Alpha Strike Strategy Guide -- Marauder Edition

[Dissolv]

I wrote a series of emails for the players of the Marauder campaign, as we tried to learn the system and keep our mercenary battalion afloat.  Since most everbody is home lately, it seems a good time to post this to the general public.  Anything referring to something local, personal, or specific is because it was all originally written for our campaign.   Hope people enjoy:



ALPHA STRIKE TACTICS #1 -- The Basics

I've said before that Alpha Strike is a surprisingly nuanced game.  In the first of at least one installment on tactics, we will take a look at mech survivability.

The main consideration with Alpha Strike is the use of the good old fashioned 2d6 Bell curve.  Expected damage delivered and expected combat lifetime are greatly influenced by to hit modifiers that become progressively more powerful as they move up --or down -- the curve.

Here's the basics:

To-hit number     %Chance to hit
2                        100%
3                        97.22%
4                        91.66%
5                        83.33%
6                        72.22%
7                        58.33%
8                        41.66%
9                        27.77%
10                      16.66%
11                      8.33%
12+                    2.77%

High TMM mech's, especially those who can also pile on further modifiers, such as Jumping or being in terrain, become progressively harder to deal with.  But it gets a little complicated, since some mech's use speed, and others pile as much armor and structure as they can, and Mediums are right in the middle doing a bit of both.  So how tough is your mech really then?

To find out, we head to the range for some examples.
Les is piloting a Goliath that has 1 TMM 1, but sports 8 armor and 6 structure.

Example 1) A sample opponent with 4 skill and 4 damage, at medium range, will output 1.55 damage per turn, on average. 
{Math = 7 to hit, for 58%, and in our optional rules only 2/3rds of the damage counts, so (.58 * 4 * .6666= 1.55).}
 Les's Goliath can stand up to that for 5 turns before he gets into structure, and then won't actually be destroyed for another 4 turns or so.  9 turns total is pretty durable.

Example 2) Against the same 4 skill, 4 damage opponent, my (at the time) Shadowhawk has 3 TMM if I jump, but only has 5 armor and 5 structure.  That's still pretty beefy for a medium--here is how long I would expect it to last in combat against the same opponent:
"9" to hit so (27.77% * 4 * .6666) = .74 damage per turn.  So a jumping Shadowhawk will, on average, last 6.7 turns until it is brought into structure, and then another 6.7 turns before it is actually destroyed.

Example 3) Same enemy, now shooting at our Cicada.  Technically a size 2 mech, but 2 armor and 3 structure.  3 TMM.
Still the same .74 damage per turn, but now the armor folds after just 2.7 turns, and explosion 4.05 turns after that.


So the medium mech actually can be more durable than the assault mech!  This comes at a steep price of +2 to his own "to hit" modifier for jumping, but we haven't gotten into that just yet. 
Where it gets worse for the medium mechs, and even more so for the lights, is against highly skilled opponents.  Here is what happens if that same 4 damage enemy mech (say a Warhammer) is now driven by a skill 2 pilot.

Example 1) Goliath.  5 to hit.  (83.33% * 4 * .6666) = 2.22 damage per turn.  Les's Goliath now lasts only 3.6 turns before his armor is gone, then another 2.70 turns until the Goliath is destroyed.

Example 2) Shadowhawk. 7 to hit. (58% * 4 * .6666) = 1.55 damage per turn.  Now it is only 3.2 turns until the Shadowhawk armor is gone, then another 3.2 until the Shadowhawk is completely destroyed.

Example 4) Cicada.  7 to hit. (58% * 4 * .6666) = 1.55 damage per turn.  But with just 2 armor, that's gone in just 1.29 turns!  1.9 further turns on average until he is gone.

The medium still stands up pretty well, but is clearly on the down side of this.  A Light mech, with even less armor to save it from the hits, is gone even faster.  Worse, he is living and dying not so much by the "average" amount, but in a "hit or miss" type world, and if the enemy rolls a solid first turn hit, then he lasts 1 turn.   The variance curve just starts to work against the speedy mechs, at the same time as the expected time in combat drops like a rock.

Gunnery skill, and especially conditions that prevent TMM from being applied -- such as ambush and Combat Intuition, really screw over the Light and somewhat the Medium mech's, while doing almost nothing bad to the Heavy and Assault mech's.  The Heavy and Assault mech's can also be much more liberal with standing still for the bonus +1 to hit, since it doesn't impact their lifespan nearly as much anyway, while the Mediums and Lights don't dare stand still under fire.   Adding cover modifiers or Night conditions, seem to help all mechs survive equally well, right up until the Light mechs can push to the "to hit" numbers up to 9 or 10.  Then they become crazy hard to get rid of.  Evasion in particular is insanely good for a Light mech, who only has to worry about mines, artillery, ambush, or Combat Intuition, short of a lucky "12".

If you start factoring how long it takes to kill enemy mech's as a time limit for the damage that you take, then it almost always is better for the larger mechs to focus on outputting damage -- since you are getting hit most of the time anyway, and for the smaller mech's to focus on being hard to hit, while taking a roll at some damage.

This is what makes the Mad Cat so devastating.  It has 8 armor, enhanced by 2 TMM, so you can't put it down quickly, and outputs 5 or 6 damage per turn -- and gets the 2 TMM without a jump to give itself a negative modifier.  This also why a Gladiator will outlast a Daishi against "typical" opposition, and also why the Daishi should be reserved for your skill 1 pilots.  It's attacks have to count -- immediately, before the enemy has time to whittle down the armor, which they are most certainly going to hit.

The good news of the system is that the light and medium mechs can be very durable, in particular against Average or militia quality opponents (Skill 5 opponents!  Bring them on!). At first I thought the heavy and assault mech's might be disadvantaged, but at the end of the day, the armor is a reliable constant, and you can stick your nose into a very rough area with a lot of confidence at the start of a fight, since there is no level of gunnery or special pilot skill that negates armor.  Mediums and Lights, on the other hand, will not fare nearly as well against superior opposition, and will have to work extra hard to keep the TMM modifiers up by jumping (which lowers damage output), hiding in woods (which lowers damage output), and keeping a respectful distance (which lowers damage output).


