Objective Raids

[Neko_Bijin]

Well hell, I never thought of that!  I need to dig out my copy and re-read it.

[mbear]

You should see mine; kept together with packing tape and covered in marginalia.

+1 Librarian Cool Point to Fireangel for correct use of "marginalia".

Regarding the original product: Objective Raids, even with errors, settled a lot of disputes and gave my gaming group a lot of raiding missions. (My opponent was particularly cheesed off when I asked the ref if the weapons factory had a proving range that could maybe turn the medium lasers around and fire on the raiding mechs and he said "I don't see why not." This put five Medium Lasers in the building and gave me more tactical options.)

I also liked the Blackjack variant in one of the footnotes. Very clever means of introducing a new 'Mech.

[Istal_Devalis]

Personally, I always enjoyed this book, and am one of the ones who'd purchase an updated version.

Warts and all, it's still one of my favorite sourcebooks.

[tabletopgamer6886]

Okay, I've tried about twenty times now to find the right words to express how I feel. 

All I can say is that I'm very, very moved by everything you said.  Having you guys tell me that you loved my book was the last thing I expected - I was bracing myself for stuff more like "save the excuses - so you didn't have a computer.  Bottom line is Objective Raids is a slipshod mess and you stink as a writer."

Some context might help here I guess.  I don't remember anyone ever telling me they loved either Objective Raids or Tukayyid until I read your comments here.  I liked them, but I can't exactly claim to have an unbiased point of view on the subject.  (-;

The only significant positive feedback that came from writing my books happened while being a guest of honor at a BattleTech convention in Lincoln back in the early '90s (I'm a Nebraska boy - not much contact with the gaming community out here in the sticks beyond the Omaha-Lincoln metro area, and especially not in the pre-internet days!) along with Warren Dettmann (the guy who did the BattleTech Record Sheet books). 

Even then, I signed a couple of books, but while I thought I was there to autograph books and talk about Objective Raids, the con organizers thought I was there to play in their tournament.  Which is probably just as well as otherwise I would have had a lot of time on my hands after my two signatures were finished!  Plus, I placed third in the tournament.  (Knocking Warren out in the first round - which shocked everyone including myself as he was a highly ranked Mechforce N.A. member.  Okay, I got lucky - it was still awesome.)

Don't get me wrong - people did fuss over me because of the books.  But it was always "oh you're published!"  Never "I loved your book!"  And certainly never "I loved (blank) about your book!"  Honestly, I felt like I could have written a manuscript that said "published" 60,000 times and achieved the same reaction.

Then when I looked online a while back and found a couple of reviews of Objective Raids and Tukayyid, they were rather negative.  So all-in-all, I was a pretty discouraged.

So again, thank you all.  And a special vote of thanks to William!

[tabletopgamer6886]

Would you mind if this posting of yours was copied over verbatim to the Sarna.net BattleTechWiki?

Edit: Typos

Hey Frabby,

After first posting here, I called up one of the two old friends who helped me retype the Objective Raids manuscript in order to get it saved to floppy disks.  While we were talking, he said "okay you're sure that you had Tikonov in your original manuscript.  But are you 100% sure that it got entered in the stuff we retyped?"

And...no, I'm not.  I had forgotten about that extra step in the process.  Yes, it was there when I wrote the manuscript.  Yes, it isn't in the final printed product.  But, no, that doesn't mean it was FASA's fault for sure - it could have been me after all.

Drat!

Well, I feel like a fool but I'd rather that than be dishonest about it.

[tabletopgamer6886]

objective raids is one of my favorate resources right up there with the star league sourcebook for history/fluff and mercenary's handbook 3055

to be honest one of my dream books/series  would be an objective raids style book for more eras
IE 2750ish
3025ish
3040ish
3050 (basically the one we have)
3060ish
3075-80ish

or even a 3085ish dated one with time frames for various facilities
like the blah factory went online (year) and by (year) was in full production producing (product) and was damaged in (year) reducing production to ...  it was repaired in (year) and destroyed by (unit) on (date)

that would give us a lot of info as a gm /player about what to expect

btw I LOVED the writeup of the marauder II factory

I actually envisioned Objective Raids as a 3025 era product.  Sure, it was published in '92 but I wrote it before that.  (My contract with FASA was signed September 1991.)

