Amiga Game-Power/Amiga Game-Power.iso/power games ii/bull run/battle_doc

Text File | 1994-05-20 | 16KB | 292 lines

BattleTech - Heavy Metal Combat

    What is BattleTech?  It is a game that simulates combat
between two or more giant, robot-like machines.  Simple words
that can't begin to give you the feel of piloting a 30 - 40
foot tall, fire breathing, earth shaking colossus that obeys
your every whim.  To enjoy the game you must put yourself in
the cockpit of a Battle Droid.  Live the experience.
    You are the elite of the elite, a Droid Warrior.  Your
Battle Droid thunders under you as you pace across the land,
searching for a reported enemy droid.  You view the land around
you, searching for the enemy.  To your left the plain climbs
gradually from low hills up to high mountains.  To your right
is a lake, the calm waters shading from light to cobat blue as
the water deepens in the center, with patches of treacherous
swamp at the edges.  Ahead of you the hills meet a mixture of
light and heavy woods.  You are debating whether to climb the
hills or fight your way through the trees when the enemy droid
steps over the crest of the hill.
     Your heart leaps as you recognize a heavy Archer, just as
he fires one of his massive 20 racks of Long Range Missiles.
Your Marauder is staggered by the multiple impacts as you
frantically pit you piloting skill against 75 tons overbalanced
droid.  You swivel your torso and call up your weapons display.
The reassuring green lights indicate that all weapons are ready
to fire.  You select a Particle Projection Cannon, one of your
main weapons.  A moment later your combat display shows you
your field of fire and weapon range.  The targeting pipper is
blinking on the Archer as you fire the P.P.C. up the mountain.
    "Too quick" you curse under your breath as the
scintillating beam of the P.P.C. slashes to the left of the
Archer.  The temperature in your cockpit jumps as the heat from
firing the P.P.C. soakes into your droid.  No problem so far,
the heat sinks can handle it.  You drive your droid into a
pounding run.  You've got to get close, his L.R.M. have a
minimum effective range, if you can just get inside it.
    The Archer is shrouded in smoke as another salvo of
missiles blast their way toward you.  Missiles clang off your
armor, tearing chunks away.  Your cockpit rings as one hits the
head of your droid.  You fight for consciousness and keep
going, his racks are empty now, he has to reload.
    Motion, behind you.  Another Battle Droid breaks from the
forest and races across the plains toward you.  You quickly
identify it as a light weight Stinger, ordinarily no threat to
a Marauder, but it AND an Archer?  What to do?  Run?  Fight?
Fight which one?
    There's no real choice, if you turn your back on the
Archer he'll nail you.  Ignore the Stinger.  You quickly check
your status.  Your heat is dropping as the heat sinks suck away
the excess heat.  Your armor indicators are still all green
although those missiles have chewed away about half of you left
leg armor.  One P.P.C. is in recycle, the yellow indicator
shows about 75 seconds to go.  Time to Rock an' Roll.
    Weapons select.  You arm your Auto Cannon.  The targeting
computer comes up and you select the Archer again.  Your droid
is rocked by laser blast in its vulnerable back, but you ignore
it, triggering your cannon.  Thunder rumbles across the plain
as your Auto Cannon belches explosive death.  A direct hit, the
Archer is staggered as the cannon shells punch craters in its
chest armor.  You watch the Battle Droid fight for balance and
fail, tumbling backward off the mountain.
    One down.  Another laser digs into you back, as red lights
flash on your status display.  Your back armor is breached, the
laser got through to your Auto Cannon and its out of the
action.  You begin to turn your ponderous steed.  As you turn
to face the charging Stinger it suddenly jumps into the air on
jets of flame.
    "Oh Shit!" you yell as you frantically bring up your
weapons.  The Auto Cannon in your Left Torso is disabled, your
#1 P.P.C. is still recycling.  Your still hot, but there's no
choice as you arm you other P.P.C.  You try to target the fast
moving Stinger, but before you can fire 20 tons of armor and
fire power land on top of you.
    Your droid shutters under the impact.  You scramble to
control it, but you're falling.  "The next time I'm in the
Factory I'm putting jump jets in this thing" you vow.  The
ground shakes as 75 tons of Battle Droid falls flat on its
back.  Lights are flashing all over.  You bring up your status
display.  The Stinger landed on your right shoulder, its out
along with all the weapons in your right arm.  The fall did
more damage to you weak left leg.  You'll survive, now where is
that little Stinger.      You look around.  The Stinger is
racing for the forest.
    "Oh no you don't" you mutter as you target your second
P.P.C. at the racing Stinger's back.  The warbling blast echoes
across the plain as your man-made lightning bolt hits the
Stinger dead center.
    The Stinger stumbles, starts to fall... a blinding flash
lights the sky as its fusion reactor explodes.  Metal peppers
your droid as the concussion threatens to knock you
unconscious.  Your temperature gauges peg as the droid shuts
down from too much heat.  With time your droid will recover.
Lets just hope the Archer has had enough.

