One Rabid Fox changes the Succession Wars [A Battletech Isekai]

[HunterxReader]

The Medium 'mech company won. And Henry is too used to what his essence allows him to do, so everyone tends to side eye him when he says stuff, and then contemplate what that is going to have once he starts organizing actual factories.

As for Dana, yes she survived her and Hanse were married Henry attended the wedding and got introduced to people by drunk!Ian which is how he knows Alexandria.

Click to shrink...

Ah, shame, seeing the class eke out a win from the Rabid Foxes then being pleasantly surprised that the OpFor is easier to beat would be funny, but I suppose would be less realistic.

Heh, is he providing just the funds and his support staff, or is he going to thrown in some orbital factories from Megamek as well? They're going to be quite surprised when they establish their factories and the Rabid Fox and/or his techs can point where they need fixing (seeing as the Essence gives not just proficiency in use but maintenance as well for the user, even if just rudimentary)

Nice. Ah, I can't believe I missed that, I went back to re-read and it's right there in the first chapter.

Edit: Yeah, after he proves he's not blowing out hot air, people are going to be lining up to propose projects or ask for funding, or get advocates close by in case he gets another big idea. MHD might get frustrated that at least two major projects are being established away from the Capellan March, but I think Michael will think twice about going against an industrial powerhouse of a military hero, and that said person is close to one or more of his major detractors (Hanse, Yvonne, to name a few) and he might not want to make another one that's close to Ian.

 

[Bofors40mm]

Honestly Diana and Hanse being wed and having kids opens up the possibility of a much less creepy age difference wise marriage between a son and Melissa Steiner that also would have a lot more time to raise the kids vs having to rule.

Also correct me if I'm wrong but isn't the rabid foxes the nickname of a mech company in the 7th Crusis Lancers?

 

[Imperator Pax]

Honestly Diana and Hanse being wed and having kids opens up the possibility of a much less creepy age difference wise marriage between a son and Melissa Steiner that also would have a lot more time to raise the kids vs having to rule.

Also correct me if I'm wrong but isn't the rabid foxes the nickname of a mech company in the 7th Crusis Lancers?

Click to shrink...

They only receive that nickname during Hanse's rule, at least originally I don't think Catalyst has retroactively canonized that moniker to an earlier era

 

[Bofors40mm]

They only receive that nickname during Hanse's rule, at least originally I don't think Catalyst has retroactively canonized that moniker to an earlier era

Click to shrink...

Fair enough. Either way be funny to run into that bunch.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Fair enough. Either way be funny to run into that bunch.

Click to shrink...

EDIT No I was mis remembering Fox's teeth is McKinnon's company 7th Crucis Lancers

MI6 is under Hanse's reign given the nickname the Rabid Foxes

 

[HunterxReader]

Honestly Diana and Hanse being wed and having kids opens up the possibility of a much less creepy age difference wise marriage between a son and Melissa Steiner that also would have a lot more time to raise the kids vs having to rule.

Also correct me if I'm wrong but isn't the rabid foxes the nickname of a mech company in the 7th Crusis Lancers?

Click to shrink...

They only receive that nickname during Hanse's rule, at least originally I don't think Catalyst has retroactively canonized that moniker to an earlier era

Click to shrink...

It is also the nickname of the DMI's special forces: MI6.

Edit: Ninja'd by the author.

 

[Bofors40mm]

On another note got to wonder if Michael has been forced to resign from all his federal government posts given that his father died fairly recently and the Capellan March needs their Duke to well be there vs doing about 5 different things on New Avalon

 

[Imperator Pax]

Thats a good point Michael is like 30 according to his birth date in the Federated Suns (2985 as per the wiki) or 40 (2976 given he was supposed to be 45 in 3025),

He married Marie '03 and she had Morgan two years later 05, which ok thats not that unusual, but he must have succeeded to George Hasek's post late in 3013 given the implication seems to be Ian was dead by then given BT travel speeds I assume in feudal status and tradition it might well have taken him until after Ian's death to be coroneted and installed so a coronation in december doesn't strike me as that odd. [George apparently served 32 years as FMCM so either birthdate for Michael is plausible] Michael's military service is brief before he had the BattleMaster Incident. Given Marie would be from her brithdate would be 44 in 3015 it arguably makes more sense to use the 2976 hypothetical, even as a baseborn member of the lineage it seems very likely that Marie should have had no end of potential suitors I would think especially given Michael's apparent belief of what it entitled him to but it doesn't provide conclusive proof she would have only been in her thirties at the start of the century George might like christmas cake.

