Lance McMillan wrote: ... Weisman's basic system for Battletech was an obvious derivative of the ancient (1930's vintage) "Fletcher Pratt's Naval Battles" game: players rolling dice to determine the location and extent of damage inflicted by each individual weapon, and then checking off little boxes on status charts to keep track of the totals. ...
Pratt was a writer and a naval expert (before he died in 1956 he had written some 60 books about naval and military affairs), and one day, in 1929, "bored with seven-card stud, backgammon and craps," he and a group of maritime minded friends decided to invent a naval game. They bought a division or two of model ships, pushed back the furniture in Pratt's living room and set to gaming. By the time they were done, they had come up with the rules for a mammoth contest that required up to 60 people on a side, a large ballroom to play in and vast fleets of accurately scaled ships, and the Naval War College started sending down experts to take lessons. [See The World's Most Complicated Game at SIVault, it's a good read.]Pratt's game even had its own version of Battevalue:
There was a vast formula for calculating the fighting power of each ship: (Gc[2] X GN + Gc'[2] X Gn' + 10TT + 10A[2] + 10 A'[2] + 10A" + 25 Ap + M) Sf; + T, and elaborate tables for telling each captain what had happened to his ship when the turn's shooting was over.What that formula means I have no idea, but now I want to find out. I located a source for the original rules at John Curry's History of Wargaming Project, which also has more details about the game:
One of the main facets of the game, the gunnery, is commonly decided by dice. Therefore, games can seem to consist of large numbers of dice rolls reflecting the low hit-rates of long range naval gunnery. To many, the sheer number of dice can make the game seem dull. Pratt aimed to change this by using estimating ranges as a way of determining hits. He also experimented with shooting, darts and tiddle-winks against paper silhouettes as alternatives, but he settled on estimating as the final method. The inspiration of using estimating the range for gunnery accelerated the pace of the game and gave naval wargamers control of the most important aspect of the naval warfare, namely hitting the other side.
It even has it's own miniatures.
I had another email from John Curry informing me he has opened up his ship cards for download. Here is an example.
It's official!I was just informed that the Origins Crew is now being formed, as the VWE pods will be there. The plan is to bring twelve pods out, the price is going to be three game tokens (six bucks).
However, these details may change. And per VGL policy, harassment by staff is always free and will be in stock the entire convention.
Actually, if you commit to being a volunteer, you get free games. We are bringing extra cockpits so our volunteers get a LOT of game time.Here is the Virtual Word Battletech training video:
Sign up to become a MechJock: RedShirt by emailing your availability to propwash@mechjock.com. Put Origins in the subject line.
Better yet, check out the online training manual from MechCorp.
More videos at Virtual World Entertainment. (Realplayer only)
"Big Red" was one of my first Battletech Miniatures (Atlas mini on the left). The enamel paint is badly chipped the the arms are off of it again. Though I'm always tempted to strip off the paint and redo it completely, I like to keep it as an example of how much my painting has changed in the 7 years or so since I came back to painting miniatures as a hobby. It's in bad shape though, so I need to do something about it.
The other miniatures in for repairs are a dis-armed Initiate and an Assassin. This Assassin is another one of my reposed minis, again running instead of standing. Because it is pinned to the base through the left leg, it has a tendency to break free and swing around on the pin. Both minis will get CA glue where they need it.
Next up are a Daishi and Night Gyr. The Daishi (left) is modified to a walking pose, and I cut and pinned the left "elbow" to put the arm in an extended position. This required me to do a bit of sculpting with green stuff (plumbing putty) to make it look right (part of my ongoing quest to learn how to sculpt). This arm is a bit of a weak point and the putty has split from the metal where the joint is pinned, making a crack in the paint. I was hoping a bit of glue would mend it well enough that no one will notice. Unfortunately, it's fairly visible if you look closely.
The Night Gyr (right) saw some rough service 2 years ago at GENCON and needs both arms to be reglued (I really have been putting this off too long). This has a very basic panel scheme, but I worked really hard to get smooth shading on it, which turned out nice.
Here is "Big Red" again after getting touched up. I panel painted some parts so it is no longer solid red, and I think the contrast make it look more distinctive. I used acrylic paint on top of enamel though, so it will probably chip off again soon.
The Night Gyr is ready for action again too.
Here are my raw session notes for Ian Schreiber's GDX talk, Duchamp, Pollock, Rohrer: Games as the Next Avant-Garde. This is my best attempt at a transcription of what he said. Any mistakes or misinterpretations are mine and mine alone. My comments are in square brackets.
