Battletech - Also known as Trannytech

Abella said:
I like the IIC because it has 2 big guns, but hated how it was always a steel coffin you’d put your elderly mechwarriors in.

Another one I’ve been fond of is the piranha. An underrated clan mech that’s great at clearing out infantry, light vehicles and weapons teams. The first time I got to use one was against a terrible meme list where it was just VTOLs and savanna masters. Being able to shoot them up enough to either kill them or rattle them was fun.
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The Piranha is a straight up rape machine under the Solaris 7 box set rules. I've killed assaults with it under those rules. Those 12 MGs and the 2 cERML are just brutal combines with the speed. If you don't get killed getting up close, those MGs are just going to wreck another Mech. I'd even consider pulling the cERML for more MGs.
 
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As long as no one manages to set of it's ammo storage. Then again maybe the Piranha's armament was a template for the Juggernaut

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6 X-Pulse-Lasers (3 large, 3 medium) and 12 Machineguns for the real close combat
 
Balr0g said:
As long as no one manages to set of it's ammo storage. Then again maybe the Piranha's armament was a template for the Juggernaut

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6 X-Pulse-Lasers (3 large, 3 medium) and 12 Machineguns for the real close combat
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There is a Linebacker variant that has 20 machine guns.

Those are linked with Machine gun arrays.
 
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William Murderface said:
The Piranha is a straight up rape machine under the Solaris 7 box set rules. I've killed assaults with it under those rules. Those 12 MGs and the 2 cERML are just brutal combines with the speed. If you don't get killed getting up close, those MGs are just going to wreck another Mech. I'd even consider pulling the cERML for more MGs.
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There’s a guy in our playgroup that loves fielding clan riot police and cheap CVs to occupy hexagons as a means to barricade important positions on the hex map and the machine guns are enough justify the BV on it as a solution. Sadly, it’s a frail body with CASE so if it eats an SRM or enough small arms it’s a goner.
 
Balr0g said:
As long as no one manages to set of it's ammo storage. Then again maybe the Piranha's armament was a template for the Juggernaut

View attachment 6273893

6 X-Pulse-Lasers (3 large, 3 medium) and 12 Machineguns for the real close combat
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Riding an ammo bomb is always a risk, but without risk where's the reward? That's why all of my MechWarriors disable their autoejectors when there's an ammo explosion. Victory or death!

But seriously, I would completely revamp the MG ammo explosion rules. Something like 1D6 explosion damage against internal structure to reflect ammo cooking off and hitting something and a chance of a crit.
 
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William Murderface said:
Riding an ammo bomb is always a risk, but without risk where's the reward? That's why all of my MechWarriors disable their autoejectors when there's an ammo explosion. Victory or death!

But seriously, I would completely revamp the MG ammo explosion rules. Something like 1D6 explosion damage against internal structure to reflect ammo cooking off and hitting something and a chance of a crit.
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Easy, just treat all MG ammo as if it was mounted in a location with CASE. It destroys the location but not the rest of the 'Mech. It's a decent enough compromise for me, because while it shouldn't turn the entire 'Mech into confetti, half a ton of .50 BMG going full popcorn would absolutely wreck anything in its neighborhood.
 
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Corn Flakes said:
Easy, just treat all MG ammo as if it was mounted in a location with CASE. It destroys the location but not the rest of the 'Mech. It's a decent enough compromise for me, because while it shouldn't turn the entire 'Mech into confetti, half a ton of .50 BMG going full popcorn would absolutely wreck anything in its neighborhood.
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I could live with that.
 
Ive always thought that the idea of MGs being able to hurt mechs to be fake and gay.
 
JJLiautaud said:
Ive always thought that the idea of MGs being able to hurt mechs to be fake and gay.
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You can thank BattleTech's zany ablative armor system. A dude with a tripod-mounted HMG could eventually core an Atlas if it just stood still and let him hit the same spot.

There's something to be said for Armor Values like in older editions of Warhammer 40K, even if they are more difficult to balance. Imagine that, a 'Mech with armor so thick Medium Lasers can't deal any damage unless they hit a weak spot. Game balance would go completely upside-down.
 
