What caused the end of Mechwarrior DA/AoD?

[worktroll]

Ummmm .... nope. CCG was Wizards - licenced from FASA. FASA closed its doors in 2001, and WotC stopped production of the CCG in 2001. So all the action happened (and stopped) before MW:DA existed, really.

W.

[OgreMagi]

My view of MWDarkAge was unique,  I attended Origins for its debue and had a bad encounter with the game, found it very flawed and i was vocal to which i was told this will be the next BT get used to it by the slaemans there.   I watched over the years as it began to change  to try to accomidate itself to the changes in the market. But all in all it never held the market   no matter how much wizkids and topps put into the marker line.

Initally it was forced down on us, wish i still had my chat logs  but ah well, that was softened after the first year  after the problem with the rules and the multiple changes that were incurred.   At one point the top players knew that the game could be won using vehicles only futher detering old BT players futher.    So there were problems all arround.  Was there a death nail that finished it   no, but a combination of things, market forces, rules changes, the addition of questionable non BT units,  remember the 3 legged mechs  URRRRRRR, mostly the lacking interest from wiz kids.
   
 Part of the problem for me was it didnt advance BT, it did add soem canon fiction  but not much in new weapontry, nor much in new rules.  Its gone and forgotten as far as i am concerned  it did pick up a bunch of cheap figures i used for parts and soem vehicles that i repainted for BT table top but thats all it was good for just parts.     

[GhostCat]

My view of MWDarkAge was unique,  I attended Origins for its debue and had a bad encounter with the game, found it very flawed and i was vocal to which i was told this will be the next BT get used to it by the slaemans there.   

Well, yes, it was flawed, and many players demonstrated loopholes you could drive a truck through. 

But ....

Overall, I'd say the gaming experience was a good one.  The benefits often outweighed the defects.  It was a Table Top Game that didn't need a map grid, had a clear and easy point system that made building armies and battle groups of any size fast and simple, and there were no big piles of documents with damage charts and hit locations to slow things down.  It was it's own Game, fast, easy and fun.  There were a lot of players that were able to appreciate that.

Rules were revised, and improvements were made, the Game itself did not fail.  The rest is Politics, Economy, and Controversy, which of course has been rehashed endlessly on many forums.

My personal opinion is this:  The original game designers (we know who they are, right?) wanted to retire with a pile of money instead of a bunch of lawsuits.  They got a big payday from Topps and got out while the getting was good.  Who can blame them for that?  Not me.  Even this much is pure speculation, but I like to think they got some reward for spending so many years creating a game we all came to love.

GC

[Atlas3060]

Funny thing is when I played Dark Age minis I wondered if Battleforce could be like this.
Years later my prayers were answered with Quick Strike.

[wantec]

Well, yes, it was flawed, and many players demonstrated loopholes you could drive a truck through. 

But ....

Overall, I'd say the gaming experience was a good one.  The benefits often outweighed the defects.  It was a Table Top Game that didn't need a map grid, had a clear and easy point system that made building armies and battle groups of any size fast and simple, and there were no big piles of documents with damage charts and hit locations to slow things down.  It was it's own Game, fast, easy and fun.  There were a lot of players that were able to appreciate that.

Rules were revised, and improvements were made, the Game itself did not fail.  The rest is Politics, Economy, and Controversy, which of course has been rehashed endlessly on many forums.

This sums up my feelings, yes there were some loopholes in the rules, some unbalanced units, but if you had a steady local group, a group that was out for fun, not just winning at all costs, you could still have a good time. All you had to do was have a gentleman's agreement to avoid abusing those loopholes or specific units and it was all good.

[AsburyGrad]

@ OgreMagi:  A friend of mine listed these benefits to MW:AoD recently:

1.  Free prize support every month
2.  Social interaction & atmosphere
3.  That "Christmas present" feeling of opening boosters and not knowing for sure what you were going to get
4.  Trading & collecting
5.  Metagame discussions
6.  Planning new army ideas and carrying them out at a tournament
7.  The thrill of hearing tiny bits of news about a future release
8.  About 30 new novels of fiction set in the BT universe
9.  You can play a whole game in 50 minutes
10.  You can play 4 whole games against 4 opponents in 4 hours
11.  World-wide rankings.  This was DEEPLY flawed, but was still amusing
12.  More player impact on the product and on the fiction than with FASA or Catalyst

Aside from #2, which of these does Battletech offer?