Whats more interesting is she explicitly excluded from the line of succession even without considering her failing out of Albion.

I would assume that Michael probably never made it past lieutenant, maybe captain, before his Marauder met the Assault mech before coming into it as a hereditary command (most likely his father held the colonel of the regiment post as Duke prior to his death in may 3013)

So on Michael Hasek I'm not sure about how his enthronement would effect his federal posts under a continuing Ian government especially since his sister is probably duke of New Syrtis in all but name if he's on New Avalon, but he's also only been duke for about two years... something to think on

 

[HunterxReader]

The fun thing about rereading is noticing interesting things I missed before. Such as this nice pair of info from Sakhara 1 & 5:

It was equally fine really that the Davion News Media had focused on Ian Davion's victory over Takashi Kurita, his equal and equivalent in the Draconis Combine in the subsequent victory won at Halstead station. He assumed that the Combine either didn't really have news media or valued their lives enough to not talk about it. He doubted the other successor states cared.​

That wasn't to say there weren't rewards... not counting the illicit salvage that he had engaged in under House Davion's nose while under contract for them. Not that he regretted that. The measly 25 points he accrued a day really wasn't nearly enough to do much by itself... he needed to accumulate more points to get the most out of his Isekai Cheat Power; 'The Essence'.

Click to shrink...

They had no evidence to support such a thing being in the works... and the truth was the DCMS probably were unable to support such an offensive... not after the victories on Mallory's World and Hallstead station the combine's other mech units had taken a beating that would take years to recover from...

... and indeed from their intelligence reports the Combine was proving slower to recoup its losses than expected. Since Halstead Station had been a raid the Combine should have been able to salvage their losses after the battlefield, but it seemed as if the toxic nature of the planet had hampered recovery efforts... not surprising given the loss of the city of Madison as a consequence of the fighting. That bought them time at least... but the Coordinator would need to make a move sooner rather than later it was the nature of the beast.

Click to shrink...

I'm assuming he looted most, if not all, of the salvage that the FS missed in Halstead Station. Ah, a fun benefit of the recycle function, instant salvage for when you no longer have cargo capacity but don't want leave anything behind for the losers. Heh, I bet the Dracs are scratching their heads wondering where their scraps went. That's a big hit, it's almost (Since the raid would get a bit of official salvage and Clay might have missed some) an entire regiment worth of repairable units and spare parts written off.

 

[Bofors40mm]

i take it that the proposed jumpship production yards Henry Clay wants will also have the means to service jumpships and probably make and service dropships?
mind you i suspect they're probably less likely to be new yards vs additions/upgrades and repairs to existing ones due to needing skilled labor and existing supply chains. which still is a major upgrade to the Suns production and maintenance capabilities

 

[Imperator Pax]

i take it that the proposed jumpship production yards Henry Clay wants will also have the means to service jumpships and probably make and service dropships?
mind you i suspect they're probably less likely to be new yards vs additions/upgrades and repairs to existing ones due to needing skilled labor and existing supply chains. which still is a major upgrade to the Suns production and maintenance capabilities

Click to shrink...

Clay's plan for yards is new unpressurized yard space deployed over Sakhara, and later in ~ 3018 ish one over Bristol if he can get the industrial concession rights to build there [he has the legal right to construct yard space at Sakhara he doesn't have that currently for bristol]

What is going to be proposed by the Federal Government is 'new yard great, can you fix the yards over New Avalon' and that will be what replaces trying to stand up a second new yard, the one over Bristol, in the short term, and then from there, expanding to repair and bring back online over the course of the remaining years of the 3rd sucession war the other major yards
EDIT: The plan in my notes is New Avalon, Kathil, Galax

I swear i have seen references to New Avalon having had shipyards but a quick trawl of the wiki doesn't show anything so I may need to double check that

 

[Bofors40mm]

Clay's plan for yards is new unpressurized yard space deployed over Sakhara, and later in ~ 3018 ish one over Bristol if he can get the industrial concession rights to build there [he has the legal right to construct yard space at Sakhara he doesn't have that currently for bristol]

What is going to be proposed by the Federal Government is 'new yard great, can you fix the yards over New Avalon' and that will be what replaces trying to stand up a second new yard, the one over Bristol, in the short term, and then from there, expanding to repair and bring back online over the course of the remaining years of the 3rd sucession war the other major yards

