Favorite bit of silly BTech trivia?

[Sartris]

definitely the spider's fault for not occupying the behemoth's hex and kicking it to death over the next seven hours.

[truetanker]

Yeah that's the one... I'm a  :wheelchair:!

Could have sworn it was a Wasp... oh well.

definitely the spider's fault for not occupying the behemoth's hex and kicking it to death over the next seven hours.

Why? Turreted pairs of AC/10's and SRM-6's, also you have the rest depending on the arc. I'd fire those LRMs point-blank at 1 hex if I had a chance to hurt you.

TT

[Sartris]

tank can't fire on the spider if they're in the same hex. the spider is Annikin with the high ground.

[truetanker]

Since when?

Behemoth has " tactical " control of hex when in combat. Spider can only hit physically from next hex over. ( 1 hex ) Infantry can attack by the way of Swarming attacks.

But two NON align units cannot occupy same hex.

TT

[Sartris]

Vehicles: A ’Mech can kick or stomp a vehicle in the hex it occupies; randomly determine the side on which a vehicle takes damage.

But two NON align units cannot occupy same hex.

this is decidedly not true. see stacking rules

At the end of each Movement Phase, up to two units from each side may occupy a single hex (a maximum of four). These units can consist of any combination of vehicles and infantry, but only one of the four can be a ’Mech. This maximum is called the stacking limit.

[truetanker]

Vehicles: A ’Mech can kick or stomp a vehicle in the hex it occupies; randomly determine the side on which a vehicle takes damage.

I read that as  A Mech can whatever to a vehicle's HEX, and said vehicle, but occupying said hex with said Mech is violating stacking rules.

Spider is OpFor- meaning it cannot occupy, without displacing unit beforehand, the hex.
Tank is player unit- meaning it needs to be displaced, there for it can still fire at anything!
Infantry as OpFor- meaning it can only occupy hex via swarm attack only, after that needs to return to last hex moved before swarm attack.
Infantry is player unit- meaning it can move thru hex, same goes for other player units.

At the end of each Movement Phase, up to two units from each side may occupy a single hex (a maximum of four). These units can consist of any combination of vehicles and infantry, but only one of the four can be a ’Mech. This maximum is called the stacking limit

But two NON align[/u] units cannot occupy same hex.

TT

[Sartris]

Vehicles: A ’Mech can kick or stomp a vehicle in the hex it occupies; randomly determine the side on which a vehicle takes damage.

I read that as  A Mech can whatever to a vehicle's HEX, and said vehicle, but occupying said hex with said Mech is violating stacking rules.

Spider is OpFor- meaning it cannot occupy, without displacing unit beforehand, the hex.
Tank is player unit- meaning it needs to be displaced, there for it can still fire at anything!
Infantry as OpFor- meaning it can only occupy hex via swarm attack only, after that needs to return to last hex moved before swarm attack.
Infantry is player unit- meaning it can move thru hex, same goes for other player units.

TT

Since this is really off topic (and it was originally meant more as a joke for how long it would take the spider to kick down the behemoth's armor), I'm not continuing this line of discussion. Suffice to say, the stacking rules are not ambiguous. A tank and a mech from opposing sides can occupy the same hex.

[Moonsword]

Ladies and gentlemen, if you have a rules question, post it in the correct area.  In the meantime, the stacking discussion is over.  Get back on topic, please.

[iamfanboy]

The thing that sticks with me, more than 20 years after I first read it, is Ricky Rodent from the Packrat entry in TRO 3025 - still gives me a chuckle, for some reason. Hey, I was a kid, kids can like dumb things.

One thing I HATED, though, was in an issue of Battletechnology Magazine, some lame-ass story that supposedly used Enter Sandman as code to signal a jailbreak.

[Domi1981]

For me its definitly the way the tank crews on the Alacorn tank found out how a Pharaoh beer was the perfect track tension gauge. It was one of the rare good writing moments in BT, since you actually learn something about the universe with humorous side note. It´s way more interesting than the usual summing up armies and battalions that we usually get from this brand.

