Abdel's Scavengers' Against the bot campaign

[crduemling]

Well, after reading through that the author of against the bot could use more campaign play alongs I decided to add the tale of the Scavengers unit.

We join this unit in the middle of their second engagement, a planetary assault against the Cappelan Confedertion sponsored by the Free World Leauge. The only reason that the Scavengers took this contract is due to the rather generous 70% salvage rate, although in retrospect, accepting a contract with 0% BLC seems to have been a bad idea.

The force is currently composed of seven functional mechs, one Laio tank, and a rather large number of mechs in various states of disrepair. The commander's mech, a Hermes 1A, or "Legless" as the techs have come to call it, has been a real hangar queen. The mech has rejected a total of twenty replacement legs so far, the control systems apparently having been an after market modification that totally blew the compatibility of the mech with standard spare parts.

Going over the current forces though....

Force allocation 3-27-2952 Abdel's Scavengers on Westerhand
Defensive forces: (Medium Lance)
OSR-2L Lance Commander Wafid bin Ridha (3/3, WS(PPC), T 2, S 1)
AWS-8Q Leutenant Ken Zhai (3/4, multi-tasker, T 1)
TBT-5N Private Anatoly Masalkov (3/4)

Scout Forces: (Light Lance)
PXH-1 Lance Commander Jeannie Meier (4/4)
PXH-1 Private Yoshito Pnyango (4/4)
WSP-1A Private Maciej Kaspercazk (4/5) ***Currently suffering from sever damage to the internal frame of the left leg***

Combat Forces: (Light mixed Lance)
BJ-1 Lance Commander Vasillos Mandrapilias (4/4, Hot Dog)
Vedette (Laio) Veronika Martinez (4/6)

Other Personell (G/R/V/E)
8 Administrators (1/3/4/0)
13 Dependants
2 Doctors (0/2/0/0)
20 Mech Techs (3/13/2/2)
2 Mechanics (0/1/1/0)
21 Infantrymen (0/21/0/0)
Off Duty Mechwarriors (0/6/4/1)

[crduemling]

Currently the finances of the Scavengers seem to be all right, as they part out the salvaged mechs to make ends meet in the short term, trying desperately to get some more up and running in order to field an effective combat unit. The Free World Leauge is slightly displeased with the mixed success on the campaign so far (score -2) and the house Laio forces are in High spirits currently.

Week of 3-27-2952
No Battles
Regular Aero Tech for Hire (rejected)

May 2952
Market
Open Market:
WSP-1A 110% 1,811,304 c-bills
Mercenary Auction:
BNC-3E 65% 6,195,055  c-bills (Purchased)
HNT-151 105% 1,311,135 c-bills
FS9-H 90% 2,742,255 c-bills
LCT-1E 90% 1,416,780 c-bills

Mech Sales
Mercenary Auction:
HD CLNT-1-2R (80%) 2,497,375 c-bills
Crp OSR-2C (80%) 4,490,067 c-bills
Crp STG-3R (85%) 1,275,374 c-bills


There was no way that Seghada was going to pass up the chance at an assault mech at a third off the standard prices. He placed the bid and quickly dropped the three most repaired pieces of salvage into the auction as well, hoping that they would cover the cost of the Banshee.

I think that you can sell units in order to have cash to purchase, at least that's what the other threads seemed to imply.

Enemy Morale roll:
9 [8+1(2 defeats)]
Fearless

Abdel sighed as he listened to another set of threats come in over the radio waves. The Confederation forces are chomping at the bit again to drive the Scavengers off world again. Suppouse you couldn't be too surprised since they were fighting for control of a planet.

Leveling:
Leutenant Ken Zhai increased his piloting making him a  3/3
2 mech techs level up to Veteran
Dependant levels to Mech Tech

[kuitiitijin]

I've found it to be a lifesaver to have the vast bulk of my techs be green (at 8, not 9), with just enough reg/vet/elite to handle the inevitable re-rolls.  But all my repairs start at green, regardless of how much extra time I'm willing to use.  This cuts down a LOT on buying parts.

[crduemling]

kuitiitijin: Afaik when you spend the 5 xp to level them up they become regular-7 instead of green-8, and testing it, yep they do. At least with the default setting in Against the Bot. Also the Era modifier of +3 is a bit rough, but you know, succession wars.

With the morale level dropping back down to high, I was worried that I would start getting more varied missions, and Yep, I did...

