Author Topic: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars  (Read 480768 times)

Mendrugo

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #270 on: 27 June 2013, 05:51:15 »
The New Dallas scenarios are Tracks, so you can use whatever force structure you like.  The only time specific units are named is in the fiction piece "Parting Gifts," which takes place at the tail end of the Marik assault.  By then, the militia is down to using whatever scattered units survived from the planetary militia through the Amaris occupation and the Marik nuclear assaults.  Most likely they had SLDF-level standardization in 2766, but that was a distant memory by 2787. 

Historical: Liberation of Terra volume II even notes that standardization disappeared during the course of the civil war, as shattered units were thrown together to form ad-hoc combat commands.  Only units that spent the war on rear-area garrison duty (like the one in "When the Bears Left") retained their homogenous company composition.

As for the Mariks, I believe it's been stated that only the SLDF went in for the standardization of units, while the House militaries used a hodge-podge of mixed forces.
« Last Edit: 27 June 2013, 07:39:37 by Mendrugo »
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

SCC

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #271 on: 27 June 2013, 06:01:42 »
I sort of figured that for the militia, but what about the Marik forces? Shouldn't they be homogenous?

Mendrugo

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #272 on: 27 June 2013, 06:37:47 »
They didn't seem to be using a homogenous TO&E in the only time we've seen FWL in action during the Star League era, in Rhean Marik's joint FWL/CC combat action on Wisconsin during the Freebooters' War. 

It's never been stated how the various Houses formed their forces in the 2600s and 2700s, but the various non-SLDF engagements we've seen (such as Wisconsin, and the battle in which the First Prince of the Federated Suns died in the War of Davion Succession, and when AFFS raiders attacked a Hegemony world in pursuit of pirates in "Infestation"), the House militaries have used a mix of forces, rather than an SLDF-style homogenous unit structure.

Likewise, contemporary battles (such as "Broken Blade" on Hesperus II) show that the DCMS and LCAF were both using diverse force groupings.
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

Mendrugo

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #273 on: 28 June 2013, 05:17:16 »
----- 2 Months Later -----

Date: July 26-27, 2899

Location: Deep Periphery (Iota 53136 9F)

Title: Half of a Warrior

Author: Philip A. Lee

Type: Short Story (BattleCorps)

Synopsis:  Snow Raven Point Commander Balla awakens inside her crippled Avar after a vicious firefight that tore away the entire rear section of her OmniFighter.  She notes the absence of her mother DropShip, the CSRS Razor Beak, and assumes it’s either returned to the JumpShip (the CSRS Nevermore) or been destroyed.  She laments the death of her pointmate, Tesha, and considers herself only half a warrior without a wingman.  She briefly considers suicide, but then notices the wreckage of another Avar nearby.

Balla relies on her pressure suit and departs her dead vessel.  She recalls that incoming fighters pounced on her point minutes after they discovered the CSRS Hailstorm hiding at a pirate point near a gas giant in this uninhabited system.  Though the Dark Caste is suspected in the theft of the JumpShip, Balla realizes that no half-trained bandit could have piloted the captured fighters with the skill the attackers demonstrated as they eliminated her Star.
 
With no remaining resources in her Avar, she kicks off and propels herself through the void to the drifting hulk of the other OmniFighter, correcting her flight path with her suit’s small maneuvering thrusters.  Looking into the other Avar’s cockpit, she is stunned to see the corpse of Snow Raven warrior Vasco of the Sukhanov bloodname house – not one of her starmates.  She wonders how it happened that he was shot down by her Star.

Fatigued, Bella removes Vasco’s corpse from the cockpit and sleeps for eight hours.  Upon awakening, she reviews his Avar’s systems and finds that the guidance computer is beyond repair.  Once again, she prepares to commit suicide, this time planning to set a course for the outer system and drifting until suffocation takes place.  However, she’s forestalled by the arrival of a vessel bearing Snow Raven markings, the Vincent-class CSRS Muninn.  However, it fails to respond to her hails.  With new, desperate hope, Bella kicks off from the Avar and tumbles through space on a collision course with the distant WarShip.

Notes:  It’s interesting to see a Sukhanov as one of the pilots from the Hailstorm.  In the elections, the entire Sukhanov bloodname house opposed Crow’s nomination of Cooper at Khan, yet Vasco believed Crow’s story of a Raven civil war in which he was on their side?  Despite the political maneuvering, the chain of command must be stronger than bloodname ties in the Snow Ravens, since Crow was the commander of Alpha Galaxy, of which Vasco and the troops aboard the Hailstorm were members.

Balla’s thoughts of suicide are emblematic of the nascent Clan concept that they are merely interchangeable cogs in a great machine, attaching little value to their lives.  Once the chance for glory and inclusion in the genetic program has been lost, Clan warriors find they have little to live for.  It must be particularly bad for Balla, since in losing her wingman/pointmate, she’s lost a lifelong friend and probably one of her few emotional connections to existence.
« Last Edit: 28 June 2013, 13:41:59 by Mendrugo »
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

Mendrugo

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #274 on: 28 June 2013, 23:31:34 »
----- Meanwhile, Aboard the Muninn… -----

Date: July 27, 2899

Location: CSRS Muninn - Deep Periphery (Iota 53136 9F)

Title: Half of a Warrior

Author: Philip A. Lee

Type: Short Story (BattleCorps)

Synopsis: Star Commodore Gregor McCorkell resents his posting to the CSRS Muninn.  He regards the Vincent-class corvette as a veritable “dinghy” consigned to backwater patrols through the Deep Periphery, and would much rather command a larger ship on a posting to the Homeworlds.  He recalls that this gloryless posting was due to having failed a surprise inspection aboard his former ship by saKhan Crow, and losing a subsequent naval Trial of Refusal (on simulators).  Acting on instructions from Khan Cooper, McCorkell orders a jump to Iota 53136 to check out the last known position of the missing CSRS Nevermore and CSRS Razor Beak.  They find the debris field, but a cursory sensor sweep detects no survivors.

The bridge routine is suddenly interrupted as an operations officer hears a thump on the hull.  Gregor initially dismisses it, but then listens more closely and identifies it as man-made.  The patrol fighters report that a person in a Snow Raven G-suit is pounding on the outer hull near the bridge.  He has the boarder taken aboard and debriefed.

When Gregor transmits Bella’s report to Khan Cooper on the ship’s mobile HPG, a heavily encrypted response comes back in fifteen minutes with a mysterious star map attached.  Stunned, Gregor realizes that this is the first leg of the Exodus Road – supposedly for the Khans’ eyes only, with the Snow Ravens holding the data for the first leg.  According to the map, Iota 53126 is the sixth jump from the Pentagon worlds along the route.  Logically, the next place to search for the missing Hailstorm would be further down the Exodus Road.