So there it is: the first installment of Alpha Strike tactics, "How tough is your mech".

[Dissolv]

Alpha Strike Tactics #2: Why Johnny can't shoot; or Leave Long Range combat to specialists.

Long Range combat values are extremely misleading.  If you are piloting an Awesome with a 4/4/4 damage rating, you may think that you do 4 damage at all range bands.  You do not.  It all comes back to the chart:

To-hit number     %Chance to hit
2                        100%
3                        97.22%
4                        91.66%
5                        83.33%
6                        72.22%
7                        58.33%
8                        41.66%
9                        27.77%
10                      16.66%
11                      8.33%
12+                    2.77%

With a 4 skill, shooting at a TMM 2 target, you are doing this much damage, on average, per turn:

Short:      1.9
Medium:  1.11
Long:       .44

That's right, your super expensive assault mech does under a half point on average under those conditions.  You do just 39% of the damage that you do at medium range!  even with re-rolls, the odds of doing anything other than wasting your turn are just too great.

There are a couple of solutions that turn your generic mech into a long range death machine.  The best part about this is not just the early and repeated hits (which can be very disconcerting to an opponent), but also the fact that you can substitute the range penalty for a form of TMM.  You can even stand still for the bonus to hit (and probably should!)  Put these beasts into a Fire Lance and two of them get the free Sniper skill.  That immediately makes your Long Range damage equal to your old Medium Range damage, while your Medium range damage also improves.  Bonus!

Short:      1.9
Medium:  1.5
Long:      1.11

If you stand still, it gets even better.  In fact you will do more damage with Sniper, standing still at Long Range than you can do at Medium Range in a normal moving and fighting type situation.   So one of these Long Range focused mech's, even with no other ability than being one of the two Snipers in a Fire Support Lance, is better than a buddy Assault mech supporting your attack at medium range.  Something to think about.

Short:      1.9 (don't stand still at Short Range!!!)
Medium:  1.9
Long:      1.5

With a +1 skill here (say from Sandblaster), you are outputting a silly amount of routine damage:
Standing still, with Sandblaster, Sniper, and 4 damage total against a 2 TMM target:


Medium:   2.22
Long:        1.9

This is insane amounts of easy to roll damage that will quickly wreck something even like a Mad Cat unless it takes steps to deal with the Longbows.  (More on that later)

But actually doing damage is only one third of the point here.  The second portion is that you are taking one of those huge, lumbering, crap TMM Heavies or Assaults and substituting the Range penalty for your poor or non-existent TMM.  Basically instead of TMM 1 and +2 for Medium range, you are giving the opponent a +3 (if you stand still at long range) shot at your relatively thick armor in exchange for a very high probability attack against his likely weaker armor.  If you need you can shuffle around to make it +4 for Range and +1 for TMM, so a whopping +5.   Standing still is to help you pick on Lights and Mediums, or if you are not likely to face serious fire since you are way in the back.

The final third is that if your unit either has wide fields of fire OR the IF attribute and a friendly spotter, you can use that Lance as an initiative sink and just always have them go first, and pretty much stabilize for the very accurate and hard to avoid shooting phase.  This gives your lights and mediums more things to react to that have already moved, and improves your position on the table top, which is pretty much invaluable.  What is almost inevitable is that once the opponent realizes that he cannot hide from the pain, he will move forward to remove it -- and that's where everything can be quickly cleaned up.  You already have a Madcat with Combat Intuition in the Company.  The best use case here is to blat annoying lights and mediums trying to deal with the Longbows.  The Light Command Lance can similarly respond to threats, working on the assumption that it intends to move last.

I definitely believe that one lance in three of each Company should have some means of delivering accurate firepower at long range.  You may not always need it, but softening up the enemy before you hit that crucial medium range firefight has proven to be surprisingly critical in a couple of wins.

Thus ends Alpha Strike tactics #2.
or "not bad for a beer and pretzels game"

[Dissolv]

Alpha Strike Tactics #3 -- Initiative and rotating linemen.

One of the hardest things about Alpha Strike is the fact that you shoot simultaneously.  That flat out means that there are a lot of situations where you literally cannot prevent taking damage, if all other things were equal, an entire enemy lance could just pick out one of your mechs, and vaporize it every turn until you or he were gone like an 18th Century musketry contest.  But things aren't equal.

Some mechs are just clearly harder to bring down than others.  Some have huge amounts of armor that has to be chewed through to even get to the structure, while others have a high TMM and offer "bad shots" that have a high percentage chance to waste the shooting turn for any mech trying to target them.  But in a game with ambushes, skill 2 pilots, and 7 damage assault tanks, these things alone are not what keeps mechs from dying.

What keeps mechs from dying is understanding the initiative order, and carefully rotating the best shots available to the enemy so that only very difficult, or even no shots are available against our damaged mechs, forcing him to shoot away the armor of the entire lance before ANY mech gets into structure, while at the same time focusing on, and taking enemy units completely out of the fight.

This is the trick to the entire game, actually.  And it is tough to describe.  But on any given turn, you should have a priority lance.  Maybe it is very beat up but is too much of your firepower to want to evade.  Maybe it is some lights that simply cannot take a beating.  Most of the game it will likely be a lance that needs to remain flexible in order to avoid or expect dish out damage.  This lance is the one you select to move last.

That lance is the lance that will have maximum number of enemy targets in final turn positions in front of it, is the lance that has the best chance to get completely behind the enemy (which is why high speed and fragile lights are often the best choice to be the priority), and also the lance that be able to get out of the way of the most enemy fire by blocking line of sight, or at least manipulating range bands and terrain to present the worst possible targets to themselves.  In other words the last mechs to go are likely to both take the least and do the most damage on the turn.

Conversely the poor saps who move first are very vulnerable to everyone else jumping out of their fields of fire, and even possibly right behind them.  Stuff moves quick in this game.  So they are the most likely to take a beating, and the least likely to have a decent shot for the turn.

Line rotation is a term from hockey, where you rotate the defensive linemen to keep them fresh.  The way to keep your mechs from getting clobbered is basically to rotate your priority Lance so that the same Lance doesn't take it on the chin beyond what it's armor can tolerate.