Click to shrink...

new avalon never had yards. el dorado is the sole missing known jumpship yard from the suns due to the Succession Wars albeit all of the others (Panpour(which unlike the others at least in the post 1st SW era doesn't do dropships), Kathil, Delevan, and New Sytris, possibly Galax in the maintenance role). also the damage to the yards is mostly from the first two succession wars with the tech and high end industry loss and skilled labor and funding being the things that make fixing them hard.
Also have a massive dropship yard at Layover that can be fixed to make a lot of stuff compared the handful of seekers a year it makes now along with at least a couple repair yards that can be upgraded to production mainly firgrove and I think Filvelt.
these mind you are the named sites with known locations

 

[Imperator Pax]

new avalon never had yards. el dorado is the sole missing known jumpship yard from the suns due to the Succession Wars albeit all of the others (Panpour(which unlike the others at least in the post 1st SW era doesn't do dropships), Kathil, Delevan, and New Sytris, possibly Galax in the maintenance role). also the damage to the yards is mostly from the first two succession wars with the tech and high end industry loss and skilled labor and funding being the things that make fixing them hard.
Also have a massive dropship yard at Layover that can be fixed to make a lot of stuff compared the handful of seekers a year it makes now along with at least a couple repair yards that can be upgraded to production mainly firgrove and I think Filvelt.
these mind you are the named sites with known locations

Click to shrink...

Yeah, as I said in my edit like probably right when you were posting

I did a wiki run, and my idea that there were shipyards at new avalon appears to be fanon. I will browse some books but what will probably happen is that the Galax will be first its in the Markesan operational area, then Kathil and into the 3020s there will be a program of training up engineers through NAIS to have GM, and FedBoeing and so forth to repair and operate returning shipyards

Need to page through House Davion anyway

 

[Bofors40mm]

Yeah, as I said in my edit like probably right when you were posting

I did a wiki run, and my idea that there were shipyards at new avalon appears to be fanon. I will browse some books but what will probably happen is that the Galax will be first its in the Markesan operational area, then Kathil and into the 3020s there will be a program of training up engineers through NAIS to have GM, and FedBoeing and so forth to repair and operate returning shipyards

Need to page through House Davion anyway

Click to shrink...

honestly i'd kill for a master industry source book for all the different eras

 

[PeaceMaker03]

Pax, it is your story if a yard at New Avalon makes sense do it.

"The Panpour shipyards were virtually destroyed in a 2796 Combine raid. Stripped of most equipment to repair the Universal Air yards above Delavan the yards were little more than a shell.[2]"​

Panpour, JS yards brought back online would give the outback a shot in the arm. Need a better organic defensive force at Panpour, never made sense why in cannon Panpour had no mech regiment out there. Just a hired merc unit defending the largest military industry in the outback.​

 

[HunterxReader]

Heh, I'm having flashbacks to The Quest. Sounds like you're going to be the FedSuns' industrial troubleshooter. Your factories and yards need fixing? we've got the parts and the techs for you. Want to open a new business/branch in the Suns? Funds, factories and factory workers, we've got 'em! Ian's probably going to have to make Henry a March Lord to make sure he's properly rewarded and can't be influenced by the other Dukes. An early Periphery March would probably help fix the Outback problem, even just more jumpships, and not ramshackled ones at that, would support the Vagabond Schools, though he can also contribute enough funding for infrastructure and "support personnel" for the VS to not be needed.

 

[Imperator Pax]

Sakhara [November 3015]
2.1​

It was funny how quickly his November calendar had exploded with all of his free time evaporating... and he still had classes that he needed to attend. He drummed his fingers on the top of his head. Fuck, and there was other stuff to deal with today too.

It was easy to say that the company of cadets needed better equipment but realistically to the perspectives of the Succession War States that was an aspiration but not a feasible one. There was another problem, not everyone would want the 'downgrade' or 'reduction' that a standard 'mech would entail. Not everyone drove a missile boat, not everyone was a 'musketeer', etc, there were specialties. There was a reason mech design in the Star League era had moved towards specialist mech designs.

His first inclinations had been Thugs.... then Thunderbolts... then Hatamoto-chi which were basically weaboo Thugs... and then it struck him thinking about the Hatamoto-chi. The Charger was a crappy assault mech... but if down engine-d it could take the engine from the Centurion... and from there it was just a matter of loading it with the weapons package from the Centurions.