[Kidd]

The ATOW weapon descriptions tickle me no end. But the most memorable for me definitely is the Alacorn pyramid-beers. Maybe the Reed's Brew (?) party vans too.

One thing I HATED, though, was in an issue of Battletechnology Magazine, some lame-ass story that supposedly used Enter Sandman as code to signal a jailbreak.

using some kind of LAM modded with what Techmanual would call an "infantry bay" as well. I always thought that was fanfiction.

[Sir Chaos]

yes, the heady days when the lore wanted any tank to be outmatched by any mech, and the Behemoth pulled off an "improbable" victory against a Spider :)

That Spider *should* have been invincible in that scenario, without double-blind rules at least.

Lost initiative? Jump out of line-of-sight of the Behemoth.
Won initiative? Jump into the Behemoth´s hex where neither of you can shoot at the other, and kick it.

Edit: Ah, nevermind. I should read the rest of the thread before commenting.

[Karasu]

The story of the founding of the New Avalon Catholic Church always tickled me.

[glitterboy2098]

The story of the founding of the New Avalon Catholic Church always tickled me.

just the right mix of plausible and improbable. i mean, it basically used an Antipope scenario. Given the nature of the incident used to kick it off, and human nature, it is immanently believable.

[Mendrugo]

The Star League SB tells that the Gestapo, after an attempt to extort money and riches from the already-stripped Rome and Vatican City, killed Pope Clement XXVII and many cardinals and bishops of the Roman Catholic Church in 2770.  Egocentric Cardinal Kinsey de Medici of New Avalon got a garbled version of the "you're on your own" message from Terra, and believed he’d been given full control of the Inner Sphere’s Catholic Church, declaring himself Pope Thomas X.

Interestingly, an NACC Pope named Clement XX is running the show by 2796 (per “The Purge” sidebar).  So not only did New Avalon break with the rest of the Catholic Church in the Inner Sphere over a garbled HPG transmission, but they decided that the last eight Clements (and perhaps any number of other Popes in between) didn’t count, and reset the numbering.

When I asked Herb Beas about this in a BattleChat (typo or schism?) he came down on the side of schism.

[Kit deSummersville]

At the end of each Movement Phase, up to two units from each side may occupy a single hex (a maximum of four). These units can consist of any combination of vehicles and infantry, but only one of the four can be a ’Mech. This maximum is called the stacking limit

A fast food restaurant created an entree based on that rule. From one to four patties.

[Daemion]

Early fiction tried to establish that "Death's Head" Vang was one of the greatest 'Mech instructors in the Federated Suns, putting his students through grueling training apprenticeships.  Yet, the scenario that pitted his cadet graduates against the Black Widow Company showed most had gunnery skills of 6 or worse.  (Of course, scenarios of that era also gave Natasha a Gunnery of 4 or 5, and Grayson Death Carlyle a Gunnery of 8, so...)

Yeah. I remember the odd choices for Gunnery and Piloting I'd find, even in the MechWarrior RPG Character stats.

I like to think that this is proof that Grayson Carlyle and other POV characters can't be trusted as valid authorities on Mech combat when you read about why they choose to do something.  They aren't authoritative, just blessed by pools of fiat, and that a lot of the secondary characters that fight alongside them are the really, truly skilled people.

So, Grayson has a gunnery of 8, but he also has an edge pool of 8, too. Or more, even.

 :thumbsup:

[Sharpnel]

I don't recall which merc unit it was in FM:Mercs(R) (I don't have the books on-hand at work to check), but the CO and two XOs were familiar names to hockey fans- they formed the front line of the Vancouver Canucks of the mid-aughts (Markus Naslund, Brendan Morrisson, Todd Bertuzzi).

Quint's Olympian Groundpounders

[truetanker]

I've always found it hard to believe the real life McDonalds theme song most of us heard on the radio / television sets of the 70's-today, (about the special sauce and all sesame seed bun one) is used in a reference to a BT Merc unit!

