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Choose the starting Era

3030s - 4th Succesion Wars, basic technology only, Star League 'Mechs are rare, Clans aren't a thing yet
- 1 (12.5%)
3040s - Renaissance era, basic technology, but advanced designs begin appearing. The dawn of the Clans
- 4 (50%)
3050s - Clan Invasion, Clan tech is rare but possible, while advanced IS design and tech starts appearing
- 3 (37.5%)
3060s - FedCom Civil War, widespread advanced tech in the Inner Sphere, Clan tech is slightly less rare
- 0 (0%)
3070s - Jihad era, Clan tech is uncommon, while everyone in the IS is running advanced technology.
- 0 (0%)
3140 - Dark Ages. Tech is... weird. You might have militarized agro-Mechs charging cutting edge Clan designs sold to IS troops.
- 0 (0%)

Total Members Voted: 8


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Author Topic: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Eclipse  (Read 42071 times)

Knave

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Re: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Bronze Eyes
« Reply #120 on: December 03, 2019, 12:37:52 pm »

Sounds like a tough week for the Brotherhood in terms of losses and repair, but overall it looks like we came out even.
Hopefully those repairs to Nova lance weren't too costly! Though I imagine grabbing the Marauder bits made it sting less.
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NickAragua

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Re: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Bronze Eyes
« Reply #121 on: December 03, 2019, 04:00:57 pm »

Oof, gyro replacement is never fun.

That Marauder is a 3D, so at least we won't have to worry about ammo explosions whenever the left torso gets hit.
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Hanzoku

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Re: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Bronze Eyes
« Reply #122 on: December 04, 2019, 02:28:10 am »

@Knave:
Once the Marauder is fixed up, it'll go into mothballs as a backup for the Kings. Possibly as a replacement for the Warhammer, in case we lose it. Though I won't switch out unless I have to, as the Warhammer has the Kings' only anti-infantry weapons.

@NickAragua:
Yeah, though I don't have through armor critical turned on, but having the ammo as the only critable location is still scary.

Undirected rant:
If I could overhaul any one thing in Battletech, I'd probably overhaul the crit mechanics. I think its utterly ridiculous with designs like the Marauder that ANY through armor crit to the left torso ALWAYS hits the ammo and converts it to confetti.

My way of handling it would be simple: On a critical, roll 2d8. check off the location hit. If it's empty space, then congrats to the defender, nothing absolutely vital was hit. If you roll the same location again, reroll until you get a fresh location.

This means that you aren't utterly screwed by having free space or inert things like endosteel in a design, and if the system worked like that, I'd be OK with using through armor criticals again.
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Hanzoku

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Re: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Bronze Eyes
« Reply #123 on: December 05, 2019, 03:11:38 am »

Operation Bronze Eyes – Week 5

Kobayashi’s Crows fly in support of Kaine’s Kings this week, while the Sparrows’ air superiority prevents them from taking damage this week.

The Special Forces’ picket fails as they encounter a militia Firestarter. Of the 19 members, only two survived the encounter, and the traumatized survivors are folded into the field guns unit.

Wednesday is the 1st of September. Militia morale remains High, but September brings another wave of reinforcements to aid the assault.

A few surprising designs came up for purchase on the mercenary auction market. Albus passed over purchasing one of a pair of original model Black Knights – while advanced technology, the only examples in the design were an active probe (useless if no one has advanced ECM suites), and the irreplaceable endo-steel chassis.

The Brotherhood did buy a RPR-100b Rapier, an extremely rare Royal variant of this heavy design. Swift enough to keep up with the Shilones, it joined the Crows as Commander Kobayashi’s fighter.

The next day, Linda’s Lancers drew their first mission, breaking the Militia lines ahead of a Marik assault.

The only problem was that a heavy ‘Mech lance was holding that part of the lines.


After the battle, Albus purchased a GRF-1N Griffin to replace the destroyed model. It was delivered alongside the Rapier, which Ichiro gleefully took possession of.

He got his chance to try it in action a few days later, as Kaine’s Kings dug in to defend a fortress city against an advancing company of militia forces. Centering on a medium lance of Griffins, with support from two lances of light tanks and ‘Mechs.

Unlike Linda’s ill-fated battle a few days previously, the terrain favors the Brotherhood this time, their jump jets and superior mass allowing them to both pick their battles and punish the lighter militia forces if they get too close.

Spoiler: Stand Up (Defender) (click to show/hide)

AAR:
The Grasshopper is only good for salvage, with its center torso, engine and gyro all shredded. The Guillotine and Warhammer both took moderate damage, but no penetrating hits.

Billy Kaine was moderately injured, but in good spirits.

The Brotherhood claimed all the salvage except for one of the Griffins, looking to refill their coffers.

6 of the militia were KIA, and one captured.

Commander Ichiro Kobayashi claimed the Phoenix Hawk as a kill.
Petty Officer Melissa Lyle claimed the Hunter, Panther and Medium Strike Fighter as kills.

