Requirements for a BTU Privateer

[Colt Ward]

Previous discussions have generally agreed that a privateer's Letter of Marquis would be a specific type of mercenary contract which means that any mercs could end up as privateers for a time.  But IMO successful long term privateers would have a few distinguishing differences from your run of the mill mercenary unit who picks up a contract that involves raiding.

First, and foremost, in my mind is the command rights- privateers ability to exploit weaknesses in a opposing House or corporation comes down to their ability to respond to situations and information they find/gain.  The House/corp rep would be a liaison to track the progress and make sure the privateers are following the Letter rather than overseeing the merc's inclusion regular forces military planning- where they fit on the regional TO&E, what they are responsible for, where they get supplies/support, and other normal military minutiae.

Second, I think having independent transport would be a requirement.  The House is not contributing any transport assets to the privateers beyond possible recharges from any stations.  Part of why privateers are employed is that the risk and cost are born by private enterprise with the sponsor gaining a cut of any take for the legal coverage in the Letter.  This IMO also sets a privateer's Letter of Marquis apart of a merc unit getting a raiding contract- the letter is simply about what rules will be followed and how the take will be split while a merc raiders' contract covers that plus transport, target, and compensation by the employer.  Independent transport will allow the privateers to seek out the highest risk-to-profit opportunity rather than ram head first into opposition to take a hard target.

Third, more likely to include greater cargo space in their transport.  Logistics discussions frequently bring up how small the cargo space is for the Leopard/Union/Overlord common carriers.  Its not enough to really support the complete embarked forces let alone take something from a enemy site for return to your own base.  IMO privateers are more likely to have Q-ship type vessels . . . either something like the DA's Civilian Conversion (CC, frex Okinawa-CC DS seen in 2nd book) or will beef up common cargo ships like the Jumbo.  Cargo ships allow them to masquerade as civilian shipping to get closer to a target before defenders start responding . . . but once they hit a target, they want to be able to haul off as much of the loot as they can since usual Letters have the sponsor taking a major (40%-60%) of what is taken away.  Percentages and classification of loot would IMO follow the salvage rules (frex 3050s, the FedCom is likely to give you IS models & cash for Clan weapons) though the privateer has to realize, ALL of their profit and operating expenses come from what they take.  Capturing 12kt of potatoes from a agri-business on BFE planet is not going to cover the expenses of operating that JS, DS or even your military gear.

Fourth, I think they will include infantry to seize objectives covered under mechs/armor/ASF guns and to remove the valuable.  Sure the mech can kick in the bank's wall but its going to have a harder time scooping up all the various currency & valuable that will be littering the inside of a smashed vault.

With those four covered, the fighting forces could be mechs/armor/ASF- whatever you have to point guns at places to make them surrender- keeping in mind that the nature of BTU makes losses harder to replace.  Especially when a Letter puts you outside a regular forces supply chain.

[Daryk]

First, it would be a letter of marque (not Marquis)… possibly a letter of marque and reprisal.

Second, it would attach to a ship (most likely a JumpShip), not a mercenary unit per se.  Any forces attached to the ship could be covered by the letter.

Finally, it would generally only apply to targets of one individual nation at war with the issuing nation, and there would be an established procedure (a prize court) to deal with any captured materiel or ships (preferably the latter).

[Colt Ward]

Lol, sorry spellchecker kept flipping it.

Privateers did leave their ships to attack shore-based targets, Morgan & what became Panama come to mind, but having a JS & DS for operational freedom was one of the qualifications I was offering.

To your final point, yes it would operate that way I just was not going to get into possible conflicts that would see them used the most.

[R.Tempest]

 The issue is that privateer's are primarily commerce raiders. They're meant to free up national forces while still harassing an opponent's commerce.
 This could be difficult in the BTU. Getting enough loot to pay your expenses (some mech's, some infantry, ground transports, Dropship & Jumpship and their crews) while not violating the Ares Conventions. You can take finished production but can't strip the factory. You can't hold a city hostage by threatening to destroy critical infrastructure unless you are paid.
 The problem is that there is no universal hard currency (like gold or silver) to make it worthwhile. Sure you can break in to the 1st Bank of Pacifica and maybe get away with 500,000 1 kroner coins. But that's not going to do you much good when you get back to your base in the FWL. The only thing close to it is Germanium and that's probably too rare.
 That's just my thought's on the concept.
 As to the details, you'd certainly need a customized dropship - maybe an Overlord carrying only a company of mech's, a platoon sized infantry bay, some vehicle cubicles, the rest is cargo space. Or, as you mentioned, a modified Mule. Certainly you'll need infantry to secure the area (and load/drive your trucks). Mech's with hands will be nice.
 In a way most mercenary operations are a form of privateering in the BTU. The merc's are replacing national forces. They get a share of any captured resources. The difference is that they get paid and may get some support from the hiring government (tech's and ammo and so on).
 They are also expendable in a way that national forces are not.
 I suppose Comstar's Mercenary Review Board (or its equivalent) could act as a prize court.

