Interstellar Operations Beta Feedback

[Welshman]

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Also, would it be possible to include a sample Interstellar Map for use with The Inner Sphere In Flames At War - perhaps of the Inner Sphere c. 3025 - or is that the kind of item that would have to wait for any era-specific expansions to be offered at a later point in time?

It is our plan to offer a downloadable map of the Inner Sphere for 3025 game play with the print release of IO. Future maps are being explored for other eras. How these would be provided will be determined in the future.

And would it be possible to add the Marian Hegemony as a sample 3025 Periphery force in TIFIFAW, alongside the Canopians, Outworlders, and Taurians? (Perhaps a training scenario of sorts could allow for a clash between the MAF and MHAF in the space between the two Periphery powers, though I'm not sure how well the current IO material might account for the Marian Legions' unique force organization structure.)

The Marian Hegemony was still considered a pirate faction as of 3025. As such it is not a standard playable faction in the rules. You are of course welcome to create any factions you wish for your game, provided all players agree.

[Welshman]

For Inner Sphere at War, the more I dig into it the more I am starting to remember more and more of my conclusions about the Fan Councils that we've tried running on these forums in the past and honestly that is not a good thing.

I have many memories, both fond and frightening, from the Fan Council games. I was one of the people do create a lot of the order sheet automation and keeping track of troop deployments was indeed a huge job.

While we are looking at things to improve this, the fact is ISW scale games are huge undertakings. Adding in the complexity of "Play by Mail" or "Play by Forums" adds to this. We will do what we can. At the end of the day ISW will be only for a small percentage of our die hard detail oriented fans due to the complexity of the rules.

What Catalyst is doing is trying to offer combat and campaign systems at various levels of detail, to allow players to choose their level of detail.

Thanks,
Joel BC

[Nerroth]

It is our plan to offer a downloadable map of the Inner Sphere for 3025 game play with the print release of IO. Future maps are being explored for other eras. How these would be provided will be determined in the future.

Duly noted, thank you.

(I dream of one day seeing a full-sized map including the material from the four Deep Periphery sectors shown in ISP3, with rules showing how to expand one's efforts across the Human Sphere - and how to get around troubling astronomical features like nebulae and whatnot. But I probably shouldn't get my hopes up...)

The Marian Hegemony was still considered a pirate faction as of 3025. As such it is not a standard playable faction in the rules. You are of course welcome to create any factions you wish for your game, provided all players agree.

I see, thanks again.

To clarify, is there a particular era in which the Marians would become "playable" in this sense?

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Also, speaking of the Periphery, the note about the DP factions not being available in the Civil War era on page 26 refers to the Clan Invasion era instead.


But on a broader note, it seems odd that the likes of the Hansa and Nueva Castile are considered isolated from the Inner Sphere and near Periphery in all six eras.

Would there not have been at least some limited trade and/or conflict between these powers and their Spheroid and Clan counterparts betwen the late 3050s and the late 3070s?

(There are notes of three Hansa worlds being opened for outside trade, of Blakist machinations in Hansa space, of the RDF being bloodied by Ice Hellion and Diamond Shark, and of long-range Hanseatic connections stretching as far as JàrnFòlk space and the Chainelane Isles.)


Also, while the Hansa and Umayyads appear to be Succession Wars-era entities, I am led to believe that the Castilian Principalities existed in Nueva Castile during the Star League era.

Would it be worth adding the Castilians to the list on page 18, with an asterisk to denote their Deep Periphery status; or were they not notable as a military power at that time, due to their lack of BattleMechs (which were first brought to Nueva Castile by the later Umayyads)?

[Atlas3060]

WMD USE CONSEQUENCES TABLE chart has a errata. (pg 168 of the book, 170 according to my pdf viewer)

The ranges go from MoS 1+,MoS 0, MoF 1-3, MoF 4-7, MoS 8-9, MoS 10+

Those last two values should read MoF instead of MoS.

[ScannerError]

Looking over the old MWDA rules for the Viral Jammers on Warrenborn, it seems there it was only effective in stopping electronics for the turns it was active.  Simply having that instead of the permanent electronic shutdown would work quite well for bringing it back in line without needing other alternations, and actually allows counter-play by the opponent. 

What happens if a unit has a mix of Retro-Streak (page 132) and normal Streak SRM ammo in it's bins?  Does it need to declare which one is in use at the start of the weapon phase, or is it assumed to have Retro-Streaks loaded if it doesn't attempt to fire normal Streaks?  Or are you unable to mix these ammo types even with multiple bins?

If creating a wheeled Quadvee, does it use it's higher vehicle mode MP to determine OBV and DBV modifiers, or just the base mech mode speed given how limiting wheeled movement is? 

