I've carefully thought about each rule change, and how it effects each type of unit, and here's my take:

Infantry- First weakened by the 450 point rules, then shake off damage, and then further by their bases being ignored, and then even further by the capture rule, infantry will be as near as obsolete as PaladinJL is now. You might see a trike or hoverbike to fill in points every once in a blue moon, but that's it.

Artillery- With the sever weakening of infantry (to base them) their rule is about perfect. You will still see tons of SSW DI Towed (AP) to constantly peck at the Assualt 'Mechs.

VTOLs- These will be as popular as ever. You will see 160-300 pt 'Mech armies being filled out with SSW Balacs all the time.

Tanks and Tank Drops- This will now be essential to defeating Assualt 'Mech armies. Tank Drops will be the counter cheese.

Low Cost Combat-only vehichles- Even more useless. Nearly as obsalete as infantry, maybe more.

Low Cost 'Mechs- These will now be used in groups of 2s and 3s. I can definently see Bart and Danni along with 2 VTOLs. These also might be used to fill in the Assualt 'Mech armies.

High Cost/Assualt 'Mechs- These will utterly dominate every aspect of the game. They cant be pogged, they cant based into oblivion, they cant seriously be catpured, they cant be trapped, AND NOW THEY HAVE SUPPORT!


OVERALL- There will be two types of armies: Assualt with VTOL support, and Light 'Mech with mixed tank drop/vtol/AP arty support.

My Imput- Only damage to infantry if failed break-away. Half-Distance Infiltrate applies to 'Mechs only (so we can get those darn Giggin up there first turn), and 'Mechs needs a clear Line-of-Sight to charge.

Why is infantry weakened for basing artillery?

And #### good thing, too! It's putting the Mech back into Mechwarrior! Finally, I'll be able to use more of my collection then my HL Long Toms, Donars, Shuns, Hoverbikes, Purifiers, Cavaliers and Joel Brane!

A thoughtful analysis. We are going to playtest some to find out more. I see a few different twists:

1) Infantry will be slightly less effective against mechs. Their ability to operate in large formations will be enhanced by #2. I expect more fire formations. They can still be used effectively to harrass the big mechs.

2) Artillery will be definitely be knocked down a notch. There will be more parity between the new and old artillery pieces.

3) VTOLs look good as support but they struggle against the assault mechs.

4) Tankdrop - this is the one to watch. No artillery to decimate the transport. The fact that it takes 2 orders is not significant. The fact that everbody plays Arnis may be the major thing holding it back.

5) Low cost combat vehicles - The ability to form large formations without being knocked out of the game by artillery may help them.

6) Mechs - Simply put, it will be high defense and agility mechs that see play. Charge will rule the battlefield once again.

The removal of artillery as the major force in the game will open things up quite a bit. It will be interesting to see where thing end up.

Some of the low-cost vehicles like the Strike Sled might get some play again. Time to dust off Magpie (wait isn't that another thread?). I see people using cheap vehicles to tie up mechs instead of infantry. The vehicle can ram the mech (move + damage potential), then toss down some artillery on the mech. If the mech breaks away, then ram it again.

Yep, now you'll need vehicles to tie down mechs...but vehicles are generally more expensive, can't capture, and often not as durable (and certainly not for the points cost). Oh yeah, vehicles are vulnerable to charge, too (ill advised, but at least it's an option).

Take care,

Rick

BF has some good points.

I'd ask yall to just forget about the 3rd thru 6th rules for a minute. Jusy think about how the point total and orders would effect the game.

I contend that the first two rules (450 points and 3 orders) are all that we need to 'fix' the game.

What do those 2 proposed rule changes do?

1) Puts the Mech back in mechwarrior. With 450 points to spend and only 3 orders to use, your going to need to bring a mech, or two. If you stick to the current 'metagame' builds, your going to have a heck of a lot of units doing nothing.

2) Makes Arty less effective. Most people will say that 1 or two arty peices are fine, its when you get 3 or more into a game is when the problem arises. The point total rule makes it crazy to bring more than 2 arty peices. Arty is fixed.

3) Makes VTOLs less effective. A lot of posters here of been crying about how the SS Balac or DF Donar eats them up for lunch. Well the point total/order rule makes it hard to bring more than 2 to a game. And if you bring two your going to be getting short on orders......

4) Makes Infantry a little less effective. They are really order intensive as it is, with only 3 orders and 450 points worth of units they are going to be even more so.

5) Gets all the big tanks back into the game. Many of the bigger tanks are not used because they cost as much as some mechs. Well all those peices could be dusted off and used.

With those changes you don't need mechs ignoring infantry bases and causeing shakeoff damage. You don't need the absurd no pog stacking rule for arty.

You could fix the 1 main problem arty unit by increasing the to hit on the pog for the SS DI Towed AA Arty by 1.

Just do that and we have Mechwarrior. Mechs will be used.

Infantry still would have some use...hopefully.

I like the idea of groups of 2 or 3 Light 'Mechs, and tons of Assault 'Mechs....

Atleast the game is finally "Mech" Warrior again!

Should have 1000pt games and just 1 round/750pt games and just 1 round...

And no need for 2-consecutive-turn-dial-click.