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

You don't think they'd be going after C-Bills?

[snakespinner]

My merc unit uses a mule class DS to get around.
It comfortably carries a lance of mechs and 1 of tanks plus 2 platoons of infantry and leaving more cargo space than i ever use.
I can carry a lot more but i have a union and condor so no need.

[AlphaMirage]

You don't think they'd be going after C-Bills?

I am under the impression that almost all c-bills are virtual and held in the "Bank of COMSTAR" itself.  Very few would be printed instead locals exchange whatever passes for currency on their world for C-bills

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

I don't know that it was ever spelled out, but I was under the impression that Comstar issued physical notes.

[Colt Ward]

They do, in Double Blind on Astrokrasy the mercs pay for things with C-bills and its noted that b/c of local inflation the C-bill's purchasing power is crazy.  I also want to say there was a story in the Legends book about a FedCom team capturing a currency train as they were trying to get off a world the Cappies took after Op Guerrero . . . re-took D-bills that were turned in and a supply of L-Bills that were to be replaced in the banks IIRC.  Lots of them untraceable . . . and the L-Bills were destined to disappear into the FC Black Ops vaults.  I want to say there were instances of c-bills being used to pay for things in Solaris City.  Did the splinter of the Tooth in Initiation to War pay the bar tab with c-bills?

The Bailey Armored Vehicle ('62) was built to replace the Knox which was opened up by GDL Stds to steal payroll but I do not have a lot of details on that incident.

How viable privateers are, to me, is a question of being able to seize high value but low mass/volume items- like those pallets of currency.  I mean the early setting had raids for industrial components and other infrastructure type items were considered valuable enough to send a JS, DS and lance of mechs to steal them from an opponent- and the risk of losing the lance of mechs tells you the value.

[Maingunnery]

Would a Privateer have a liaison with them to keep an eye on them?
Just for making sure that they keep to the set rules.

[dgorsman]

I would think hydrogen fuel would be a valuable, if dicey, target designated as priority by the issuers.  Fuel has always been an exploitable weak point in resource raiding.  Same with liquid helium shipments.

[Colt Ward]

Would a Privateer have a liaison with them to keep an eye on them?
Just for making sure that they keep to the set rules.

Absolutely IMO, its why I included it as the manner of command rights in the traditional merc contract format.  The liaison does not even have to come from a combat arms position, a quartermaster might be a better sponsor representative b/c they would be tracking the intake and assessing some of the information the privateers might find.

[Hellraiser]

Have there been any instances in BT Lore of Privateers & a letter of marque?


My initial thoughts are what we would really have is a Raid Contract where nearly all Transport/Support/Command/Salvage, etc etc, is all provided by & goes to the Mercs.

In turn, pay would be minimal, probably enough to cover expenses if they didn't find any loot, and that is about it.

Basically, just enough legal support from the hiring nation so that the mercs are not labeled Pirates/Bandits which is essentially what they are doing.

[dgorsman]

Filtvelt, during the Jihad.

[Daryk]

*snip*
I mean the early setting had raids for industrial components and other infrastructure type items were considered valuable enough to send a JS, DS and lance of mechs to steal them from an opponent- and the risk of losing the lance of mechs tells you the value.

Didn't the early setting include WATER raids too?  ???

[Colt Ward]

Didn't the early setting include WATER raids too?  ???

Sure, thought that got ret-con'd for water purification equipment . . . but clean water was very Mad Max.  Its why I was questioned the feasibility for your typical merc mech company to do it . . . but rather brought up specialists.  I would even expect them to be employed more between feuding nobility in the same realm than between Houses.

[Daryk]

When was the ret-con again?  It's been so long, I've forgotten...

[R.Tempest]

 It's a problem with printed bills (from any nation). They have no intrinsic value. The serial numbers are registered and can be voided or tracked. Gold & Silver coinage on the other hand has a value based on its purity. In a worst case it can be melted down & sold by weight. Bills are just paper (or probably plastic in the BTU). I don't recall if national coinage is physically described anywhere, but it too could just be representative. Made out of cheap metal or hardened plastic but representing a certain amount of purchase power - next to worthless in it's own right.
 Water & fuel would require tanker's of some sort.
 It does occur to me that this might be something that get's done in peacetime, depending on how much autonomy the local nobles have. I could see a Duke from a border world hiring a unit to do commerce raiding across the border (& vice-versa) Keeping things to the level of local raids without escalating to national warfare. Then again, this is pretty much the original setting for the game isn't it.

