I happen to think that not fixing mechs is causing more people to drop the game than we might expect. Mechs are _cool_. Tanks? Not so cool. Helicopters? Not so cool. Infantry? Not cool. MW:DA isn't a bad wargame, in and of itself, but it's not _cool_. I think that cool is important in getting and keeping players, especially the younger ones (heck, I haven't played mechless since, well, I can't remember ever playing mechless, but I have to have done so at least once or twice, cause mechs are cool and I'm almost 30).

@ltrain187 & Prydefalcn.

(5) 14 pt. inf vs Erin? Hopeless for the infantry you say?

Fine. 5 DF Shock Troopers. If Erin fails to break, or chooses to clobber 1 and kill it you still have a full close combat formation. 7+2+2+2 (rear arc) = 13 vs 26 to capture. 13 with IT. Not easy ... but not terribly hard either. Lord forbid you drop Hazens Strikers instead and move in a couple of Kage or something. Would need 11s to cap.

Or we could try 6 SS Kage for giggles all basing each other and Erin. There's no single infantry he could kill that would prevent at least 1 formation of 3 or more from attacking next turn with a ranged shot (using AP) with an 11 attack or greater. All for the cost of a light mech.

Just pointing out. Infantry are far from helpless.

@Narcissus. In CBT there were, what, at least 2 slots on the 2d6 table that resulted in you having to roll on the 1d6 critical hit table? On that 1d6 critical hit table at least 4 out of the 6 would knock the vehicle completely out of action. So ... if my math is right then that's 66% of 6% = about 3-4% The odds of a critical hit in MWDA are 3% so destruction of a vehicle on a critical hit WOULD be an accurate reflection of the frailty of vehicles.

I'm not saying we SHOULD have it that way. I was merely pointing out it would be accurate. Currently vehicles cost too much to implement this fairly perhaps. If tank-drop were eliminated then vehicles could have their average point-cost drop significantly as a result. Then I would say that would be a good time to introduce this 'effect'.

Of course ... killing tank drop would make a lot of heavy vehicles worthless so you would have to introduce a new rule that permits units to perhaps fire on targets that are inside their min range. Make it at a penalty of +3 to target defense just like an indirect shot (as long as the target is in the front arc). Suddenly a 4 pt. Peasant might think twice about basing a 100 ton assault tank and vehicles in general might have a new lease on life.

Erin Johnston with one click of heat and one order token surrounded by 5 DF ATV/Minigun cycles in her DZ with no support and two mechs waiting in water (Daani Haag and Colin Yukinov, both undamaged). Erin had been doing the smart thing, spending two actions to hammer my DF SM1/Scimitar/Scimitar formation that I'd moved to threaten her. Unfortunately, I'd used my much more numerous support to exterminate everything he had (this was an all infiltrate army that started far closer than he had anticipated).

Opponent had the following options:
1) waste a single ATV, go to heat sink overload, risk a flamer hit (7IT with formation bonus) which will put her into ammo explosion and shutdown checks.

2) Break away, take a click of heat, hope that you don't cascade or suffer an ammo explosion, do a click of damage to the infantry if you succeed, stuck in the middle of the infantry pack if you fail with the potential for cascade/shutdown/ammo explosion. Bear in mind that there was nowhere Erin could go to that would leave her outside the fire range of Daani or Colin or both, to say nothing of their charge range.

3) Do nothing, clear, hope I miss.

The ATV flamers were enough to keep Erin in bad situations, even though I couldn't do damage to her, while I set up Daani and Colin for charges or just plain attacks.

Eventually he missed a die roll, Erin went down and Colin and Daani finished the job.

Now, my opponent had a slightly sub-optimal army and wasn't facing an army he'd seen anything like before. But my 70 points of infantry was enough to make 4x their points into a problem even I couldn't think of a decent way out of.

In retrospect this sounds arrogant, so let me rephrase it to feel right:

Most of the time when I have a plan I'm intimately aware of how it can be fragged up. Most of the time when my opponent has a plan, he's aware of how it can be foiled. Familiarity and contempt and all that. In this case, I didn't see any options I didn't like. Not that I am INWINCIBLE!

he should've broken and based a single infantry. That would have ruined your formation :p


Yeah, add your two mechs' totals to the Jupiter and you have what it was up against. Otherwise it could've just repeatedly broken off.



meh, like I said, combined arms. Infantry alone like that aren't threatening in themselves, but those mechs you were moving up were :confused:

I'm talking about purely THOSE infantry vs THIS mech. First of all, the infantry would have to take a round of fire from Erin before getting in to base. He COULD simply kill off one, or cripple two and slow the formation. Regardless if you drop Hazens Strikers in, then he can just nuke THAT.

Fine, throw in 6 kage. What, like around 100 pts there? Well, if he just breaks once successfully then you just lost over 100 pts. Rolling a 3+ to break is easier than an 11+ to capture.

Well, truth be told, I started with 3 minibikes and 3 ATVs and I based her with 5 total. I think the conclusion to draw is clear. :) But, even with that, no, actually, Erin has a range of 12, ATVs move 14. No free fire unless it's set up like that (my infantry were busy destroying artillery, leaving a free shot after succeeding.

He is correct if it was say hasbani or Jona Levin then the formation would have been broken apart by 2 spontanously becoming 1 click from dead. But its Erin Johnson the worst assualt mech in the game. Ms Cascading heat dial of death herself.

There are large scale numbers of Infantry that in formation will capture or kill and assualt mech with little or no effort. Simply because like many simple fixes whiz kids is unable to make capture a special attack.
________
Volcano vaporizers

2 things.

A: Erin DOES have multiple target Ballistic, and could deal 3 and 2 alternately to some infantry until they die, or..

B: Break away and wander into some water so that the bikes can't even base her like most players would do.

BTW, if you tell me that the player playing Erin looked on your side of the board, saw all those bikes, and did not place some water for Erin to walk into in case this happened, then frankly, you were playing down.

Erin the worst assault mech in the game?? Thats an insult to Dragon's Fury.

My pick for the worst assault mech has to go to Hasbani. He can quickly destroy himself with no help from the enemy.

Ah, the old mechs must have water tactic. A well worn tactic to all of us Dark Agers. It may come as a surprise to some that some games are played without water. Must all games be played in a giant puddle??

Must all games be played with ATVs?

No, but anyone that does not have some avalable when playing a big mech with bad heat... In an wheeled infantry heavy enviroment, frankly made a bad decision with their terrain choices.

either way I still fully believe with a little risk (a break-away roll and possibly a minor energy test) one can get out of that jam, but comment I made was based mostly around what topgun had said, involving slower infantry that WILL take a shot or two before basing.

To be competetive? Yes.



Lets get one thing straight all, without mechs, you just have another run-of-the-mill combined arms wargame, and a bad one at that. There a a billion other wargames out there, 80% of which have a far superior rule system, and are just as fun.


If this game didnt have mechs, how many of us would have even touched it in the first place?? Think about that, all us CBT and Battletech lovers would never have touched it, and the thought of huge giant robots are also what attracted a lot of others into the game.

why don't you play competitively with mechs? I do.