Battlefield Support: Assets

[butchbird]

Battlefield support belongs in this sub-section, right?

Haven't noticed a thread on the subject yet and I just tried it so I'm eager to see what others think and learn of their experiences. Don't really have a specific point to defend...but oh well.

So we just finished a game with 240 tons per team with a limit of 4 'mechs per team (3 vs 3, two new players, one with some WH40K experience, the other with zits nada in terms of anything ressembling a wargame, though being apparently skilled in basic maths, she caught on the basics quite well) and something like...85 points worth of assets. Game lasted for approximately 7 hours before there was a clear winner (though you have to count 2 meals and the cigarette breaks), whitout all that much game changing critical hits.

Honestly I liked it. While the rules for vehicles are much less satisfying then BMR (or TW, I would presume), I was quite satisfied with how it enabled to field more units while not adding any complexity nor making any difference on the lenght of the turns. That's really the biggest pro. Playing the vehicles was really a jiffy.

The firepower they weild was also far more accuretly depicted then I tought at first glance. That Shrek really is a menace that you take out as soon as you have a chance. You don't want that Drillson on your six. While it has far less character to have a "firepower rating" then actually "using" weapons, it speed things up immensely, same thing for the fixed TMM.

But yes, the lack of character. That warrior Vtol is only a golden BB now. The firepower rating just doesn't offer the flexibility your used to. I was also a bit offput by the gimped movement points. We had an Ontos on the table (map was open terrain) and, a team being long range heavy and the other more short range oriented (Ontos on this team), that tank simplyrolled at a snail pace, never managing to keep up with the battle, merely taking long range shot at backstabbers. Now I know the Ontos ain't exactly mobile, but that was a clear limitation on its role.

The treshhold and destroy check were also...odd. Unbattletech like. Can't say I disliked it, but can't say I'm a fan.

Again, it really streamlined the use of the vehicles. Applying damage couldn't be simpler. At the same time, well, you know, didn't feel very "CBT" and was much less filling. I did like how it made vehicles go "pop" quite quickly, but then for this game we were pretty lucky on those rolls. Their was only one survival on the 7 roll of the game, might not give me the correct view on their survival rate.

All in all, very good "introductory rules" for getting the conventionals on the table and hence adding more units on the table while having absolutely no impact on the lenght of said game.

[DevianID]

How did you find the damage tracking and degrade tracking?  What did you use to keep count of the rolling damage number before the end of turn destroy roll?

The simplified movement and shooting I understand, its the damage part I get hung up on.  Tracking damage is needed, but there is no damage tracking bubbles or anything on the cards is there?

[butchbird]

Actually there is a square over the "damage treshhold" stat and next to the "destroy check" stat.

We didn't have to track the damage. Anytime we shot at a vehicle, if we hit, we'd bust the treshhold, rendering the point moot. I suppose you can track it in the square at first.

Degrade tracking is, again, in the square. It works real well really.

I suppose that if we hadn't been lucky on the destroy checks (or unlucky, depending on the owner of the unit), both the degrading and the "current turn damage" could be inserted into the grey square with a fine point marker.

Ours was a big point (one of my players said he'd bring one so I didn't take care of it myself) so that would've been out of the question, but I'm pretty sure a fine point (and by that I mean the kind of fine point you'd use for tracing for metal working and such) could enable you to fit in both variables in the square.

Do keep in mind that the treshhold is pretty low. It must be said that we used 3039 tech, but the Shreck had a...8 I believe? So a large laser can core it. Doesn't take that much to force a destroy check.

[DevianID]

As I havent got my kickstarter yet, doesnt tracking if the tank took 18 versus 23 damage still matter?  At least in the beta, you had to keep a running total from shooting phase to assault phase with kicks and stuff.  If the final rules are just 'exceed 8 threshold' and 'made the destroy check, so -1 for next time', that would be a lot simpler to track.

[butchbird]

Huh, in my haste I'd skipped a bit.

So basically, yes, you have a low treshhold to bust ( most need just a medium laser). BUT, Thinking maybe I'd misread and not wanting to mislead others, I went back to check and it seems that you also get a +1 to your dice roll for every 10 damage thereafter, or something like it (like 11 for first +1 one , read it pretty fast).

Still easy enough to track .

[DevianID]

I finally got my kickstarter and was able to read the new rules for them.

The big one seems to be the loss of run speed making the 'faster' BSP units way weaker.  I crunched the numbers in the general thread, but basically the 'best' BSP assests are those that dont move very much to begin with, and have some range.  The savannah masters, for example, with its 13h BSP speed, loses 7 hexes compared to normal rules where they have 20.  A Manticore though only loses 2 hexes of speed being a 4t BSP instead of 6MP in full rules on a run.  So the Savanah overall lost more in BSP card form, and the efficiency kinda shows that.

