What breach dice would you give to BattleTech weapons?

[Alius]

Okay. I've asked this in private, but I'll ask it again now. Randall? Troll? What breach dice would you assign to different battletech weapons?

Feel free to expand into range brackets, too.

[ColBosch]

Well, it depends. BattleTech weapons are insanely powerful. They have to be, to get through the similarly insanely protective BattleTech armor. For example, a modern 120mm hypervelocity tank cannon is a Light Rifle (Cannon) in BT terms...meaning it does no damage to 'Mech armor. This would suggest that Leviathans weapons would be just as worthless against BattleTech units...and BT weapons would start in the range of 3DBlack and go up from there (way up). Worse yet, given how vulnerable leviathans are to lightning (electroid "flashes over" catastrophically when over-energized), any hit from a PPC would likely blast great holes in a lev and drop its carcass like a stone.

Really, the tech bases are just so vastly different that neither system would work well for crossovers. This isn't a bad thing, it just reflects two very different realities (each with different divergences in physics) seperated by over a thousand years.

[ElectronJon]

I think you'd be better served trying to apply a dice-modifier based system to BattleForce/Quick-Strike than to traditional BattleTech.  Even then, I'm not sure you can maintain the feel of the game. 

In BattleTech, you slowly wear down a section of armor, tracking cumulative damage as you go.  Leviathans is more about smacking repeatedly into one side of a ship, hoping that something punches through a weakness in the vast expanse of armor.

That being said, it might be interesting to get movement and terrain mods into a dice-modifier system.  Hmm.

[Worktroll]

Going the reverse way, I think using Leviathans-style initiative all - assaults move first, then all heavies, then all mediums, then all lights - would drastically improve the value of mediums and lights in the game

[Trenchknife]

That's....an intriguing idea.  I'm gonna have to game that out and see how it works.  Hmm....where to put vehicles?  Same setup to move with their counterparts in the Mech forces I think. 

[Weirdo]

Hmm....where to put vehicles?  Same setup to move with their counterparts in the Mech forces I think.

Given that one of the main early advantages of 'Mechs over tanks was their ability to easily outmaneuver them, I'd put tanks as one step before their equivalent 'mechs. (It's probably due to the shorter time in 'mech decision-making as opposed to tanks. A tank commander must decide where to go, then tell the driver, and only then does the driver go, while a 'mechwarrior just decides where to go and goes there. Same with weapons fire.) The move would be assault tanks, then assault 'mechs, heavy tanks, heavy 'mechs, etc. Light and fast stuff would still have an advantage over heavies, but 'mechs would still have an advantage, one that could be negated if they got careless.

[Trenchknife]

Makes sense to me and is a logical result I believe.  Hmm...now to contemplate VTOLs, WiGEs, Aerospace, and Infantry/BA

Also, in order to make life a bit more maneageable in a combined arms battlefield.  Each unit would need to be given an initiative class.
Mechs: Light=1/Medium=2/Heavy=3/Assault=4
Vehicles: L=2/M=3/H=4/A=5

For others here's what I'm thinking:
Infantry/BA: 1 possibly 0 even
VTOL: 1 or 2 here not sure
ASF: L=2/M=3/H=4
Small Craft: 5
DS: 6
Warship: 7
Jumpship: 8

Not so much because it's necessary on the field, but it would easily illustrate how movement works among all the parts.

[pianobar]

You could possibly take that a bit farther, if you really wanted to get detailed. Knock the Clan vehicle ranks up a notch for those factions that don't field them normally, make units that traditionally use Aerospace have a later turn sequence to illustrate their adept piloting ability, etc.

For ground units, I would almost put standard infantry moving before BA, to show their advantage. One plus to this kind of thinking is it keeps people from using infantry/BA as initiative-sinks.

[Lord Cameron]

Going the reverse way, I think using Leviathans-style initiative all - assaults move first, then all heavies, then all mediums, then all lights - would drastically improve the value of mediums and lights in the game

Indeed, but then in a light lance vs light lance one side would move EVERYTHING first.

I would prefer to see individual init rolls, with an added bonus for lighter/faster units.

There should also be an advantage for a unit "tailing"

[Trenchknife]

Going the reverse way, I think using Leviathans-style initiative all - assaults move first, then all heavies, then all mediums, then all lights - would drastically improve the value of mediums and lights in the game

Indeed, but then in a light lance vs light lance one side would move EVERYTHING first.

I would prefer to see individual init rolls, with an added bonus for lighter/faster units.

There should also be an advantage for a unit "tailing"

Well, the result that I've often seen with a light vs light or medium vs medium lance fight is that it usually ends up with a 'chain of pain' whereby a nice series of rear shots occurs.  Sure you can end up have an entire lance get reamed if the controlling player isn't smart.  I kinda like the idea of cohesive unit movement for lances.  Though if you're playing a large fight, I'd be fine with stopping that movement at lances/stars/level 1s.