Is the lack of non-enhanced Cybernetic Tail rules intentional (ie: they have no notable impact outside of AToW scale games), or an oversight?

[SirFozzie]

Fuel Air Munitions (p167-168)

In addition to this, all infantry units must also roll 2D6 and subtract their distance from the  FAM’s point of impact (in hexes) from the result. If this modified roll is 9 or less for a conventional infantry unit, or is less than 7 for a battle armor unit, the remaining troops in the unit are also destroyed.

I suggest that this is backwards (the units closer to the FAM's impact hex are in more danger, not less). Should it be:

In addition to this, all infantry units must also roll 2D6 and ADD their distance from the  FAM’s point of impact (in hexes) from the result. If this modified roll is 9 or less for a conventional infantry unit, or is less than 7 for a battle armor unit, the remaining troops in the unit are also destroyed.

Example: Conventional Infantry Unit A is 3 hexes away from a FAM impact hex: The dice comes up 2+2 (+3 hexes away)=7, and the remaining troops in the unit are destroyed. Battle Armor Unit B is also 3 hexes away from the same FAM Impact hex and rolls 3+2 (+3 hexes away)=8 and is not destroyed due to being battle armor (although it does take normal damage otherwise)

[bobthecoward]

Zellbrigen is a campaign level rule. Strategic BattleForce is primarily a combat system. Rules for Zellbrigen in SBF and ACS level warfare will likely be in a future ISW expansion to cover the play of the Clans. Until then, whatever rules work for your game table apply.

Does that mean no clan scenarios will be accepted for the final product scenario submissions?

[Adrian Gideon]

Does that mean no clan scenarios will be accepted for the final product scenario submissions?

You may submit Clan scenarios.

[bobthecoward]

You may submit Clan scenarios.

I'm sorry for bugging about rules on this...but if I go with one of my clan ideas, I want to do a good job. In the special rules section can I make an oblique reference to zellbrigen? Would that be adequate?

[ScrapYardArmory]

Page 306 states the following:

"A single ACS turn lasts approximately 3.5 days (84 hours), with eight turns taking 1 month or 1 Inner Sphere at War Turn."

And then on page 317 it states:

"At the end of an ISW Game Turn (4 ACS Combat Turns) "

I'm guessing the correct 8 is the correct value.

[Arthinas]

I noticed that the force creation and solar system generation rules that were tested on the forums a few years ago aren't in the book. Did they get cut completely?

[pheonixstorm]

Those I believe were split into a second campaign book. Don't remember where the post is about it... but it is somewhere.

[Welshman]

To clarify, is there a particular era in which the Marians would become "playable" in this sense?

If memory serves me, they are playable faction in 3039 and later.

But on a broader note, it seems odd that the likes of the Hansa and Nueva Castile are considered isolated from the Inner Sphere and near Periphery in all six eras.

For the purposes of the core rules, they are a minor blip in the power games of the Successor States. Even all banded together, the Deep Periphery states are barely a match for some Periphery powers.

That is not to say future ISW supplements might not cover the use of these factions. Just not in the core ISW rules.

[Welshman]

Page 306 states the following:

"A single ACS turn lasts approximately 3.5 days (84 hours), with eight turns taking 1 month or 1 Inner Sphere at War Turn."

And then on page 317 it states:

"At the end of an ISW Game Turn (4 ACS Combat Turns) "

I'm guessing the correct 8 is the correct value.

Correct, the original ACS turn was 1 week in duration.

[Nerroth]

Thank you for the further clarifications. (Or should I say, Diolch yn fawr iawn!)


One last question for the time being: might it be worth considering adding a note referring to "official", yet non-canonical setting options (such as that shown in the Empires Aflame PDF) as examples of alternate settings which the players would be free to make an attempt of modelling in ISW? Or is it better that any non-generic references and/or scenarios in IO be based solely on the "Prime" timeline, with the likes of EA best left to those who come across that file of their own accord?

[Giovanni Blasini]

Page 130
Table: Primitive Kearny-Fuchida Drive Forumula

On Primitive JumpShip rules, I highly urge setting a minimum jump distance.  As the rules currently stand at 5% of ship mass + 2%/LY, it reopens the backdoor to allowing "Monitors" back into the game, simply by choosing to limit your jump distance to 1-5 light years (and, thus, 6-20% of vessel mass taken up by the KF core).  Once primitive JumpShips start getting to a million tons of mass for their limit, it allows for some truly unbalanced concoctions.