The immediate obvious problem to such a down grade of the engine was that they would be slow... comparable to an Atlas without the firepower... but it would still be an improvement over the base line Charger... but it was an idea that was ultimate tossed on the back burner.

No, he was over thinking things.

He looked up as Alexandria sat down. "Thanks for coming."

"Did you sleep?"

"Hmm, a few hours." He replied, and waved it off, "Are you aware of were your being posting on graduation," She stiffened and started to evaluate what her answer was going to be, and he shook his head, "SO you do know, good. That's good I wasn't honestly sure. Alright loose summary is while I plan to have Haakon extend feelers to Mountain Wolf I have no idea how long that will take-"

She stopped him, "What are you talking about, we have an exercise against the Robinson Rangers today."

He rubbed around his eyes. "Yes I'm aware and I expect you to do your best, but realistically we're hitting structural problems with the materiel involved. Mechs are being used for roles, and by pilots they're not appropriate for." He stopped... "I'm sorry has Coleridge talked to you yet?"

"The vice chancellor?" Her face creased. "No, why-"

"Coleridge is angling for me to lead the cadets against 1st​ Rangers, if Lord Aaron will agree to that."

"What?"

He was glad they weren't in the cafeteria. She hadn't shouted but her expression had flashed almost to briefly touch on apoplectic. "It was last minute," Really last minute, Coleridge had only sent him the email this morning... a little after five, but in truth he'd been up for about two hours by that point, "And if that's the case I'll probably be in a rifleman anyway."

"You can't," She protested.

"I'm not saying its going to happen, Colonel Coleridge may not get approval, but you needed to know it was being discussed." He scrunched his eyes up and rubbed his face, but resisted the urge to yawn and stretch, "As I was saying Haakon is going to visit Mountain Wolf BattleMechs on my behalf, and the Merlins will most probably benefit ... future classes." Probably not the next round of graduates, after Justin and Alexandria, but it might be possible to allocate graduates the following class with Centurions and Merlins. Maybe they could even start outfitting ASF pilots... but they weren't there yet.

The truth was he'd need time.

"It doesn't matter they're talking about it," She hissed defensively.

"I know." He replied, he fought down the urge to talk with his hands, "Alright, that's not the point I had another idea over the weekend."

Forty minutes later.

The class trudged in, and once we sure that the exhausted cadets had settled down, he pulled the sheet off to begin his plans.... well more correctly he pulled a lever that released the tarp.

Don Juan was pretty on point in terms of asking rather blithely what the hell it was.

"Call it a Cataphract... though you could be excused for calling it a Franken Mech." He shrugged, "I had some spare parts, and a weekend..." He withheld a joke about being left unsupervised... it was a Cataphract, but it was also one made from various bits of technology and models that wouldn't conform to the Capellan model that should show up, in about a decade. "I had an engine that came out of a Night Hawk, so its not exactly the fastest thing," and indeed its use of the GM 210 was in part a mix of his Charger idea, but also Mountain Wolf potentially related, but also he'd gone into the mech lab to make sure specific parts were fluffed to back stop any potential ... well accusations of Capellan construction... it would be funny in a decade. Maybe a little petty. "It carries two Imperator As, from a rifleman, a large laser from a rifleman, and a five cell LRM launcher that we happened to have just lying around." He shrugged as if that was nothing. He had their attention... but also had the gunnery instructors attention. "Yes, well I think we'll allow a demonstration on the gunnery range first, and go from there."

He allowed the Mustachioed officer to apply his neurohelmet and clamber into the mech, after which he booted it up.

Justin idled up, "You look particularly smug, what are you up to?"

"Well it meant reducing the complement of armor and ammunition on this one, but we had the parts to take the engine from a Warhammer and build a second faster one. In all honesty this one has too much Ammunition for the Imperators... but I was told in no uncertain terms that trying to cram a second large laser would make a seventy ton slightly better protected Rifleman... but I think they werent - I think as a mech this goes overboard on the load out with extra heat sinks and four tons of ammunition... It is a very Davion mech though isn't it?"

"Can I pilot it?"

"Which one?"

"either, both."

He slotted into the first machine, while the other instructor 'inspected', for 'safety reasons of course' the other machine and tested their Imperator A auto cannons on the range. Alexandria frowned, "You planned that."

