Author Topic: Aurigan Reach  (Read 41798 times)

Elmoth

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #180 on: 15 November 2018, 08:20:56 »
Yeah, a forced withdrawal option would be good. I hate when a pair of light mechs keep attacking me when I have killed their 6 Heavy and Assault friends.

Caedis Animus

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #181 on: 15 November 2018, 09:22:05 »
What basic relationships? At the point in the game where you get the Argo flying, you have nothing tying you to Kamea except the puppet strings she puts on you by assuming your debts--which she does for her own agenda, not because she's a nice lady. You were in the Reach working under Mastiff. Your loyalty was to him and he's gone.


The player character is very much a murderer, as it happens. You kill people on every single drop (often gleefully), voluntarily and for nothing other than pay. Unless you exclusively take defense and "mercy" missions and take every enemy 'Mech out at the legs, you're basically a state-sanctioned hit man.
We often pretend that war is "clean" in the BT universe, but it is very much not. It's not over-the-top grimdark, no, but you're fooling yourself if you think mercenaries are good people. War is hell; anyone who goes into it deliberately when they have other career choices is by definition a bit of a psychopath.
The game doesn't even give you much in the way of chances to roleplay trying to spare human life--a surrender mechanic would have added a lot of depth that is presently missing. You're expected to kill the opposition to a man. Everyone on your crew is complicit and voices no opposition. You really think they're going to mutiny if you dispose of someone who is blatantly using you and risking your lives for political ends?
The former because your crew has known eachother FAR longer than they've known you. They've known you three years? Yeah, Darius, Yang, and Sumire-plus the Mechwarriors Dekker, Glitch, and Behemoth-have all known eachother long before they even met you. I almost gaurentee that three years after they have you take command, they'd still shove you out the airlock-or restrain you and leave your dispossessed rear on some backwater-for trying to shove someone ACTIVELY TRYING TO HIRE YOU and bail you out of debt. For Darius, that just goes doubly so.

There's a difference between shoving someone out an airlock (with no contract whatsoever on the dropship,or their life), to steal a dropship, and killing people because you are outright hired to do so. Being a Mercenary is entirely legal-killing someone to get paid because you have a contract to do so is completely legal, especially as you have Comstar's backing TO do so. Killing someone to steal and sell a dropship? Yeah, that's being a pirate. I'm not saying that Mercenaries are good people-I'm saying that throwing someone out an airlock who was trying to hire you, without a contract or real reason to kill them other than 'hurr durr steal dropship' makes you nothing but a pirate.

Because while *you* may be an awful, slimy, backstabbing person, doesn't mean the rest of your crew-much less Doctor Murad, who's essential in getting the Argo to go anywhere-will be complicit in getting a rusting hulk back to IS to sell when you have the blood of your would-be financial savior on your hands.
« Last Edit: 15 November 2018, 11:15:41 by Caedis Animus »

The_Caveman

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #182 on: 15 November 2018, 11:57:06 »
There's a difference between shoving someone out an airlock (with no contract whatsoever on the dropship,or their life), to steal a dropship, and killing people because you are outright hired to do so. Being a Mercenary is entirely legal-killing someone to get paid because you have a contract to do so is completely legal, especially as you have Comstar's backing TO do so. Killing someone to steal and sell a dropship? Yeah, that's being a pirate. I'm not saying that Mercenaries are good people-I'm saying that throwing someone out an airlock who was trying to hire you, without a contract or real reason to kill them other than 'hurr durr steal dropship' makes you nothing but a pirate.

"Hurr durr steal dropship" stands to make you and your crew more money than you would earn in every contract you get for the Liberation, combined. That "rusting hulk" isn't just some run of the mill 'Mech carrier. The technology that Yang activates in the 'Mech bay by accident is LosTech on a level that isn't seen in that era outside of some of the stuff the Dragoons brought with them. The ship is basically a flying 'Mech factory and it's worth far more to anyone who has the ability to take it apart and study it than the table scraps Kamea and her Canopian puppet masters are willing to feed you.
Not to mention the debt is being used as leverage to strongarm you into fighting a war you have no stake in and there is a very good chance one or more of you will die trying to get out from under that thumb.

