mudekk
10/01/13 02:36 AM
64.53.216.145
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Is it just me, or in Second Edition on page 157 is the section on Land Income Modifiers missing something? It talks about using a "Land Management Skill" and "modifying the Target Number as indicated below." But there's no such skill. Are they referring to "Administration"? And, where is the list of modifiers? In the example, they refer to a Baron with a skill of 6 whose land is "not contested." I assume that is referring to the missing modifiers, right? Anyone have the missing info?
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Shadrak
10/01/13 07:07 AM
174.238.231.126
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Ancient historty...use the new rules
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mudekk
10/01/13 10:51 AM
64.53.216.145
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Unfortunately, I don't have the new rules. Want to share them with me?
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ghostrider
10/01/13 01:04 PM
66.74.188.151
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I believe it was administration for land management. Its been a while since i looked at them.
Think the baron thing was an example of how to use the tables.
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Shadrak
10/01/13 11:41 PM
98.227.214.21
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Quote:
Unfortunately, I don't have the new rules. Want to share them with me?
I would, but I am not sure if I would be in violation of the TOS...plus, if you don't have the full ruleset you won't really be able to work it properly....
But I will say, the newer systems make a lot more sense...one of the last (3rd) generation supplements cover land management in detail for about 3 pages. There is probably a new (4th gen) ruleset that covers it as well.
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skiltao
10/02/13 05:36 PM
68.77.110.226
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"Land Management" is what "Administration" was called in the First Edition. Here's the missing table:
------------------------------------------------
Modifier Situation
-2 Light Lance vs Light Lance
-1 Heavy 'Mech vs Heavy 'Mech
-3 Heavy Lance vs Heavy Lance
-2 Heavy Lance vs Single 'Mech
-4 Heavy Lance vs Medium Lance
-14 Full-out Invasion
+1 Per Land Management Skill Level
------------------------------------------------
I assume "uncontested" means nobody was fighting on top of it. 
Note also that these rolls give you *surplus* income after all normal expenses (including normal defense) are paid for.
EDIT: I suspect that either the -3 or -4 was meant to be medium lances.
Edited by skiltao (10/02/13 05:40 PM)
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Cray
10/02/13 06:39 PM
71.47.122.85
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Quote:
Quote:
Unfortunately, I don't have the new rules. Want to share them with me?
I would, but I am not sure if I would be in violation of the TOS...plus, if you don't have the full ruleset you won't really be able to work it properly....
Illegal file sharing is more a violation of the US's terms of services than Sarna's. It's also a big dent in game company profits that inhibits the ability to turn out new, high quality products. It's hard to muster funds for a new project when everyone's just sharing free copies on the internet.
Quote:
But I will say, the newer systems make a lot more sense...one of the last (3rd) generation supplements cover land management in detail for about 3 pages. There is probably a new (4th gen) ruleset that covers it as well.
The 4th Gen ruleset ("A Time of War") not only made character generation a lot faster than 3rd, it does have land management rules.
Mike Miller, Materials Engineer
Disclaimer: Anything stated in this post is unofficial and non-canon unless directly quoted from a published book. Random internet musings of a BattleTech writer are not canon.
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Shadrak
10/05/13 11:09 AM
98.227.214.21
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Quote:
The 4th Gen ruleset ("A Time of War") not only made character generation a lot faster than 3rd, it does have land management rules.
I have been messing around with the Table Top rules mostly, so can you tell me if this is in Age of War or in the Companion...I bought them digitally because I don't have an active game store near me and it is harder to read the digitals.
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Cray
10/05/13 02:58 PM
71.47.122.85
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Quote:
I bought them digitally because I don't have an active game store near me and it is harder to read the digitals.
PDFs can be rough on the eyes, but at least you can read the table of contents. Which of the two books has a table of contents section labeled, "Maintaining a Landhold"?
Mike Miller, Materials Engineer
Disclaimer: Anything stated in this post is unofficial and non-canon unless directly quoted from a published book. Random internet musings of a BattleTech writer are not canon.
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ghostrider
10/06/13 01:28 AM
66.74.188.151
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I resent that remark cray. I buy books for the pictures.
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Shadrak
10/06/13 03:54 PM
98.227.214.21
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Quote:
PDFs can be rough on the eyes, but at least you can read the table of contents. Which of the two books has a table of contents section labeled, "Maintaining a Landhold"?
