How do you deal with the loss of detail?

[Daemion]

Now... that being said... I would not be opposed to certain large weapons (AC20s, Gauss Rifles, etc) being allowed an automatic crit roll in Alpha Strike to simulate the potential catastrophic damage.

I really like this. Though, I wonder if there would be a way for more heavily armored units to withstand that kind of hit once or twice. Maybe have a 'heavy armor' box next to the relevant crits, and it can survive that kind of hit as long as the box isn't knocked off?

This would make for a minor secondary weapon class - devastating.

I was always thinking that if people wanted to, they could have each standard attack make a crit chance roll similar to AeroTech when doing damage on Armor, versus the automatic status effect to open internals. This, to me would simulate damage piling onto a particular location by chance.

I think that the game is just fine, but it is not battletech in the slightest to me, if it was released as its own game (not affiliated at all with battletech) I would have probably liked it , but without any of the feel (to me at least) of the game it is supposed to represent makes it unplayable.

I had this same problem with MechWarrior Dark Age (of Destruction). On it's own, it was just fine. But, tied with BattleTech, and having been a dedicated BattleTech Player, there were aspects of the dial system that just didn't catch the true random nature of BT damage. The two were not the same.

For me, Alpha Strike is very much like that. It looks to be a nifty little game, but it still doesn't capture what I grew up understanding Armored Combat in the 31st century to be.

Although, anymore, I will agree that Classic BattleTech really is a Roleplaying combat system. Heck, the RPG defaults to that when people are 'augmented' for combat.

[Daemion]

We want things to be familiar, the way we "remember" it, not knowing that our own memories are false; our brains delete or edit the difficulties we faced, making them seem smaller and easily overcome in retrospect and amping up the current problems to truly epic proportions.

The only problem is that this collides with the stone-cold, immutable fact that change is inevitable. It is going to happen. There is sometimes a regressive backlash when change occurs and the people who were made comfortable by the new way don't pay enough attention to the grievances of those who were made uncomfortable, but that doesn't stop the tides of change for long.

It's not how I 'remember' it. For me it's all about how the combat plays out in my mind. I like BT because I don't have to do as much imaginary hurdles to effectively write a small paragraph about how an AC shot took out my PPC on the right arm that turn. It's easy to visualize.

Then, when you break down the numbers and think about what that means in real life, you start working backwards from 'why are lasers missing so much? Aren't they like insta-hits?' to 'So, the mech jinks, and combined with the magic armor, the shot landed on the left arm instead of going for the obvious center of mass, and didn't do any lasting damage - just burnt the paint'.

(Can you tell I'm a story-teller by nature?)

You read the novels and even the writers break down how shots went and obviously pull from the combat system. You get to see the game played out to some degree in the story!

This defines combat in the BattleTech Universe. It's not just robots fighting robots. You can go Adeptus Titanicus, or maybe MonsterPocalypse, or RoboRally, and get robots fighting robots. Heck, RoboTech is an alternative, or HeavyGear/Jovian Chronicles. How about Warmachine? Or Star Wars minis during the Clone Wars. Droids are robots, too.  :( ^-^

OOOH! And, who couldn't forget CAV? ClickTech on a sheet! Great looking minis.

You change any of the mechanics, then you change the nature of image generated in the mind's eye. That's why I have the hardest time accepting anything that doesn't mimic the system which defines the universe as far as I'm concerned. The story is not the same once you completely remove something. Locations is a something. Variable armor across a body is a something. Partial cover dealing damage on the PUNCH table is a something.

MW:DA, the dial was the same every time. You didn't get health reduction without losing weapons, though in BT it's possible to donut a Mech without touching any of the other systems.

Alpha Strike - if you move so fast, you always get x movement mod. No crits until all (technically most of?) the armor is gone! It's not possible to torso twist (since all the weapons are combined into one stat). 3 stander BT turns means you hit all three times or you don't hit at all, with a single attack roll in an AS turn.

What kind of narrative can I write off a standard AS engagement without taking the time to brainstorm? How can I get it to match up with what a typical Classic BattleTech engagement would give out? Sure, I don't mind a challenge, but how many liberties would I have to take to get a Centurion's AC and LRMs all connecting over three volleys in 30 seconds when most of the rest of the time they're not 'connecting'?

Both games suffer from a dichotomy or schizophrenia of scale. Whereas Classic BT is rather consistent. For someone who obsesses over scale because of the 'all the toys in my toy box on the same table (1)' attitude I have, this is a something.

I had a campaign I was running with a hero unit under the BMR rules structure, and I tried transitioning to Total Warfare for the Dark Age portion of that timeline. Because of how things had changed regarding infantry and other things, it didn't mesh with how I saw things working for the original campaign and how things might have pro- or regressed from that point. So, that campaign went back to the BMR. But, things about the Total Warfare changes I liked got ported over to another campaign, and got some modifications after a play over with my friends. (Random motive table is really neat, but the spread of damage over 4 locations instead of 2? Had to go. Hovers needed tweaked, so that they weren't gimped on speed and quickly rendered into turrets - One or the other, not both. A hefty revision to how infantry deal and take damage. Stuff like that.)

So, it's not a matter of 'It's not the same'. For me, it doesn't tell the same story. Big difference.

Like MW:DA, it would be really neat if AS were a game with giant anime Mecha, each only sporting a single big gun, like is typical with Japanese style Mecha. The single hit to the armor and structure make me think of them.