So early in the game the Assaults might move first a lot, depending on their armor to absorb whatever the enemy can dish out, and the lights move as late in the turn as you can manage.  But after your assaults get jacked up enough (and they will -- the armor buys them time in combat, but they don't have the TMM to expect not to get hit a lot), they may need to be rotated later down the turn order to make sure that the enemy is denied opportunity to finish them off.  This is how we get things like Bill's Zeus getting attacked from behind one turn, only to get completely behind his tormentor the turn after that.

Obviously if you win the initiative,things are on a good curve.  The enemy will move one unit, and you absolutely know where they are and be able to make a good move.  And the priority lance should have a great move because everything on the board is stuck in position and you can just do the very best thing with them easily.

The first play of the turn should generally be conservative, and focus on lining up a very basic shot either on something that has already moved, cannot move out of line of sight, or be in a big arc where stuff is likely to be.  This goes triple if you have lost the initiative.  In fact pulling back a little and making sure that you don't get flanked for free is a fine move.

Different Companies are in different positions with regard to the Initiative order and it changes how the company plays.  For example Beta has a Fire Support Lance that in all likelihood will have no problems going first, being the "initiative sink".  Everything in the Lance just hangs out at long range and plants their feet for the -1 to hit.  Then the enemy has to move something that the rest of the lance can key off of.  If Beta wins the initiative, then the enemy might have to make TWO meaningful moves before Beta touches a front line model.  That's an almost incalculable advantage. 

Gamma plays differently. (Note: this information is dated as the nature of Gamma has evolved)  The light lance brawls.  The medium lance brawls.  The heavy lance brawls.  One neat advantage to this is that they can swap priority order positions fairly freely. But whoever goes first is not in a great position -- at all.   We saw that in the Night Fight, where  when the enemy won the initiative we got shot in the back.  A lot.

That game was a case study in swapping Lance Initiative priority.  Most of the game the mediums were prioritized so that they could get advantageous shots against the enemy -- especially as the enemy dominated the initiative rolls early on and were just very hard to catch.  Later in the game we switched to the heavies, and since we were winning the initiative by that point, the enemy had to deal with our toughest mechs suddenly walking out their fields of fire, taking multiple rear shots on their best units, and they never got a real chance to finish them off.  The mediums were tough enough to handle not always going dead last, so it was just their turn to take one for the team while the heavies had their fun.

The net result was that everything got damaged a lot, but no mech actually exploded. Was there a lot of luck involved? Certainly!  But even with the same rolls, if we had just kept on giving the medium lance the priority turn order, it would not have gone as well for us.

So that's it, the secret to the game, albeit poorly described.  It is also important to note that the only way you can ever really ensure your mechs' safety is to take the other guys out.  I am a strong proponent of taking the first couple of enemy out of the fight ASAP just to get their dice off the table.  No matter what it is -- even an infantry stand.   Anything that won’t bother you next turn is a good thing.

[Dissolv]

Alpha Strike Tactics #4 -- How to win

As anyone who has studied history knows, there are different ways to go about attaining victory.  I'm going to go through them, with examples, and hopefully connect the concept to Alpha Strike.

Method #1 -- Jousting.

This method is named after two Knights in a tournament.  The ancients guys use it when two very similar units hit on the flank, such as two Knight units, and the outcome of that singular clash has dramatic ramifications on the battle.  It is also sometimes used pejoratively, as in you aren't really using "tactics", just applying maximum force in a direct line.

Historically this path to victory is an extremely common Western concept.  We do more or less the same thing that you do, but we do it better because we have trained harder, prepared better, have better equipment, etc.  Romans vs. Barbarians.  Greeks versus Persians.  Greeks versus other Greeks :-P  Indeed, Sparta was literally built around this concept.

The advantage is that if you actually hold the cards, you can run right over your opponent's best.  If you have a Tiger tank, and the opponent has a (single) Sherman tank, then by all means engage him mercilessly until he is dead.  Then you can do what you want for the rest of the field.

In Battletech, the Clans embody this concept.  They win because they are better than you, have trained harder, have better equipment, and are also better people, with more honor (according to them).

Tactically speaking, how you fight depends on what your culture thinks that your advantage is.  The Japanese, and therefore the Draconis Combine (ruled by House Kurita) puts strong emphasis on maneuver.  Much like the Japanese Zero, they win because they outmaneuver your slow and busted fighters, applying their maximum force while denying you good (or any) shots against them.  More classical Western concepts put much stronger emphasis on armor and durability.  ALL jousting or dueling concepts rely on being better trained.  Combat is for the expert, who likely has no other responsibilities in his culture.

In our campaign so far this has been the dominant tactic.  We pit our mechs and our skill against whatever the enemy has, and hopefully come out on top.

In fact all of Battletech is overwhelmingly dominated by this concept.  Mech vs. mech is the general order of the day, with the assumption being that the winner of the Battlemech contest will  carry the greater battle.


Method #2 -- Combined Arms.

This is a more complex evolution over "just being better" than the other guy.  Essentially you are trying to use a collection of greatly different combat elements (traditionally infantry, cavalry (tanks), archery (artillery), skirmishers (recon), to achieve a collective effect greater than what any one of them could ever achieve.

Historically this is well represented by the German Blitzkrieg, where well coordinated arms of combat ran roughshod over more numerous French, British, and Soviet forces, despite them all having stronger tanks, more tanks, and a variety of other advantages.  Alexander the great used the most famous combined arms force in history, with his Pike, Cavalry, elite skirmishers and archers used in a mutually supportive fashion in multiple battles.

In Battletech, this concept shows up every now and again, but I rarely see it emphasized.  Obviously a lot of this is to showcase the Battlemechs in game play, but Alpha Strike gives the opportunity to put out varied and interesting formations that aren't necessarily mech heavy.  We fight a lot of "hodge podge" style formations that I would characterize as combined arms, but crappy implementations of it.  I would suspect that some of the more professional formations that routinely use combined arms (and I am thinking House Davion here for some reason??) could wind up fielding a mix of light units, infantry, mechs, air, and artillery that would be incredibly hard to deal with.

