Name:
Crucis March RangersHomeworld:
LogandaleCommander:
Colonel Brian EvansBadge:
Silver Dragon RampantMotto:
“We win wars.”Introduction:
“We win wars.”
It is a bold statement of intend, but one the Rangers strive to live up to. Highly mobile, the field a mixed force of battlemechs, VTOLs and battle armour, specialising in lightning assaults aimed at the complete destruction of the enemy forces. They eschew straightforward missions, instead preferring to seeking out the difficult or the intractable problems that other units cannot solve. Their fees are high, but their record speaks for itself.
History:
“One hundred years of glory looks back at us. Who are we to break that chain?”
Original formed as Gibson’s Commandos in 3050 to fight in the Clan Invasion, the unit served the Federated Commonwealth bravely before being all but destroyed during Operation Bulldog. Subsequently reformed as Shadowsword’s Rangers in 3065 it fought in the FedCom Civil War and the Jihad before again being destroyed during Operation SCOUR. Reformed again in 3080, this time called the Crucis March Rangers, it began to take on its current form in around 3103 while taking part in the Victoria War. Subsequently they would spend much of their time on the Draconis Reach front, before retreating back to the Federated Suns after the fall of the Reach in 3039. Now in the employment of the Federated Suns, their leadership relishes their new role as a fire brigade, constantly on the move, seeking out the fiercest fighting and earning fresh accolades to add to their growing reputation. Glory comes at a price however and as their losses mount, the question has to be asked how long a mercenary unit can sustain these casualty rates, for while the combat pay is generous, it has been noted that dead man have no use for money.
Recruitment:
“A career, not a job.”
Almost uniquely for a mercenary unit, the Rangers don’t offer short term contracts and rarely hire experienced personnel. Pay and conditions are fairly standard, with substantial combat bonuses paid for successful missions, but contracts are for a flat nine years with subsequent pension guaranteed by the Logandale Planetary Council. The Rangers go out of their way to present working for the unit as a career and most senior NCOs and Officers are on their second or third ‘tour of duty’. Infantry and technician candidates are usually recruited from Logandale itself where they will undergo three months basic training before being sent to join Eagle Battlegroup for further training. Mechwarriors are typically recruited from old mechwarrior families, may of who have been serving in the unit for generations, but they also recruit graduates from academies who have failed to secure a ride in a AFFS unit. Mechwarriors proceed directly to Eagle Battlegroup where they will be inducted in the Rangers’ preferred method of fighting.
Doctrine:
“Fight with your brain. Then fight with your fists!”
The Rangers are taught to always seek out a decisive battle, to always aim to inflict such damage upon an enemy that further resistance becomes impossible, to win not just the battle, but the whole campaign. Upon entering a conflict zone they first study their enemy, using scouts to probe his defences and testing his reactions while concealing and preserving their own strength. Once they have identified a weakness they are not slow to exploit it, swiftly moving their main force into position they launch forward into a lightning assault with battlemechs supported by battle armour. They show a marked preference for close assaults, banking on the violence of action to throw their enemy off-balance and then relentlessly press forwards to keep them that way. Losses are inevitably heavy, but Rangers are indoctrinated to understand that casualties are heaviest in long campaigns and it is better to fight hard today then have to do it all over again tomorrow.
A key element in their success is mobility. All their mechs can jump, all their battle armour platoons have a VTOL assigned to transport them and all their vehicles use fusion engines. Terrain that would halt a more conventional unit is little barrier to them and that allows them to launch their assaults from directions that the enemy least expect.
Retirement:
“Dead or alive; your still a Ranger.”
Serving for a full nine year tour guarantees a partial pension, serving a second tour grants a full pension. If a Ranger is invalided out due to injury, his pension is calculated assuming he completed his current tour. If he dies in the course of his duties that pension is paid to their next of kin. It is held as a point of pride that no one retires from the unit either broke or bankrupt. The Rangers know they ask a lot of their people and are quite open that the survival rate over nine years only averages about 70%, but they are adamant that the unit should give back in equal measure to those who serve it faithfully. Their close links to their homeworld’s government helps them live up to that promise.
