BattleTech is a bad game -- don't buy it

J

Joshua

Spaceman
This is not a something vs. something thread; this is a something vs. nothing thread and I can prove it.

Wing Commander takes place in the future and reflects the U.S. form of government. BattleTech takes place in the future and does not reflect the U.S. form of government. In BattleTech, there is no President, no Senate, no United Nations, no reference to any real world countries.
In Wing Commander, there's a vast variety of races -- caucasians, Lations, blacks, Asians. In BattleTech, there's only people descended from caucasians and Asians.
In Wing Commander, the player is encouraged to better himself/herself by increasing his/her rank. In BattleTech, the player is not encouraged to better himself/herself at all.
In Wing Commander, players are encouraged to play the best they can, to find unique ways of winning. In BattleTech, players are not encouraged to play the best they can -- they're not encouraged to find unique ways of winning, indeed the typical person instructing new BattleTech players gets very angry when they find rules they can use to effectively win.

TECH EDITED PART:
Often, players in BattleTech are discouraged from mixing tech of different organizations like Clans & Inner Sphere. In Wing Commander players aren't discouraged from mixing tech like Border Worlds & Confed.
 
I'm confused. Are you talking about the tabletop game, or something else entirely? Oh, and this is BT vs WC, not BT vs nothing. Otherwise you wouldn't have a comparison for every single point.
 
Actually, in Battletech there are distinct governments (some have real world counterparts). Comstar is the equivalent of the UN. Kurita is the equivalent of the Japanese shogunates.

For the reference to the race issue...in Battletech, there are as many different races as there are in the real world. But the problem is homogenization. Given that the events in Battletech occur in the year 3025 (or thereabouts), do you really think that people will still maintain racial purity? In any case, given over a thousand years I think that there would be VERY few people who can claim a non-mixed racial profile. Honestly, I think that the Wing Commander universe is the one that is making the error in the racial department. To think that racial groups would only marry into the same racial group is just plain silly.

As for the whole issue of achieving a higher rank: If the GM is actually good, then he/she would allow the players to actually achieve higher ranks. IE, becoming a lance commander, or even a general. The rationale is that the higher the rank, the more strategic say he/she would have. It all depends on what type of scenario you are playing. If you are in a mercenary band that has a defined leader of the group...but no upper management, then it makes sense not to have promotions.

In Battletech, if the GM is a good GM, then players are heavily encouraged to use varying strategies to achieve victory (or at least to accomplish their mission objectives). It's just that, as is the case with a lot of RPGs, there are a lot of 'bad' GMs directing the game. A game is only as good as the GM who creates the scenarios.

And personally, I think you should stike that first complaint of your post. To list that there is no US government in battletech in the list of complaints against the game universe, is silly. Remember, in WCIV Confed was the 'bad guy'. Are you saying that the US is the bad guy? And if so, why would that be a negative to the Battletech universe? And in actuality, while they may not be the US form of democracy, they DO have a parliament, and follows more closely to the British form of government.

In any case, this whole thread is pretty much a "this is better than that" type of thread. I mean, your whole argument is based on "This (WC) has this, but that (BT) doesn't...so therefore, the game is bad." So, by breaking it down, BT is bad because it has a percieved lack of what WC has...therefore WC is better. Anyways, I'm done.
 
Actually, Kurita is not like modern day Japan. Kurita is more like Old Imperial Japan. Modern day Japan gives equal rights to women in all aspects of life including politics. Kurita does not.

In BTech, I think that's basically the way it is -- segregation of races in regards to marriage -- I haven't seen any novels that talk about racing mixing, though there is Victor & Omi (Victor is a caucasian, Omi is of Asian) but that's in the year 3060 some. According to a guy who used to do official BattleTech demos, BattleTech was intended to be sold to white 18 to 26 year old males and some Asians -- the people who designed BattleTech thought they were the only ones with a good education and capable of understanding BattleTech.

As for strategies, that's the problem with BTech, GMs are never encouraged to be "good". They're, from what I've seen, practically encouraged to be jerks with players.