Sergeant Matt Fischer claimed the three Griffins and a Vedette AC/2.
Corporal Baira claimed the J. Edgar, Saracen and Meteor Heavy Strike Fighter.



The Marauder, just in mothballs, is quickly reactivated and assigned to Billy. By Sunday, most of the damage is squared away. The Stalker is missing a LRM bin, and the Phoenix Hawk is missing a large laser that none of their salvage has been able to replace yet.

With the Special Forces wiped out, the Swallows fly air superiority, while the Crows fly air support once again.
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Rince Wind

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Re: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Bronze Eyes
« Reply #124 on: December 05, 2019, 06:13:54 am »

Three Griffins :D


Other than that, not the best week for the Brotherhood, let's hope we can do better next week, we can't sustain losses like that, unlike the militia.
Maybe we can bring our lances up to strength soonish.
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Knave

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Re: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Bronze Eyes
« Reply #125 on: December 05, 2019, 09:37:45 am »

Three Griffins :D


Other than that, not the best week for the Brotherhood, let's hope we can do better next week, we can't sustain losses like that, unlike the militia.
Maybe we can bring our lances up to strength soonish.

Yes, I don't mean to destroy all the company's profits by losing expenive mechs. Maybe it's better Billy is no longer piloting a mech with hand actuators  :P
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Burnt Pies

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Re: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Bronze Eyes
« Reply #126 on: December 06, 2019, 12:48:30 am »

Looks like we're taking a beating from this contract. Yikes.
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I can read box now
Also, I am a bit drunk
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Hanzoku

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Re: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Bronze Eyes
« Reply #127 on: December 06, 2019, 03:34:57 am »

I'm sure Billy will figure out how to make his offensive comments clear, despite having one of the most inhuman 'Mech designs and only weapon pods to offend people with.

And yeah, this contract has been rough. We're managing to stay above 0 on contract score, but we really need one of our ally 'Mechs to survive a winning mission for a change.
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EuchreJack

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Re: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Bronze Eyes
« Reply #128 on: December 06, 2019, 03:45:53 am »

I always wondered, is there some rule that the player has to fight unwinnable battles, or can the player just deploy all their units, look at the enemy, and go "Nope, we're going home now", then just admit defeat?
...my guess is that the player needs to lose their token number of units in order to be in contract compliance, unfortunately.  Best case scenario would be to rush ahead with the garbage mechs and hope they go down before better mechs take the hits.  Except I'm convinced the pure garbage always survives.


...and I'm reminded of my Shadow Hawk lances on MegaMek.  They were garbage from a BV standpoint, which determined what lanced one would fight.  But by moving them first and counting on them just not dying, they could still ekk out an occasional win, provided they had something weak with guns to back them up, like a tank.  Most battles, you'd lose, be buying a new tank and fixing up the Shadow Hawk.  Still, faction mates appreciated that you were pulling from the tank factory rather than the mek factory, and the battle would help the factories recharge.  A truly noble sacrifice.

Rince Wind

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Re: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Bronze Eyes
« Reply #129 on: December 06, 2019, 04:18:25 am »

At least with Against the Bot BV is meaningless for enemy lance generation, it all depends on the weight thresholds.

If you don't deploy at all you get -2 contract score and if you deploy and leave -1 for a defeat.
Some missions are harder to justify to leave from, like breakthrough (attacker), as it implies you are behind enemy lines and need to get back to safety.
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NickAragua

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Re: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Bronze Eyes
« Reply #130 on: December 06, 2019, 04:05:09 pm »

The main problem with AtB comes when you start fighting the clans, at which point the opfor generator will throw binaries and trinaries against your single lance (and let's not even get into fighting vs Comstar or WOB). The advice I give people is to remove units (or stars/Level IIs) randomly until the BV is roughly even (or 1.5/2x in the case of some scenarios).
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Rince Wind

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Re: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Bronze Eyes
« Reply #131 on: December 06, 2019, 04:22:21 pm »

I reduced difficulty to ultra green, but that isn't a good solution either, as that reduces air support as well, and probably more besides.
But you'll only ever fight a single lance/star/lvlII and possibly their reinforcements.
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Mini

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Re: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Bronze Eyes
« Reply #132 on: December 07, 2019, 08:46:35 am »

