In the far future of the 31st century warfare in the area of populated planets called the Inner Sphere is dominated by heavily armed multi-story BattleMechs that stride across the fields of battle using Lasers, Autocannons and Particle Projector Cannons to destroy their opponents. Populated space is controlled by a series of different Houses that are at continual war with their opponents. Battles are for entire planets not just continents and Mechwarriors battle not only their opponents but the heat buildup of their machines to try to keep their ‘Mechs fighting to the last.

The Classic BattleTech Introductory Box Set is the first new BattleTech starter set produced in some years. Released by Catalyst Game Labs at Gen Con Indy this year the $39.99 US boxed game contains all you need to start playing BattleTech including 24 plastic miniatures.

The boxed set contains:

• 24 unpainted plastic BattleMech miniatures
• 12-page Quick-start rulebook
• 32-page BattleMech Record Sheet book
• 80-page full-colour rulebook
• Inner Sphere at a Glance booklet
• 16-page Painting and Tactics Guide
• Two heavy-duty reference cards
• Two 22″ x 27″ full-colour double sided mapsheets
• Two six-sided dice
• One full-colour, poster-sized map of the Inner Sphere circa 3067

The set contains two different rule sets. A small quick start set that presents a very simplified version of the BattleTech rules and an Introductory rulebook that contains the core of the BattleTech rules. For the purpose of this review we did not use the quick start rules and instead focused on the Introductory rules.

The name “Introductory” may be confusing in the context of the boxed set but these rules are actually a small subset of the whole BattleTech rules. Over the course of the 20+ years that the game has been developing the rules have evolved from a game that only featured giant ‘Mechs to include tanks, infantry, power armour, aircraft, spacecraft, advanced technologies and an accompanying set of rules to allow you to build your own tanks, infantry, power armour, aircraft, spacecraft and ‘Mechs. The full rules are available in a hardcover volume called Total Warfare and the rules in the Introductory Box Set are labelled as “Introductory” as they are a slimmed down version of the full rules from Total Warfare. Despite being a subset of the Total Warfare rules the game is complete and you can get a full game experience from the rules in the Introductory Box Set.

Components

The material in the boxed set is, with a few exceptions, quite excellent. The printed material, with the exception of the Record Sheets, are printed in full colour and richly illustrated. The reference cards are printed on heavy, gloss stock and are, in a nice touch, marked with references to the pages in the Introductory Rulebook to which they refer. The Record Sheets are printed in black and white on 24lb stock. The two main problems with the printed material are the map of the Inner Sphere and the mapsheets. The Inner Sphere map is printed on very thin stock and is going to be prone to ripping. The maps sheets, which are required to play the game, are printed from slightly thicker stock but are still quite thin and if you are going to use them heavily you may want to look into getting them laminated in order to avoid accidents. These particular maps are not available individually, but Catalyst Game Labs do sell map packs for the game that have additional mapsheets with various terrain.

Aside from the issue of the thickness of the paper the map sheets are really quite nice. They are 22″ x 27″ in size and double sided. One side depicts a flat grassy plains area with trees and the other side a small series of hills and forests. The plains make for good introductory terrain as they are much simpler and only require you to know the terrain rules that apply to forests. The other side, with the addition of hills, adds some additional terrain rules but are still reasonably easy to come to grips with.

The Painting and Tactics Guide is fairly basic but is a good introduction for anyone new to the game or new to painting miniatures. The best part of the book is the Tactics section that goes over some significant tips and tactics for gamers new to the BattleTech game. It’s also very well written and easy to understand so new players should be able to apply those tactics right away.

The perfect bound Inner Sphere at a Glance booklet gives you an overview of the Inner Sphere setting for the game starting at 2108 and continuing until 3067. There are numerous maps to illustrate the changing political boundaries over time and the booklet ends with a small Technical Readout that describes the 24 ‘Mechs in the Boxed Set.

The box itself is quite sturdy and will bear up to extensive abuse and is also big enough that you can use it for storage of other gaming materials after you have painted the miniatures. Whilst on the subject of them, the plastic miniatures are worthy of an in-depth look on their own and you can see that at the end of this review.

The printed books in the set are very well done and show a consistent design and visual look that is extended to other products in the game range. They are all easy to read and also easy to search through, something handy for a rulebook. The maps are a bit on the thin side but in over a month of testing they haven’t developed any tears or excessive creasing. The Inner Sphere map though is quite thin and I was actually surprised that it hadn’t been damaged in transit. If you want to use it I can’t see how it will survive without being mounted or laminated.