No, I'm not trying to make out that the U.S. is the bad guy. Also, I added a new point to my original thread -- techmixing & salvaging.

Also, one thing I noticed about Wing Commander as opposed to BattleTech is that Wing Commander personnel don't really try to pressure players into being mindless herd following robots; BattleTech personnel do. Wing Commander personnel treat people like they're smart; BattleTech personnel treat people like they're stupid.
 
If you had read what I had written in my post, I said that Kurita was analogous to the Japanese shogunate. That is the imperial era.

Okay, let's take a look at another universe that has a VERY limited racial profile: Bladerunner. There were 'whites', Asians, and Mexicans. Does that make Wing Commander better than Bladerunner? No. Race does not make one universe better than the other. Besides, if you want to have a darker skinned character in the Battletech universe, go right ahead...nobody will stop you. Do you need a separate rulebook to make a dark skinned character? No. Why are there no dark skinned characters in the Battletech fiction (novels, games, etc...)? I don't know, ask FASA. To reiterate: Race does not make or break a game universe. It is never assumed that the races of the Battletech universe would be so completely skewed as to eliminate all other races other than White and Asian.

You rebuttal to my GM claim is silly. A GM is pressured to be a good GM in the sense that if they are not a good GM, the players will just get up and leave. Example:

GM: "You just blew off the cockpit of that Nova Cat"
PC: "Great, I want to salvage the Clan ER PPC's off of that thing."
GM: "Uhh...you can't."
PC: "Why not, you just said that the cockpit was blown off."
GM: "Yeah, but you can't use clan tech."
PC: "Wait a minute, but we have excellent technicians at base."
GM: "Yeah, well, they can't do this."
PC: "What the %&#$! You're just making this @#$& up as you, aren't you?"
GM: "No, it's in the rules."
PC: "Screw this, I'm outta here."

I've had something similar happen in one game that I GM'd, and I was quickly voted out of the GM position. Not my proudest moment, but it just goes to show that bad GM's are VERY rarely tolerated.

As for your last point about the herd mentality, I have just one thing to say to that: WHAT THE HECK!!! In the WC universe, your characters are in the military. When you are in the military you are ritually forced to do exactly what your fellow soldiers would do. You are to follow the orders given to you by your superior officer. If that is not the herd mentality, then I guess I just don't know what it means. A military organization is all about structured order. In both the WC and BT universes, the character IS MOST CERTAINLY treated the same...as a soldier in a much larger army. There is no "smart" or "dumb" about it, you are a soldier. IF you get to be promoted into a higher echelon of management (ie general, commander, brigadeer, etc...) then you are no longer treated as a simple soldier...but that can happen just as easily in WC...if you can get promoted that highly in the WC universe.

In any case, it seems to me that my posting in BT's defence is all in vain. You have your views and are not going to be swayed by anything I, or anyone else, will say. In which case, I have to ask you: Why are you posting a "This is better than that" form of post? It's not informative because there are people who will enjoy the BT universe...it's not argumentative because you will not relinquish your position and admit that BT has it's merits (an argument needs the one to present a case, be presented with a case, possible counter-cases can be made, and one side will claim victory and the other defeat). It's not persuasive because people who like the BT universe will refute your claim that BT is as bad as you claim it is. That leaves us with the claim that WC is better than BT. That is your opinion and cannot be argued. If you argue an opinion you cannot win...nor can you lose. An opinion does not an argument make. So, somebody (a moderator) please...this thread is just WC chest thumping. Lock this thread. It is not informative, nor poses an argument.
 
So, somebody (a moderator) please...this thread is just WC chest thumping.
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I don't think it has anything to do with WC. It's just that stupid super polymer trolling. It doesn't really break any rules, though, so we won't close it - but please be assured that no one is taking anything Joshua says seriously (G)
 
I do believe that you are mistaken.

BattleTech has people of all ethnicities, religions, social standings, etc. It takes some reading to find them, but they are there.