[roosterboy]

12.  More player impact on the product and on the fiction than with FASA or Catalyst

On the product, perhaps, but there was really little to no effect on the fiction in evidence.

Catalyst actually has more, with the canon events held every year. At least during the Jihad some of the results from those events were incorporated into the ongoing storyline.

[LordNth]

Funny thing is when I played Dark Age minis I wondered if Battleforce could be like this.
Years later my prayers were answered with Quick Strike.

And when I first played DA I recalled my first game of BattleForce many years earlier.
Still haven't tried Quickstrike  :(

[AsburyGrad]

On the product, perhaps, but there was really little to no effect on the fiction in evidence.

Catalyst actually has more, with the canon events held every year. At least during the Jihad some of the results from those events were incorporated into the ongoing storyline.

I was recalling the first year of organized gaming under WizKids.  Every month was a campaing between two of the factions.  When the month was over, the results were tallied and the color of the planet on their map was actually changed to the winning faction's color.

I suppose you are right, not actually an impact on the fiction.  But it was still exciting, as a player, to see a visual result of our battles.  And to see it updated regularly.

[SCC]

Well, yes, it was flawed, and many players demonstrated loopholes you could drive a truck through. 

But ....

Overall, I'd say the gaming experience was a good one.  The benefits often outweighed the defects.  It was a Table Top Game that didn't need a map grid, had a clear and easy point system that made building armies and battle groups of any size fast and simple, and there were no big piles of documents with damage charts and hit locations to slow things down.  It was it's own Game, fast, easy and fun.  There were a lot of players that were able to appreciate that.

Rules were revised, and improvements were made, the Game itself did not fail.  The rest is Politics, Economy, and Controversy, which of course has been rehashed endlessly on many forums.

My personal opinion is this:  The original game designers (we know who they are, right?) wanted to retire with a pile of money instead of a bunch of lawsuits.  They got a big payday from Topps and got out while the getting was good.  Who can blame them for that?  Not me.  Even this much is pure speculation, but I like to think they got some reward for spending so many years creating a game we all came to love.

GC

I think some of this was the problem. Yes, it was it's own game, but I think Topps/Wizkids wanted to supplant or supplement 'real' BT and expected a 100% or near that conversation rate. Interestingly the fan group whose view of the universe matches the DA the most are the ones who would have rejected it out of hand, the 3025 gognards.

Also remember that while it had no rule books, Sarna indicates that 3 sets came out a year, meaning that the rules would have been in constant flux, and that due to it's inclusive tournament nature groups would have had trouble using the classic house rules fix system

Interestingly how close are the QS rules to the final DA/DoA rules?

[Lorcan Nagle]

The MWDA expansion sets didn't always add new rules (one had VTOLs, one had artillery, and the Jade Falcons and House Liao had some faction-specific bonuses when they came out), but the other ones just had new units with different stats.  The only major rules revision was Age of Destruction, and I don't think any of the sets after it had new rules.

MechWarrior and QuickStrike aren't really similar at all.

[Nemesis]

I think one of the things that hurt the game the most was the setting itself. When I first heard of a clicky Battletech game I was interested, until I saw construction mechs. That alone was enough to stop me looking any further, as I wanted the mechs I knew and had no interest in playing with dump trucks. Many people I knew made a similar decision. I didn't look at the game again until Vanguard. At that point my friends and I began playing it but it was far too late for the game to survive, the damage had already been done.

A game will get the most interest on it's release, which is when most people will make a decision about it. After that initial surge the rate of new players coming in will slow down, unless it gets strong word of mouth. MWDA needed to go with the classic, recognizable figures and factions right from the start instead of trying to present something completely new. Not only did they turn off existing BT fans, but new players are unlikely to be attracted by Tonka toys with legs.

