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DDAAWWNNOOFFTTHHEEJJIIHHAADD•• AACCLLAASSSSIICCBBAATTTTLLEETTEECCHHSSOOUURRCCEEBBOOOOKK•• •• 3355002233 Classic Classic BattleTech shakes the and universe to its foundation, ® Dawn of the Jihad box of secrets? BattleTech Sphere surviveopening of ComStar’s the documenting the opening year in a decades- documenting the opening year in truth is the lie of tomorrow. Can the Inner truth is the lie of tomorrow. across not as it a thousand light years, all is appears. Friend becomes foe and today’s appears. Friend becomes foe and Classic BattleTech But amidst the chaos and confusion swirling But amidst the chaos and confusion

will also find framework rules to run almost any bring humanity to its knees.

strings taut in righteous anger, launching a war to launching strings taut in righteous anger, long struggle for the very survival of humanity. power behind the fanatical Word of Blake pulls the of Blake pulls power behind the fanatical Word ™ When the Star League self-destructs, a shadowy Sample file Sample type of campaign set in this chaotic time. more directly the action than ever before. into Players of both RPG rolling format, readers allowing themselves to immerse The series of events presented in this book unfold in a to lead mankind to the light … by any means necessary. to the light … by any means necessary. to lead mankind for single-handedly turningfor single-handedly a pseudo-religious ComStar into organizationvision: with a Primus Conrad Toyama of ComStar, successor to Jerome successor responsible Blake and the man ComStar, of Primus Conrad Toyama November 3067 saw the culmination of work two centuries in the making, work begun by centuries in the making, work saw the culmination of work two November 3067 Sample file connection/DAWN OF THE JIHAD/section00: TABLE OF CONTENTS

TABLE OF CONTENTS i

THE DEVELOPER’S SAY 4 “Cowardice!” 67 SHADOWS OF FAITH 6 Doctors: Coordinator Ill, Recovering 67 INTRODUCTION 16 “Who Among Us Shall Rule?” 68 How to Use This Book 17 The Widening Confl icts 68 AND IT CAME TO PASS 18 Dieron Under Quarantine 70 War Engulfs Inner Sphere 19 Death to Mercenaries! 70 Decade of Tumult 19 Borders on Alert 71 Opening Shots 23 THE EAGLE SCREAMS 72 FILTHY MONEY 27 Winds of Change 73 War Strikes Mercenaries! 28 The Star League Failure: What Happened? 73 The Gathering Storm 28 Mercenary Assault on Mars Fails! 