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I bought the “a game of armored combat” box set. God damnit What have I done Why I hate you all This is all your fault Why
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Jun 26, 2023 03:34
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Crazy Joe Wilson posted:I think there's room and necessity for both stories, but the majority of the novels should be on the smaller side of things. If you're constantly advancing the story it makes it hard for people to roleplay or pick a faction if there's a high chance you're going to axe it. The Republic of the Sphere was steadily gaining fans among older fans as more and more content came out for it, and then !boom! IlClan killed it off. You know what? It would be nice if ilClan era Federated Suns went on a kind of "reluctant savior of the Republic" kind of kick for pushing into the Dieron District area. It'd give lore enjoyers something to rally around and bring the faction around to having something nicer than the schadenfreude-bait teethkicking they'd been getting as of late. Screw drac players tbh
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Jun 26, 2023 03:43
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I'd love to know what happened to my 4th Deneb Light Cavalry after they became the Deneb Kaitos planetary militia under Republic rule. The FedSuns had the planet back for like two years before the Dracs took it. Did the militia get rebuilt to RCT standard and shipped offworld or did it die in agromechs?  Grevlek posted:Ymmv but I would just play the game. It isn't like 30 cents on every dollar you spend is split between the Queen of England and Vladimir Putin.
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Jun 26, 2023 04:57
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aphid_licker posted:The noble stuff always had this sorta old timey soap opera feel. Like it's just this handful of ppl dramaing at each other in budget sets. It never worked that well for me. The old Stackpole Melissa and Hanse trilogy etc. Stuff like Wolves on the Border felt a tad more lived in but overall it's probably better to write about the little guys and let the reader imagine the crazy poo poo going on at the top that sets it all in motion. Well the great houses do love stealing each others DNA to make fake replacement babies and secret heirs.
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Jun 26, 2023 09:56
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Sidesaddle Cavalry posted:You know what? There technically was a "Republic March" for a few short years in the Dark Age era, it appeared on one map in a book and was mentioned by another character, made out of territory the SwordSworn had siphoned off the Republic back to House Davion under Caleb. Didn't last too long as that territory (Or what's left of it, prior to ER3145 it was basically Prefecture III and IV, with Tikonov as capital) is now part of the Draconis March again. But if enough Republic forces made it to FS space as refugees, I could see Julian Davion forming them up into a couple regiments and telling Jonah Levin "If you can capture this territory you get to be the March Lord/Exarch of it under my protection", assauging his guilty conscience over betraying Stone. Xenomrph posted:I bought the “a game of armored combat” box set. Welcome to the club. Alpha Strike is the way I prefer to play. Also; for the cheapest CGL minis, this is your ticket. https://www.fortressminiaturesandgames.com/
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Jun 26, 2023 11:10
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Crazy Joe Wilson posted:There technically was a "Republic March" for a few short years in the Dark Age era, it appeared on one map in a book and was mentioned by another character, made out of territory the SwordSworn had siphoned off the Republic back to House Davion under Caleb. Didn't last too long as that territory (Or what's left of it, prior to ER3145 it was basically Prefecture III and IV, with Tikonov as capital) is now part of the Draconis March again. But if enough Republic forces made it to FS space as refugees, I could see Julian Davion forming them up into a couple regiments and telling Jonah Levin "If you can capture this territory you get to be the March Lord/Exarch of it under my protection", assauging his guilty conscience over betraying Stone. My friend instructed me to buy from Aries Games and Miniatures 
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Jun 26, 2023 15:30
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aphid_licker posted:The noble stuff always had this sorta old timey soap opera feel. Like it's just this handful of ppl dramaing at each other in budget sets. It never worked that well for me. The old Stackpole Melissa and Hanse trilogy etc. Stuff like Wolves on the Border felt a tad more lived in but overall it's probably better to write about the little guys and let the reader imagine the crazy poo poo going on at the top that sets it all in motion. That's on the craft of the writer. Stackpole's stuff feels like that because Stackpole has no idea how to write a conversation. You can write stuff between powerful people and not have it feel like a high school play, but he's never going to be able to deliver that. FWIW though I agree that it's best to keep powerful people as background figures. Not because they're impossible to write well, more because the stuff they should be doing doesn't fit well into the structure of your standard novel. They should have big plans that work themselves out over decades, not finding ways to drive a robot.
