CLASSIC BATTLETECH CATALYST game labs

So I'm working on this concept for an alternate setting... actually more than one, but focus!

This one specifically deals with the collapse of the Inner Sphere as we know it. The clans attack in the year 3000 instead of sending the Dragoons.

All of them, en mass, starting from the top and working their way down until Terra and the Great Houses fall. The great houses lose the war, and the clans (minus one clan that was devastated by Comstar during the first battle for Terra and absorbed) subdivide the Inner Sphere between themselves and establish their new order, with the ilClan (the victors of the second battle for Terra) ruling over them.

The reign of the clans is stormy and fraught with rebellions that the clans are never able to completely control (there's just so many of them). Though they're able to maintain hold over their domains for decades, between their internal dissent and infighting ways they never have the stability to mount any serious campaigns after that. Those periphery states that weren't in the direct path of the initial invasion thus manage to survive.

After a generation of clan rule, the Clan Empire begins to crumble under shear weight of numbers. Both rebel forces and the clan overlords resort to extreme methods to achieve their goals. Billions of people die, and the Inner sphere's infrastructure is devastated, but the Clan Empire collapses as a unified entity.

Given the widespread damage caused by the fall of the clans and the complete lack of interstellar infrastructure (the best way to ensure there was no major interstellar challenge to clan rule was to heavily regulate interstellar interaction by controlling/blowing up jumpships) there is nothing to fill the void. Sure, the surviving periphery states take their chances to (re)claim some territory, and Comstar is still licking its wounds on its five hidden worlds, but aside from that, the Inner Sphere is reduced to at best a massive chaos march, and at worst struggling, isolated, or dying worlds stuck in the dark ages. The way things used to be is first just something grampa likes to gripe about, and over time fades further and further from memory into the history books. House Davion joins the Star League and Ancient Rome as something our ancestors once tried once, but doesn't really matter nowadays, and the only people who really think of themselves as Capellans are people who are actually from Capella.

But over time, the pieces are getting picked back up. The knowledge that was lost is reclaimed the same way their ancestors figured it out in the first place. Strong worlds start bullying/coercing/encouraging/bullying their weaker neighbors to join new empires. Smaller empires. Lots of them. And before long the shooting... okay, it never really stopped. It just shifts once again away from the planetary scale back to the interstellar.

Anywho, that's the basic idea. The question is, what does this setting need to make it fun? Also, I wonder what I should do with it if I actually finish it....

So.... basically a reset but with clan tech standing in for lostech.

Hey, why not, i'd love to have that old Mad Max feel again 

Wolf Commonwealth, Ghost Bear Republic, Falcon March, Capellan Confederacy?

What loony?  Back then he was essentially a less-successful version of his grandson.  Same with Janos, back then he was the shit.

Unless they're in a Stackpole novel

Only if you enjoy his interpretation.

Niops Association.  Most advanced faction in the game.

Seriously, though, I think MadCapellan has the right of it.  You need some major people driving conflict, perhaps by trying to conquor enough territory to build up a powerbase again.

Additional things I'm considering:

1) set approximately one hundred years after the clan invasion, so circa 3100, this is to allow for the rise and fall of the Clan Overlords, as well as sufficient time for the rediscovery of jumpship technology (since interstellar infrastructure is basically shot to bits during the fall of the clans and what remains is insufficient to sustain interstellar societies) and the beginnings of new interstellar alliances.

2) Rather than attempting to cover the entirety of the inner sphere, I would most likely focus only on part of it. Given my leanings, most likely the former regions of the Federated Suns... which means one of the ominous threats on the horizon will be the slowly expanding Taurian Concordat, bent on civilizing the lawless border regions for the greater good (the inheritors are absolutely insufferable these days)*.

*Taurian fans rejoice! I had to kill off the great houses and the clans to do it, but the Concordat is relevant in this setting!

3) In addition to the expanding Taurian frontier, there's also The Guild, which controls the single largest fleet of functioning jump capable craft in the inner sphere (just enough to maintain a bare trickle of interstellar commerce). This particular organization will have a rather long and convoluted history incorporating both Comstar and those elements of the Clan Merchant caste that managed not to get shot up during the Fall. The Guild is not entirely happy with the development of new interstellar proto-empires and new jumpships flying around disturbing their monopoly, but they aren't strong enough to act directly to prevent it.

4) Battlemechs are back to being rare, however the emerging states maintain fairly large conventional armies. Those who have access to mechs (generally 3025 tech, sometimes even primitive tech, clan tech is the new lostech) use them predominantly as elite shock troops or raiders rather than the sole reason and means to wage war. They take care of things that can't just be run over by armored divisions.