74 Where the Money Trail Ends 29 Tharkad: Was It or Wasn’t It? 74 Northwind Highlanders Returning Home 29 Assassins Gun Down Head of Sirian Concordance 75 Death of a Legend 30 Outreach Nuked! 75 Harlech City Under Siege! 31 Day of the Hawk 76 Counterstrike 31 War! 76 Dragoons Break Contract 31 Bolan Declares War 77 Northwind Blockade 33 Captain-General Condemns “Lyran Aggression” 77 Mars: What Happened? 34 Steiners Launch Second Wave 78 Fall of Outreach 35 The Quagmire of the Alliance 80 Mercenary Treachery 35 At Last! 81 Outreach Bombarded! 35 Jeremy Brett: Usurper in a Hero’s Clothing? 82 Outreach: A Survivor’s Account 36 Knights Recalled 82 Legacy of Distrust 37 ENEMY BROTHERS 83 “Divine Retribution!” 37 Tumbling Downward 84 Mercenaries Under Fire 38 Word of Blake Declares War as Star League Dies 84 Running the Blockade 38 Heretics and Traitors! 84 BURNING FIST 39 Slaughter! 85 Tharkad Burns 41 Com Guards Shattered 86 Star League Disbanded! 42 Tide of Fire 87 Horror Unleashed Sample43 fileTukayyid Hit, Heavy Casualties Reported 87 Chaos and Confusion 44 Dow Vows “Swift Retribution” 88 The Archon Dead? 44 Case White 88 The Greater War 45 Precentor Martial Victor Steiner-Davion Speaks 88 Skye Assaulted! 45 Case White Underway! 89 Long Odds for Duke Robert 47 “Devastation” 91 Wave Two? 47 Mopping Up 92 An Appeal for Unity 48 “The Bringers of Truth” 92 Skye-League War Forces Archon’s Hand 49 The Holy Light of Blake Comes to Demeter 93 Alliance Under Siege—Day 115 50 TRIALS OF VICTORY 94 BROKEN SWORDS 52 Silent Runnings 95 Sunset Over the Sword 54 Whispers and Rumors I 95 Who Is In Charge? 54 Whispers and Rumors II 97 Marshal of the Armies Speaks 55 Awaiting Orders 98 The Forgotten Fronts 56 Borrowed Time 99 The Pleiades Question 56 On the Precipice 99 Lest We Forget 58 Whispers and Rumors III 101 The Taurian Problem 58 Time of Deliberation 101 Marches at War 58 Whispers and Rumors IV 102 Operation Sovereign Justice Underway 58 Outreach Survivors? 102 Sovereign Justice Strikes Deep 60 Guarding the Flank 103 TEARS OF THE DRAGON 62 Righteous Rage 104 Dreams Torn Asunder 63 Showing Restraint 104 Leaders Gather for Whitting 3067 63 Watching and Waiting 104 Star League Disbands 64 Cry Havoc 105 The Dragon Speaks 65 CELESTIAL CRISES 106 Black Dragon Rising 66 Gathering Shadows 107 Uprising on Luthien! 66 Celestial Wisdom Dedicates Memorial 107 Betrayal at the Dragon’s Heart 66 Blake’s Wrath Targets Capellan People 108 connection/DAWN OF THE JIHAD/00: TABLE OF CONTENTS 002 / 003

