CLASSIC BATTLETECH CATALYST game labs

At $5 I consider it worthwhile - just for the map.

New Avalon, Sian, Tharkad.  Probably going to be some good ones in the FWL to come.

But New Srytis, Hesperus, and Dieron (to name 3 off the top of my head) all fit in the list of campaigns We'd all "like to know more" about I'd bet.

Oooooh! I want. but I am going to wait a little while and see what the response is (it might be only $5 but money is incredibly tight at the moment)

Yeah, I noticed that too on the advert page. I guess this most likely will answer the question of 'if' CGL will begin publishing DA material. I figure another year and a half to two years before the 1st DA product from CGL will come out. Heck it might just be a reprint of the MWDA RS book or even TRO 3100.

Okay, let's start with a breakdown. Of those 22 PDF pages, we have:

• Cover: 1 page
• Title Page: 1 page
• Short Story: 1 page (more of a vignette)
• Introduction and Credits: 1 page
• Isometric Map of Luthien: 1 page (actually a 2-page spread; see below)
• Background on planet and special battlefield rules: 1 page
• Combatants: 2 pages
• Tracks: 4 pages (six tracks/scenarios total)
• Record Sheets: 6 pages (2 BattleMechs and 4 WarShips)
• Planetary Invasion Map: 4 pages (see below)

So it's a decent amount of stuff for $5.

A very nice cover, formatted as if it was a print product. The addition of a title page was a bit off-putting, though; as a PDF-only product, it really doesn't need one, but it does give space for the copyright and licensing information. It still says Wizkids, which is a little sad. The artwork looks crisp; it appears that CGL has figured out a good balance between file size and image resolution. The layout is more generic than the major rules and sourcebooks. There is not real border art, just a bit of "tarnished metal" effect.

The section names are in grey, printed vertically along the upper left-hand corner of each page, so they're easy to miss (as my breakdown, above, did). As mentioned, the Introduction page includes the first time we've seen an era logo for the Dark Age; it's the Republic of the Sphere logo, appropriately "damaged." The credits show that this was Ben Rome's baby, which is unsurprising given his influence on the Track scenario system.

The planetary map for Luthien annoyed me a little. It's a two-page spread done as one page in the PDF. This is unneccessary - the two most common PDF programs, Adobe Reader and Foxit Reader - can easily show two pages side-by-side, but breaking down such a page for printing tends to be more difficult. Also, the data box and Combine logo overlap the map art, which would leave a blemish for those nutbars like myself who like assembling such maps into pseudo-globes. The labels on the map are very clear and I was able to zoom in to read them all. (As a nitpick, the section title here reads "Jihad Turning Points Atlas," rather than the next page's simple "Atlas.")

The maps section still makes reference to the FanPro printings of mapsheets, which I hope suggests that CGL intends to reprint those products. Also, we have our first direct references to Strategic Operations page numbers! Yay! Also of interest to our naval historians, all of the Blakist ships used in the campaign are listed, along with the dates they either were destroyed or withdrew.

Since when are RATs "Random Access Tables?" That typo aside, the combatants section gives a neat overview of each unit involved in the battle. The Word of Blake really did give better than it got over the course of the campaign; they only had three divisions present for the entire conflict! I would've rather seen the word "Loyalist" used instead of "Samurai" for the, well, loyal DCMS units, but that's just another nitpick. I liked the capsule special rules for each unit, allowing fairly new players to use such abilities without having to track down books ten years out of print.

The tracks themselves seem balanced and interesting. I like that they're compatible with the Chaos campaign from the Jihad books. They're arranged in chronological order. There are no generic tracks, so players using the Warchest system will want to figure out some on their own, perhaps adapting those from the Starterbooks.

Yay, we finally see Albert Benton's mixed-tech Black Hawk-KU, along with a Thresher mounting an MRM-20. Neat. The new WarShip record sheets look clean and easy to use. I'll leave the AeroTech experts to poke through them to see if there's any hints at major changes.

Finally, we have a Planetary Invasion map of Luthien, as from BattleForce 2. This is very, very cool, though folks are going to have to visit Kinko's (or whatever it's called now) to get them printed; it's made up of four 11x17 pages. This also suggests, very strongly, that the new BattleForce rules will look more like a revision than an entirely new system.

So, final thoughts? Well worth $5 if you're at all interested in the campaign for Luthien during the Jihad, and easily skipped if you're not.

4 Warships!!! Thats worth $5 for me.

Just downloaded 'Turning Point Luthien'   and while not all that interested in the Combine I think it is worthwile because of the spread of different factions involved.  Maybe not for everyone but for devotees of the factions involved there should be something of interest in it for you.  On the Aerotech Record Sheets the armour boxes are printed outside the ship's silhouette so  that they don't look so cluttered.

I can live with that. I just prefer a printed book in my hand over a pdf, and I don't like paying for a pdf when I may possibly pay for a printed version in the future.

But for the price I don't think I'll miss $5 too much. Its the dutch blood in me that I have to get past.

Its nice seeing what the new warship record sheets will look like.

A question:  Are there any Manei Domini units in the book/.pdf?

i really hope to see this one in dead tree soon. im one of those traditional old fogeys who likes his books to be physical (although it hasn't stopped me from getting my BC subscription)

Yes.  The 42nd shadow.

Thanks!