In a move bound to further annoy players who declared their personal fannons end in 30xx, BattleTech has released Technical Readout 3145, Era Report 3145 and Field Manual 3145 should be hot on their heels. And my love for BattleTech grew three sizes that day.
For everyone for whom the MWDA setting was a turn-off, the 3145 era feels like a breath of fresh air. Forget your preconceptions and dive in. TSEMPs and Re-Engineered Lasers for everyone!
It's politics as usual in the wake of the collapse of the Republic of the Sphere.
Trillian Steiner barely holds together a Lyran Commonwealth quailing under a two-front was, facing the resurgent Jade Falcons and their new Khan Malvina Hazen's aggressive Mongol doctrine and Alaric Steiner's new Wolf Empire.
The Hell's Horses face a crisis for faith, forced to choose between supporting the Falcons and forging their own destiny.
The Dragon roars, having annihilated the seditious Nova Cats and smashed into the heart of the Federated Suns, aided tacitly by the betrayal of the Davion's former allies in the Raven Alliance.
Daoshen Liao's Cappellan Confederation now stands as the Inner Sphere's premiere military superpower, their hidden military buildup putting lie to Devlin Stone's dream of disarmament. It's target? New Avalon.
Shattered by betrayal and the incompetence of Caleb Davion, the Federated Suns stands on the cusp of what will either be it's finest hour, or it's darkest defeat.
A Phoenix in purple, Jessica Marik's reborn Free Worlds League quietly girds itself for war against enemies on all sides. With both Regulus and Andurien refusing to cooperate and the Wolf at her door, a new Captain General finds many willing to smother her nascent state in its infancy.
And lurking at the core, the Republic remnant lurks like a malignancy, waiting for their time to come again.
The gangs all here, and it's nice to watch the writers gleefully stretch their legs, unbound by the need to cling to the material foisted on them by WizKids. They've done a fantastic job so far, polishing up the gems of the Jihad era and turning them into well thought out plot points that roll the universe forward.
It's simple, unpretentious BattleTech, returning to its roots to wallow in intrigue and warfare. Unburdened by the need to keep fan favorite characters alive and no longer straight-jacketed by Michael Stackpole's heavy handed fiction, it's a no holds barred slug-fest where nothing, not even the Kell Hounds, Nova Cats and Eridani Light Horse are held too sacred to be fed to the meat grinder.
The Kuritans are back to being bad-ass all-conquering space samurai. The Cappellans are playing aggressively for keeps rather than defensively. The Free Worlds League are no longer the joke enemy faction. The Wolves are back to kicking ass and taking names (and then writing about it in the Remembrance).
If you thought the Dark Age couldn't be saved, think again. If you liked the Dark Age, well... drink deep.
PGI, the producers of MechWarrior Online has just opened a charity fundraiser to pay respects to a young player who recently lost her battle with cancer.
They're selling a custom Jenner Light BattleMech themed after the girl's favorite 'Mech with all proceeds going to charity - I personally think it's a nice gesture worthy of support.
PGI wrote:
100% of the proceeds will be donated to the Canadian Cancer Society, net of applicable Sales Taxes and third-party transaction fees such as credit card and payment processing fees. These fees typically represent less than 4%. For clarity, IGP and PGI are not making any money off of the donated funds.
I'm still teetering on the fence over the idea, and this post is to test the waters for a campaign based on the Super-Dimensional Fortress Macross franchise run using Heroic Journey Publishing's MECHA RPG system.
MECHA is a rules-light generic Giant-Robot RPG. For more information, you can page through the quickstart HERE.
I've had this idea rattling around in my skull since forever, but until I encountered MECHA, I'd not found a system which completely satisfied my giant robot itch without turning into a Palladium-esque nightmare. And since I found the tools and it's Macross' 30th Anniversary this year, I decided 'why not?'
I was thinking of setting the campaign in 2049, where the UN Government is at the height of it's colonization efforts, with a 'New Macross' class colonization fleet launching from the factory satellite in Earth orbit every year.
