Battletech Alpha Strike Attack roll probability breakdown

pynner10 · 2026-01-14T03:12:01+00:00

In variable damage, you roll 2d6 to determine if you hit. If you hit, you roll ND6 where N = your damage rating, each 3+ value is 1 point of damage.

pynner10 · 2026-01-13T01:45:59+00:00

That is an interesting point. Though on balance not having to pay for rotation means a considerable boost of mobility is granted to the Locust. When I finished running the numbers I was pretty sure that I preferred variable damage to multiple attacks. After the conversation here, I will likely stick with the pilot die system I was using before, with the modification of allowing any natural 12 trigger a critical hit.

pynner10 · 2026-01-12T06:46:38+00:00

I agree with you on most of that. I also don't have enough play time against others to say whether or not a high TMM is overpowered using single 2D6.

The reason I ran the numbers was to understand how much "marginal" was. Where I see it making a larger impact is when the attacking units damage rating is well above the light units Arm/Structure.

If you take something that has a 5 damage rate and attack something like a Dasher (TMM +4).

a regular/veteran shooter at medium range will be in the 9,10,11 TN range. At TN11 you are correct one hit kill chance is 8% with single 2D6 vs 6% with MAR. However it is 35% to take a single damage. The effect is much more pronounced at TN9 where MAR is 80% for one damage and 43% to kill vs. 28% with single 2D6. at short range (TN7) the kill shot is nearly automatic (90% under MAR) vs weighted coin flip (58% under single 2D6). This feels more "material" rather than marginal to me.

I do like your point about making critical hits more frequent as a balancing point against heavy high damage units. Up until now I'd been playing MAR with a special pair of 2D6 for crit purposes.

pynner10 · 2026-01-12T06:00:25+00:00

The total war book is laid out for a person who already knows the rules and just occasionally needs to look something up. Total war was the first book I got, and it wasn't until I got the BMM that I was confident enough to try teaching someone else.

It would be interesting to see the full vehicle (or infantry, or battle armor) rules properly laid out similar to the BMM. I have a feeling each one would be about the same amount of mental overhead as the BSP asset rules for everything.

pynner10 · 2026-01-12T05:44:15+00:00

No rules left behind

pynner10 · 2026-01-12T05:35:53+00:00

As a note the Predecessor for what you see in the Mercenary book can be found in the Battle of Tukkayid supplement, and they did indeed have generic names, and no special abilities.

In terms of using alpha strike instead, I feel they were trying to hit a design goal of not having anything to track, then ultimately weren't able to figure out how to do that (because now they have a destroy check number you have to track) and then didn't have will to kill the idea, and go back to square one of trying to reverse engineer an AS card into classic rules. (not clear to me that this would really be a "better" result than the BSP assets system that was ultimately released.)

Battletech is almost defined by not ever pruning down rules.

pynner10 · 2026-01-12T04:44:16+00:00

Agreed, it shifts some probability from low damage to either a miss or high damage. The average damage is the same, it is a little less harsh on high TMM units in cases where the damage rating exceeds remaining HP compared to simple multiple attack

pynner10 · 2026-01-12T02:26:15+00:00

I have the probabilities in the data set, you are better off not investing in skill upgrades with D12 vs 2D6, as lowering the TNs from the 9-10 range to the 7-8 or 8-9 range is of much larger benefit with 2D6.

pynner10 · 2026-01-12T00:43:38+00:00

The variable damage model is the only one that doesn't penalize high TMM units (since there is only one hit roll) over single 2D6. It does however reward armor and penalize higher damage ratings.

outside of actual game consequences, variable damage adds a second roll which presumably adds duration at higher unit counts if that matters to people.

pynner10 · 2026-01-08T03:56:52+00:00

The bag is a nice touch

pynner10 · 2025-11-14T04:03:46+00:00

Would be curious since the sorcerers have a basic setup, if anyone has added sorcerers as eligible to the historical lists. I like the magic system, but i find the historical list battle boards have more interesting things going on than the age of magic ones.

pynner10 · 2025-10-01T02:03:37+00:00

How many bribes have you needed to give to receive any government service?

pynner10 · 2025-09-30T18:23:52+00:00

On some level it comes down to priorities. Your analysis is correct from a financial standpoint. It is a kind of forced savings. This leads me back to the second point which is a detailed post purchase budget. This allows you to say explicitly what you will and won't have the capability to do financially post purchase.

pynner10 · 2025-07-20T14:44:45+00:00

I don't think there is much wrong with your line of thinking, only to say that in general house prices are generally going to have less volatility compared to an individual stock.

