Yeah, Comstar did control the communications and still does in the game
universe. Take Terra and you can pretty much shut the system down, or at
least tie it up between states.
The main problem BT will have is a simple one: For most of the Battletech
timeline? There's no credible navy fielded by anyone. That's right, no
major power has a navy that could stand up to an Imperial CRURON. And what
happens when the powers began to build warships? The new line developer
decided "I don't like warships! Or those nasty clans" and touched off a
genocidal war from a bunch of religious nuts that nerfed everyone. (Not to
mention most of the major powers turned major elements of their militaries
and territory over to a outsider messiah, John Connor like figure with a
cipher like background who saved the Inner Sphere from these nuts, Sorry
gang, could we see the Imperium, it's successor states, the Regency or the
RC being that silly? Um...no. I can almost imagine the words Pat Ritter or
Hammer Lathrop would use for such an idea...let alone Strephon). So yeah,
by the time the Inner Sphere is building warships, which are going to get
wacked at long range by PA and Meson fire, the Imperium is at the gates of
at least two Successor State capitols playing "Let's make a unconditional
surrender".
Jason
On Mon, Jul 16, 2012 at 6:39 AM, Craige Cook <>wrote:
> **
>
>
> Hi All,
>
> It seemed to me when I was playing a lot of BT during my early to mid
> twenties, that BT tech level was universally lower than high stellar tech
> in Trav. I don't have the BT books any longer (having sold them on in a
> hugh ebay sale many years ago) but from memory BT seemed to range from
> about TL 9-11 in comparative Traveller terms.
>
> WHen I tried to build a BT robot in traveller a long tie ago using MT
> rules it ended up being about 30-40 meters tall and with greatly improved
> sensors and weaponry cf the original BT mechs. I probably still have it
> here somewhere...
>
> I remember one Mechwarrior game in BT in which two Clan mech pilots were
> on patrol in two Mat Cats. One Mad Cat had PPCs and SRM 6s. The other one
> had Large Lasers and LRM15s and was low on ammo. THey had just finished a
> battle with an inner sphere lance light lance which was a no contest.
> However one of the Mat Cats had some armor damage. So the pilot was trying
> to fix it "in the field'. The Mad Cat on watch detected two squads of
> elementals in battle suits incoming. He had about four rounds to finish his
> repairs and on the last round possible he finished attaching the new armor
> and jumped into his cockpit and fired two SRM6s turning the 6 angry
> elementals into just so much smoking molten battle casualties. THat made us
> smile.
>
>
>
> Enjoy!
>
>
> Craige Cook
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From:
>
>
> To:
> <>
> Cc:
>
> Sent:
> Sun, 15 Jul 2012 04:36:32 -0500 (CDT)
>
> Subject:
> Re: [Traveller_TNE] Re: Battletech Jumpship in the Imperium
>
>
>
>
> Without more analysis of why BT chose the ranges it did, I might not
> approach it that way, because published SF combat ranges owe not much to
> physics and a lot more to an arbitrary editorial decision, ASSUMING that
> the BT and Traveller universes are assumed to be of a comparable tech
> level. Given the similar size of their inhabited areas, I would assume
> they are intended to be about the same TL, as ability to expand out to be
> proportional to TL and it sounds like both universes are about the same
> order of magnitude.
>
> The only reason Traveller laser ranges were as (unrealistically) long as
> they were is because someone in CT simply said they were, and the only
> reason that their FC could control them out that far is that they had to.
> Star Trek space combat ranges are also extremely short. I think I'd be
> inclined to try to normalize the ranges of all the universes around what
> they say standard operational laser range is, ensure that they are all
> getting about the same power:damage ratio, and ensure that one or more of
> them is not benefitting from artificially inflated power density, and then
> rationalize them out from that common baseline. Otherwise the three
> radically different game universe assumptions could interact
> "unrealistically."
>
> Either that or work out that the BT universe represents a consistently
> lowish Traveller TL and let them get thrashed for being a bunch of
> low-tech rubes. Has anyone here done any analysis to see if BT does seem
> to fit into an established Traveller TL? Or is it maybe higher in some
> areas and lower in others?
>
> But it is true that the laws of physics in the Traveller universe prevent
> giant rock-em-sock-em robots from working, so maybe the mechs that the BT
> ships bring with them would disappear into puffs of smoke, or transmute
> into giant amusement park rides.
>
> > Battletech's Inner Sphere is ~1000 ly wide, or about ~300 parsecs. The 3I
> > is a bit larger. Of course, BT is a bit shorter in range than 3I, where
> > capital scale beam weaponry has a maximum effective range (IIRC) of ~540
> > km.
> >
> > So the players in their ship will be able to dance around outside a BT
> > ship's range easily. The problem is if the BT force gets a few 3I
> > targeting systems, and integrates the two. A small laser is effectively a
> > ~160 MJ weapon that can fire once every minute (in Space, on the ground
> it
> > can fire once every 10 seconds).
>
> >
> > So treat them as Brutes, where they don't hit that often, but when they
> do
> > hit the players are going to be staring at you in shock.
> >
> > Todd Kes
> >
> > --- On Sat, 7/14/12, userbimbob wrote:
> > hmm... guess i need to find a simple way to overlay the Mechwarrior
> > starmap over the Third Imperium... and watch the "great land rush" as
> the
> > major powers expand past the old borders of Charted Space... :)
> >
> > or maybe rescale the Spacemaster starmap 10-15x larger to get some
> > 'interesting' aliens to interact with.. ;)
> >
> > or would that be too evil a thing to do to unsuspecting Scout players?