    This is BattleTech.  Its not much fun with one person, but
get two or more people with imagination in the room and its a
blast.

Documentation

    BattleTech can be played with up to eight players.  Input
is through the keyboard, joystick or mouse.  Each player
choices his input device by using it to roll for initiative at
the beginning of the game.  Only that device will be accepted
for that player for the rest of the game.
    Selection is via a series of menus at the bottom of the
screen.  For the keyboard use the left and right arrows tohighlight the menu item you want and the space bar to select
that item.  For the joystick use left and right on the joystick
to highlight the menu item and select with select the button.
For the mouse, the highlighted menu item with follow the mouse
cursor.  Select with the left mouse button.
    The menus are pretty much self explanitory.  There are two
main menus associated with two timers.  One for Movement and
one for Weapons.  Everything is based on TIME.

MOVEMENT Menu:  The 'Move' menu has the following options:
  Walk: Walk forward or backward one hex.  Takes base time +
        heat penalty + damage penalty.  Minimal heat.
  Run:  Run forward.  Takes 2/3 the time of Walk and generates
       some heat.
  Jump: Use jump jets to jump forward, backward or turn.  You
       must have jump jets and fuel to jump.  Don't run out of
       fuel in mid-air.  When you jump, the image of your
        droid will change color from red to pink.  Jumping
        generates a fair amount of heat, but there are no
        terrain modifiers.  Base time is the same as running.
        You must make a Piloting Skill roll on landing or fall.
  Turn: Change direction 60 degrees (one hex side).  Time is
        based whether you are standing, walking, running or
       jumping.  Turning while jumping is very quick.
  Stop: Stop is used to stop jumping.  You must make a piloting
       skill roll when you land or fall.
  Wait: Wait is used to control the timing of events.  You can
       wait for 10 seconds, wait until you Call Move, wait
       until all your weapons are recycled, or wait on your
       weapon selection.
  Call Attack: This option will call the attack menu if it is
       waiting.
  Status: This option brings up the Droid Status display and
       takes two seconds of time.

WEAPON Menu:  The 'Attack' menu has the following options:
  Weapon: Bring up the weapon select display.  This display
       shows all weapons, including arms and legs, where they
       are located ( LT=Left Torso, etc), and their condition.
       If the status indicator is green they are ready to use.
       Red indicates damaged or out of ammo.  Yellow means
       they are recycling is a bar graph of how long until
       ready to use again.
  Wait: This use to control the timing of events in the weapons
       timer.  You can wait 10 secons, wait on Call, wait on
       your current move, or wait until all your weapons are
       recycled.
  Call Move: This option will call the movement menu if it is
       waiting.
  Status: This option brings up the Droid Status display.  It
       takes two seconds of time, but this comes off the
       weapons timer.

    The movement and weapons timers are separate so you can
move and fire weapons simultaneously.  The wait conditions
allow rapid movement without bothersome weapons messages, or
standing still and firing, without bothersome move messages.
For even more accurate timing you can use the call feature and
then Call Move or Call Attack from pulldown menus with the
mouse.

TERRAIN:  The hex types are obvious, their affect is not.
  Plain: This is basic ground level, open plain, and is what
    all movement times are based on.
  Light Forest: It takes twice as long to move through light
    forest as across plains, and makes you one point harder
    to hit.
  Heavy Forest: It takes three times as long to move through
    heavy forest and you are two points harder to hit.
  Swamp: It takes twice as long to move, you are one point
    easier to hit, and there is a good chance of slipping
    and falling.
  Shallow Water: This type hex takes twice as long to move
    through and makes it easier for you to be hit and harder
    for you to hit others, but helps you too cool down.  There
    is a chance you will slip and fall.
  Medium Water: This type water is up to the droids waist.
    Weapons below the waist can not be fired.  You cool down
    a lot quicker, but you are easier to hit and it is harder
    for you to aim.  You can't kick in medium water.  Move
    at 1/3 normal rate.
  Deep Water: This type water provides maximum cooling.
    Weapons below the neck can not be fired and you are very
    hard to hit.  You can't kick or punch in deep water.  Move
    at 1/4 normal rate.
  Low Hills: Hills provide cover.  You can't shoot over them.
    Low hills make it one point easier to hit droids below
    you.  Move at 1/3 normal rate uphill or half normal rate
    on the same level.
  Medium Hills: You get two extra points to hit droids below
    you due to height.  Move at 2 + 1/level going uphill.
  High Hills: You get three extra points to hit droids below
    you due to height.  Hills have a tactical advantage, but
    beware of skill rolls.  If you fall you can roll all the
    down, doing multiple damage.
     Fire: Energy and Missile weapons can start forest fires.
    Moving or stopping in a forest fire adds a lot of heat to
    your droid, and the smoke adds three points on all hit
    rolls.  Move at half normal rate.
  Cleared: Cannons and Missiles can clear trees from forest
    hexes.  This is rough terrain, move at half normal rate.
  Burned: Once a forest fire has burned out the hex becomes
    rough terrain.  Move at half normal rate.