[dgorsman]

Coins and physical currency are shown in all of the House books.  From memory none of them are valuable metals.

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

With HPG transmission time considered more valuable, why would anyone bother with precious metals?

[Daryk]

C-Bills are still fiat currency, even if they're pegged to HPG transmission time.

[Colt Ward]

IMO this is how the typical objective raid plays out vs a privateer raid-

Obj Raid-  House Davion sends a company of merc mechs to the planet Grand Base to raid a satellite factory that builds armor and 280 fusion engines for the Cataphract line.  The mercs land, push their company out to encounter two lances of House Fujita mechs and two armor lances of EW security.  Mercs fight, win they collect up any thing they can salvage from the Fujita mechs or EW armor and then cart off as much of the stockpiled armor & 280 SFE they can fit on their JS, which is not much b/c its a standard Union.  If they lose, they retreat off the field with as much as they can- or might ransom their force if they get trapped into a bad position, depending on the era.  Either way,  House Davion was paying them to fight defenders and take what they could which will harry the CCAF with losses and disruption to their supply lines.

Privateer Raid-  Privateers burn in to Grand Base orbit, their pathfinders report that a pair of Fujita lances have been sent to re-inforce the SFE factory (intel said they had a shipment that had not gone out, so they were overstocked) that was going to be the main target.  Privateer CO has to decided if it is worth the possible damage to his lance of mechs and company of hovertanks to fight the House warriors & security forces.  Dropship comes down on a trajectory for the 280 SFE factory, but at the last minute diverts to another site.  The privateers shifted to a factory that produces PPCs for the Cataphract line, though they are not sure how many will be on site- hopefully enough.  The security on site is a single wheeled medium armor lance and two platoons of guards equivalent to rifle infantry.  The DS lands as close as feasible with the combat team moving out to clear away defenders with the seizure team in their hovertrucks right on their heels.  The pathfinders are picked up by VTOL to check out other near by options.  Part of the pathfinder team stakes out the largest bank in Mediumville, the town the factory gets its power and workforce from.  While the seizure team is loading every single completed PPC on to their hovertrucks along with whatever critical parts are stockpiled (focusing lenses, power converters, etc), they also have a data section make a run at the factory's network computers to pull shipping manifests, current & pending contracts, corporate communication w/CCAF, and any R&D information in the databases.  The seizure team then goes on to hit the First Bank of Mediumville to clean out the vault.  The seizure team returns to the dropship along with the combat team and any salvage, the dropship lifting off for orbit to decide if there is anywhere else they want to try before any response force could show up.

And some demented gun toter broke open the vending machines at every location to take the Twinkies.

A merc force on a Objective Raid contract has to take a shot at the objective, usually the amount or skill of the defenders is immaterial due to the contract's negotiations.  Some mercs operating as privateers can shift their target to find something else profitable without as many dangerous/damaging defenders- for the simple reason the liaison cannot order them to fight and the sponsors will not pay for the repairs.

[Daryk]

Sounds reasonable to me...

[R.Tempest]

 So, the Privateers get told to `go and raid' while the Mercs get told to `go and raid here'. Sounds reasonable to me.

[Atarlost]

I have trouble seeing an outfit not primarily engaged in commerce raiding as a privateer.  Commerce raiding is difficult in the era of sacrosanct jumpships, but not necessarily impossible.  From a jumpship about 10 degrees from the standard point you can chase down civilian cargo dropships with something like an Avenger or Achilles or maybe even a Leopard CV and force them to accept boarding and hook up to your jumpship on pain of death.  How many you can steal per expedition is limited by your collars, but if you snap up ships on a route known to carry high value goods it might be worth the trouble. 

And by the time the Flitvelt Coalition exists to have privateers, jumpship the technological renaissance may have made jumpships viable targets for boarding and theft rather than completely untouchable.  At least until it sinks in that the Blakists have been destroying shipyards again and there won't be so many new build jumpships in the future. 

[Mohammed As`Zaman Bey]

So, the Privateers get told to `go and raid' while the Mercs get told to `go and raid here'. Sounds reasonable to me.

  There is really no difference. The original concept of "letters of marque and reprisal" is to allow the recovery of stolen goods across national borders. The earliest mention of letters of marque issued to English ships is in a patent roll of Edward I dated 1293 which ordered a stay of letters of marque previously granted to his subjects in Aquitaine. Ships were the fastest means to cross borders and raid, especially before navies were established and even (as late as WW2) cheaper to arm civilian craft than to expand fleets.                                  That being said, there isn't much difference between raiders on a ship and raiders on the ground, but in the BTU, ships are still the only way to cross borders.

