Liftoff planet and conquer an entire solar system! Deploy kilometer-long WarShips as escorts, first for JumpShips bridging the gulf between stars, then for detaching DropShips that burn in system to drop troops onto any battlefield. New aerospace tactics will allow you to gain air supremacy to match your grasp of ground tactics. Yet the war for a star system is more than a single battle and a commander that utilizes his supplies and personnel with skill will survive the numerous battles to come.

Strategic Operations is the one-source rulebook for advanced rules aerospace assets that open the entire conquest of a solar system. It includes new aerospace movement, combat and advanced aerospace unit construction rules.

Under License From

Sample® file

©2007–2021 The Topps Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. BattleTech Strategic Operations, BattleTech Total Warfare, Classic BattleTech, BattleTech, BattleMech and ’Mech are registered trademarks and/or trademarks of The Topps Company, Inc., in the United States and/or other countries. Catalyst Game Labs and the Catalyst Game Labs logo are trademarks of InMediaRes Productions, LLC. BATTLETECHTM STRATEGIC OPERATIONS

Sample file • CATALYST GAME LABS • DF JH

A Word of Blake fleet, lead by the Black Lion-class Rays of Enlightenment, moves to protect one of its Hidden Worlds: the Ruins of Gabriel.

Space Drops for Ground Units In Zero-G Operations 22 INTRODUCTION 6 Ejection and Abandoning Ship 24 Fighters 24 Advanced Rules 6 Large Craft 25 Tactical Operations (2 Volumes) 6 Fighter Squadrons 25 Strategic Operations 7 Creating a Fighter Squadron 25 Interstellar Operations 7 Using a Fighter Squadron 28 Campaign Operations 7 Splitting a Fighter Squadron 32 Choose What You Like 7 Fuel Consumption (Aerospace Units) 32 Player Adjudication 7 Tactical Fuel Efficiency 32 Fiction 8 Strategic Fuel Efficiency 33 Fiction Vs. Rules 8 Refueling 33 Fiction Vs. Art 8 Fuel Consumption (All Units) 33 Components 8 HarJel 34 JumpShips 8 Gravitational Effects 34 WarShips 8 Thresholds 34 Space Stations 8 Infantry Vs. Infantry Actions (Expanded) 34 Record Sheets 9 Boarding for Damage (Optional) 35 Aerospace Record Sheets 9 Orbital Obstacles 36 Additional Record Sheets and Templates 11 Asteroids 36 Debris 36 THE NAVAL FACTOR 12 Movement and Weapon Resolution Dice 37 Random Aerospace Assignment Tables 37