When Sam (Lewis) told me they wanted to publish the book, he said "but I'm afraid you're going to have to revise your draft.  We're making a big change to the BattleTech setting right now."  Of course, the change was the Clan invasion.

[tabletopgamer6886]

Mr. Layton,

Thank you so much for your commendation, it truly means alot to me!  As I explained my fanbook's introduction, ObjectiveRaids has been my favorite sourcebook forever.  As a young player, I loved that book to near death, flipping through it so much it had to be rebound with duct tape.  I marked the unit deployments on the maps inside with colored dots to denote unit experience.  It was an awe-inspiring work of universe data.  I don't fault you your errors in it, as I know full-well the difficulty involved in compiling so much data, and that I relied on this entire CBT internet community to gut-check each chapter of my fanbook before compiling it into the completed document, a luxury you'd have never had.  There is no such thing as an error free sourcebook, as much as we'd like it.  We can only do our best with what we have.  Thank you!  Your inspiration has brought me to where I am now working with Catalyst!

Of everything here, this is what really moved me the most.  Now that I'm starting to write again, I'm struggling a bit at times.  Reading what you've said (well, what everyone here has said, but especially this) has helped me to remain motivated to work at it.  Thank you so much!

Also, I wanted to let you know that I've written a review of Objective Raids 3067 on my blog.  And it's a big recommendation.  (-:

[Degman]

Don't have the Objective Raids but Tukayyid is the best scenario pack I've read  :)

[mbear]

All I can say is that I'm very, very moved by everything you said.  Having you guys tell me that you loved my book was the last thing I expected - I was bracing myself for stuff more like "save the excuses - so you didn't have a computer.  Bottom line is Objective Raids is a slipshod mess and you stink as a writer."

You might have seen more of that if the community hadn't seen the trials and tribulations the Master Unit List team went through to make their product. It was just a matter of education: People didn't realize how much work was involved until they heard the rumblings from the MUL team. MadCapellan's work just underscored the fact that something like Objective Raids is a huge effort.

Then you add in the fact that you didn't have the Internet, email, or a distributed factchecking team, and the scope of Objective Raids really hits home.

[Kwic]

Mr. Layton,

I will echo what others have said here, by saying that the Objective Raids Sourcebook was and still is one of my favorites.  MadCapellan's updated work is a constant reference for me and without the work of the amazing writers that we have devoting their time and efforts to our hobby, it certainly wouldn't be the remarkable and robust system that we have to play in.

My thanks to all the writers, contributors, fact checkers, editors and artists who have made this game a lifetime hobby for us all to enjoy.

Bruce

[Tressel]

I just wanted to chime in and say what a great book objective raids was. We had about 10 people in our group and everyone had a copy for our campaign. A few years later ('97-'98 maybe) we found a copy online that someone had updated with all the current changes throughout the clan invasion. It filled a 3" 3-ring binder.

[GramL]

I am going to add on more kind words and praises about Objective Raids.  Growing up as a gamer in a small farming town 90% of my battletech experience as a teenager was playing against myself using cardboard squares with the names of mechs on them and creating elaborate scenarios, units and campaigns all in the cramped space that was my bedroom.  Your book was by far my greatest resource in creating these stories.  I used it to plot massive invasions, what-if scenarios, and create stories that I can still look back on with fondness.  I still own my original copy, even with its missing front cover, several pages falling out, and star maps with convoluted lines arrows and notations that tracked the movements of all of the great houses in the inner sphere.  In summation, Thank You.

On another note, Mad Cappellan, I was able to see your work for the first time through the link on this thread and it is awesome.  I think it is a worthy successor to the original Objective Raids both in scope and spirit.

[Fireangel]

Before we all go overboard with love for the book, I do want to point out the three things that always bugged me:

1) The organization; units up front, clan front borders in the middle and remaining worlds in the back... It gets annoying having to go through three separate sections for information on the same State.

