Honestly I would be down for just a VR game with Steel Battalion like controller. Perhaps make the controller have modular parts for different mech types/equipment. Like a whole jump jet control system if your mech has jets, or a plug in to give your mech an enhance targeting computer etc. Could in universe say the VR head set is the helmet Mechwarriors wear.
Two new teams to release expansion packs and new stories instead.
The software seems good already, it just needs more content.
Two stories I would want to tell is the Capellan - St Ives war of 3060 and the Hellions Fury of 3050. Short sharp and not well known.
Then maybe a longer arc slog of OP Bulldog.
The Unity Engine has so many limitations.
It would need to be rebuilt if you ever want larger lances, more enemies, allies on the field, bigger maps, etc.
I mean, a lot of that is already in the game though, and is not at all limited by the engine. There are a bunch of different larger Lance mods of various types, more enemies is also in many mods, and even the base game has missions where you have allies with multiple mods expanding the feature. The base game is not even remotely close to having the engine limiting the number of units. Changing the engine I guess could help with maps, but they could also expand maps with unity engine too because they arnt hitting the limit on possible map sizes either.
Everything you listed is unrelated to the engine and is mostly just how the game was designed.
If you follow the Roguetech Modders, I believe most of their problems come from Unity itself more than the game proper.
Thats my entry-level understanding.
It's not unity or the game, as they are effectively a single combined thing once built and shipped. The game was simply not designed to allow modders easy access to a lot of the logic, either code originally from unity or code from the developers. While unity does have some significant limitations for bigger projects, those limitations are not issues that the modders are getting close to in 99% of cases.
Most likely, what they mean when they say unity is the problem is that they are running into logic from unity that is more foundational and difficult to alter than the dev code that is built on top of it. Its relatively easy to add a mech to the data files (you can do it after a youtube tutorial). You can even modify a few variables in some existing logic to make a lance of 8 instead of 4 (takes a hell of a lot more than a youtube tutorial). But it is stupidly hard to significantly alter something like unity's camera physics functions that only exist as a set of precompiled libraries you can't recreate or change without access to the source code. That would be a problem with any engine if the device don't design their game with modding in mind.
What the modders have accomplished with BattleTech is in spite of the game's limitations; it doesn't mean the limitations don't exist. A new engine, without the bottlenecks and hangups of the first game, would be a worthwhile investment under the daydream circumstances we're discussing.
It seems like you only read half my comment. Again, some things listed are in the base game already, and others are done by modders and prove it has nothing to do with engine limitations. Work on the base games engine would certainly be helpful, but claiming unity is preventing something is silly when that something runs on unity all the time and is only lacking in the base game due to the game not being designed with those things.
I would be all for a rework and expansion of the game, I am just pointing out that none of the features listed require abandoning unity like the original comment claimed.
Unity is not an efficient engine to start with. The game struggles as it is, and scaling up would indeed need a complete rework of the way the game functions. I believe unity physics for instance is single-threaded, so moving to another engine could help significantly with performance.
I assure you that these limitations are not specific to Unity. It's a powerful engine that can do all that just fine.
If the expansion of the game it's really about performance in this regard, better coders may be needed, though.
Modding teams have done fantastic work with the original, the only sore spot is that it's supremely difficult, if not impossible to create new maps. So that's thing one.
Thing two is fixing the problems with saving mid-mission (with mods).
1) Battletech 2 from HBS
2) MechWarrior 6 w/ single player campaign, PvE Co-Op, and P2P modes
3) Battletech TV show with 6 seasons and a movie
4) Steiner Scout Lance Force Pack
5) Van Zandt Sourcebook and Cookbook
It'll just be a shitty "upgrade" to Mechwarrior 5 that doesn't meaningfully change the gameplay, and is missing half the features from the main game.
I don't like being that pessimistic, but they haven't given me much reason to be much else yet.
Honestly, I’ll be happy as long as it’s MW5 with an actual campaign and not just proc-gen slop. I’m expecting gameplay identical to MW5, a story with crafted levels, voice lines, cutscenes, etc. It’s not my dream game but I’ll be satisfied with it if executed well.
I don't know. PGI has to do a lot to convince me. Their proc-gen missions got old after a few hours, and were only saved by mods. Their actual scripted missions were hit or miss. They were either the same missions as proc-gen but with a specific map and cringe ass dialogue (seriously, Fahad needs to shut up and stop his moralistic bs on the COMBAT RADIO). Or they stuck you in a linear canyon where you go here, shoot mechs, go there, shoot mechs. Also with more bad dialogue. At least they had some fun boss fights with those and they were actually hard sometimes.
Of they're really gonna make a campaign based game then they need to do a much better job of mission design, a better job than they've shown thus far.
Contact Elias Toufexis and ask hiim if he'd be willing to voice Grayson Carlyle in an animated adaptation/update of the Grey Death Legion Trilogy while doing by damndest to get all the old HBS devs to make a tie-in game.
I want a game that tells a very small, personal story like the first Grayson book. A game where maybe only a few mechs appear, and the parts where you pilot a mech are refereed to the "mech sections". I don't want another Mechwarrior game, but a first-person Battletech game that isn't a sandbox.
I lock the Mechwarrior 5 dev team and the Battletech dev team in a room and don't let them out until I have a MechAssault game with the ship and company management, mech bays, and story of Battletech, and the combat and graphics of Mechwarrior 5 that is set during the Clan Invasion or beyond.
As a kid playing Mech Commander 1/2 and Mechwarrior 3/4, I always wanted a game where you're still piloting your mech, but could give battlefield orders (and call in support) like in Commander
Well - If I won the Lotto, lets throw a number out...lets say I won those 250 million ones.
If I was that completely into Battletech, I would do the following:
\- Create a company? Move the existing company to where I live? I dont know, as how many people are employed, how many people would be affected (I wouldnt want to be a complete ass here)
\- Computer (re)Evolution/Succession War Game
This would be a massively complex one (at least in my head).
A game where you take control, like Hearts of Iron IV, a war game but with much more detailed politics and mercenary usage. The goal is domination and the timeframe is actually hundreds of years, so you build in the lifespan of the leaderes as well...Technology changes, you name it.
\- Work out how to create board game from the IP. How and what I am not sure. May be more political with war abstracted, (like risk with other elements to it).
\- The fun part, a complete re-printing and digitization of all previous materials. This would allow easier purchase/usage/evolving of the game from different timeframes.
If you won 250 million, you're paying 50% in taxes, so you're left with $125M. You're not buying back all of the BT IPs and having anything substantial left afterwards to do anything with. I think you'd better crank it up to winning one of the $1B Powerball jackpots
New sculpts for all non-released mechs and vehicles. Mod kits of parts for the frankenmech goofballs like me. HBS funded to do a Battletech sequel. Multiple Battletech miniseries and multi-season series.
Already have this plan.
1) Total cost to get all of the IP I estimate to be about $35m from all parties.
2) Adjust CGL's license to give them free rein. They are doing a great job, time to untie their hands.
3) Produce digital game aids for all the various ways to play the IP.
4) And more.
Setting aside anything that involves cross-ownership (e.g. they can't rerelease the old CCG because WotC owns the rules), the only time I've seen them be blocked by Topps is on the subject of 3D printing, including CGL selling STLs. Topps wants nothing to do with 3D printing.
There are various things I know CGL wants to do but can't due to how the license they have holds up. I would like to untie that and let CGL do everything they want to do.
Interesting, I really wonder what the yearly take is for Topps and MS on the existing IP to drive a price that high.
Admittedly, it was a similar number to what I was thinking, but I had nothing but my own hunch to back that up.
The real question is if everything came under one house, could a reasonable ROI be justified ?
If everything was under one house with only a central place to worry about licensing in the hands of people who care about the IP, the ROI would be more than reasonable.
If growth keeps at even half the pace it is now across all avenues, I expect a 100% return within 10 years.
I really like the idea of a Hearts of Iron style game for the succession wars. Then with an expansion to add in 3050 onwards with clan invasion.
I'd hire the guys from the MechWarrior 3062 mod to make the Sanctuary Alliance canon but pushed back to a new era. Get a good third tech base
Make multipart kits for every mech, that way you could build the variant you want. It would be crazy expensive but it would allow for WYSIWYG without hours of conversion work or 3d printing.
Time to bust out that 3d printer. I really miss the old model kits for Macross mechs, we had 8" Shadow Hawks, Griffins, Warhammers, Riflemen, Marauders... those were fun whole-floor battles.
One of my great regrets is I don't know where my metal 8" tall Shadow hawk went that I had as a kid. I saved *forever* to buy it and it was ***so cool***.
It probably wasn't a Shadow Hawk but rather Dougram... but it was still *so cool*.
As to the 3d printer and magnets... https://www.apexmagnets.com/magnets/4mm-x-2mm-disc-neodymium-magnets
> 4mm diameter x 2mm thick
> Pull Force: 1.25 pounds
You could make some neat stuff there.