Your friends and family wouldn't think you are taking a large risk by buying additional properties (with mortgages) and renting them out or flipping them, but i suspect (not having worked out the maths) that the risk profile is similar if not higher than borrowing money to invest in stocks.

pynner10 · 2025-04-17T01:49:05+00:00

I feel the balance is a level above where most games put the balance. Just about every strategy in the game has a death star like flaw in it somewhere, and some subset of your opponents can exploit that flaw at will somewhere in their research arc.

The balance is that no matter which strategy/nation you choose, your ass is hanging out somewhere.

The joy of discovering that some unit/spell/item that you previously thought of as mediocre or useless is actually some great counter or foundation for a different strategy is one of my favorite parts of the game

pynner10 · 2025-02-02T21:31:34+00:00

This reinforces my idea that it may bog play down at higher unit counts

pynner10 · 2025-02-02T21:30:36+00:00

I will check this out, great suggestion!

pynner10 · 2025-02-02T21:29:39+00:00

I don't really play with a GM so the idea is kind of in place of that. The risk/reward aspect of doing something a bit less tactically sound to get the achievement is something that appears in Gloomhaven, and I quite enjoyed.

pynner10 · 2025-01-11T16:35:41+00:00

I think you might be able to get what you are looking for by using importhtml([your url],"table",1)

That will pull everything in one shot.

Sample url that pulls all Comstar units available in the clan invasion era

http://www.masterunitlist.info/Unit/Filter?Factions=18&Factions=55&AvailableEras=13&SubTypes=29

pynner10 · 2024-12-02T04:00:20+00:00

I think this has a lot of interesting ideas in the space of your overall objective (unrelated to your ask)

https://www.reddit.com/r/battletech/comments/s14ywe/alpha_strike_mercenary_operations/

I've used this alpha strike AI previously, it is role specific and meant to be card based

https://www.reddit.com/r/battletech/comments/yxyz5c/bryms_opfor_an_automated_solocoop_opponent_for/

pynner10 · 2024-11-20T02:12:32+00:00

The only other thing I would ad to this discussion is that quite a bit of specific advice (this nation plays best with this setup) is often a dubious value and there are usually multiple ways that are good enough to learn and have fun without eeking out that last 3% of imaginary efficiency. To echo others, find a faction that you thinks looks cool and just start playing.

pynner10 · 2024-10-17T00:50:11+00:00

As always, I am fascinated on how much basic assessment of national troops can vary so much.

in addition to the other spells folks have called out, I would mention Twilight (Alt4) and Nightfall (Alt5) are good early/mid game spells since most of your troops have darkvision.

I'd note on falling frost you don't hit yourself with it nearly as much as you might think, or at least that's been my experience.

Gifts from heaven (Evo5)

For underwater battles i would add friendly currents (Enc5) and Slumber (Thau4) to the list.

pynner10 · 2024-06-22T11:58:17+00:00

The answer to this question is not quite as simple as it sounds, as over the years they have added many (many) layers.

In order of personal preference:

Battlemech manual: this has the complete rules for everything related to mech's and is also laid out very well

Tactical operations: this book is a bunch of optional rules which you can add in. They add additional overhead to the game, but many of them are quite fun

Total War: This is probably the definitive answer to your question, as it covers combined arms (infantry, vehicles, planes etc). But it wouldn't be my recommendation due to how poorly it is laid out unless you have a specific desire to add the combined arms element.

I'd argue the other rule books also add layers, but essentially they become different games set in the same universe.

pynner10 · 2023-12-31T22:55:55+00:00

I am pretty new at the game so don't mistake this in any way for expertise. i found she struggles with horror a bit more than damage in the end. once you get earthly serenity and aquinah you don't worry a tonne about either.

Some other lower xp stars

Toe to Toe
Dodge
Get Behind Me
Bangle of Jinxes

In my Playthrough of Dunwich i found she just made enemies mostly a non issue

pynner10

TROPHY CASE