All told the components of the boxed set, aside from the Inner Sphere map, were all very good quality and professionally designed and printed. Good quality for the money.

Introductory Rulebook

The Introductory Rulebook is divided into 11 sections

• Introduction
• Components
• Playing the Game
• Movement
• Combat
• Heat
• Scenarios
• Construction
• Weapons and Equipment
• Vehicle and Infantry QSR
• Glossary

The Introduction explores the game system, different types of products available to extend the game and also gives an overview of all of the components in the box. The Components section deals in more detail with the record sheets and maps (including a look at the terrain symbols). Playing the Game is, not surprisingly, where we get introduced to the core game mechanics, the sequence of play, and the main game terms. The Movement section explores the rules for moving your ‘Mechs, Combat deals with Line of Sight, arcs, firing and damage allocation. The Heat section explains how to track heat and how it effects your ‘Mech (an important issue). The Scenarios section has three basic scenarios to use and after that there is a small Construction section that explores some basic rules for building ‘Mechs. The last two sections are quick descriptions of some of the weapons in the Introductory rules as well as a simplified, quick start, look at the rules for infantry and vehicles. The Introductory Rulebook is 80 full colour pages but the core rules that you need to read to play the game only take up about 35 pages.

The Introductory Rulebook is probably one of the better designed books I’ve seen in quite some time. It is easy to read, heavily illustrated with photos of well painted miniatures and game illustrations, divided into logical sections and edited to ensure that the material in each section makes sense. This means that there are no combat rules or modifiers in the Movement section and no flipping from section to section to get all the rules you need for a particular situation. It is a very well written rulebook and in all of our testing I can’t recall a time when we were confused as to where to look in the rulebook for clarification on an issue.

All of the new BattleTech printed material produced by Catalyst uses a series of coloured tabs on the outside of the pages to help you find the appropriate sections in the books. They even do this in situations like the Painting and Tactics guide that only has two sections. It’s useful but I think that it would be slightly better if the section tabs were different colours. That is a small complaint though.

This set is distinctly aimed at new gamers and this is made obvious by the Introduction section of the rulebook that guides the gamer through the various related BattleTech products that are available as well as associated products such as the Heavy Metal ‘Mech building software and Iron Wind Metals range of pewter ‘Mech miniatures.

Game Basics

For gamers unfamiliar with BattleTech the system may seem as if it has a lot of book-keeping. Each ‘Mech in the game has an associated Record Sheet that shows the armour, internal structure, weapons and heat sinks for each ‘Mech. ‘Mechs build up heat by walking, running and firing their weapons and the heat sinks are used to dissipate that heat. Each ‘Mech is also rated for tonnage, the weight that the frame of the vehicle can support. Higher tonnages mean more weapon systems and armour but also mean a slower ‘Mech. There are also tracks to help mark overall heat gained from turn to turn as well as damage to the pilot. The Record Sheet can seem to be a bit much at first, but after a few games it starts to become second nature.

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At the beginning of the first turn, and in each subsequent turn, players roll 2D6 for initiative. The player, or team, that loses has to move one of their ‘Mechs first. This player, or team, will also be the first to declare fire later in the turn. Each ‘Mech is rated for a number of Movement Points that it has when walking and running and, if equipped with them, the number of hexes of movement it has when using Jump Jets. These MPs are then used to move and turn your ‘Mech. It costs 1 MP to enter a hex and other terrain or increased or decreased height levels increase the number of MPs that it costs to move into a hex. ‘Mechs can only move forward or backward and it costs 1 MP to turn your ‘Mech one hexside right or left.

Movement is done in an alternating fashion with each player taking one or more ‘Mechs and completing their movement before their opponent takes a turn. Before you move a unit you have to declare what mode of movement it is using; walking, running or jumping. Running and walking generate different numbers of MPs and jumping allows the unit to move a number of hexes equal to its Jump rating. Jumping generates a considerable amount of heat. Once each player has moved all of their units it is time to declare fire.

