What's about Mad Dogs. They are good missle boats.

actually they are showing up right now. If you want to get in on the battle of coventry it's possible.

Damn it, I want a Warhawk. Stronger, tougher, more compact version of the Awesome, from what I remember.

Or a Kodiak.

*cough* Anyway, would there be any logical reason for us to go to Coventry?

Bad idea. Clanners completely trounced the sphere in the first battles.

"Hey look. an enemy marauder on my scanners. Wait... it's a catapult. Marauder... Pult... Mad Cat! Yeah! *BOOM, head explodes from Timber-wolf's alpha strike*"

The idea of going to Coventry is to realize that we're not being paid enough to die. I say we stick with Solaris.

Ecurt: Warhawks are bigger, I think.

Anyway, should we go there, I'd rather had been a Clanner taken as a bondsman by our forces in some pitched battle, where she had been captured. I can do Jade Falcons pretty well.

Isn't the point of being a Mechwarrior to tempt death and piss off the fates as you continually escape from increasingly difficult odds that should by all means kill you but don't?

it shouldn't surprise you to much I'm the group negotiator, it may seem like a small skill but it can be huge in getting us deals. it's almost better than scrounge.

Not really...

House mechwarriors fight for their House's military interests.

Mercenaries fight for money.

Clan Mechwarriors fight for Kerensky's ideals. (Conquer Terra, Yar!)
Clan Wolf: "W-wait, wasn't his ideals to restore the Star Leagu..."
Clan Jade Falcon: "CONQUER TERRA! We'll *make* our own Star League from the ashes."
Clan Wolf: "If you say so..."


No real thrill seekers, I'm afraid. Getting killed is never a good plan.

Don't worry our first mercenary job after this will take us in the complete wrong direction for the first year of invasion but will supply us with some interesting lostech.

Well, we could engage the unknown aliens who have better tech than us, Gunnery and Piloting skills of 7, and a samurai-like dedication to killing you, or we could stay in the arena and kill wannabes.

Well, seems like that in every game about the battletech/mechwarrior universe made. You start off easy and eventually end up facing off the entire enemy by yourself as your halfwit AI lancemates run around in circles.

I don't really think that Clanners have that much better Gunnery/Piloting than any of Inner Sphere. They just have better computers and technology; individual abilities still vary from person to person.

One of the first BT books I read, I recall the clanner protaganist getting his ass kicked the first few mock-battles with one of the Draconis Combine mech pilots.

Pheonix Hawk: Really? Warhawks always did look more compact to me in the game; then again Awesomes always look like they're going to topple over or something.

I want a custom battlemech. It's a 200 ton ball of rock with a Naval PPC built into the side and Jump Jets to roll it around and DFA people.

I call it the Stone Stone.

Pish. You might as well be piloting Dropships then.

Imagine: DFAs from a vehicle which can carry entire companies of what you're piloting. (Note: I do not remember how many mechs a dropship can actually carry. Close enough though)

... No. Clan trueborns are artifically bred from the genes of the best mechwarriors in existance to be the best they can possibly be. Their training is rigorous and from birth. Out of a 50-child sibko, on average, only 1-3 become mechwarriors. Many die, the rest transfer out to different castes. They're fierce and fight to the death in most situations. Highly honorable, highly dangerous.

They've been doing this for many hundred years, and their technology and personell are far beyond anything the sphere has.

Secondly: That clanner was either a freebirth, a trainee, or the author was downplaying the abilities of the clans. OR the DC mechwarrior was some famous figure.

Warhawks are heavier. MW4 made them smaller than they should be. Much bigger in MW2.

Oddly enough, the game I was referencing to was MW2: Mercs.

Pheonix: Basing off our skill setups, what would the clanners be?

7/7 across the board? :p

While I'm not sure, and I don't know if CBT even scales clan pilots to be superior to IS ones, I'd say if the average IS pilot was 3/3, the Average clan pilot is 5/4 or so. Perhaps 5/5. I honestly don't know, but it sounds right.

Given that their training is rigorous and standards are far higher, and the abilities of their mechs, the Clans frequently steamrolled over odds in the 5:1 agaisnt range versus sphere forces, in frontal assaults. They're scary.

Especially with a bloodname (last name) as the trial of bloodright pretty much proves that you're in the top small percentage of mechwarriors in your clan, which is already far and away superior to anything the sphere has.

In terms of combat skills, then yeah, that sounds about right now Pheonix. Still means there are people out there who can beat them.

Though, I must admit, I do recall one scene where an elemental took down an Atlas by himself.

In any case, not 7/7 across the board Dante. Everyone knows that most clanners suck at strategy and politics.

Karen's clan counterpart is likely a bloodnamed star commander piloting a Timber Wolf, with 6/6 in piloting skills. Therefore, she'd totally trounce Karen in any manner of straight fight. We'd need to outnumber them severely to win.

Eh. Surrender and become bondsmen. Work your way up to the Warrior Caste.

Or, we could challenge them, convince them to send out as little number of warriors as possible. Possibly 1 star versus our entire 2/3 company?

You'd never stack up to trueborns unless you were really something. Still, you'd never get a frontline assignment as a freebirth. Or a good mech. It's not a good idea to surrender to the clans anyway. Worker caste jobs aren't fun.

That is exactly what happens. The clan commander will, under Zellbrigen rules of engagement send a "Batchall" to the defender, declaring an attack. Defender will bid his troops, and the Attacker's commanders will all make bids for the glory of battle. Lowest bid wins, underbidding resulting in mission failure is disgraceful and generally ends up with poor results for the commander in question.

However, agaisnt the IS... it's likely they'd just invade. Although if you could get a talk with them, convincing them to do that is entirely possible.

Considering the average frontline clan mechwarrior skill package looks like this

gunnery 4
Pilot 3

and several other skills

clan mech warriors gain a free +1 reflexes and +1 int

So in recap clan warriors are better gunners and pilots, have better weapons and pilot faster mechs. Not to mention their advanced armored infantry.

Yeah. What Squishy said sounds better in hindsight. In addition to being good mechwarriors, they're good outside of the cockpit too, hence the other skills. The +ref and int make their physical stat 4, also, so their gunnery TN is just as good as Raviel's with 4 gunnery (Raviel has 6!).