GENERAL RULES 16 DESPERATE THRILL 46

Abstract Aerospace System 16 ADVANCED AEROSPACE The Radar Map 16 Deploying Forces 17 MOVEMENT 50 Abstract Ground Support 17 Abstract Air-to-Air Combat 19 Advanced Units 50 DroppingSample Troops 20 Movement Sub-Phases file50 Atmospheric Drops 20 JumpShips 50 Space Drops for Orbital Insertion 21 WarShips 51 Space Stations 51 General Rules 82 Unit Type 130 Advanced Initiative 51 Advanced Heat 82 Technology Base 131 Advanced Movement 52 Advanced Point Defense Weapons 84 Weight 131 Rotational Vectors 53 Advanced Atmospheric Control Rolls 85 Space 131 Random Movement 54 Ammunition 85 Designing Advanced Aerospace Units 132 Lateral And Deceleration Movement 54 Anti-Aerospace Capital Laser Targeting Mode 87 Step 1: Design the Chassis 132 Angles of Attack 54 Attacking the Jump Sail 87 Choose Advanced Aerospace Unit Type 132 INTRODUCTION Special Maneuvers 54 Bracketing Fire Mode Choose Technology Base 133 Yawing and End-Overs 54 (Capital and Sub-Capital Weapons Only) 87 Choose Weight 133 Docking 54 Called Shots Mode 88 Allocate Weight for Structural Integrity 134 Flight and Transit Times 56 Capital Missile Bearings-Only Launch 88 Step 2: Install Engines and Control Systems 134 Atmospheric Flight Times 56 Capital Missile Preprogrammed Install Engine 134 Suborbital Flight Times 57 Waypoint Launches 90 Determine Fuel Capacity 135 Interplanetary Flight Times 57 Capital Weapons Fire In Atmosphere 90 Determine Structural Integrity (WarShips Only) 136 Landing and Liftoff (Expanded) 58 Electronic Warfare 98 Determine K-F Jump Capability Systems Status 58 Emergency Combat Heading Operation (JumpShips and WarShips) 136 GENERAL RULES Fuel Use For Landing and Takeoff 60 (DropShips and WarShips Only) 101 Add Control/Crew Systems 137 Vertical Landing and Liftoff 60 Individual Weapons 102 Special Enhancements 139 Water Landing and Liftoff 61 Large Craft and Sensor Shadows 102 Step 3: Add Heat Sinks 139 High Speed Closing Engagements 62 Over-Penetration Weapons Fire 104 Step 4: Add Armor 140 Types of Closing Engagements 63 Space Bombing 104 Step 5: Add Weapons, Ammunition Set-Up 63 Targeting Capital Missiles 105 and Other Equipment 141 Sequence of Play 65 Tele-Operated Missiles (Expanded) 105 Step 6: Complete the Record Sheet 147 ADVANCED Detection and Initial Maneuver Phase 65 Variable Damage Thresholds 105 Calculating Advanced Aerospace Unit Costs 148 AEROSPACE Capital Missile Phase 67 Advanced Sensors 105 Basic Cost Calculations 148 MOVEMENT Meeting Engagement Phase 69 Infrared Jump Signature (Object) 106 Structural Costs 148 End Phase 73 Emergence Wave (Object) 106 Weapons and Equipment 148 High Speed Damage 73 Radio Triangulation (Object) 106 Final Unit Costs 148 Hyperspace Travel 74 Drive Plumes (Object) 107 Calculating Advanced Aerospace Unit BV 148 Jump Points (Outside of Game Play) 74 Radar (Object) 107 Calculating Advanced Aerospace Charging the Drive (Outside of Game Play) 75 Optical/Thermal Detection (Object) 107 Offensive Battle Rating 148 Jump Calculations (During Game Play) 76 Zero-G Ground Unit Combat 107 Space Stations 149 ADVANCED Jump Process (Outside of Game Play) 77 BattleMechs 108 JumpShips 149 AEROSPACE Making a Jump (During Game Play) 77 Zero-G Ground Unit Combat WarShips 149 COMBAT on Large Aerospace Units 108 Balancing Aerospace Unit Forces 149 PUNITIVE STRIKE 78 Weapon Attacks 108 AEROSPACE OPERATIONS 150 AEROSPACE TECHNOLOGIES 110 ADVANCED INDEX 168 ADVANCED AEROSPACE COMBAT 82 ADVANCED AEROSPACE CONSTRUCTION Advanced Aerospace Units Combat 82 AEROSPACE UNITS RECORD SHEETS 172 Firing Arcs 82 CONSTRUCTION 130 Hit Location 82 TABLES 179 Critical Hit Effects 82 Collisions and Ramming 82 The Basics of Advanced Unit Design 130

INDEX

RECORD SHEETS

Sample fileDF JH A pair of Word of Blake Vengeance DropShips patrol the Ruins of Gabriel. 3 CREDITS