It is a time of unparalleled growth, though the omnipresent danger of rogue Zentraedi fleets and the darker thing that lurk among the stars continue to prey upon the fleets trailblazing a path across the void. Meanwhile, tensions between the more independent colonies and the central UN Government on Earth run high.
The PCs would be the latest batch of UN Spacy variable fighter pilots out of Officer Cader School and attached to an escort carrier operating on the edge of UN Space.
I've got some conversion work to wrap up before I can push out a formal recruitment request, but I was hoping to test the water to see if I was wasting my time.
My natural cynicism to fan-game releases has been overcome by the fact that it's a Wing Commander game. Sure, it looks a bit rough around the edges from the trailer, but what the heck... it's a Wing Commander game...
They don't make those anymore...
Please pardon me while my nostalgia runs in circles screaming "WOOOOOOOOoooooooooo!" for the next couple of minutes.
INFINITE GAME PUBLISHING TO PUBLISH MECHWARRIOR® ONLINE™
- Piranha Games brings the long-awaited MechWarrior® as a Free-To-Play PC game -
MONTREAL, QUEBEC, October 31, 2011 -- Infinite Game Publishing Inc. (www.infinitegamepublishing.com) and Piranha Games Inc. (www.piranha-games.com) have announced MechWarrior® Online™ (www.mwomercs.com), the first officially licensed free-to-play title in the long-standing and award-winning MechWarrior® franchise. MechWarrior Online is set to launch in the second half of 2012 from newly formed digital publisher, Infinite Game Publishing.
Set in the year 3049 during the early stages of a massive interstellar war, MechWarrior Online puts you in command of the most powerful war machine to ever walk the field of battle, the mighty BattleMech™. Command your Mech™ and customize it to suit your battlefield role; upgrade systems, replace weapons, and tweak armor with endless options.
MechWarrior Online lets players command at will: go head-to-head online alone or with friends in high-octane Conquest and VS modes. Band together and form your own Mercenary Corp, invite friends and battle other player-made Merc Corps for prestige and power. Pledge your allegiance to one of the five great houses and fight for control of precious Inner Sphere planets.
You will play a key role in a dynamic and ever-changing universe where player exploits impact the world around you and daily story updates and frequent content additions create epic changes to the Inner Sphere universe and its many inhabitants.
MechWarrior Online delivers a rich online experience, rewarding everything a player does with experience points, C-Bills, unlocks, and recognition. Upgrade skills and refine your role in gameplay using an all-new leveling system, and up-to-the minute detailed player statistics allow you to compare, track and share your progress with other players.
“We’re excited to lead the MechWarrior franchise online for fans of the series,” said Russ Bullock, co-founder of Piranha Games. “We’re proud to partner with Infinite Game Publishing, and are thankful for the fans of the MechWarrior series that have been so patient for the next MechWarrior game to arrive. Infinite Game is a partner who understands both the world of games publishing and the crucial technical needs of today’s AAA online gaming experiences. Together we are bringing fans epic next-generation Mech combat online in 2012.”
More information about MechWarrior Online at http://www.mwomercs.com.
About Piranha Games Inc.
Piranha Games Inc. was founded in January 2000 by Russ Bullock and Bryan Ekman. Piranha Games is focused on the core action games market and has worked on exciting IPs such as: Need For Speed®, Transformers® 2: Revenge of the Fallen and Duke Nukem Forever®. Please join us at http://www.piranha-games.com
About Infinite Game Publishing Inc.
Infinite Games is a newly formed publisher of AAA online interactive entertainment. Formed by industry vets with a passion for great games, IGP’s leadership is driving online entertainment forward by partnering with best-in-breed developers to bring high-octane excitement to PC gamers everywhere.
Official Web site: http://www.infinitegamepublishing.com
MechWarrior® is a registered trade-mark of Microsoft Corporation and is used under license. All other trade-marks are the property of their respective owners; ® or ™ as indicated.
There are a few BattleTech fans scattered around. Some of them hate the Jihad. Others hate the Clans.
This is not the book for you. Spoilers to follow.
Okay. Some Clanners are going to get really really upset at the outcome.
Condolences if your Clan got run over by the bus. If the following list makes you upset, you might not want to read on.