TABLE OF CONTENTS i

St. Ives Struck 108 Warchest Point System 136 Royal Family Kidnapping! 109 Getting Started 136 Flashing Swords 110 Warchest Points Between Tracks 137 Capellans, Unite! 110 Skill Advancement 138 Luck or Foresight? 111 Ending the Campaign 138 Reclaim Your Destiny 111 Chaos Unbound: The Setup 138 Victorious They Vanquish! 112 Look Who’s Coming to Dinner 139 Fortress of Determination 112 Another Day, Another C-bill 140 Davions Sue for Peace 113 FUBAR! 142 Falling Skies 113 Payback 144 Sian Struck! 113 Vacationing in the Wasteland 146 Not Again! 114 The Skye Is Falling! 148 Union of Sword and Spirit 115 Running From the Devil 150 Too Far! 115 Game On! 152 AFTERSHOCKS 117 Golden Goose 153 CHAOS UNBOUND 132 Full Metal Press 155 Chaos Unbound: Dawn of the Jihad 133 Falcon Ptomaine 157 How to Use This Section 134 Final Curtain? 159 Tracks 134 Campaign Special Rules 135

CREDITS ii

Writing Cover Art Proofcheckers Herbert A. Beas II Klaus Scherwinski Mike Miller and Peter LaCasse Randall N. Bills Cover Design Loren L. Coleman Jason VargasSample file ©2005 WizKids, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Dawn of the Jihad, Warner Doles Header Design Classic BattleTech, BattleTech, ’Mech, BattleMech, MechWarrior, Chris Hartford Jim Nelson Classic BattleTech RPG, AeroTech 2, and WK Games are registered Ken Horner Layout trademarks and/or trademarks of WizKids, Inc. in the United States Kevin Killiany David M. Stansel-Garner and/or other countries. No part of this work may be reproduced, Nick “Gunslinger” Marsala Illustrations stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any David L. McCulloch Gerhard Mozsi means, without the prior permission in writing of the Copyright Ben Rome Additional Graphic Elements Owner, nor be otherwise circulated in any form other than that in Paul Sjardijn Chris Lewis which it is published. Printed in the USA. Christoff er “Bones” Trossen Øystein Tvedten Special Thanks Version 1.0 (June 2005) Phaedra Weldon To…Everyone! Published by FanPro LLC Shadows of Faith Playtesters and Fact-Checkers 1608 N. Milwaukee • Suite 1005 • Chicago, IL 60647 Loren L. Coleman Raymond Arrastia, Daniel M. Ball, Ron “Steel Hawke” Chaos Unbound Barter, Charles Borner, Paul “Blackhorse” Bowman, Rich Find us online: Ben Rome Cencarik, John Danovich, Brent Dill, Tim DuPertuis, John “Quentil” [email protected] Paul Sjardijn Dzieniszewski, David Fanjoy, Bruce Ford, Jon Frideres, Aaron (e-mail address for any Classic BattleTech questions) Product Development Gregory, Anthony “Shadhawk” Hardenburgh, Ross Hines, Glenn http://www.classicbattletech.com Herbert A. Beas II Hopkins, Peter La Casse, Rodney Klatt, Camille Klien, Edward (offi cial Classic BattleTech web pages) Randall N. Bills “TenakaFurey” Laff erty, Edward Lott, Mike Miller, Jeff “Highlander” http://www.fanprogames.com Morgan, Darrell “Flailing Death” Myers, Louis “Nukeloader” Myers, (FanPro web pages) Product Editing Michael Nelson, Andrew T. Norris, Keith “Vang” Oberschulte, http://www.mwdarkage.com Diane Piron-Gelman Nathaniel Olsen, Aaron Pollyea, “Medron Pryde”, Rick Raisley, (offi cial MechWarrior: Dark Age web pages) Rick Remer, Christopher K. Searls, Chris “Chunga(lomeningitis!)” http://www.wizkidsgames.com BattleTech Line Developer Smith, Joel Steverson, Rob Strathmann, Geoff Swift, Scott “Clutch” Randall N. Bills (WizKids web pages) Taylor, Roland “Ruger” Thigpen, Todd Thrash, Jason “Panzerfaust http://www.studio2publishing.com Production Staff 150” Weiser, Chris “Chinless” Wheeler, Aaron Williams, Charles (online ordering, sales and distribution) Art Direction Wilson, Andreas Zuber. http://www.battlecorps.com Randall N. Bills (offi cial Classic BattleTech fi ction) connection/DAWN OF THE JIHAD/section02: THE DEVELOPER'S SAY