[jymset]

Interstellar Operations covers less than half of the different types of R.I.S.C. equipment WizKids put out. Is Catalyst planning on making BattleTech stats for all of them or just the ones we've seen in IO? It makes sense to me that you guys might not want to invent twenty new pieces of bizarre, rare and/or overpowered equipment that would probably see little use by players. At the same time, I can see Catalyst wanting to flesh out all that R.I.S.C. equipment for the same reason you guys have fleshed out almost all the other old Dark Age stuff. For that matter, is IO even meant to be the definitive guide to R.I.S.C. equipment? Some official clarification would be nice. Thanks!

List of all the R.I.S.C. cards WizKids released:
http://www.warrenborn.com/Search.php?ID=r.i.s.c.

Yes, the IO RISC items are the definitive list of what will be seen in BattleTech stats. Some items just weren't deemed feasible, at least in the scope of BT rules, some were deemed redundant. Fun fact: the list of adapted items was originally much shorter.


As for the trepidations towards game balance - there are three balancing factors that RISC worked with, and none of them are comparable to conventional equipment balancing factors. They are a) intrinsic failure, as represented by the rules. There are a few parallels in TO to this; b) space and time, being available to only one faction for roughly a single decade. This can be compared to iATMs, which are vastly superior without drawbacks and limited only by faction and time; c) a few meta-game notions which obviously are outside of all other considerations. In short - the effect of viral jammers are rather deliberate...

[jymset]

Dev-level correction, Universal Technology Advancement Table

page 38: Rifle (Cannon) – In the Notes column, change “Ext: ~2825” to “Ext: ~2865”
page 48: Actuator Enhancement System – Change Intro column from “3109 (LC/CJF)” to “3108 (RD)”. Add to the Notes column for this item: “IS Intro: 3109 (CC)”

[Gus]

P. 105 states "...Though some Clans (notably the Jade Falcons) experimented with a dual-cockpit version for their own forces..."

Just how does one have a dual-cockpit LAM? The first thought would be to use a Command Console, although there are no slots available in the head. A small cockpit could be used, but they weren't invented by the time we saw canonical examples of dual-cockpits in Freebirth, set in 3059. The small cockpit was prototyped in 3060, and available to the Clans in 30380, (p. 39 on the Universal Technology Advancement Table)).

Perhaps there is a LAM dual-cockpit similar to what QuadVee have... O0

[Maingunnery]

I am trying to play with the Primitive aerospace (JS/DS/SC) construction rules and the tables are a bit of a mess. Please abstract them to have only 1 row for each century.

[BirdofPrey]

Just how does one have a dual-cockpit LAM?

Maybe if we actually had dual cockpit rules

[nova_dew]

Still no return of dual cockpit rules (unless it's a tripod) :(

====
Is it too late to reorder things?
The way things are laid out in the Alternate Eras units & equipment seems a bit haphazard you skip back and forth between eras, between prototype and experimental equipment (granted, there's not a huge difference between the two), and between basic equipment, and construction rules for new unit types.
-snip-

I agree that this area needs a reorder but would suggest by era then by prototype, basic then experimental.

Also could you please add one or two extra columns to the Universal Technology Advancement Tables, Book and page for rules and construction, with now five books to look through things can get a little confusing (unless you are planning to have a master table of equipment and their rules locations)

I also second the revisit to LAM Airmech to hit modifiers maybe to +2,+3 since the average pilot is at 8+ to hit while cruising before any target or range modifiers are applied.

-edited by me because i apparently can not read... -

[Maingunnery]

page30
"The Escorpión Imperio, in an effort to upgrade its native manufacturing to Clan standards, has been flooded with lower-quality samples of Clan equipment (see Early Clan
Improved Equipment and Early Clan Prototype Systems"
--
The "UNIVERSAL TECHNOLOGY ADVANCEMENT TABLE" doesn't acknowagle that. All those systems remain extinct on them. They will need a 'Ret: 3080 (EI)'.



page 43
On page 43 the Prototype dates between Compact K-F Core and Primitive K-F Core are switched.



page 72
"a series of breakthroughs in both materials design and power transfer brought the concept of the Gauss rifle to reality."
Sentence is a bit ambigious, suggested change:
"a series of breakthroughs in coil-gun technology brought the concept of the Gauss rifle to reality."



page: 73 & 46
ROCKET LAUNCHERS (RL-P)
Introduced: circa 2250 (Various states)
&
See also the conflict with normal RLs (on page 46).

My suggestion:
RL-P Introduced: Pre-Spaceflight  (like rifle cannons)
RL Introduced: 3064 (MH)

[Joe]

I withdraw my feedback.