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Jun 26, 2023 19:04
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Main event has been pretty boring tbh. It meanders a lot and I'm curious what the payoff will be
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Jun 26, 2023 19:47
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There isn't one, you don't have to keep punishing yourself.
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Jun 26, 2023 19:50
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I never got my hands on the Black Thorns novels when I was getting physical books so I am super looking forward to just how terrible they are when I hit that point in my Legends reading. Literally nothing about the books even hints at it being more than bad fanfiction.
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Jun 26, 2023 20:04
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Arquinsiel posted:I'd love to know what happened to my 4th Deneb Light Cavalry after they became the Deneb Kaitos planetary militia under Republic rule. The FedSuns had the planet back for like two years before the Dracs took it. Did the militia get rebuilt to RCT standard and shipped offworld or did it die in agromechs? Well technically there is also still a Queen.
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Jun 26, 2023 22:24
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Defiance Industries posted:There isn't one, you don't have to keep punishing yourself. I powered through, it was not great. Now to read either the kerensky trilogy (I think that's the clan invasion) or some of the Solaris vii books.
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Jun 26, 2023 23:58
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Arquinsiel posted:I never got my hands on the Black Thorns novels when I was getting physical books so I am super looking forward to just how terrible they are when I hit that point in my Legends reading. Literally nothing about the books even hints at it being more than bad fanfiction. I remember them as being substandard but not terribly so, although admittedly my standards for genre fiction are low. They did have a few interesting bits, like the mechanics of how Kurita handles mercs on Clan contracts, as well as how they ran Clan blockades.
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Jun 27, 2023 00:43
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Yeah I quite happily consume slop so in a way I'm looking forward to seeing just how predictable and bad they are.feedmegin posted:Well technically there is also still a Queen.
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Jun 27, 2023 12:47
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Arquinsiel posted:I never got my hands on the Black Thorns novels when I was getting physical books so I am super looking forward to just how terrible they are when I hit that point in my Legends reading. Literally nothing about the books even hints at it being more than bad fanfiction. Bad fan fiction is a good way to describe it. Underdog hero with a tragic background gathers up a team of misfits to overcome impossible odds. Random NPC of negligible value perishes to give the team a CAUSE to rally around. A plan so stupid it only works in a movie. Good stuff.
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Jun 27, 2023 14:34
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So I wanted to dive into the game soon but wanted to start with some novels. Which books are good to start with?
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Jun 28, 2023 20:17
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Elblanco posted:So I wanted to dive into the game soon but wanted to start with some novels. Which books are good to start with? Wolves on the Border Grey Death trilogy Double Blind
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Jun 28, 2023 20:32
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Gray death trilogy + the warrior trilogy provide some nice background on the return of technology to the inner sphere and the fourth succession war
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Jun 28, 2023 20:46
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But then you have to read Stackpole as an adult instead of an 11 year old.
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Jun 28, 2023 21:00
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i bought the humble bundle and have read the first two GDL books and recommend that as a good start. it does feel like jumping right into the third requires me to read something else so that some 'in game time' can pass. going from just about having a lance, to just about having a company, to just about having a whole planetary empire feels a little incomplete wrt game progression i wish there was a book of them at the company level doing some stuff ****edit**** can anyone recommend a book to read inbetween book 2 and 3 of GDL???? Grevlek fucked around with this message at 22:19 on Jun 28, 2023 |
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Jun 28, 2023 22:11
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I read Decision at Thunder Rift really late into BattleTech's history and I was pleasantly surprised at how right it got the feel of things considering it was the first or very nearly the first book.
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Jun 28, 2023 22:18
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Gray death was pretty good, then I read main event (don't bother) but have started warrior trilogy and it's alright but not stellar so far. The Solaris vii books I kind of want to read if they're not world changing stories. Just random people fighting with mechs not changing the world. There was a one I read when younger which was a solaris mechwarrior who ended up in the Solaris vii riots but it never seemed to get more involved than that. Can't remember the title now though
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Jun 28, 2023 23:49
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That's Illusions of Victory. The only thing I remember about it is that it contains a joke about how everyone just fast forwards through mech fights in movies because they all look the same.