THE DEVELOPER'S SAY i

The Word of Blake fi rst appeared in 1992 with the publication The hiatus took place for numerous reasons. It allowed FanPro of the ComStar sourcebook, a direct result of events from the novel to fi rmly establish its ability to produce quality products (includ- Lost Destiny by Michael Stackpole. As with any major schism within ing the creation of a fact-checking group of fans to help maintain a fi ctional setting—especially one revolving around a pseudo-re- continuity/quality), and enabled WizKids to fi rmly cement its own ligious order—the plan from inception was to ultimately stage an timeline and game before starting to close the gap. The decision to apocalyptic future battle between the sundered halves of ComStar. “pause” the BattleTech universe was not made lightly. In 2003, I pro- However, as with so many plot threads weaving through the Bat- posed that by 2005, all other criteria should be met and we could tleTech universe, at that point in time the unfolding of events was fi nally delve into the Jihad. nebulous at best. We soon realized that the framework for how the Jihad would In 1994, FASA held its fi rst fi ction summit concerning the Bat- take place and develop had changed almost beyond recognition tleTech universe. At each of these large-scale summits—which since 2000. Instead of presenting to the community a largely un- have occurred every two or three years for the past decade—the expected event (beyond foreshadowing laid down across the past BattleTech developers and editors, the president of the company, decade), as FASA had done with the Fourth Succession War and game creator Jordan Weisman and the primary authors of Bat- the Clan invasion, the history of the MechWarrior: Dark Age time- tleTech sourcebooks and novels met to develop the next several line spelled out in some detail the events of the Jihad, including years’ worth of plot threads, which they could then weave into its ending. We also did not have the primary venue for conveying novels and sourcebooks. At the 1996 meeting, participants began such a mammoth storyline; no novels about it had been written. to fi rm up the nebulous plan, using the word “Jihad” for the fi rst (WizKids did launch a new and successful line of MechWarrior: Dark time to describe the coming battle. However, the major events of Age novels, continuing to fl esh out a new and exciting universe the Twilight of the Clans and the FedCom Civil War still needed to and characters, but these books don’t provide the support needed be developed and published, making any jihad many years distant. for Classic BattleTech fi ction.) At the next fi ction summit in 1998, the Jihad received a little more So when we convened another summit at the end of 2002, we meat on its bones, though the meeting participants spent most of quickly realized we had to think outside the box across the board. that time spelling out the details of the huge FedCom Civil War. The standard, all-inclusive, mostly straightforward style of source- The summit in late 2000 saw serious eff ort to develop the Jihad books published for BattleTech over the past twenty years simply event. Authors and developers fi nally put on paper a series of novel would not cut it. Instead, writers needed to generate a completely ideas and concepts (along with rough sketches for accompanyingSample new file style that would put the players directly into the events of the sourcebooks) to begin what would become the Word of Blake’s cru- Jihad, unfolding them as time and sourcebooks progressed. sade… and then everything came crashing down. FASA closed its We also had to deal with continuity as never before—not only doors in January 2001, and it appeared BattleTech might die. to tie in and develop the past ten years and more of plot threads Fortunately, the BattleTech community refused to let that happen. across dozens of FASA/FanPro published products and novels, but WizKids, Inc. purchased the BattleTech Intellectual property and also to work in the numerous threads leading back from MechWar- went on to publish MechWarrior: Dark Age (the collectible miniatures rior: Dark Age. We needed to develop these plot threads through game set 65 years in BattleTech’s future). Meanwhile, FanPro licensed the Jihad to create the “next era” for Classic BattleTech stories and the rights to continue publishing BattleTech sourcebooks and rule- sourcebooks in the Jihad’s aftermath, and also to lay the founda- books. Since that day, FanPro has published a new base box set and tion for events planned for the future of MechWarrior: Dark Age more than twenty new sourcebooks and rulebooks, while getting (game and novels). All this while attempting to provide action- additional products back into print as well. packed storytelling rife with suspense and surprises to shock and However, a key element temporarily went missing. From the entertain; not just to keep the community coming back for more, beginning, BattleTech has been a living universe, growing and mov- but to generate new excitement for the BattleTech universe. ing forward, its characters, nations and people constantly evolv- To achieve that goal, more front-end work has gone into this ing. After the FedCom Civil War plot line ended in 2001 and 2002, product than any of the roughly fi fty others I’ve worked on. We the BattleTech universe went into hibernation of sorts—stuck in spent half a year alone kicking ideas around and fl eshing out a pro- 3067. This hiatus allowed us to explore numerous facets of the uni- posed style of presentation that all Jihad sourcebooks will follow, verse never before fully developed (such as publishing construc- its outline and the accompanying timeline: a ten-thousand word tion rules for battle armor and support vehicles, generating badly proposal. Because this project would start to move into MechWar- needed revisions of such books as AeroTech 2 and Technical Read- rior: Dark Age territory, more so than any other BattleTech product outs: 3026 and 3057, delving into some of the “supposed” powers published by FanPro to date, it would require WizKids’ approval to behind the Clans and Houses in Interstellar Players, launching the move forward. I consider it a testament to the work all the vari- Historical and Handbook series, and so on), but the lack of forward ous authors put forth that WizKids approved it without a single progress in the timeline made itself felt. requested revision. connection/DAWN OF THE JIHAD/02: THE DEVELOPER'S SAY 004 / 005

