Triple post!  And I'm not a post count whore, honestly...

Joking aside, would it be possible for a new thread to be created in community involvment for the posting of scenario/campaign dialogue, or would be another place to post it?

For now, I'll just put a basic Dramatis Personae here.

Linda Yurkowski:  23 year old Lyran female

A Mechwarrior tested for light/medium mechs.  Passed the academy but didn't have a high enough score to obtain a decent mech posting.  She refused an offer to transfer to armor and returned after one tour of garrison duty to her homeworld of Mahone.  There she joined up with the Militia and tested out for a sniping role in the unit's new Hollander II.  She favor's the Archon's decision to split from the Federated Commonwealth and is a pro-Lyran.  She wants glory, but is content in the militia, justifying it as protected the Lyran Alliance from the renegade Arc Royal Defense Cordon.

Leeroy Atkins:  31 year old Lyran male

A militia weekend warrior.  Never left Mahone and isn't the best mech pilot, but his expertise in electronics secured his spot piloting the militia's state of the art Raven.  Occassionally question's the commander's decision to assign Linda as lance leader over him, but overall accepts it and plays his role of being the lance's, and militia's, eyes.

Ben Huntington:  25 year old Federated male

A Davion who lost all his money upon discharge for the Federated Sun's armed forces, and wound up on Mahone.  After drifting for a while, he decided to sign up with the militia.  Although tested for higher weight classes, a shortage of equipment and lack of seniority has left him stuck piloting a vintage Commando.  A rash personality and pro Davion viewpoint annoys his lancemates from time to time, but his desire to fight the Clans stems from his time in the army, and is higher up on his agenda.

Fargus Baker:  38 year old Lyran male

A long time member of the Mahone Militia, and proud of it.  He use to pilot a Warhammer, but jumped for an opportunity to pilot an off the assembly line Bushwacker.  Prefers fighting up close and personal, trusting his long time skills and ego to save him.  Ever since the clans invaded he was cut off from his family on Wotan, and was repeatedly rejected from the LAAF due to his refusal to be a team player.  Thus he took up drinking and a general displeasure of authority.  It is a surprise to the whole militia that he puts up with Linda's orders.

Colonel Argus Randolph:  31 year old Lyran male

Son of Duke Titus Randolph, who obviously used his father's position to obtian command of the 15th Regulars Regiment at so young an age.  However, he has the tactical mind to justify his position, and has a fair, if not outstanding, record to date.  He is very ambitious and a staunch Katrina supporter, and takes a liking to Linda Yurkowski based on her similar, if not as intense, dedication to the Lyran Alliance.  Ironically, this sets in motion Linda's destiny in a way neither could have forseen.

Star Captain Stan Helmer:  25 year old Jade Falcon trueborn

A proud warrior of Clan Jade Falcon and already bloodnamed.  He earned his promotion to Star Captain as a reward for his performance in the Refusal War.  Like all trueborns he inherits the same views and attitudes of freebirths and the Inner Sphere and looks down upon them.  Still he likes surprises and courage no matter who the individual is, whether warrior or laborer.  Perhaps it was very fortunate that he ended up taking Linda Yurkowski as his bondsman.

Tech Luke:  29 year old Jade Falcon freebirth

A member of the technician caste assigned to Star Captain Stan Helmer's trinary.  Takes an immediate liking to Linda and assists her through her integration into Clan society.  Something of a chatterbox who can't hold his mouth even when threatened by the warrior caste.  Still he knows his trade and is considered to be one of the best among his caste.

Nice one KiloEcho, are you thinking creating the story via a diary style (like the MW2:Mercs campaign)?  Or a mixture of Battle & Situation Reports, with the story mixed in (like MW2)?  I'm leaning towards the Diary style, think it would personalise things easier.

Are you Michael A. Stackpole?

Haha. Your scenario made me laugh!