Notes:  It’s interesting to see historical and literary references in Clan naming conventions, given Nicholas’ evident desire to make a clean break with Spheroid culture by purging Clan databases and caches of Spheroid items like books.  In the Jade Phoenix trilogy, Horse is scandalized to find out that Aidan has found and is concealing a stash of forbidden books.  Yet McCorkell’s ship is named for one of Odin’s ravens from Norse mythology, and Balla’s DropShip draws its name from Poe’s “The Raven.”  If pre-spaceflight poetry and Nordic mythology were retained (otherwise, the names would be meaningless), what was purged?

It’s not mentioned in the story, but I presume that Balla’s flight suit, in addition to having a 48-hour oxygen supply, fuel, and maneuvering jets, also has some pretty strong magnetic clamps, since otherwise (unless she found a convenient handhold on the outer hull), her first knock on the hull would cause her to float off into space again.

Gregor mentions a failed Trial of Refusal against his assignment, fought using simulators.  I wonder how those are handled.  ‘Mech simulators put the pilots at controls identical to what they’d have in the cockpit and simulate the experience of being in a ‘Mech.  But for a WarShip simulation, I imagine it’s something like the Kobiyashi Maru test at the beginning of “The Wrath of Khan,” with a full bridge mockup for each commander involved and the test being one of their relative command abilities.  This sort of testing would seem to depend greatly on the relative qualities of the bridge crews as well.  Is there a schoolyard pick for bridge crew?; Do commanders bring their own handpicked crew with them to the trial (and would that crew share in the penalties if its side loses?); or do the Ravens maintain teams of Technician Caste members who are carefully balanced in skill levels who serve as balanced bridge crews to make sure the contest is decided only through command ability?

A further point -  Gregor's disdain for his Vincent is interesting, to say the least, considering that after the destruction of the Dagda shipyard and cache, and the looting of other caches by the Wolverines, plus the losses from the battle of Barbados, there simply aren't that many WarShips left in Clan space.  Command of any WarShip should be a matter of pride for anyone in the naval-focused Snow Raven Clan.  It's possible that the Clans haven't yet brought new shipyards online with sufficient capacity to service the active WarShip fleets.  I'm using the TRO:2750 picture of the Vincent to represent the Muninn at this juncture, but my guess is that, by the first half of the 2900s, the Clans had sufficiently advanced their naval technology and their shipyard capacity to execute full refits on their WarShips, resulting in the radically altered silhouettes seen in TRO:3057.  I doubt that Gregor would be complaining about his ship if it had been refitted with upgraded tech since the battle of Barbados, now more than 75 years in the past.

[EDIT]: Since the next scene shows the ship using expanded fighter bays (10 instead of 6), it must have already been refitted to Mk 42 stats and appearance.  Gregor just likes to complain.

The most common Star League version of the Vincent (the Mk 39) moves 4/6 and packs 4 NAC/10s, 2 Barracuda launchers, and 8 Large Lasers for fighter defense (along with six fighter bays and four small craft bays).  The Clan refit (the Mk 42) has the same armament, but upgrades the fighter complement from 6 to 10 (to accommodate a star rather than a squadron) and boosts the armor protection by switching to ferro-carbide, as well as putting in a lithium-fusion battery for double-jumps and harjel-based hull sealing technology.
« Last Edit: 30 June 2013, 06:14:26 by Mendrugo »
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #275 on: 29 June 2013, 10:07:07 »
I wonder if some of the Ravens are making run for the Inner Sphere.  How big is this Half of a Warrior serial?
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Frabby

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #276 on: 29 June 2013, 14:26:20 »
It's no serial, just a single story. Mendrugo is going over it with a very fine-toothed comb and giving lots of context info here. 
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Mendrugo

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #277 on: 29 June 2013, 15:08:16 »
My practice, in general, is to do one entry per scene, though multiple scenes may be amalgamated if they use the same characters in the same location on the same day.  Friday's entry and Saturday's entry are in the same system, but aboard different vessels and with different POV characters, so I consider them separate scenes.
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

Mendrugo

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #278 on: 29 June 2013, 23:05:30 »
----- 2 Days Later -----

Date: July 29, 2899

Location: Deep Periphery (Gamma 4617 4E)

Title: Half of a Warrior

Author: Philip A. Lee

Type: Short Story (BattleCorps)

Synopsis:  Gregor’s analysis of the Khan’s message proved correct – the Muninn has discovered the Hailstorm at the nadir jump point of the next system along the Exodus Road and scrambled its fighters to intercept the rogue vessel.  Balla has been given an antiquated Hellcat II and paired with a freebirth pointmate, Meghan, for this operation, both of which she deeply resents, as a Trueborn accustomed to OmniFighters.

Fighters from the Hailstorm engage the Muninn’s squadron, and Balla gets over her disdain for Meghan as the freeborn pilot demonstrates even greater skill than Balla’s own.  She recalls her training – without a pointmate, a pilot is only half a warrior.  As the Hailstorm prepares to make an emergency jump, Bella rams its K-F drive core with her fighter.

Notes:  Star Commodore Gregor McCorkell guessed right by coming in at the nadir jump point (though it wouldn’t have mattered if they guessed wrong, since their L-F battery would have allowed the ship to pop directly from the zenith to the nadir if they’d come in there instead).  However, his decision to appear “close enough to be detected” yet “far enough away to avoid the risk of enemy fighter patrols” seems overly cautious.  Popping in within weapons range would have allowed the Muninn to have used its NAC/10 to quickly cripple the thin-skinned (4-6 capital armor per facing) Star Lord and slap down any DropShips that got uppity, while its nearly 20 capital armor points on each facing would have rebuffed the attacks of the Hailstorm’s CAP long enough for it to launch its own fighter star, especially since it has the capability to engage small ships with its laser and missile batteries.  McCorkell clearly lacks respect for the innate capabilities of his much-maligned vessel.

Color me wrong about the model of the ship!  Since it has the expanded bays, then the Muninn must have already been refitted by this point.  It's unclear, though, whether it's the full Mk 42 or some intermediate upgrade (say, Mk 41 or 40), because we lack data on whether or not it has a lithium-fusion battery.  Shortly after the Muninn jumps in, the Hailstorm attempts to jump out, and Balla receives urgent orders to stop it from doing so.  Whether this is because the Muninn would need to recharge before pursuing (lacking an LF battery) or because they could follow with the LF charge, but couldn't know for sure where their prey had gone isn't specified.  Ferro carbide armor debuted in the 2300s, and lamellor ferro carbide in the 2600s, and HarJel was available prior to 2868 (when Clan Sea Fox traded it to the Wolves for Elemental technology).  So Gregor doesn't even have the excuse of his ship having been passed over for an upgrade.  He just feels inadequate lone-wolfing it in a corvette designed to operate as part of a squadron.