And everyone on the crew--with the possible exception of Murad--has already long since passed the point of being able to have qualms about killing someone to get ahead in the world. If they had a problem with doing business that way, they'd have already picked up stakes long ago. Whether or not it's under contract is, in my view, an odd ethical line in the sand to draw.
Half the fun of BattleTech is the mental gymnastics required to scientifically rationalize design choices made decades ago entirely based on the Rule of Cool.

The other half is a first-turn AC/2 shot TAC to your gyro that causes your Atlas to fall and smash its own cockpit... wait, I said fun didn't I?

Colt Ward

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #183 on: 15 November 2018, 12:00:35 »
Dunno, "I can kill these people because its not murder but combat related," is a pretty standard thing troops tell themselves.  Its why the line is draw that you do not shoot surrendered enemy soldiers . . . because that would be murder.
Colt Ward
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Maingunnery

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #184 on: 15 November 2018, 12:03:19 »
Because while *you* may be an awful, slimy, backstabbing person
I role-played as a Space Pirate Clown or Space Clown Pirate, however you want to call it.
Not exactly a nice person....
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Icerose20

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #185 on: 15 November 2018, 12:14:14 »
While solders, warriors and mercenaries ply the same trade, they are not serial killers or mass murders.  There has been these 'rules of War' that has been in some form and fashion since the Bronze Age.  They just don't go into a city and start randomly shoot civvies, that is against numerous conventions and if caught you, you will be summarily executed, or brought to trail  and executed.  You will be hunted by your former mates becuase of the stain YOU did to their honor.  You may say there is no honor, thats fine. 

Go ahead, throw out Kamea, and you will follow her if im Darius. 

The_Caveman

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #186 on: 15 November 2018, 12:38:16 »
Dunno, "I can kill these people because its not murder but combat related," is a pretty standard thing troops tell themselves.  Its why the line is draw that you do not shoot surrendered enemy soldiers . . . because that would be murder.

The difference though between a soldier and a mercenary is the merc is doing it all for personal gain. When a soldier kills on the battlefield, it's necessary for the defense of the state (or that's what we claim) and to protect the lives of his fellows. And for that reason it can be forgiven.
For a mercenary, the only reason you're there in the first place is you undertook that assumption of risk with the understanding you'd be paid to do someone else's dirty work. When you're put in a position to take lives as a merc, it's because you chose it as an individual and not as an instrument of the state.

It's also interesting that you seldom fight other mercenaries in the game. Which makes sense, historically mercenaries have been very reluctant to kill each other, to the point that when facing one another the condottieri would stage extravagant show battles with almost no loss of life. Because while you might be getting paid enough to kill for it, no one is being paid enough to die.

I really think the campaign storyline they gave us was an ill fit to a mercenary career. I can see how it might have been intended to be a bit like the old Christopher Walken classic Dogs of War but it fell kind of flat.

Player character should have either had some real skin in the game (letting us know before Weldry that Mastiff was a prisoner would have been nice, they wasted an emotional moment by bringing him back suddenly only to immediately kill him off) maybe being an actual Arano loyalist with reason to fight on Kamea's behalf. Or they should have left it open to choose either side. The mercenary career could have been a separate free-play game mode.

There has been these 'rules of War' that has been in some form and fashion since the Bronze Age.  They just don't go into a city and start randomly shoot civvies, that is against numerous conventions

In actual fact those conventions exist because up until very recently, that is exactly how wars were fought, mostly using large mercenary armies. Looting, pillaging, and killing civilians was not only normal but expected in centuries past. Codes of conduct in war came about with the rise of state-supported armies using professional soldiers.

BT has it very nearly backwards, where the state actors are brutal and the mercenaries depicted as noble. In reality it doesn't go that way.
Half the fun of BattleTech is the mental gymnastics required to scientifically rationalize design choices made decades ago entirely based on the Rule of Cool.

The other half is a first-turn AC/2 shot TAC to your gyro that causes your Atlas to fall and smash its own cockpit... wait, I said fun didn't I?

Colt Ward

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #187 on: 15 November 2018, 13:13:13 »
Personal Gain?  What else is there in peace time?  I signed up to pay for college and chose the MOS based on the tens of thousands I was getting to possibly drop rockets on enemy troops that would kill hundreds at a time.  Your point might be valid for a conscripted force, but not volunteer force.

HBS narrative replays the original GDL novels- we got revenge, we toppled a regime, and we fought over a Star League cache.  All as mercs too.