[kaliban]

Battlefield support belongs in this sub-section, right?

Haven't noticed a thread on the subject yet and I just tried it so I'm eager to see what others think and learn of their experiences. Don't really have a specific point to defend...but oh well.

So we just finished a game with 240 tons per team with a limit of 4 'mechs per team (3 vs 3, two new players, one with some WH40K experience, the other with zits nada in terms of anything ressembling a wargame, though being apparently skilled in basic maths, she caught on the basics quite well) and something like...85 points worth of assets. Game lasted for approximately 7 hours before there was a clear winner (though you have to count 2 meals and the cigarette breaks), whitout all that much game changing critical hits.

Honestly I liked it. While the rules for vehicles are much less satisfying then BMR (or TW, I would presume), I was quite satisfied with how it enabled to field more units while not adding any complexity nor making any difference on the lenght of the turns. That's really the biggest pro. Playing the vehicles was really a jiffy.

The firepower they weild was also far more accuretly depicted then I tought at first glance. That Shrek really is a menace that you take out as soon as you have a chance. You don't want that Drillson on your six. While it has far less character to have a "firepower rating" then actually "using" weapons, it speed things up immensely, same thing for the fixed TMM.

But yes, the lack of character. That warrior Vtol is only a golden BB now. The firepower rating just doesn't offer the flexibility your used to. I was also a bit offput by the gimped movement points. We had an Ontos on the table (map was open terrain) and, a team being long range heavy and the other more short range oriented (Ontos on this team), that tank simplyrolled at a snail pace, never managing to keep up with the battle, merely taking long range shot at backstabbers. Now I know the Ontos ain't exactly mobile, but that was a clear limitation on its role.

The treshhold and destroy check were also...odd. Unbattletech like. Can't say I disliked it, but can't say I'm a fan.

Again, it really streamlined the use of the vehicles. Applying damage couldn't be simpler. At the same time, well, you know, didn't feel very "CBT" and was much less filling. I did like how it made vehicles go "pop" quite quickly, but then for this game we were pretty lucky on those rolls. Their was only one survival on the 7 roll of the game, might not give me the correct view on their survival rate.

All in all, very good "introductory rules" for getting the conventionals on the table and hence adding more units on the table while having absolutely no impact on the lenght of said game.

Have you tested the Patton, the VonLucker or the SturmFeur? I am curious on how playable they are due to the very high Dmg Check numbers they have.

[Calimehter]

We've enjoyed them quite a bit so far, though we are still using the "V2 Beta" since none of us did the kickstarter (boo, hiss, yeah, I know).

The destruction check is a bit odd sometimes, esp. when a whole vehicle or infantry platoon goes down to a single 5-pt. hit.  With that said, when I field groups of them what seems to happen is that some die very quickly and others hang in there a bit and end up causing a bit of havoc, so it seems to work out overall.  And for flow of game play, they are -much- better than TW rules while still having a fun and (often) meaningful effect on the game.

My "headcanon" for the destroy checks is that BSP vehicle crews bail out when the vehicle is immobilized (instead of becoming hard-to-kill turrets like in the TW rules) and that BSP infantry platoons sometimes fail a morale check when they realize that the hulking great war machines are actually paying attention to them enough to hit them with heavy weapons, whether those weapons are optimized for AI work or not.

[Firesprocket]

I've played with them once and wasn't very impressed.  I feel we spent more time referencing back to the rules vs. the actual comabt we used the assests.  Perhaps if used frequently we'd cut down on referencing back to the rules and smoother game play, but they bogged down the game more then speeding it up.

One side had a pair of Demolishers and a pair of Pegasus.  The other side had a pair of Ontos and 2 light tanks (I can't remember what they were unfortuneately).  The lighter elements generally died pretty quickly when they took fire.  The Demoslishers and the Ontos were a different animal entirely.  The higher DC kept them alive longer than would have been expected considering the fire they took.

Unfamiliar rules aside the conclusions we drew post-game were that tanks with a higher DC, even ploding as they were accross the battlefield, played a decent value in the game.  Lighter units were less effective as they lose out on the benefit of their flanking speed and lower DC.  A game where you have a GM and they are controlling the support units could probably operate more effectively.  That isn't often how our group operates though.