By now, we know quite a few of the systems along the Exodus Road:

Zulu 11981 TZ (Pentagon -5 Jumps) - Nicholas was on Circe seven weeks before reaching this point, and assuming some organizational lag in getting the fleet together and transiting from Circe to the jump point, I assume this is five jumps out).
Iota 53136 9F (Pentagon -6 Jumps) - Stated as being the sixth system on the Exodus Road from the Pentagon.
Gamma 4617 4E (Pentagon -7 Jumps) - Stated as being the seventh system on the Exodus Road from the Pentagon
Gamma 12901 FQ (Pentagon -12 Jumps) - The Wolverine fleet is here one jump before reaching Barbados.
Gamma 1551 AV (Barbados; Pentagon -13 Jumps) - Nicholas' fleet made it back to Strana Mechty from Barbados in four months, so I guesstimate that it's 13 jumps from the Pentagon (which is about three jumps from Strana Mechty).
Gamma 25098 3W (Pentagon -14 Jumps) - This was one jump past Barbados.
Gamma 1301 LW (Pentagon -15 or 16 Jumps) - This was the point where Nicholas realized he'd been tricked and had half the Grand Fleet turn around.
 
Charlie 425 A - Unoccupied system somewhere between Clan Space and the Exodus Road.  Either it's way off the main charts, or Hallis was going very slowly, since it takes him seven months to reach Barbados from Charlie 425 A, whereas Nicholas Kerensky and the Grand Fleet returned to Strana Mechty from Barbados in only four months.

The numbering conventions don't appear to tell us anything, but I'm intrigued by the alphabetic designations of the systems.  Do you suppose those designations correspond to grid sectors?  Gamma appears to cover a lot - from the 7th to the 15th, while Iota is only one system between Gamma and Zulu.  That might be consistent with the Exodus Road having just traversed a corner of Grid Iota, while proceeding diagonally along the longest stretch of Grid Gamma.
« Last Edit: 30 June 2013, 06:17:48 by Mendrugo »
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

Mendrugo

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #279 on: 01 July 2013, 05:14:28 »
----- 1 Week Later -----

Date: August 7, 2899

Location: Lum

Title: Half of a Warrior

Author: Philip A. Lee

Type: Short Story (BattleCorps)

Synopsis:  Bennett discusses the campaign to retake Hellgate with saKhan Crow, who warns him that the Raven council is close to declaring a vote of no confidence against him for squandering resources on the search for the Hailstorm.

Bennett responds by dropping the hammer on Crow, informing him that he’s discovered Crow’s political maneuvering to undercut Khan Siegel during the earlier fighting on Hellgate – delaying reinforcements and interfering with communications between Lum and the Khan’s forces.  Based on information recovered from the Hailstorm, Bennett is aware that Crow himself ordered the crew of the Hailstorm to take its Alpha Galaxy forces and flee down the Exodus Road, telling them there had been a schism in the Clan and to consider other Snow Ravens as hostiles.

SaKhan Crow responds that his actions were justified, because Khan Siegel had shown herself to be unworthy by letting the Steel Vipers gain a foothold on Hellgate in the first place.  Bennett accuses him of fearing to challenge her directly, and instead working to undercut her and then to humiliate and destroy Bennett, her ristar protégé, so that Crow could be hailed as the Clan’s savior.  Bennett tells Crow that not only did his actions cause the deaths of 43 warriors lost in the fighting to recover the Hailstorm, but it has delayed the Raven counterattack and allowed the Steel Vipers to fortify Hellgate, making it impossible to retake.

Stunned, Crow can only whisper that Bennett was never supposed to find the Hailstorm, and that nobody was supposed to die.  Bennett plans to inform the Raven Council of Crow’s actions, and then permit as many Trials of Position as necessary to reduce him to Point Commander, and then assign him to latrine duty on the Muninn.

Notes:  All ends well for Star Commodore McCorkell, who had been busted by Crow, and will now be taking the former saKhan’s place as head of Alpha Galaxy.  One wonders why, given the relative rarity of WarShips, any of them would be allowed to fall into disrepair and disgrace.  I guess the reason may be that under the Clan philosophy, WarShips only Trial against other WarShips, and a tiny corvette like the Vincent doesn’t have a chance against battlewagons like the Black Lion and Aegis.  Thus, being assigned to one means either never getting to fight, or being consigned to inevitable losses in Trials.  Either way, opportunities to enhance one’s codex would be few and far between.

It’s interesting that Crow gets such a lambasting for his political maneuverings.  Setting up an artificial crisis to advance one’s own political power should fit right in with the Raven focus on politics, and is a time honored Clan tradition handed down from Founder Nicholas, as we’ve seen.  Probably the rage is not from playing politics with lives and the fortunes of the Clan, but for having done it so poorly.

One wonders, though, exactly how Khan Bennett got word of the events out on the Exodus Road so quickly.  Since the story establishes that they were on the seventh jump from the Pentagon on the Exodus Road, that's up to 205 LY away, and the maximum range of an HPG burst is only 50 LY.  The following scene establishes that the Muninn is still at Gamma 4617 4E.  This also begs the question of how the Muninn checked in with Lum while they were parked at Iota 53136 9F (up to 174 LY from the Pentagon).  One possibility is that the Muninn was operating in conjunction with a Naval Star of communications vessels - ten JumpShips with onboard HPGs that formed a relay back to Lum and adjusted their positions to stay in contact with the Muninn as it pursued the Hailstorm.  If that's the case, then there could have been another ship in the chain at Zulu 11981 TZ, and so on.  That would give the Muninn a 550 LY range in which it could remain in communication with Lum.  I think this is the most likely response, since I find it highly doubtful that there would be the kind of automated HPG repeater stations like the Clans built for communications between the Homeworlds and the Inner Sphere in support of Operation REVIVAL, since the Exodus Road was supposed to be a secret at this point.
« Last Edit: 01 July 2013, 05:29:40 by Mendrugo »
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #280 on: 02 July 2013, 06:19:14 »
----- 1 Day Later -----

Date: August 8, 2899

Location: CSRS Muninn - Deep Periphery (Gamma 4617 4E)

Title: Half of a Warrior

Author: Philip A. Lee

Type: Short Story (BattleCorps)

Synopsis:  Balla regains consciousness in the Muninn’s sickbay, having ejected at the last moment before her Hellcat II slammed into the Hailstorm’s hull.  Though quickly recovered from space, she broke her collarbone in the ejection.  Meghan informs her that she stands to receive the Order of the Raven for her heroism.

Since that initial battle together, Balla and Meghan have bonded, and are no longer “half warriors,” but a fully unified team, despite the Trueborn/Freeborn mixture. 

Notes:  This section gives us some unique insight into the Snow Raven sibko process.  As children, Snow Raven pilots are trained in pairs (owing to the two fighters = one point system) at the McKenna Naval facility.  Balla and her former pointmate, the Trueborn Tesha, had even sworn to die together in combat to avoid the psychological damage resulting from losing a lifelong partner.  Does this imply that Snow Raven fighter pilots take their Trials of Position in tandem, and pass or fail together?
« Last Edit: 02 July 2013, 06:26:11 by Mendrugo »
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #281 on: 02 July 2013, 16:42:51 »
Notes:  This section gives us some unique insight into the Snow Raven sibko process.  As children, Snow Raven pilots are trained in pairs (owing to the two fighters = one point system) at the McKenna Naval facility.  Balla and her former pointmate, the Trueborn Tesha, had even sworn to die together in combat to avoid the psychological damage resulting from losing a lifelong partner.  Does this imply that Snow Raven fighter pilots take their Trials of Position in tandem, and pass or fail together?