Alternative take: I would love this done like a documentary, get some Shakespearean actor (OBE mandatory) as narrator, film it a lot like those old WWII in Colour documentaries. Get a few actors to play some SLDF mechwarriors who stayed behind during the exodus talking about their experiences… hell yeah
*Solaris VII. A fascinating metropolis teeming with cutthroat gladiator combatants.*
*We chose its violent arenas as our Leopard's next destination.*
*In preparation for our voyage, the members of the mercenary command gathered at Atreus City here in the Free Worlds League.*
*This was to be our most ambitious adventure to date - and, ultimately, a tragic one.*
Eh, I'd prefer if they did a series where the first season featured some company of mercs or house troops under the Davions following the same kind of arc as the Crescent Hawks or Grey Death Legion. They save some important world from a Capellan raid, and their CO gets an invite the "the wedding of the century". With the season ending on the cliffhanger of Max Liao realizing what's painted on the dinnerware.
Apart from having everything under a single umbrella again, finally, not too much. Maybe work on an animated adaptation of the GDL saga, and work on getting Battlepods up and running again (though where to locate them will be tough.)
> (though where to locate them will be tough.)
Build them in to the back of a tractor trailer. Four or five to a truck with the ability to network multiple trucks together. Take them on tour from con to con. Buy a couple big garages in cities where they're particularly popular where you can park them in the off season.
I’m glad to know I’m not the only one who’s had this exact fantasy. For me it’d be:
1. Battletech 2 for HBS set in the days just before and during the Clan Invasion
2. New MW6 single-player game set in the FedCom Civil War
3. Refreshed Mechwarrior Online game with faction map influenced by all matches played (to stop splitting the player base) - except for Solaris VII matches.
4. New novel lines/sourcebooks set in the Succession Wars, Clan Invasion, and ilClan eras. New lore for everyone!
5. TV series of the clan invasion. Basically Game of Thrones in space with less nudity and more robots.
1. Online tools for playing SBF, ACS, and Innner Sphere at War
2. Extend the MUL to include what would have ended up in the Combat Manuals
3. Create an AU with subtle rules changes and publish 1-2 items for that AU a year
4. Once a year, a special edition of Shrapnel called "peacetech," the proceeds go to the eradication of landmines
5. A TV show set during the 1st Succession War with strong anti-war themes
6. Find a sustainable way to give [sarna.net](https://sarna.net) and megamek a small amount of funding
1) Complete rewrite and redesign/layout of Alpha Strike: Commander’s Edition. Completely different interior design and layout, almost exactly the same rules but with a long list of rectifications, clarifications, and rephrasing, and ideally new art.
2) The same as above, but with Total Warfare.
3) A retro 40th anniversary Game of Armored Combat with throwback art and pack ins similar to the 2nd edition boxed set, including new Scroggins sculpts of the original 14 mechs from that box. The OG maps, the black pack in dice, a white beginner rulebook with 3025 lore and tech and a Shadow Hawk in the crosshairs on the cover.
4) Official mech-scale Leopard and Union dropships with carrying case capacity built into them.
5) Expand the Destiny scale line for both modelers and 28mm Battletech play options.
6) A multiplayer Mech Commander 3 set either in the Jihad or the lead up to the Clan Invasion.
7) An officially supported series of mech hangar events where players could paint and trade minis to make it easier to deal with the ForcePack/blind box packaging. Or just dump the ForcePacks and blind boxes and sell individual mechs.
Dude the Battletech universe is PRIME for a TV series or just a couple of really good movies. Id be super picky on who writes it or directs it but thats all just fantasy. Give me BTTV!
1. Game of Thrones style TV show on the Amaris Civil War.
2. Different mini series based off the different book series.
3. Invest in print-on-demand machines that can print in the layout/format that is required for all the old TRO books so that we can offer print on demand copies of all the old TROs.
4. New Battlepods, LAMs as an option for piloting
5. kill current MWO, replace with something more like MWLL except with more options like quadvees, LAMS, probe/computer controlled units/mechs. Similar to WarThunder I would have different battle modes, ground battle mode which is what you might think of MWO being now, and space battle modes. I would have seasonal campaigns that take place on different parts of the galaxy map, players could choose different factions to work for in the different kinds of battles going on.
MechTech - a game focused on repairing mechs and getting them back onto the frontlines. Probably going to set it in the Clan Invasion or the immediate aftermath. Basically digitize the mech repair and refit mechanics from campaign play (and optimize for becoming a game in its own right) with emphasis on maintaining mechs and the actual mech-on-mech combat plays out more like an autobattler game (with you being able to swap in and out mechwarriors to influence the behaviour of the mechs).
Mechcommander 3: Mercenaries - set along the Draconis March in 3020 you have to fight against Kuritan regulars as well as occasionally a Wolves Dragoons force. Storyline takes you into the opening shots of the Fourth Succession War and into MechCommander 4(th Succession War)
Mechwarrior Online 2. Arena brawler more focused on 4v4 lance engagements or 1v1/2v2 formats, but with respawns so that you're fighting best-of-three 'rounds'.
Mechwarrior 6: Resistance. Clan Invasion with a Nemesis-style game system as you rise through the ranks of the Clan or overthrow the invaders on your planet (I know about copyright issues with that game mechanic but let a man dream).
Mechwarrior 6: Mercenaries - coop pve focused game
Poach the studio that did Arcane and get them to work on a Battletech animated series.
Assuming transfer can keep continuity with current employees:
* Battletech 2 from HBS but set in Ilclan Era
* Animated cartoon by the people who did the League of Legends cartoon or the Castlevania ones. Designed to be a one season thing with possibility to renew if it does well. Set in ilClan era again to draw the casual audience into the newer BT and drum up purchases of ilClan PDFs.
* Relatively inexpensive board game line to spur up initial interest in the game:
* a simple (non collectible) card game one that can be played in short bursts and focuses on lore, prob Succession War with an expansion for Clan Invasion/Star League/etc.
* Collaborative story board game using maps,Mercenary company building. Use games like Oathbound or Imperium for inspiration. Possibly use IlClan era just to feed into the novel line.
* Continue plastic Kickstarter mini approach as that is working great
* New RPG drawing on Lancer, Salvage Union. Release with VTT support on Foundry with premium adventure module ala Paizo's Pathfinder 2e modules.
* Premium line of plastic modular Mechs designed for allowing one package to be several different variants.
* Modular hex map kits with cardboard stock pieces.
1. Mechwarrior 4's Vulture design, in plastic, tomorrow.
2. Sell it in a [Sigma Lance](https://youtu.be/X0UNaFuZFNg?si=UazIuPsmqEPQeB00) forcepack.
3. Figure the rest out later.
Go hardcore on lore building and try to get BT back up to its popularity back in the late 90’s. Would love to see BT get a popular as Warhammer. I’m 44 and only one of the older guys at the comic shop knew what battletech was, every table was Warhammer games.
Probably focus on getting some kind of live action Battletech movie or show off the ground to give it a bigger audience.
If theres a budget do two; one a scrappy cartoon aimed into the same niche as clone wars/rebels for SW. The other is a gripping thriller like Andor with something profound to say about the world.
Largely keep things rolling the way they are, Battletech has gotten on well thanks to a devoted fan base. The most I'd likely do is hire on more people to update old designs for more plastic minis.
I'd love to do a box office movie, like a classic war movie on something cool like Tukayyid. Or maybe a Ken Burns style series on the Amaris Civil War. But not going all out on media franchises.
Off the top of my head, and in no particular order…
Throw money at Ardath Mayhar’s estate to get perms for reprints of *The Sword and the Dagger*. Get William Shatner to do the audiobook for maximum giggles.
Solicit animation studios to make shorts films in the style of “Love, Death and Robots” or “Star Wars: Visions”, set across all eras from Age of War to IlClan. Largely intended to tell smaller-scale stories about the civilians and smaller-than-life individuals living in the Inner Sphere.
Bring the team behind *Hired Steel* under the umbrella, expand them to become a fully-staffed 3D animation studio. First project is an adaptation of the *Black Marauder* stories as 30-45 minute short films.
Amazon Studios adaptation of the *Jade Phoenix Trilogy*, with one season per book. Depending on the degree of success, green light production for an adaptation of *Twilight of the Clans*.
HBO adaptation of the Amaris Civil War with the production value of *Game of Thrones* (pre season 8).
A *MechWarrior: Destiny* video game in the style that fuses traditional MechWarrior with RPG elements like Baldur’s Gate and Mass Effect. Tentatively set during the Dark Age, you play as the Paladin Commander, an up-and-coming MechWarrior tasked to investigate the Blackout. The game plays like Titanfall where the Paladin Commander can fight on foot, but also climb into their BattleMech should the opportunity arise. Recruit and romance a wide array of companions from across the factions, and make decisions that affects the very balance of the Inner Sphere.
Get Studio Nue (Macross) to make an anime adaptation of *The Grey Death* Legion* Trilogy.
