The 'effing' Wobblies vs. Clan Nova Cat

o/

Well, its only taken 2 years, but I finally got Screech to play a (non-digital) game of Battletech! After some debate we settled on 12k points. Originally I was going to field my Wolverines just to irritate his sense of Clan pride, however I would essentially be fielding a carbon copy of a list I've used previously with maybe a single mech swap at best (i.e.: the unpainted one). 

In the typical Wobbly 'false flag' operation, my mechs were using their complete lack of paint to masquerade as Rob's Lyrans, lol. Note: there's a 2nd Stinger deployed on the other side of the Catapult. 

Thus I delved into list hammering for something different.  Initially, I was trying to come up with a Kuritan C3 lance, but the modifiers are just to damned expensive! The only two mechs I have that have C3master variants are the Atlas (which is why the mod. is so expensive) or a Komodo (which is too fragile really). I originally bought the Komodo for the C3M capability, but only for use in a medium-light lance, which really isn't the best choice when fighting against the clans.

OMG! SCREECH PAINTED HIS MECHS!!! Well sorta, lol. Seriously though folks, even just primer is actual progress (though how recent this primer was applied I couldn't tell you). 

However in the end, (mostly) light mechs is what I opted for, deciding to use this game to try out a bunch of mech variants I've never used before. Not to mention, who is better than for fielding new stuff than the Fucking Wobblies? Also no, it wasn't a C3i Level II for the same reasons I didn't field the Kuritans. 

Going for a suicide squad of uber pilots (Urbie excluded) in mostly light mechs, for the 'new' designs I chose the the rocket launcher equipped Panther 14S and  5R Stingers, a Flashman 8K (with that mini making it's battlefield debut), and lastly the R-80 Urbanmech. A Catapult CPLT-K4, the only variant out of this list that I've used before, rounded out the list.

The first couple of turns was merely maneuvering at speed (the Urbie was literally bouncing along lest it never get to shoot) to get into line of sight of one another. 

No scenario, just the typical slugfest on my canyons of death map. We deployed in opposite corners with everyone eventually joining the melee in the middle. We made the black objective markers level 4, the same as the canyon walls just to fuck up lines of sight even when we were out in the open.

My first piloting check and I rolled a fucking snake eyes! yay. 

My initial shooting was in a word: abysmal, hitting with next to nothing. Also, unlike my last game with Hoss where I held the initiative almost all game, in this one I had it maybe once. Eventually the dice warmed up, though with a bunch of light, 1-shot wonders floating around shooting and missing is bad!!!!

Ack! Squiggoth! Squiggo-oh wait, wrong game system. 

You is looking here, so I sits here.

lol, it never fails. Whether I'm doing a crossword at dinner with the Mrs.,  or playing a mini-game, Baxter figures out where our attention is focused and plants himself right in the middle of it every time. After a few of these interruptions, I moved him to one of the hammocks in the kitty tree, where he could watch (and luckily decided to stay).

That said, my crummy little expend-a-mechs took far more punishment than I thought the would, with one out of every two rocket launchers actually connecting with their targets. Heat spikes resulting in lost movement weren't really a concern as the mechs are fast and the excess heat is from 1-shot weaponry (mostly), so you don't continue to add excess heat turn after turn. 

Gauss rifle huh? Yeah well I have a rocket launcher...

Yup, gauss rifle. ...sigh...

The Nov Cat 'war face'. Rumor has it he just tested down to a solahma vehicle crew position, hence his lack of fury/glee.

Still though, Stingers vs. Shadow Cats is anything but a fair contest with both Stingers coming out on the losing sides. The Panther did fairly well vs. the Ryoken, however caught in a crossfire between that mech and the Nova Cat squashed and hope of victory in that exchange.

I believe this is where the Panther started losing it's arms, side torso...eventually in the last turn, the Panther's pilot would have no other option and just reach out of one of his mech's gaping holes and fire his sidearm at the enemy. 

....and another one bites the dust! Have you ever seen what a gauss rifle in the back of a Stinger looks like? It ain't pretty!

Good night sweetheart! This was the 2nd game in a row where an enemy pilot has been knocked unconscious!

To be honest I wasn't looking to win (and its a good thing!), but rather just test out new-to-me designs and was happy just to get a game of anything in with Screech. To that end I'm calling this a draw even though technically the game was a loss for me of 3 mechs lost vs. none (though he didn't kill the Urbie, a mech he loathes especially which is a win in my book!)

Overall I was pleased with the rest of my mechs in their collective test run. Expenda-a-mechs aside, the other three performed well:

My last pic of the game, with the Panther and 2nd Stinger both starting on their ultimately futile attempts to retreat. 

The Urbie was a wobbling and a weaving (i.e.: evasive maneuvers), drawing considerable fire but remaining untouched until taking 2 medium pulse lasers and a gauss slug to the back in the last turn. Despite that, it survived and remained upright! Prior to that mauling it had scored several snub nosed PPC hits on the Ryoken, Nova Cat and one of the Shadow cats.

The Flashman, once it warmed up (both literally and figuratively) proved an excellent combination of speed, firepower, resilience, and heat sinks (though 17 doubles are still easily overwhelmed, so ya need to be careful with it). Expect to see this beastie fielded more often in the future!

As always, the K4 Catapult is a slow but deadly mech. Kind of hampered by terrain and the bouncing Urbie being in it's way early on, once it got stuck in the HPPCs never missed a shot! It is well armored too (for a Catapult) and soaked up a savage last turn exchange in which it and the Nova Cat both fired near point blank alpha strikes at one another with neither missing at all! I should have gotten a photo of that in hindsight but oh well. 

I suppose I'll take something a bit more conventional next time. Something that can absorb the high-powered, clan weaponry. I have altered the TBAGers fluff to have them not be wiped out till the clan invasion. So they can now plausibly face Screech's clan mechs. They might have this time had I not announced early on that I would be using this map which would have neutered both of my Awesomes at the outset. 

Regardless, I just hope it doesn't take another two years to get Screech to play again.