[Azakael]

Infantry feels about useless, especially since their range and movement are so short. I really wish they had used this opportunity to make field guns standard on infantry instead of keeping the existing generic small arms can damage armor.
Vehicles feel okay, if a bit on the slow side.
Turrets feel undercosted, but that's from an initial first use - they're easy to hit, but they hit like bricks and have a fairly high threshold and destroy TN. I do like them, as they allow you to add turrets to a defensive position without the overhead in Tac Ops for making them. Edit: Oh. We screwed up. And used the emplacements as turrets with 360 degree arcs of fire... I might rethink my valuation of them.

I think my only complaints about Assets right now - there's only a limited number of them (where's my Alacorn?) and gaining a bonus to your destroy check is the same whether the threshold is 1 or 8. I feel like it should be for every 10 damage past the threshold. But that's my opinion.

[Charistoph]

I've only used the BSP Assets in Campaign play.

In that, they have been very useful for a variety of reasons.

Infantry aren't so bad here because in most cases, they are there as much for scenery and ambiance as they are an effective unit.  This applies whether they are Record Sheet or BSP, at least for the Infantry I don't expect/want to do Anti-Mech Attacks.  For those that are expected to use Anti-Mech Attacks, the chance to Leg a Mech is too good to exchange for 2 additional Hits.

Emplacements have been iffy.  I have used them as Turrets and not.  They are actually less dangerous than most of the Building Gun Emplacements that I built earlier.  Though, I didn't give them 360 fire as Turrets, I did allow them to change their Facing by 1 each Turn as a balance.  They are really bad at hitting anything, but they can really hurt what they hit.  I might change the MG Nests to being able to choose a Facing each Turn, but that's about all I'd switch up on this.

I've only used Vehicle BSPs once in this manner.  That was mostly because they were objectives that were trying to get off the board, and nothing more.  Very useful in tracking something that isn't expected to do much, particularly when I'm already outnumbering the player force due to them being Clan, and I'm running Inner Sphere.

One thing I wish was included were the stats for the immobile bonus BPS like the Parts Cache, Ammo Crates, and Field Hospitals.  While it isn't something that someone would normally shoot at in a BV game, it would have been nice to have those stats available and not invent them in preparation.  It could also make for interesting decisions when you ARE using BV games.

[Church14]

We’ve been using the new BSA for a Tukayyid campaign in place of the original BSP in there. In general, we’ve found it extremely swingy. Across 4 games they’ve done:

3x Light turrets did a combined 20:damage and all died

3 bulldogs did maybe 8 damage total and all died

A warrior and two drillsons used speed and moving first to create movement obstacles to bring a pursuit mission from a clean clan win to a nearly coin flip final results. Some bad luck on the destroy rolls kept the BSA alive longer than they should have been.

2 manticores were present and added to Com guards creating a no go zone in the middle of a map, but 4 MP meant they couldn’t really compensate for faster clan movement to the flanks.


3 games they did almost nothing. One game they were MVPs. Their gameplay loop is fine, but extremely swingy. Their use is its own new skill set. They feel like something entirely new and not like TW vehicles.

[Charistoph]

Effectively being in their Initiative branch definitely makes for very very swingy units.  Easy to avoid for short-ranged Assets, and easy to counter for everyone else.  Their Skill also doesn't help when even a Regular has a hard time hitting, a Greeny or worse is almost impossible.

[kaliban]

I have tested a large number of assets plus 2 Urbanmechs, equivalent to 7500 BV, against an enemy lance of 7500bvs in an urban mech
I have used mainly Sturmfeurs, PAttons and VonLuckner.

We played one of the missions of the Mercenaries book. Only one Patton was destroyed and 3 enemy mechs were destroyed

Sincerely, these rules are not well playtested

[DevianID]

Yeah I have posted before the relative value, using the BV calculation in techmanual, compared to the cost (in 20 bv per BSP).  I am not surprised the heavier sturmfeurs pattons and von luckners did well, the numbers show the trio average about 120% value.

Now, being forced to run/flank, being forced to move first, and in general having few options does mean a force of all BSP shouldnt beat a force of mechs.  I think the city had a lot do to there, negating the tanks slow speed and initiative by just blasting things with their turret up close in the tight city streets.

In our games, not getting hit is the way the players overun my GM BSP tank forces.  Jump 5+ and heavy woods put my regular tanks at 11 in short range.  I demolish the 4/6 slow mechs, like I killed one players hunchback multiple games in a row, because it cant generate the defense to avoid the BSP assets damage.  Meanwhile the mechs running around with +4 combined evasion from TMM and cover are already immune to medium range fire, which means the mechs people bring are faster then normal.  No awesomes or other slow bricks, as they take too much damage from the BSP assets with their lack of evasion.