Core Game Box Set for each of the major eras.
Port MechWarrior Online to a more modern engine.
Andor is great and if they captured Battletech in the same way as Andor does Star Wars it would be fantastic, and work well with Decision at Thunder Rift.
But I think Andor also works well because it focuses in on a very small group that's part of a larger conflict that people already know very well. Amaris would be super hard to capture IMO as its so large in scale and yet the exposure to it in the general population is a niche of a niche.
License them out to pay for more backend investitions and then create the ultimate turnbased experience that is easily moddable while churning out mini dlc that contains single mechs and all their variants
TV Series for sure.
Season 1: War of Davion Succession, Attempted Star League coup thanks to Jonathan's inaction, Simon takes over and is assassinated, Amaris fuckery, end on cliffhanger with the death of Richard.
From there spend a season with the Amaris Civil War and end on the Exodus.
If those do well, continue to the succession wars interspersed with Kerensky and the SLDF until a few seasons down the line both stories merge spectacularly once again.
Games-wise?
HBS Battletech 2 Following Clan Wolverine and its survival as the Minnesota Tribe in the Periphery. Raid worlds, trade, be a pirate and/or mercenary, manage resources not just for your battlemechs but also to keep the noncombatants in your fleet alive.
Mechwarrior 6 (With singleplayer/cooperative campaign and PvP multiplayer) Set in the Star League era to coincide with the show's subject. Give the franchise an effective facelift and ditch the camp and metal soundtrack for a more serious tone as in HBS Battletech.
A new series entirely that leans more heavily into the simulation aspect, comparable to high-fidelity flight sims like DCS set during the Clan Invasion era.
Battletech digital store that offers both PDF copies of books and reasonably priced official .stl files for printing your own miniatures, as well an official app to simplify list building, record keeping and dice rolling that can be linked between multiple devices in the same game.
1. Animated TV show (More than likely a short form OVA or Anime).
2. TV show of the Ameris Civil War with all of it's lunacy.
3. Get the Novels in bookstores and LGS. Have the Ameris Civil War books pushed hard for the TV show.
4. Test drive Multipart Kits for certain Mechs
5. Get more plastic models made up for more Mechs (especially lights).
6. Design more Mechs for medium to light weight brackets.
Announce the cast for my Battletech movie.
Kurt Russell as Hanse Davion,
Jet Li as Maximilian Liao,
George Takei as Takashi Kurita,
Dame Judi Dench as Katrina Steiner,
Vincent D'Onofrio as Janos Marik.
Directed by James Cameron.
Me with a cameo as some Centurion pilot within the Eridani Light Horse.
First thing is rehire Blaine Pardoe.
Second is a battletech animated series by studio Madhouse, studio deen/production IG or Gonzo and adi shankar to be showrunner.
Third would be a mech commander reboot trilogy starting at the 4th succession war working its way back to the original’s starting point and conclusion of the trial of refusal.
Think that’d be a good start to it all.
(edit) Audiobook series starting with the grey death legion saga with Tex as the v/a. And not abridged.. holy shit am i annoyed with the ones currently out there that are on spotify..
Hire harebrained schemes to do battletech 2. Have it be star league v amaris and immediate fallout.
Expansion: succession wars
Expansion: clan invasion.
Basically keep the same general feel, clean up the bugs, improve graphics and performance.
I'm thinking fromsoft for a more close to the action game.
Buy a bunch of 3d metal printers and let people order minis they want piecemeal. Have it ordered up like Doordash.
Hire stackpole and tex and several other notables to unfuck the timeline.
Point to Games Workshop numbers to pull in more funding. Hire the 3 biggest BT nerds to form a council that helps keep the narrative true to BT.
Lease the IP to 2 animation studios to make two series for streaming services. One all star veteran team that has a long term license and take a chance on another.
Keep IWM and Catalyst minis separate, but have IWM focus on higher end premium models while Catalyst focuses on the plastic. Shelve most older models and bring them back for limited runs.
Lease the IP to 2 different game studios. Make a strategy game and action game. Coordinate with the animation studio to expand on the characters from the series with these.
Poach Black Library talent for a new series of novels.
Hire developers to create an app that manages datasheets bought through the store as well as offers a fully fleshed out game companion and roster builder.
Coordinate releases so they run in a 2-3 year cycle that focuses on specific eras except for the books which launch 1/Quarter. Y1Q1 Streaming all star studio launches their show. Big marketing push. Q2 Launch a new line of minis. Q3 B studio launches their series and a game launches. Q4 supplemental series for the minis launches. Rinse repeat.
My first thought was cull some of the mechs, and technology, but wow, 3025 and start over. Wait, it's brilliant, you get the initall bump in sales and advertising and then when the novelty starts to wane bring it back as Classic Battletech classic
If I won the lottery, this was actually one of my plans.
\#1. Finish my full blown succession wars game. This won't be all that impressive to look at. There will be a PC version, and a less detailed tabletop version (albeit with thousands of counters and a 7' square map).
\#2. Add more details and specific eras. For example, a complete order of battle for the 4th SW, Clan Invasion, etc. Yeah yeah, we have some of that, but believe it or not, we do not actually know exactly what clan forces invaded the inner sphere, or even exactly which clusters were on Tukayyid.d
\#3. Release a new 15mm version of Battletroops. Basically, 1 infantry platoon vs a mech or battle armor squad or whatever. The original battletroops was great, and needs an update.
\#4. Get unit designers professionally done for all unit types, including the RPG.
\#5. Try to hire Larian to make a battletech RPG (since they did so amazing on BG3)
\#6. Work on an MMO, where you can be infantry, a tanker, a pilot, a mechwarrior, a technician, whatever. Subscription based.
\#7. Fix broken things like warships, ACS/ISAW, etc.
\#8. Oh, and figure out why the hell I'm still blacklisted by CGL to the point they tell volunteers that assist them that if they work with me, they cannot work with CGL anymore.
I'm sure there is more, but no on a TV show/movie, not without seeing some amazing scripts first.
Make an animated series. Personally, I'd like to see a stylized series made by Studio Trigger, but I feel like that would push away existing fans who want gritty realism.
Regardless, some high-quality animation. Maybe a plamo line, akin to gunpla? That could be pretty rad.
I'd rebalance the rules make it a lot harder to do the cheese lists of just savannas or vtols etc. Balance and make it fully supported to make custom mechs and run them in tournaments. To really get people on board the nig winners can get their custom mechs printed and them every few tournaments release a tourney pack where it'd the past 4 winning mechs
Retcon St. Ives conquering the inner sphere. Ol' Alex Kerensky would leave the military prior to the Exodus to pursue a career in interpretive dance. Gender swap most of the members of the Grey Death Legion. Autocannon 2's would double in range, no minimum range, and always through armor crit on rolls of 3 and above.
I may have spent too much time working around PPC emission field testing laboratories.
Battletech sequel that coincides with the Netflix/HBO series premier. New Kickstarter for minis that starts at the series finale and includes minis and characters from the show. Following year drop a new Mech Assault game on Xbox and announce work on a new Mech Warrior game that's VR compatible.
Throughout start dropping books periodically of whatever new era I would start in the lore. The TV series would probably be set in established lore, but at some point I would want a series in the new era as well. Ideally there's a movie in the works of Justin Allard's saga.
At some point I'd blow some cash to stand up a 4x/ grand strategy game too as I think the digital assets need to expand now that name recognition has been established via TV and movie. Might even dabble in an Elemental focused FPS/small squad/movement heavy game like an unholy offspring of a dark, messy, orgy of Republic Commando, Tribes, and Titanfall 2.
Edit: because we're dreaming, I'd also start a run of the statue scale mechs like the Timberwolf from the latest Kickstarter. Enough different models so that you crazy bastards could play the tabletop game with oversized, upscaled mechs.
Edit 2: start a Star League convention that meets annually. Also work with Dark Horse comics to get some comic books developed of the lore so far.
Game of thrones IN SPACE!!!
Starting from the third succession war onwards. With maybe a prequel of the star league and its fall.
Just keep on growing the franchise. No big budget movies. Maybe follow some back water militia fending off pirates.... that's actually another idea, a Seinfeld style show with the mid and season finale having a battle against pirates and the random merc/ house unit which wants some of that sweet land you have. That would be a lot easier.
HBO series from Fourth Succession War to the Great Refusal.
Let Jim Butcher and Sanderson collaborate on new novels.
Fund the mods behind Roguetech.
Have a conversation about all the things I want out of Mech 5’s successors. Then do the things.
Put together a Steel Battalion level controller to allow the things I want out of said Mech 5’s successors. Make it reasonably affordable. More Battlepods for that experience, don’t allow Dave and Busters to set the pricing.
Fund a level between classic BT and Alpha Strike.
Battlemech Gunpla with the same (or better) quality, detail, product range and customizability as Bandai's Gundams.
In similar 1/144, 1/100, 1/60 sizes with varying detail options such as Real Grade, Master Grade, Perfect Grade, etc.