For example, we have the Mercenary Regiment Camacho's Caballeros, consisting of those of Hispanic descent, those of various Southwestern North American Indian tribes, both Protestant and Catholic cowboys, a group of ex-Draconis Combine citizens with a predominantly Japanese heritage, and a bunch of ex-FedCom militia whose heritage comes from all over Europe.

And that is just one of the many regiments in BattleTech. Just take a look at any Field Manual and look at the regimenal officers. Their last names are a cross-section of the Earth today.

Also, for those of an African Heritage, we have Minobu Tetsuhara, by race, African, but culturally a proud samurai of House Kurita. We have ilKhan Lincoln Osis, a hulking elemental who achieved the highest position within all the Clans.

Joshua, how much of the later day BattleTech universe have you read? The Combine grows less like Imperial Japan by the day, thanks to the reforms of Coordinator Theodore Kurita. There has never been any restriction on marriage between the races in BattleTech. All the authors had better things to write about, such as death, glory, and BattleMechs!

Border Worlds tech can be mixed with Confed tech because Border Worlds tech was Confed Tech!

The reason that the game makes it difficult to intermix Clan and Spheroid tech is because of munchkins who equip Spheroid 'mechs with all ClanTech. What sort of game would it be if everyone had the highly-sophisticated ClanTech?

Geez, its almost as bad as the whole premise of this topic.
 
Hear hear, Expendable. Finally, somebody who knows something about BT rises up to debunk this naysayer. Still, with the whole Clantech stuff, I find it acceptable if you are restricted to 1 or 2 pieces of clan-tech. I mean, they use different power structures (as could be seen by the difference in power levels between Clan-tech and IS-tech). So, if you have a good enough engineer/technician, you should be able to use a couple pieces of clan weaponry/equipment...just at the risk of a blowout due to the ad-hoc nature of the field refit. But, that's just my $0.02.

That's it, I've had my say in this, and I'll retire from this thread. That is, unless somebody makes another silly claim on either side of the spectrum and nobody points it out. Later alls.
 
It would be a fun game if people could use whatever tech they wanted. It would also be a balanced game because people who salvage ClanTech (or Kilrathi or Confed Tech or whatever tech they're salvaging) will be able to use the tech for the next battle. The way I see it, if people just exclusively relied on mathematical formulas for balancing forces so that neither side has a huge advantage (although the players should have an advantage so they could complete their mission with no casaulties), games would be much better.
 
friend of mine just sent me this link, and, as we both read the first post, cryed, laughed and cursed, I decided it was about time someone said something from the point of view of someone who KNOWS btech. Thankfully, Expendable said a lot already, but let me add a little

First, Clan tech is the evolution of 300 years of separation from the Inner Sphere. It doesnt matter that they are both humans, they followed different "evolution" paths, techwise. You think the systems would just be the same in two different groups 300 years appart? Getting Inner Sphere and Clan technology to work together is not easy

Now, a lot of what I saw mentioned here is a simple matter of GM decision. Btech is made out of several optional rules, and encourages use of house rules or modifications, as its very common among real battletech players. If you had a GM who was an ass, or wanted to control the game not to become too powerful using the wrong ways, dont blame the game. you only make yourself sound stupid

now...there is one thing here that really astonished me...
"Wing Commander takes place in the future and reflects the U.S. form of government. BattleTech takes place in the future and does not reflect the U.S. form of government. In BattleTech, there is no President, no Senate, no United Nations, no reference to any real world countries."

What kind of moron says a game is bad because its not the reflection of his own country?
That apart, the Btech governments reflect different world governments in different periods of history. There are long discussions on the matter over btech boards and groups, and im sure you can find them or even join them all over the net,. That if you ever manage to drop the excessive patriotic act

"In Wing Commander, there's a vast variety of races" - Expendable already spoke about this one, but why not add a little more to it? the Btech world represents EVERY nation and race earth has. Its not because the 5 ruling houses are caucasian (3) and asian (2) that they are the only ones. What is really interesting about the btech story is that, its not a matter of been of one race, but of one society, like the example of Minobu Tetsuhara. He is black, his name is japanese, and he acts like one. No one looks weird at him for that, its just part of society 1000+ years in the future