Tactically speaking, there are a lot of tools once you get it onto the table.  Since everyone has played WWII gaming, you know what I am talking about. Use artillery to force the enemy to move, armor to leverage him out of position, fast recon to expose his hidden units/assault his rear echelon formations, or heavy armor to hit him with a hammer blow.  The down side is that you actually have to have it all on the table to use it.  We normally only get mechs.

In our campaign, we are currently company limited, unless allowed to build up forces in multiple trips.  Since battlemechs are the best things available to us, that's what we use.  But we do use some combined arms tactics, at least in the sense that we tend to field different Lance types and always roll with air power.  That last fact alone has been extremely helpful/absolute salvation from time to time.

As time goes by I would like employ more combined arms formations for specific missions, although would require a significant expansion to ultimately realize, just getting air, artillery (mech mounted or vehicle mounted), mechs, infantry, and armor/hover units all on the table at the same time would be a feat.


Method #3 -- Strategic Victory

This one is where you win the war, then go fight it.  It can be done a variety of ways, but generally we think of it as having a better economy, inexhaustible manpower, or possibly superior planning and intelligence to such a degree that victory is almost assured.   Sun Tzu advocated this above all else.  Martial artists also emphasize winning before you ever get into a fight, mainly because they are strongly influenced by the great Eastern Masters.

Historical Examples of this: The Roman Republic with its ability to raise as many armies at takes to defeat Hannibal, the U.S. codebreakers delivering Midway up on a platter to Nimitz.  The U.S. economy in WWII.

This one is easy to confuse with Jousting, and is done so time and time again historically.  Leaders get overconfident that their military is "better", and thus they cannot lose.  But war doesn't work like that.  "The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong"  Properly speaking, it is a strategic advantage that has nothing to do with the armor thickness on a Tiger tank.   The Spartans were overwhelmed by Epaminondas and his Thebans because they had put all their faith in a Jousting strategy, but the elite Spartan Hoplites were blown away by clever deployment and overwhelming concentration against them.  The rest of the army saw that that the "best" Hoplites were defeated and so just fled.

In Battletech there are a lot of examples of this kind of approach.  House Davion regularly uses superior logistics to gain advantage, as did Clan Wolf in the Clan Invasion.  House Liao favors intelligence coups and deception on a grand scale.  The Clans had Comstar in their corner feeding them information during the Clan Invasion.


For us, we are generally applying force in a tactical situation.  So a lot of the situations are out of our control, which means that we do always risk being put into a situation that chews up the Company if we take the wrong contract, deploy the wrong formation, or underestimate some facet of the opposition.


But we can still use all three primary strategies to try to consistently eke out a win.

Jousting is probably our primary strategy.  We are an all mech force in a mech heavy game, after all.  Beta has by far our strongest Jousting Lance, with the Clan tech, high skill, high damage + re-roll force of doom.  It is not often that you put together a force where a Hunchback is ignored in an Urban environment!

Combined arms we are presently limited to mixing light and heavy forces + air power for Alpha and Gamma.  Gamma does not even have a long range/short range mix! (Note: also an outdated comment.)

Beta also has the most combined arms, as they employ a hammer unit (Clan tech led Battle Lance), a swiss army utility knife unit (the Command Lance), and a Fire Support unit (the Fire Lance).  The Fire Lance has moderate Indirect Fire capability, and good to very good Direct Fire Support capability.   Being able to add the Long Range/Indirect Fire into the combat wherever it is needed is what really makes it "combined" arms.  Broadly speaking, Beta is heavy armor + artillery + light unit.  Given that we only generally field 3 Lances at once, that's about as combined arms as you can get right now.

Beta is pretty much as set as we can make a Company atm.  (Note: Not sure this comment holds up, but it’s still close.  Beta is a beast by design.)


Alpha I would also rate as using the Jousting strategy, but poorly.  There are extremely strong mechs in the unit, but they are just mismatched with speed and damage and style of play.  It is hard to tell what any particular Lance should be doing in any given situation.  Worse, the losses suffered were all among the better mechs, so now it is like King Arthur's Court minus Galahad and Gawain.  I'm confident that we'll feel something out, but like the Spartans, these guys are going through the pain of when this tactic does not pay off like the commanders expected.

Alpha's personality I expect will change dramatically after Acamar.  (Note: And it did, but has been reconstituted so many times that I don’t even know what it’s character current is, really.)

Gamma is closer to the "Jousting through superior maneuver" concept used by the DCMS/WWII Japanese.  They don't necessarily win by having the most armor or damage values, or even being better trained, although we are starting to get there.  They win by rapid maneuvers that get mechs into the right position and wrong foot the enemy forces turn after turn.   Personally I also favor the Western concept of durable units. (Note: Still true, but evolving as we learn more and increase in capabilities.)

But what about Method #3?  Strategic Victory?  That is damn hard for us to apply.  Even though Jeff is fond of pointing out that the intelligence has been pretty much correct in our missions, the reality (to the players) is that we often drop with no idea what to expect.  Night Fight? Defensive mission? Enemy air?  No idea.  The best way for us to "win" strategically is to continue to groom pilots wisely, match the mechs to the missions, and above all -- Glenn must accept contracts that are not meatgrinders.

So far we have out pointed our opposition --tremendously in some missions, and generally have had air superiority of some type.  While we also have had to overcome terrain and mission parameters, this is a "good" way to make a living as a mercenary and embodies the Strategic "win before you play" idea.  At least as best as we can manage it.  If we take a contract where the enemy has a PV advantage as well as other advantages, then we bit off more than we can chew and may have to concede that we got our asses' kicked.  Not something that I am sure we can do well as players, but as we ramp up in general quality we do have to worry about being caught in the Great Houses' eternal wars and having to bag one, or go down fighting.  (Note: We have had missions now where we were outpointed by 2-1 or worse, and come out on top.  Other times we have lost to a 1 on 1 ish fight.)

Hope that was worth the read!