A smart **** I see! LOL...
I haven't done anything more than "flipped" the pages on the RPG books--which would be enough to tell me where landhold info was in the previous, but because I can only see the pages when they are large enough to only show 1/2 page on my screen I haven't run across it.
I have been spending most of my time reviewing the rules in Tech Manual and Tactical Ops which, by the way, are very poorly formatted...information on a variety of items require referencing 3 or 4 different, non-consecutive pages. An example of this is the "Super Heavy Support Vehicle Bay" that indicates on only 1 out of 4 reference sections that the maximum capacity is 200 tons (I suspected this but wanted to confirm it) and when it does it is a note in a chart.
When using Support Vehicle Construction Rules, the book references a "base engine weight" when it should be referencing a "base engine value" and it is further complicated when the chart that assigns "base engine value" is 3 pages before the formula that calls for "base engine weight"
I think the newer books look better, have better rules, and and make the system more interesting, but I wonder if they play tested and edited enough...
And because of this, I haven't even started on the RPG books other than to skim them.
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Cray
10/07/13 06:49 PM
71.47.122.85
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Quote:
I think the newer books look better, have better rules, and and make the system more interesting, but I wonder if they play tested and edited enough...
Thoroughly. However, playtesters tended to focus on individual rules and typos rather than large-scale formatting of the whole books.
There's a logic to Tech Manual and Tactical Operations, though you might find another approach. The idea was to group like topics together. So, Tech Manual has a 'Mech Section, and Aerospace Section, a combat vehicle section, and so on. Those sections have the rules unique to one topic. There was no reason, for example, to re-list weapons (or super heavy vehicle bays) for each vehicle construction rules section when you could just make a single equipment chapter at the end.
When it came to the weapons chapter, there was also an effort to avoid duplicating information excessively. You were always going to have a master weapons table at the end of the book; a centralized list of stats has always proven handy in many BT rule books. With that master equipment table there was no need to provide (for example) a duplicate laser stats table in the equipment chapter sub-section on lasers. Meanwhile, the equipment chapter had the laser construction rules that wouldn't fit easily in a table, leaving stats to the master equipment tables.
Such was the concept, anyway.
Mike Miller, Materials Engineer
Disclaimer: Anything stated in this post is unofficial and non-canon unless directly quoted from a published book. Random internet musings of a BattleTech writer are not canon.
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Shadrak
10/08/13 02:54 PM
98.227.214.21
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Quote:
Quote:
I think the newer books look better, have better rules, and and make the system more interesting, but I wonder if they play tested and edited enough...
Thoroughly. However, playtesters tended to focus on individual rules and typos rather than large-scale formatting of the whole books.
There's a logic to Tech Manual and Tactical Operations, though you might find another approach. The idea was to group like topics together. So, Tech Manual has a 'Mech Section, and Aerospace Section, a combat vehicle section, and so on. Those sections have the rules unique to one topic. There was no reason, for example, to re-list weapons (or super heavy vehicle bays) for each vehicle construction rules section when you could just make a single equipment chapter at the end.
When it came to the weapons chapter, there was also an effort to avoid duplicating information excessively. You were always going to have a master weapons table at the end of the book; a centralized list of stats has always proven handy in many BT rule books. With that master equipment table there was no need to provide (for example) a duplicate laser stats table in the equipment chapter sub-section on lasers. Meanwhile, the equipment chapter had the laser construction rules that wouldn't fit easily in a table, leaving stats to the master equipment tables.
Such was the concept, anyway.
Swore I responded to this.
I think that is a decent idea for paper copies, but I wonder what the ratio of digital copies to papercopies is.
Perhaps having an adjusted digital copy that allows hyper links between sections. I spent 2 hours looking for the weight on a mechanical jump jet and found it on sarna.net in 10 minutes...when I located it in the book, it was at the bottom of a chart (not in the text of the book or in the tables) in 3 pt text.
An example,
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Shadrak
10/08/13 03:05 PM
98.227.214.21
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Also, formatting of rule-related information varies dramatically...sometimes it is in prose/descriptive text, other times it is in info boxes/charts/and excerpts...
This wouldn't be an issue if it were in both locations, but it can lead to oversights.
My suggestion would be to have all tables in a given section located on a page at the end of the section and referenced in text with footnotes. Especially design/construction rules...the majority of these can be reduced to less than 1 or 2 pages of charts.
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