    Terrain plays an important part in combat strategy.  A
good position can mean the difference between winning and
loosing.  Use the terrain to your advantage.

HEAT:  Almost everything you do in a Battle Droid creates heat.
It is your worse enemy.  Heat can slow down your droid, throw
off your targeting computers, cause your droid to shutdown
unexpectedly (that right, you're a sitting duck), and even
cause ammo to explode.  Watch your heat.  The Status display
gives the amount of heat generated by each weapon in hundreds.
Ten heat means it generates 1000 points of heat.  The actual
tempature is in the Status display.  In addition, there is a
small status light in the upper right corner of the weapons
selection window.  Green=OK, Blue=reduced movement/aim,
Yellow=danger of shutdown, Red=danger of ammo exploding.  Your
Battle Droid will automatically shutdown if your heat goes over
3000.  In addition, a damaged engine generates a lot of heat.
The only thing that protects a pilot from the heat is the life
support system.  If that is destroyed you are in big trouble.

COMBAT:
    There are two forms of combat, weapons combat and melee
combat.  Melee combat is hand to hand, punching, kicking and
charging.  Melee combat doesn't generate any heat, but you may
do damage to yourself and you have to be in the same hex or in
the adjacent hex.  When used to fight, your arms and legs have
recycle times just like your other weapons.  Legs take 100
seconds and arms take 50 seconds.  Both legs must be ready in
order to kick so you can only kick with one leg, however a kick
does twice as much damage as a punch.  If you miss a kick you
have to make a Piloting Skill roll to keep from falling.  On
the other hand if you connect with a kick the kickee has to
make a Piloting Skill roll.  Damage is based on the weight of
the attacking droid.  A 50 ton droid can do 10 points of damage
kicking and 5 points punching.  To punch or kick simply select
the arm or leg you want from the weapons selection window.
    When one droid attempts to move into the hex occupied by
another droid, that is a charge.  You must have both arms and
both legs recycled and in good condition to charge.  If your
arms and legs aren't ready or damaged you won't be allowed to
make the move.  Charging can do massive damage.  The damage is
one, two or three times that of a kick depending on whether you
are walking, running or jumping when you charge.  A jumping
charge is call "Death from Above".  An 80 ton droid jumping on
you can do 48 points of damage.  To do a jumping charge, jump
into the opponents hex and stop.  All charges that hit require
both droids to make a Piloting Skill roll.  Only the attacker
makes a skill roll if the charge misses.  The skill rolls are
based on the relative weights of the droids.  You can walk or
run charge a droid that is down.  You can jump on him.
    Melee is also dependant on the terrain.  If you are too
high above or too low below a droid you can't melee.  If you
are slightly above you can only kick him.  If you are slightly
below you can only punch him.
    Weapon combat is fairly selfexplanitory.  Pick the weapon
you want from the weapons selection window.  That arms the
weapon.  Two seconds later the targeting computer will displaya firing fan for that weapon.  The firing fan will show your
field of fire and the weapons maximum range, and for some
weapons the minimum range.  You can fire inside the minimum
range, but at a penalty to hit.  The menu bar will list all
players.  As you highlight each one the image of his droid will
blink.  Select your target to activate the firing sequence.
Two seconds later the weapon will fire.  Hit locations will be
flashed in the menu bar.
    Terrain is important in weapon combat.  You can't shoot
through mountains so being on top of a mountain is a strategic
advantage.  Forest provide cover, but they can be set on fire
or cleared of trees by concentrated fire.  Water provide a good
barrier from a charging droid.
    The main objective of combat is to eliminate the opponents
armor so that your weapons can damage delicate internal
components, like the pilot.  Once the armor in a particular
location is destroyed any further hits in that area have a
chance of hitting internal components, such as weapons, ammo,
arm and leg joints, heat sinks, engines, gyros, etc.  One or
more hits will destroy the item.  All weapons are destroyed
with one hit.  Ammo explodes if hit, doing addition damage.
Engines require three hits, and then they explode, violently.
Gyros will take two hits.  After the first you have trouble
standing.  After the second you can't stand.