191 replies to this topic

[Escef]

Strum Wealh, on 06 August 2014 - 01:42 AM, said:

What is your source for this "textual description" that you mention?

The original TRO3025.

[Bishop Steiner]

Escef, on 06 August 2014 - 03:47 AM, said:

The original TRO3025.

could you scan and post that? I got a first ed one still, and don't recall that, TBH.

[CDLord HHGD]

Bishop Steiner, on 06 August 2014 - 03:49 AM, said:

could you scan and post that? I got a first ed one still, and don't recall that, TBH.

I have both TRO3025's and both call the hatchet a functional club and not a laser sandwich.....

[Escef]

Bishop Steiner, on 06 August 2014 - 03:49 AM, said:

could you scan and post that? I got a first ed one still, and don't recall that, TBH.

Buried in my storage somewhere... I think I used to have a pdf of that printing, but if I did I must have deleted it after I got the official pdf of 3039.

cdlord, on 06 August 2014 - 04:17 AM, said:

I have both TRO3025's and both call the hatchet a functional club and not a laser sandwich.....

Does that include the one that didn't have a hatchet listed under the Weapons&Equipment table?

[Strum Wealh]

Escef, on 06 August 2014 - 03:47 AM, said:

The original TRO3025.

Bishop Steiner, on 06 August 2014 - 03:49 AM, said:

could you scan and post that? I got a first ed one still, and don't recall that, TBH.

TRO 3025 (both the original & the revised version) says nothing of the sort within the description of the Hatchetman.

What it says (on page 48 of TRO 3025 & page 48 of TRO 3025R) is:
"The Hatchetman's hatchet is actually a hand held club. The club makes the 'Mech a slightly more powerful fighter in hand to hand combat. This still does not overcome the light armor and general frailness of the Hatchetman."

The exact text is reproduced on the Solaris7 page (here), on the BattleTech Engineer page (here), and on the EBT Trueborn page (here).
Additionally, none of TRO 3039, TRO 3050, TRO 3050 Revised, TRO 3050 Upgrade, CBT Master Rules, or TechManual describe Hatchets in general, or the Hatchetman's Hatchet specifically, as being made up of a laser & Heat Sinks.

Morover, both CBTMR and TechManual indicate that no BattleMech can mount a Hatchet in an arm that does not possess a hand.

• "To use the Hatchet, a BattleMech must have a functioning Hand Actuator in the arm in which the Hatchet is mounted." - CBTMR (revised edition, #10984), pg. 138
  
• "Each arm may install a maximum of 1 Hatchet, and then only if the selected arm also [possesses] a full set of arm and hand actuators." - TechManual, pg. 220

Edited by Strum Wealh, 06 August 2014 - 04:25 AM.

[CDLord HHGD]

Escef, on 06 August 2014 - 04:20 AM, said:

Buried in my storage somewhere... I think I used to have a pdf of that printing, but if I did I must have deleted it after I got the official pdf of 3039.


Does that include the one that didn't have a hatchet listed under the Weapons&Equipment table?

What Strum said, but you are also correct in that the original 3025 doesn't list the hatchet in the chart. It's just nothing.... So, artistic fluff pre-ruleset?

[Escef]

Strum Wealh, on 06 August 2014 - 04:24 AM, said:

TRO 3025 (both the original & the revised version) says nothing of the sort within the description of the Hatchetman.

What it says (on page 48 of TRO 3025 & page 48 of TRO 3025R) is:
"The Hatchetman's hatchet is actually a hand held club. The club makes the 'Mech a slightly more powerful fighter in hand to hand combat. This still does not overcome the light armor and general frailness of the Hatchetman."

The exact text is reproduced on the Solaris7 page (here), on the BattleTech Engineer page (here), and on the EBT Trueborn page (here).
Additionally, none of TRO 3039, TRO 3050, TRO 3050 Revised, TRO 3050 Upgrade, CBT Master Rules, or TechManual describe Hatchets in general, or the Hatchetman's Hatchet specifically, as being made up of a laser & Heat Sinks.

Morover, both CBTMR and TechManual indicate that no BattleMech can mount a Hatchet in an arm that does not possess a hand.

• "To use the Hatchet, a BattleMech must have a functioning Hand Actuator in the arm in which the Hatchet is mounted." - CBTMR (revised edition, #10984), pg. 138
  
• "Each arm may install a maximum of 1 Hatchet, and then only if the selected arm also [possesses] a full set of arm and hand actuators." - TechManual, pg. 220

If you have a scan of the original book that would be nice. Because the original printing pre-dates construction rules for hatchets. The mech did not have one. It had a third ML. I'd wager money on this, and I am not a betting man.

[CDLord HHGD]

Escef, on 06 August 2014 - 04:29 AM, said:

If you have a scan of the original book that would be nice. Because the original printing pre-dates construction rules for hatchets. The mech did not have one. It had a third ML. I'd wager money on this, and I am not a betting man.