Again starting with the team that lost initiative, players take turns declaring fire for each of their ‘Mechs. Each weapon on the ‘Mech is rated for the heat it produces when fired, the damage it does (per missile for missile weapons) and the distances it can be used at. Weapon ranges are broken into Short, Medium and Long range bands and each weapon has a different rating for each range. For instance the Medium Laser has a Short range of three hexes, a Medium range of six hexes and a Long range of nine hexes. Past nine hexes the weapon is not able to hit a target. Some weapons, such as the Particle Projector Cannon (PPC), also have a minimum range (three hexes in this case) and targets closer to the firing unit than the minimum range increase the difficulty of attaining a hit with the weapon. Each weapon system is also physically situated in the ‘Mech, either in the torso, an arm or sometimes even a leg. This restricts the firing arc that the weapon can be used in and this makes it important to manoeuvre your ‘Mech to make the best use of its weapons.

painted plastic ‘Mech samples by Frederic Lagoanere

The game uses four arcs to determine weapon bearing and incoming fire. The three hexes in front of the ‘Mech are the front arc, the hex directly behind the ‘Mech is the rear arc and the two remaining hexes to the left and right of the ‘Mech are the left and right arc respectively. Weapons in the torso and head can only fire through the front arc. Weapons in the left and right arm can fire through the left and right arc as well as the front arc. Some torso and head mounted weapons are marked as firing through the rear arc as well. This arc is gauged from the hexes printed on the mapsheet or from the hex base that the ‘Mech is mounted on.

Players are able to measure the range to their targets and then choose what weapons they want to fire. There is no declaring fire and then finding out that your target was two hexes outside your maximum range. Players are allowed to fire at more than one target but doing so applies a penalty to hit any secondary targets.

Once all fire has been declared players then resolve weapon fire and damage. Before you can hit something you need to determine if you can see it and the Introductory Rules include the core of the BattleTech Line of Sight rules. The rules are simplified by the fact that the rules in the Introductory set only have a minimal number of terrain types to deal with: hills, trees (Heavy and Light) and water. Trees add modifiers to hit and enough hexes, or inches, of trees will block Line of Sight. Three or more hexes of Light Trees will block LOS, as will two or more Heavy Trees or one Light and one Heavy hex. After trees the only other terrain that can block LOS are hills. ‘Mechs are considered to be two height Levels above the base height of the terrain they are in. Woods also raise 2 Levels above the level of the underlying terrain. Height differences can block fire and with the two sets of maps that ship with the boxed set it is quite simple to determine if hills block LOS.

All fire and damage is considered simultaneous and so damage to one of your ‘Mechs will not effect its ability to return fire during the fire phase. To determine if a hit is made with each weapon being fired, players take the pilot’s Gunnery skill, usually 4, and add a series of modifiers. The first are those based on range. Any fire at a target that is within the weapon’s Short range has no modifier, Medium range is at +2 and Long range is at +4. So, using our Medium Laser example, fire at one to three hexes has no modifier, from four to six hexes is at +2 and from seven to nine hexes is at +4. If your ‘Mech walked there is an additional +1 modifier, if it ran there is a +2 modifier and if it Jumped there is a +1 modifier per hex with a minimum modifier of +3. Next is a modifier based on the number of hexes that the target moved. Moving zero to two hexes results in no modifier, three to four is a +1 modifier and the results go all the way to a +6 modifier for any target that moves 25 or more hexes in a turn. Light tree hexes add +1 to hit and Heavy trees add a +2 to hit.

There are also modifiers (in the Introductory Rules) for cases based on damage to the ‘Mech. Attempting to fire an arm based weapon that has taken damage to the internals of that arm can also make it more difficult to hit. All of these modifiers are added to the pilot’s Gunnery skill and this is the minimum roll that a player needs to obtain on 2D6 to hit their target. Any final total that is higher than 12 means that the shot automatically misses. It is often quite difficult to hit your target in BattleTech and the wealth of to hit modifiers allows for many options for gamers to try to keep their ‘Mechs from getting hit.

Once you have hit you need to determine where the weapon damages the target ‘Mech. Using either the miniature’s base or the mapsheet hex you determine which arc the fire comes through. This will either be the front, rear, left or right. You then roll 2D6 and refer to the ‘Mech Hit Location chart cross referencing the arc the fire came through. This gives a location on the ‘Mech that the weapon hits. This can be one of nine locations, Left Torso, Left Arm, Left Leg, Center Torso, Right Torso, Right Arm, Right Leg and Head. Each ‘Mech’s record sheet has two diagrams. The first is an armour diagram that shows the armour values in each of the nine locations (front and rear) and the second is a diagram showing the internal structure of the ‘Mech in each of the nine locations. The damage value for the weapon is applied to the location determined using the ‘Mech Hit Location chart. The Panther ‘Mech that is included in the Introductory Starter Set has an armour value of 10 on its Left Arm. If it was hit in the Left Arm location by a Medium Laser, with a Damage value of 5, it would only have 5 points of armour left. Another shot from a Medium Laser would strip the armour from that location and any subsequent damage would impact the internal structure of that location.