There's an xml file (MekHQ/data/universe/atbconfig.xml) that can be edited to change opfor generation. It can handle clans, ComStar/WoB, and everyone else separately, but by default it only does the sizes of each group differently, and not the number of groups. Here's how I've edited the number of groups bit, but note that I haven't fought anyone using the updated generation yet so I have no idea how well it actually works.
Code: [Select]
<botForce org="IS">
<weightedTable weightClass="L">
<entry weight="9">M</entry>
<entry weight="7">L</entry>
</weightedTable>
<weightedTable weightClass="M">
<entry weight="5">LL</entry>
<entry weight="5">H</entry>
<entry weight="10">ML</entry>
</weightedTable>
<weightedTable weightClass="H">
<entry weight="3">LLL</entry>
<entry weight="4">MM</entry>
<entry weight="2">A</entry>
<entry weight="3">HL</entry>
<entry weight="4">MLL</entry>
<entry weight="4">HM</entry>
</weightedTable>
<weightedTable weightClass="A">
<entry weight="4">MML</entry>
<entry weight="3">HLL</entry>
<entry weight="2">HH</entry>
<entry weight="2">AL</entry>
<entry weight="4">MMM</entry>
<entry weight="3">HML</entry>
<entry weight="2">AM</entry>
</weightedTable>
</botForce>

<botForce org="CLAN">
<weightedTable weightClass="L">
<entry weight="7">L</entry>
</weightedTable>
<weightedTable weightClass="M">
<entry weight="5">LL</entry>
<entry weight="10">M</entry>
</weightedTable>
<weightedTable weightClass="H">
<entry weight="4">ML</entry>
<entry weight="3">H</entry>
</weightedTable>
<weightedTable weightClass="A">
<entry weight="1">HLL</entry>
<entry weight="4">MM</entry>
<entry weight="3">HM</entry>
<entry weight="2">A</entry>
</weightedTable>
</botForce>

<botForce org="CS">
<weightedTable weightClass="L">
<entry weight="7">L</entry>
</weightedTable>
<weightedTable weightClass="M">
<entry weight="5">LL</entry>
<entry weight="10">M</entry>
</weightedTable>
<weightedTable weightClass="H">
<entry weight="4">ML</entry>
<entry weight="3">H</entry>
</weightedTable>
<weightedTable weightClass="A">
<entry weight="1">HLL</entry>
<entry weight="4">MM</entry>
<entry weight="3">HM</entry>
<entry weight="2">A</entry>
</weightedTable>
</botForce>
I'm not 100% on how exactly this is changed by the difficulty settings, but I think it uses the first ones and discards the later ones at lower difficulties when it's capping them.

It might also be a good idea to change the lance generation as well, since they have a huge amount of variance in how heavy the forces they make are (heavy lances, for example, can be anything from 2 mediums and 2 heavies to 3 heavies and an assault), but then you'll not be getting as much variation in difficulty between missions.
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Hanzoku

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Re: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Bronze Eyes
« Reply #133 on: December 09, 2019, 03:43:34 am »

Operation Bronze Eyes – Week 6

The Sparrows face stiff opposition from the militia forces and take damage from several skirmishes, though nothing bad enough to down one of them. The Crows fly in support of the Legionnaires, halting a militia advance.

A pitched battle is fought between the Legionnaires and the Militia, and the Marik forces break the militia lines. Two mixed companies of militia forces fall back in disarray, and the Iron Brotherhood is tasked with running them down and destroying as many as possible. Nova’s Knights and Linda’s Lancers find the trail and take up pursuit.

Spoiler: Chase (Defender) (click to show/hide)

AAR:
The King Crab and Pillager took light armor damage, while the Phoenix Hawk lost a leg, arm and left torso. As mentioned above, the Dervish is likewise out of the running for a while.

The only notable salvage claimed by the Brotherhood was the remains of the Militia Phoenix Hawk, with a still working Large Laser. The rest was sold as salvage.

The Militia had 15 KIA, and 11 more captured.

Captain Susanna Nova claimed a Scorpion, Packrat, Foot Platoon, Karnov and a rare Hatchetman as kills.
Lieutenant JG Linda Vo claimed a Wasp and a Stinger.
Corporal Jack Euchre claimed a LRM Carrier, AC/2 Carrier, MSF Defender and Drillson hovertank.
Corporal Svetlana Ragozina claimed a Packrat.
Corporal James Gundersen claimed a Scorpion, HSF Meteor and the HALO Squad.
Corporal Gani Leminoke claimed the Phoenix Hawk.
Corporal Jami Sonnborn claimed the Rommel tank.



Sunday was just the next day, but the technical teams worked around the clock, getting the Knights back up and running. Only Linda’s Phoenix Hawk was still down – her new Phoenix Hawk, that is. The captured Militia one was in better condition, so they consigned her original ‘Mech to the scrappers and started working on fixing up the new model.

Operation Bronze Eyes – Week 7-9
Other units were assigned to push the Militia, giving the Iron Brotherhood a chance to recover. By the middle of the first week, all ‘Mechs were once again fully operational.

Friday of the third week marked the 1st of October. Enemy morale was now Normal as the League forces began to push back against the Militia offensive.
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NickAragua

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Re: The Iron Brotherhood - A Battletech/MekHQ Let's Play: Operation Bronze Eyes
« Reply #134 on: December 09, 2019, 02:29:00 pm »

Just, uh... wipe the seat and the neurohelmet down.
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