[Dissolv]

Alpha Strike Strategy #5 -- Winning the EWAR

When classic Battletech started, it was the year 3025 and there was almost no EWAR left around.  Some lostech, certainly, but only the Capellans had a prototype EWAR module ready to go.  And it was bad.  Just terribly bad.  It was however, the beginning of a revolution of warfare.  We are presently playing in the campaign in the year 3065, and technology has come a very long way since then.  In addition to the more obvious changes, such as Extended Range Lasers, or Extra Light Fusion Engines, EWAR is poised to change the battlefield of the future.

The most basic bit of EWAR kit is the humble Beagle Probe.  This is abbreviated PRB/RCN on the Alpha Strike sheet, because having a probe automatically grants recon.   The Probe grants the unit the ability to Sensor spot blips (hidden movement units using poker chips or similar to move around the map) at 18" regardless of line of sight.  It also also an "Active Probe" of any single enemy unit within 16".  This is done prior to firing and lets the player know the variant or configuration of the scanned unit, its current heat level, and damage status, Move, and possible movement modes.    It will also reveal this information for every enemy within 6", automatically.  Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the probe will detect hidden and motionless enemies laying in ambush up to 10" away. 

The Recon portion provides pre-game Battlefield Intelligence which provides a bonus to all Initiative rolls during the battle, adds to the number of pre-plotted artillery impact points and the total number of hidden units (in the cases where it is allowed) is equal to the number of Recon units in the force.  Essentially the probe spends its time more accurately charting the terrain when not actively scanning mechs.

A more advanced form of EWAR is the C3 network.  Command, Control and Communications over a linked set of computers within a formation of mechs.  The most basic use of this is to share targeting data.  In game terms one mech moves within short range, and ALL linked mechs can now fire using the Short Range band modifier (+0), even if they are at long range themselves.  This allows for light scouting mechs to act as amazing force multipliers for powerful, distant mechs, pushing the envelope of what can be quickly and easily killed out to maximum weapons range.  This is very popular with Draconis Combine formations (House Kurita).

There are also two types of specialized long range assisting capabilities that fall under EWAR.

The first is TAG -- Target Acquisition Gear.  TAG is used to "paint" a target for pre-launched homing rounds from artillery.  Rather than the area of effect artillery, a guided missile may be launched towards a specific target.  This missile has flight time like normal artillery, but on the turn that it is to impact, a TAG equipped unit must paint a target by making a separate "to hit" roll for the TAG gear.  He may also fire his normal weapons, and does not seem to suffer a penalty for doing so in this case, unlike artillery or Indirect Fire spotting.  So long as someone succeeds with at least one TAG on the turn that the homing round is due to land, one of those targets will be hit on an unmodified 4+.  A miss or no TAG successes means that the round hits nothing.  Guided missiles do 2 damage from mech sized artillery, so this might best be seen as a force multiplier, or a way to direct damage where it is needed by having several such guided missiles in the air consecutively.

The second is the NARC Missile Beacon.  This is a beacon shot from a mech which will magnetically or otherwise cling to the target for the rest of the game.  It requires a "to hit" roll.  If a unit is struck by a NARC beacon, it will take +1 damage from any Indirect Fire, LRM, or SRM attacks -- for the rest of the game.     Note that I learned that a spotter can target more than one Indirect Fire attack, but they must all be onto the same target.  This is potentially valuable to all those IF 1 mechs out there.   (Alpha Strike, p. 35)  Get a NARC beacon onto a target, and even a couple Valkyries will destroy it quickly.

To combat all of this force multiplier nirvana, units must either surgically remove the key targets possessing the EWAR capabilities, identifying which is which ironically requires a probe, or they can use ECM.  Electronic Counter Measures equipped units create a 12" radius zone which cancels the effects of Active Probes, C3, and NARC systems.  It does not seem to help against TAG, which is presumably a laser painting (hard to block light with ECM).  Outside of this zone, the EWAR capabilities work normally.  Within it, they do not.  In my opinion we should consider getting one Light and one Heavy ECM mech for each company, if possible.

ECM equipped units may also choose to use their electronics as ECCM, on a turn by turn basis.   While in ECCM mode, their 12" bubble will defeat an equal amount of enemy ECM, allowing the EWAR units to function normally.  Two ECM units in the same area require 2 ECCM units to counter.  The best use of the ECM in a Light Lance is to turn it to ECCM, to assist the Probe equipped unit in finding ambushes and hidden units that are covered by an ECM field.  It can also be used to mask our own movement from enemy Probes.

There are more powerful versions of most of the items listed here.  For example there is a Bloodhound Probe that can punch right through regular ECM.  There is also Angel ECM, that counts double from the regular strength version, and so on.

Fundamentally though, there are a variety of EWAR options, and they are all very powerful.  ECM is mainly about not suffering at the hands of enemy EWAR, but it is challenging to provide an ECM screen for your entire force, and you must be selective.  Finally, you can turn your ECM into ECCM, to punch a hole in the enemy ECM, and allow your own EWAR assets to have an impact.

In our specific case, we generally only have a few PRB/RCN equipped units, which we use for Battlefield Intelligence and to try to spot ambushes and hidden units.  They are invaluable, but quite a few other options exist to take a look at.  Beta company uses Indirect Fire a fair bit, so might look into a light mech equipped with a NARC.  Alpha picked up an artillery mech. Conceivably it could also find a TAG and PRB/RCN mech to paint for guided missiles, and to spot for artillery barrages.  A full commitment to this concept would use a Scout Lance, spotting for an Artillery Fire Support Lance.  We don't currently have anything that sophisticated, and are primarily generalists, but a scout lance in Alpha Strike is a significantly more dangerous thing than in classic Battletech, if you exploit all the angles.  EWAR and combined arms is a major reason why.

[Dissolv]

Alpha Strike Tactics #6 -- The Mechwarrior

This time around I'll be taking a look at the role of the Mechwarrior on the performance and tactics of the mechs.  AKA -- trapped hosting a super bowl party that he'd much rather skip.

There is a strong tendency to focus only on the tech, but if WWII has taught us anything, it is that better trained crew will outperform their counterparts even when outnumbered, or when facing materially superior vehicles.  It is no different in Battletech.