Battles for 4/3/2952:
4/3/2952 - Stand Up - Attacker - Woods - Deep - Full Moon - Medium Gale
4/6/2952 - Recon Raid - Defender - Woods - Deep - Strong Gale
4/9/2952 - Extraction - Attacker - Town - Concrete

Regular Aerospace Pilot for Hire (rejected)

The first battle went south quickly, even with a dropship for fire support and no extra lances on the enemy side. The dropship was unable to shoot at anything due to the woods and the low light. The house unit charged forward through the heavy woods, and got himself obliterated in a six for a quick loss and a drop of three points to -5.

The second battle was much more successful, with the Awesome getting to drop itself into a lake at the start and just keep laying down three barrels of PPC fun while the Ostoric beat things down quickly. The CC was kind enough to skid out their two harasser hover tanks making for easy picking with a single PPC shot coring them out from the front and  Dragging it up to a -4 score.

The third battle went well for me, taking out four unit easily enough to gain control of the battlefield and taking relatively little damage to my mechs. The house unit die early on to an ammo crit as it bounded off by itself, doing little but soaking fire. It ended early for me though with the enemy just hammering the civilian units, killing three of them before the end of turn seven. This was even with my mech moving just enough to tans next to the enemy mechs and grin them into dust. I guess squishy vehicles were just too tempting of a target. This brought the score down to a lovely -7.

[crduemling]

Abdel sat in his command quarters mulling things over in his head. The way things were going his unit's reputation would be ruined if they kept at it as things were going. The combat lance had suffered too many losses, and was down to just a blackjack and a captured Laio tank. Then it struck him, why not let Ken Zahi in that monster of a mech the Awsome have a shot at running combat operations on his own...

Week off 4/10/2952
Force allocation
Defensive forces: (Light Lance)
OSR-2L Lance Commander Wafid bin Ridha (3/3, WS(PPC), T 2, S 1)
TBT-5N Private Anatoly Masalkov (3/4)

Scout Forces: (Light Lance)
PXH-1 Lance Commander Jeannie Meier (4/4)
PXH-1 Private Yoshito Pnyango (4/4)
WSP-1A Private Maciej Kaspercazk (4/5)

Combat Forces: (Light mixed Lance)
AWS-8Q Leutenant Ken Zhai (3/3, multi-tasker, T 1)
Vedette (Laio) Veronika Martinez (4/6)

Battles:
4/10/2952 - Base Attack - Defense
4/11/2952 - Breakthrough - Defense
4/14/2952 - Stand Up - Defense

Veteran Aero Pilot (Rejeceted)

I read a few times on the forums that vehicles only counted for half tonnage, but nowhere  in the rule sheet. I'm going with that since they really are only worth about half as much bv.

[crduemling]

Battle Report:
4/10/2952
Base Defense
Wooded Town
Daylight
41 and Clear

Scavengers:
OSR-2L Lance Commander Wafid bin Ridha (3/3, WS(PPC), T 2, S 1)
TBT-5N Private Anatoly Masalkov (3/4)
HBK-4G House escort (4/4)

Wasn't too sure about the ally lances as less than light, but I just winged it and dropped a unit from each lance

Enemy forces:
2 Medium mech lances
1 Light vee lance Reinforcement

This mission started off well, with the Ostoric and and Trebuchet picking off one lone vindicator in the wood north of the town to start, beating it down and kicking one of it's ammo supplies. Fortunately the defenders were enough help in holding up the Laio forces that it was possible to engage just three of them at once, and take down two, with the base defenders taking our a whitworth on their own for a win bringing the score up to a -6.

Salvage:
VND-1AA worth 2,978,569 in parts

This Vindicator only has a torso a head and a leg...

[crduemling]

Battle Report:
4/11/2952
Breakthrough Defense
Ruined Town
Daylight
41 and Moderate Fog

Scavengers Forces:
AWS-8Q Leutenant Ken Zhai (3/3, multi-tasker, T 1)
Vedette (Laio) Veronika Martinez (4/6)
HER-2S Escort (3/4)

Enemy Forces:
One Medium Lance (3xVND-1R[3/6,4/4,4/6], VL-2T[4/4])

Ken Zhai knew that fighting in any sort of fog with a long range mech like that Awsome would be suicide, especially with no real backup other than a single tank to keep things of of himself. There was that abandoned town back there they could fall back to. Hopefully the fog would clear up

Weather re rolled to Clear

Turned out to be a rather sound victory with the Awsome just sitting and sniping from a heavy woods hex. The house unit bit it though so the score is still -6.

Picked up another mil in salvage though.

[crduemling]

After the mission remembered to finally roll for Ken's special ability on level up, got a 10[7+3] and 81. Sniper, how fitting.

Also leveled up Jennaie Meier, to a 3/4 got an 8[6+2] so no ability.