I like the clans and I think trying to limit their effectiveness in the game with
zellbrigen was a nice touch - though that of course limits its effectiveness on how closely players really follow these rules.
The clans have the better equippement, the better soldiers and they have the strategic advantage (partially, cause ComStar supported them from behind the curtains), but their absolutely stiffling rules of engagement, their culture and their attitude made them vulnerable to the Inner Sphere. Their culture and their rather idiotic notions of honorable combat very nicely originate from the harshness and scarcity of resources in the Pentagon Worlds. To me, this all works together to make a believable threat with a believable weakness, that is smartly taken advantage of by the Inner Sphere to stall their progress towards Terra. It certainly helps that the whole Clan Invasion was a shot from the hip, so to speak, after the Clans feared that IS-scouts had found them and that they had to act fast. Also a nice touch that the clans themselves were divided on the whole "invading the Inner Sphere" thing, which resulted in a split into Warden Clans and Crusader Clans, who sought to get their will by various means of fuckery and some tactical blunders (some even intentional by Warden Clans). I don't know how the clans were supposedly freed from their own rules by the IS breaking them, after all, the Battle of Tukayyid lead to a 15 year truce. The sourcebook on Clans has a pretty chunky table that explains what clan will follow zellbrigen in what way, depending on what their opponent does, and this goes from "disregard zellbrigen at the drop of a hat" to "zellbrigen is an iron law that must never be broken, no matter what my opponent does".
It's a subjective opinion for sure - but I never claimed it would be anything else.
I like the Clan Invasion. I dislike the Jihad. I think everything in regard to the clans has been handled a lot better than the Jihad. Ironically, the Clan invasion feels less "invasive" to the setting than the Jihad, whereas the Clan Invasion was something that happened after the War of 3039, the Jihad threw a wrench into whatever was going on in the Inner Sphere beforehand.
I might be mistaken, but weren't there force-field like shields in Solaris arenas? I think in the novel "Illusions of Victory" there's a mention of that. But then again, maybe it was just super-reinforced glass or something.
The artwork certainly makes it look like some type of glass:
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