Project Concept Miniatures Painting & Photography Randall N. Bills Ray “Adrian Gideon” Arrastia (CSO Coordinator) William “Sounguru” Burt Project Development Chris “Pendragon” Dolega Herbert A. Beas II Paul “DarkMarauder” Eckes Randall N. Bills Dave Fanjoy Joel “Psycho” Hardwick Writing Ross “SavageCoyote” Hines Fiction David “Dak” Kerber Paul Bowman Frederic “foxbat” Lagoanere Dan C. Duval Steve “MadDoc” Livingston Kevin Killiany Mark “Hyena” Maestas Mike Miller Ryan “B1BFlyer” Peterson David L. McCulloch Mike “Ogre” Raper Steven Mohan, Jr. Ben “Ghostbear” Rome (additional photography) Rules Ed “Captain of the Watch” Smith Herbert A. Beas II Drew “Tai-sa” Williams Randall N. Bills Terrain Additional Rules William “Sounguru” Burt (2007/2008 Diorama), Joel Bancroft-Connors Dwin Craig, GHQ Miniatures, Ground Zero Games, Térence Harris Herpa Miniature Models, Iron Wind Metals, Chris Hartford David “Dak” Kerber (Gabriel Base) David L. McCulloch Map of the Inner Sphere Mike Miller Øystein Tvedten Luke Robertson Map Diagrams Ray Arrastia Product Editing Record Sheets Diane Piron-Gelman David L. McCulloch Index BattleTech Line Developer Rita Tatum Herbert A. Beas II Additional Design and Development Production Staff The following people have been involved in the creation and de- Art Direction velopment of BattleTech rules, either by writing material that was Randall N. Bills assimilated into the main body of the rules, serving as the BattleTech Cover Art line developer in the past, or otherwise contributing to the game in a major way. Jim Holloway Samuel B. Baker, Herb Beas, Randall N. Bills, Forest G. Brown, Cover Design Chuck Crain, Chris Hartford, Clare Hess, Scott Jenkins, J. Andrew Matt Heerdt Keith, James R. Kellar, Dale Kemper, L.R. “Butch” Leeper, Bryan Li- BattleTech Logo Design Brandi, Jim Long, David McCulloch, Jim Musser, Bryan Nystul, Mike Shane Hartley, Steve Walker and Matt Heerdt Nystul, Blaine Pardoe, Boy F. Peterson Jr., Rick Raisley, Ben Rome, Evolved Faction Logos Design Jerry Stenson, Christoffer Trossen, Wm. John Wheeler. Jason Vargas Graphic Presentation Acknowledgements David M. Stansel-Garner To Chris Hartford for all the years of being the “aerospace guy” Troy Stansel-Garner and giving us a great framework off of which to expand. Layout To Joel Bancroft-Conners for constantly digging deeper and Matt Heerdt, David Kerber making sure that in my drive to create a “yeah, we’ve got a rule Illustrations for that” mentality with the ground combat found in Tactical Op- Doug Chaffee erations, I raised aerospace rules to the same high bar. I hope we David R. Deitrick made them Zug proof (or at least “almost”). James Hauser To Herb Beas for settling further and further into the role of the Brennan Letts BattleTech line developer so I can move on to other things. Chris Lewis To the core group of people who, to one extent or another, Duane Loose have significantly contributed to transferring BattleTech to its SampleMatt Plog new home, and to taking it to a new filelevel: Ray Arrastia, Herb Beas, Klaus Scherwinski Loren Coleman, Warner Doles, David M. Stansel-Garner, Diane Steve Venters Piron-Gelman, Jason Hardy, Chris Hartford, Jason Knight, Chris Franz Vohwinkel Lewis, David McCulloch, Ben Rome, Matt Plog, Paul Sjardijn, dukeroyal, elsni, failure16, fireangel, foxes teeth, freak, gaiiten, Peter Smith, Scott Taylor, Christoffer Trossen, Øystein Tvedten, gbscientist, general308, geoff watson, ghost0402, glitter- Jason Vargas, and the fanatic core of fact-checkers and play- boy2098, gojira01, gomi, goose, gracus, greywolfactual, gus, testers who worked under “urgent data requests” more often Harvey, hunterada, ice_trey, idea weenie, istal devalis, jackmc, than we’d like to admit. jedibear, jeyar, jibbajabbawocky, jimdigris, jink rum, jmiles2, To Ray Arrastia, our own Renaissance man: sculpting, paint- jungle boy, kit_desummersville, kobra, kojak, kuttsinister7, INTRODUCTION ing, illustration, graphic design and layout…just don’t start Leon_Shirow, lissette woo, lyonheart, mad malefactor, mala- writing, or you may put some authors out of a job. kar, martius, mattlov, max francis vard, minchandre, mock26, To Diane Piron-Gelman for always stepping up to edit an- mostro_joe, mystic, nan, nightlord01, nikita, oldfart3025, oma- other giant tome. harenegade, panzerfaust150, perkinsc, peter smith, praetorian, To the CGL Demo Team for continued support! Let’s get prometheus fire, purpledragon, rage, redshirt, revanche, rexor- some cool aerospace games going! k, Rick Raisley, rommel_twee, shadow slayer, shadow_walker, To the camospecs.com team, who always step up no matter shadow6, shatara, shijima, shockwave, sierra_gulf, skiltao, sldf_ how many curve balls I throw. spector, snake_eyes, sudedei, sushi, talz, teamnutmeg, tel GENERAL RULES hazen, torrent, truegrit, truetanker, twycross, urgru, vandal, Playtesters/Proofers/Fact Checkers vega_obscura, vorpal, wantec, warchicken, wasp, weirdguy, Joel Agee, Kirk “RommelTwee” Alderfer, Ray “Adrian Gideon” weirdo, welshman, werewolf, whistler, wildfire, wolf lancer 4, Arrastia, Chuck Chaffins, Joel Bancroft-Connors, Ron Barter, wolfspider, wrangler, zone of alienation. Brian “cache” Benzing, Paul “Blackhorse” Bowman, James Rich- ard Brown, Joshua “Sweeper” Brumley, William “Sounguru” Burt, Special Thanks Roy “Wolf Lancer 4” Carl, Scott “Gnollyn” Crandall, Aaron “Jalinth” To the Aerospace Cabal: Joel “Welshman” Bancroft-Connors, ADVANCED Davis, Konstantin Dika, Brent Dill, Nicolai “Wolf_Mav969” Duda, Jason Donahue, Térence “Weirdo/Zug” Harris, Mike Miller, Luke AEROSPACE Dan Eastwood, Roberta “Fallguy” Elder, Tami “McKenna” Elder, “Jellico” Robertson, and Christopher K. “Goose” Searls. I’ve tried MOVEMENT Roy “Davion” Falo, Dave Fanjoy, Thomas Ferrell, Bruce Ford, hard to interact with the community over the years, taking Anthony Hardenburgh, Térence Harris, John “Worktroll” Haward, their dedication and passion and using that to increase the Ross “Savage Coyote” Hines, Glenn Hopkins, John “Bleusman” quality of our products. The creation of the “Aerospace Cabal” Hudson, Lynne “Devessi” Hunt, Rich “Hunter” Hunt, Jan-Hendrik and their work on Strategic Operations took that to a new level, Kalusche, David Kerber, Rodney Klatt, Michael “Konan” Koning, as I directly tapped into players’ expertise to “hopefully” fill in so Alan “Brainburner” Kreilick, Edward “Tenaka Furey” Lafferty, Jay many of the gaps left in aerospace rules across so many years. I ADVANCED Lawson, Edward Lott, Tami Lynx, Mark “Hyena” Maestas, Chris believe I can finally say that this is the rules set aerospace fans AEROSPACE “Alex Knight” Marti, Eberhard “Rote Baron” von Massenbach, have been waiting for. COMBAT Brian McAuliffe, Tim McAuliffe, Mike Miller, Jeff Morgan, Matt “Blarg D Impaler” Murray, Darrell “FlailingDeath” Myers, Justin Dedication “iamclanwolf” Nelson, Andrew Norris, Jason Paulley, William As this book is really volume two of Tactical Operations, I must J. “incrdibl” Pennington, Michael Pfister, Aaron “Gravedigger” again dedicate this book to my fantastic, all-too-forgiving wife. Pollyea, Jim Rapkins, Rick “Rick Steele” Remer, Kevin Roof, Luke Again, please give Tara a giant round of thanks if you like these ADVANCED Robertson, Andreas “Gaiiten” Rudolph, Eric “Mendrugo” Salz- core rulebooks, as they wouldn’t exist without her support. AEROSPACE man, Rick Sardinas, Björn “Keiran” Schmidt, Christopher K. CONSTRUCTION Searls, Chris Sheldon, Paul Sjardijn, Jeff Skidmore, Ed “Captain ©2011-2021 The Topps Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Bat- of the Watch” Smith, Peter Smith (played by Peter Smith), Sam tleTech Strategic Operations, Classic BattleTech, BattleTech, ’Mech, BattleMech and MechWarrior are registered trademarks and/or “Wasp” Snell, Joel Steverson, John Surette, Geoff “97jedi” Swift, trademarks of The Topps Company, Inc., in the United States and/ Roland “Ruger” Thigpen, Christopher J Thomas, Colin “Char- or other countries. No part of this work may be reproduced, stored lieTango” Toenjes, Øystein Tvedten, Jason “Panzerfaust 150” in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, Weiser, Lawrence Wigg, Chris “Chinless” Wheeler, Paul “Weasel” without the prior permission in writing of the Copyright Owner, Wolf, Patrick Wynne; OPFOR Kiel: Andreas “Rico” Basener, Sven nor be otherwise circulated in any form other than that in which INDEX “Wallace” Gorny, Björn “Cunningham” Grammatke, Jan-Hendrik it is published. “Korsar” Kalusche, Alexander “Guyver” Krohn, Jan “Fastjack”

