BattleTech

[FPAlpha]

Oh Hell Yeah!

Edit: Though I kinda wish they would include Clan stuff in MW 5: Mercenaries, like having to fight off the Clan Invasion (like in MW2: Mercenaries).

I can only assume but since it's called MW5 it will be based technologically off MW5 so all IS models could be re-used for MW5:Clans and the path may be open at some point through a DLC to combine the 2 games into one ( kind of what Total War Warhammer did that allowed to combine all 3 games into one massive map and giving you the option to use any army against any other army).

If they did that the sky is the limit and i'm getting all kinds of giddy if that actually happens and i get to pilot an IS Mech against the Clans My only gripe is that you apparently have to play the Smoke Jaguars for the campaign initially (booooh ) but i hope they will include a livery tool, so you can repaint the mechs in any Clan or even special Galaxies ( Ghost Bear Alpha Galaxy player here as well as a little Thirteenth Wolf Guards when i play Clans) you want for quick games or maybe some DLCs that will deal with other Clans.

 

[Thestral]

And one of my all time favorite Mechs - the Mad Cat

Timber Wolf, you filhy freebirth.

I do bet they'll have a third game to tie it all together ending in Tukayyid. Playing as the Smoke Jags is gonna be different but it's not been done before, and depending on how the scripted campaign goes, I wonder if Turtle Bay will be a big decision point. After having fun tearing through hordes of Kuritans it would be kind of fun to have the chance to play out the big stand on Luthien.

 

[JoseNoodles]

I can only assume but since it's called MW5 it will be based technologically off MW5 so all IS models could be re-used for MW5:Clans and the path may be open at some point through a DLC to combine the 2 games into one ( kind of what Total War Warhammer did that allowed to combine all 3 games into one massive map and giving you the option to use any army against any other army).

If they did that the sky is the limit and i'm getting all kinds of giddy if that actually happens and i get to pilot an IS Mech against the Clans My only gripe is that you apparently have to play the Smoke Jaguars for the campaign initially (booooh ) but i hope they will include a livery tool, so you can repaint the mechs in any Clan or even special Galaxies ( Ghost Bear Alpha Galaxy player here as well as a little Thirteenth Wolf Guards when i play Clans) you want for quick games or maybe some DLCs that will deal with other Clans.

Maybe, but I was hoping they would have at least added some Clan mechs and tech to Mercenaries as it would have made some good endgame material for the career mode.

 

[FPAlpha]

Timber Wolf, you filhy freebirth.

I do bet they'll have a third game to tie it all together ending in Tukayyid. Playing as the Smoke Jags is gonna be different but it's not been done before, and depending on how the scripted campaign goes, I wonder if Turtle Bay will be a big decision point. After having fun tearing through hordes of Kuritans it would be kind of fun to have the chance to play out the big stand on Luthien.

Screw you Trashborn Noob!

Tukayyid is the high point for me when it comes to Battletech - so much awesome in the lead up and the execution of that pivotal battle. I would pay premium and beyond to be able to replay that as an AAA title. My tabletop club has had its first convention post Covid again earlier this year and we did an Alpha Strike Demo table, for which painted up a Comstar unit to face off against a Ghost Bear force, we had such a blast.

This is my unit:

Maybe, but I was hoping they would have at least added some Clan mechs and tech to Mercenaries as it would have made some good endgame material for the career mode.

It must have been planned or at least intended for a long time i think and i can understand to not include it in Mercenaries. I mean by the end of the game you are pretty much close to Clan tech anyway so i'm quite ok with them holding this back until they are ready. We ( my BT group in our club) have talked about this for a long time and were all wondering why they didn't move forward and introduce the Clans, the framework was there and now we know why.

 

[Thestral]

Screw you Trashborn Noob!

Tukayyid is the high point for me when it comes to Battletech - so much awesome in the lead up and the execution of that pivotal battle. I would pay premium and beyond to be able to replay that as an AAA title. My tabletop club has had its first convention post Covid again earlier this year and we did an Alpha Strike Demo table, for which painted up a Comstar unit to face off against a Ghost Bear force, we had such a blast.