The Knife felt a moments vertigo, as if a turbo lift had stopped 2 fast, as the main engines of the nemesis engaged for the final descent to the lunar surface below.
Quad pillars of superheated plasma , with a stellar glare fought against and slowly balanced the opposing kinetic forces. and just as the first sand was flashed to glass by the tip of this fire, the dropships massive legs swung out from their armoured recesses and locked down . four seconds later there was a gentle thump, and the "landed" lights began to flash in the cavernous mechbay.
the massive clamps that held the mechs in their transit gantrys now responded to commands of the individual pilots and swung clear of their cargo's.
even in the cockpit of his atlas, the knife could feel a gentle rumble as the massive armoured doors ground open, freeing the way for his men and mechs to disembark the nemesis.
as per doctrine the smaller mechs went first , they would form up on their lance mates and each group would head for a Nav point already calculated and downloaded into the onboard computers during the descent.
with the scouts out, the mediums came next and set up a pair of revolving defensive lines. clockwise and counter clockwise at 1000 metres from the nemesis.
that done the heavy's and assaults thundered down the ramps and set up position under the firing arcs of the nemesis's functioning guns.
atop the dropship other armoured covers were rolling aside and the radar arrays and comm's dish's rose like periscope's. they were ready for battle.
but it was not at a place of their choosing, nor was the timetable theirs...
all they could do was wait now, for the enemy to deal the next hand in the game.......

to be continued....

eons ago, when man was still clinging to logs in order to cross water, a large asteroid had hit this moon. its impact creating the massive crater the nemesis stood in. but such was its angle of descent it also took the top of a peak, one of many in a mountain chain 100 kilometres east of where the nemesis sat waiting.
It was to this peak, Nova Col Zhan directed his dropship be relocated. once the defence of the nemesis was neutralised he would move again to begin the transfer of mechs and supplys, but for now this gave excellent line of sight , his forces would use jump where applicable or drop cradles for those without it, to deploy to the plains below. there they would engage and if possible draw the enemy back into the range of the big guns on his overlord class dropship. either way he was happy with the situation, his dropship stood little chance of being overrun in its location but was in a perfect position to "feed" mechs as needed into the battle as it developed. the range was perfect as it allowed him to flank left and right of the nemesis as well as approach straight on. he keyed an order into the ships comms system for his officers to attend him in the operations room. it was time to listen to their bids.

In the cockpit of his Atlas the knife had been apraised of the situation and location of the enemy dropzone.
locking the actuators he placed the mech in standby mode, while he unhooked his neural interface, and rumaged in an equipment locker.
he removed a small satchel of limpet mines and choose one, replacing the rest back in the locker.
tearing off its wrap he snapped the safety strap off, and removed the radio controled remote from its housing, exposing the arming toggles set below.
he set the remote within reach of his pilot seat, and sealing his suit opened the primary hatch on the cockpit, which led to the left shoulder of the Atlas.
He braced for one second as the air rushed past, then moved carefully out.
very even greater care he chose a spot where two of the armour plates that covered the Atlas's massive head joined.
triggering the adhesion mechanism, he armed it and set it for remote detonation.
returning to the cockpit, he re pressurised and flipped the visor on his helmet. reconnecting his neural interface, he brought the mech back online and unlocked the actuators. the remote he taped to the controlboard in front of him.
it was always good to have an ace up ones sleeve.....though if anyone else had known what he had just done, they may well have chosen to think this joker was wild.


to be continued...................