I would think it depend if this story had any impact on canon behavior in the sourcebooks.  I don't think I've read anything that suggested tandem dependence of pilots. Blood of Kerensky series, Phelan Kell's Pilot friend, Carew Nygren, didn't have anyone pilot related hanging out with him.

Elementals in fiction (novels at least) don't, Test of Vengeance  on the future Khan of the Hell's Horses (didn't happen until off camera in the Jihad).  Focused on Jake who only had one sibkos attached to him side until she died during the 1st Combine-Dominion War.

If anything, it would been unique for Ravens unless its in a source book anywhere.
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Mendrugo

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #282 on: 02 July 2013, 16:53:00 »
I think the implication is that the Snow Ravens have some unique training philosophies for their aerospace pilots to ensure that they're the best of the best, given the Clan's special focus on aerospace combat.
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #283 on: 03 July 2013, 03:09:45 »
----- 6 Years Later -----

Date: October 7, 2905

Location: Barcella

Title: Whispering Death

Author: Philip A. Lee

Type: Short Story (BattleCorps)

Synopsis:  On the eve of her judgment by the Nova Cat Clan Council, Star Captain Madeline of the 179th Striker Cluster undertakes a vision quest ceremony under the supervision of Loremaster Kyle Devalis, but the mix of fasting, sleep deprivation, and toxic smoke inhalation (from the burning of her "vineers" - battle trophies) fails to produce any prophetic foresight.  Frustrated, she believes that one more day of privation would have tipped the balance.

Notes:  Based on what we saw in “Pulsar,” some people in the BattleTech universe may indeed have prophetic visions from time to time, but if Carolina Devalis’ reference to having inherited the ability from her mother is accurate, then Madeline (of the Morris bloodname house) is hoping to achieve such a vision through ritual rather than genetics.  (Notably, Carolina was neither hungry nor huffing fumes prior to her vision of a Cameron Star going supernova, screaming its rage at the universe, only a short time before Simon Cameron’s death.)

Interestingly, the techniques being used are remarkably similar to those of Clan Coyote, which inherited its vision quest rituals from Dana Kufahl, who’d grown up among the tribes of the American southwest during the Amaris occupation.  One wonders whether the Nova Cats developed their rituals independently, or if they were introduced by ex-Coyote bondsmen.  I can see the other Nova Cat bloodname houses coming to covet the Devalis bloodline’s genetic gift for visions/foresight (if indeed that exists), and trying to replicate it through ritual.  Notably, the Loremaster in this story is a Devalis, so he may have achieved his position on the strength of successful visions.

Per the Invading Clans sourcebook, the 179th Striker Cluster's nickname is "Circle of Power," and it belongs to Sigma Galaxy.  FM: ComStar indicates that Sigma isn't particularly renowned, compared to other Galaxies, but was used extensively during the Golden Century to expand Nova Cat holdings, bringing them into conflict with most other Clans.  A particularly brutal clash in 2888 (17 years before this story) led to a long-standing feud with Clan Hell's Horses.  The Galaxy is known for its adaptive tactics, allowing it to outmaneuver its opponents in the field.

Pondering the bloodname “Morris” in the “Nova Cat” Clan, I can’t help but think that it’s a very obscure in-joke, since a major pet food brand (9Lives) uses “Morris the Cat” as a mascot in their advertisements.
« Last Edit: 03 July 2013, 03:19:28 by Mendrugo »
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #284 on: 03 July 2013, 04:19:48 »
Notes:  Based on what we saw in “Pulsar,” some people in the BattleTech universe may indeed have prophetic visions from time to time
No. Not in a technical sense, at least. Herb Beas was very clear on the matter in his Line Developer ruling - there is no such thing as true prophetic visions in the BT universe. And I am 101% behind him in this.

An accurate description would be that supernatural stuff is as "real" in the BT universe as it is in the real world - it's technically impossible to confirm its non-existence, but there is no proof of its existence either. Anything can be tagged as "supernatural" if the defining aspects are unclear enough. In this sense there may be prophetic visions in the BT universe, but they wouldn't contain genuine or even helpful information about the future beyond guessing. (Just ask a Nova Cat - if you can find one - how much good their visions did them...)

Those inclined to believe in the supernatural will always find an excuse in the invariably wonky "mechanics" of how their field of esoterics is supposed to work, to explain why it didn't work this time.
As for prophecies, probability dictates that there will be random hits, and more importantly, hindsight will allow later reinterpretation to match the "vision" with the facts that went down.
« Last Edit: 03 July 2013, 04:22:03 by Frabby »
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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #285 on: 03 July 2013, 04:41:53 »
Herb has since backtracked a little bit and said that it's "open to limited interpretation."  Make of that what you will.

Looking at the "Nova Cat Paradox" sidebar in FM: Updates, it asks why the vaunted Nova Cat visions didn't help the Cats prepare for the Abjuration, and questions whether Khans Leroux and Carns lied about having a vision of the future.  Note the lack of the Devalis name, there.  Thus my theory that the Devalis bloodline may have something unique, on a limited basis, but that the rest of the bloodlines are just faking it, like the Coyotes.  Due to the genemixing over time, it's possible that some of the other bloodlines may have picked up a bit of the Devalis talent, but it would theoretically be strongest in a pure Devalis.

According to Historical: Operation KLONDIKE, Khan Sandra Rosse established the tradition of fasting and meditating for visions, and using those to set policy, but it was her successor (Isabella Devalis?) who says she "had a dream that the Wolverines would one day cause more deaths, more suffering, more chaos than all of us know, and saw a Ghost Bear bleeding."  Again, the spot on vision (the Wolverine taint in the Ghost Bear genetics program) came from a dream, not a ritual, and could have been linked to a Devalis.

Looking at the RPG rules, the Nova Cat package includes Sixth Sense and Edge as standard elements, suggesting that there's enough of "something" there to have a gameplay mechanic effect.
« Last Edit: 03 July 2013, 05:10:04 by Mendrugo »
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #286 on: 04 July 2013, 02:59:02 »
----- 1 Day Later -----

Date: October 8, 2905

Location: Barcella

Title: Whispering Death

Author: Philip A. Lee

Type: Short Story (BattleCorps)

Synopsis:  Galaxy Commander Tristan Morris chairs the session of the Nova Cat council that has convened to pass judgement on Madeline.  The jury consists of five bloodnamed warriors, while a few dozen spectators from Madeline’s Trinary are present as witnesses.  Tristan charges Madeline with willfully attempting to destroy his genetic legacy, due to her failure to win a Trial of Possession defending it against the Smoke Jaguars.  The jury finds her guilty of conspiring with the Smoke Jaguars, causing the deaths of her starmates, and dereliction of duty – all stemming from her having led her Star into a Smoke Jaguar ambush during the Trial of Possession, and having the misfortune to be the sole survivor.