This is my unit:

View attachment 36457 View attachment 36458

Trial of Grievance, surat!!

Tukayyid was just fantastic, and they keep coming back to it for good reason. I need to look at the newest book set there. Although for me, the high point was probably the Twilight of the Clans, it just seemed like such a climactic time for the universe, that whole series. Made me fall in love with the Eridani Light Horse, too.

That Comstar unit looks... brilliant, wow. You did a great job painting them! The new minis - especially the King Crab and Thug sculpts there - are so good.

 

[Nerroth]

A few days ago, this preview video for the upcoming BattleTech Universe book - set to provide a detailed overview of the setting through to the onset of the current IlClan Era - was posted:

 

[Nerroth]

After several years of collecting print and PDF sourcebooks, fiction, and other such BattleTech-related items, I had never bought a proper "box set" with which to actually play one of the games on the tabletop.

Until recently, that is:

Miniature-wise, the Alpha Strike Boxed Set includes eight Inner Sphere BattleMechs:

As well as five Clan OmniMechs:

Beyond this, the universe primer included is set in the current IlClan Era, complete with an Inner Sphere and near periphery map set ca. 3151. Ironically, one faction not covered in the primer is the Scorpion Empire - who, as of this time period, are the only ones building new Warhawks, of the kind offered in this very box set!

Of course, the minis can be used for Total Warfare (or "classic" BattleTech) game play - but the main focus here is on getting players up and running with the Alpha Strike game system.

Speaking of the Scorpion Empire: if or when I get around to actually painting any of these miniatures, I'll probably try to go with something to do with Clan Goliath Scorpion, and/or with their now-former opponents in the Hanseatic League.

 

[Unicron]

I sometimes feel like the Republic of the Sphere got short shrift, as a side effect of Gray Monday. I feel like they could have gone on far longer given what ComStar achieved during the Succession Wars, without even utilizing their stockpiled Star League military assets.

I don't always keep up with the histories of specific designs, given the vast number in the BT universe, but couldn't some of the invading Clans establish their own Warhawk factories? The wiki mentions it was mainly produced in the Clan homeworlds and thus became more of a rarity after the Jihad era, but it just seems like an odd choice. I'm also tempted to say some of the Houses would have access to the design from salvage, but I might be wrong.

* shrugs *

 

[Nerroth]

Given the scale of destruction and dislocation caused for both the invading Clans and for their estranged Homeworld counterparts during the Wars of Reaving - and also given the further challenges faced by the Scorpions during their own post-Reaving flight from the Homeworlds - there were only so many pre-Reaving designs which could survive unscathed.

In the case of the Warhawk, the sheer stubbornness of the Scorpions in keeping this OmniMech as a part of their touman, and in eventually bringing it back into limited production, was not matched by any of the Council of Six Clans in the Inner Sphere and near Periphery. And since we have no update on what has been going on with the Homeworlds since 3095 (the in-universe publication date for The Wars of Reaving Supplemental), none can say what - if any - presence this unit type has out there.

But, of course, if someone outside of the Scorpion Empire wants to play using a Warhawk in the IlClan Era - as this box set tries to encourage - they can probably find some sort of excuse to do so...

 

[Nerroth]

In terms of actually trying to paint any of the above minis: to start things off, I wanted to use one of the Inner Sphere BattleMechs and one of the Clan OmniMechs as test cases for... whatever the paint schemes for these units end up being. so, I volunteered the Wasp and the Pouncer for this duty.

My idea - such as it is - would be to give both types of 'Mech a mostly shared colour scheme, but with one key difference to distinguish the Omnis from the rest. In this, I was minded of the paint schemes I gave my Mæsron and Vulpa ships from my ADB Shapeways collection, as shown here.

Long story short: over in the Star Fleet Universe, the wolf-like Vulpa are a former member species of the Mæsron Alliance; their ships are "post-Mæsron" designs. I tried to reflect this by changing the red on the Mæsron ships to a kind of "blood orange", yet otherwise keeping the rest of the colour scheme more or less the same.