This is all pretty far afield from the OP however . . .

I look forward to the Reach getting put in as a minor footnote and the rumors & conspiracy theories it can generate in a new ISP book.
Colt Ward
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"We come in peace, please ignore the bloodstains."

"Greetings, Mechwarrior. You have been recruited by the Star League to defend the Frontier against Daoshen and the Capellan armada."

The_Caveman

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #188 on: 15 November 2018, 13:48:15 »
Personal Gain?  What else is there in peace time?  I signed up to pay for college and chose the MOS based on the tens of thousands I was getting to possibly drop rockets on enemy troops that would kill hundreds at a time.  Your point might be valid for a conscripted force, but not volunteer force.

Well, of course, you can't eat patriotism. The state has to offer something. But I've known a lot of vets and I have yet to meet one who joined the army to get rich.

Quote
I look forward to the Reach getting put in as a minor footnote and the rumors & conspiracy theories it can generate in a new ISP book.

Yes. Personally I'm interested to see if they canonize the background material invented to cover a number of the lesser planets in the region, none of which had been detailed in the past. I don't think Aquagea, for example, had anything more than a dot on a map.
Half the fun of BattleTech is the mental gymnastics required to scientifically rationalize design choices made decades ago entirely based on the Rule of Cool.

The other half is a first-turn AC/2 shot TAC to your gyro that causes your Atlas to fall and smash its own cockpit... wait, I said fun didn't I?

Icerose20

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #189 on: 15 November 2018, 14:08:04 »
(looks at Merc FM, revised)

Nope, you will not get rich in a merc unit.  You die, good chance you will not have life insurance.  You become a merc becuase of freedom of choice, not to be rich. 

Caedis Animus

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #190 on: 15 November 2018, 16:05:17 »
I role-played as a Space Pirate Clown or Space Clown Pirate, however you want to call it.
Not exactly a nice person....
And? I play with a former Canopian Noble-turned-Pirate-turned-merc. But even professional hired guns don't space potential golden gooses.

Hell, if the hypothetical Argo-stealer was patient, he'd even get the Argo for free. There's just too many flaws with this idea to work out in any favorable way, even getting ethics out of the picture.

On the OP, wouldn't the Canopians likely be providing direct aid to the newly refounded Aurigan Reach? Like the Taurians, they should have a vested interest in keeping the Reach/Directorate under their control.
« Last Edit: 15 November 2018, 16:19:02 by Caedis Animus »

glitterboy2098

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #191 on: 15 November 2018, 18:12:46 »
On the OP, wouldn't the Canopians likely be providing direct aid to the newly refounded Aurigan Reach? Like the Taurians, they should have a vested interest in keeping the Reach/Directorate under their control.
can't speak for the Canopians, but going through Sarna for the entries regarding the Reach worlds that had appeared on maps in canon, several of them on the spinward border became Taurian worlds in the 3030's and 3040, so either the Taurians decided that possession was better than a weak buffer state, or the Coalition collapsed and some of the worlds willingly joined their neighboring power.
we have a lot more that just have no info for the timeframe post star-league.

it is also possible that if the Taurians did provide aid, the Canopians actually worked to disrupt the Coalition/Taurian accord. after all, Canopus is far enough away that they can't use the reach as a buffer zone against the Capcon, and if they can make the reach (and by extent, the Taurians) look weak they can distract the capcon away from canopian space.

after all, look at the astrospatial layout?
« Last Edit: 15 November 2018, 18:21:34 by glitterboy2098 »

Caedis Animus

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #192 on: 15 November 2018, 20:29:51 »
can't speak for the Canopians
The Canopians are the one who are stated as giving Kamea's organization support in the early game. To me, that's kind of obvious; The Canopians want a Canopian-friendly force between them and the Taurians.

While the Aurigan Reach falling to the Taurians was an inevitability, IIRC someone in-game mentions the region being desired due to being essentially a DMZ between the Canopians and Taurians. Don't have a source for that though.
« Last Edit: 15 November 2018, 20:34:20 by Caedis Animus »

The_Caveman

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #193 on: 15 November 2018, 20:33:50 »
(looks at Merc FM, revised)

Nope, you will not get rich in a merc unit.  You die, good chance you will not have life insurance.  You become a merc becuase of freedom of choice, not to be rich.