Another part of the issue is that MGs like ACs have a range of calibres. Sure a .50 cal taking down a mech sounds dumb but what if its a 20mm?
 
Moja Zemlja said:
Another part of the issue is that MGs like ACs have a range of calibres. Sure a .50 cal taking down a mech sounds dumb but what if its a 20mm?
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I wonder if a 30mm rotary cannon would be a type of MG under battletech classification.
 
JJLiautaud said:
Ive always thought that the idea of MGs being able to hurt mechs to be fake and gay.
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I thought that too until I tried it and it paid off. The fact it doesn’t cause heat buildup allows you to take care of annoying units like battle armors and then turn to pop a Jenner or some other annoying light harasser made me a believer.

Corn Flakes said:
You can thank BattleTech's zany ablative armor system. A dude with a tripod-mounted HMG could eventually core an Atlas if it just stood still and let him hit the same spot.

There's something to be said for Armor Values like in older editions of Warhammer 40K, even if they are more difficult to balance. Imagine that, a 'Mech with armor so thick Medium Lasers can't deal any damage unless they hit a weak spot. Game balance would go completely upside-down.
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Pickup trucks with SRMs mounted to them can blow the head off an awesome or drop a commando.
 
Corn Flakes said:
You can thank BattleTech's zany ablative armor system. A dude with a tripod-mounted HMG could eventually core an Atlas if it just stood still and let him hit the same spot.

There's something to be said for Armor Values like in older editions of Warhammer 40K, even if they are more difficult to balance. Imagine that, a 'Mech with armor so thick Medium Lasers can't deal any damage unless they hit a weak spot. Game balance would go completely upside-down.
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There is a fan produced set of rules called RenegadeTech that essentially replaced the armor rules as we know them with what Renegade Legion used.

In short, armor in BT is ablative and you have to knock it all off to get to internals (ignoring stuff like TAC and AP ammo). What those rules did was replace that system with one that essentially gave each weapon an armor piercing rating. Ballistic weapons like AC and GR were great for blowing holes in armor, energy weapons were great for doing little damage to armor but having a much better chance of getting to crits. standard missiles just took off chunks of armor. But the kicker was those AP weapons depended on how thick the armor was so a laser would either get through the armor and go crit seeking or essentially just leave a tiny hole.

It really did being a whole new dynamic to the game. it made ACs useful and made flashbulbs great under certain circumstances but not useful under others. I don't know when it was last updated or if it takes into account the arms race of the Jihad and beyond eras, but they shouldn't be too hard to adapt.

 
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Abella said:
Pickup trucks with SRMs mounted to them can blow the head off an awesome or drop a commando.
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Nothing new there. The Hilux is the preferred combat vehicle of militaries on a budget for a reason since it can carry everything from HMG's to AA guns to ATGM's. Not sure why BattleTech should be any different.
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Hell, the image for the Jeep on Sarna even kinda vaguely looks like a knockoff Warthog. What you should be more concerned about is that it somehow mounts a ton and a half of armor despite not even having a roof or doors.
 
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If your interested in high quality miniatures and are looking for the unseen mechs the Robotech dogfight game's mini's are the right scale and they look pretty damn fine.

https://www.kidslogic.toys/collections/minitech-1/products/mt12

The warhammer looks amazing and it's only 15 US.

Dunno if this has been brought up before, rate me spaz but I ain't reading 250 pages looking fer it.
 
Yeah, it's a shame they never implemented any kind of actual rules for them, as it's pointless given that they don't function apart from that specific mech. External equipment and weapons that mechs could carry with limited ammo stores could be pretty cool.
 
robobobo said:
Yeah, it's a shame they never implemented any kind of actual rules for them, as it's pointless given that they don't function apart from that specific mech. External equipment and weapons that mechs could carry with limited ammo stores could be pretty cool.
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Actually there is rules for Handheld weapons as a few mechs utilize them.
 
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