Compare the Mæsron light cruiser:

Spoiler: Mæsron CL

To the Vulpa blockade runner:

Spoiler: Vulpa VBR

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So far, my (very) rough WIP BattleTech minis follow a somewhat similar pattern:

By no means is this intended to be a "final" decision on the respective paint schemes. But, if or when I settle on what (I hope) works for these 'Mechs, I can then consider painting up the rest of the box set's minis to match.

Any thoughts thus far?

 

[Nerroth]

On another topic, I recently started playing HBS' BattleTech on my Steam Deck OLED:

There are a few caveats, however.

Firstly - SteamOS does let you manually set certain mouse functions to the analogue sticks and/or to the track pads, and there is a way to bring up an on-screen keyboard. it's still best to play the game with an external keyboard and mouse, however.

Secondly - the screen on the OLED model in particular is very nice, and it is possible to pay the game on it... if you don't mind the small font size. It is quite possible to use a dock (either Valve's official dock, or one from a third party) to connect to an external monitor.

Thirdly - if you try to play the game in Gaming Mode, it defaults to the device's own screen resolution, even if you are outputting video to an external monitor. If you set the system over to Desktop Mode first, however, higher external resolutions can be set as normal.

And fourthly - if you are outputting to an external monitor, note that the device's own speakers are quite good. So if you find them to be of higher quality than the ones in your monitor, it's possible (again, in Desktop Mode) to set things so that you are using the device's speakers, even if you have set the default screen to the monitor.

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And speaking of Desktop Mode - you can of course use it to access other BattleTech-related material:

 

[Thestral]

It's been awhile since I played the HBS game but I thought it was fantastic! It's such a shame they're not going to be able to make a sequel.

And those minis are looking great.

 

[Nerroth]

A review has been posted for the forthcoming BattleTech Universe book:

 

[Thestral]

Anybody been keeping up with the Mechwarrior 5 DLCs? I wasn't hugely impressed with the game at launch but the recent DLCs have been really fun and this looks like a big step up for the new Clans game.

 

[Timby]

Unfortunately, the games won't stop sucking until someone other than Piranha Games is actually developing them.

 

[Thestral]

Unfortunately, the games won't stop sucking until someone other than Piranha Games is actually developing them.

Hmm, you don't think they've gotten better as the dev cycle of MW5 has gone along?

I would prefer somebody to take it on that has AAA budget and... well, actual storytelling abilities... but I think the core gameplay is quite solid.

 

[FPAlpha]

Anybody been keeping up with the Mechwarrior 5 DLCs? I wasn't hugely impressed with the game at launch but the recent DLCs have been really fun and this looks like a big step up for the new Clans game.

I've recently reinstalled MW5 and had to spend some time getting re-familiarized with the controls. Need to polish my double AC20 headshot skills, muscle memory is a bit rusty

I just feel dirty having to play Smoke Jaguar, i hope it'll get DLC'd/modded soon to allow other Clans to be fielded.

 

[Thestral]

I've recently reinstalled MW5 and had to spend some time getting re-familiarized with the controls. Need to polish my double AC20 headshot skills, muscle memory is a bit rusty

I just feel dirty having to play Smoke Jaguar, i hope it'll get DLC'd/modded soon to allow other Clans to be fielded.

I never got really into focusing on double headshots until I got Gauss Rifle... but boy was that fun once I did.

I'm curious how they'll present the Jaguars. Mustache-twirlers, more-brutal-Jade-Falcons, something in between? I wonder too how far the campaign will go. As far as Tukayyid? They'll probably want to leave space for expansions/DLCs.

 

[FPAlpha]

If they do Tukayyid i might actually die from sheer bliss

 

[Unicron]

For my part, I found the early Clan biographies in the Operation Klondike sourcebook really interesting. Franklin Osis (the first Jaguar Khan) was a pacifist for most of his early life, until he had the misfortune of watching a smoke jaguar kill his brother Simon. That experience radically changed Franklin into a more aggressive personality which set the tone for his Clan's development.

I've often found the Clans interesting as a society, even though one could argue some aspects are kind of more conveniences for storytelling and game balance.