The MW salaries in the HBS game must include pretty exorbitant rates for insurance then, because they're something like 13 to 15 times higher than what's quoted in sourcebooks. By the time your pilots have reached the equivalent of 0/0 they're making several hundred thousand c-bills a year. I'm paying Glitch alone the equivalent of $7M per year (per MWRPG 1st Ed, a c-bill in 3025 was equal to $5 US in 1986, that's a bit over $11 today). If that's not getting rich, I don't know what is.

It's not the only problem with the ingame economy, but it is one of the most striking.
Half the fun of BattleTech is the mental gymnastics required to scientifically rationalize design choices made decades ago entirely based on the Rule of Cool.

The other half is a first-turn AC/2 shot TAC to your gyro that causes your Atlas to fall and smash its own cockpit... wait, I said fun didn't I?

Colt Ward

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #194 on: 15 November 2018, 22:36:26 »
Actually . . . consider that her cost TO you as the employer.  Self-insured for life/med, food & water, any uniform allowance, upkeep and pay . . .

It was nearly $18,300 in '06 according to some quick numbers I could find for training a enlistee . . . which does not include their pay since that varies by rank and a few other modifiers.  So that comes to around 88k for a year, not including pay . . . now add that they are being supported, usually the ratio varies for a tooth to tail count but at for the US forces world wide its given as 1 to 10.  So to support that 1 mechwarrior you need 10 folks who are admin (Darius & friends), mechanics (Yang & Co), medical, supply/log (say the doc working on the DS), and transport (Sumir- a pilot) which means . . . 880k, so figure 968k before even getting into payroll.  This does not get into a parts budget to keep the mechs running properly or the 'magical' replacement of armor or ammo each time you use either one up.

A ton of LRM ammo is 30k cbills, or $330k using your numbers . . . and how many tons of LRM ammo do you go through a battle?  Standard armor is 10k per ton so $110k using the same numbers.  How much armor do you need replaced each battle on each mech?

Say you need to replace 1t of LRM ammo used in contracts every month, that is a bit under 4 million for the year.  Say I need to use 1t of replacement armor a month from contracts . . . that is a bit over 1.3 mil a year.  So for a single ton of LRM ammo and a single ton of armor used for the whole year you are looking at 5.3 mil.  Tooth & Tail support is .97 before salaries . . . so 6.3 mil and that leave the other 700k to be divided up for salaries between the 11 people, comes out a bit under 64k per individual.

I know I use more than a single ton of LRM ammo a month per mech and definitely more armor, but I just waved away the differences under the salvage abstract.
Colt Ward
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"We come in peace, please ignore the bloodstains."

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epic

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #195 on: 15 November 2018, 23:04:25 »
I say I hope they canonize a bit of the Aurigan Reach to give a bit of logic to the supply lines for the Canopian invasion of the Capellans.

Prior to this, their closest world is what, 2 or 3 jumps away? 

But in the light of the HBS game, it makes sense to interfere with Aurigan local politics because it paves the way for the attempt at empire building by Canopus. 

It can very easily fit into canon, while also noting the dissolution after the failed Canopian invasion; after all, the Big Mac hit Canopus; they probably passed through the Aurigan worlds too, and maybe hit a few targets of opportunity that basically sealed the fate of those worlds. 

Years later, what remains just falls into the hands of the Canopians, the Taurians and the Capellans anyways. 
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The_Caveman

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #196 on: 16 November 2018, 00:21:49 »
Actually . . . consider that her cost TO you as the employer.  Self-insured for life/med, food & water, any uniform allowance, upkeep and pay . . .

Doesn't work. Pilot salaries in the game scale directly according to their experience level. A pilot with 10s in all skills isn't costing you 5 times as much in medical costs or food and uniforms as a raw recruit. And there are separate upkeep costs for the 'Mechs and the ship.

The game's economy is just wonky. Sale prices for weapons, for example are rigged something like 10-to-1 against the player which doesn't work in the near-barter system economy of the 3025 periphery.

When I finish my current run I'm going to look for an economy overhaul mod and see if anyone has created one that makes sense.
Half the fun of BattleTech is the mental gymnastics required to scientifically rationalize design choices made decades ago entirely based on the Rule of Cool.