[YingJanshi]

I was of the same opinion originally. Until I read Mercenary's Star and realized we've had weaponized IndustrialMechs from the very beginning (or very close to). Just haven't had the rules/units to do so until MaxTech came out (AFAIK that is the earliest book with low-tech/industrialmech rules, is there one earlier?).

That said for me (at least storywise), what turned me off the most was that for the longest time the rest of the universe was a black hole. How was I supposed to get into the new story when my favorite faction isn't even included at startup?

[worktroll]

I think some of this was the problem. Yes, it was it's own game, but I think Topps/Wizkids wanted to supplant or supplement 'real' BT and expected a 100% or near that conversation rate. Interestingly the fan group whose view of the universe matches the DA the most are the ones who would have rejected it out of hand, the 3025 gognards.

GOt to correct a couple of points there.

1) Topps really had no involvement in the development. They bought a cow for the milk, they had no interest in how the cow was fed/exercised/etc.

2) When MW:DA launched, there was no company selling BattleTech. In fact, WizKids went out of their way to help first FanPro, then CGL, succeed with keeping BattleTech going - favourable conditions, lower than industry syandard royalties. and generally giving them a free hand with story development as long as it didn't directly contradict the WizKids work. Does that really sound like an expectation of 100% conversion?

Face it - MW:DA had, for its run, massively greater commercial success than BattleTech's ever had. Over two million click-base minis - want to guess where the number of BT minis comes in? I'd guess on the order of a few percent of that. While BT has survived for 30 years, we've never had the same number of players at any point. The pity was that unlike BT, MW:DA ended up being run by businessmen, not game fanatics.

Interestingly how close are the QS rules to the final DA/DoA rules?

You really should either pick up a copy of Strategic Ops, or a copy of the MW:DA/MW:AoD rules, because it looks like you haven't had a chance to see both. They're nothing like each other. QuickStrike is very clearly descended from BattleTech rules, while the game mechanisms for MW:DA are clear descendants from Jordan Weisman's click system as premiered in Mage Knight.

[Nemesis]

Face it - MW:DA had, for its run, massively greater commercial success than BattleTech's ever had. Over two million click-base minis - want to guess where the number of BT minis comes in? I'd guess on the order of a few percent of that.

You can't really compare the two since one's collectible and the other isn't. For Battletech, most people will buy about 20 mechs that they actually want. For MWDA, each box came with 7? figures in it, and you'd have to open 3 boxes to find one you actually wanted. If you could have simply bought what you wanted I think you'd find the number sold would be far less than Battletech's, though if MWDA had gotten 25 years of sales it might have pulled ahead if only due to the planned obsolescence of figs in a collectible game.

I also think far more Battletech minis have been sold than anyone thinks. The various editions of introductory box sets have contained a few hundred thousand plastic mechs. In addition to that, not only are there 25 years of mech/aero sales, but there's a huge amount of infantry and vehicles that have been bought over the years to use with the game, even if they're not official BT sculpts. The various microarmor tanks seem to be an especially common source of vehicles. If you want to include all the junk non-mech figs in the count of 2 million clickies, those have to be included too.

[AsburyGrad]

If you want to include all the junk non-mech figs in the count of 2 million clickies, those have to be included too.

Only someone who never played MW:AoD would call the non-mech figures "junk".  :)

[Ratwedge]

Only someone who never played MW:AoD would call the non-mech figures "junk".  :)

I loved the heck outta MW:AOD enough to have three boxes full of it, but even I acknowledge most of the things I got were junk that I needed to trade or sell away to get what I really wanted. Painting each piece as vital and important makes it sound like you actually didn't play the game.

[Greywind]

Depends on if you were playing to tournament or playing for fun.

[StCptMara]

I loved the heck outta MW:AOD enough to have three boxes full of it, but even I acknowledge most of the things I got were junk that I needed to trade or sell away to get what I really wanted. Painting each piece as vital and important makes it sound like you actually didn't play the game.