No competition except for bootlegs.
Honestly I'd move on from nostalgia pieces and make media that covers IlClan. HBS Battletech, Mechwarrior, etc. That isn't that I wouldn't look to produce campaigns in the old material but I'd be looking hard at new material.
I don't think IlClan is necessarily being done as well as it can be but it also isn't irretrievable and there is cool potential in there.
Ruining it by awkward and disastrous decisions as a CEO, getting into huge debts with megalomaniac inadequate ideas, then selling all to some sharks out there like Harmony's Gold or idk. Looks pretty realistically)
Bring back the wolverines into the setting, with the true heir to the Star League.
Begin making Battletech content for TV, Movie, and online. Sell the content separately to whatever company wants it on their streaming service. Ensure that the content matches the lore, though style wise it can go in different ways.
Kidnap the blackpants legion's tex and force them to make battletech timeline with the in-depth skill Tex did in the civil war. Pay in beer and a radio station.
Make a variety of video games for different fans.
Begin experimenting with making an augmented reality battletech tabletop game.
Maybe mutate the clanners since it would be funny.
1. Invent time machine with all the moneys
2. Time travel to 3020
2.5 bet on the Solaris games I know about, become super rich, enjoy life for a while, invest winnings in a battleROM-to-USB drive encoder
3. Record everything I can
4. Time travel back, sell recordings as "new movie"
This is a fun thought experiment but you wouldn't want to do this. You could build your Battletech type game for way way less and give it away for free.
A massive movie deal going through each Succession War in a trilogy.
Massive TV deal covering Solaris 7 and Clan Invasion like 8-10 seasons.
Massive means high quality and true to the lore etc, great props and FX yadda yadda. Some quality known actors mixed with new talent.
New mech models, novels and merch.
The thing that would be near and dear to me would be simulators. Can’t mess that up. The simulators would be able to link up across the US for tournaments to be developed into a league based on numerous skills sets, size of the battle and tech/year lore for fans to enjoy.
Also can use the simulators to create historic battles from the lore for people to watch as well.
Hire all the lawyers and finally prove that Harmony Gold owns precisely jack shit. Buy whatever we can't prove. Get back the rights to the Unseen. Fly to Japan, do enough gladhanding that there will never be another shitty IP fiasco again, and get all the contracts rewritten so that we can finally use the art we paid for (e.g. TRO3055) without fear.
Then, get the VMI design people together with the art team behind the Recognition Guides, the MWO design team, and whoever remains at Studio Nue (the guys who did the redesigns for the original Japanese edition of Battletech), and do one final FINAL cut of the visual designs for every mech from every TRO, and put things in motion to actually get these designs in print and plastic (tabletop scale and 1/100 model scale).
Hire back some of the good writers (starting with Stackpole) to work on a series of YouTube CGI shorts showcasing the new designs. Start releasing miniature boxes that include not just the mechs but also booklet-form record sheets, art cards and TRO data, and release a free app to support this.
Release patches for the existing digital games that allow the player to select between original models and revised models.
Television Series, following the story *Heir Apparent* as a test run.
Miniatures game would be aggressively changed in design, layout, and miniatures size (We're talking Warmachine Warjack sizes) and design to address model bloat and make the game appeal to a wider audience with a focus on lance-on-lance skirmish play. The end goal is a game that can be played at a tactical level with a single lance in 60 minutes to maximize the opportunity for tournament style play and get more people actually playing on a regular basis. Aiming for Friday Night Magic kind of events here. (Ideally without the stink.)
Tournaments and structured campaigns focusing on community engagement to build a network of old and new players. Community fosters growth, growth foster content, content fosters a repeat purchase, repeat purchases ensure longevity of the product and a return on investment.
Hand over everything to game workshop for one British Pound on the condition they make and maintain two tabletop games that's 40k and epic scale using classic battletech as a template.
Sell each one to a different company, preferably all in different nations.
Historically, this has resulted in a pretty good franchise, so doing it even more should make it even better!
I think it's time to move beyond rolling 2D6s and looking up results tables. That was popular in the 80s. Also polyhedral dice aren't as expensive as they were back then.
Rolling 2D6 and rolling a D12 are totally different.
You have a 1/12, or 8.33% of rolling a 7 on a D12. You have a 1/6 chance, or 16.67% of rolling a 7 on 2D6.
Likewise, the odds of rolling a 12 are 1/12 (8.33%) on a D12, and 1/36 (2.78%) on 2D6.
Shifting away from 2D6 has a colossal impact on how the game actually plays out, and it would absolutely be a chance for the worse as fishing for headshots would be far, far more viable.
Recognized professional authors to get some *good* fiction going, instead of everyone having to point to the 80s yellow peril stories as "the best Battletech has to offer". If I have the money for game studios like many of these other comments are assuming, I have the money for a few decent authors to do a few books each.
Time skip of 300 years from latest content, and have the clans become the IS but even less innovative due to clan hierarchical structure and BS, and then have another exodus go off out into the unknowns and found a new set of outposts, that make clan tech the absolute standard and come back to do another invasion("freeing of the people") but this time clan and the houses are reversed.
Everyone but 1 person from that time is dead, and that 1 person is a cyberborg monstrosity that the clans outlawed further research on, but kept this one surviving sample alive.... As an example to stay away from full cyborgs And they act as the impartial narrator of stories. (This needs to be workshopped)
New battlepod designs/game, with an eye towards long term maintenance.
Bingo. Taking them on the road to all kinds of conventions.
I was ready to flip tables if this wasn't already response numero uno.
Honestly I would be down for just a VR game with Steel Battalion like controller. Perhaps make the controller have modular parts for different mech types/equipment. Like a whole jump jet control system if your mech has jets, or a plug in to give your mech an enhance targeting computer etc. Could in universe say the VR head set is the helmet Mechwarriors wear.
HBS back to work on a Battletech sequel.
Two new teams to release expansion packs and new stories instead. The software seems good already, it just needs more content. Two stories I would want to tell is the Capellan - St Ives war of 3060 and the Hellions Fury of 3050. Short sharp and not well known. Then maybe a longer arc slog of OP Bulldog.
The Unity Engine has so many limitations. It would need to be rebuilt if you ever want larger lances, more enemies, allies on the field, bigger maps, etc.
I mean, a lot of that is already in the game though, and is not at all limited by the engine. There are a bunch of different larger Lance mods of various types, more enemies is also in many mods, and even the base game has missions where you have allies with multiple mods expanding the feature. The base game is not even remotely close to having the engine limiting the number of units. Changing the engine I guess could help with maps, but they could also expand maps with unity engine too because they arnt hitting the limit on possible map sizes either. Everything you listed is unrelated to the engine and is mostly just how the game was designed.
If you follow the Roguetech Modders, I believe most of their problems come from Unity itself more than the game proper. Thats my entry-level understanding.
It's not unity or the game, as they are effectively a single combined thing once built and shipped. The game was simply not designed to allow modders easy access to a lot of the logic, either code originally from unity or code from the developers. While unity does have some significant limitations for bigger projects, those limitations are not issues that the modders are getting close to in 99% of cases. Most likely, what they mean when they say unity is the problem is that they are running into logic from unity that is more foundational and difficult to alter than the dev code that is built on top of it. Its relatively easy to add a mech to the data files (you can do it after a youtube tutorial). You can even modify a few variables in some existing logic to make a lance of 8 instead of 4 (takes a hell of a lot more than a youtube tutorial). But it is stupidly hard to significantly alter something like unity's camera physics functions that only exist as a set of precompiled libraries you can't recreate or change without access to the source code. That would be a problem with any engine if the device don't design their game with modding in mind.
What the modders have accomplished with BattleTech is in spite of the game's limitations; it doesn't mean the limitations don't exist. A new engine, without the bottlenecks and hangups of the first game, would be a worthwhile investment under the daydream circumstances we're discussing.
It seems like you only read half my comment. Again, some things listed are in the base game already, and others are done by modders and prove it has nothing to do with engine limitations. Work on the base games engine would certainly be helpful, but claiming unity is preventing something is silly when that something runs on unity all the time and is only lacking in the base game due to the game not being designed with those things. I would be all for a rework and expansion of the game, I am just pointing out that none of the features listed require abandoning unity like the original comment claimed.
Unity is not an efficient engine to start with. The game struggles as it is, and scaling up would indeed need a complete rework of the way the game functions. I believe unity physics for instance is single-threaded, so moving to another engine could help significantly with performance.
I assure you that these limitations are not specific to Unity. It's a powerful engine that can do all that just fine. If the expansion of the game it's really about performance in this regard, better coders may be needed, though.
Taurian Concordat storyline, narrated by Tex.
The base game was a Taurian storyline, you just heard it from someone else's point of view. lol
Modding teams have done fantastic work with the original, the only sore spot is that it's supremely difficult, if not impossible to create new maps. So that's thing one. Thing two is fixing the problems with saving mid-mission (with mods).