Some weapons, such as Long Range Missiles (LRM), scatter their attacks and even when they hit they do a variable amount of damage. The Quick Reference Sheet has a Cluster Hits table that determines how many missiles, or other munitions, from these weapons hit. As with other mechanics in the game, 2D6 are rolled and then cross-referenced with the number of munitions fired. So an LRM 20 which fires 20 missiles at a target might hit with as few as 6 or as many as 20 of those munitions.

Each ‘Mech also has a varying amount of internal structure based on the weight of the ‘Mech. The Panther has six points of internal structure in its Left Arm and has 11 in its Center Torso. Each time a location is damaged by a weapon it not only eliminates those internal structure points but it also has a chance to damage systems in the ‘Mech. The ‘Mech’s record sheet also has a chart listing the weapons and structures in each location. When internal damage is dealt there is a 50% chance that this damage will disable one or more structures including weapons, heat sinks, actuators (which help your ‘Mech move) and even your engines and gyros.

Once all of the internal structure from a location has been damaged then that location is blown off the ‘Mech. Arms and legs fall off, torso sections drop off taking arms with them and if the head is destroyed then it’s “lights out” for your pilot.

painted plastic ‘Mech samples by Frederic Lagoanere

Some systems, such as weapons, can take multiple hits (a single hit will disable them though) and damaging most internal systems produces additional game effects. Actuator damage limits the movement of limbs, gyro damage makes it difficult to keep your ‘Mech on its feet and damage to ammo bins can cause catastrophic explosions that can rip your ‘Mech apart.

You can also attempt to get “up close and personal” with your opponent and attempt physical attacks. These can be basic punches and kicks or more complex moves such as charges, attacks with weapons such as Hatchets or Axes or even the famous “Death from Above” attack using Jump Jets to try to crash into an opponent while in the air. Physical attacks use the same attack and damage allocation rules as weapon attacks, but can also require a piloting check (before or after the attack) depending on the type of attack and the result.

During the course of the game there can be different circumstances, taking excessive damage, getting kicked, actuator or gyro damage or the impact of physical attacks such as charges or kicks that can cause your pilot to take a Piloting Check to avoiding having their ‘Mech take a header into the turf. As with other similar tests the base value used is the Piloting Skill of the pilot (usually 5) and there are various modifiers, based on the situation, that are then added and the player needs to roll this number or higher on 2D6. Failing the roll means that the pilot has lost control of the ‘Mech and it falls taking damage based on the weight of the ‘Mech. Losing internal structures like actuators or taking gyro damage produces permanent modifiers to Piloting Checks and so in a game you can sometimes effectively remove a ‘Mech from play by damaging it internally so badly that the pilot is unable to control the vehicle.

Finally, after all of the movement and attacks each player determines how much heat is generated by their ‘Mech based on the actions it took during the turn. Movement and weapons fire generates heat and this is all compared to the number of heat sinks the ‘Mech has to determine if it was able to dissipate all the heat it generated or if the vehicle has residual heat left over. This heat builds, or dissipates, from turn to turn and can have an effect on the ‘Mech’s targeting and movement and even, at extreme level, cause ammo explosions or force the pilot to shut the reactor down to avoid a meltdown.

The Panther has 13 Heat Sinks and its two weapons, a PPC and Medium Laser, can create 13 points of heat. If the Panther jumps and fires all of its weapons in a turn it could generate 17 points of heat. This is four more than it can handle with its Heat Sinks and so if a rash pilot did this they would accumulate 4 points of heat. The first heat effect happens at 5 accumulated points of heat and at that point ‘Mech loses a movement point, if the heat climbs to 8 or more then in addition there would be a +1 modifier to fire. At the upper levels ammo explosions and damage to the pilot are possible.

To add another complication to the mix, your pilot can take damage and be required to make checks to maintain consciousness. Damage to the head, ammo explosions, excess heat and falling can all damage your pilot and require them to roll equal to or higher than a Consciousness value depending on how much damage they take. The first point of damage requires a roll of three or higher, the second a roll of five or higher, the fifth a roll of 11 or higher and if your pilot takes 6 points of damage they are dead.

