Okay, let's start with a few general notes. Obviously, this is my AU and I'll be setting the rules for it. I'm definitely interested in feedback, but I should be upfront and note that I have some specific goals in mind. Some of those goals are not likely to change, but how I get there certainly could. Realism has never been one of those things that I've found to work too well when applied heavily to Battletech. Instead, I prefer to look for internal consistency. Do the ideas and storylines hold to the “rules of the game†as established within the setting? That's probably my rule of thumb when it comes to the AU, balanced with the idea of just keeping it fun. My ideas might not match up to other folks thoughts, and even after discussion, they still may not. I'm very interested in that discussion though, since it helps to have multiple eyes on target for problems or consistency issues.
The general framework for the AU is pretty simple. I wanted to see what happens if the Succession Wars become a six-nation battle. Yes, that means the SLDF stuck around. And yes, that definitely requires some handwaving. Ideally, I'd like to eventually get two (maybe three) “snapshots†of the AU. These will roughly correlate to my own versions of the Fourth Succession War and the Clan Invasion (if I go for a third, that one is a bit undefined currently). These two snapshots will give general overviews of the factions, timelines, available tech, and custom units for this AU. No, I don't have a real timeframe for how long this will take, or how detailed it'll be. This is a big project that I'm partially doing to see if I can get such a project to some level of completion, and as a world-building exercise. Before we delve into the actual material here, let's cover a few of the core ideas I'm using to put this storyline together.
The canon timeline is largely unchanged up to 2780. There's a few tweaks to events in Amaris' plan and the reclamation of the Hegemony, which I'll cover now.
- SDS systems in the Hegemony were more numerous and built up than in the canon events.
- The other member states of the League did contribute some small amounts of troops (or at least, did allow those who wished to assist Kerensky, to do so). Often these were not the most desired of their own troops, mercenaries, or units with more loyalty to the League than the specific member state.
- The carnage in the Hegemony was incredibly rough on the SLDF, but the additional troops did offset that to some extent.
- There were Cameron twins that Colonel Schmitt of the Royal Black Watch saved. They were initially sent to Federated Suns space, but Schmitt also got word to Kerensky. This means that Camerons came back to the Hegemony after Terra was liberated.
- There's a grey area of what, if any, advanced technologies the non-Hegemony member states had access to at this time period. I'm choosing to go with the fact that they had none prior to the Amaris Civil War.
- Amaris had quite a bit more in the way of covert ops access, and received assistance from some of the upper class Terran once he took over. This allowed him to do a bit more to stir up conflicts outside the Hegemony.
Due to Amaris' meddling, the Succession Wars kick off earlier, and scattered. While Kerensky is pushing on the Hegemony, the other Houses begin to brawl amongst themselves over perceived wrongs (and due to false flag attacks). The wars don't get particularly nasty until some time has passed (more on specifics of that later) after the liberation of Terra. Initially, the Houses focus on each other and old rivalries, before turning on the Hegemony. The wars, once they go hot, end up being far more destructive. Planets are abandoned, economies fall apart, and the rebuilding is much longer.
The SLDF ends up consolidating in a locked down portion of the former Hegemony, leaving a number of worlds to their own fates during the Succession Wars. Former Hegemony worlds are hit particularly hard, and are later raided by the Houses for technology, so it can be recovered. In many cases though, the worlds are badly damaged enough that the Houses do not bother holding this conquests.
Production and industry are scaled up a bit more “realistically.†This is some handwaving to have factions recover a bit more on their own, adjust army sizes slightly, but still keep the main feel of Battletech intact. I do prefer some of the more modern feel, less of the Mad Max of earlier material, so that influences this point.
There's an end goal of the SLDF/Hegemony at some point developing Clantech. Though they keep to themselves, they'll put in appearances during the two snapshots. The first will be with predominately IS Advanced/Experimental gear as their base tech, but still largely resembling the SLDF. The second will be my own version of the Clan Invasion, seeing a Clantech base SLDF from a Hegemony that has undergone some significant changes.
A lot of this material will focus on the ground side of things. That mostly comes from the fact that I don't have an easy program like SSW or MML to deal with creating the other unit types. At some point though, I'll certainly look to fill out that side as well. Not unlike canon material though, WarShips largely disappeared from all but the Hegemony (and were drastically reduced there as well) for at least the first snapshot.