There are things that could have been done to Make Alpha Strike emulate the story aspect of BT combat and still make it simple enough for a quick game. I'm absolutely sure of this. Part of the problem isn't the style, it's the aspect of game design. Would relegating crits or location seeking to a deck of cards still be BattleTech? Or, is it only BattleTech as long as there are only multiples of chance cubes involved in every aspect of chance resolution?

[greasyspoon]

This has been a very interesting thread.  Bit of History I started with BattleTech right when it switched from Battle Droids.  I was never a heavy player but always had either a board game, video game or megamek game every few months for many years.  Now my Son is getting into games and I get to play more often now.  We started classic BattleTech but to a 10 to 13 year old it was a bit slow and could not hold his interest. This year we switched to alpha strike and he really likes it.  I was just ok with it.  The loss of detail did bug me but getting to play BattleTech again was great.

After a few games, it bugged me that medium mechs could be knocked out with 2-3 hits and light mechs even faster.  But after the reading the aerospace rule it got me to thinking of alpha strike in a more abstract way.  This really help me over my issues coming from classic BattleTech. I think of the armor point and structure points as the “good” hits.  Even on the turns where you roll and “miss” there are still hits that don’t do major damage.  Just like the hits in Classic that 5 point of damage to leg armor when the center torso is exposed. You hit but in the big picture it does nothing to the mech.  And the opposite is true as well.  When my Dashi did 9 damage to his locust (with 7 armor and structure).  I see an alpha strike doing great rolls and all hitting center torso.  “All” the weapon system hit just right.  Because if you think about half the hits in classic BattleTech are just to burn though the armor and 4 or 5 good hits are what killed the mechs.

Once this clicked for me I have enjoyed my games quite a bit more and even started buying new mechs for bigger battles.  Where before most games were lance vs lance at most.  Now we can do 2 company vs company battles in the same amount of time.  But to be honest we don’t get the dramatic moments like classic where someone gets head capped or the one legged mech running around with a PPC and machine gun.  They are different games but the feel is very close for me.

Just my two cents.

[Daemion]

For someone who obsesses over scale because of the 'all the toys in my toy box on the same table (1)' attitude I have, this is a something.

Oh, yeah. I ran out of time, so I didn't put in my little footnote:

(1) = I grew up with very few of any given single toy out of the 80s and 90s. Never a complete collection. So, when I played, I played with what I had, and mixed and matched. Being a fan of Sci-fi and fantasy in general, I look at these franchises the same way. There will be times I want Mechs to face off against AT-AT's or LAMs against Valkyries, or Chippewas against X-Wings and Tie Fighters.

One of the reason's I'm big into cross-overs. But, the engineer in me wants to be relatively faithful to the capacities that each element portrays from its parent tapestry, or box. Thus, having something that defines, even roughly, how something works that can be identifiable with something in another, or in, say, real life, is important.

That's another reason why the depiction of combat in the mind's eye for one thing will be drastically different once you change the mechanics under which it operates.

[mcjomar]

I have yet to test out the game, but I've grabbed a PDF (I'll grab a DTF at a later date) and it seems interesting.
Based on the responses from this thread, here's my take:

I started in Battletech via the medium of MechCommander Gold.
I later got the chance to play MechCommander 2, and then MechWarrior 4, and the expansions.
I eventually played most of MW3, and half of MW2 Mercs, as well as all of MW2 on PS1.

Somewhere along the way I stumbled over IWM and bought a bunch of minis, plus some rulebooks, and eventually an intro box (later a couple of the 25th anniversary ones).

It seems to me that the comparison of AS vs CBT is this - CBT is the Mechwarrior games, but with World of Tanks accuracy for shooting. Meanwhile, AS as described in this thread and elsewhere strikes me as being more akin to Mechcommander 2 - maybe MCG depending on how the campaign system (?) shakes out.

As such, it seems like they're each worth enjoying on their own merits if treated that way - in my head in CBT I'm one of the guys on the board, issuing orders to the others, and trying to get my lance through the mission, and if "I" get taken out, I'm left hoping the AI can finish the job and rescue my ejection seat from the battlefield (I wish the MW games had tried this method, rather than just doing mission over if the player died, even when the AI was still alive). By the sound of it in AS I gotta pretend I'm an Operation Bulldog Mech Commander of the Fed Suns (or whatever your headcanon wants I guess), and that I need to manage my forces across each battle of company vs whatever to ensure I make it out the other side. Preferably with my unit intact (or at least repairable). Does this sound right?

I've got a local gamer in my FLGS who has been heavily burned by MechWarrior: Tactics AND the Dark Ages clicky game, and I'm not sure that CBT would be enough (even if I described it as being the equivalent of Necromunda from 40k, and honestly not as bad as MW:T), while it sounds as if maybe I could get a game of AS with him, and he might enjoy it from a 40k perspective?

[Tai Dai Cultist]

I agree with the opinions expressed upthread about there is not so much a loss of detail in AS as there is a change in granularity.  Yes, you lose the impact of headcapping & getting a gyro-smashing TAC. But you gain the entire world of lance level tactics (and up..).  Honestly, I feel CBT has a niche that is dubious at best. Want detailed mech on mech battle? Use Solaris VII rules.  Want lance on lance or bigger scale? Use alpha strike.

Also, as mentioned upthread, the lance should be considered the common denominator in AS rather than the individual mech.  A mech losing a limb or major weapon in CBT is analgous to a lance losing a mech in AS.

And absolutely I agree with the sentiment of AS games being a better representation of the prosecution of battle as described by canon than CBT games.