The other half is a first-turn AC/2 shot TAC to your gyro that causes your Atlas to fall and smash its own cockpit... wait, I said fun didn't I?

Phalanx

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #197 on: 16 November 2018, 00:26:16 »
I say I hope they canonize a bit of the Aurigan Reach to give a bit of logic to the supply lines for the Canopian invasion of the Capellans.

Prior to this, their closest world is what, 2 or 3 jumps away? 

But in the light of the HBS game, it makes sense to interfere with Aurigan local politics because it paves the way for the attempt at empire building by Canopus. 

It can very easily fit into canon, while also noting the dissolution after the failed Canopian invasion; after all, the Big Mac hit Canopus; they probably passed through the Aurigan worlds too, and maybe hit a few targets of opportunity that basically sealed the fate of those worlds. 

Years later, what remains just falls into the hands of the Canopians, the Taurians and the Capellans anyways.

It also explains the limited Taurian role during the Andurien War. What if the Magistracy and the Concordat made a secret deal to partition the Rimward periphery? A line is drawn that allows the Taurians to annex the Aurigan worlds(and the Aurigans were ex-Taurian worlds anyway, according to their backstory. Not to mention the game story putting in plot hooks that could setup exactly this scenario.). However, Aurigan resistance is so heavy that the region is devastated and no longer worth conquering, but has been rendered uninhabitable.

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #198 on: 16 November 2018, 00:31:48 »
It's easier to explain the Concordat's disinterest in the Andurien conflict as simple disinterest. Even if Thomas Calderon wasn't terrified of the Davion boogeyman to the point of complete inaction, there's nothing for the Concordat to gain from getting involved.
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The_Caveman

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #199 on: 16 November 2018, 03:55:13 »
It's easier to explain the Concordat's disinterest in the Andurien conflict as simple disinterest. Even if Thomas Calderon wasn't terrified of the Davion boogeyman to the point of complete inaction, there's nothing for the Concordat to gain from getting involved.

This.

The Aurigan Reach makes more sense to me as a flash in the pan. Life in the Periphery is already a notoriously hardscrabble existence. It doesn't take a secret treaty between foreign powers to make a government unstable when it's already probably barely keeping the lights on. Taurus had nothing to gain from from stepping outside its borders and precious little to lose from keeping to itself.

The civil war would have depleted the state coffers and destroyed the military, and the Reach has no great source of wealth that would have outside benefactors lining up to issue loans. At best, it was going to end up as a Taurian or Canopian puppet state useful in keeping local pirate bands from getting too organized.

Even if the civil war hadn't happened, Kamea is most likely not the kind of ruler who could have kept a place like that together. The worlds of the Reach would gradually have slipped away from Coromodir's control as the Succession Wars cooled down and there was less incentive to band together for mutual defense.
Half the fun of BattleTech is the mental gymnastics required to scientifically rationalize design choices made decades ago entirely based on the Rule of Cool.

The other half is a first-turn AC/2 shot TAC to your gyro that causes your Atlas to fall and smash its own cockpit... wait, I said fun didn't I?

Mecha-Anchovy

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #200 on: 16 November 2018, 04:52:06 »
It's 3025.

Aren't the Succession Wars about to heat up again in a pretty extreme way?

ANS Kamas P81

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #201 on: 16 November 2018, 05:12:33 »
Not until Hanse Davion's marriage proposal gets misrouted to Kamea, and she accepts.
Der Hölle Rache kocht in meinem Herzen,
Tod und Verzweiflung flammet um mich her!
Fühlt nicht durch dich Jadefalke Todesschmerzen,
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Elmoth

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #202 on: 16 November 2018, 05:43:01 »
LOL! That would be something xD

ANS Kamas P81

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #203 on: 16 November 2018, 05:49:18 »
It's already an alt-u, why not have fun with it?  The Taurians would collectively lose their **** at the idea, which of course is just funny.
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Fühlt nicht durch dich Jadefalke Todesschmerzen,
So bist du meine Tochter nimmermehr!

Elmoth

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #204 on: 16 November 2018, 05:52:45 »
And then they invade. Bye bye Aurigans.

Then the Canopians think that the Aurigans were too far away and build their next buffer state near home, in the other side of the region: welcome Fronc Reaches

The_Caveman

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #205 on: 16 November 2018, 09:01:32 »
It's 3025.

