Today’s ‘Mechs are slightly more obscure than those I usually cover. Their appearance in Interstellar Players 3: Interstellar Expeditions might have been missed by a few BattleTech fans, to which I can only say one thing: this is one product you’re gonna want to buy. Seriously. ISP3 is one of my favorite products out there, offering a huge amount of detail on a wide variety of Deep Periphery worlds and kingdoms. One of the most interesting of these would forcibly be the Escorpión Imperio - a nation born of a forced three-way merger between three sworn enemies: the Umayyad Caliphate, the Castilian Principality, and Clan Goliath Scorpion.
I won’t go into too much detail - if you’re interesting in learning more about the Escorpión Imperio I would suggest reading
The Wars of Reaving and
Interstellar Expeditions. Only a few details matter to us today; by the mid-3080's the Scorpion military was in shambles, their eugenics programs heavily disrupted, and their economic base almost nonexistent. Rebuilding would not only be difficult, but be the greatest challenge the Clan had ever faced.
The Escorpión’s troubled formation lead to the creation of two new castes: Support and Garrison. The Garrison (or Grunt) caste would be filled by ex-Castilian and Umayyad soldiers, men and women too untrained to be uplifted into the true Warrior caste but still able to fill basic security, policing and garrison needs. Although most of these soldiers would be part of an armored vehicle or infantry core, a lucky few would be allotted lower-quality but homegrown MilitiaMechs. We know of two: the Reptar and the Araña.
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To explain things as simply as possible: the Reptar is the Clan equivalent to the Arbiter, Quasit, or Sarissa. Built on an industrial chassis, the 35-ton frame and fuel cell engine would hardly make the Reptar a viable threat even before acknowledging its weaponry. Only able to move 5/8 and with Heavy Industrial armor used for a layout of 12/3(CT), 9/2(ST), 8(Arms), 9(Legs), 9(Head), the Reptar can hardly stand up against even the lightest opposition. Its armaments, consisting of an arm-mounted ProtoMech AC/8 (with two tons of ammo) and two torso-mounted Light Machine Guns (fed by a half-ton of ammo), are barely enough to deal with a marauding Light ‘Mech. Two heat sinks handle all of the weapon heat - remember, fuel cell industrials build no movement heat.
The Reptar isn't a tough customer - it even has trouble dealing with basic IntroTech bugs. Stingers, Wasps, Locusts...they can all take a Reptar out in a one-on-one engagement. Two Medium Laser hits breach any location save the Reptar's CT, and a single shot will pierce straight through any of the rear locations. This is a much bigger deal than it might sound - the industrial chassis ensures that an average roll of 7 will result in a critical hit. With each side torso holding only one non-explosive crit, that’s one hell of a dangerous weakness. Hitting fuel cell crits is barely better; anything that starts going internal on any of the Reptar’s torsos is nearly guaranteed to completely destroy the ‘Mech in a massive explosion. If that wasn’t bad enough, the Reptar does *not* have an ejection seat. Expect dead pilots.
On the armament side of things, the Reptar is fair...but certainly not fantastic. The twin Light Machine Guns are a good choice for dealing with the more infantry-intensive militaries of the Deep Periphery. The ProtoMech AC/8 (apparently taken from ProtoMechs...sounds like an intelligence mix-up to me) is alright as an anti-‘Mech weapon. It has slightly better brackets than two of the most common Deep Periphery weapons: the Medium Laser and the SRM. When bugs do attack - and they will - the Reptar should be able to retaliate. That 8-point hit is pretty hefty, too. It’ll rip right through a bug’s arm, smash through their side or legs armor, and even headcap a Stinger or a Wasp. It’s a big hit for those 20-ton ‘Mechs to deal with, and it makes the Reptar worthy of some respect, at least. Things get really interesting if the Militia formations somehow get their hands on some special munitions; a ton of Precision can dramatically tilt things in the Reptar’s favor, while a ton of Flechette can make it a real menace versus infantry. Just make sure you have something covering your rear.