5) I have yet to decide on details concerning the squabbling powers that are rising from the ashes. Aside from what I've already stated of course.

I would love to see more on this Parallel Universe in particular. Hopefully by the end of the year our new website, the Shattered Core, will be up and running. I'd love to promote this and all other settings for the BattleTech universe.

Here is a link to a similar theme we were discussing over on BTSD forums.

Alternate BattleTech Universe: Clans Ubar Alles

I would only add two things based on this thread. One, as strange as it sounds their could be friendly areas of the InnerSphere to the Clans. I could see Smoke Jaguar rushing headlong into the Terran defenses of ComStar and Wolf in typical cunning fashion picking up the pieces. I could see their newly restored Hegemony in the center of your Clan empire being an island of tranquility in an otherwise stormy sea. What I'm saying depending on the Clan and the Region they come to rule you could have a favorable outcome or a very bad one. Say Coyote (a traditionalist Clan) and Skye (a traditionally rebellious region). Team Diamond Shark with a merchant heavy region or any aggressive Clan with a border region (say Draconis March or any region with historical hatred for a neighbor especially one who has been under the boot of the opposition for a long time) and there can be good possiblities for cooperation.

Two, as my discussion had the Periphery beyond the control of the New Clan established Second Star League it would be entirely appropriate for your story to begin with that region IMO. If you have the InnerSphere so ardently resisting the Clans then the fringes of space might never have fallen. If I could draw on the example of the Chainelaine Isles perhaps the Clans think the Periphery is unworthy of conquest and leave it much to their later horror. Have a worthy opponent by 3100 esepcially with the aid of InnerSphere rebels seeking to free their worlds.

Okay, but how does the Clan filth have enough warm bodies to get through the top half of the Sphere without choking on all the loonies that would spring up to do real damage to them?  Doubly so, if the Clans are dismantling infrastructure all willy-nilly?

::cough::Grand Duchy of Furillo except with way less guns::cough::

For 3000 invasion sake details. What is the Clan population at this time? I know Warriors of Kerensky gave us their population in 3050+ but with their crazy growth rate their population at this time would have been even smaller.

This extends to their toumans which were built up significantly in the decades prior to the invasion. Their front line strength may be diminshed a galaxy or two in 3000 compared to 3050. PGC wise if you look at the founding of the Dragoons I would say each Clan could field many of those units quickly in a time of need. This seems like one of those times. Also thanks to Tech Manual we know what designs (mainly since most weaponry was developed circa 2820) they have at this time and what they don't.

So basically overnight starting in 3006 the mechwarriror aristocracy of the neo feudal system is replaced by the Clan warrior caste. Patriotic fervor not withstanding the common Spheroid likely shrugs until his or her Clan master begins to introduce their societal reforms thus threatening their individual way of life. I guess that could have a variety of affects depending on how that is done. Some again might welcome this. The Clans have a tremendous technological advantage which is added to by the tremendous industry of the InnerSphere which is likely to boost their effectiveness in delivering a higher standard of life to humanity - although one could argue that their myopic focus on war would overshadow any effort at pacification.

For example take my example of Wolf becoming the ilClan. They and a small number of other Clans might have good plans to establish a new order but others like Jade Falcon could ignore that and start trying to chip away at the ilClan trying to absorb them. Not noticing the growing strength of the rebel cause possibly lead by ComStar, whatever remains of the Great Houses, and/or even the Periphery powers they are defeated after such infighting near the turn of 3100.

You could have a breakdown of the Grand Council as a result of Clan infighting almost mirroring the fall of the Star League. Perhaps said ilClan is shattered in a Refusal type War and various Clan remnants press their claims to the ilKhanship. A Succession War for the Clans ironically. Add in your rebel faction here and there. Certainly has potential.

Well, I think more time than 100 years should have passed.  I'd say 300 years would be conservative to have civilization collapse, most things be forgotten, and then relearned.

I'd also like to see strange genetic adaptations to worlds... high grav, low grav, slightly different atmospheres, etc.

I think there should be a lot more faction specific gear in a setting like this.  People will find their own solutions to unique problems on planets cut off from the once powerful (insert nation here).  This way, once contact starts to be reestablished there will be quite a lot of unexpected gear and capabilities.  Maybe only one faction rediscovers double heat sinks, or ER lasers, or RACs... maybe they come up with new and interesting ways of powering their mechs... or have to rely on more primitive idea's.

Basically I think the gloves are off in a setting like this.  There is zero reason to hold yourself back.  Let the imagination flow!

I think it would be appropriate if Terra is a wasteland.  I think it would also be cool to have some kind of shadowy group descended from the Clans still out there, lurking in the background and waiting for their chance to do... whatever their nefarious goals might be.