Battletech Quick Strike Campaign Set Up

What?

I played a Scenario in the Sword and Dragon Starterbook. This kind of book is perfect for me and the level of involvement I want with Battletech – surface. The fact that I'm playing Quick Strike version is another example of this. Even more, the fact that I'm playing it on a board is even more the case. (QS is supposed to be played on the table top as a miniatures game.) The board makes it that much easier to get a game in quickly. (Yes, I would rather play as a miniature game, with scenery and all that. But I'm choosing expediency over aesthetics.)

I've chosen to use Sorensen's Sabres of House Kurita as the force to use. No other reason than I like the Dragon of House Kurita. And I like that whole Asian/Japanese theme. You can also play Fox's Teeth of House Davion.

Here's the basics of the campaign, straight from the book:

"Starterbook: Sword and Dragon provides a campaign framework that allows players and gamemasters to run either Sorenson's Sabres or the Fox's Teeth (McKinnon's Raiders) through a period of border raids along the Davion and Kurita borders during the years of 3048-3049."

Also

"There are two types of tracks in the Sword and Dragon campaign: Mission and Touchpoint.  A Mission track is a generic track focused on a kind of mission (reconnaissance for example.) Mission Tracks may be played as many times as players wish.

From CamoSpecs

"A Touchpoint track deals with a specific event that occurs during a forces' history and is keyed to either the Sabres or the Raiders (with the exception of the last track which involves both forces.) Touchpoint tracks do not need to be played in order the finish the campaign, but they do bring a level of detail to the force and players will find their campaign experience that much richer if used."

You are given Warchest points to buy new mechs, pilots, ammo, etc. In addition, you also pay for the missions with WP. You begin the campaign with 100 WP. The first mission, Recon costs 50 WP. You get more WP based on objectives and bonuses in each mission.

Finally, for each scenario the opponent is typically chosen off of Random Mech Assignment Tables. You could get house, mercenary or militia forces. (These tables often stir up some ire among the BT faithful. I'm not versed enough in the universe to understand why. But it may be a game issue as well that I'm not understanding either.)

Interestingly enough I see this like the role playing I've just begun. The fun of the campaign is to play the games, of course. But also to see your team progress through a series of missions. To get to "know" your team and how  they do.

This has turned out to be a long one, so I'll stop here with a list of the opposing forces for the next post. It will be a brief summary of the first mission.

Mission Recon:

Objective: ID/Scan all of the Defender's force. And, Escape! At least half of the attacker's force must survive and exit the Attacker's home edge after 8 turns (this will need to be amended 'cause there was no way with movement as it is that is is even possible.) Also, apparently Scanning is not covered in the introductory rules, or the entire Strategic Operations book. Therefore I asked for some guidance from the web and it turns out this is in Tactical Operations. The person that answered me recalled something about being a roll of 8+ meant it was successful. It also depended on the equipment on the mech. I just went with 8+ within 4 hexes (the 4 hexes was written in the mission brief. I'll need to look at this as well because the weapon distances are different with QS, I think the scan distance needs to be increased.)

Emory Wilk - Soon to be VIP

Opposing force has the Forced Withdrawal rule: Basically they are required to disengage and leave the board if they become crippled. (Using some home brews from the web I'm stating crippled once they take some structural damage.)

Sorenson's Sabres:

Daniel Sorenson, skill 2, HTM-27T Hatamoto-Chi Daniel (Atlas)

Grace Shiro, Skill 3, JR7-K Jenner Grace

Emory Wilk, Skill 3, DRG-1G Grand Dragon Emory

Shakir Jerrar, Skill 3, HBK-4G Hunchback Shakir

Opposing forces Militia working under the Mercenaries on the planet (All skill 5)

(2) SDR-5V Spider

JR7-D Jenner

HNT-151 Hornet (proxy a Cicada)

Next time: we see that the homely militia doesn't make it easy on the Sorenson Team.