> >
>
>
>
universe. Take Terra and you can pretty much shut the system down, or at
least tie it up between states.
The main problem BT will have is a simple one: For most of the Battletech
timeline? There's no credible navy fielded by anyone. That's right, no
major power has a navy that could stand up to an Imperial CRURON. And what
happens when the powers began to build warships? The new line developer
decided "I don't like warships! Or those nasty clans" and touched off a
genocidal war from a bunch of religious nuts that nerfed everyone. (Not to
mention most of the major powers turned major elements of their militaries
and territory over to a outsider messiah, John Connor like figure with a
cipher like background who saved the Inner Sphere from these nuts, Sorry
gang, could we see the Imperium, it's successor states, the Regency or the
RC being that silly? Um...no. I can almost imagine the words Pat Ritter or
Hammer Lathrop would use for such an idea...let alone Strephon). So yeah,
by the time the Inner Sphere is building warships, which are going to get
wacked at long range by PA and Meson fire, the Imperium is at the gates of
at least two Successor State capitols playing "Let's make a unconditional
surrender".
Jason
On Mon, Jul 16, 2012 at 6:39 AM, Craige Cook <>wrote:
> **
>
>
> Hi All,
>
> It seemed to me when I was playing a lot of BT during my early to mid
> twenties, that BT tech level was universally lower than high stellar tech
> in Trav. I don't have the BT books any longer (having sold them on in a
> hugh ebay sale many years ago) but from memory BT seemed to range from
> about TL 9-11 in comparative Traveller terms.
>
> WHen I tried to build a BT robot in traveller a long tie ago using MT
> rules it ended up being about 30-40 meters tall and with greatly improved
> sensors and weaponry cf the original BT mechs. I probably still have it
> here somewhere...
>
> I remember one Mechwarrior game in BT in which two Clan mech pilots were
> on patrol in two Mat Cats. One Mad Cat had PPCs and SRM 6s. The other one
> had Large Lasers and LRM15s and was low on ammo. THey had just finished a
> battle with an inner sphere lance light lance which was a no contest.
> However one of the Mat Cats had some armor damage. So the pilot was trying
> to fix it "in the field'. The Mad Cat on watch detected two squads of
> elementals in battle suits incoming. He had about four rounds to finish his
> repairs and on the last round possible he finished attaching the new armor
> and jumped into his cockpit and fired two SRM6s turning the 6 angry
> elementals into just so much smoking molten battle casualties. THat made us
> smile.
>
>
>
> Enjoy!
>
>
> Craige Cook
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From:
>
>
> To:
> <>
> Cc:
>
> Sent:
> Sun, 15 Jul 2012 04:36:32 -0500 (CDT)
>
> Subject:
> Re: [Traveller_TNE] Re: Battletech Jumpship in the Imperium
>
>
>
>
> Without more analysis of why BT chose the ranges it did, I might not
> approach it that way, because published SF combat ranges owe not much to
> physics and a lot more to an arbitrary editorial decision, ASSUMING that
> the BT and Traveller universes are assumed to be of a comparable tech
> level. Given the similar size of their inhabited areas, I would assume
> they are intended to be about the same TL, as ability to expand out to be
> proportional to TL and it sounds like both universes are about the same
> order of magnitude.
>
> The only reason Traveller laser ranges were as (unrealistically) long as
> they were is because someone in CT simply said they were, and the only
> reason that their FC could control them out that far is that they had to.
> Star Trek space combat ranges are also extremely short. I think I'd be
> inclined to try to normalize the ranges of all the universes around what
> they say standard operational laser range is, ensure that they are all
> getting about the same power:damage ratio, and ensure that one or more of
> them is not benefitting from artificially inflated power density, and then
> rationalize them out from that common baseline. Otherwise the three
> radically different game universe assumptions could interact
> "unrealistically."
>
> Either that or work out that the BT universe represents a consistently
> lowish Traveller TL and let them get thrashed for being a bunch of
> low-tech rubes. Has anyone here done any analysis to see if BT does seem
> to fit into an established Traveller TL? Or is it maybe higher in some
> areas and lower in others?
>
> But it is true that the laws of physics in the Traveller universe prevent
> giant rock-em-sock-em robots from working, so maybe the mechs that the BT
> ships bring with them would disappear into puffs of smoke, or transmute
> into giant amusement park rides.
>
> > Battletech's Inner Sphere is ~1000 ly wide, or about ~300 parsecs. The 3I
> > is a bit larger. Of course, BT is a bit shorter in range than 3I, where
> > capital scale beam weaponry has a maximum effective range (IIRC) of ~540
> > km.
> >
> > So the players in their ship will be able to dance around outside a BT
> > ship's range easily. The problem is if the BT force gets a few 3I
> > targeting systems, and integrates the two. A small laser is effectively a
> > ~160 MJ weapon that can fire once every minute (in Space, on the ground
> it
> > can fire once every 10 seconds).
>
> >
> > So treat them as Brutes, where they don't hit that often, but when they
> do
> > hit the players are going to be staring at you in shock.
> >
> > Todd Kes
> >
> > --- On Sat, 7/14/12, userbimbob wrote:
> > hmm... guess i need to find a simple way to overlay the Mechwarrior
> > starmap over the Third Imperium... and watch the "great land rush" as
> the
> > major powers expand past the old borders of Charted Space... :)
> >
> > or maybe rescale the Spacemaster starmap 10-15x larger to get some
> > 'interesting' aliens to interact with.. ;)
> >
> > or would that be too evil a thing to do to unsuspecting Scout players?
> >
>
>
>