Battletech: Alpha Strike Hardcover – October 9, 2013

Thanks!

Alpha Strike, essentially the the fast-playing version of Total Warfare, serves to bring BattleTech to the crowds that prefer fast playing mini-strategy games. It also serves to bring this BattleTech old dog (starting playing with the first post-BattleDroids name change to BattleTech boxed set in the 1980's when they still had the unseen as primary mechs of the Inner Sphere) a way to play with his Tomboy 12-year old that doesn't take us a full day.Really. That is the advantage of this version.When I got the BattleTech introductory Boxed Set, it took us about 1/2 hour of setup, and then almost 4 hours to play a 2 light mech vs 2 light mech battle.With Alpha Strike, we set up in 15 minutes, and played a full lance vs full lance (light, medium, heavy, and assault) in less than 2 hours. It was glorious. It was also close (dang Jenners).I believe this product would work well with A Time of War, the roleplaying aspect, to speed up the large scale battles and get back to the role-playing and personal scale battles quickly, but have not had the chance to test that theory yet. I would still use the Total Warfare (or at least Introductory boxed set) rules for any 1 vs 1 mech duels however, to make them more dramatic.Unlike Total Warfare, this book has sample mechs in it (sample Lances, really), with their stats in Alpha Strike terms. If you want more, there is the Master Unit List at the Battletech website (address also given in the book) that has pretty much most of the mechs, vehicles, battlearmor, and aircraft you could want. I recommend going to the MUL to see the format of Mech stats in the game before purchase if you want to be sure of the level of detail.Battletech has always been a game that didn't require you to have the specific unit mini to play it, so this combined with the Introductory Boxed Set (conveniently, this book fits right in the box) gives you most of what you need to start blasting away in Alpha Strike.The only reasons this is not a 5-star product is 1) The Aerospace rules are somewhat abstract, meaning that if you love your planes, you're abstracting them away and 2) the C^3 system is poorly implemented in this book. Thankfully, C^3 is somewhat rare on Mechs, so it should not impact too many games (and is a virtual non-issue in my preferred Succession Wars era).

This is a very palatable and fast new format for reviving the old Battletech minis and bringing new people into the action. However there are a few fundamental issues. The point buy system is easily exploitable, this is easy enough to deal with as long as its understood, people should buy units with in game currency or use an agreed upon template of unit types and era. The biggest problem comes with the inability to diversify the various impacts of weapon load-outs. There should be slightly more detail in that regard for those of us who wish to play out engagements of smaller sizes, similar to those common in classic Battletech. For example there should be a margin of success for mechs with many small arms to still cause some damage on a near miss. Contrarily mechs with one or two massive weapons, like the Hollander or Hunchback, lose out on a lot of their feel when a single volly merely causes a bit of damage instead of posing a serious threat to critically damage smaller mechs. I've solved both issues with house rules and I think these minor touches really restore the feel of the Battletech game and still allow for the fast paced streamlined play that Alpha Strike offers. It is now much easier to incorporate combined arms, aerospace, infantry and armor into a single battle in a short time.

Alpha Strike is essentially a rule set where you can play larger scale Battletech battles by sacrificing detail. There are a lot of factors which determine how long a game will last including, but not limited to, player knowledge of the rules, units used, the battlefield and skill of pilots. The vast majority of my standard Battletech games that use 4 ‘Mechs against 4 ‘Mechs take about 4 hours to play. I use map sheets for the battlefield, so the setup of 4 map sheets or so, the handing out of 8 or so record sheets and getting the miniatures out, takes maybe 15 minutes at most. I understand that Alpha Strike was meant to speed up game play so that you can use more units than standard Battletech. I really don’t understand the appeal though. O.K. so you can use more units but at the cost of detail. Does that make the game more interesting? And honestly, learning how the standard Battletech rules work isn’t rocket science. Even with Alpha Strike, there are a lot of large scale canon battles in the Battletech universe that would be impractical to play out. My opinion is just to use fewer units with the standard Battletech rules and acknowledge that in most cases, it is just one small section of the battle.It really depends upon what you are looking for...

