Trial of Possession, of Revenge, and of High Stakes

Once again, I have to apologize for the lack of updates. Unfortunately, much of what we've been doing has been posted on Facebook or Instagram, so it hasn't made it over here in a bit. To sum up a couple of our past games, though.

We had some serious Clan ruckus to start. A "team" four way Trial of Possession for a world on Clan Wolf's Periphery border. Jesse had his Ghost Bears in full gear, with a Stone Rhino, Wyvern IIC, and Mad Dog. Sean also brought a Stone Rhino, as well as a Nova and Hunchback IIC. Guest player Jen had 'Mech selection help from Sean, and ended up with a Turkina, a Cauldron-Born, and...something small. I actually don't remember what her third 'Mech was, as it died quickly. I'll get to that in a moment. I, of course, represented Clan Wolf well, with a Dire Wolf, Blood Reaper, and Hellion.

The initial plan was to divide into two sides - Wolf/Bear vs Falcon/Spirit. What we actually decided on once 'Mechs hit the field is that the winner of the Bear vs Blood Spirit fight would match with the winner of the Wolf vs Jade Falcon scrap. Then, to make it even more interesting, we added a house rule - lose a 'Mech, take a Jagerbomb. Now, I'm sure I don't have to tell anyone out there how bad an idea it is to mix drinking with BattleTech, especially when we were all drinking a bit, but it's a bad idea. As in, several hours to play three turns bad.

So what happened here is that on the Spirit/Bear side, a super lucky shot from Jesse's Stone Rhino head capped Sean's Stone Rhino, and then later took down his Nova. Whilst not losing a 'Mech. Which put the Hunchback IIC at a disadvantage, especially with blowing through UAC/20 rounds like hot cakes.

On the Wolf/Falcon end, the smallest Falcon 'Mech died on turn one, the Cauldron-Born died on turn three, the Turkina couldn't hit the Hellion but did damage the Dire Wolf a lot.

Because we were all getting soused (Jesse and Sean especially), we called it with a Ghost Wolf win over the Blood Falcon forces.

However, to paraphrase a quote from Patlabor 2, in the aftermath of an unjust peace lay the seeds for the next war...

So then we came to the Trial of Freebirthasskicking, aka Sean is really upset that Jesse beat him so badly that he wanted a rematch. And no teams this time to blame it on. I called total weight. Unfortunately, we had an unforeseen complication - one of Jesse's friends from Minnesota planned on surprising him by being here waiting. In his excitement, he ended up selecting far underweight and as the defender, he also chose the maps (which gave Sean the choice of map edge), which also did not end up in his favor.

Ghost Bears rocked the Stone Rhino, the Mad Dog, Solitaire, and Bear Cub. Blood Spirits brought a Kodiak, Timber Wolf, and a pair of Crimson Langurs. You see the problem here already?

The banter between the guys and our guest made the game pretty light hearted, but the Bears faced a daunting uphill battle against a seasoned veteran of multiple campaigns and pick up games.

Then it went downhill fast...

At which point Jesse tried self immolation to gather his warrior spirit...

But it did not help..

Jesse's Mad Dog takes three shots from Sean's Kodiak - two slugs of LB 20X and a medium laser all in the CT. Lots of boom. Bears call it being basically down two 'Mechs ('Dog and Solitaire). Sean, being who he is, took no pleasure from the win and is willing to give Jesse a rematch when he can focus more on the game. And also at a point where I pick the mapsheets and ensure both sides are matching tonnage. Just in case.

Now, part of the reason that updates have been so slow is that we'd planned on also starting a D&D chronicle, which we're still building characters for, and then I got back into playing Magic with Rachel, and also with Tiffy and Jer at some point, in exchange for the two of them playing more BattleTech. And with my upcoming marriage & family time stuff, my gaming time has severely been curtailed for right now. Look for more updates to be coming in the near future doh!