"Don't complain Lady Lex you have an Orion."
--
Truthfully he was a little relieved... and also that there had been enough of a distraction that no one had noticed. "Oh come on Fox they're not going to let you play, this is bullshit." Bard declared. Loudly. The kilted Wolverine pilot was vociferously expressing his displeasure at not being given the chance at what he called a friendly game.

"I'm as surprised as you are that the Chancellor shot down Coleridge's suggestion." He replied in a much more mild tone while David Bowie the MechWarrior continued to complain. "How did you think they did last week?"

"Oh they did good, no question about it. You said that was their second go at them, yeah. Still that was a lot of missiles to throw at them. Six hundred tons even, twelve mediums versus sixteen mixed including that assault, and the little lady with the Orion." At least he hadn't called her his girlfriend, that might have caused problems. "Her cousin, Lord Allard's son, that was impressive shooting ... admittedly with a pop gun, but color me impressed."

"Is this going to be a combined arms test?"

"Hmm... no, not this one. Maybe Fridays I think your vice chancellor is hoping to spice things up, we did bring the bull dogs with us." He had seen as much, and the Partisan anti aircraft tanks. Those had a special place in Aaron Sandoval's heart, because those had been what he had served on in his time... and it was a general gesture that they could be easily converted over the fusion engines.

So to could the bull dog tanks as well, but they hadn't actually planned for that.

The conversation was interrupted by the growing crowd.

"You have a cheeky look on your face you know that right?" The kilted officer questioned him.

"No I don't."

"You do." Bard countered. "What are you up to?"

"I'm not up to anything."

"Historically people who say that are in fact up to something."

He sighed, "You'll have to wait an see what happens," But he was interested to see if the Cataphract would improve Justin's performance. He expected it would. He was admittedly concerned about the lack of medium lasers on the Cataphract design, but the twin AC 5s ... well how Justin performed with medium caliber auto cannons like the imperator A was what he was interested in seeing.

 

[Fragment of Serenity]

Justin's skill with autocannons does mark him as rather more Davion than most. Which is... rather hilarious considering how the Cappellans failed to notice it.

Then again, it IS the Cappellans.

 

[Wargamer08]

I've forgotten, do they have specialist AC5 ammo yet or is that a post-Helm thing? Accurate ammo makes AC5s less of a total waste of weapon weight.

 

[Imperator Pax]

I've forgotten, do they have specialist AC5 ammo yet or is that a post-Helm thing? Accurate ammo makes AC5s less of a total waste of weapon weight.

Click to shrink...

I'm not sure if it's canon but in this yes there is still limited production of specialty ammo inside the fed suns

 

[HunterxReader]

I guess Coleridge really wants a win for the cadets. Kek, a Catapracht huh, I suppose if you're going to make a mech then the first design might as well be the one that's an ascended Frankenmech to make it easy to introduce, and messing with the Liaos is a very big bonus. The "stock" as a -4X makes sense as a Davion design. Seeing as the second one is using a 280 FE I assume that "variant" is the original IntroTech version. I can just imagine Earthwerk's/the Capellan's bemusement when R&D brings out their proposal for a new mech and it's a copy of a Davion cadet's cobbled together design (Though I suppose the fact that said cadet is the Rabid Fox would help). I feel that there is a very good chance that our dear vice chancellor will approve of this mech. He might ask for a unit, along with every other AC-loving FedRat, to inspect the "safety" of its autocannon on the battlefield of course.

Justin's skill with autocannons does mark him as rather more Davion than most. Which is... rather hilarious considering how the Cappellans failed to notice it.

Then again, it IS the Cappellans.

Click to shrink...

Huh, he started out and beat Candace with a Blackjack, lost his arm in a Valkyrie (albeit against Gray Noton), won in Solaris in a Rifleman, and his favored mech is a modified Centurion-AH. That tracks. 4/6 AC-wielding mechs seems to be his preference. With his experience with dual ACs from the Blackjack, I'm looking forward to seeing what he can do in a Catapracht as well.

 

[drakensis]

A Charger with the engine of a Centurion 'mech wouldn't even be as fast as an Atlas - it's a 200 SFE in a 80 ton machine, so walking speed of 2.5. A Centurion fighter's fusion turbine has the right rating - 240 - but it's a turbine not a reactor so it's debateable if that's much use in a 'mech.