The most basic measure of a pilot's contribution is his Skill Rating.  A lower number becomes progressively more powerful.  The Combat Manuals offer this description of skill values:

7: Wet behind the ears
6: Really Green
5: Green
4: Regular
3: Veteran
2: Elite
1: Heroic
0: Legendary

So in our campaign we have taken on a few Green pilots, but never anyone fresh out of basic or totally untrained.  Our leaders are now all Veterans or Elites, and we are growing our regular pilots to be Veterans and a few Elites, and Indy’s Beta company has two Heroic level pilots.  Yikes!

Raw skill is most important since it is the base number "to hit".  So putting an Elite pilot in a 1 damage mech is a waste of his talents.  The better your skill, the more raw damage that you can throw downrange successfully.  So the game does tend to reward putting the most experienced pilots in the biggest, most damaging mechs.

But that is not the only way for a Mechwarrior to be notable.  In addition to just standard "skill", there are a large number of Special Pilot Abilities (SPA's) that a Mechwarrior can learn.  These provide focus and specialization, and a lot of tasks really require a marriage of the right mech and the right pilot to get the most out the more specialized combat tasks.  SPA's are where a pilot can become good at these MoS's without necessarily becoming Elite or better pilots. 

The best overall mix for most general combat tasks appears to be gaining Veteran skill (or at least Regular -- some combat tasks are not skill dependent), but then to take a hard look at the various SPAs, and what you want your pilot to become, long term.  An intelligent SPA path can make an enormous difference, but to make good choices, you need to know the options. 

The most common way to get an SPA is to be assigned to a Lance formation.  For example a Battle Lance gives Lucky to its members, Pursuit gives Blood Stalker to three of them, and a Fire Lance gives Sniper to 2.

But to build a truly good mech warrior, you will want more than just the "free" SPA from the Lance skills.  Here is a breakdown of the SPAs, from the point of what you want the mechwarrior to be doing on the table.

Focus #1 -- Damage Avoidance.

This one is easy, as there is very little here.  There are no skills that improve damage absorption at all; your armor and structure are never modified by pilot skill.  There are also just 2 skills that can directly increase the difficulty in hitting your mech.  There are a couple that can help indirectly.

TerrainMaster (Forest Ranger, Swamp Beast) are the two SPA's that make you harder to hit.  Both decrease the movement cost within the favored terrain type (so that you keep your normal TMM modifier) and also apply an additional +1 to hit your mech when you are in your favored terrain.  At 3 points, these specialized talents are expensive, but are the only means of directly increasing survivability in the game.  Skills like this can make mechs like the Wraith nightmares to confront, but the cost and on-map limitations are significant considerations.

A number of skills will indirectly assist making you harder to hit as well.  Most Terrain Master skills and Maneuvering Ace will allow your full movement through difficult terrain, which allows you to retain your full TMM while also picking up terrain modifiers.  Jumping Jack will reduce the penalty to you for jumping, making it more appealing to jump routinely to avoid incoming fire.  Even Jumping Jack is 2 points, making taking less damage a rather expensive focus. 

But the right mech (say a TMM 3 + Jump capable Wraith) with both Jumping Jack and Forest Master can offer a stunning set of penalties to hit: (skill) + (range) + 6.  That is a 12 needed for a Regular pilot at medium range into a woods when the Wraith jumps.  And he still has 5 armor to chew through, and shoots back with minimal penalties.  Something to think about when saving those skill points.

Float like a Butterfly is a new skill that can force a re-roll against an enemy hit or critical roll.  This is a VERY powerful survival tool if you are consistently presenting difficult rolls to your opponent.  It is almost a waste if you are presenting target numbers of 6+ or such.  I strongly recommend this skill for all officers, as the enemy Op For specifically tries to kill them.

Focus #2 --  Melee Damage.

There are a large number of skills that assist or improve the damage that a mech can do in melee.  Having a melee specialist around can have a lot of utility, and a fully focused melee pilot in the right mech can be extraordinarily decisive.  This is aided by the fact that the variable damage rule explicitly does NOT apply to melee damage.  So melee damage = 1.3x regular shooting damage.  This often catches people out as they tend to think that “3 damage is 3 damage” in the heat of the moment.  However in 3 damage is 2 damage shooting, and 3 when melee.  There are also a number of cheaper skills in this category, so you can build a melee pilot skill by skill and improve as you go, or take it as a minor relatively easily. 

Melee Specialist -- the most basic skill at 1 point.  Gives a -1 to hit on your melee attacks.  Given that all melee attacks also happen at short range (+0), this is for when you are not very high skill in the first place, or are sick of that Wraith hiding in the woods, and want to go in and punch him on the nose.  Dirt cheap, however you can expect a high percentage of melee attacks to not "need" this skill, just because of the range.

Melee Master -- Adds half your size, rounded up to your melee damage (including Charge or Death from Above).  Very efficient on fast, Heavy (size 3) mechs, like the Grand Dragon, which moves 12" or more, and picks up +2 damage.  Ouch.  Only 2 points.

Zweihander -- +1 Damage to regular melee attacks (not Charge or DFA).  2 points. 

Swordsman -- If the mech has a dedicated melee weapon (says MEL on the unit sheet), this will do either +1 damage for a melee attack OR allow a critical roll on a successful hit.  2 points.  This can be a game changer against one of those huge assault mechs with tons of armor.  Just keep giving it annoying criticals until it becomes combat ineffective, even if you can't kill it. 

Fist Fire -- Your pilot can shoot while meleeing to some extent.  Add half the short range damage (rounded up) to a regular melee attack.  2 points.  Our Victor has this, and so does 4 melee + 2 shooting damage when he makes a melee attack.  Only the Mad Cat II can dish out more damage in our Battalion.  (Note: the Victor pilot sadly perished.  Gamma presently has two melee heavy pilots carrying on the tradition.)

Dodge -- This makes you harder to hit in melee.  +2 to hit modifier to any mech trying to melee you.  It can sort of come under the "Avoid Damage" category as well, but is very specialized.  2 points again.

Street Fighter -- If any enemy in base to base contact attempts a melee attack against you, before you have made your own attack, you get to make a "Combat Intuition" style interrupt of the turn to immediately execute a melee attack against that opponent, although at a +1 penalty.  This counts as your shooting for the turn, but not your movement.  2 points.  Obviously an extremely specialized skill for someone expecting to see a lot of melee style combat from the opponent, and also requires your own pilot to have good melee capability as well.

