The Red Menace

Going forward, I am going to alternate my Battletech Aces blog posts between narrative and mechanical posts. So, I will post a narrative account of a battle or engagement, and then a rules-based turn-by-turn “After Action Report.”

Of course, that will follow two preparation posts. This week, I will discuss the forces I will bring to the battle; next week, I will cover the terrain and other background materials.

The most important thing in every narrative is a name. I frequently remind players, especially in my kids' RPG groups, to name their characters when they first start on them. This way, after two hours of character generation, we have a 50/50 chance of any character having a name. I should have told myself to do that, as I was basically done with my forces and had no name. I had a red-and-gold paint job that I thought looked fun, a force list already made, but no name for my mercenary unit. Luckily, I was describing the paint job as a sort of “Gatsby Communist,” and a name clicked: “Red Menace.” To kind of run with that highbrow Gatsby communism theme, I think that the full name for my force will be the “Red Menace Mercenary Cooperative”. I like it, it has a little bit of a Madison, Wisconsin, in the 1990s communist feel.

Well, as I said, this happened long after I had done the painting and assembled the units, so let's step back. According to the Battletech Aces rulebook, your force should be 400 points, so that is where I started. I had a couple of additional personal guidelines. I like infantry and traditional vehicles, so I would have at least a lance of each in my forces, and every force I build needs to have some of my childhood favorites, namely the Phoenix Hawk and the Wolverine. So I started with the Mechs, and in addition to the Phoenix Hawk and Wolverine, I chose mechs whose cards I found easily, and that looked cool. Here are my choices for my 400-point force.
Phoenix Hawk PXH-3K 32 points

            Wolverine WVR-6R                                     30 points

            Shadowhawk SHD-2D                                    30 points

Then I added a couple of big boys…

            Warhammer WHR-6R                                   32 points

            Battlemaster BLR-1G                                40 points

A little guy,

            Locust LCT-1V                                       18 points

And I always ran my Phoenix Hawk as a spotter, so I needed a missile boat.

            Archer 5R                                            37 points

We have 219 points of Mechs

For my vehicle lance, I could double up and bring all of the missiles.

            LRM Carrier (x2)                                     44 points

            SRM Carrier (x2)                                     52 points

            Galleon Light Tank GAL-102                           31 points

For 127 points of vehicles.
Finally, my infantry lance.

            Heavy Wheeled APC (MG) (x2)                           16 points

            Xenoplanetary Infantry (x4)                           36 points

For 52 points.

Total: 396 points.

Not bad. The Xenoplanetary Infantry will give my infantry a bit of range, while being light enough to carry in the APCs. I realize that infantry and vehicles are bad choices in Battletech, but I want them. I also have 4 points that I will convert to SP at the start of the campaign.

Everything on this list is painted in the red and gold scheme, and most are appropriate Catalyst models (I like supporting rules makers, as so many of these companies have failed since I started playing TTGs) But I have some exceptions, the infantry are GW Solar Auxilia, I tried some 3D prints, but that did not go well, and the APCs are Kuagnu Command Vehicles, from Modiphius’s Hardwar line.

So, now we have to choose elite pilots. You can choose up to 6, but they leech off supply points when you win battles. So, this is a trade-off between repairs and excellent pilots. I decided to go with the recommended 4, and make 3 Mech pilots and 1 vehicle pilot. Maybe next time I will be daring enough to make an infantry leader. They each start with 150SP to distribute, so I decided to give each an Edge and 2 Edge Tokens, and drop the remaining 30 somewhere.

Pilots:

            Red One: Mech Pilot Skill:30, Edge Tokens:60, Edge:60 Assassin

            Papa: Mech Pilot Skill:30, Edge Tokens:60, Edge:60 Protector

            Girlie: Mech Pilot Skill:0, Edge Tokens:60, Edge:90 Forward Observer

            Thumper: Vehicle Pilot Skill:0, Edge Tokens:90, Edge:60 Marksman

The Red Menace is ready for its campaign.