2) No index (at least I corrected this in my copy); seriously; this kind of book is in serious need of an index - if only for all the worlds!

3) The big lettered margins; the font just does not help (blame for this falls squarely on FASA's shoulders; I'm pretty sure the manuscript didn't have that  ::) )

Besides these minor quibbles, I really don't have any complaints about the book. It still sees almost as much use as the TROs

OTOH, I absolutely love the maps; for years it was the single-source resource for maps of the Inner Sphere 'round these parts.

[Blacknova]

As with many others,  I too found OR inspirational and it led me and some willing collaborators to create the Kapteyn Universe BattleTech AU.  If not for OR, I think my BTech experince would have been lessened somewhat.

[BrokenMnemonic]

I actually envisioned Objective Raids as a 3025 era product.  Sure, it was published in '92 but I wrote it before that.  (My contract with FASA was signed September 1991.)

When Sam (Lewis) told me they wanted to publish the book, he said "but I'm afraid you're going to have to revise your draft.  We're making a big change to the BattleTech setting right now."  Of course, the change was the Clan invasion.

For my BattleTech group in uni, Objective Raids was a huge go-to book; we were limited to what we could buy in the local games stores for supplies, and mercenary campaigns ran for years using Objective Raids as one of the core books. It was hugely useful - the only gripe I had was that it was clan-era, rather than 3025, which is the era most of our other sourcebooks were from. That's not a criticism of the book itself, but it did rather mean that the campaigns tended to revolve around areas that hadn't changed much since the Fourth Succession War. As others have mentioned, no matter what criticisms the internet community may have had for the book, the maps alone made the book a must-buy for me, with everything beyond that being pure gravy.

[Adrian Gideon]

Pssst.Check out the "coming soon" section.

[Kit deSummersville]

Can you repeat that for the rest of the class?

 :)

[roosterboy]

Aw, no fair.

[Adrian Gideon]

Can you repeat that for the rest of the class?

No. I made roosterboy mad.

[Kit deSummersville]

Wow, this level of workplace productivity among BT fans is unprecedented.

[Youngblood]

I am now a tuning fork being held up in a stiff breeze.  I am not sure I've wanted a Catalyst PDF this much, ever.

Okay, that's a lie.

[Klep]

Color me excited!

[roosterboy]

Color me excited!

Is that anything like cerise?

[Klep]

Is that anything like cerise?

Presumably it's one of these.

[Hersh67]

I always thought OR was a good product, and was always disapointed that we didn't see it spin off into a line of products like the TROs where they would change with the changing political situation/geographic situation.  I mean Taurans for all their backwardness (imagine - refusing to join the Star League!) had their own production facilities that could use raiding from time to time. 

OR for the not-quite declining / early IIISW might be a bit different in feel than they are in 3025 or in 3045 for that matter.  I always felt that was a direction that FASA failed to follow up on.

It was good work, and without a computer database to consult or the internet to work with an A+ (for the day), an effort like that today with all the  current resources available would have to be graded harsher, but that is now and it came out back in the day.
 

[BrokenMnemonic]

Pssst.Check out the "coming soon" section.

Any chance of a pointer for forum novices like myself?

[DarkISI]

Any chance of a pointer for forum novices like myself?

http://classicbattletech.com/index.php?action=products&mode=full&id=357
;)

[Kit deSummersville]

I always thought OR was a good product, and was always disapointed that we didn't see it spin off into a line of products like the TROs where they would change with the changing political situation/geographic situation.

You might check the past few posts in this thread....

[roosterboy]

Any chance of a pointer for forum novices like myself?

DarkISI's given you the direct link to the product page of this particular book, but for future reference the homepage (http://www.classicbattletech.com) has a small section showing upcoming and recently released books. When there are multiple books per category they rotate each time you load the page, so liberal use of the reload button will cycle through them all if at first you don't see one people are talking about.

[mbear]

Any chance of a pointer for forum novices like myself?

You can also go to the main page http://www.classicbattletech.com/ and select Products from the right hand side. Then uncheck In Print and check Release pending to see all the stuff that CGL is working on.

Plus there are handy dandy search features that let you find a particular product.