I play a solid amount of Battletech today, but only because last summer I wanted to play Flames of Orion. I wandered into to my FLGS and after picking up and putting down the box four or five times, I bought the Inner Sphere Fire Lance because I thought it had the coolest mechs there. Curiosity got the best of me, and so I soon bought the Essentials Box for some rules (and two more mechs), then I went down the rabbit hole entirely.
At Under The Dice Fest the past weekend, I finally got to play Flames of Orion, and I bashed a lance of mechs for the occasion. These are mostly 3D printed Battletech knock-offs, with the exception of the Urban Mech, which came from Punykaiju at My Mini Factory. I printed some claws and hammers, found a floating skull between bottles of paint on my bench, and went to town.
What did I think of Flames of Orion? I liked it a lot more than Alpha Strike. The game play was fast, and a complete departure from Battletech. The heat mechanic is novel and fun, and results in explosions, I'm a fan. After a couple of rounds I more or less had a handle on the rules. I look forward to the Kickstarter delivering, and I will play again.
As I build more forces, warbands, what-have-you, I'm starting to get more into providing them with lore. In the case of this crew, these are the Rad Scavengers of HD 37605 C.
The corporation was loathe to simply abandon their investments, so reclamation crews were assembled to recover serviceable equipment and any remaining raw materials. The rest was either broken down for scrap or at least broken to prevent scavengers from gleaning any benefit from what was left behind. Less care was given, however to evacuating the men and women from the recovery crews once the last shipping vessels sailed into the ruined night.
Recognizing they were doomed, workers squirreled away equipment as they could, including recovery mechs and anything that could become a weapon. Abandoned and presumed dead - at least on the corporate ledger - these mad scavengers emerged from the most irradiated areas of planet HD 37605 C to chisel out a new life. This freedom will kill you dead, but at least the bosses won't be around to bother us in our final days.