  Letters of marque and reprisal granted civilians legal authority to act on behalf of a belligerent nation in times of war and as a civil collection agency to recover stolen property during times of peace (that's the "reprisal" part).

  The British government was one of the first to regulate privateers by establishing "prize courts" for captured vessels. The Royal Navy wanted first dibs on captured vessels, while the government wanted its share of taxes; Privateers were required to send captured ships home or to a British port, instead of selling what they captured at a neutral port and keeping the entire profit. Once again, government regulations screw up a lucrative business...

  In a BTU context, commerce raiding is viable and could be effective. Jumpships may be off limits for destruction but may be captured/commandeered. The primary purpose of commerce raiding is the denial of supplies, so a privateer could apprehend a JS, remove the cargo, even destroy the dropships it cannot capture, and all would be good and legal under the letter of the law.
  I've done planetary interdictions and while starving an enemy could take months, those with low industrial capacity eventually find it impossible to field combat equipment. Privateering could have a long-term strategic effect on a conflict.

 

With HPG transmission time considered more valuable, why would anyone bother with precious metals?

  HPG time is like an exclusive gift certificate, only valuable at certain outlets. Precious metals have universal value, can be used in electronics and their value is multiplied in the form of jewelry (as a jeweler, I could attest to that). They also have the value of being untraceable, and could be molded to nearly any form.

   

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

Ultimately, all money only has value so long as all parties agree it has value.

Prior to the Dark Age, everyone agreed that C-Bills had value.  Arguing about the merits of other standards of currency are irrelevant.  FASAnomics has been a Battletech meme for decades for a reason.

[Maelwys]

Just a quick bit of info, page 17 of FM:Periphery has 2 paragraphs on the use of Privateers in the Periphery (last two paragraphs under the "Unconventional Forces" header).

Just thought y'all might be interested in what the books say about them (which is not much really).

[Dave Talley]

Hm
Repossessing ships could also fall under this
Send privateer/repo dudes, arrive on plant as mercs or traders,
Grab stuff and load either or both ships per instructions
Lift for space

[Arkansas Warrior]

I have trouble seeing an outfit not primarily engaged in commerce raiding as a privateer.  Commerce raiding is difficult in the era of sacrosanct jumpships, but not necessarily impossible.  From a jumpship about 10 degrees from the standard point you can chase down civilian cargo dropships with something like an Avenger or Achilles or maybe even a Leopard CV and force them to accept boarding and hook up to your jumpship on pain of death.  How many you can steal per expedition is limited by your collars, but if you snap up ships on a route known to carry high value goods it might be worth the trouble. 

And by the time the Flitvelt Coalition exists to have privateers, jumpship the technological renaissance may have made jumpships viable targets for boarding and theft rather than completely untouchable.  At least until it sinks in that the Blakists have been destroying shipyards again and there won't be so many new build jumpships in the future.

Historically, pirates were generally involved in commerce raiding as well.  The were just in business for themselves instead of a government.  In the BTU, though, “pirates” do things that aren’t commerce raiding all the time.  If you instead think of a privateer as a tame pirate on a leash, it transfers over pretty easily (even if in Filtvelt, the main canon example, they pretty readily slipped the leash and proved not to be very tame at all).

[Mohammed As`Zaman Bey]

Historically, pirates were generally involved in commerce raiding as well.  The were just in business for themselves instead of a government.  In the BTU, though, “pirates” do things that aren’t commerce raiding all the time.  If you instead think of a privateer as a tame pirate on a leash, it transfers over pretty easily (even if in Filtvelt, the main canon example, they pretty readily slipped the leash and proved not to be very tame at all).

  Actually, they are mercenaries, performing regular military duties, as any other unit would, under the same rules of warfare, as per contract and treaty protocols.
.

[Emcha]

I've been working on a mercenary company that specializes in anti-piracy and recapture operations.

basically a force built to 1)track down stolen ships with the intent of boarding them and reclaiming them for the client, and 2)find pirate bases and make like the Beach assault scene in 'Apocolypse, Now!' only with battlemechs.

so each lance is built as a reinforced air lance, with four mechs, two ASFs, and at least one platoon of infantry, preferrably two. the ASFs would have troop compartments.

three of these lances combine into something like a battalion combat team equivalent to a squadron of ASFs, a company of mechs, and two companies of infantry.

I would imagine dropships like the Octopus would be ideal for privateer operations.

[Daryk]

Nice combined arms set up...  :thumbsup:

[Arkansas Warrior]

I found something relevant: in FM 3145 Mercs, there’s a short account of a unit operating under Letter of Marque in the Notable Units section of the Gun Trailers entry.  Apparently they were just doing normal, terrestrial convoy escort.