Rüther, Michael “JackTF” Schulz; Steel City MechWarriors: Rich Corrected Third Printing Cencarik, Charlie Cogley, Rich Darr, Brian Golightly, Dave Lang, Published by Catalyst Game Labs, Drew Martin. an imprint of InMediaRes Productions, LLC 7108 S. Pheasant Ridge Drive • Spokane, WA 99224 Additional Thanks To the following on-line players that provided great sug- FIND US ONLINE: RECORD SHEETS gestions, off of which many of the rules in this book were [email protected] built: 3rdcrucislancers, abandon, adept dave Baughman, (e-mail address for any BattleTech questions) agen, aparbiter, asano, atlas3060, auren, awprime, axeman89, https://bg.battletech.com bean2213, bedwyr, Blackhorse 6, blacksheep, bluedragon7, (officialBattleTech web pages) bluetiger, boilerman, bored_lyron, boyscout, bryanc, bull- https://www.CatalystGameLabs.com dog79, cache, cannonshop, captainjohn, casper, chaos cat, (Catalyst web pages) charlieSample tango, chrisxa, cobrausn, coelacanth, daemion, dark file https://store.catalystgamelabs.com jackal, dark jaguar, dark_falcon, darkstar2011, Davion, deathk- (online ordering) night69, Deathrider6, demi-precentor worktroll, diplominator, 5