I'd suggest that it's a Rifleman reactor being considered - the 240 SFE from a Rifleman was used in the Challenger rebuild of the Charger.

 

[Bofors40mm]

Charger can't take a FE 200 but can take a FE 240

 

[Imperator Pax]

A Charger with the engine of a Centurion 'mech wouldn't even be as fast as an Atlas - it's a 200 SFE in a 80 ton machine, so walking speed of 2.5. A Centurion fighter's fusion turbine has the right rating - 240 - but it's a turbine not a reactor so it's debateable if that's much use in a 'mech.

I'd suggest that it's a Rifleman reactor being considered - the 240 SFE from a Rifleman was used in the Challenger rebuild of the Charger.

Click to shrink...

That wasn't what I meant the types of guns found in the centurion loadout not its engine.

The Cataphract 4x uses a GM 210 which gives it 3/5 which 54 KpH at top speed.

I will probably go back and re edit the Engine blurb to make htat more clear as to what engines we're talking about but in production terms production catapults as frontline mechs will likely be built using 280 later

 

[Bofors40mm]

Honestly if your making that sort of design go make a modified into a proper pocket assault Hammerhands.

 

[Bofors40mm]

Spoiler: Longsword LSG-4D

Longsword LGS-4D
Mass: 70 tons
Chassis: Achernar Special 5
Power Plant: VOX 280 Fusion
Cruising Speed: 43.2 kph
Maximum Speed: 64.8 kph
Armor: Duralex Heavy
Armament:
2 Donal PPCs
4 ChisComp 39 Medium Lasers
Communication System: Achernar Electronics HICS-11
Targeting & Tracking System: Federated Hunter
Introduction Year: 3020
Tech Rating/Availability: D/X-E-D-D
Cost: 6,365,933 C-bills

Type: Longsword
Role: Brawler
Technology Base: Inner Sphere (Introductory)
Tonnage: 70
Battle Value: 1,467

Equipment		Mass
Internal Structure		7
Engine	280 Fusion	16
Walking MP:	4
Running MP:	6
Jumping MP:	4
Heat Sink:	18	8
Gyro:		3
Cockpit:		3
Armor Factor:	176	11

	Internal Structure	Armor Value
Head	3	9
Center Torso	22	27
Center Torso (rear)		8
R/L Torso	15	20
R/L Torso (rear)		6
R/L Arm	11	20
R/L Leg	15	20

Weapons and Ammo	Location	Critical	Tonnage
2 Jump Jet	LL	2	2
2 Heat Sink	CT	2	2
2 Medium Laser	RT	2	2
2 Heat Sink	LA	2	2
PPC	LA	3	7
2 Medium Laser	LT	2	2
2 Jump Jet	RL	2	2
Heat Sink	HD	1	1
2 Heat Sink	RA	2	2
PPC	RA	3	7

Quirks:
Improved Cooling Jacket (RA/LA PPC)
Rugged (2)

the longsword. aka what happens when a battleaxe and a warhammer 6D had a kid
moves at 4/6/4. has 11 tons of armor in a layout that mimics of that of the introtech black knight and 18 heatsinks and armed with 2 PPC and 4 medium lasers.
has the rugged (2) and Improved cooling jackets for its PPCs as quirks
as per our glorious OP nominally going to be a canon thing in this story.

 

[Bofors40mm]

BTW you want a pocket assault hammerhands expy design or not imperator pax?

 

[Imperator Pax]

BTW you want a pocket assault hammerhands design or not imperator pax?

Click to shrink...

You can put it up this is a megamechlabs essence thread so I'm open to hearing suggestions the long sword I'm totally willing to include and I'll look at anything else

 

[Bofors40mm]

Spoiler: Hammerhands HMH-4F

Hammerhands HMH-4F
Mass: 75 tons
Chassis: Achernar Special Type 4-reinforced
Power Plant: Dav 225 Fusion
Cruising Speed: 32.4 kph
Maximum Speed: 54 kph
Armor: StarGuard III
Armament:
2 Donal PPCs
4 ChisComp 39 Medium Lasers
2 Harpoon-6 SRM 6s

Communication System: Achernar Electronics HICS-11
Targeting & Tracking System: Federated Hunter
Introduction Year: 3025
Tech Rating/Availability: D/X-E-D-D
Cost: 6,562,500 C-bills