Battlegroups:
On paper, the Rangers are made up of three overstrength battalions, one of mechs, another of battle armour and finally the VTOLs that transport them. In practice they shake down into four battalion sized battlegroups supported by a number of independent specialist companies. Over time each group has developed its own culture and subtle variation in their approach to warfare. All share a mutual rivalry, though care is taken to ensure it doesn’t get too out of hand.
Sword Battlegroup:
“They sneer at us and call us the spit and polish brigade”
“But, we polish our boots because a disciplined military unit is an effective one”
“We polish our mechs because clean equipment is effective equipment.”
“And we polish our blades, so our enemies will know they are sharp.”
Sword Battlegroup takes its name from the Commandos’ Heavy Lance and still views itself as the Rangers premier assault formation. Whilst still predominately deploying medium mechs, Sword possesses the majority of the unit’s fast heavy mechs, particularly Dragons, and eschews the lighter Vindicators. Proud of their history and their reputation as the best disciplined of the battlegroups, they can be expected to stick together and keep fighting regardless of the odds.
Shadow Battlegroup:
“They point and laugh and call us scruffy”
“But, we polish our boots because it keeps the water out”
“Our mechs are dirty because we are constantly out training in all weathers”
“And we keep our blades sharp through constant use.”
Shadow Battlegroup takes its name from the Commandos’ Medium Lance and takes pride in using their brains to defeat their enemies before falling back on brawn. Masters of the dirty trick and the ‘oblique approach’, they regard themselves as professional soldiers who are uninterested in parades and inspections because they detract from their primary job of finding and killing the enemy. Often the lead battlegroup in larger actions, they rely upon their fieldcraft to keep them safe as they locate the enemy, fix them in positions and then join the other battlegroups in finishing them off.
Eagle Battlegroup:
“They call us the forgotten and leave us at home”
“But they all started here and all will end here”
“We are the future of the regiment and its past”
“Never forget that.”
Eagle Battlegroup is the training battlegroup and if deployed on field is usually held in reserve. Inevitably understrength, its mechs and pilots constantly pilfered to reinforce other formations, it is none the less never reduced beyond a central core for it is the future of the regiment and the rest of the regiment knows it. During normal running, newly enlisted Rangers will spend their first year as part of Eagle Battlegroup being trained in the style of warfare they will be expected to undertake once they become part of the other battlegroups. Their instructors are usually soldiers transferred from the other battlegroups to serve out the last year of their tour in relative safety. Thus the experience gained at the sharp end is transferred to the new recruits.
Stalker Battlegroup:
“We do what others cannot”
“We go where others do not dare”
“We have done the impossible”
“Who gives a damn if we’ve polished our boots!”
Though the other battlegroups would never admit it, Stalker battlegroup represents an elite formation within the Rangers. Prospective candidates cannot apply to join until they have served with the other battlegroups for at least three years and earned a positive recommendation from their commanding officer. Even then Stalker is notoriously selective and prefers to be understrength than allow unsuitable pilots to join.
The mechs employed by Stalker Battlegroup are difficult to master, none weigh less than 55tons, yet all can jump at least 240m, all are fitted with TSM and can punch another mechs head clean off with a single blow. It takes a special kind of mechwarrior to get the most out of these mechs, they need to be comfortable making their own decisions, to use their initiative without reference to their chain of command. They need to be brave enough to take on superior forces, skilled enough to win anyway and wise enough to know when to run. The type of mechwarriors that excels in Stalker Battlegroup are inevitable rogues and often discipline case in the barracks. The infantry and VTOL pilots are often little better, they after all have to be crazy enough to follow those mechwarriors into combat.
The Technicians
“There is broken, proper broken and Logandale broken”
“Very little is Logandale broken.”