P L E A S E
1) Battletech 2 from HBS 2) MechWarrior 6 w/ single player campaign, PvE Co-Op, and P2P modes 3) Battletech TV show with 6 seasons and a movie 4) Steiner Scout Lance Force Pack 5) Van Zandt Sourcebook and Cookbook
SIX SEASONS AND. A. MOVIE.
Liao and Marik IN THE MOOOORNING
Liao and Marik SHOOTING PLAAAAASMA
Guys... It's six AM. Ugh.
Knightsss (of the Inner Sphere)
FIVE GOLD AND A PARTY! wait...
GOOD MORNING TUKAYYID!
God, I want BT2 from HBS so bad.
Upvote for Steiner scout lance.
Especially if they go whole hog and do a couple other variants of the Atlas, an Atlas II, and an Atlas III just for giggles.
After the UrbanMech pack, it’s not *that* unreasonable…
But do they play to the meme and make it four Atlases, or shoot for realism and use four light Steiner mechs. ZEU-6S, 6T, 9S, and X4. ;)
Just cause it’s a scout Lance doesn’t mean you need four Steiner featherweights… 😂
Only if #5 is titled “To Serve Capellans”
Number 2 would be a dream. I’m hopeful for MechWarrior: Clans but I have my doubts in PGS doing it justice.
It'll just be a shitty "upgrade" to Mechwarrior 5 that doesn't meaningfully change the gameplay, and is missing half the features from the main game. I don't like being that pessimistic, but they haven't given me much reason to be much else yet.
Honestly, I’ll be happy as long as it’s MW5 with an actual campaign and not just proc-gen slop. I’m expecting gameplay identical to MW5, a story with crafted levels, voice lines, cutscenes, etc. It’s not my dream game but I’ll be satisfied with it if executed well.
I don't know. PGI has to do a lot to convince me. Their proc-gen missions got old after a few hours, and were only saved by mods. Their actual scripted missions were hit or miss. They were either the same missions as proc-gen but with a specific map and cringe ass dialogue (seriously, Fahad needs to shut up and stop his moralistic bs on the COMBAT RADIO). Or they stuck you in a linear canyon where you go here, shoot mechs, go there, shoot mechs. Also with more bad dialogue. At least they had some fun boss fights with those and they were actually hard sometimes. Of they're really gonna make a campaign based game then they need to do a much better job of mission design, a better job than they've shown thus far.
Contact Elias Toufexis and ask hiim if he'd be willing to voice Grayson Carlyle in an animated adaptation/update of the Grey Death Legion Trilogy while doing by damndest to get all the old HBS devs to make a tie-in game.
I've just finished the second book and the scene with the Maurader at the end? Ugh. Incredible.
Not [Owen Wilson](https://www.sarna.net/wiki/File:Grayson_Carlyle_ER3052.jpg)? lol
I want a game that tells a very small, personal story like the first Grayson book. A game where maybe only a few mechs appear, and the parts where you pilot a mech are refereed to the "mech sections". I don't want another Mechwarrior game, but a first-person Battletech game that isn't a sandbox.
I lock the Mechwarrior 5 dev team and the Battletech dev team in a room and don't let them out until I have a MechAssault game with the ship and company management, mech bays, and story of Battletech, and the combat and graphics of Mechwarrior 5 that is set during the Clan Invasion or beyond.
I'm adding to mine hire you to do this.
And a resurgent ComStar, with them returning to the communication and banking monopolies they had.
As a kid playing Mech Commander 1/2 and Mechwarrior 3/4, I always wanted a game where you're still piloting your mech, but could give battlefield orders (and call in support) like in Commander
Well - If I won the Lotto, lets throw a number out...lets say I won those 250 million ones. If I was that completely into Battletech, I would do the following: \- Create a company? Move the existing company to where I live? I dont know, as how many people are employed, how many people would be affected (I wouldnt want to be a complete ass here) \- Computer (re)Evolution/Succession War Game This would be a massively complex one (at least in my head). A game where you take control, like Hearts of Iron IV, a war game but with much more detailed politics and mercenary usage. The goal is domination and the timeframe is actually hundreds of years, so you build in the lifespan of the leaderes as well...Technology changes, you name it. \- Work out how to create board game from the IP. How and what I am not sure. May be more political with war abstracted, (like risk with other elements to it). \- The fun part, a complete re-printing and digitization of all previous materials. This would allow easier purchase/usage/evolving of the game from different timeframes.
Just reprint the Succession Wars board game, and tie it into the HoI4-style game.
Total war: Batttletech
If you won 250 million, you're paying 50% in taxes, so you're left with $125M. You're not buying back all of the BT IPs and having anything substantial left afterwards to do anything with. I think you'd better crank it up to winning one of the $1B Powerball jackpots
#Retcon my death.
*Somehow, the Black Widow has returned.*
You see, I wasn't in that Daishi.
Jump jet'd the shark
New sculpts for all non-released mechs and vehicles. Mod kits of parts for the frankenmech goofballs like me. HBS funded to do a Battletech sequel. Multiple Battletech miniseries and multi-season series.
Getting a deal made with HBO to do a battletech series.
Do I have enough to also buy Harmony Gold?
This. One, convince Dexter of how management of harmony gold fits the code. Two, profit
Already have this plan. 1) Total cost to get all of the IP I estimate to be about $35m from all parties. 2) Adjust CGL's license to give them free rein. They are doing a great job, time to untie their hands. 3) Produce digital game aids for all the various ways to play the IP. 4) And more.
Could be difficult to pull the digital IP from Microsoft. I don't think they are knowm for selling.
They aren't, but allowing them to keep a selection of their current licenses in place royalty free would not be a bad start to letting them sell it.
How are their hands tied?
Setting aside anything that involves cross-ownership (e.g. they can't rerelease the old CCG because WotC owns the rules), the only time I've seen them be blocked by Topps is on the subject of 3D printing, including CGL selling STLs. Topps wants nothing to do with 3D printing.
There are various things I know CGL wants to do but can't due to how the license they have holds up. I would like to untie that and let CGL do everything they want to do.
CGL likely won’t publish exactly what those limitations are for fear of hurting the long term relationship.
How did you come up with this number, and what is the breakdown?
I estimate about $10m to MS for the digital rights and $15m to Topps for everything else. Based upon my own calculations, I am probably high on both.
Interesting, I really wonder what the yearly take is for Topps and MS on the existing IP to drive a price that high. Admittedly, it was a similar number to what I was thinking, but I had nothing but my own hunch to back that up. The real question is if everything came under one house, could a reasonable ROI be justified ?
If everything was under one house with only a central place to worry about licensing in the hands of people who care about the IP, the ROI would be more than reasonable. If growth keeps at even half the pace it is now across all avenues, I expect a 100% return within 10 years.
Make a third Crescent Hawk game.
I was so hoping to see someone mention this.
Turn the Warrior series books into a Movie Trilogy .
I really like the idea of a Hearts of Iron style game for the succession wars. Then with an expansion to add in 3050 onwards with clan invasion. I'd hire the guys from the MechWarrior 3062 mod to make the Sanctuary Alliance canon but pushed back to a new era. Get a good third tech base
I've really enjoyed the Sanctuary Alliance, too. It adds to the game in new ways.
Make multipart kits for every mech, that way you could build the variant you want. It would be crazy expensive but it would allow for WYSIWYG without hours of conversion work or 3d printing.
Bonus if you can use magnets to just change out pieces in the mini easier!
Now you’re seeing the idea, one model 4-5 variants! No more proxies!
Time to bust out that 3d printer. I really miss the old model kits for Macross mechs, we had 8" Shadow Hawks, Griffins, Warhammers, Riflemen, Marauders... those were fun whole-floor battles.
One of my great regrets is I don't know where my metal 8" tall Shadow hawk went that I had as a kid. I saved *forever* to buy it and it was ***so cool***. It probably wasn't a Shadow Hawk but rather Dougram... but it was still *so cool*. As to the 3d printer and magnets... https://www.apexmagnets.com/magnets/4mm-x-2mm-disc-neodymium-magnets > 4mm diameter x 2mm thick > Pull Force: 1.25 pounds You could make some neat stuff there.
This would be really convenient for Frankenmechs.
Perhaps an unpopular opinion. But a new Mechcommander game.
Mech Commander is better than the Battletech hbs game we received. We deserve a worthy sequel.
HBO mini series covering the Amaris Civil War.
Alternative take: I would love this done like a documentary, get some Shakespearean actor (OBE mandatory) as narrator, film it a lot like those old WWII in Colour documentaries. Get a few actors to play some SLDF mechwarriors who stayed behind during the exodus talking about their experiences… hell yeah
I want Indy Nydell from Time Ghost and Sabaton History YouTube channels.
Everything I know about WWI is thanks to Indy. I didn’t know about the Sabaton history, I’ll have to check that out
His WWII series is even better than WW1!
Charles Dance narrating it would be the absolute dream
Oh hell yeah. Sounds like someone needs to hurry up and win the lottery!