Type: Hammerhands
Role: Brawler
Technology Base: Inner Sphere (Introductory)
Tonnage: 75
Battle Value: 1,678

Equipment		Mass
Internal Structure		7.5
Engine	225 Fusion	10
Walking MP:	3
Running MP:	5
Jumping MP:	3
Heat Sink:	18	8
Gyro:		3
Cockpit:		3
Armor Factor:	231	14.5

	Internal Structure	Armor Value
Head	3	9
Center Torso	23	35
Center Torso (rear)		11
R/L Torso	16	24
R/L Torso (rear)		8
R/L Arm	12	24
R/L Leg	16	32

Right Arm Actuators: Upper, Shoulder, Lower
Left Arm Actuators: Upper, Shoulder, Lower

Weapons and Ammo	Location	Critical	Tonnage
Heat Sink	LL	1	1
Jump Jet	LL	1	1
Heat Sink	CT	1	1
Jump Jet	CT	1	1
3 Heat Sink	RT	3	3
Medium Laser	RT	1	1
SRM 6	RT	2	3
SRM 6 Ammo (15)	RT	1	1
Medium Laser	LA	1	1
PPC	LA	3	7
2 Heat Sink	LT	2	2
Medium Laser	LT	1	1
SRM 6	LT	2	3
SRM 6 Ammo (15)	LT	1	1
Heat Sink	RL	1	1
Jump Jet	RL	1	1
Heat Sink	HD	1	1
Medium Laser	RA	1	1
PPC	RA	3	7

Quirks:
Barrel Fists (RA/LA)
Protected Actuators
Rugged (1)

Its not quite as good quirks wise as the longsword but the hammerhands comes with Barrel fists and protected actuators and I figured rugged probably ain't hard to add to such a venerable design. Also uses a new coms and tracking and targeting system much like the longsword does from the hammerhands. They're the systems the enforcer uses actually and so widely available in the Suns.
Still 3/5/3 with 14.5 tons of armor and 18 heatsinks is solid. Especially with 2 PPCs,2 SRM-6s with a ton of ammo each, and 4 medium lasers as the weapons suite

 

[Imperator Pax]

Sakhara 2.2
​

He stuffed his hands in the pockets of his blazer and waited. He hadn't done anything too complicated. The standard Cataphract had protected actuators, and he had for about five minutes been pretty tempted to replace that... but he had held off.

If actually did try to do something with the seventy ton design he might change that quirk, but he'd been running on too little sleep as it was. He wanted to see how Justin did with a slower better armed mech.... frankly just giving him a Grasshopper might not have been a terrible idea, but well here they were.

"Why do you need Corean again?"

"Factory floor expertise. Assembly line manufacturing for large stompy robots." He shrugged off Bard's question, "I need input from the factory line team, engineers service personnel... once the line is set up," Henry Clay trailed off, "Well you have to walk before you can run."

The truth was that wasn't true... but Henry couldn't admit that... he was getting good at the cover story, and repeating it over and over again. They'd torn a Morninstar Command vehicle into its constituent parts and recycled them individually... the ones they weren't going to reuse for other things so he could have easily called up the forces necessary to stand up a much heavier force... but no... he had to restrain himself.

Even though it was really fucking hard at times... because it was only a matter of time before people figured out that he could set up factory lines and build stuff like he claimed, and he needed to be ready for that day to come. People might not believe in magic, but they'd figure out logistics won wars when it showed results.

Coleridge leaned forward to squint at the screen, "You are correct it is a little slow but even the 210 version has potential as simply a training and gunnery mech. As you said Mister Clay it does use standard weapons. Given its ammo it would be possible to run an entire class on a handful of machines through a stationary gunnery course without needing to reload."

That hadn't actually been his intention.... but from the looks that skeptical. Coleridge must have only been talking about firing the Imperators. Each bin of medium auto cannon ammo allowed 20 shots and with tons of the stuff even split between Imperator A auto cannons that was a fair bit of ammo for a day of instruction at the range.

"Well as I had said, the GM 210 powering this design is the same as the standard fusion engine of Mountain Wolf BattleMechs Night Hawk and I have an interest in their products." he replied. He had no idea if there would be teething issues with the mech or not... other than it carried five tons worth of ammunition cooking off risk... but it didn't matter, "The 280 is a more common engine, and we have several vox engines in that rating, but that weight meant some of that ammunition had to be sacrificed." Unfortunately. That kind of ammunition would have made more sense with something... well with auto cannons with a higher rate of consumption... but no none of those not yet.