If you can manage to build a melee specialist with Melee Master, Fist Fire, and Zweihander you will be doing 8 damage if you are piloting a Grand Dragon or Quickdraw with at least 3 short range damage to start.  This is a stunning upgrade, and is only 5 skill points.  To get that level of damage out of shooting you would need a mech that does 11 damage at short range.

Focus #3 -- Long Range damage

The +4 to hit for Long range is simply insurmountable for any kind of regular pilot to bother with.  Only the occasional lucky hit will be scored, and most pilots standing back from the fray do nothing more than take themselves out of the combat, no matter what the damage rating on their mech might be at long range.  It just isn't worth all the many turns of missing.  But there are a number of SPA's that reverse this situation far more dramatically than almost any amount of skill can, and for dramatically less development time.

Range Master(long) is the king of these skills.  It swaps the Long Range penalty (+4) with the Short Range(+0).  So suddenly your long range mech is hitting things at 40" away with the same odds that everyone else has at point blank!  This 4 point swing is by far the most dramatic of the specializations available to a mech warrior.  It does mean that your now have a +4 penalty at short range, of course.  At only 2 points, this is also insanely affordable, so if you have a very focused long range support type mech, you can quickly and easily train a pilot to perform in that role, at the cost of making him a fumble fingers at close range. (Note: This has changed with Commander’s Edition.  It is no longer as extreme.)

Sniper is the more conservative option.  This skill merely halves the range penalty.  So medium becomes +1 and Long becomes +2.  At 3 points it is very worth it for a mech that wants to engage at any range, but it competes very strongly with just going ahead and getting skill level 3.  It will no longer assist Indirect Fire, only direct.

Sharpshooter is a skill that grants you a critical whenever you hit, even if armor has not been breached.  This skill is extremely powerful, but is balanced out by requiring you to remain stationary AND succeed the to hit roll by a margin of 3 or more.  It also costs a whopping 4 points.  This one is too restrictive for general use, but you can build a Range Master/Sharpshooter specialist who can be used to cripple large, slow vehicles and mechs. 

Oblique Attacker -- A straight up -1 to Indirect Fire attacks.  This is a straight up removal of the normal +1 penalty to make an Indirect Fire attack.  It does also has the option of allowing an Indirect Fire attack to be made without a spotter, the way that artillery is able to, although in this case it is +2, stacked on top of the regular +1 for Indirect Fire.   At just 1 point this is something to think about for any mech that ever has made an indirect fire attack.  If you have a dedicated Recon Lance in front of you which can also apply NARC beacons (for the +1 damage from IF), this skill becomes even more attractive, even for the IF1 mechs that would normally never look at this skill, despite it's cheapness.

Focus #4 -- Artillery

Artillery has an amazingly easy skill path, and you can get a lot for a little specialization here.  On the other hand, skills like Sniper and Range Master do not help.

Oblique Artilleryman is the basic artillery training skill.  It is a straight up -1 to hit with artillery, and also dramatically improves counter battery fire.  At just 1 point this is a steal, and really if you don't have it, you aren't all that good at artillery compared to someone who does.



Focus #5 -- Reliability

This is an area that we have lately been discovering.  Like any dice game, there will always be those moments when you set up a game-changing, high percentage shot and the dice screw you.  It is built into the game for this to happen, and table top gaming can be accurately described as a Shakespearean tragedy generator.  But a number of SPA's exist to mitigate this, and these can be very powerful indeed. 

Lucky is the most basic one.  1 point for a reroll.  2 points for 2 rerolls, and so on.  The more damage that your mech does, and the more aggressively that you drive him, the more useful this skill becomes, but 1 point of Luck is never really wrong. 

Natural Grace gives you a 360 degree fire arc.  At 3 points this one is very strangely expensive and specialized, but it completely takes away the option to just get behind your mech and shoot him from safety there.  Hilarious when you have 7 short range damage.  Mainly useful for very slow bruisers that no one wants to stand in front of, but are easily outmaneuvered due to 6” move.

Tactical Genius is the other way to try to deal with the enemy movement.  This is a reroll to initiative, attempting to ensure that your side keeps the initiative and the other guy has to move first.  At 3 points this is expensive, but not everyone has to have it, only the officers.

Combat Intuition is another skill that we tend to focus on.  If your side wins the initiative, then once every 3 turns you can simply move and fire your mech before anyone else can take any actions.  That allows you to catch the enemy without TMM, and can let your mech maneuver to flank them completely as well.  It is extremely powerful, but also useless if you simply move up to medium range, get into cover and form a part of the firing line, as we have seen.  It is not cheap at 3 points, and can wind up leaving your mech an exposed target for the angry survivors.  Best taken on a high damage, rugged mech who can expect to use this skill to finish an opponent.

Blood Stalker also gets a lot of use in our formations.  It is a simple -1 to hit when applied against a pre-chosen target.  This is balanced out by a +2 penalty when shooting at other targets of opportunity.  At 2 points it may be better to just focus on skills, but it is materially improved in the Commanders Edition since it allows you to select a new target any turn that your target starts out of Line of sight.  You definitely need a mobile, aggressive play style to make use of this skill, as you will always be moving, always hunting, and always relentless.  We have had a lot of success with Pursuit lances, and the -1 to hit has helped train up our greenest pilots.

Float Like a Butterfly is a re-roll to the enemy hit or critical dice.  This can smooth over lucky hits against your mechs, and is best when the enemy needs a very high number, but happens to hit anyway.  It was covered under Survivability, but also belongs here.


Focus #6 -- Speed

This is one that we are just now really discovering.  Movement on the table really determines so much of the game, yet it is easy to get carried away trying to build a mechwarrior who can deliver colossal damage, or shoot a fly off of a cockpit at 2 miles away.   Only a very skills help here.