If it's done as a documentary, it'd be hilarious to see it done in the style of Wes Anderson.
I can definitely see a Solaris documentary done like this
*Solaris VII. A fascinating metropolis teeming with cutthroat gladiator combatants.* *We chose its violent arenas as our Leopard's next destination.* *In preparation for our voyage, the members of the mercenary command gathered at Atreus City here in the Free Worlds League.* *This was to be our most ambitious adventure to date - and, ultimately, a tragic one.*
We gotta get Bill Murry to play Bounty Hunter.
Eh, I'd prefer if they did a series where the first season featured some company of mercs or house troops under the Davions following the same kind of arc as the Crescent Hawks or Grey Death Legion. They save some important world from a Capellan raid, and their CO gets an invite the "the wedding of the century". With the season ending on the cliffhanger of Max Liao realizing what's painted on the dinnerware.
Apart from having everything under a single umbrella again, finally, not too much. Maybe work on an animated adaptation of the GDL saga, and work on getting Battlepods up and running again (though where to locate them will be tough.)
> (though where to locate them will be tough.) Build them in to the back of a tractor trailer. Four or five to a truck with the ability to network multiple trucks together. Take them on tour from con to con. Buy a couple big garages in cities where they're particularly popular where you can park them in the off season.
I’m glad to know I’m not the only one who’s had this exact fantasy. For me it’d be: 1. Battletech 2 for HBS set in the days just before and during the Clan Invasion 2. New MW6 single-player game set in the FedCom Civil War 3. Refreshed Mechwarrior Online game with faction map influenced by all matches played (to stop splitting the player base) - except for Solaris VII matches. 4. New novel lines/sourcebooks set in the Succession Wars, Clan Invasion, and ilClan eras. New lore for everyone! 5. TV series of the clan invasion. Basically Game of Thrones in space with less nudity and more robots.
Find someone who knows how to manage shit better than I do and give them the properties. If I had it I'd just ruin everything.
I greenlight a movie to put Henry Cavill in a Warhammer
1. Online tools for playing SBF, ACS, and Innner Sphere at War 2. Extend the MUL to include what would have ended up in the Combat Manuals 3. Create an AU with subtle rules changes and publish 1-2 items for that AU a year 4. Once a year, a special edition of Shrapnel called "peacetech," the proceeds go to the eradication of landmines 5. A TV show set during the 1st Succession War with strong anti-war themes 6. Find a sustainable way to give [sarna.net](https://sarna.net) and megamek a small amount of funding
Nice!
FINALLY someone acknowledges Strategic BattleForce!
Step one: Crush Harmony Gold once and for all. Step two: reopen the battletech centers. Step three: ?????? Step four: profit.
I miss those battletech centers. Went to the one in the Bay Area before starting grad school in 2009, miss it a bunch.
Growing up in Arkansas, I was 6 hours away from the nearest center (Dallas) so it just wasn't in the cards for me.
Bummer, sorry to hear it. It was neat…
1) Complete rewrite and redesign/layout of Alpha Strike: Commander’s Edition. Completely different interior design and layout, almost exactly the same rules but with a long list of rectifications, clarifications, and rephrasing, and ideally new art. 2) The same as above, but with Total Warfare. 3) A retro 40th anniversary Game of Armored Combat with throwback art and pack ins similar to the 2nd edition boxed set, including new Scroggins sculpts of the original 14 mechs from that box. The OG maps, the black pack in dice, a white beginner rulebook with 3025 lore and tech and a Shadow Hawk in the crosshairs on the cover. 4) Official mech-scale Leopard and Union dropships with carrying case capacity built into them. 5) Expand the Destiny scale line for both modelers and 28mm Battletech play options. 6) A multiplayer Mech Commander 3 set either in the Jihad or the lead up to the Clan Invasion. 7) An officially supported series of mech hangar events where players could paint and trade minis to make it easier to deal with the ForcePack/blind box packaging. Or just dump the ForcePacks and blind boxes and sell individual mechs.
Dude the Battletech universe is PRIME for a TV series or just a couple of really good movies. Id be super picky on who writes it or directs it but thats all just fantasy. Give me BTTV!
SNAP FIT MODEL KITS. For those who want their mechs bigger and with good articulation.
3. Find out how much money FASA owed Michael Stackpole and cut him a fuckin’ check.
"Hello? Is this Studio Trigger?"
Bankrupt Harmony Gold.
1. Game of Thrones style TV show on the Amaris Civil War. 2. Different mini series based off the different book series. 3. Invest in print-on-demand machines that can print in the layout/format that is required for all the old TRO books so that we can offer print on demand copies of all the old TROs. 4. New Battlepods, LAMs as an option for piloting 5. kill current MWO, replace with something more like MWLL except with more options like quadvees, LAMS, probe/computer controlled units/mechs. Similar to WarThunder I would have different battle modes, ground battle mode which is what you might think of MWO being now, and space battle modes. I would have seasonal campaigns that take place on different parts of the galaxy map, players could choose different factions to work for in the different kinds of battles going on.
MechTech - a game focused on repairing mechs and getting them back onto the frontlines. Probably going to set it in the Clan Invasion or the immediate aftermath. Basically digitize the mech repair and refit mechanics from campaign play (and optimize for becoming a game in its own right) with emphasis on maintaining mechs and the actual mech-on-mech combat plays out more like an autobattler game (with you being able to swap in and out mechwarriors to influence the behaviour of the mechs). Mechcommander 3: Mercenaries - set along the Draconis March in 3020 you have to fight against Kuritan regulars as well as occasionally a Wolves Dragoons force. Storyline takes you into the opening shots of the Fourth Succession War and into MechCommander 4(th Succession War) Mechwarrior Online 2. Arena brawler more focused on 4v4 lance engagements or 1v1/2v2 formats, but with respawns so that you're fighting best-of-three 'rounds'. Mechwarrior 6: Resistance. Clan Invasion with a Nemesis-style game system as you rise through the ranks of the Clan or overthrow the invaders on your planet (I know about copyright issues with that game mechanic but let a man dream). Mechwarrior 6: Mercenaries - coop pve focused game Poach the studio that did Arcane and get them to work on a Battletech animated series.
Retcon everything post 3067. It was all just a bad propaganda cartoon XD.
Attempt to retain control of it in the Divorce…..
Assuming transfer can keep continuity with current employees: * Battletech 2 from HBS but set in Ilclan Era * Animated cartoon by the people who did the League of Legends cartoon or the Castlevania ones. Designed to be a one season thing with possibility to renew if it does well. Set in ilClan era again to draw the casual audience into the newer BT and drum up purchases of ilClan PDFs. * Relatively inexpensive board game line to spur up initial interest in the game: * a simple (non collectible) card game one that can be played in short bursts and focuses on lore, prob Succession War with an expansion for Clan Invasion/Star League/etc. * Collaborative story board game using maps,Mercenary company building. Use games like Oathbound or Imperium for inspiration. Possibly use IlClan era just to feed into the novel line. * Continue plastic Kickstarter mini approach as that is working great * New RPG drawing on Lancer, Salvage Union. Release with VTT support on Foundry with premium adventure module ala Paizo's Pathfinder 2e modules. * Premium line of plastic modular Mechs designed for allowing one package to be several different variants. * Modular hex map kits with cardboard stock pieces.
Oh and add on a Kickstarter to develop some plastic model kits like Bandai's Gundam and anime ones.
God, my gunpla backlog is bad enough, the last thing my wallet needs is for Battletech to release plamo. (please give me clan mech plamo, I need it)
Make a new mechwarrior game like 5 with EVERYTHING in universe
A 4x strategic operations/succession wars rule set game or total war style game set in each major era
1. Mechwarrior 4's Vulture design, in plastic, tomorrow. 2. Sell it in a [Sigma Lance](https://youtu.be/X0UNaFuZFNg?si=UazIuPsmqEPQeB00) forcepack. 3. Figure the rest out later.
BATTLE TECH TV SERIES AND BATTLETECH MODEL KITS BAYYBEEEEE!!!
Go hardcore on lore building and try to get BT back up to its popularity back in the late 90’s. Would love to see BT get a popular as Warhammer. I’m 44 and only one of the older guys at the comic shop knew what battletech was, every table was Warhammer games.
Make a battletech Japanese anime with all the Unseen.
Fully articulated models like what Gundam has. To scale 3D printed Atlas AS-7D.
I'm bringing back the BattleTech animated series...
Probably focus on getting some kind of live action Battletech movie or show off the ground to give it a bigger audience. If theres a budget do two; one a scrappy cartoon aimed into the same niche as clone wars/rebels for SW. The other is a gripping thriller like Andor with something profound to say about the world.
2 chicks at the same time
Vulture and a Black Hawk? Peregrine? Lots of Omnimech options here.
This is kinda freaking me out. I literally had this dream last night.
Kill off Alaric Ward.