But enough about the technical details of the game, I’m sure you’re more interested in how it plays.

Playing the game

The first thing that most gamers I know have mentioned is that they thought that the game would bog down with all of the record keeping that BattleTech requires. During normal gameplay you need to track your damage (internal and external), heat, weapon ammunition levels for missiles and autocannons and your pilot’s damage level. This is not insubstantial. In actual games though this is never really a problem once you’ve managed to play a few games and are no longer distracted by your lack of familiarity with the rules. The Record Sheets make it easy to track all of this information, they contain many of the rolls you need for Consciousness Checks and Heat effects and all of the armour and internal structure points are also easy to track, this all makes it simple to check the status of your ‘Mech at a glance.

The game also has a level of detail that, while not as complex as games like Starfleet Battles, is probably higher than that in most tabletop games. The game system description above is a slight simplification of the actual rules in the Introductory Rulebook. Individual systems in a ‘Mech can have various effects when damaged and there are quite a few movement and attack options in the game which all add up to make this a fairly complex game system. The question is whether this complexity is easy to learn and remember and whether it is worth the effort to do so.

painted plastic ‘Mech samples by Frederic Lagoanere

The Quick Reference cards include rule page references in most charts to make it easy to look up additional effects of things like Gyro hits and the game system itself is quite logical. Despite having a wide range of systems like leg and arm actuators and gyros, each of them has an effect based on the physical location, so losing an arm actuator makes it difficult to punch and shoot with weapons in that arm. Over the course of the six test games we played as part of this review most of the common structure and game effects, such as to-hit number calculation and damage effects, became second nature.

That isn’t to say that this is an easy game to learn, but the Introductory Box Set does a very good job of giving you enough of the rules to create some fun games without overwhelming you. If you want a more graduated introduction to the game there is also the Quick-start rulebook that removes most of the internal system rules leaving you with movement and weapons fire rules. Most gamers shouldn’t have that much difficulty learning the rules though. The boxed set may be new to some gamers but this is a rules system that has had twenty years of playing and testing and so it is very well written, well illustrated and free from the logical inconsistencies that often crop up in other games.

But is it fun?

BattleTech has a random element to it that is often missing in other games and this is more that just the vagary of the dice. Thanks to the Hit Allocation tables it is possible for your 80 ton ‘Mech to be taken out by a single shot from a much smaller ‘Mech if it happens to hit you in the head with a large enough weapon or get a lucky critical that takes out the cockpit. Death can come quickly and from unexpected sources in this game. Fate can also intervene in the form of failed Piloting Checks, Consciousness Checks, Reactor Shutdown rolls or, my favourite, Ammo Explosion Rolls. ‘Mechs fall down, pilots pass out, reactors overheat and shutdown and ammo cooks off in the game with delightful regularity.

I say “delightful ” because unlike other games that have had random events this doesn’t actually ever becoming annoying. Your ‘Mech isn’t falling down because of blind chance but because it was kicked or you walked into deep water. These events aren’t truly random since there is always some genesis to them but they are often unexpected and can sometimes cause the battle to tilt dramatically for or against you. Your grand plan almost always falls apart after contact with the enemy as the game has so many possible vectors for the unexpected to happen.

To me, it makes the game a lot of fun to play and adds a lot of replay value. One of our test games had a Hunchback ‘Mech destroying two Assault ‘Mechs with shots to the head with its AC20 (autocannon). The next game the same ‘Mech was taken out early when a Wolverine punched through its rear torso armour to touch off its autocannon ammo and cause it to explode. These events are sometimes dramatic and they are sometimes banal and so they simply add drama to the game without unbalancing it. This also helps to add to the replayability of the game. Even using the same ‘Mechs and the same maps the game doesn’t play the same twice.

The game has a level of detail to it that many gamers familiar with 40K or even Warmachine may find a bit intimidating, but this detail is easy to learn and master and I think it adds a great deal to the game. There are new avenues of tactics and strategy that come about from the specifics of both your and your opponent’s ‘Mech that give the game a depth of experience that most other games can’t duplicate, especially when playing with a small number of ‘Mechs. The game also scales well but can get a little out of hand (particularly for beginners) if you are playing with more than eight ‘Mechs a side.