"In Wing Commander, the player is encouraged to better himself/herself by increasing his/her rank." - Now, there is one big thing here. Battletech is a strategy board game, not a game where you play a single character, but lead a unit. Mechwarrior RPG would be the correct relation to what you say about wc. Still, btech can still mean improving chars, and saying otherwise only means you dont know btech, or any sort of game at all, it seems (or had a really bad GM experience)
Btech improvement can come with skill improvement, salvage, money, and many other things, depending only on how you are playing it

"Wing Commander, players are encouraged to play the best they can, to find unique ways of winning." - That shows only lack of imagination. I have seen and done improvesations and new tactics to screw up enemies more than once in btech. My piece of resistance is when I defended a city with 1 lance of mechs and tons of infantery against 2 assault companies of mechs, or using terrain (a canyon), and fast mechs with equipment to improve its speed, waiting in hidden to strike against the first mechs who jump over the canyon at top speed, slaming them down the canyon on their backs. great way to reduce 3 heavy clan mechs to scrap

"As for strategies, that's the problem with BTech, GMs are never encouraged to be "good". They're, from what I've seen, practically encouraged to be jerks with players." - if your playing Btech, thats how it is. After all, its a board game. its not a matter of gm vs player, but player vs player. If its really a rpg, then your gm's fault again, not the games

"Wing Commander personnel treat people like they're smart; BattleTech personnel treat people like they're stupid" - again, its either your gm or you who are stupid

"According to a guy who used to do official BattleTech demos, BattleTech was intended to be sold to white 18 to 26 year old males and some Asians -- the people who designed BattleTech thought they were the only ones with a good education and capable of understanding BattleTech." - I have never heard such an amazing amount of bullcrap in my whole life. Are you been paid to say shit about btech? Cause, really, another show of your stupidity here. The game doesnt have demos, unless you refer to computer games, and if thats the case, its still quite stupid to make a comment like you did. "only ones with good education" would be a comment from a racist, not a company
 
Furthermore, BattleTech game playtesters are not credible people and I can prove it. Years back, a question was asked if it would be ok to use 1/2 a point of Edge to reroll a 2D6 roll for a new event only if the previous event was kept and played. The playtester said it would unbalance the game because it would permit higher rolls to be rolled. What he didn't realize was that was that it would permit lower rolls to be rolled too -- the lower rolls would have the same probability of being rolled as the higher rolls would. And that's just one of many examples of how BattleTech playtesters are not credible people.

Actually, using BMR rules, mixing tech is quite easy. I think it only requires a +4 modifier to the tech 2D6 roll.

I'm not making myself seem stupid when I blame BTech for not encouraging GMs to use house rules that players believe are good. The game should do that. If it doesn't, it's not worth playing.

Actually coming up with unique ways of playing demonstrates a great deal of imagination - it takes imagination to think up the unique ways of winning.

Again, it practically is the game's fault because the BattleTech game designers and game playtesters are jerks with players -- they don't respect players at all. They then pass this jerk attitude on to the game and to other GMs. Those GMs then pass such attitude on to other GMs and this creates a chain reaction

Yeah, it's the GM alright who's stupid.

The guy who did official BTech boardgame demos was a FASA Marauder when FASA had the Marauder program. I myself couldn't believe it -- I had seen the cartoon where there were different races and genders. No, I'm not getting paid for saying all this.