THE DEVELOPER'S SAY i

Based on the proposal, detailed writing assignments were excitement, “Shadows of Faith”—the fi rst of many stories support- generated. Once written sections came in, they were handed off ing, fl eshing out and weaving through the various future FanPro to the fact-checking team, which—combined with the playtesters Jihad sourcebooks—appears at the front of this product. and authors—generated more than two-thousand e-mails in the I have always contended that every license, from the million- weeks (and months) of review and counter-review. Outside of the selling computer games and novels, to decals and miniatures, to fantastic work they’ve done in making the Handbooks a quality the Heavy Metal software line, all provide essential support for the line, they earned their keep and then some with the mammoth BattleTech universe. BattleCorps is no diff erent. Even though so eff ort they’ve poured into helping make this product and the Jihad many people have poured so much time and eff ort into the Dawn as a whole all it can be. of the Jihad sourcebook to make it as exciting and dynamic as pos- Overall, we’ve done more front-end and back-end work than sible, BattleTech fans will miss the full experience of the Jihad with- for any previous product I can think of…and all for a product that out the fi ction BattleCorps provides. covers only the fi rst year of the Jihad! So now comes the test. As you dive into Dawn of the Jihad, you will notice that the You hold in your hands the culmination of nine years and short fi ction piece at the front not only ends in a cliff -hanger, but thousands—if not millions—of man-hours, the beginning of that the continuing story will not be published in future source- what I hope will be a fantastic and enjoyable ride for several years books. Instead, it will continue at www.battlecorps.com (the offi - (and numerous sourcebooks) to come. cial online source for canon Classic BattleTech fi ction). In the end, none of this would be possible without the Bat- I made this decision for several reasons. tleTech community. Though it is my sincerest hope that this prod- First, the cliff -hanger aspect of the fi ction piece fi ts Dawn of uct will generate the excitement needed to spark interest among the Jihad as a whole; this is only the fi rst year of the Jihad and the a new generation of players, while bringing back those who have whole product ends on a cliff -hanger, waiting for the story to con- parted ways, this book is dedicated to those fans who have stayed tinue in Jihad Hot Spots: 3070. the course with BattleTech through thick and thin. It is because of Second, while the BattleTech sourcebooks have always been you that BattleTech still exists and because of you that we’ve dedi- entertaining in their own right, players would have missed the full cated so much eff ort to making the Jihad the most enjoyable event experience of any major BattleTech event (from the Fourth Succes- yet in BattleTech’s long, illustrious history. sion War to the Clan Invasion, Twilight of the Clans, the FedCom Only you can judge whether or not we succeeded. Civil War and so on) without the accompanying novels.Sample I believe Thankfile you. BattleTech has survived for more than twenty years because of those novels and the dynamic storytelling format that began in Randall N. Bills 1986 with the publication of the fi rst BattleTech novel, Decision at Classic BattleTech Line Developer Thunder Rift. As FanPro has grown over the past three years and increased [Assistant Developer’s Addendum: There’s really nothing I can add to the quality, size and scope of its products in preparation for fully the above except a heartfelt dedication of this product to the fans at accepting the BattleTech mantle and moving the timeline forward large. Thank you all for your stalwart support and love of the game, once more, BattleCorps has grown as well. While able to explore even in our lean years. Starting now, I hope, we can repay your pa- numerous aspects of the BattleTech universe—including historical tience and devotion in full. fi ction—I believe BattleCorps’ true contribution to the BattleTech property and more importantly to the community will be felt dur- Herbert A. Beas II ing the Jihad. In what has already generated a huge buzz of online Classic BattleTech Assistant Line Developer]