Battlemaster (Heavy Metal Thunder)

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CrayModerator
03/09/15 09:27 PM
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Heavy Metal Thunder (HMT) is a small mercenary force that is most noted for its small team of assault 'Mechs that heroically turned many a battle along the Capellan-Suns border. The 'Mechs get the glory, and the advertising deals, and the syndicated HPG-distributed reality show, and the merchandising (HMT is never one to miss a revenue stream). One overshadowed key to its success is its team of elite technicians, which keep the venerable war machines not just operational, but also modify them to make them easier to keep operational.

One of the other unsung features of HMT is their minimal logistics footprint. The Victor and Battlemasters of the assault lances (which had grown to two lances by the Fourth Succession Wars) are almost entirely armed with energy weapons. Their modified Union-class DropShip and its rudely malfunctioning drive, the Le Petomaine, has been retrofitted primarily with lasers. The Slayers that guard their Invader, the Event Horizon, and the escort the Le Petomaine traded AC/10s for a pair of PPCs. The infantry platoon is primarily armed with blazer rifles, except for the SRM squad that supplies "some righteous high order energetics." In a universe where a ton of missile ammunition costs most than a MechWarrior's annual salary and fueling a tank can wreck a merc force's budget, HMT is able to wander the Periphery without watching its accounts slide into the red simply keeping its war machines in fighting form.

HMT's Battlemasters are the workhorses of the 'Mech force. The elite technicians of Heavy Metal Thunder have worked some miracles in the past, but their best-known work (thanks to the reality show and merchandising) is the Battlemaster HMT refit. Most major weapons other than the lasers are shed. The SRM launcher, machine guns, and their volatile ammunition are removed to free tonnage for a second PPC. The original handheld Donal PPC is removed in favor of a compact, forearm-mounted Hellstar PPC, shared with the common Marauder, which is then mirrored on the left arm by the second PPC. This leaves the Battlemasters' hands free for combat engineering and close-quarters combat. The Battlemasters have set the standard for parts in the force: all medium lasers used are Martells, while the force's Victor was carefully refit to take the Battlemasters' model of gyroscope.

Through its recent operations on former Outworlds Alliance planets and in the Fourth Succession War, HMT was able to accumulate a significant amount of salvage, even an additional Union-class DropShip that a pirate group no longer needed. Most of that was traded away to acquire scrapyard Battlemasters that the techs brought up to good condition and fitted to the HMT standard. By 3029, HMT was operating six of the giant assault 'Mechs, one Victor (HMT), and two heavy scout Phoenix Hawk PHX-1Ds.

Prior to 3020, HMT had mostly been used as a simple assault lance: a lance of thickly-armored 'Mechs that was thrown at strong points. During the 3020s, HMT took a series of Periphery garrison missions where it acted as a military and industrial adviser to several independent planets. Its technicians helped local industry begin producing useful weapons, while its infantry platoon set up military training plans, and the 'Mechs crushed any pirates that bothered the planet during the garrison contract. This period of Periphery "uplift" ended following events that are sealed to this day (and never discussed near the reality show's cameras), and saw HMT accept a contract for garrison work on the Federated Suns planet El Dorado. This contract is suspicious by itself since El Dorado is one of the Suns' "Golden Five" planets located near the capital New Avalon and possesses a very large, professional militia, in addition to hosting several regiments of front line AFFS troops. A mercenary lance, even of assault 'Mechs, doesn't add much to that firepower. It is noted that just prior to HMT receiving its Suns contract an entire Davion Heavy Guards regiment was deployed into the lost districts of the Outworlds Alliance where HMT was operating.

HMT dropped from the public eye for several years during its garrison contract on El Dorado. It did issue some new miniatures as it had gained a couple more 'Mechs and a new (well, pirate scrap heap) Union, and introduced a line of remote-controlled toy BattleMechs made by possible by El Dorado's advanced industry but only affordable to children on wealthy worlds. Otherwise its reality show went on hiatus and its advertising promos stopped.

The mercenaries appeared in the public eye again during the Fourth Succession War. As they were a small force (still in Davion employ) and their activities banal (their Invader-class JumpShip, the "Event Horizon," was the primary moneymaker, running JumpShip-starved AFFS forces into the Confederation), it took a while before mercenary industry watchers noted HMT was active again. Their 'Mechs were only finally deployed on the Capellan planet CoughIdidntlookitupcough, where they were accompanied by several regiments of Capellan March Militia troops and expected to help with breakthroughs before yet another quick conquest.