As punishment, the Council sentences her to Abjuration, giving her five days to depart the Nova Cat enclave.  If she is found on Nova Cat lands following that period, she will be imprisoned and executed.  Though Madeline proposes a Trial of Abjuration to defeat the verdict, Tristan informs her that she’d have to defeat eighteen opponents in a row to prove victorious, which she recognizes as a death sentence.  She tears her insignia and codex from her tunic, crushes them underfoot, and leaves the Council chamber.

Star Colonel Lucien Nostra, one of the few who believed in Madeline’s innocence, attempts to appeal for clemency to Galaxy Commander Morris afterward, but is sternly rebuffed.  Lucien leaves, chastised, but still hopes to find a way to restore Madeline to her rightful place in the Clan.

Notes:  Interestingly, despite the tradition mentioned in the Blood of Kerensky novels that the bloodname eligibility descends matrilineally, Madeline records that her sibko was made by combining the genes of Tristan Morris with former saKhan Zachary Drummond.  So why was Morris selected as the “matrilineal” member of the pairing?  How did that work, anyways?  Did they strip the genetic material out of a third-party’s egg, then insert Tristan’s genes in its place?

Digging a bit, Warriors of Kerensky has the answer: That’s exactly what they did. – “Clan scientists can take DNA strands from two individuals and use recombinant techniques to splce them into sperm and ova gametes, creating a zygote irrespective of the gender of the donors.  Therefore, a male warrior can be a ‘gene-mother’ if his DNA is spliced into an ovum.”  The “Warriors of the Double Helix” sidebar notes that this technique is rare, and that in-vitro fertilization is the usual practice.

Warriors of Kerensky also clarifies that a Ritual of Abjuration is used to kick out disaffected Clan citizens (from any caste) into the bandit Caste.  The Abjured have five days to surrender anything that belongs to the Clan and leave Clan space.  They may be killed on sight if found afterwards.  This serves to purge agitators from Clan society and replenishes the ranks of the Dark Caste.  Rather than this being seen as a threat, the Warriors generally regard it as an opportunity for low-risk live fire combat exercises to keep themselves sharp.  Interestingly, mentioning the name of someone who has been Abjured is considered grounds for a Circle of Equals, sharing the taboo nature of the Ritual of Annihilation (thus the “Not-Named Clan”).
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #287 on: 05 July 2013, 05:13:11 »
----- 11 Days Later -----

Date: October 19, 2905

Location: Barcella

Title: Whispering Death

Author: Philip A. Lee

Type: Short Story (BattleCorps)

Synopsis:  Staggering through the desert wastes, Madeline attempts to stay alive while avoiding Nova Cat settlements.  She has no plan of where to go or what to do, other than to avoid contact with her former society.  Unfortunately, the stream she’d been heading for is marked on her map, but has since dried up.  Without water, she collapses and is set upon by Barcellan raptors (orange-tufted panther-sized flying predatory avians) which are looking for a snack.

She awakens in a Dark Caste encampment, having been found by the group’s hunters when they came in search of raptor meat.  The band’s leader, Alban, tells her that he was abjured after murdering his Star Colonel.  He tells Madeline that she’s no longer bound by Clan laws and principles, and has the freedom to walk her own path.  He directs her to see a man called Saint Anthony for help in “procuring lost items.”

Notes:  Strangely, despite having five days to get her affairs in order before departing Clan territory, Madeline appears to have taken less than an hour to prepare – taking basic survival gear from her barracks and a hastily sketched map copied from an atlas before heading out into the wilderness.  One wonders to what extent the Nova Cat Watch is/was responsible for making sure that freshly Abjured individuals don’t try to use those five days to set up caches out in the wilderness they can get to and live off of or try to make contact with the Dark Caste via the black markets to ease their transition.  Perhaps Madeline was aware that there would be such surveillance activity, and knew that if she didn’t act immediately, she wouldn’t even have ration bars and a canteen to use later.
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #288 on: 06 July 2013, 05:26:39 »
----- 12 Days Later -----

Date: October 31, 2905

Location: Barcella

Title: Whispering Death

Author: Philip A. Lee

Type: Short Story (BattleCorps)

Synopsis:  Back at Pulsar Station, Lucien bemoans the loss of the potential he saw in Madeline, and worries about how she’s faring out beyond the borders of the Nova Cat enclave.  He speaks with Galaxy Commander Tristan, who is perturbed that the 179th Striker Cluster’s failure to deploy offworld on schedule.  MechWarrior Paulos informs the commanders that the delay is due to a misrouting of parts and an AWOL MechWarrior – Yumi – who is presumed to be drunk.

As the command staff discuss logistics, Paulos takes a sniper’s bullet to the head.  Half a kilometer away, Madeline embraces her ancient FNF-J12 sniper rifle, recovered by Dark Caste prospectors from an abandoned Brian Cache.  The rifle had been left behind by the Clans because it had no place in a society based on dueling, but Madeline has embraced it as the perfect tool for exacting her vengeance in her new rules-free existence.

Notes:  Placing Madeline “more than half a kilometer” from the DropPort sounds okay on paper, but that’s only 500 meters – 16 hexes on the BattleTech maps.  (An UrbanMech could cover that distance in less than a minute.)  In the Inner Sphere, that would be well within the DropPort’s security perimeter, and would be easy to secure if a whole Cluster is present at the port, ready to ship out.  This, to me, indicates that Clan perimeter security is criminally lax by Inner Sphere standards – a cultural bias, since almost all combat is preceded by ritualized batchalls, bidding, and designation of a circle of equals.  It is this ingrained blind spot that allows the Dark Caste to remain an active threat to the Clans, even when they’re little more than savages on horseback armed with bolt-action rifles (as seen in the Jade Phoenix books).
« Last Edit: 10 July 2013, 16:30:50 by Mendrugo »
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #289 on: 06 July 2013, 07:51:03 »
Notes:  Placing Madeline “more than half a kilometer” from the DropPort sounds okay on paper, but that’s only 500 meters – 16 hexes on the BattleTech maps.  (An UrbanMech could cover that distance in less than a minute.)  In the Inner Sphere, that would be well within the DropPort’s security perimeter, and would be easy to secure if a whole Cluster is present at the port, ready to ship out.  This, to me, indicates that Clan perimeter security is criminally lax by Inner Sphere standards – a cultural bias, since almost all combat is preceded by ritualized batchalls, bidding, and designation of a circle of equals.  It is this ingrained blind spot that allows the Dark Caste to remain an active threat to the Clans, even when they’re little more than savages on horseback armed with bolt-action rifles (as seen in the Jade Phoenix books).

Seems like their security is really lacked.  I guess the Dark Caste normally doesn't attempt to do such things.  Without the reading the story, i'd assume the DropPort is properly basic ferrocrette pad for dropships and some hangers.