The scout lances had shifted east in their sweeps towards the confirmed enemy DZ. the mediums patrolling at 1000 metres taking on the task of scouting west as they rotated through that quadrant. 50 mins later the scouts reported contacts. no hard data at first as the emeny mechs used the terrain to block radar when possible. the first contacts were like ghosts, appearing and disappearing from the rader scopes. here a Madcat, there a pair of Ryokens. the first wave moved in like phantoms, these would be the faster mechs , scouting the scouts. the lighter mechs fell back towards the dropship, fanning north and south to ensure they were not being flanked.
Matt jenson's 25 ton Commando was the first to take fire. two ER large lasers hit his left arm, and red lights lit his weapons board, as his armour melted and the arm actuator locked. seconds later at least 20 of the 30 LRMs fired from paired LRM15 launchers atop the Ryoken that had found him struck and his Large Laser and left arm were destroyed.The Hot Drop, the waiting, all had taken their toll on Matt's nerves. he made a fatal error, like a flushed game bird he panicked. he triggered a long burst of his jump jets , the low gravity of the moon made the jump much higher than it should have been, and the Commando flew like a dandelion seed on the wind. in the cockpit Matt could only sit helplessly as ER PPC fire from 3 Madcats slammed his mech again and again. there was no where to eject to on this airless desert, and the ejection charge would likely put him into low orbit at this altitude, there was no where to go, nothing to be done, he was helpless ......
the end when it came was almost a relief

to be continued............ 
 
 
Kaela Roshak smiled with grim satisfaction as the ER PPC from the left arm of her Madcat scored the definitive hit on the Commando. punching through what was left of the armour and internal structure, it cored the reactor and the Commando exploded in a white ball of destruction. for a brief moment it resembled the seed of the jorda plant blown on the winds of Tokasha the world where her Sibko had been creched.
Her star consisted of 3 madcats and 2 ryokens, and in biding such , she had won the right to first charge at the enemy. It was fitting and auspicious she should start the battle by claiming the first kill.
her Star fell back into formation with practised ease and they resumed the push forward. the Ryokens flanked left and right of the Madcats who played anchor to the formation with her Mech centre of the star.
the Ryokens BAP which had found the Commando long before the pilot even knew it, would give extended tactical warning of enemys left or right of them, and would allow the star to flex left or right in response with her mech as pivot and anchor. it was a formation that all her people were comfortable with and they worked not as five separate mechs, but rather as a Clan Star should, a single amorphous being a flowing organisim of destruction, that moved over the terrain, in command of and able to respond to the battle as it evolved.

accelerating her Madcat to its top speed she pushed forward towards the Nemesis

TBC........

On the bridge of the Nemesis Capt Tan relaxed into his chair, he listened to the reports and instructions flowing over the Ops Comm channels. his job was done, the dropship landed. there were casualtys, bones broken, including a mechwarriors neck. a combination of the initial scamble for the mechbays and the high gee manouvers. but all and all he'd done as well as anyone could have asked, his ship was landed,the mechs were deployed. he shut his eyes, and listened to the battle comms.
"scout lances, procede to new nav points, snipe where you can and watch that crossfire","medium lance's continue picket cycle until contact then engage","assaults hold position"


Wi Chu (Wally) Tetsuri, crouched his Bushwacker at the rim of a crater and checked the position of his lancemates. to his left was another Bushwacker and Thompsons Uziel, to his right Niro's Hunchback, its ECM and its electronic interferance adding to the cover given by the crater. His own Bap had picked up a Ryoken moments earlier and they waited here in ambush.
the moment his HUD gave the range he was waiting for , he gave the command, and they surged up over the lip of the crater. triggering his zoom, he targeted the left leg of the Ryoken. his gauss riffle shook the mech as it fired a melon sized ball of hardened steel at supersonic speed, paired PPC fire from the Uziel also struck the leg.
the Ryoken fell, but as it did 4 ER PPC's struck Niro's Hunchback, the mech was critically damaged and the lance fell back into cover. the Ryoken regained its footing under the covering fire of the two madcats that had come to its aid, but it limped its left leg actuators mangled and melted


TBC.................................. 
 
 
kaela Roshack, no longer smiled as she cut her mechs speed to hold formation with the critically damaged ryoken.
"Stravag", with her push forward irreversably slowed, Star capt Torson, would be free to begin his advance by the rules as set by Nova col Zhan.
keying open comms she gave the orders to hunt down the Surats responsible.