Instead, the invasion of CoughIdidntlookitupcough rapidly ran into problems: far more CCAF troops were present than expected, including elite Warrior House troops and the veteran mercenary force Miller's Marauders. ComStar selected that moment to slap an Interdiction on the entire Federated Suns, cutting HMT and Davion troops off from fast requests for reinforcements. However, the Federated Suns' aerospace forces achieved aerospace superiority and began mercilessly destroying Capellan supply depots. After a week on the defensive, the AFFS was able to begin defeating the the ammo- and fuel-starved Capellan troops in detail. HMT's 'Mechs were readied for deployment against dense groups of Capellan holdouts when they were abruptly ordered into hill country noted for its twisting karst formations but not for its concentration of Capellan troops.

The short and succinct AFFS report on the HMT engagement was that the mercs were deployed against a group of holdouts, two lances of Miller's Marauders that consisted of, well, Marauders that were too much for the worn and battered March Militia troops to deal with. The eight Marauders were holed up in a very defensible box canyon almost immune from aerospace attacks and apparently awaiting a dust off by some of the remaining Capellan DropShips. HMT's Battlemasters "performed an elegant battlefield maneuver" (charged headlong into the narrow canyons) and "demonstrated superior gunnery and piloting" (smashed the lighter, more numerous Marauders into scrap.) Aside from one lost arm and a dinged engine, the HMT Battlemasters readily prevailed. The tinfoil and shrapnel salvaged from the canyon was sufficient to build several functional Marauders.

There are persistent oddities about the engagement, though. Reporters embedded with the Capellan March Militia filed articles before HMT's deployment noting that HMT was sent "after a High Value Target," but later articles never again mentioned a High Value Target - not even as a retraction. Some inadequately vetted BattleROM footage showed a Thunderbolt in the rear of the Miller's Marauder formation, but the Thunderbolt was in Capellan parade ground colors rather than Miller's colors. Reporters on New Avalon, less constrained by military censors, found a contract violation charge filed against HMT in AFFS records, but the charge had been suspended and filed without action. HMT's customized Victor, which mounted a unique blazer cannon, was turned over to NAIS for "structural analysis and assessment of its unusual main weaponry," which meant it was scrapped while being reverse-engineered. This odd considering that the Lyran Commonwealth had a great deal of engineering data about the blazer cannon and the newlywed Katrina Steiner-Davion would certainly make this data available to her ally and husband, Hanse Davion.

Perhaps coincidentally, merely three weeks later the badly burned quadruple amputee that Davion claimed was Maximilian Liao appeared at New Syrtis, the Federated Suns' capital of its Capellan march. This is consistent with rumors that critical Suns JumpShips were diverted to a one-time Command Circuit from the CoughIdidntlookitupcough to the capital of the Capellan March. The AFFS and Federated Suns' civilian government have been reluctant to discuss Liao's injuries, other than repeating, "The fortunes of war resulted in the Capellan Chancellor being injured by a heavy battlefield laser during a daring effort to truncate ongoing hostilities by seizing the unreasonable leadership of the Confederation for frank peace discussions."

After "generously donating" HMT's Victor to the New Avalon Institute of Science, HMT received a fairly new Battlemaster in compensation. This brings the small merc force up to 8 of the unique assault 'Mechs, which is now starting to interest the several Battlemaster manufacturers around the Inner Sphere.

Code:

BATTLEMASTER BLR-1G-HMT

Mass: 85 tons
Tech Base: Inner Sphere
Chassis Config: Biped

Chassis: Hollis Mark X
Power Plant: 340 VOX
Walking Speed: 43.2 km/h
Maximum Speed: 64.8 km/h
Jump Jets: None
Jump Capacity: None
Armor: Durallex Heavy
Armament:
2 Hellstar PPCs
6 Martell Medium Lasers
Manufacturer: Hollis Industries
Communications System: HartfordCo COM 4000
Targeting and Tracking System: HartfordCo XKZ 1

================================================================================
Equipment Type Rating Mass
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Internal Structure: Standard Structure 130 points 8.50
Engine: Standard Fusion Engine 340 27.00
Walking MP: 4
Running MP: 6
Jumping MP: 0
Heat Sinks: Single Heat Sink 18 8.00
Heat Sink Locations: 1 CT, 2 LL, 2 RL
Gyro: Standard 4.00
Cockpit: Standard 3.00
Actuators: L: SH+UA+LA+H R: SH+UA+LA+H
Armor: Standard AV - 232 14.50

Internal Armor
Structure Factor
Head 3 9
Center Torso 27 32
Center Torso (rear) 11
L/R Torso 18 26
L/R Torso (rear) 7
L/R Arm 14 25
L/R Leg 18 32

================================================================================
Equipment Location Heat Critical Mass
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PPC RA 10 3 7.00
PPC LA 10 3 7.00
2 Medium Lasers RT 6 2 2.00
2 Medium Lasers LT 6 2 2.00
Medium Laser RTR 6 1 1.00
Medium Laser LTR 6 1 1.00
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.


