Isn't there or shouldn't there be an easy way to go from a Combat Command with two values (Exp/Loy) to PV for an Alpha Strike mission (one value).
That just isn't enough to go on. Exp/Loy doesn't truly relate to units the CC would have in any meaningful way, you'd essentially be open to choosing anything faction appropriate—which is perfectly fine, but doesn't do much to aid or guide you.
Players would then need a table of available units, but doesn't the Master Unit List do that for us?
If you're choosing for yourself instead of rolling randomly, that's correct. The MUL is wide open.
To expand, you'd be expected to go through the motions of Combat Command > ACS > SBF > AS (/TW/BF) to get your AS units, because what you're really doing is determining the makeups of constituent battalions and companies. If you're not interested in that but instead lances here and there and *maybe* companies, you should be just fine with using existing methods of picking your forces, whether from
Total Warfare or the
Combat Manuals, with limitations dictated by the scenario and the setting of the overall
ISW campaign you're running.
That said, you can still use the conversion rules from the
Campaign Companion, you would just skip through them a little quicker. Here's an example.
You wish to create an Alpha Strike company for the 7th Donegal Guards, "Earthquakers," circa 3025. The
House Steiner source book (available for sale at the BattleShop and DriveThruRPG), have their Experience Rating as Regular, but don't list a Weight (some House Books do). This information (and more) will be in
Combat Manual: House Steiner, but that's not available yet. Looking at their information it's likely that they're a
medium Weight Combat Command.
Using that information, You can create your AS company using the
Random Method or the
PV Method.
Random Method: Use the table on p. 89 of
Campaign Companion to roll up your company's lance composition, using the "medium" column (this table is for determine a regiment's constituent battalions, but works just fine in this instance). From there, follow the rules on p. 91 under
Random Method. You'll need
Total Warfare (for tables) and
War of 3039 (for Random Assignment tables). Follow the
Random Method rules for assigning Skill Ratings, keeping in mind that the 7th is rated as Regular.
PV Method: The only difference here, is since I'm using a company as a starting force, we turn to p. 96 of the
Campaign Companion (which has the different default stats for Lyran Commonwealth formations circa 3025), and look at the middle table, which pertains to companies. Cross-reference the "Medium Mech" row with the PV (PV SBF) column, and look at the results in parenthesis—96. Multiply this by 4 for a result of 384. This is the total PV available to build your company. From there, follow rules as laid out in the
PV Method section on p. 91, just ignore the first two sentences which we replaced here. As explained in that section, you can adjust Skill Ratings for this Regular Combat Command to be Green, Regular or Veteran (all within one 'step' away from Regular), and PV is adjusted accordingly. To choose your forces you'd use the Master Unit List within the Late Succession War Era setting.
That's just a tiny leap from the rules as written to get the results you need.
New questions: is there any source (other than the total number of CC listed in IO) for the specific units for each of the five factions in 3025 or another time in the 3rd Succession War.
As above, for this period, the
Combat Manuals which are currently being produced, the House source books and the
War of 3039, all available on the BattleShop or DriveThruRPG.
Last question: Does anyone know where I can find a copy of an Inner Sphere map (like the 3025 one on the downloads page) but without the borders and hexes and with a transparent background (essentially, just a map with system names and locations)?
Nope.