Forged in the heat of the clan invasion, the then Commandos quickly learned to not just salvage whatever equipment they could, but also to modifying that equipment to suit their needs, to seek whatever edge they could in their battle against the invaders. It is a tradition that has been carried on through the early days of the Rangers and into the modern day. With over a hundred years of accumulated engineering experiences stored within the unit’s library, there is very little a Ranger technician cannot fix and their reputation for turning total wrecks into functioning mechs has earned them much respect over the years. This has resulted in the Rangers being one of very few mercenary units to truly give their technical branch equal standing with the combat arms.
Rarely in the position of being able to field ‘uniform’ lances, the Rangers make do by modifying the mechs they salvage to fit common ‘standards’ for weapons fit and movement profiles. The result is an eclectic collection of mechs that are none-the-less similarly armed and equipped, greatly simplifying command and control. The most common standards are known as ‘Vanguards’ and ‘Vengeances’.
“Vanguard”Tonnage Range: 45-65tons
Weaponry: 1x SNPPC, 1-2 Medium Lasers, 1 SSRM Rack
Maximum Speed: 86kph
Jump Range: 150m
Wolverine and Centurions are the most common ‘Vanguards’ in use by the Rangers, though there are a fair few Dragons, Griffins and Vindicators that have been modified to the standard. Neither fast, nor flashy they are solid line mechs and make up most of Ranger’s mech strength.
“Vengeance”Tonnage Range: 55tons
Weaponry: 2x SNPPC, TSM
Maximum Speed: 86kph
Jump Range: 240m
Unique to Stalker Lance, there are currently only eleven of these mechs in existence. Created purely from Shadowhawk mk5 or 9 chassis and using Light Fusion Engines, they are both tricky to pilot and tricky to keep in working order, but if well handled are very capable heavy skirmishers with a nasty punch in the assault.
There are also a handful of unique mechs fielded by the Rangers, mostly survivors of days long past that are maintained as functional reminders of the regiment’s history. These include ‘Chieftain’, a kit mech based upon a Shadowhawk chassis that is believed to have been in service since the 3060s and ‘Midnight’, a 3rd series Battlemaster that is rumoured to have fought in Operation Bulldog and is now the traditional ride of the unit commanding officer. The strangest however is ‘Gilgamesh’ a highly modified survivor of the Succession Wars that only vaguely resembles the Charger 1A1 it once was. Gilgamesh came into the Ranger’s ranks as the personal mech of Sgt Major Diana Gibson, the senior NCO in Stalker Battlegroup. Radically overhauled at the pilot’s own expense, it is now capable of keeping up with the rest of the battlegroup with a 240m jump range and TSM. On paper it is a ludicrous design, but one highly suited to its pilot who has racked up an impressive kill count at its controls.
MIIO’s Notes: (!delete before publication!)
We have been concerned at the unusually close relationship between this mercenary unit and its homeworld’s government for some time. It is likely no coincidence that the Rangers were reformed in November 2080, mere months after the Logandale Militia was ordered stood down after the Jihad. It is also likely no coincidence that their original pool of equipment was made up of the same types of mechs that the Logandalers had been ordered to decommission. It can only be assumed that this subterfuge was missed at the time due to the chaos of the post Jihad era.
Officially, their relationship is a business one, the Rangers pay a yearly fee in exchange for basing and recruitment rights, while Logandale holds the mercenaries pension fund in trust. In practice, the Rangers effectively form a second Logandale militia. Their official status as mercenaries allows the Logandale Government to continue to pretend that it is not violating Federated Sun laws on force levels, whilst giving its soldiers battle experience and getting someone else to pay the upkeep costs. This arrangement is currently being tolerated by MIIO mostly because of the Ranger’s utility in this current crisis, but also because of the historically reliable loyalty of Logandale's government to House Davion. If either of these change, we should reconsider that tolerance.
A few years back I wrote a short story about these guys called Dangerous Amateurs.
https://www.fanfiction.net/s/12734960/1/Dangerous-Amateurs