Does ATOW cover this particular weapon in sense of a sniper rifle being able reach out and kill someone like story describes?
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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #290 on: 06 July 2013, 08:03:57 »
I don't have access to my books now (on vacation, posting from iPad), but I looked it up when I did the writeup, and the 500 meter effective range is consistent with the stats for the sniper rifle.

Be interesting to use the advanced infantry platoon construction rules to kit out a force with sniper rifles and start whittling away at enemy infantry from 16 hexes away.
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #291 on: 07 July 2013, 06:56:02 »
----- 3 Months Later -----

Date: January 11, 2906

Location: Hoard

Title: Whispering Death

Author: Philip A. Lee

Type: Short Story (BattleCorps)

Synopsis:  The Nova Cat holdings on Hoard (a series of mining complexes) are under threat from Ice Hellion trials.  Lucien intends to use the 179th Striker Cluster to halt their string of victories.  He reviews a report, just in via HPG, that investigators have no new evidence behind the sniper attack at Pulsar Station on Barcella.

Star Colonel Lucien contacts the Ice Hellion commander and challenges her to a Trial of Refusal over the mining complex she just conquered, wanting to seize the initiative rather than wait to defend against an Ice Hellion Trial of Possession for another Nova Cat facility.  In the Trial, Lucien will lead his troops from a Marauder IIC, hoping to catch the nimble Ice Hellions in a trap that will eliminate their mobility and bring a Nova Cat victory.

Star Commander Sol demands a brevet field promotion to Star Captain for the Trial, given the absence of Star Captain Paulos.  Before Lucien can respond, Sol goes down with a hole blown in his skull.  Panicking, Lucien grasps Galaxy Commander Tristan’s arm and escorts him to his ‘Mech, where he’d be safe from sniper fire.  Lucien has a gnawing suspicion that he knows who the sniper is, but doesn’t know how Madeline could possible be pulling off her attacks.

Notes:  The Nova Cats’ use of the term “Trial of Refusal” seemed odd to me, since what they were proposing seemed, to me, more in line with a new Trial of Possession.  I posed the question to the Line Developers, and received the answer that it is not possible, under Clan rules, to conduct a Trial of Refusal against the outcome of another Trial.  Trials of Refusal can be issued against, say, executive decisions by commanders or by the Clan Council (or Grand Council), but Trial results are considered final, lest things degenerate into a permanent feud.  Trials of Possession also generally don’t continue ad infinitum back and forth, so after a loss, the losing Clan doesn’t declare a new Trial of Possession unless the situation on the ground has markedly changed.  In this case, the arrival of the 179th provides the impetus for a new Trial. 

Given the clarification from the Line Developer, Lucien seems to have misspoken when he called for a Trial of Refusal, when he actually meant a Trial of Possession.  (Line Developer Herbert Beas did cite this incident as a sign of the Nova Cats’ early deviancy from Clan ways…though that may have been tongue in cheek, given that Clan’s eventual shuffle off the mortal coil.)

The Nova Cat officers seem unusually disoriented by the sniper attacks, which seems odd, given how seemingly blasé the Snow Ravens were about alleged Dark Caste bandits stealing an entire Alpha Galaxy JumpShip.  The Snow Raven experience implies that Dark Caste pirate attacks are commonplace by this point, and engagements between bandits and Clan warriors would probably exclusively consist of ambushes, so why is Galaxy Commander Tristan so shocked at the attacker’s “cowardly” behavior.  Was he expecting a Dark Caste bandit to issue a batchall?
« Last Edit: 10 July 2013, 16:37:21 by Mendrugo »
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #292 on: 08 July 2013, 05:55:14 »
----- 1 Day Later -----

Date: January 12, 2906

Location: Hoard

Title: Whispering Death

Author: Philip A. Lee

Type: Short Story (BattleCorps)

Synopsis:  Despite losing Sol to a sniper attack, Lucien’s forces have defeated the Ice Hellions’ 45th Striker Irregulars and reclaimed the mining complex.  However, Lucien notes that his troops took more damage than they should have, being distracted and on edge due to the sniper attacks.  Upon returning to base, he receives word of another sniper victim back on Barcella – MechWarrior Yumi, who appears to have been shot in the head before the departure of the 179th from that world.  Galaxy Commander Tristan orders Lucien to ignore futher batchalls from the Ice Hellions and Star Adders, and prioritize the elimination of the sniper.  Lucien notes the rising level of fear in the Galaxy Commander, something he hasn’t seen in a Clanner since his sibko days.

Lucien meets briefly with Oathmaster Kyle Devalis, who is preparing for to defend against a new Trial challenge from the Ice Hellions, who want to take a crack at another Nova Cat mining complex.  As a result of their conversation, both realize with surprise that Galaxy Commander Tristan has bid elements of the 179th without informing Lucien, a major breach of chain of command and protocol.

Nonplussed, Lucien inquires about Madeline, telling Kyle that she’s the one picking off his men.  The two realize that Madeline is obsessed with having failed in her previous vision quest, during which she sacrificed all her battle trophies (vineers) in a bonfire and inhaled the smoke.  It appears that she’s attempting to restock her veneer supply by killing off Trueborns, in the hopes of achieving success in a new vision quest.  However, they note that she hasn’t targeted Tristan, the man most directly responsible for her abjurement, and resolve to find out why.

The Ritual of Battle consists of a huge bonfire on the parade grounds of Firebase Titan, surrounded by BattleMechs, while their pilots gather around the bonfire to celebrate the coming combat.  Madeline watches from the shadows, having used the Dark Caste smuggling network to pursue her quarry to Hoard and to slip through Nova Cat security with purloined encryption codes obtained from Saint Anthony’s local counterpart.  At the Ritual, speakers stand on a raised platform and recount tales of bravery, honor and triumph.  However, she can see the fear on their faces and hear it in their words – the fear of dying without honor as the next victim of the “Whispering Death.”  Her internal monologue reveals that she’s been targeting only the surviving members of her Trinary who supported Tristan Morris’ false allegations of collusion with the Smoke Jaguars.  Tristan will be her final kill.  But that’s for later.  Now, Madeline decapitates MechWarrior Galene mid-sentence, then flees for her safehouse.

Notes:  This story provides a unique look into the capabilities and practices of the Dark Caste.  When the Dark Caste first appeared (in the Jade Phoenix trilogy), they were almost laughably unthreatening – neo-savages riding through the wilderness on horseback using bolt-action rifles, braiding their hair and calling their leaders anti-Khans.  I’m sure the Grand Council didn’t lose a lot of sleep over that.

However, the Dark Caste groups that Madeline has hooked up with have shown a much higher level of sophistication than the stumblebums with whom Aidan associated (though, admittedly, he too managed to smuggle himself from world to world on merchant-caste vessels).  They have an interstellar smuggling network, full access to Clan encryption codes and communications channels, and the apparent ability to blend in seamlessly among the lower castes. 

To me, the organized crime syndicate model is much more believable than the “wild men of the woods” band in the Jade Phoenix novels.  Those guys canonically exist alongside the syndicates, but they probably consist of psychologically damaged individuals (going through a sibko and then washing out in the latter stages would probably lead to a high level of PTSD) who couldn’t handle the intellectual and organizational requirements of the syndicate infiltrators.