Speed Demon is the core skill, giving an extra 2" of movement all the time, and 4" if your sprint.  This does not affect your TMM.  At first I was dismissive of this, but then I realized that an Atlas (6" move) can sprint for 13" down the table, quickly setting itself up in medium range.  A fast assault/standard heavy moves 8".  With this skill they move as fast a standard medium all of the time (10"), and can sprint an astonishing 16".  The main goal here is to quickly achieve a favorable position on the table, either not getting outflanked, or making it to the next piece of cover, or controlling the desired range for combat.  2 points for your own Blitzkrieg.  Note: this was improved in Commander’s Edition because sprinting no longer makes you easier to hit.  Super fat assaults should now be barrelling down the table to get into medium range much more than previously.

Terrain Master and Maneuvering Ace skills help dramatically with table positioning, allowing non-jump capable units to avoid being slowed by terrain penalties.  This is almost always the first SPA purchased for fast lights who lack jump jets. 

Any initiative winning or supporting skills help make an intelligent move, and may count in this area. 

Example Historical Pilots:

The Combat Manuals for Alpha Strike are very helpful with a wide range of historical mech pilots from the Succession Wars/Clan Invasion period. 

Captain Reece McGee -- Skill 3, Dodge, Melee Master
Pilots a Warhammer -- is a disaffected DCMS commander
Clearly took these skills to counter the melee focus of the DCMS pilots

Captain Lori Kalmar-Carlyle -- Skill 2, Jumping Jack, Sharpshooter
Pilots a Shadowhawk
Uses her excellent skill to get long range criticals with the Sharpshooter SPA, switches to jumping to avoid damage when up close. 

Natasha Kerensky -- Skill 0, Lucky (1), Demoralizer, Iron Will
Pilots a Warhammer in this time frame.
Triumph of the skill?  I mean what can you say about skill 0 except to take it if you can get it?  Lucky is there to cancel the occasional snake eyes, and Demoralizer is just harsh, as we have seen from Deathclaw’s application.

Lojtnant Hanssen Mansdottir -- Skill 2, Forward Observer, Tactical Genius
Pilots a Zeus or an Atlas when he makes Captain (just prior to the Clan Invasion)
A classic Commander set of skills inside a well protected and long range capable mech.


Special Command Abilities:

An area of the game that we have totally ignored are the Special Command Abilities (SCA).  Special Pilot Abilities change the core rules for a single mech.  Special Command Abilities are the ability of the officer core to alter the rules for an entire command.  Since they impact so many mechs they are extremely powerful.  Jeff has not allowed them to stack, so when I am under Bill’s command, I lose my SCA, but we gain his instead.

Despite that, many of the formations described in the Combat Manuals have 2, 3, or even 4 SCA's!  We are no where near the level of these units, and might have trouble against some of them for this reason alone.  (If Jeff allowed them to stack).

Now that we are starting to earn them, it might be a very good idea to think about what you want your company to be like, as these will have a very big impact on how they play, even if the bonus seems mild compared to what an individual mech warrior can learn. 

Sharpshooters -- Changes the Range modifiers to +1/+2/+3.  Basically your entire command becomes better at long range shooting by 1, but worse at short range by 1 in exchange.  This reduces the value of individual long range SPA's, like Sniper, but suddenly your entire command becomes much better at long range fire.  Ideal for when you like the idea of the entire Company engaging at long range for a turn or two, but without actually committing any individual pilots to the (expensive and focused) long range SPA's.  Also better with a Veteran command.

Brawlers -- Changes the Range modifiers to -1/+2/+5.  This gives up on Long range combat entirely (unless an individual has taken Range Master(long) to swap in the -1 bonus!!!!), but makes hitting at point blank range even easier.  Can be great for a melee focused command.

Overrun Combat -- When you win the initiative, a number of your mechs can use Combat Initiative.  The number is 1 for every full 2 points that you won the initiative by.   Obviously you want to fight normally until this comes up, and then use it to try to gain a decisive advantage.  I picked this one up for Gamma out the choices that Jeff offered.   I think any of them could have been very beneficial.

Zone of Control -- this is an interesting one where  you can force your opponent to fall back or spend an extra 4" trying to get through a 2" area in the front of your mechs.  You can use this to push forward in a good formation and prevent being flanked or otherwise restrict enemy movement. 

Communication Disruption -- This one is also wholly unattainable using single pilot SPAs.  What it does is to constantly try to interfere with enemy comms.  Every turn you roll a die, and on a "6"  all units in a randomly chosen lance lose 4 inches of movement or 1 unit of Thrust, if aerospace.  This is very random, but is a unique bonus.

Banking Initiative -- You may automatically lose the initiative to the opponent. For every 2 times that you do this, you can automatically win the initiative.  Up to 2 automatic wins can be stored at one time).  The obvious tactics is to lose the first 4 turns of initiative, and then wait for a critical set of turns to capitalize. 

Forcing the Initiative -- You gain a modifier to initiative equal to the number of enemy units killed (minus any units that your force lost).  So the more successful you are at eliminating units, the better the odds of winning the initiative roll.

Off Map Movement -- A long range flanking maneuver, using on and off map points that are hidden from the opponent. 

Strategic Command -- Can change home table edge and move terrain 6" before deployment.

Strategic Planning -- +2 to initiative.  Must be Veteran or above rated unit.

Tactical Adjustments -- After turn 3 the opposition does not benefit from any bonuses to initiative from SPAs or SCAs.

Tactical Experts (Combined Fire).  If an entire Lance/formation shoots at the same target, they all get a -1 to hit.

Tactical Experts (Engineers) -- Can place light buildings or minefields at set up. 

Tactical Experts (Hidden units) -- Can place twice as many hidden units as the scenario allows.  Can always place 4 hidden units, even in missions where they cannot normally.

Esprit de Corps -- Never subject to Forced Withdrawl

Hit and Run -- If outnumbered, any unit that does not stand still gains a -1 to hit.

Intelligence Specialists -- gain a MHQ5 special ability on one unit

Highlander Burial -- Units get a -1 to hit bonus and +1 damage to all Death From Above attacks. 

And the list goes on.  There are also Region specializations, Enemy specializations, Terrain Specializations, Attacker specialization, etc. 


The main point here, is that we are slowly easing into having one or more of these abilities in our formations.  We might also encounter them from enemy formations from time to time as well. 

[LegoMech]

Great read, thanks for sharing!