War of Reaving Survivors:
Home Clans:
Cloud Cobra
Coyote
Star Adder
Stone Lion (Hell's Horses remaining on Clan Homeworld)
Council of Six:
Diamond Sharks (Abjured, Fled to Inner Sphere)
Jade Falcons (Abjured)
Ghost Bears (Abjured, Merged with Free Rasalhague Republic to from Rasalhague Dominion)
Hell's Horses (Abjured, Fled to Inner Sphere)
Snow Raven (Abjured Fled to Inner Sphere, Merged with Outworld's Alliance to form Raven Alliance)
Wolf (Abjured)
Deep Periphery:
Goliath Scorpions (Abjured, Merged with Umayyad Caliphate and Nueva Castile to form Escorpión Imperio)
It all starts with Steel Vipers call for the Clans to remove the Inner Sphere taint. We have the homeworld Clans embracing total war, branding each other Dezgra and feuding politically as well as militarily. By the end, several Clans are gone and more have fled and the remains of Kerensky's glorious society is gone completely.
The book is a roller-coaster ride that wraps up plots left hanging since the Twilight of the Clans to the detriment of everyone involved. The book introduced the Society and it's Gene Caste, a hidden conspiracy concealed within the Scientist caste, gene-select viruses which ripped through the imbred Clan populations, orbital bombardment, the Dark Caste uprising, weaponized HPGs and everything else in between that makes the Word of Blake Jihad look almost plebeian in comparison.
I enjoyed the book in the same violently nihilistic way I enjoyed the Jihad. Ben Rome was given full rights to butcher Clan society, and he did. The man has done his homework and he's dragged just about everything even vaguely hinted at in the novels out into the open. We get to see whether the Clans overturn the Great Refusal. We get to see the fate of the Eridani Light Horse regiments stranded on Huntress. We get to see just how deep the Scientist Conspiracy goes. We get to see exactly what Russou Howell has been mucking around with after Twilight of the Clans. He's somehow managed to weave a neat tapestry of violence together from these messy separate strings (and killed a lot of Clanners in the process).
Later this year, we’ll release Ogre 6th Edition. It will be a very, very deluxe boardgame, with all the rules and units from Ogre, G.E.V., and Shockwave, as well as things that have only appeared in magazines and miniature releases.
Why? Because I want to. Ogre was my first design, and the boardgame version hasn’t been available for years. And people keep asking me for it. So some of our Munchkin money is going back to support the people who bought my very first game, by bringing them an edition with the best possible components.
It won’t be “Euro” style. No meeples, no plastic. This will be the kind of hex wargame that we dreamed about 30 years ago, back when our heroes were SPI and Avalon Hill. HUGE double-sided map boards. HUGE full-color counters with HUGE type. A HUGE box to hold them in. And giant constructible Ogres!
So why am I writing this letter? Not to say “Hey, distributors, we’ll do this if you like the idea.” I’m going to release this game, no matter what. If we don’t get enough distributor interest, we’ll release it for direct sales only, with (probably) a lower print run, and (certainly) a lower price, since we won’t have to build in the distributor and retailer margin.
But I don’t want to bypass distribution. We went through this with GURPS Russia, back in ’98. When we solicited it, the distributors said “Meh.” We believed in the book, and printed a short run for direct sales. Suddenly everybody wanted it! It sold out quickly, distributors and retailers demanded it, and we ended up reprinting it for distribution! I won’t go through that again.
Here’s why you may not want this game: It’s going to retail for $100, and it isn’t full of plastic toys. It’s a classic hex wargame, and those aren’t in fashion. Here’s why I hope you DO want it:
- It’s a humongous, heavy box that will have a huge shelf presence. How big is it? Over twice the size of Munchkin Quest. It takes three copies of the original edition of Ogre to cover up the word "OGRE" on this box.
- It’s got three huge mapboards with 1.5” hexes, and big full-color counters. The Ogre and building counters are 3-D constructible miniatures!
- I don’t expect to keep this in print. Realistically, I expect to print it once and let people spend the next 30 years fighting over the remaining copies. The people who get it are going to show it off at parties and conventions.