Saying that if something wasn't a 'mech, it was junk is actually where the problem came in. Second comes the fact that in competitive
play, Combined arms was absolutely key. I mean, even in the AoD Era, the DF Maxim+Marksman Tankdrop was one of the more
dangerous tactics to use. 'Mechs were, actually, only a small part of the game, and, frequently, were not used in competitive play.
One guy in out playing area, in fact, used an army of mostly artillery + pre-nerf SSw Balacs to slaughter armies a) before they could
get very far and b) he was known to kill half an army while they were still the deployment zone before "1st Turn immunity" was
FAQ'ed in.

[Ratwedge]

Saying that if something wasn't a 'mech, it was junk is actually where the problem came in. Second comes the fact that in competitive
play, Combined arms was absolutely key. I mean, even in the AoD Era, the DF Maxim+Marksman Tankdrop was one of the more
dangerous tactics to use. 'Mechs were, actually, only a small part of the game, and, frequently, were not used in competitive play.
One guy in out playing area, in fact, used an army of mostly artillery + pre-nerf SSw Balacs to slaughter armies a) before they could
get very far and b) he was known to kill half an army while they were still the deployment zone before "1st Turn immunity" was
FAQ'ed in.

I both loved and hated the situation where the Mech took a back seat. Even to this day I can't really decided if I loved it more because of it or disliked it at the end because of it. It ended up being the biggest factor in the changing my gameplay for the Boardgames to combined arms.

[StCptMara]

I both loved and hated the situation where the Mech took a back seat. Even to this day I can't really decided if I loved it more because of it or disliked it at the end because of it. It ended up being the biggest factor in the changing my gameplay for the Boardgames to combined arms.

Same here. I originally tried to use all 'mech forces. They lost horribly everytime. By using infantry in support, and, eventually, forgoing 'mechs entirely, I started winning. I kinda always hoped they would have come out with real campaign rules...

[Nav_Alpha]

Same here. I originally tried to use all 'mech forces. They lost horribly everytime. By using infantry in support, and, eventually, forgoing 'mechs entirely, I started winning. I kinda always hoped they would have come out with real campaign rules...

This actually suited my campaigns and RPG scenarios perfectly - almost exclusively my homebrewed campaigns and RP'ing was based around "here's planet x, the HPG has gone down, bad stuff happens to it, you're here to fix it/make things worse, etc".

So overwhelmingly I was playing with militia units, splinter faction, terrorists, eco-terrorists, religious insurgents, clanner-wannabes small Errant Forces, Republic Knights, small raiding forces, etc.
So i loved running a half trained infantry company, two squads of BA, a lance of heavy tanks, a pair of Agro-mechs (neither upgraded) and the planet's sole remaining Battlemech...

As I said - I really embraced the idea of "the Jihad blew up all of our facilities and then Stone told us to melt down all our mechs", so it worked for me. But my experience is not everyone's experience and I can see why it really frustrated the hell out of some people.

[Mattlov]

@ OgreMagi:  A friend of mine listed these benefits to MW:AoD recently:

1.  Free prize support every month
2.  Social interaction & atmosphere
3.  That "Christmas present" feeling of opening boosters and not knowing for sure what you were going to get
4.  Trading & collecting
5.  Metagame discussions
6.  Planning new army ideas and carrying them out at a tournament
7.  The thrill of hearing tiny bits of news about a future release
8.  About 30 new novels of fiction set in the BT universe
9.  You can play a whole game in 50 minutes
10.  You can play 4 whole games against 4 opponents in 4 hours
11.  World-wide rankings.  This was DEEPLY flawed, but was still amusing
12.  More player impact on the product and on the fiction than with FASA or Catalyst

Aside from #2, which of these does Battletech offer?

I'll take this:

1. Battletech isn't collectable, so it doesn't need prize support every month.  And there is prize support at Cons.
2. Obviously, both games have this.
3. This is not a positive.  How much money did players waste getting the same damn booster three times in a row of figures they didn't want?  At least with Battletech I know what I'm getting.
4. People don't trade and collect Battletech?  Books, novels, 'Mechs, both games have this.
5. Both games have this.  Battletech simply isn't constantly changing due to power creep and unbalanced units.
6. Both games have this.
7. TPTB release info all the time. 
8. Battletech had what, 60 novels first?  Without that base, MW:DA never happens.
9. You can do this with Battletech and Quick Strike.
10. MW:DA does have this one.  Unless you are throwing nukes around in BT.
11. Battletech had this years ago with the MechForce rankings.
12. Impact?  Debatable.  Battletech has had canon events for years as has been stated by others.  I'd call it a push.

