Training Day 1 (Battletech Aces: Scouring Sands)

 Now that I have finished the Forgotten Ruin campaign, it is time to play Battletech Aces. The first training scenario involves four Inner Sphere mechs fighting two Clan mechs. These are all mechs found in the Alpha Strike boxed set.

Set-up. The 8th Sword of Light face off against a pair of Rasalhague Dominion mechs

To help you get to grips with using the Aces automa for the hostile force, the scenario is set up as fully programmed with all the dice rolls done for you. It tells you where to move your figures and walks you through reading the Aces cards to determine what the hostile force does. I did this once to get my head round it, then I played the scenario out properly.

The forces comprise, on the Draconis Combine side, an Archer, a Warhammer, a Phoenix Hawk and a Locust. Facing them are a Rasalhague Dominion Timber Wolf and Pouncer. In theory, the advantage lies with the Inner Sphere mechs, because they are worth more points.

The Timber Wolf moved into cover of the building ahead of it, dodging around to get a good shot at the Archer, which had moved into the woods in front of it, supported by the Warhammer. Meanwhile, the Pouncer had also moved into the woods ahead of it as the Locust and Phoenix Hawk raced forward, using buildings as cover. Before it knew it, the Pouncer had a Locust standing right behind it hammering it. Unphased, the Pouncer pilot let rip a carefully aimed shot at the Phoenix Hawk, scoring a freak critical that damaged its engine. The Timber Wolf was busily hammering the Archer from range at this point. Despite its best efforts, the Pouncer could not shake the Locust, whose persistence was rewarded. The Pouncer was pounded into the ground, leaving the Timber Wolf on its own.

"We have you now, cursed clanner!"

The four Inner Sphere mechs closed in on the lone enemy mech, surrounding it. However, the Timber Wolf pilot was canny and spotted an opportunity. He moved to close with the Locust and blew it apart, while keeping his mech far enough away that the Inner Sphere weapons all missed him.

"Oh no you don't, spheroid scum!"

Then he gunned his engine and raced in behind the Archer, firing everything he had at it, causing the heat in his cockpit to jump massively.The Archer slumped to the floor, a pile of slag. The rest of the lance retreated.

Conclusions

As far as this game went, the clanners had the dice on their side. They won the initiative every single turn of this five-turn scenario. They also scored a through-armour critical against the Phoenix Hawk, and trashed the poor Locust and Archer with an unfeasibly high number of normal hits that took out the structure of both mechs in no time at all. Meanwhile, the spheroids missed a lot of the time, and the two times they scored a chance of a critical hit, the result was 'no critical hit'. It reminded me of playing my brother and my friend, both of whom score lots of crits while I always seem to roll the 'no critical hit' result. It was lucky for me that the Locust was able to dance around the Pouncer and pound it in the back or I might not have taken out even one of the enemy mechs.

The automa worked well, giving me a few surprises and leading to a fun game. It took a bit of getting used to. There area a bunch of icons on the cards that you need to get familiar with. Fortunately, there is a cheat sheet on the back of the rulebook, which helps a lot. Working through the priorities lists that you are given and remembering to stop when you meet the conditions of one of them is also a mental hurdle. However, that will come with more practice. The play by play walkthrough really helped both with remembering where to stop and just apply the conditions and with making the conditions for choosing actions make sense. Movement is the more complex part of this, with a good chance of you having several possible end points for the move, but it did not make my brain ache too much. I should note at this point that the rules include a note to just relax and not fret if you get something wrong. Important and good advice. My solo gaming became way more enjoyable once I achieved that realisation.

Now I need to read the rules again to trying to fix them in my brain before playing the second training scenario. That one features all the mechs from the Alpha Strike boxed set, so it will be interesting to see how long it takes to play out.