If there's one final thing to remember, it's that you only have two heat sinks - Flamers will take up your full dissipation ability, while Infernos can take you out of the fight with a single volley. Stay away from fire, and since you don’t have environmental sealing, stay away from water as well. Use it defensively, as a cheap anti-light/anti-infantry bodyguard for larger and more important units. If used
en masse, cover each other's backsides and use combined firepower to down opposing Light ‘Mechs or tanks fast than they can burn through your minimal armor.
Our second Imperio MilitiaMech is much more imposing. The Araña gains five tons, bringing it to 40, while also using a quad chassis to give it more stability. While it still uses an Industrial Chassis and Heavy Industrial Armor, it gains much more armor - this time having 18/5(CT), 15/5(ST), 20(Legs), 9(Head). The biggest changes, though, are the use of a Fusion Engine and the inclusion of an ejection seat. The Araña is clearly for more seasoned Grunts, pilots the Imperio deems worth a sharper knife and a later grave.
The weapons mounted on the Araña are considerably more powerful as well. Three ClanTech ER Medium Lasers are mounted on a turret in the left torso, with a total of fifteen Single Heat Sinks dissipating everything but movement heat. The same 5/8 movement profile appears again, making the Araña a surprisingly tough customer for most Periphery forces. Bugs can't face an Araña alone, period - it positively disintegrates them. This MilitiaMech can instead take on medium ‘Mechs, outgunning both the common Shadow Hawk -2H and Wolverine -6R. I believe it's no coincidence that the Araña has the same total armor and similar speed as both of those Periphery staples - it is definitely a cheaper, more easily mass-produced version of them.
That's not to say it's flawless, though. The big issue is, once again, crits. Anything that starts hitting internal structure will dismantle the Araña in moments. The Left Torso only has a single Heat Sink padding it, while the Right Torso carries all of its firepower and nothing else. The legs and center torso have extra Heat Sink padding, but even those won’t last long against the type of crits the Araña will invariably suffer from. This is where being a Quad really comes in handy - the Limb Blown Off crit, more common on industrials, is less hazardous on a Quad than it could be on a Biped. It can always use Partial Cover or Hull-Down to improve its survivability, where it can continue to maintain a near-constant barrage of firepower thanks to its turret. The Araña really isn’t all that bad.
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The speed of both ‘Mechs makes them decent partners for your typical Medium Troopers. The Shadow Hawk, Trebuchet, Wolverine, and even Quickdraw can all stand in formation with both of these MilitiaMechs. On top of that, their speed makes them useful in semi-support roles for more static tank or infantry positions. They can quickly move forward and bring a good amount of quick firepower against most typical Periphery junk, "stiffening" up more fragile conventional lines. They work best against softer targets, of course; larger ‘Mechs always have the option of bringing physicals to the party, something that no industrial likes under any condition.
If there’s something the Araña and Reptar can’t stand against, it’s other Clan units. Don't expect these to survive against any Coyote raids. They’re sluggish and have roughly no firepower when compared to their Homeworld-made peers. The best they can hope for is to temporarily slow any invaders down. Battle Armor are even more dangerous, if possible; Elementals will have an advantage when performing Swarm or Leg Attacks against these industrials, and their auto-crit from those attacks will down the MilitiaMechs in a heartbeat. Even the Araña’s three ER Medium Lasers aren’t enough to warrant caution from Elemental Points, so your best bet as a defender would be to keep the MilitiaMechs as far away from any battle armor as humanly possible.
Will we see more of these MilitiaMechs? Only time will tell. The fate of the Imperio is still unknown, and their close proximity to the Homeworld Clans and Hanseatic League doesn’t bode well for them. You never know, though, and no matter what happens...they’re worth playing. There’s no other faction out there that lets you field a mixed-tech MilitiaMech alongside a Blakist Initiate, a second-line Commando IIC, a primitive Shadow Hawk -1R and a point of Triton ProtoMechs - with a platoon of Horse-Mounted Infantry scouting for the lot. The pure variety of tech available to you is amazing and incredibly fun to bring to the table. I’d suggest anyone and absolutely everyone give it a try at least once.