The two games are entirely different.  Like many others, I hated the initial game because the ConstructionMech angle was ridiculous, and the rules were pretty terrible.  Once it reformed into AoD, it became better, but most Battletech players I know still didn't want to play collectable, and many Battletech fans like 'MECHS.  Combined arms is good fun and all, but if I'm in the Battletech universe I want to run 'Mechs, and possibly 'Mechs only and have a chance to win.  It simply wasn't feasible.  ANd that was a big turn off.

[Labyr]

Mechwarrior Darkage had some really interesting innovations, no record sheets, limited number of orders per turn, turns played faster, there tended to be fewer turns and you don't need a clear route to be the clear winner. I didn't like the innovation of not knowing what you where getting in a booster box, it felt a little bit too much like gambling. Also the power creep. Ultimately I do think MWDA did more right than it did wrong.

Battletech can incorporate a bunch of these ideas to speed up play, I'm surprised I haven't seen more house rules sets that do so. Doing initiative by side really speeds things, so does playing with smaller numbers of Mechs and having a system of victory points so battles don't have to go to the bitter end. All these changes would either lessen verisimilitude or tactical depth so it's understandable that they haven't seen much play in Battletech.

[Papabees]

My issue with MWDA was always the rules. I've always felt like the rules played too much like a board game and not enough like a miniatures game. I feel this way about all the click games. I thought the click dials were genius but the one action per turn, push mechanic always felt too limiting to me. I think the dials with the traditional Btech turn sequence would play better. And as mentioned previously, I think the initial run having sooo many construction mechs turned alot of potential players off. 

[worktroll]

I had problems with the "I move or shoot, then you move or shoot" sequencing - never played MW:DA, but did play Mage Knight extensively with one of my sons. Being the impatient type, I'd always be the first to break and move, and then he'd take me down.

W.

[JadeHellbringer]

I had problems with the "I move or shoot, then you move or shoot" sequencing - never played MW:DA, but did play Mage Knight extensively with one of my sons. Being the impatient type, I'd always be the first to break and move, and then he'd take me down.

W.

AoD resolved that with 'assault orders' for Mechs, in which they could do both at the same time. It meant that even lame Mechs like the Stingers had legitimate advantages over conventional forces in a game, and expensive units like Thors or Atlases could become the monsters of the battlefield we've always believed they should be. A Kelswa tank was a nasty customer to fight, but if it can move OR shoot, and a Thor can stomp around AND shoot (albeit at heat cost)... the Mech's advantages become clear.

[wantec]

AoD resolved that with 'assault orders' for Mechs, in which they could do both at the same time. It meant that even lame Mechs like the Stingers had legitimate advantages over conventional forces in a game, and expensive units like Thors or Atlases could become the monsters of the battlefield we've always believed they should be. A Kelswa tank was a nasty customer to fight, but if it can move OR shoot, and a Thor can stomp around AND shoot (albeit at heat cost)... the Mech's advantages become clear.

Yeah it definitely helped a lot of mechs become more useful. Mechs with short ranged weapons were no longer stuck moving into position and waiting for the opponent to fire, now they could move into position and get the first shot off (at the cost of a targeting modifier and extra heat), but it opened up the possibilities for a lot of mechs.

No longer did mechs have a small "bubble o doom" at just their weapon ranges, you had to include the possibility of movement as well, which enlarged those bubbles. This meant that most of the time your units were in range of the other player's units and vice-verse. There was less time spent calculating where to move to avoid an attack and more time spent planning where to move to go on the offensive.

[SCC]

On Nemesis' junk comment. He could have been saying 1) comparing BT's Mech Mini sales to AoD's total Mini's sales is flawed  because AoD Mini's sales include more the just 'Mechs, 2) He could have found AoD non-'Mech mini's junk (IE el Cheapo) or 3) earlier in his post he referred to every mini in an AoD box that you didn't want junk and just misspoke at the end