Aren't the Succession Wars about to heat up again in a pretty extreme way?

4th SW was a blip, and it can really be thought of as the inevitable climax of the 3rd once things had simmered for long enough that everyone had enough of an army to fight one another in earnest again.

But Hanse did something no one had ever done before: he won a Succession War--admittedly one with very limited strategic goals and he failed to permanently shatter Liao, but it was followed by close to 30 years of nearly uncontested Fedcom dominance.

That basically puts an end to refugees streaming to the Periphery. The Helm core gets dug up, so the major IS powers stop raiding the Periphery for resources as they start learning how to rebuild their own stuff, and a crippled Capcon eventually starts making overtures toward the rimward Periphery kingdoms. With conditions improving in the IS, migration starts flowing the other way, with fortune seekers headed to the high-tech centers of the Sphere.

3030-3067 is a bad time to be a frontier pirate. The selloff of pre-Helm equipment from Successor State armies feeds a booming merc trade that gives minor Periphery planets the ability to defend themselves, legitimate factories being reopened makes it harder to fence raided parts for a living, and the climate favors closer ties with the IS that make it more dangerous to enter civilized space. (There's the occasional Suzy Ryan and so on popping up, but for the most part the trend on the Periphery is toward going legit, best exemplified on the coreward side before the Clans show up, and in Circinus and Marian space. Those few big name pirates, by virtue of their own success, were likely blocking out any sunlight from lesser bands that would have otherwise been preying on isolated worlds, stifling their growth.) That's not to say the post-4th SW Periphery was safe, but it was a lot less deadly than it had been 50 years prior.

All those factors make a minor power like the Aurigan Reach start to seem superfluous. It isn't organizing the economies of its member worlds to increase their output and compete with its neighbors, nor is the level of mutual defense the alliance provides really worth the taxes and feudal levies to Coromodir anymore. The minor houses would start to pull out or drag their feet on contributing, the central government would weaken and eventually collapse as it no longer had the force to prevent member worlds from going their own way. And if it did try to use force to hold things together, any of its neighbors would happily intervene in order to scoop up those worlds in an easy victory.
« Last Edit: 16 November 2018, 09:20:53 by The_Caveman »
Half the fun of BattleTech is the mental gymnastics required to scientifically rationalize design choices made decades ago entirely based on the Rule of Cool.

The other half is a first-turn AC/2 shot TAC to your gyro that causes your Atlas to fall and smash its own cockpit... wait, I said fun didn't I?

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #206 on: 16 November 2018, 10:27:21 »
Add to this that the Aurigan Reach is very much Kamea´s nation. Until she has produced an heir and this heir has had time to come of age, the Aurigan Reach is one well-placed bullet or jumpship accident (or even jumpship "accident") away from falling apart again. So more or less until the late 3040s.


(Though I´m not ruling out a sequal... BattleTech 2: Kamea´s Kid... with a plot loosely patterned after the original MechWarrior game  :D)
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Kovax

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #207 on: 16 November 2018, 10:39:02 »
I'd have to more-or-less agree with the assessment.  The future of the Aurigan Reach doesn't look promising, even if Kamea doesn't mismanage it to the point of collapse.  Without the lucky/skillful mercenary unit to prop it up, its own defense force can't protect the planets under its tenuous control, and the cost of paying the mercenaries ties up nearly the entire defense budget, leaving practically nothing for expanding its own meager forces.  Once the mercenaries move on, it can't put down any attempts at independence by member planets, and is itself at risk of invasion for the next few years or decades while it rebuilds.

I can't see it holding most of its existing worlds in the face of both internal and external pressure, much less growing, and the most likely scenario would seem to be having it shrink to 1-3 planets: Coromodir and one or two weak dependent worlds that had no expectations of surviving solo, and not worth the bother of absorbing for the Taurians or other powers in the region.  I could certainly see it surviving for several more decades as a tiny remnant, at least until the next major war between the larger Periphery states in the region destabilizes things, or a new minor power rises in the area and absorbs it (possibly with Coromodir itself still led by Kamea's family as a feudal vassal state to the larger regional power).  I see this as the "gray option": the Arano family maintains control of the planet, but little or no more, and it becomes a part of someone else's larger empire.

