I will try to have a battle report up sometime tonight. I wanted to take pictures, but, well, there's a few reasons I will consistently refer to one player as THAT GUY, and one of them is his insistence I couldn't photograph him or any of his models. Considering he contributed nearly a whole Cluster, it was hard to keep them both out of the shot, so I eventually gave up. I'll take pictures of the battlefield, though, we'll need them for a reference.
For now, background and the TO&E of the groundside battle; I'll ask Ally about the space stuff later if she remembers.
In the alternate universe of our FLGS, the FedCom Civil War never happened, and the Star League never disbanded. The trigger for Jihad has not yet occurred as such. The Word of Blake's control of the Chaos March is being actively contested by a more militant ComStar, however, and it's probably inevitable.
And the Free Rasalhague Republic, three months ago, invited Clan Ghost Bear to talks regarding the Ghost Bear Dominion. Talks broke down quickly, and the Free Rasalhague Republic unexpectedly made an appeal to the Grand Council of the Clans, attacking the Ghost Bears as perverters of the Warden philosophy; in deciding to stay and rule, they are Crusaders masquerading as Wardens. This appeal successfully isolated the Ghost Bears from many of the other Clans, Crusader and Warden.
That done, the Star League initiated War Plan 23: the annihilation of Clan Ghost Bear and the liberation of those Draconis Combine and Free Rasalhague Republic worlds it holds.
For ease of play we broke up things so that specific sub-units had their own player commanders, one of whom was also the nominal commander of either a regiment or cluster-sized unit, and each side also had an overall commander. We did not use the Alpha Strike rules, because we're beardy assholes who mostly predate them. Also completely insane. Movement and firing was done not by player but by side (so everybody on one side does their moving and shooting all together), and it was encouraged, though not made explicit, to focus on the player opposite you to prevent confusion. It was also encouraged that the player point out their command unit; we had plans to incorporate that somehow but they got dropped.
Artillery and Aerospace assets were the personal shotguns of regimental or side commanders, and under the rules in effect initially not used. The only flying units on the field to start were the rotary-winged aircraft, and the only ones that participated in combat from the start where the gunship/transporters of the one airmobile infantry regiment. When melee broke out, though, the attack helos and ASFs moved in.
Task Force Iron, representing the Star League and the Outworlds Alliance
Pesht Armored Cavalry Regimental Combat Team (split into variable-strength combat commands between four people for the purposes of the scenario; yours truly as the regimental commander, since they were my models)
'Mech Regiment, 4 Battalions
Heavy Armored Regiment, 4 Battalions
Three Mechanized Infantry Regiments (2 Battalions infantry, 1 Battalion Battle Armor each)
1 Battalion ASF
Royal Skye Armored Regiment (split into two combat commands for the scenario; brigaded with the Outworlds Foreign Legion as a "regiment")
1 Heavy Armored Regiment, 3 Battalions
1 Scout Armor Battalion
The Outworlds Foreign Legion (split into two combat commands for the scenario, donated their third armor battalion to the Com Guards; their artillery regiment was the side commander's personal shotgun)
2 'Mech Battalions
1 Light Armored Regiment, 3 Battalions
1 Reinforced Artillery Regiment, 5 Battalions
1 Battalion ASFs
The Flameseekers (unitary command for the scenario; brigaded with the BLTs from the 1st Davion Guards and 3rd Saint Ives Lancers as a "regiment")
2 'Mech Companies (pretty much all heavy or assault class)
2 Battalions medium armor
2 Companies rotary-wing attack aircraft
Battalion Landing Team, 1st Davion Guards (unitary command for the scenario; by far the best-looking unit on the field in their Blue and Gold designs as seen in MechCommander)
1 'Mech Battalion
1 Reinforced Battle Armor Battalion (4 Companies)
Battalion Landing Team, 3rd Saint Ives Lancers (unitary command for the scenario)
1 'Mech Battalion
1 Battle Armor Battalion
1 VTOL Gunship/Transport Battalion
Carver Commandos (unitary for the scenario, though they donated a battalion of airmobile infantry to the Com Guards; brigaded with the Fighting Uruk-Hai and Focht's Own as a "regiment")
1 'Mech Company
1 Regiment airmobile infantry, 3 Battalions
1 Battalion fixed-wing attack aircraft (Mechbuster Fighters with XL engines and Arrow IV launchers rather than AC-20s; at the end of the game they were duking it out with the Clan evac DropShips
and winning.)
First Battalion, Fighting Uruk-Hai (unitary for the scenario)
1 'Mech Battalion
Com Guards 181st Division VII Delta "Focht's Own" (with an attached armor and airmobile battalion; a unitary command)
2 'Mech Level 2s
Omega Galaxy, representing Clan Ghost Bear
A notation on nomenclature: Clan units are classified by weight and combat role. A "Strike" unit consists of faster medium and heavy 'Mechs intended to punch a hole in an enemy line; a "Combat" unit consists of medium and heavy 'Mechs and does what is says on the tin; a "Scout" unit is light and medium fast 'Mechs and also does what it says on the tin; an "Assault" unit is heavy and assault 'Mechs. "Supernova" indicates the unit is paired with an Elemental unit of equivalent size. You'll notice that some binaries and trinaries are not marked as any particular sort. This indicates they are not biased towards a particular role, but instead have internally a scout, combat, and assault star; a binary omits either the scout or assault star.
Omega Command Binary71st Provisional Garrison Cluster (Was not split into combat commands at the insistence it could be handled by the one person, who quickly turned into the game's THAT GUY)
1 Strike Trinary (
NOT Second-Line)
2 Combat Trinaries (Second-Line)
1 Assault Trinary (Second-Line)
1 Heavy Vehicle Trinary
2 Support Vehicle Trinaries (mostly Arrow-IV tanks, so attached to Omega Command)
2 Aerospace Trinaries (Second-Line)
4 Elemental Trinaries
3rd Bear Dragoons "The Immortals" (split into two combat commands)
1 Supernova Assault Binary
2 Supernova Trinaries
1 Supernova Scout Binary
2 Trinaries
1 Strike Trinary (See this? Iota Strike Trinary was
all Mad Cat Ds. ****ing terrifying!)
1 Scout Trinary
1 Aerospace Trinary
5th Bear Guards "Avalanche" (split into two combat commands)
1 Supernova Trinary
1 Supernova Scout Trinary
2 Supernova Strike Trinaries
1 Assault Trinary
1 Trinary
1 Combat Binary (Second-Line)
2 Scout Trinary (Second Line)
2 Aerospace Trinaries