Coleridge did have a point given the armament of long range weapons. As a training mech the 210 powered 4X was fairly ideal, it wasn't especially fast and could serve as a 'driver's ed' mech while carrying simple enough weapons to learn the basics on.

That hadn't been his intention at all, but it didn't seem anyone believed that happy coincidence.
--
A part of him didn't want to give up his Black Jack. He had gotten used to it and more importantly he'd gotten used to using it to show people not to underestimate him in it.

He watched as the Reactor start up on the 280 began, and then confirmed the armor readout. 12 tons of standard plate equated out to a digital reading of 192 pips. The Computer ameliorated his crappy resolution of the fake desert around him as the simulator program started get on with it. Pixels turned into what was believable 'life like' sand, and he pushed his mech's arm through a fake digital tree brushing the palm fronds out of his mech's camera.

The young madman's face appeared. "Good sorry I needed to ditch and Bard was, never mind." The Rabid Fox remarked, "Basic run down of the machine it is designed to run heat neutral. Its not oversinked, but on the other hand ... well do your best you have limited ammunition, and while I might be able to provide better ammunition these simulators get schizo about more exotic lost technology or non standard equipment."

"Right," Justin muttered, "Cataphract Launching." He pushed the mech's throttle forward and left the stand of palm trees looking around. There were other Sakhara Cadet's mechs appearing and starting their boot up in the digital battle space.

Alexandria's Orion appeared about four hundred meters to his right, and was up and moving quickly as the Star League Defense Era machine completed its pretend boot sequence. Or rather her actual mech dated to when their ancestors, it had passed through the rulers of Kestrel and their heirs since the beginning of the Succession Wars.

"Hmm," The voice continued, "I don't have a bunch of spare orions sitting around Justin."

"What?"

"You've pivoted the Cataphract inline to Lex. Two and two is four. Anyway, it is a classic robust machine there is a lot to appreciate about the design. You could even refit the Orion easily enough to approximate the armament of the Hammerhands." He muttered something about if its not broke don't fix it, and not getting ahead of themselves. "Alright I should get off the line it looks like most of the cadets are now in the pipeline, and the rangers as well. Good luck."

He was right naturally his feeds were signaling his lance mates had shown up in the simulation, and were after a couple more moments started making their way towards his machine.

--
An Imperator A fired in five shot bursts and Justin putting both auto cannons on the center torso of the opposing 'mech was enough to shred almost half a ton of armor. Class 5 auto cannons produced far less heat than most weapons, but autocannons in general were fairly heat neutral anyway, with class tens producing roughly the waste heat of common medium lasers. It was only with assault auto cannons really throwing 16 and up centimeter projectiles in three shot groups that you had to contend with risky excess heat; even that was still waste heat relative to longer range weapons like a PPC or Large Laser.

"The missile packet seems a tad extraneous."

"it provides some indirect long range firepower , though I admit out of the line of sight is more for wide scale unit confrontation." In the Cataphract case one LRM 5 launcher well twenty four fires it was very unlikely that this engagement would last long enough for Justin to get through all 24. He would probably get through the rest of his auto cannon ammunition.

That was the thing though, the cataphract wasn't equipped with anything out of the ordinary. Nothing lostech to be sure, and Justin was doing well. Certainly better than he would have been doing in the Black Jack as they were now in an engagement range where his personal machine's medium lasers would have been in play.

... that was an idea to consider, is to drop the lrm 5 for medium lasers... well later... when the convergence of the main lines of the force weren't hitting it. The actual force disposition of the mechs wasn't that dissimilar. The reality of two Davion forces coming to blows meant that there were Centurions, and Enforcers present. There were other mechs that were common. The Rangers had Black Jacks and a group of light mechs filling out their scout lance for the company which was screening for a fire lance, but the Cadets had a slight advantage in terms of having a handful of heavier mechs and more over all machines.

Unlike the previous two engagements the cadet lances were focusing on cohesive unit engagement. Moving as Lances and engaging targets, which he was happy to see. If they hadn't been the Rangers probably would have looped around been hitting them from possibly three sides, but that possibility was now unlikely as attrition began to take its toll on both sides.

"Major Cameron is moving to engage Cadet Lead."

"I see him." Gene replied, and more importantly he was watching the hillside that was probably blocking Bard's line of sight.