I like Star Adventure 4010. This is a good game. They got all kinds of units, equipment, and rules. The people who desiged the game exclusively use mathematical formulas for calculating movement, damage, range, hit probability, making units & equipment, creating personnel, building buildings, and other aspects of the game. By exclusively relying on mathematical formulas, Star Adventure 4010 is a totally balanced game -- players won't have to worry about having sides that are unequal and/or unfair advantages/disadvantages. What I like about SA4010 is that the people who designed the game encourage people to come up with their own rules to play it -- they encourage people playing that game to expand that game (the people who design SA4010 truly believe in real freedom). It's not like the game Mechanized Madness in which people have to conform to a strict set of rules or have authority craving control freaks telling them how they should play. And what's great is that it doesn't matter if people have only played one game of SA4010, their input on rule ideas count with those that design SA4010, i.e., a person who's only played one game of SA4010 counts just as much as someone who's played hundreds of SA4010 games. In SA4010, people can submit their rules to people designing SA4010 for publishing. The rules can only be published if they're fair for everyone rather than a select bunch of people. However, there are talent rules -- those are basically like the Field Manual abilities -- those cannot be played with unless all players agree. The people who write SA4010 novels don't mind it if others work with them to write novels. People who purchase a copy of the game can win a chance to get their names entered into the novels. They can also have great opportunity to win chances to have adventures about them published. SA4010 doesn't have tournaments like BTech does -- the people who designed the game wanted to limit the competitiveness of SA4010 as much as possible to avoid friendships being broke up. Also what's neat about SA4010 is they don't label people with words like "soldier", "technician", etc. - they just refer to people as people, period. The only problem I've seen with SA4010 is that the people who design it don't have a website yet.
 
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Shouldn't you be canceling your internet subscription soon? Or was that just a "woe is me" post to generate sympathy?
 
I have never met a playtester or developer. Considering the sad state of BattleTech nowadays, I don't think I ever will.

But, I DON'T WANT TO MEET ONE! I DON'T CARE WHAT JERKS THEY ARE!

No matter what jerks you think they are Herring-boy, what the devs have managed to create over the many years of BattleTech was a unique science fiction universe. Instead of just adapting a few things and changing names around like in Warhammer 40K, BattleTech sets a totally different niche, with decaying technology that no one can understand or build in constant use, and daily war. We see the dreams of many, such as Katrina Steiner (the original), who seeks to end this state of constant warfare, or Hanse Davion, who is the only leader bold enough to try to make peace within the Successor States. We see the struggles of Justin Xiang Allard, who is reviled as a half-breed traitor, but who secretly works for his nation no matter what. We see Patrick Kell, who knows that he will die, but he takes on an invincible Yorinaga Kurita to preserve the future of the Successor States.

I feel that is more important than any number of knowledge lacking devs or playtesters. Remember, playtesters are only human also, and also make mistakes.

Yes, mixing tech is quite easy, but how many people would want to fight against a munchkin mech, such as a Sagittaire with all Clan pulse lasers with twice the range of Spheroid versions, or a Devastator with all ClanTech? It violates both the fluff and the spirit of the game. Keep Clan seperate from Sphere Tech, for they each have their own advantages. What fun would it be to have a pure House line company, to face off with some whiny munchkin who spends his time trying to build munchier and munchier 'mechs?

And that Marauder was just one Marauder. For all we know, he could have been making it up to look cool and "in the know".

Finally, please refrain from insulting BattleTech upon your generalizations and assumptions.

If you really want to discuss BattleTech, the forum on dropshipcommand.com should prove most interesting for you.

And, well said, psych.
 
Joshua said:
I like Star Adventure 4010. This is a good game.
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There's no such thing as Star Adventure 4010. There's absolutely no trace of it on the interweb - and since the interweb lists virtually everything, the logical answer would be that you made it up.
 
Taking a cue from Bob McDob, I just ran a search through 4 search engines (google, webcrawler, metacrawler, yahoo) on the subject of "Star Adventure 4010." The only return I got was from WCCIC's own forum thread "Why didn't Confed fight the Kilrathi more intelligently?"

I am afraid that we (I and a few other posters) have been the victim of a troll. Hook, line, and sinker we have been lured to spending several minutes formulating responses that have no impact on the original poster. Just thought I'd share this little insight to the rest of you. Bye bye.
 
Still, let us look at the positive side of things.

We now have the knowledge of thermite super polymer missiles!

May all future Wing Commander and Battletech games be abundant with them. George Washington would be proud.
 
The reason why you haven't found any Star Adventure 4010 websites is because the people who created Star Adventure 4010 haven't made any yet.

Also, some BattleTech players talk about hurting and/or killing other BattleTech players. Thus the BattleTech game system is nothing but scum.
 
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