Edited by Cray (03/10/15 06:42 PM)
ghostrider
03/09/15 09:59 PM
76.89.120.217

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Is there a typo on the right hand actuator?
Otherwise, it helps fix a problem with the original battle master. Lack of long range weapons on it. One ppc is decent, but not great for an assault mech.

Since it is not set up for min/max, saying it could use a couple of heat sinks would be obvious, but not worried about.
Karagin
03/09/15 11:52 PM
70.118.139.48

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R: SH+UA+LA means it's missing the hand critical slot. So it has the shoulder (SH), and the upper arm actuator (UA) and the lower arm actuator (LA), BUT does not have the hand actuator (H) in the right arm. Don't think it's a typo, thinking Cray need the critical slot for weapons or other items to make things fit.
Karagin

Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
ghostrider
03/10/15 12:18 AM
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This is a normal 3025 mech. No advanced equipment.

The original handheld Donal PPC is removed in favor of a compact, forearm-mounted Hellstar PPC, shared with the common Marauder, which is then mirrored on the left arm by the second PPC. This leaves the Battlemasters' hands free for combat engineering and close-quarters combat.

Unless I misread this, both arms either have the hand or niether does. The second part of that statement says hands free for things.

And the heat output for the 2 rear lasers is added twice. That thru me off when I suggested some heat sinks.

Still a nasty unit.
Karagin
03/10/15 06:37 AM
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Actuators: L: SH+UA+LA+H
R: SH+UA+LA

The right arm is missing the hand Ghostrider, if it had the hand it would show the H after the LA. Just like the left arm shows it. So either Cray remove it or the design program dropped it.
Karagin

Given time and plenty of paper, a philosopher can prove anything.
CarcerKango
03/10/15 08:59 AM
64.251.51.246

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Great fluff as always.
CrayModerator
03/10/15 06:45 PM
67.8.171.23

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Quote:
Karagin writes:

R: SH+UA+LA means it's missing the hand critical slot. So it has the shoulder (SH), and the upper arm actuator (UA) and the lower arm actuator (LA), BUT does not have the hand actuator (H) in the right arm. Don't think it's a typo, thinking Cray need the critical slot for weapons or other items to make things fit.



It was a copy-and-paste error. I've been borrowing from my other recent posts (in turn based on one of Giovanni's posts) to keep the formatting clean. This Battlemaster was based on the Victor-HMT, which IS missing a hand, and I overlooked the actuators when I updated the template. It's fixed now.

I definitely wanted both hand actuators. I like the roleplaying opportunities of a two-handed 'Mech, like those hinted in the fluff: combat engineering, supply raids, etc.

As for crits, this thing has gobs of unused crits, 30 if I counted correctly. It's got a 340 standard fusion engine that holds 13 of 18 single heat sinks and 12 crits of weapons, so there was no need to ditch a hand actuator.
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.


Edited by Cray (03/10/15 06:46 PM)
GiovanniBlasini
03/11/15 07:55 PM
76.243.24.89

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Definitely feels like a predecessor to the Warlord, and that's not actually a bad thing.

Amusingly, this BattleMaster kind of feels like it's got the opposite problem of the original: with 2 PPCs and 4 ML facing forward, you lose out a bit on your close-range firepower, thanks to the loss of the SRM-6 pack, which averages another 8 points of critseeking when it hit. Sure, you've got the PPCs, but heat management is actually a bit funky with them up close.
Member of the Pundit Caste
"Which side are we on? We're on the side of the demons, Chief. We're evil men in the gardens of paradise, sent by the forces of death to spread devastation and destruction wherever we go. I'm surprised you didn't know that." -- Col. Saul Tigh, BSG2003
ghostrider
03/11/15 09:38 PM
76.89.120.217

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Just have to decide to use lasers or ppcs. Can't use both.
Granted I like using everything, so having an option isn't always that good.
If you go straight lasers in close, you can cool down. Even with a walk/run you can cool down.

I think the battle master would have been even more popular had this variant been released way back when. To me it just seemed to lack the long range fire power an assault mech should have.

And I absolutely hated the original charger. That designer should have been.. well in todays day and age, I can't say it in jest anymore. Might be considered threatening. Sheesh.
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