It appears that the Warrior Caste's disdain for guard duty has left them highly vulnerable to infiltrators, assassins, and spies. True Clan warriors want to attack, or at least march out on the field to mount a mobile defense after a formal batchall.  There are Clan police, but they seem to be mostly used for suppressing unrest in the civilian castes.  So, they appear to farm out perimeter security exclusively to electronic systems.  The Wolverines easily disabled such automated sentries around the naval boneyards, and Madeline does so as well. 

Now, in the Star League, automated sentries were commonplace, from Caspars to armed sentry robots patrolling Castles Brian.  The SLDF had a nigh impossible time hacking their systems, resorting to jamming instead.  What happened to that tech?  Abandoned, like the sniper rifles, because it doesn't fit the warrior ethos?  Used, but lacking upgrades, so it becomes increasingly easy for Dark Caste operatives to neutralize it with cutting edge EW tech and/or stolen codes?  In The Hunters, an AFFC analyst projects Clan SDS capabilities, telling the Serpent Fleet to expect high speed automated drones the size of fighters that give IFF challenges and, if not correctly answered, vector alongside and detonate an onboard nuke.  We never saw if Huntress indeed had such technology, since the Nekekami strike team seemingly just walked into the SDS control center and skragged it.  (Again, here's that "no guards" thing.)
« Last Edit: 10 July 2013, 16:41:47 by Mendrugo »
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #293 on: 08 July 2013, 08:02:44 »
Notes
Now, in the Star League, automated sentries were commonplace, from Caspars to armed sentry robots patrolling Castles Brian.  The SLDF had a nigh impossible time hacking their systems, resorting to jamming instead.  What happened to that tech?  Abandoned, like the sniper rifles, because it doesn't fit the warrior ethos?  Used, but lacking upgrades, so it becomes increasingly easy for Dark Caste operatives to neutralize it with cutting edge EW tech and/or stolen codes?  In The Hunters, an AFFC analyst projects Clan SDS capabilities, telling the Serpent Fleet to expect high speed automated drones the size of fighters that give IFF challenges and, if not correctly answered, vector alongside and detonate an onboard nuke.  We never saw if Huntress indeed had such technology, since the Nekekami strike team seemingly just walked into the SDS control center and skragged it.  (Again, here's that "no guards" thing.)

If remember the novel correctly, Mountain HQ for the SDS did have security guards.  Elemental were eliminated by the Nekekami.   
Maybe the Smoke Jaguars actually thought of security, lackist as it was then prior to the Serpent's invasion.
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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #294 on: 09 July 2013, 06:53:03 »
----- 2 Days Later -----

Date: January 14, 2906

Location: Hoard

Title: Whispering Death

Author: Philip A. Lee

Type: Short Story (BattleCorps)

Synopsis:  On Hoard’s Jotun Ice Shelf, Madeline huddles against the wind under the starry sky and stokes the flames of her bonfire.  She’s been fasting and not sleeping, and is ready for another run at her vision quest.  She has a fresh collection of vineers – Yumi’s codex bracelet, Sol’s blood, the bullet that killed Galene.  She notes that collecting the vineers was more difficult than the assassinations themselves.  Breathing in the smoke, she sees Lucien appear to her as a ghostly apparition through the haze.

Or not.  Lucien used satellites to spot the thermal plume from her bonfire and has come to demand she stop the killings.  She refuses to quit until Tristan has paid in full for her banishment on false charges.  Madeline tells a disbelieving Lucien that many honorable Nova Cat warriors, like Alban, have been abjured on shaky pretenses.  She informs Lucien that, prior to the Smoke Jaguar ambush, Tristan had summoned Madeline and demanded that they couple.  Hurt by her refusal, he trumped up the charges of treason as a punishment.

Lucien responds that he would have supported Madeline, had she but asked.  But now her actions mark her as a bandit, and Tristan is awaiting his return with evidence of her death.  He demands that the Whispering Death die, as mandated by Clan law, then pulls the trigger as Madeline looks him in the eyes.

Tearfully, Lucien presents Madeline’s sniper rifle to Tristan, who congratulates him and promises a reward of extra work credits.  Lucien then asks Tristan about Madeline’s allegations.  Tristan’s reaction convinces him that they were true, and he unhesitatingly unloads his pistol clip into the Galaxy Commander, then departs, looking back at Madeline’s hilltop with regret.

Notes:  As Herb pointed out, even in the Golden Century the Nova Cats aren’t the most tradition-bound of Clans.  By Clan law, Lucien should have challenged Tristan to a Trial of Grievance in a proper Circle of Equals and given him a chance to defend himself against the allegations, or brought the matter before the Clan Council and, if the decision went against him, challenge it in a Trial of Refusal.  Instead, seeing how Tristan abused Clan laws in the past, creating this situation, Lucien simply shoots him without warning.

The reference to “extra work credits” is interesting.  While Spheroid references to the Clan economic practices generally reference the “Kerensky” as being roughly 5 C-Bills, the Warriors of Kerensky sourcebook clarifies that only the merchant caste uses the Kerensky as a macro-currency to facilitate mercantile exchanges.  The rest of the Clans use “work credits” to purchase goods off standardized lists at official stores.
« Last Edit: 10 July 2013, 16:44:29 by Mendrugo »
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

Mendrugo

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #295 on: 10 July 2013, 01:28:48 »
----- 7 Months Later -----

Date: August 27, 2906

Location: Hoard

Title: Whispering Death

Author: Philip A. Lee

Type: Short Story (BattleCorps)

Synopsis:  Galaxy Commander Lucien Nostra commands the defense of Hoard against renewed Ice Hellion aggression, and notes that they’ve moved the Seventh Attack Cluster to the Boleyn Pass in preparation for a new batchall. 

In the stack of papers on his desk, Lucien finds a note slipped in which reads “Just passing through.  Be safe.  Miss you. –M.”  He recalls that he intentionally missed his shot back on the Jotun Ice Shelf, and allowed Madeline to survive and escape.  She’s now fully integrated into the Dark Caste, and drops him a note through untraceable methods when she’s in the vicinity. 

Notes:  The Nova Cats appear to have been successful in their fight with the Ice Hellions.  By 3050, the Hellions had been driven completely off Hoard, and only the Burrocks shared the planet with the Nova Cats, operating a small Battle Armor factory at their Toolan enclave.

