Each trooper is a bubble of health for the platoon. How those bubbles get marked off has changed over the years though. The older weapon hit kills that many troopers may have been too much one way but 1/10 damage goes too far the other. And the mechanized infantry damage is worse.
Yup. And you're asking about all the different ammo types. I hope you realize that the alternate ammo types are there to bring back the full weapon damage against infantry in a limited fashion. It's purely a rules for rules sake effect. Which, to me, shows a regression in technology when you look at the meta.
It's not just with infantry. The biggest, easiest example is with terrain.
Recall that in the oldest rules, you just had to target a woods hex with weapons that weren't on a restricted list, and a hit would knock it down a class, no question. Nominally it was any weapon that didn't do 5 or more points of damage. Why the AC/5 was on the restricted list is beyond me. You could ALSO accidentally clear woods hexes as well as accidentally set them on fire. In the optional rules for that era, it took 40 points of damage to crater a hex. That's moving 900 square meters of earth 6 meters deep.
Move to the BMR period. Now all weapons can potentially clear woods, but it's not guaranteed. You had to roll for it even on a successful hit, and roll equal or under the weapon's damage to knock a woods hex down a class. Much more difficult to do for light damage weapons. Some were guarantees.
Aside from anything that BattleTroops shared with BattleTech and CityTech, BT 2nd ed and on had much the same in common with the BMR when it came to attacking and damaging infantry.
Then comes Total Warfare. Not only do some weapons get their damage cut against infantry, but against terrain, as well. It takes 50 points of damage to take a Heavy Woods to Light, and 40 to reduce Light Woods to rubble.
Drastic difference in performance.
I could actually envision the right technology mission-killing a set number of dudes rather mechanically and still be able to use the same weapon to do an equivalent of trackable damage to armored units. Could be the targeting software combined with the firing platform. In the case of munitions, it could be something in their design that might be programmable on the fly. We
are talking 500 years into the future here at a
minimum along with whatever discoveries may come with prolonged activity in vacuum as well as better access to rare metals and other minerals that are in short supply on Earth.
So, when I see that you
have to have specific munition types to get an effect that was once automatic in a prior version of the game, I ask: Doesn't it feel like a tech downgrade?
And I would have been fine with that. Infantry still have some minor conceptual issues, but it would have felt minor.
I
would have been fine with it if TW hadn't been retconned to be how Everything in BattleTech functions for all periods of history in the Inner Sphere. But, that's what happened. I'm sorry, but when you spoiled me on the good stuff, why do you think I would be satisfied with this low-end crap as the new norm? I was expecting to at least have the option to run the older style game effects as a tech option. But, if I want that, I'm currently forced to do it on my own at my own table.
Color me not surprised when I learn that they had taken the 'game rules for a tournament board game's sake' approach, with little consideration for story and setting consistency during the transition from BMR to Total Warfare.
And, that's why
I personally want to see a return to the glass-jawed infantry. Sure, give them teeth and a little extra reach. They sure certainly can't move worth squat if they're not motorized/mechanized. But, your weekend warrior and glorified police grunt (IE Militia, rebels, or local lord's retainer) probably shouldn't have access to ultra-high tech bullets for his rifle. Only certain squad weapons should be capable of doing damage at the BattleTech Armored Combat level. That's SRMs, maybe LRMs, lasers of the small class, and minigun style machine guns. (You know, the kind that can drop eleven pounds - 5 kg - of bullets down-range in a pull of the trigger.) Anything less should only be good at hurting squishies.
But, again, there's no hiding the squad weapon. There's no ducking and weaving and firing from the hip with the squad weapon. Not in a way that will keep a guy from getting pegged by something fired with mechanical, computerized precision. Actually, I would cede that it's
possible with the right equipment and training. But, do you think a paranoid
System Lord House Ruler would let just
anyone have that stuff?
So, yeah. I want to see front line elite infantry to be exceptionally rare to the point you should not expect to field them in anything more than a company at a time. Everyone else should be a glass-jawed unit which is readily defanged with a single hit from any armored unit. I'm open to the option of them still being able to run around and deal with other infantry if I or the situation, or the faction doctrine, allows.
Basically, give me BattleSquad, or give me Infantry Pogs. Maybe both. This strange version of what was introduced in City Tech just doesn't work for me anymore.
Heck, the current infantry aren't even interesting. You can't crit them like you could any other armored unit. At least with Battle Armor, you get the random opportunity to knock the troopers off in detail, or risk the chance that you'll sand blast the entire squad before they start dropping off quickly. Standard Infantry don't even have
that.