The Introductory Starter Box Set comes with two double sided map sheets that the game is meant to be played on. BattleTech is an odd hybrid game in that it ships with 24 plastic miniatures but is played on a flat mapsheet with hexes. Catalyst Game Labs has a free PDF download with rules to play the game on a gaming table with 1:285th scale terrain as well. When I initially started playing our test games I made sure that we played a few games using the miniature rules and my 6mm scale Epic terrain. I actually expected to like the mapsheets a lot less than I eventually did. While I think that I may play the game using terrain more once I finally finish my 6mm scale road sections, I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed using the provided maps. They give you a fairly dense and interesting set of “terrain” to play on and they don’t take up a lot of space.

If you don’t mind the learning curve for the game and for the units then the Classic BattleTech Introductory Starter Set can provide you with a lot of gaming fun for your money. Especially since it comes with 24 miniatures and the record sheets for those ‘Mechs which allow you to play quite a few games without ever using the same combination of ‘Mechs. The miniatures combined with the game system give you probably one of the better play experiences of any starter set that I can recall.

The Miniatures

The figures that come in the boxed set remind me of the maxim that “quantity has a quality all its own”. The boxed set comes with figures for:

• Awesome
• Jagermech
• Vindicator
• Cicada
• Zeus
• Dervish
• Enforcer
• Jenner
• Dragon
• Grasshopper
• Whitworth
• Hunchback
• Cyclops
• Quickdraw
• Hermes 2
• Spider
• Atlas
• Clint
• Commando
• Trebuchet
• Catapult
• Panther
• Banshee
• Assassin

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You can see more photos of the miniatures in the set in our review gallery

These range from quick Light ‘Mechs to heavy, slower Assault ‘Mechs and the boxed set gives you a really good range of ‘Mechs that not only differ in weight but also in purpose. There are missile boats like the Catapult as well as speedy lightly armed units like the Spider.

The figures are made from a soft(ish) plastic and while are advertised as single piece figures some of them are actually pre-assembled from multi-part sprues. In fact, most of the figures appear to have been clipped from a sprue. Many of the figures including the Awesome, Vindicator, Jenner, Dragon and Spider are clearly built from more than one part and the Awesome in the review set we received has clear signs of glue under the arms. I had to clear and reglue all the parts for three of the ‘Mechs in the set as the glue used when they were assembled either did not set or was not the correct type for the plastic. Several miniatures also had large blocks of plastic on the connection points between the figure and the sprue where they had been cut improperly.

The quality of the figures really varies significantly. Some figures, like the Spider, very closely resemble their metal counterparts and have quite a bit of detail on them. Others, like the Clint, lack crisp detail and seem rather soft and poorly formed. Some ‘Mechs, like the Hunchback seem a little thinner than the metal versions and in general many of the figures seem slightly compressed vertically. The miniatures are made of a soft plastic that is more rigid and holds detail better than the soft plastic of the Battlefield Evolution or Star Wars Miniatures figures, but is not as dense or hard as the injection moulded plastic of the GW miniatures. So there is a decent amount of detail in the figures but it often lacks the depth that you’d see in a Warhammer or 40K plastic miniature. Some details like missile barrels tend to fill and the Catapult miniature is meant to have twenty missile barrels on each missile pod but often it only has five or ten distinguishable barrels. The Cyclops is supposed to have a right side PPC at its waist that is also missing most of the detail in this plastic version.

The figures are all on small bases that are irregular hexagons with the side faces shorter than the front and back faces. The base has a raised lip that is about a third of an inch high and a slight texture on the top of the base. For some reason the Grasshopper’s base has no lip at all and is flat. Overall I rather disliked the bases, they aren’t regular hexagons and aren’t really useful if you are playing the game without a mapsheet. I clipped all of mine off and rebased them on regular hex bases as I intend to use these figures on terrain instead of on the supplied mapsheet and will need to have proper hex bases to accurately determine incoming arcs.

Almost all of the miniatures had mould lines running along the outside of the figure directly in the middle of the miniature. In some instances these mould lines actually distort the detail of the figure. The mould lines also have an annoying habit of being in some rather difficult to access places. The Cyclops miniature has mould lines along the inside of its legs and it is next to impossible to get a knife into the space to clean them. The plastic is unfortunately not something you want to use a file on as it is not hard enough to stand up to a metal file. It is easy enough to trim the mould lines off but the plastic has a habit of clinging to the figure in small little spurs. Happily enough you can use a soft brush to whisk the spurs off the miniature or even wash them off. In some figures the mould lines are minor but in others, like the Grasshopper, the lines are quite severe on the torso (at least when viewed from the rear) and require a bit of work to remove.