The not-a-dropship, not-a-jumpship, non-canon vessel would have to be retconned into something less rule-breaking, but could retain MOST of its characteristics as a mobile platform with a docking collar (it could EITHER dock with a jumpship, OR have a dropship dock with it, but not both simultaneously, so any attached dropship would need to undock and use another collar on the jumpship).  Its exotic repair and construction facilities would still make it a very valuable "toy", once the Helm Core provided the information on how to make more of it functional again.
« Last Edit: 16 November 2018, 10:42:54 by Kovax »

Icerose20

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #208 on: 16 November 2018, 12:11:34 »
Or, heaven forbid, something goes right. 

Battletech 'galaxy' may not be all sunshine, but guess what, humanity has become an interstellar species.  Worlds and worlds have millions or billions of humans on it.  Even with the losses of so much technology, and the losses of a good amount of worlds, humanity is still there and growing. 

I started to play in 1991, and got the House Kurita sourcebook and saw the Starmap it had, and it seemed so fanciful that there was as many human habitable worlds 'close by'.  Science at the time thought that planets were rare, because we hadn't found any yet. Boy, were we wrong.  Battletech universe has tried to be more grounded in its outlook then Star Trek or Star War.  But it has never been Westeros fatalistic.  Leaders do learn from their mistake if they survive them, and they do pass down that knowledge down to the next generations.  Then Kids will be kids and maybe learn for it, or have to relearn what was taught by experience.

The Argo can be seen as an analog to the Aurigan Coalition.   With some luck, intelligent people, and good amount of resource, it can be whole again.   

Colt Ward

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Re: Aurigan Reach
« Reply #209 on: 16 November 2018, 12:51:09 »
Doesn't work. Pilot salaries in the game scale directly according to their experience level. A pilot with 10s in all skills isn't costing you 5 times as much in medical costs or food and uniforms as a raw recruit. And there are separate upkeep costs for the 'Mechs and the ship.

The game's economy is just wonky. Sale prices for weapons, for example are rigged something like 10-to-1 against the player which doesn't work in the near-barter system economy of the 3025 periphery.

Actually, I never included basic maintenance costs for the mech though I mentioned it.  I know its a separate line item, based on weight afaik which matches up with the FM Mercs (R) cost. 

Only the first line used the troopers' cost.  My second was tooth to tail cost, which is the admin, medical, tech, and transport personnel who you have to pay to get your effective mechwarrior to the battlefield.  I just calculated the costs of replacing a single ton of armor and LRM ammo a month per mech operated- which does not include AC or SRM ammo as some mechs will mount- which are abstracted.

As far as selling weapons . . . you not selling them to another user yourself, you are selling them to buyers who are going to flip them to sell on the open market.  So you are not going to get that market value you get charged when you buy gear . . . 10% is a bit depressed I will agree, you should be getting 30-60% of the value IIRC based on other RPG sources.

To me the economics work, its not like some games where late in the game you are sitting on stockpiles of cash b/c you have filled the money sinks and do not need stuff.  It may not be overall aesthetically pleasing, but its functional in its abstract nature considering its not something most players are going to care about- they want to go PEWPEW.

Icerose-

Sure it could go right . . . for the discussion about how tenuous the continuity of government is (aka heir talk) a couple of points . . . first, we do not know Kamea did not get knocked up in the three years she was putting the pieces in place for her restoration.  A spouse/consort could be sitting safely back in Canopian space or even closer like Detroit or Herotitus.  BT has a tradition of heir being hidden in certain political structures (like the Magistry) which is also taken from history.  Which means a 2-3 year old could be in hiding as the heir with a succession plan (picked regent) in place for the moment she steps on the dais to get crowned.

Secondly, as recent product shows the writers for BTU for some reason do not care about heirs and the continuity of government . . . which is ironic considering the game started with a background of centuries of war trying to determine who was properly to succeed to a throne, aka continuity of government.  In the current timeline point, only a single Inner Sphere ruler has a heir.  One just took power who was the heir shortly before though we do not know if she has her own heir she does have siblings that can have a reasonable claim though that could cause its own problem.  So Kamea not having a heir is not a huge hindrance the way things are being written today.

The big problem is that folks already involved in the government have determined the only solution to whatever the problem may be is violence.  Once that happens it takes a lot of effort/reform to pull the society back from that brink.
Colt Ward
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