SC Torson , on being given the GO took a moment to check the status indicators of the mechs in his Star.
His Gladiator and the 2 Thors had used Jump to ascend from the dropzone to the battlefield below, but the 2 vultures that completed the Star had worn drop cradles which had been shed once they had landed, he wanted 2 be sure both vultures were functioning in the green.
when he was confident all was satisfactory he gave the order to advance.....

in the battle room on board NC Zhans dropship a comms officer took careful aim using the enhanced zoom of one of the external cameras, lining up one of the Nemesis's comm dish's he triggered the laser.
a minute practised adjustment in aim and the comm set chimed with a receiver lock and "handshake"
"Sir" he hailed Zhan, "i have ship to ship laser comm"
"send our Ident, and the terms under which we accept surrender" ,"they have little hope opposing us quiaff"
"AFF sir" replied the comms officer, and set about his task.
Personally Zhan hoped the enemy commanders would accept defeat, but he knew his Star Capts were eager for combat. the Mechwarrior in him felt the same, but the commander in him knew it served no purpose to destroy that which he sought to capture, but if they had to destroy every mech opposing them to get to the spares and munitions aboard the Nemesis then so be it.

He would succeed in this campaign, he had only ever suffered defeat in combat once a very long time ago when he was young and relatively untested in battle, the humiliaton of that time had burned in him like a sacred flame, fueling his return to mechwarrior status, his rise through the ranks. And yet for every victory won since that time, even combined their totallity could not even begin to expunge the shame he kept secreted inside, he would give anything to cleanse this blot, but had long ago given up ever finding a means of doing so, instead he directed this gnawing anger at his opponents.
he would suceed , if he had to do so over the broken bodies of every person aboard the Nemesis.


TBC..........

Niro began slaping overide switch's with a sense of detached horror, those ER PPC's had hit with pinpoint accuracy, the centre torso of his Hunchback.
they had cored right through and stripped a sizable chunk of reactor sheilding from his Nissan 200 engine.
the mech tettered on the brink auto shutdown, but he regained partial control. he could move, but firing the weapons would, with the overides in place , cause his reactor to go critical.
he keyed open a comm channel to the lance leader.
"im gone Sir", he reported
"get the lance back to that secondary ambush point we tagged. ill hold em as long as i can"
"no no, fall back we can cover you" replied Lt Tetsuri
"sorry boss no can do, im Cooked........"
there was a moments silence as the lance leader absorbed the ramifications of that word, with the loss of reactor sheilding niro was taking Radiation.
"Roger" replied Lt Tetsuri, "is there anything you want me....." he was cut off by Niro, "Sir get moving, and Wally..... its been an honor serving with you...."
another moment of comm silence....... then quietly
"likewise Son, Tetsuri out"
he watched leave them Via his HUD , but at 500 metres they turned and raised the right arms of their mechs in salute.
he "punched the air" twice with is own right arm in response and with weapons systems deactivated set the Hunchback in motion forward towards the enemy............

The Knife listened with interest to the Intel on the Command channel, the enemy had identified himself as Nova Col Kieran Zhan, a name from the Knife's distant past. he put through a request to the Comms Ops for a link. an idea was begining to formulate in his mind...........


TBC
 
 
 With what appeared to be subtle silence, the massive energy stored in the coils of a Kierney Fuchida Hyperdrive, translated the jumpship Kerensky's Pride to the systems pirate jump point.
on the bridge the strained silence was not entirely due to the inherent risks taken jumping to a pirate point, but was inspired instead by the obvious cold fury of the personage in the command chair.
Galaxy Commander Elsha Pryde, was here to kill Nova Col Zahn.
She had just jumped from the system Zhan had been assigned to garrison, of the 16 industrial/mining complexes scattered amongst the systems mineral rich moons and asteroids ,only 5 remained functional, the rest destroyed by pirate raiders or a rival Clan, they would never know, by the time those left to cover his absence had worked up the courage to call for assistance, the raiders were gone.
The officer left in charge had cracked and told her the whole plan and Zahns location before she had him shot.
the remaining officers had each received entry's into their Codex's that would forever bar them from contributing to the Clans genetic repositorys, she would have designated the entire roster Solahma had she the resources to replace them.
"dropship reports ready status Galaxy Commander" informed the captain. breaking the silence.
without a word she rose and headed towards the leopard class dropship.
this was his last mistake, she thought back to his first.