[abou]

p. 229, short story "Falling into Fire"

The Latin motto ad respiratio ultimas is incorrect. There are two instances of it on the page. It should read ad respirationem ultimam. Ad takes the accusative, not the nominative. The case, number, and gender of the adjective ultima should agree with the noun.

[Maingunnery]

page 110
"In BattleMech mode, a LAM becomes unable to execute bombing missions. Thus, in
this mode, the LAM may only use TAG and rocket launcher weapons stored in its bomb bays,"
LAM still use fuel for jumping, suggestion:
"In BattleMech mode, a LAM becomes unable to execute bombing missions. Thus, in
this mode, the LAM may not use bombs, only equipment and missiles stored in its bomb bays,"

page 111
Please add required bomb-bay tonnage/slots to the "LAM BOMB BAY ORDNANCE TABLE".

Also for the RL ordnance, please remove "for air-to-air or air-to-ground use" text.



page 350
Cpombat -> Combat

[monbvol]

I have many memories, both fond and frightening, from the Fan Council games. I was one of the people do create a lot of the order sheet automation and keeping track of troop deployments was indeed a huge job.

While we are looking at things to improve this, the fact is ISW scale games are huge undertakings. Adding in the complexity of "Play by Mail" or "Play by Forums" adds to this. We will do what we can. At the end of the day ISW will be only for a small percentage of our die hard detail oriented fans due to the complexity of the rules.

What Catalyst is doing is trying to offer combat and campaign systems at various levels of detail, to allow players to choose their level of detail.

Thanks,
Joel BC

Seems I need to further clarify.

I have been part of multiple Fan Councils and been the one to demand what turned out to be too much detail and tracking and been the one to automate the spreadsheet for that Fan Council(more than once).  So I consider myself one of the more detail oriented fans that Inner Sphere at War should be for and with my recovered memories of the Fan Councils, some of which actually required less tracking that what the Inner Sphere at War demands, I am saying this is too much detail and tracking to be workable at current.  Whether that is playing in person, play by post, or play by e-mail.

In other words if it requires more complexity and tracking than I know what I can deal with before burning out then I can't help but be really worried that it is just going to be another interesting rule set that cannot be executed in a reasonable manner without getting a computer game developer on board.  Because despite my seeming negativity I do consider these rules to be a vast improvement over Inner Sphere in Flames and some of the Fan Councils we've had on these boards, it is just that with my experiences and best judgment burnout and tedious book keeping are too high for me to think it will be a success but I am prepared to be proven wrong.

[Welshman]

Seems I need to further clarify.

No, I got it, thanks. I remember the Fan Councils very well. We had several FGC veterans involved in the game design process just for that reason.

I am saying this is too much detail and tracking to be workable at current.  Whether that is playing in person, play by post, or play by e-mail.

Without more detail, there isn't much I can do. We are trying to balance the repeated requests for more detail, with the ability to be playable. We're still considering a re-release of the old SW BOx Game, which takes everything to a highly abstracted state and may satisfy players not wanting a lot of detail.

So if you have specific feedback on how to simplify record keeping, without losing game detail, I'm all ears. Feel free to contact me direct at welshman.bc@gmail.com. (Note: People who choose to use my email to spam me with random ideas will be quickly blocked).

Best,
Joel BC
ISAW Developer

[monbvol]

No, I got it, thanks. I remember the Fan Councils very well. We had several FGC veterans involved in the game design process just for that reason.

Without more detail, there isn't much I can do. We are trying to balance the repeated requests for more detail, with the ability to be playable. We're still considering a re-release of the old SW BOx Game, which takes everything to a highly abstracted state and may satisfy players not wanting a lot of detail.

So if you have specific feedback on how to simplify record keeping, without losing game detail, I'm all ears. Feel free to contact me direct at welshman.bc@gmail.com. (Note: People who choose to use my email to spam me with random ideas will be quickly blocked).

Best,
Joel BC
ISAW Developer

I'll admit that is the 900lb Gorilla in the room for this level of play I haven't ever sufficiently figured out(how to balance sufficient detail to make it fun/interesting for nutbars like me while keeping it simple/fast enough to play).  But I'll shoot over some of the potential ideas I've had that may help.

[skiltao]

In the same way that SBF and ACS are meant to "stage up" to ISAW, perhaps ISAW would benefit from being split into two levels of "staging." Perhaps a single factory world and its surrounding client worlds, with SW Box replacing the top level of staging.

Notes to that effect appear in the SBF and ACS rules

Page ref for those Warchest mentions? Or are you referring to an improved, post-Beta version of the document.

Also, I notice that a bunch of equipment all starts with the word "cybernetic." Don't do that--somebody looking for "myomer implants" will expect to find it indexed under "m," not "c."