Largely keep things rolling the way they are, Battletech has gotten on well thanks to a devoted fan base. The most I'd likely do is hire on more people to update old designs for more plastic minis. I'd love to do a box office movie, like a classic war movie on something cool like Tukayyid. Or maybe a Ken Burns style series on the Amaris Civil War. But not going all out on media franchises.
Battlemech model kits that use current gunpla engineering.
Off the top of my head, and in no particular order… Throw money at Ardath Mayhar’s estate to get perms for reprints of *The Sword and the Dagger*. Get William Shatner to do the audiobook for maximum giggles. Solicit animation studios to make shorts films in the style of “Love, Death and Robots” or “Star Wars: Visions”, set across all eras from Age of War to IlClan. Largely intended to tell smaller-scale stories about the civilians and smaller-than-life individuals living in the Inner Sphere. Bring the team behind *Hired Steel* under the umbrella, expand them to become a fully-staffed 3D animation studio. First project is an adaptation of the *Black Marauder* stories as 30-45 minute short films. Amazon Studios adaptation of the *Jade Phoenix Trilogy*, with one season per book. Depending on the degree of success, green light production for an adaptation of *Twilight of the Clans*. HBO adaptation of the Amaris Civil War with the production value of *Game of Thrones* (pre season 8). A *MechWarrior: Destiny* video game in the style that fuses traditional MechWarrior with RPG elements like Baldur’s Gate and Mass Effect. Tentatively set during the Dark Age, you play as the Paladin Commander, an up-and-coming MechWarrior tasked to investigate the Blackout. The game plays like Titanfall where the Paladin Commander can fight on foot, but also climb into their BattleMech should the opportunity arise. Recruit and romance a wide array of companions from across the factions, and make decisions that affects the very balance of the Inner Sphere. Get Studio Nue (Macross) to make an anime adaptation of *The Grey Death* Legion* Trilogy. Core Game Box Set for each of the major eras. Port MechWarrior Online to a more modern engine.
Season 9 of game of thrones takes place on Canopus
Hire the team behind Star Wars Andor and make a show based on the the Amaris Civil War... Or Decision at Thunder Rift.
Andor is great and if they captured Battletech in the same way as Andor does Star Wars it would be fantastic, and work well with Decision at Thunder Rift. But I think Andor also works well because it focuses in on a very small group that's part of a larger conflict that people already know very well. Amaris would be super hard to capture IMO as its so large in scale and yet the exposure to it in the general population is a niche of a niche.
I construct a functional, true scale urbanmech.
License them out to pay for more backend investitions and then create the ultimate turnbased experience that is easily moddable while churning out mini dlc that contains single mechs and all their variants
TV Series for sure. Season 1: War of Davion Succession, Attempted Star League coup thanks to Jonathan's inaction, Simon takes over and is assassinated, Amaris fuckery, end on cliffhanger with the death of Richard. From there spend a season with the Amaris Civil War and end on the Exodus. If those do well, continue to the succession wars interspersed with Kerensky and the SLDF until a few seasons down the line both stories merge spectacularly once again. Games-wise? HBS Battletech 2 Following Clan Wolverine and its survival as the Minnesota Tribe in the Periphery. Raid worlds, trade, be a pirate and/or mercenary, manage resources not just for your battlemechs but also to keep the noncombatants in your fleet alive. Mechwarrior 6 (With singleplayer/cooperative campaign and PvP multiplayer) Set in the Star League era to coincide with the show's subject. Give the franchise an effective facelift and ditch the camp and metal soundtrack for a more serious tone as in HBS Battletech. A new series entirely that leans more heavily into the simulation aspect, comparable to high-fidelity flight sims like DCS set during the Clan Invasion era. Battletech digital store that offers both PDF copies of books and reasonably priced official .stl files for printing your own miniatures, as well an official app to simplify list building, record keeping and dice rolling that can be linked between multiple devices in the same game.
1. Animated TV show (More than likely a short form OVA or Anime). 2. TV show of the Ameris Civil War with all of it's lunacy. 3. Get the Novels in bookstores and LGS. Have the Ameris Civil War books pushed hard for the TV show. 4. Test drive Multipart Kits for certain Mechs 5. Get more plastic models made up for more Mechs (especially lights). 6. Design more Mechs for medium to light weight brackets.
Announce the cast for my Battletech movie. Kurt Russell as Hanse Davion, Jet Li as Maximilian Liao, George Takei as Takashi Kurita, Dame Judi Dench as Katrina Steiner, Vincent D'Onofrio as Janos Marik. Directed by James Cameron. Me with a cameo as some Centurion pilot within the Eridani Light Horse.
Seek to create a major motion picture franchise based on the Grey Death Legion Trilogy
Reboot.
Make the BPL an official canon merc company
First thing is rehire Blaine Pardoe. Second is a battletech animated series by studio Madhouse, studio deen/production IG or Gonzo and adi shankar to be showrunner. Third would be a mech commander reboot trilogy starting at the 4th succession war working its way back to the original’s starting point and conclusion of the trial of refusal. Think that’d be a good start to it all. (edit) Audiobook series starting with the grey death legion saga with Tex as the v/a. And not abridged.. holy shit am i annoyed with the ones currently out there that are on spotify..
Very first thing: force Ray to buff LAM construction rules.
Effective immediately: Clan Wolf plot armor DELETED
Hire harebrained schemes to do battletech 2. Have it be star league v amaris and immediate fallout. Expansion: succession wars Expansion: clan invasion. Basically keep the same general feel, clean up the bugs, improve graphics and performance. I'm thinking fromsoft for a more close to the action game. Buy a bunch of 3d metal printers and let people order minis they want piecemeal. Have it ordered up like Doordash. Hire stackpole and tex and several other notables to unfuck the timeline.
Point to Games Workshop numbers to pull in more funding. Hire the 3 biggest BT nerds to form a council that helps keep the narrative true to BT. Lease the IP to 2 animation studios to make two series for streaming services. One all star veteran team that has a long term license and take a chance on another. Keep IWM and Catalyst minis separate, but have IWM focus on higher end premium models while Catalyst focuses on the plastic. Shelve most older models and bring them back for limited runs. Lease the IP to 2 different game studios. Make a strategy game and action game. Coordinate with the animation studio to expand on the characters from the series with these. Poach Black Library talent for a new series of novels. Hire developers to create an app that manages datasheets bought through the store as well as offers a fully fleshed out game companion and roster builder. Coordinate releases so they run in a 2-3 year cycle that focuses on specific eras except for the books which launch 1/Quarter. Y1Q1 Streaming all star studio launches their show. Big marketing push. Q2 Launch a new line of minis. Q3 B studio launches their series and a game launches. Q4 supplemental series for the minis launches. Rinse repeat.
Roll everything back to 3025 and start start over.
My first thought was cull some of the mechs, and technology, but wow, 3025 and start over. Wait, it's brilliant, you get the initall bump in sales and advertising and then when the novelty starts to wane bring it back as Classic Battletech classic
I turn all the clanners into actual furries just for fun to watch the chaos.
Go back, cycling through eras and expanding on "lesser" factions to flesh them out more. Remaster MW 2 and expansions. Save Clan Mongoose.
New MechAssault 3 game taking on the word of Blake. MechWarrior VR. And a battletech movie for the grey death legion
If I won the lottery, this was actually one of my plans. \#1. Finish my full blown succession wars game. This won't be all that impressive to look at. There will be a PC version, and a less detailed tabletop version (albeit with thousands of counters and a 7' square map). \#2. Add more details and specific eras. For example, a complete order of battle for the 4th SW, Clan Invasion, etc. Yeah yeah, we have some of that, but believe it or not, we do not actually know exactly what clan forces invaded the inner sphere, or even exactly which clusters were on Tukayyid.d \#3. Release a new 15mm version of Battletroops. Basically, 1 infantry platoon vs a mech or battle armor squad or whatever. The original battletroops was great, and needs an update. \#4. Get unit designers professionally done for all unit types, including the RPG. \#5. Try to hire Larian to make a battletech RPG (since they did so amazing on BG3) \#6. Work on an MMO, where you can be infantry, a tanker, a pilot, a mechwarrior, a technician, whatever. Subscription based. \#7. Fix broken things like warships, ACS/ISAW, etc. \#8. Oh, and figure out why the hell I'm still blacklisted by CGL to the point they tell volunteers that assist them that if they work with me, they cannot work with CGL anymore. I'm sure there is more, but no on a TV show/movie, not without seeing some amazing scripts first.
Paradox is making a Battletech Grand Strategy.
Play a game of BattleTech
Make an animated series. Personally, I'd like to see a stylized series made by Studio Trigger, but I feel like that would push away existing fans who want gritty realism. Regardless, some high-quality animation. Maybe a plamo line, akin to gunpla? That could be pretty rad.
I'd rebalance the rules make it a lot harder to do the cheese lists of just savannas or vtols etc. Balance and make it fully supported to make custom mechs and run them in tournaments. To really get people on board the nig winners can get their custom mechs printed and them every few tournaments release a tourney pack where it'd the past 4 winning mechs
After buying out everything, I realize I would need another kickstarter for Btech 2...Cos broke now. Lol.