I'm talking about McCarron's Armored Calvary....

TT

[ColBosch]

using some kind of LAM modded with what Techmanual would call an "infantry bay" as well. I always thought that was fanfiction.

Pssst. BattleTechnology was fanfiction. FASA hadn't yet figured out that letting fans write canon is a Bad Idea.

[nova_dew]

For me it's the treatment of the cartoon. it's a canon in universe cartoon.

ok i kinda want to read a 80's styled fanfic where TPTB are in fact mechwarriors from the future that come back in time to create Battletech to make sure they give people the inspiration to develop 'Mech's so that their future comes true  :D

[Frabby]

Pssst. BattleTechnology was fanfiction. FASA hadn't yet figured out that letting fans write canon is a Bad Idea.

You're using "Fan Fiction" as a derogatory term, in the sense of "Bad Writing". That's a bit harsh, given that my own published BattleCorps stories are nothing but fan fiction at the end of the day, elevated to canon. Any fiction written for a shared universe boils down to fan fiction.

The point is that you need someone to factcheck and coordinate the universe building. A Line Developer who really knows the nuts and bolts of the universe. Herb was a godsent in this respect, he really tied the BattleTech universe together and fixed oh so many issues.

As for BattleTechnology, at least the first ten or so issues under the aegis of the Keith brothers were actually pretty good, certainly on par with their novels and actually pretty close to the Jihad era sourcebooks in their "newsreel as it happens" style, complete with oftentimes excellent artwork (especially the magazine covers) and even stories hidden between the lines and across several issues. It neatly fit into the timeline as it was being developed through the novels, and even gave extra background and tie-in information, like Keith's extensive writeup on Hassid Ricol. BattleTechnology was some impressive universe-building right there.

That said, I do grant you that the later issues could not uphold the initial sterling quality. But I wouldn't go so far as to call them outright bad, even when individual pieces of art and fiction had... issues.

[glitterboy2098]

Yeah. I remember the odd choices for Gunnery and Piloting I'd find, even in the MechWarrior RPG Character stats.

I like to think that this is proof that Grayson Carlyle and other POV characters can't be trusted as valid authorities on Mech combat when you read about why they choose to do something.  They aren't authoritative, just blessed by pools of fiat, and that a lot of the secondary characters that fight alongside them are the really, truly skilled people.

So, Grayson has a gunnery of 8, but he also has an edge pool of 8, too. Or more, even.

 :thumbsup:

Iirc, in the battledroids version of the rules, weren't piloting and gunnery figured a bit differently?

[grimlock1]

Not to mention Team Banzai and the Fighting Urukhai.  Ah, for the days when an homage didn't break the seventh seal and summon forth hordes of slavering copyright lawyers. ;)

That kind of stuff has been with table top RPG since the Gygax and company first gave us D&D. 

My brother had an interesting question.  How much does Ready Player One have to pull in just to pay for all the cameos?

[Tai Dai Cultist]

My brother had an interesting question.  How much does Ready Player One have to pull in just to pay for all the cameos?

Less than you might think.. Warner Bros ultimately owns more than a few of the references in the WB movie...

[Baldur Mekorig]

Its the Abbey Distric. Someone in the FWL like vintage music.

[Mendrugo]

If you conquer both Boardwalk and Park Place...do you get to build hotels?

[BrokenMnemonic]

I like the planet Fjernet, after it was pointed out that Fjernet translated to deleted/removed in Norwegian.

Then there's the Tedibyhr system...

[truetanker]

I like the Planet Annunziata... literal translation from Italian: annunciation or the announcement by Gabriel to Mary about her having a son, Jesus.

Was annexed from Rim World Republic and is currently owned by the Falcons.

TT

[Empyrus]

BattleTech's non-combat robots (as rare as they are in its fiction) seem to be the Three Laws compliant.