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One of the problems with the miniatures is quality control issues regarding the packaging and assembly of the figures. The first boxed set we received had the correct figures in it but the second had two Catapults and two Grasshoppers and was missing the Quickdraw and the Cicada miniature. In both sets the wing section on the rear of the Spider was put on upside down and some of the figures were glued incorrectly and had to be reglued. There have been enough problems with this that Catalyst Game Labs have posted a form on their website to report issues and get replacement miniatures.

Individually there would not be a lot to recommend these figures. The metal versions of these miniatures are all much better sculpts and have few issues with mould lines. That said, “quantity has a quality all its own”, and in this case the sheer number of figures that you get in the set is astounding for the money you are paying and despite the flaws in the miniatures you can clean them up and paint them quite well. Classic BattleTech forum member Frederic Lagoanere (foxbat) posted photos of painted examples of the miniatures (the painted samples you have seen in the review) and as you can see these clean up nicely and can be painted to a fairly high standard. You can see more examples of his figures on the CBT forum.

These figures are, individually, not the best example of sculpting. Taken as part of a $40 boxed set that includes rules, record sheets and two mapsheets they are a very good value and may even be worth the $40 on their own. Again, the quantity of the miniatures and their overall utility make up for any imperfections in any individual sculpt.

The photos in this review are taken from the second starter set that I purchased since I was actually incapable of waiting to take photos of the miniatures in the review set and had most of them primed and painted well in advance of finishing this review. In fact, many of our test games were played with painted versions of the figures from the review copy I received. So not the best miniatures you will ever see but certainly good enough that you’ll want to start painting them and gaming with them.

Summing Up

The Classic BattleTech Introductory Starter Set is essentially two products. For new gamers it is, as advertised, an introduction to the wider BattleTech game that includes all you need to start battling with giant BattleMechs. For existing gamers it is an inexpensive set of plastic miniatures that also comes with a free ruleset you can use for demos.

You get a large number of acceptable figures, a very playable set of rules, maps and a fairly large amount of background material and additional reading material. You can’t fault the game for the amount of material it provides. If you are a gamer interested in getting into the game the boxed set provides you with a lot of value for your $40. If you are an existing BattleTech gamer then this is a good set of rules to help get some friends or local gamers interested and you also get a large number useful ‘Mech miniatures to expand your forces.

Some gamers may find that BattleTech requires more book-keeping than they want in a game. I found it to be a manageable amount of data to track and I also found that this additional level of detail provided the game with a lot of interesting twists and strategic options. Out of the box the game only supports playing on the supplied mapsheets but once you master the core rules you can get the free PDF miniature rules and play using your 6mm or 1:285th scale terrain if you have any.

The mapsheets and the lack of miniature rules may put some gamers off. The boxed set is still a hybrid board/miniatures game and if you want to transition to playing with terrain then you need to get the free miniature conversion rules and jump to using them after you work through the rules in the boxed set. As I mentioned earlier, I actually found myself liking the mapsheets far more than I expected to.

The boxed set exists to act as a launchpad for gamers to explore the rest of the vast BattleTech gaming universe and this product does a good job of informing you of your options if you care to do so. It is also a fairly decent ruleset on its own and there is really nothing stopping you from sticking with this ruleset and gaming in a subset of the entire BattleTech universe as the Introductory rules, on their own, provide you with a very good gaming experience.

Your impression of the miniatures will really vary wildly. If you are just starting out playing BattleTech or you want to get a set of the more common ‘Mechs in the game then the figures in the boxed set represent good value. Even considering the mould and assembly issues you really can’t argue with the price or the quantity of figures you get. And they do actually paint up into very acceptable tabletop figures. If you’re a fan of metal figures or of precise quality sculpts then these miniatures will leave you wanting.

Pros

• Great value for $40
• Clear, concise rules
• Large number of miniatures supplied in starter set
• Great introduction to a much larger game and game universe
• Fun game with lots of twists
• Deep strategy
• Great production values

Cons

• Miniatures have mould and assembly issues
• Miniature quality is not the best
• Game requires more record keeping than most games
• The game can have more random influences than some gamers like
• Mapsheets and map printed on thin paper stock