Great addition to bring back Battletech! I've loved playing Classic Battletech for years, but always wished that the game found a way to pick up the pace and to allow for larger formations (companies, battalions, regiments) to come into play without causing a game to last for days. This is exactly that! While the record keeping has been vastly streamlined, it doesn't take away from the nuances that make Battletech great. The book also offers great strategies in building campaigns and scenarios for objective-based play. Plus, Catalyst was fantastic and made Alpha Strike record cards for just about every mech and vehicle available on line FOR FREE, so it really spurs on interest in playing. I played a company vs. company game with a friend last week, and we actually finished the game in under 5 hours; this would normally have lasted us more than 10 hours! Great job Catalyst!

Hallo zusammen,tja, die Überschrift verwirrt, aber ich kläre auf:"Einfacher"Alpha Strike bringt das klassische BattleTech auf den Tabletop Tisch und vereinfacht die meisten Spielabläufe.Daher ist Alpha Strike zu allererst mal für Personen geeignet, denen das brettspielhafte spielen auf Hexfeldern nicht gefällt und außerdem für Einsteiger schneller zu erlernen.Was wird vereinfacht:- Bewegung: Ich starte bei A, kann mich x-Zoll bewegen und beende den Zug bei B, ohne Drehungen etc. zu beachten. Lediglich das Gelände sorgt für Abzüge.- Feuern: Es gibt drei definierte Entfernenungen die den Treffermodifikator erhöhen. Nah/-, Mittel/+2 und Weit/+4. Die eigene Bewegung hat keinen Einfluss auf den Trefferwurf. Dafür geben Gegner unabhängig davon ob sie sich bewegt haben einen Modifikator. So sind leichte und sprungfähige Mechs meist schwerer zu treffen. Auch das Gelände erschwert das Treffen wie gehabt.- Schaden: Jede Einheit verfügt über einen Waffenschaden der sich aus der Summe aller Waffen ergibt. Dieser Schaden variiert je nach Entfernung.- Datenbögen: Der Datenbogen wurde deutlich vereinfacht. Schaden wird nicht auf Zonen verteilt, es gibt nur einen für Panzerung und einen für Interne Struktur.Sind die Basisregeln einmal gelesen und ist ein passender Tisch nebst Gelände vorhanden, kann schon losgespielt werden.Sobald man drin ist, kann man sich den fortgeschrittenen Regeln widmen, die dann die notwendige Spieltiefe und Taktik rein bringen."Größer"Da die Regeln und Datenblätter vereinfacht wurden, ist es jetzt möglich in größeren Truppenverbänden zu spielen. Dauert bei CBT ein Spiel mit zwei Lanzen einen ganzen Abend, so kann im gleichen Zeitraum bei AS ein Gefecht auf Kompanieebene durchgeführt werden. Endlich macht es Sinn mit Jägern, Panzer, Artillerie etc. zu spielen.Zum Regelwerk selbst:Das Buch selbst ist super verarbeitet. Die Inhaltsseiten sind zwar etwas dünn, aber stabil.Wer die aktuellen Regelwerke vom Catalyst kennt, weiß was er bekommt.Druck und Bindung sind einwandfrei. Preis/Leistung stimmt absolut.Viele CBT-ler stehen AS weiterhin skeptisch gegenüber, aber wer schon immer Lust hatte tonnenschwere Kriegsmaschinen durch Tabletop Landschaften stampfen zu lassen, der sollte hier unbedingt zugreifen.

Fast play Battletach, does what it says on the cover.

Great book came fast in good condition. Rule look clear. Top quality book.

far too expensive compared to other places - £28 in shop or £25 from other sources product itself is a must for battletech players

Do it, buy it. Its a must have.quick, simple, but still battletech.Giant stompy robot action and with terrain