[Escef]

cdlord, on 06 August 2014 - 04:34 AM, said:

Ok, I was wrong about the third laser. But if you check later printings you will see the 3F with 3 fewer heat sinks. What does the text say?

Edited by Escef, 06 August 2014 - 04:42 AM.

[CDLord HHGD]

Escef, on 06 August 2014 - 04:41 AM, said:

Ok, I was wrong about the third laser. But if you check later printings you will see the 3F with 3 fewer heat sinks. What does the text say?

It's worth nothing that these are from my scanned archived hard copy of my original TRO3025. At the time had to search and blackmail to get ahold of it.

Edited by cdlord, 06 August 2014 - 04:51 AM.

[Bishop Steiner]

Escef, on 06 August 2014 - 04:41 AM, said:

Ok, I was wrong about the third laser. But if you check later printings you will see the 3F with 3 fewer heat sinks. What does the text say?

Yeah, they did not charge it weight, initially, and later used 3 of the (way too many) 14 heatsinks to comp. But the text described it's "gruesome cleaving" and such.

Later today I will have to dig out my first edition rules of war and 2nd and 3rd to see when they actually did include "official" hatchet rules, because, TBH, I can't remember.

Edited by Bishop Steiner, 06 August 2014 - 04:48 AM.

[Escef]

cdlord, on 06 August 2014 - 04:46 AM, said:

From a pdf that jumps straight from the cover to page 8, right? I'm pretty sure that's not first printing, but unless I can cause my copy to magical rise to the surface in my storage, I can't independently confirm... So, either I'm mistaken (and becoming senile in my impending old age), or this is from the second printing? I dunno. I will concede that the available resources do not support me on this.

[CDLord HHGD]

Escef, on 06 August 2014 - 04:53 AM, said:

From a pdf that jumps straight from the cover to page 8, right? I'm pretty sure that's not first printing, but unless I can cause my copy to magical rise to the surface in my storage, I can't independently confirm... So, either I'm mistaken (and becoming senile in my impending old age), or this is from the second printing? I dunno. I will concede that the available resources do not support me on this.

Had to do what I had to do. I wasn't willing to run a band saw down the spine of my good copy to get a decent scan for archiving...

[Carrioncrows]

I agree with almost everything posted here.

However.

I think the Assassin should only have the bare minimum hardpoints.

For instance the ASN-21

Would have
x1 Energy and x2 missile hard points

But all variants would have the perk = (-75% cooldown on energy and missile weapons)

They would have very few hardpoints but be able to fire them x4 times faster

[Escef]

cdlord, on 06 August 2014 - 05:04 AM, said:

Had to do what I had to do. I wasn't willing to run a band saw down the spine of my good copy to get a decent scan for archiving...

Wouldn't be an issue with my copy, the binding fell apart ages ago. Sucker's held together by duct tape.

EDIT: Unfortunately, the book is also beat to hell and back. That and back in the early teen years I used colored pencils to apply woodland camo to the T-bolt (which came out well) and a green legs to sky blue chest transition on the Battlemaster (which came out really bad).

Edited by Escef, 06 August 2014 - 05:20 AM.

[Strum Wealh]

Bishop Steiner, on 06 August 2014 - 04:48 AM, said:

Yeah, they did not charge it weight, initially, and later used 3 of the (way too many) 14 heatsinks to comp. But the text described it's "gruesome cleaving" and such.

Later today I will have to dig out my first edition rules of war and 2nd and 3rd to see when they actually did include "official" hatchet rules, because, TBH, I can't remember.

cdlord already beat me to posting the page scans.

As for the Hatchet rules, they appear on page 46 of the BattleTech 4th edition Rulebook (#1604), so they existed at least since that was published.
Sarna gives the publishing date for that as 1996.

The Rules of War (#1626, published in 1987) has rules for picking up objects and using them as clubs (on page 27), but seems to have no rules for Hatchets specifically.
The BattleTech Compendium (#1640, published in September 1990), though, does include specific rules for Hatchets (on page 31).

So, it would seem as though specific rules for Hatchets were added somewhere between 1987 and late 1990 - between one and four years after TRO 3025 was published (in 1986).

[Noesis]

[Bishop Steiner]

Well, instead, we get the Vindicator, as expected.....but gonna keep stumping along for the Assassin!

[Escef]

Bishop Steiner, on 07 August 2014 - 05:12 AM, said:

Well, instead, we get the Vindicator, as expected.....but gonna keep stumping along for the Assassin!

Lemme know if you need a hand. Hit me up on twitter or something.

[Bishop Steiner]

updated art to better follow original profile of the ASSASSIN, by narrowing the side torso/shoulders, and delineated "idealized" hit boxes.


thoughts?