Zhan had been given command of a small force, bid to hold the freebirths off while a newly discovered Star league Library was copied prior to its destruction.
his entire force was wiped out, the library lost. Zahn the only survivor.His commanding officer and one of her Sibko, had allowed him a Trial by combat, and had lost, Zahn retained his MW status, eventually rising to Nova Col rank.

there would be no Circle of Equals this time.his failure to communicate this venture up the chain of command, and the subsequent loss of the facilitys he was assigned to guard gave her the right to shoot him outright. her hand strayed unconciously to her side arm holster. this day had been long in the coming.




tbc............


with no atmosphere, the solar winds beat down directly on the surface of the moon, ionising the rocks and dust.

Kaela Roshak looked again at the MAD (Magnetic Anomaly Detector) display.The ionisation had created enough of an electrical charge to scramble any data its sensors picked up. "Malfing useless", she muttered. Thus it was she did not notice the Hunchback sprawled face down until she was almost on top of it.
it was dead. shutdown, a few kicks to the exposed cockpit area would ensure it remained salvage, she walked her Mech towards the prone Hunchback.


"Sir ?, repeat the message Quiaff ?"
Nova Col Zahn turned to his comms operator numbly
"NEG..........., Neg" , "i understood it"
his comms operator returned his gaze stiffly to the screen in front of him , the message had been short, "Karl Carver wants to call in an I.O.U"
that the Nova Col understood the freebirth code was less surprising that the effect it had had on him.
the whites of his eyes were showing and the corners of his mouth were flecked with spittle, he looked like a man posessed.

Niro hung from his seat straps, his arms dangling over the cockpit's control panel, the "Not a Dame" as he had christened his Hunchback was shutdown and would never rise from where he had lain her down.
he had felt the gentle vibrations minutes earlier and had blinked bleary eyes and focused on the switches he would need.
the vibrations were no longer gentle now as the approaching mech got closer, his vision swam again.

Star commander Roshack raised the right leg of her mad cat and aimed a kick at the hunchbacks head, just as her sensors reported the mech had powered up.........

Niro felt the mech hum to life around him one last time, he triggered an Alpha strike, he did not need to aim.
the reactor damaged and now called on for a massive power load went critical and exploded like a minute sun
the glare was the last thing Star Com Roshak saw.....


tbc.........

JESUS CHRIST.

Nice writing..kudos...


*would the devs like a small format for scenario suggestions?  Look ^


*Situation (<200 words)
*Affiliations (~5 words per team)
*Time of Battle (~1 word)
*Win conditions (~each team x25 words)

 

Here is a VERY Brief example, something simple, short and sweet, just for example...

Sit Rep- Team A is holding 5 hi-level officers of Team B.  The hostages are being held in a hilltop compound which isn't directly assaultable from the ground.  Only access to the compound is via underground tunnels which are only large enough to accomodate Battle Armor and ground vehicular units.  The compound's (Team A) garrison consists of 8 mixed medium and light battlemechs, 4 aero fighters, and 2 Myrmidons in support.  Team B's strike force consists of 8 Battlemechs, max tonnage 400, 4 aero fighers, and 4 Battle Armor.

Affiliations  Team A =Inner Sphere, Team B =Inner Sphere  (this will happen, right?, IS vs IS....)

Time of Battle= Team B selectable

Win Conditions- Team B must destroy all defending Battlemechs and vehicles before reinforcements arrive, 10 minutes.
                      Team A must destroy all attacking units or defend compound for 10 minutes.