- It’s a pretty good game, if I say so myself. A lot of people remember it. (More than 25 years after its original release, Ogre won a spot in Hobby Games: The 100 Best.) Some of them would love to drop $100 for a beautiful version of the game they played 20 or 30 years ago, whether it was in high school, or in Germany or Kuwait or some classified spot in the middle of the Pacific.
I was almost sold until I saw the price tag. US$100 is a hefty chunk of change. Nevertheless, I'm torn. I grew up playing OGRE (getting my face kicked in as the conventional military), but to drop US$100 for OGRE entirely on the basis of nostalgia... is a tad painful (understatement).
At the same time, it's OGRE. It, Avalon Hill's Starship Troopers and BattleTech were the cornerstones of my geek existence.
Those who care would probably be happy to note that Kawamori keeps his promise and resolves the love triangle in the sequel.
Plot has gone completely off the rails from the TV series. Amusingly enough, there is a small cameo from a previous Macross.
As a fan, I am not happy with the final outcome. It provides closure and it's a well written ending that ties up most of the loose knots, but I'm not happy.
Very entertained and satisfied with the outcome, but not happy.
Movie plot spoiler:
Very bittersweet ending. Alto explains to Ranka that he can't love her. Professes that he's fallen for Sheryl but then gets blown up mid-sentence. Sheryl collapses into a coma afterwards through a combination of distress and V-Type infection...
Ranka closes with the hopeful musing that Alto will come back some day and then maybe Sheryl will regain consciousness.
The bleak ending hints that the two are still somehow linked through the fold quartz resonance.
The ending kept everyone glued in their seats until the credits rolled. There were exclamations of shock at the lack of a post-credit trailer.
Apparently ol' Shoji Kawamori went for the arthouse ending.
I'm very concerned about the Gunslinger's Targeting ability with it's potential to trivialize single creature encounters, which are already dubiously problematic to balance due to the issue of action economy.
I have no issue with called shots to the torso. A grit point for a 2x Crit Range is fine and dandy.
Head, Arm, Leg/Wing shots, I have issue with. Shouldn't there be a 'Save' attached to the effect somewhere? Or a check? Or a size restriction? Or something? Anything at all...
The ability of a Gunslinger to basically declare "Confused", "Drop Weapon", "Fall Over" and "No Fly Zone" on everything from a Mite to a Dragon gives the Gunslinger a bit too much battlefield control.
I know if I did this to my players, there'd be mutiny later.
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Covering Shot is a bit gimmicky as well. It 'feels' like a good idea, but shouldn't the target have some say in whether or not it's entangled? I can see an Orc hitting the deck to avoid getting shot, but pinning down a monster with DR or something like a Solar or Balor just because the Gunslinger couldn't aim for nuts feels a trite random. Annoying even.
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Pistol Whip. Grit to beat face in close combat. Very nice. Free ability to send someone to the floor is however a bit much. You don't get the secondary effect when being smacked around the head by a Lucerne Hammer or Greatclub, so why should a janky little person who just smashed you in the face with a pistol get to do the same?
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I want to like these effects. They're thematically awesome. I can't as a GM or player without feeling a bit guilty using them though, which is my issue. As they stand, I feel that these abilities should have some degree of limitations coded in rather than the free-for-all they currently are.
As much as the mental image of a Halfling sending a Colossal Dragon plummeting to the ground is amusing to me, I can see potential where it would not only be disruptive, but downright annoying.
I'll probably field test a Gunslinger ambush AS-IS in my current campaign shortly. Expect test reaction to follow.
During the siege of Rannick, my group of professional looters... erm... adventurers... decided to have the surviving Black Arrows and Shalelu run distraction while they infiltrated the Rannick from the hidden tunnels.
Long story short, Lucretia got away after the other Black Arrows stumbled into an ambush.
They've finally also noticed that Kaven "Backstabber" Windstrike and Shalelu have not returned, after last being seen running for their lives from an Ogre patrol.