Given the prevalence of noteputers and the oft-stated Clan passion for Spartan efficiency, one wonders exactly why Lucien is receiving his reports as paper hardcopies, particularly since the best records of any fight would be the fully digital BattleROMs.  (This isn’t a critique of author Philip Lee – there have been a plethora of references to printed reports and spies using microcameras to photograph secret documents throughout BattleTech stories and sourcebook art.  My question is just why people with access to Star League technology wouldn’t have gone to a largely paperless format.  It probably has much to do with BattleTech being “the future of the 1980s.”)
« Last Edit: 10 July 2013, 16:49:53 by Mendrugo »
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #296 on: 10 July 2013, 07:03:22 »

Notes:
Given the prevalence of noteputers and the oft-stated Clan passion for Spartan efficiency, one wonders exactly why Lucien is receiving his reports as paper hardcopies, particularly since the best records of any fight would be the fully digital BattleROMs.  (This isn’t a critique of author Philip Lee – there have been a plethora of references to printed reports and spies using microcameras to photograph secret documents throughout BattleTech stories and sourcebook art.  My question is just why people with access to Star League technology wouldn’t have gone to a largely paperless format.  It probably has much to do with BattleTech being “the future of the 1980s.”)

Hasn't been mentioned that Nicolas Kerensky wanted his Clan descents to rough it  little bit?  Paper copys forced people to think and not get distracted i would imagine, like people today.  Anyways, i didn't key in that Madaline and Lucien had more a connection than former comrades.  Without reading the story i can't tell if she really "misses him" or misses him with the rifle.
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Mendrugo

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #297 on: 10 July 2013, 07:25:36 »
Lucien was Madeline's mentor prior to her abjuration.  Since he spared her life and took vengeance against Tristan, she appears to regard him with considerable affection.
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #298 on: 11 July 2013, 00:03:42 »
----- 47 Years Later -----

Date: September 27, 2953

Location: Lee

Title: The Great Lee Turkey Shoot

Author: Randall N. Bills

Type: Scenario (Northwind Highlanders)

Synopsis:  The “Great Lee Turkey Shoot” has been referenced as one of the most lopsided aerial battles in the Succession Wars, a smashing defeat for the Capellan Confederation.  This scenario gives the gruesome details. 

Upon becoming Chancellor, Ingrid Liao beefed up the CCAF’s aerospace arm and managed to claim a number of victories over House Marik.  Switching fronts, she sent the heavy Eagles and Thunderbirds attached to the 2nd Kearny Highlanders to attack the 5th Davion Heavy Guards [see Notes], which had only light Sparrowhawks.  However, the greater maneuverability and higher skill of the Davion forces shattered the Liao armada in a several-day running battle.

Notes:  The battle pits four Thunderbirds and six Eagles against 18 Sparrowhawks.  The average Liao gunnery is 3.6 while the average Davion gunnery is 3.33.  Going by BV, the Davions have 11,466 points, against the 16,872 in the Highlander force.  The Highlanders get 5 points for each Sparrowhawk they shoot down (for a maximum score of 90), while the Davion Guards get 10 points for each Liao fighter they down (for a maximum of 100).

The Thunderbirds are star performers on the Liao side, with plenty of forward long-range guns and two aft-mounted medium lasers to discourage pursuit.  The Eagles also have a fair amount of firepower, plus a rear laser to cover their six.  The Sparrowhawks, however, have only forward mounted medium and small lasers, so they have to get right into knife-fighting range to attack, and their armor can’t really repel firepower of any magnitude, so to speak. 

The Highlanders’ best tactic would be to try to engage at range as much as possible, since they’ve got a substantial advantage in reach over the Sparrowhawks.  Since this is the BattleSpace ruleset, they fight as squadrons, and the most heavily armored units get destroyed first.  This can be mitigated by splitting them into separate air lances, since the deployment section doesn’t specify whether Air Wings have to deploy as single squadrons or as individual Air Lances.  Likewise, the Sparrowhawks can either deploy as three six-element squadrons or as nine two-element Air Lances.  The fact that each air lance has a different functional designation would seem to support deploying at the Air Lance level.

The best option for the Sparrowhawks would be to try to swarm the Highlander lances en-masse, overwhelming them with sheer numbers.  However, for this to work, the Liaos will need to be drawn into splitting their formation – otherwise a dense formation will tear the light fighters apart.
 
I honestly can’t see this going at all well for the Sparrowhawks.  The Davion forces are going to have to weather a round or two of heavy incoming fire before they even get within their own guns’ range, and the rear guns on the heavy fighters are nearly a match for the Sparrowhawks’ main batteries.  The Davions do have an edge in skill and better scoring rewards, but I don’t see it being enough to make a difference in the outcome, which looks unlikely to match the historical result.

Most likely, the Davion victory came from a superior performance in the larger strategic battle.  While this local fight greatly favors the Liaos, it would be over in minutes, a small part of a much larger battle that raged for days.  Historically, the Davion Sparrowhawks in this fight would probably have used their superior speed to break contact with the Liao squadron, regroup with additional wings, and then come back with a veritable swarm of light fighters that gives them three-to-one force superiority or more, while slower Liao reinforcements would be too far away to help and the heavier Liao fighters would be unable to disengage.

Ingrid Liao appears to have been channeling the Outworlds Alliance with conviction that massed aerospace forces were superior to ground forces.  (She must have read the Inner Sphere in Flames rules, where that’s unquestionably true.)

This scenario uses the “AeroBattle” rules from the BattleSpace ruleset.  It’s interesting that the various Air Lances are given different designations, such as “Support Air Lance” or “Pursuit Air Lance,” when they contain exactly the same fighters with the same capabilities, giving no particular basis for any sort of specialization.

Another question raised is the identity of the Davion defending forces.  The roster calls it the 5th Davion Guards, but the setup calls it the 5th Davion Heavy Guards.  I’d go with the 5th Davion Guards, since there’s no numbered set of Heavy Guards – just Light, Heavy and Assault, in addition to the numbered ones.  Plus, the Davion Heavy Guards are known for favoring heavy 'Mechs and fighters, so they wouldn't be packing Sparrowhawks.
« Last Edit: 11 July 2013, 00:08:58 by Mendrugo »
"We have made of New Avalon a towering funeral pyre and wiped the Davion scourge from the universe.  Tikonov, Chesterton and Andurien are ours once more, and the cheers of the Capellan people nearly drown out the gnashing of our foes' teeth as they throw down their weapons in despair.  Now I am made First Lord of the Star League, and all shall bow down to me and pay homa...oooooo! Shiny thing!" - Maximillian Liao, "My Triumph", audio dictation, 3030.  Unpublished.

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Re: Chronological BattleTech Fiction Review - The Succession Wars
« Reply #299 on: 11 July 2013, 10:19:33 »
I wonder how well this would play in modern TW/StraOps rules.  Squadrons formations with Thunderbirds would be devastating on Capital scale damage against the Sparrowhawks.  Those pilots must had allot edge get out being overwhelmed by that firepower.

I would think they would have some Assault DropShip support in the wings helping them out.
"Men, fetch the Urbanmechs.  We have an interrogation to attend to." - jklantern
"How do you defeat a Dragau? Shoot the damn thing. Lots." - Jellico 
"No, it's a "Most Awesome Blues Brothers scene Reenactment EVER" waiting to happen." VotW Destrier - Weirdo  
"It's 200 LY to Sian, we got a full load of shells, a half a platoon of Grenadiers, it's exploding outside, and we're wearing flak jackets." VoTW Destrier - Misterpants
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