCommander’s handbook? No. It’s been sidelined by the new rulebook.
--Any update on the new Succession Wars game? They built a tabletop sim mod and gave the Kerenskies/Kappas access. They’re taking the feedback from them and will be doing a wider playtest next year. Expect a solicitation for playtesters early next year.

Aces chat with Randall and Josh Derksen
-Is Aces selling better than Gothic? It’s hard to tell. Gothic was the fastest selling box set to date, and Aces looks set to match that if not exceed
-International release? Shipments for Canada and Europe left Canada around the same time so they’re on the way.
-Will there be a medium mech in Snowblind? I was surprised there wasn’t one in Scouring Sands. Josh noted the Howler is the most common unit you'll face off against in Scouring Sands. Randall said he’d love to show off the spreadsheet that determines what can be in an Aces box. Josh said that he wanted to generally do 2 each of light, medium, heavy and assault
-Tell us more about Snowblind?
--The mins are: Fire Moth G, Arctic Cheetah A, Rime Otter Prime, Mongrel Prime, Nova Cat B, Grizzly 3, Kingfisher C, Viking IIc.
--In Scouring Sands, you’re sent to deal with a situation, in Snowblind you’re garrisoning a planet as things go wrong
--You might want to supplement Snowblind with forcepacks. There will be cardboard tokens in the box but if you have the Battlefield support Battle and Fire lance set you’ll have mins for a lot of the tokens
--The terrain theme is arctic. There’ll be hills and buildings, though the buildings will be a different shape and size than the starter box
--In scouring sands, we get the Bane 3, in Snowblind we get the Viking IIc. Will we see a big missile boat in the other boxes? No. Josh Franklin got involved in the project early on. Josh asked if he could get a raw spreadsheet of the data in the MUL and checked the special abilities. He saw the hige gap between the IF ability on the Bane 3 and any other unit and decided he had to have it in the set. He did similar for the Viking and the amount of Armour it has
--There’ll be a new Viking IIc variant in Snowblind
--Can we expect an Alpha Strike open playtest? The BattleTech playtest will be wrapping up in January, and they’re hoping to do the same for Alpha Strike late Q1 next year
--Josh talked about how multiple attack roll is the default in Aces but not Alpha Strike proper, and he talked a bit about how Alpha Strike is a fork of BattleForce and if you’re playing BattleForce at a Battalion on Battalion you want single attack rolls for sure, but people have been using Alpha Strike to play streamlined BattleTech and multiple Attack rolls makes sense there. To reflect this you’ll really need to redo the rulebook
--Who are the factions in Scouring Sands? The players are mercs hired by the Alyina Mercantile League to take a planet that’s being run by Lionel Sender, a Mongol Doctrine falcon left behind in the Hinterlands

Aces live play
-Aces Legacy is a legacy campaign format for tournaments, three sorties to be played in a day with a narrative but also a competitive element so a leaderboard can allow for a team to win.
-They’re playtesting some sorties for the format at Pax Unplugged
-Meknificient Seven series 2 will be debuting soon. Probably first or second week of december. 12 episodes in total. 2 episodes will be using Aces to play classic BattleTech. Tex, Big Red and Randall will be back, as will Scott, the Six Sides tech guy.

Itxi wrote:
Bear in mind that I'm a rep and have received advanced notice of some of the changes which I am not allowed to talk about. What I will say is that there is a change in direction; it is being seen as a game first and foremost and less as a simulation, so things will be a bit more abstract and possibly more streamlined, but imo less immersive and challenging from a strategic pov.

Itxi wrote:
Take what I say with a pinch of salt; I'm not very high on the cgl rep ladder, I do know some people who are though and this is what they have been indicating.

Can we expect an Alpha Strike open playtest

To reflect this you’ll really need to redo the rulebook

 cole1114 wrote:
First I'd heard that gothic is their fastest selling box set, very nice to hear. And since I'm more excited for Aces, hearing that it's probably gonna break that record already is also very nice to hear!