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Jun 28, 2023 23:53
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Defiance Industries posted:That's Illusions of Victory. The only thing I remember about it is that it contains a joke about how everyone just fast forwards through mech fights in movies because they all look the same. Someone in the first warrior trilogy does that but I think it's more because they don't care about the fight and have bet on the specifics of the result. The only thing I remember about it is specific amounts of tons of armor being shot off. Excited to reread it to see if it holds up as okay sci fi 20 years after I read it the first time
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Jun 29, 2023 00:02
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I'm not going to claim the warrior trilogy is well written, it's just a good groundwork for a lot of the poo poo going on pre clan invasion. Fourth succession war, word of Blake and ComStar shenanigans, kell hounds stuff, etc
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Jun 29, 2023 00:09
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Azhais posted:I'm not going to claim the warrior trilogy is well written, it's just a good groundwork for a lot of the poo poo going on pre clan invasion. Fourth succession war, word of Blake and ComStar shenanigans, kell hounds stuff, etc If a book is only worth reading because you need to know the things that happen in it to set up things later, and the actual writing isn't enjoyable with interesting and believable characters, you might as well just read a wiki summary.
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Jun 29, 2023 01:15
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Enjoyable books that move the timeline forward: Robert Charrette Enjoyable books: Vic Milan Books that move the timeline forward: Michael Stackpole
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Jun 29, 2023 02:09
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Stackpole is fine, goons are just goons about stuff. There are better BattleTech authors, but there are also significantly worse authors. Read 'em if you've got 'em TBH.
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Jun 29, 2023 04:14
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I disliked Stackpole long before the first time Richard "Lowtax" Kyanka ever logged onto the internet
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Jun 29, 2023 04:15
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Stackpole's X-wing books are schlocky fun, Stackpole's BattleTech books are awful. I reread Ghost War again about six months ago and it's loving dire. If that was the first BattleTech book I'd ever read I doubt I'd have kept going.
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Jun 29, 2023 04:16
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GD_American posted:I disliked Stackpole long before the first time Richard "Lowtax" Kyanka ever logged onto the internet
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Jun 29, 2023 04:20
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Arquinsiel posted:Stackpole is fine, goons are just goons about stuff. There are better BattleTech authors, but there are also significantly worse authors. Read 'em if you've got 'em TBH. You should only read books that you enjoy, not feel like you're obligated to read them just because you need to for some nebulous understanding of a metaplot that happened 35 years ago.
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Jun 29, 2023 05:20
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Is it too late to plug good sourcebooks for universe lore instead of novels? Inner Sphere was just fine as a digest up to 3062ish.
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Jun 29, 2023 06:23
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I find them to be more enjoyable as a rule. Individual characters have always been the weak point of major stories.
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Jun 29, 2023 07:38
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I quite enjoyed the maximum chaos of all of the jihad era sourcebooks.
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Jun 29, 2023 14:11
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Defiance Industries posted:You should only read books that you enjoy, not feel like you're obligated to read them just because you need to for some nebulous understanding of a metaplot that happened 35 years ago.
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Jun 29, 2023 14:15
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Stackpole is awful, just absolutely awful, he is as bad or worse than his reputation. His characters are either embarrassing Mary Sues, puppy-kicking villains whose only goal is to defeat said Mary Sues, or boring nothings who orbit his Mary Sues. His plots are stale but convoluted, his dialogue is walls of dreadful exposition, and his version of the Inner Sphere is just Reagan's America in space with a few racist Disneyland-foreigner planets for spice. The worst part of Battletech is that he was in control of the metaplot for so long and it loving sucks.
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Jun 29, 2023 16:48
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I just read Ghost War and while it was schlocky with a lot of recycled descriptive tropes it wasn't as dreadful as, say, Kevin J. Anderson Does Dune.
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Jun 29, 2023 18:17
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Ghost War is bad. But it's bad licensed genre fiction for a tabletop wargame. Kevin J. Anderson's Dune is a terrible book that desecrates a masterpiece. It's not just a bad book (it is very bad), it's a bad book based on an incredible book. In a vacuum they're not that different, but the juxtaposition of source material makes KJA's Dune look like the literary version of Hitler. A similar example is Easy Rider 2, a movie that secured the rights to the Easy Rider name and used it to make a film that jerks off to how great cops and troops are.
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Jun 29, 2023 19:02
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Stackpole’s name is kind of funny so he’s got that going for himself at least
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