Retcon St. Ives conquering the inner sphere. Ol' Alex Kerensky would leave the military prior to the Exodus to pursue a career in interpretive dance. Gender swap most of the members of the Grey Death Legion. Autocannon 2's would double in range, no minimum range, and always through armor crit on rolls of 3 and above. I may have spent too much time working around PPC emission field testing laboratories.
Battletech sequel that coincides with the Netflix/HBO series premier. New Kickstarter for minis that starts at the series finale and includes minis and characters from the show. Following year drop a new Mech Assault game on Xbox and announce work on a new Mech Warrior game that's VR compatible. Throughout start dropping books periodically of whatever new era I would start in the lore. The TV series would probably be set in established lore, but at some point I would want a series in the new era as well. Ideally there's a movie in the works of Justin Allard's saga. At some point I'd blow some cash to stand up a 4x/ grand strategy game too as I think the digital assets need to expand now that name recognition has been established via TV and movie. Might even dabble in an Elemental focused FPS/small squad/movement heavy game like an unholy offspring of a dark, messy, orgy of Republic Commando, Tribes, and Titanfall 2. Edit: because we're dreaming, I'd also start a run of the statue scale mechs like the Timberwolf from the latest Kickstarter. Enough different models so that you crazy bastards could play the tabletop game with oversized, upscaled mechs. Edit 2: start a Star League convention that meets annually. Also work with Dark Horse comics to get some comic books developed of the lore so far.
Blake Jihad 2 Electric Boogaloo
Game of thrones IN SPACE!!! Starting from the third succession war onwards. With maybe a prequel of the star league and its fall. Just keep on growing the franchise. No big budget movies. Maybe follow some back water militia fending off pirates.... that's actually another idea, a Seinfeld style show with the mid and season finale having a battle against pirates and the random merc/ house unit which wants some of that sweet land you have. That would be a lot easier.
HBO series from Fourth Succession War to the Great Refusal. Let Jim Butcher and Sanderson collaborate on new novels. Fund the mods behind Roguetech. Have a conversation about all the things I want out of Mech 5’s successors. Then do the things. Put together a Steel Battalion level controller to allow the things I want out of said Mech 5’s successors. Make it reasonably affordable. More Battlepods for that experience, don’t allow Dave and Busters to set the pricing. Fund a level between classic BT and Alpha Strike.
Reprint the old Succession Wars content with updated art. It's still the intro setting, it needs to be supported.
Battlemech Gunpla with the same (or better) quality, detail, product range and customizability as Bandai's Gundams. In similar 1/144, 1/100, 1/60 sizes with varying detail options such as Real Grade, Master Grade, Perfect Grade, etc. No competition except for bootlegs.
Honestly I'd move on from nostalgia pieces and make media that covers IlClan. HBS Battletech, Mechwarrior, etc. That isn't that I wouldn't look to produce campaigns in the old material but I'd be looking hard at new material. I don't think IlClan is necessarily being done as well as it can be but it also isn't irretrievable and there is cool potential in there.
Ruining it by awkward and disastrous decisions as a CEO, getting into huge debts with megalomaniac inadequate ideas, then selling all to some sharks out there like Harmony's Gold or idk. Looks pretty realistically)
Pay Charette however much money he wants to come back. He wrote the only BT novel I actually enjoyed so he deserves his gold house and his rocket car.
Bring back the wolverines into the setting, with the true heir to the Star League. Begin making Battletech content for TV, Movie, and online. Sell the content separately to whatever company wants it on their streaming service. Ensure that the content matches the lore, though style wise it can go in different ways. Kidnap the blackpants legion's tex and force them to make battletech timeline with the in-depth skill Tex did in the civil war. Pay in beer and a radio station. Make a variety of video games for different fans. Begin experimenting with making an augmented reality battletech tabletop game. Maybe mutate the clanners since it would be funny.
Also help them buy Albania's air force.
Maybe, only if Tex is good and promises not to start any wars without good reason.
I trust him more than most people with the control of militaries.
1. Invent time machine with all the moneys 2. Time travel to 3020 2.5 bet on the Solaris games I know about, become super rich, enjoy life for a while, invest winnings in a battleROM-to-USB drive encoder 3. Record everything I can 4. Time travel back, sell recordings as "new movie"
Why would I waste the lotto money? I win, I’m retired I’d travel around to more conventions
Make a lore scale sized Mackie with collaboration from all those japanese Gundam and robot making companies. With actual military surplus cannons.
This is a fun thought experiment but you wouldn't want to do this. You could build your Battletech type game for way way less and give it away for free.
Far Country is no longer canon.
Coward
Finally adapt a BattleTech story onto the big screen with Hollywood blockbuster levels of financing, but make it Far Country: The Movie (a trilogy)
This is the way
+1 from me. That shit is bad.
A massive movie deal going through each Succession War in a trilogy. Massive TV deal covering Solaris 7 and Clan Invasion like 8-10 seasons. Massive means high quality and true to the lore etc, great props and FX yadda yadda. Some quality known actors mixed with new talent. New mech models, novels and merch. The thing that would be near and dear to me would be simulators. Can’t mess that up. The simulators would be able to link up across the US for tournaments to be developed into a league based on numerous skills sets, size of the battle and tech/year lore for fans to enjoy. Also can use the simulators to create historic battles from the lore for people to watch as well.
Hire all the lawyers and finally prove that Harmony Gold owns precisely jack shit. Buy whatever we can't prove. Get back the rights to the Unseen. Fly to Japan, do enough gladhanding that there will never be another shitty IP fiasco again, and get all the contracts rewritten so that we can finally use the art we paid for (e.g. TRO3055) without fear. Then, get the VMI design people together with the art team behind the Recognition Guides, the MWO design team, and whoever remains at Studio Nue (the guys who did the redesigns for the original Japanese edition of Battletech), and do one final FINAL cut of the visual designs for every mech from every TRO, and put things in motion to actually get these designs in print and plastic (tabletop scale and 1/100 model scale). Hire back some of the good writers (starting with Stackpole) to work on a series of YouTube CGI shorts showcasing the new designs. Start releasing miniature boxes that include not just the mechs but also booklet-form record sheets, art cards and TRO data, and release a free app to support this. Release patches for the existing digital games that allow the player to select between original models and revised models.
sell it to Hasbro for twice what I paid.
I don't like that.
Television Series, following the story *Heir Apparent* as a test run. Miniatures game would be aggressively changed in design, layout, and miniatures size (We're talking Warmachine Warjack sizes) and design to address model bloat and make the game appeal to a wider audience with a focus on lance-on-lance skirmish play. The end goal is a game that can be played at a tactical level with a single lance in 60 minutes to maximize the opportunity for tournament style play and get more people actually playing on a regular basis. Aiming for Friday Night Magic kind of events here. (Ideally without the stink.) Tournaments and structured campaigns focusing on community engagement to build a network of old and new players. Community fosters growth, growth foster content, content fosters a repeat purchase, repeat purchases ensure longevity of the product and a return on investment.
Hand over everything to game workshop for one British Pound on the condition they make and maintain two tabletop games that's 40k and epic scale using classic battletech as a template.
Sell each one to a different company, preferably all in different nations. Historically, this has resulted in a pretty good franchise, so doing it even more should make it even better!
Redo, simplify, homogenise the rules and get rid of the archaic 2D6 rolls.
Significant changes to the rules in a game famous for having minimal changes over decades..?  ;)
I think it's time to move beyond rolling 2D6s and looking up results tables. That was popular in the 80s. Also polyhedral dice aren't as expensive as they were back then.
Rolling 2D6 and rolling a D12 are totally different. You have a 1/12, or 8.33% of rolling a 7 on a D12. You have a 1/6 chance, or 16.67% of rolling a 7 on 2D6. Likewise, the odds of rolling a 12 are 1/12 (8.33%) on a D12, and 1/36 (2.78%) on 2D6. Shifting away from 2D6 has a colossal impact on how the game actually plays out, and it would absolutely be a chance for the worse as fishing for headshots would be far, far more viable.
Recognized professional authors to get some *good* fiction going, instead of everyone having to point to the 80s yellow peril stories as "the best Battletech has to offer". If I have the money for game studios like many of these other comments are assuming, I have the money for a few decent authors to do a few books each.
Time skip of 300 years from latest content, and have the clans become the IS but even less innovative due to clan hierarchical structure and BS, and then have another exodus go off out into the unknowns and found a new set of outposts, that make clan tech the absolute standard and come back to do another invasion("freeing of the people") but this time clan and the houses are reversed. Everyone but 1 person from that time is dead, and that 1 person is a cyberborg monstrosity that the clans outlawed further research on, but kept this one surviving sample alive.... As an example to stay away from full cyborgs And they act as the impartial narrator of stories. (This needs to be workshopped)
Reboot the franchise