Metagamers that they are, they've figured that there's no point worrying about it since it's OBVIOUSLY JUST THE DM REDUCING HIS NPC WORKLOAD and that this was just A CONVENIENT POINT TO WRITE HER OUT OF THE STORY and as such are currently focused on rebuilding Rannick and figuring out how to profiteer from it.
...
Hoo boy...
I've been dropping large hints that something spectacularly bad is going down at Skull's Crossing as well but they can't currently see past the $$$ signs embedded in their pupils and have assumed the flash flood was a localized event.
...
Any suggestions how to get things back on track? And for that matter, any idea what Barl Breakbones is likely to do with a captive? I figure Kaven is slimy enough to try and talk himself back into Lucretia's good graces. Alas poor loyal Shalelu... not so much...
I recently stumbled across this little gem of a freeware game which was rushed out for a competition.
http://zarat.us/tra/offline-games/eversion.html
It take some time to pick up the pace, so play it, stick with it and don't abandon the game early on. It's the most deceptively mind-blowing platformers I've ever played.
About time really. The books have been out of print for ages. I guess with Privateer Press trying to bring the system in house, they finally decided to re-release the 3.5 material.
The Paladin thread had me thinking... which is usually never a good thing. Over the course of the game I'm pretty much sure that everyone here has ignobly lost characters to the fickleness of the dice gods. Then there are those earth shaking character deaths worthy of epic ballads and manly tears.
Memorable deaths that players can look back on and hold their head high as they hand over the sheet and roll up a new character... (Or wait for someone to produce an expensive diamond).
Anyone here has a particular story of this nature to share?
I'm not particularly sure how to address a particular fracturing situation which seems to be developing in my particular gaming community and the trend of character optimization that seems to be a breeding ground for inter-player hostility.
The arguments usually goes something along the line of
"A Cleric/Cloistered Cleric/Druid is able, by synergistic application of class abilities, domains and spells, to outperform a Fighter/Barbarian/Paladin. You should play a Cleric/Cloistered Cleric/Druid."
"But I have a really cool character concept and background for my pure class fighter. Look... I have 20+ strength, hit stuff regularly and still contribute to the party."
"But this is far superior and your inferior class is a drain on party resources. This is a far more broken build."
"I DON'T want to play a Cleric..."
Needless to say, this gets even worse when someone plays a Cleric/Druid and doesn't follow the supposedly optimized builds. Meanwhile the players with optimized builds determine they have a point to prove and go around in games flaunting their outright superiority over the supposedly inferior builds. Clerics which cast Detect Traps and rub it in the rogue's face, Druids which maul the opposition and point it out to the fighter.
I mean, I can see one side of it; a more 'optimised' class build will work better and ensure smoother progress than a supposedly inferior class and I've always advocated responsible character generation (a supposedly great role-playing opportunity is still rubbish if you mechanically become an albatross to the rest of the group... someone once thought an Con 8 low AC melee bard was a spectacular idea... don't ask.) and even with much of Pathfinder's fixes, the old fundamental of magic means that at high levels, a caster can still produce a performance spike that far exceeds a high level fighter's capacity to work.
Yet there's the other side. A pure fighter/etc might not be the biggest baddest thing in the party, but he/she's contributing. And most importantly they're having fun in the group (and pretty much everyone else doesn't mind) and I don't begrudge a player having fun especially when they are contributing to the overall story (albeit at a reduced rate compared to earlier levels).
It's just I'm not sure how to respond in such situations when another player in the group basically tells the pure class fighter they're not pulling their weight and to shape up.
Honestly, I wish the two could reconcile their perspectives. The character optimisers argue that if everyone just built their characters better mechanically with their various tweaked and 'broken' builds, things would just work out more efficiently. The other players have started referring to character optimisers in terms that are not usable in polite company.
It's spectacularly getting annoying to the point where the community is fracturing into two groups with a great deal of animosity between players who are otherwise great people.
Does for anyone have a solution for a GM which is getting the brunt of getting stuck between groups?
There's Seoni getting pitched off a mountain by a stone golem in 'Sins of the Saviors', falling from a rope bridge in 'Flight of the Red Raven' and now getting blasted from a tower by a dragon in 'The Impossible Eye'.
Girl doesn't handle high places very well does she?
