As someone who “gets” it, I’m going to try and explain it to the crowd that doesn’t understand the what or why. The best way to explain the Aces format is to move a little away from the wargame aspect and move a little more towards the RPG side of the house. The general idea is a progressive campaign (of which this box set has) where the human players are cooperating as a part of the same force against the predetermined opponent instead of having a dedicated game master. You’ll have some friendly NPCs most likely in the form of additional mechs you and your friends control, unless you have a larger player base around the table where everyone is invested in a mech. It’s a different game at that point, not really a test of combat acumen between two people. That may or may not appeal to people, and both options (yes or no) are perfectly valid. The author, Mr. Derksen, originally wrote something like this as a fan made rule set for the X-wing miniatures game. I’ve played the heck out of that system, and it is actually pretty fun when you think of it as an RPG night. So when I saw his name turn up as the dev for the Aces format, my mind went straight to “it’s the same thing but in Battletech, this is awesome”. It won’t replace playing Battletech against players, but rather be its own thing. And I actually really look forward to giving it a try within the context of playing an RPG combat. TL;DR - this isn’t a wargame product, it’s an RPG product that doesn’t need someone to “sit out” and be the game enemy. Hope that helps,
Thanks for throwing this out there. I’ve played the X-Wing system and am actually really interested in seeing Aces. I like the idea of co-op play in a style like this especially when you don’t have enough consistent players to have a GM.
You could have saved yourself a lot of time by just saying its a mechwarrior RPG but with yugiho cards. There have been many like it but this is pretty much one of those gundam cardgames.
@@twinkzilla-5356 My tiny little BattleTech RPG group is just myself and my GM using MegaMekHQ. We're proof that even with a GM and one other person, you can play out an engaging campaign.
This is made for me. Believe it or not, there’s been a few dice based AI charts that people have been making for years. I’m (loosely) part of an Alpha Strike group that’s an hour north of my town. The stars align and I get to go every 6 months, maybe. Between work and a family member’s health condition, I can’t always go on Saturdays. I can’t wait to get my hands on this. In case anyone is wondering, all of the game stores in my town outside of the Warhammer store have closed down. I did walk in there once and met the girl who ran it and I’m not getting involved in that.
@@KageRyuu6 sure can but still wouldn't be a bad idea to have an automated system for the opponent. Couldn't hurt. I didn't get Aces either until I saw some people say that it got their spouse into the game who wouldn't have played otherwise. If it's getting other people interested, putting new minis, and terrain out. How is this an issue?
@@KageRyuu6this makes it possible for the “game master” or opforce guy to also be a part of the party. I don’t see any issue with it. My thinking is if it opens up another way to play the game and more people join for genuine interest of the game, that’s a good thing.
"Automata" systems for board games give your board games a "computer player." Which is good for people who can't find opponents, or for solo-narrative play.
3 ways this can be used: 1.) Wanna game? No one available? No problem! Shuffle up and deploy! 2.) List testing. 3. PvE or PvEvP campaigns. i.e. All human players run a house list, and the AI controls Clans. Solo and Co-op games and expansions are just becoming more and more common. TCGs like Arkham Horror (I know it's an LCG). RPGs like Dragonbane and the One Ring. Miniatures games, like the Silver Bayonet and Forbidden Psalm. Board games have been done solo since the days of original Squad Leader.
My nearest LGS is around an hour from my house and there is no room for gaming as it is more of a comic shop than gaming. The next closest is also 90 minutes away in a different direction and it's a Warhammer store. Both of those are assuming no traffic on the roadways and no inclement driving conditions. My nearest gaming buddy that can afford to play, and also has the time to play games, is almost 90 minutes away too. The only thing I liked about the Mercs KS was Aces as it gave me a way to play BT without using MegaMek or setting up at the dying mall and seeing if there's a random person that wants to play.
I played the beta and like the system. The cards correspond with the mech roles. The system showed me different ways to look at the battlefield and it actually show me options that I would not have see. I feel that it works well for solo, cooperative, as an instructor, and as a system to test forces for competitive games.
@@mageleader3699 nah, its just one of those things that Catalyst sort of neglected until someone woke up and went "hey lets go ahead and throw these group of people a bone."
Hi Mage Leader, AI decks are pretty common for modern board games that have cooperative elements. Also I think this was a stretch goal from the mercenaries kickstater. I got the beta test elements for it in my digital materials for the kickstater and it's a cool add on to allow people to automate certain units or forces.
There was a fan made game for X-Wing miniatures called Heros of the Aturi Cluster. It was a cooperative RPG campaign with the bad guys run by the automated system. I believe the creator of that was asked to make the same thing for alpha strike. I played the system for X-Wing Miniatures and it was a lot of fun. I don't know if it will translate to well to Alpha strike, but my brother is all excied about it. I imagine I will be playing it soon enough.
@@einrauser6103it is, he was actually on the streams Catalyst had for it participating as a player and the “op force” manager (the guy following the enemy logic and making final calls for the op force). In between HotAC and Aces, he wrote an AI and campaign system for WizKids Star Trek Attack Wing. I never played it, but I heard it was a commercial success for them.
I fall under the "I can never find anyone to play with" category. I like the idea, but why set it up for Alpha Strike? Did they say if you can use it for CBT?
Catalyst has explicitly stated that they plan to later on release a version of the AI system for classic. This system as-is can only be used with Alpha Strike. I'm sure the community can adjust the system to make it classic compatible.
@@maroonmattadoor5022the battletech community can do anything and everything one thing I've realised getting into battletech is the community is very versatile and dedicated
I will use the heck out of this. I am an OTR truck driver who tends to get sat at truck stops for days on end waiting for loads. Now I can play AS even when I can't uber into town to a game store that may or may not have players that day.
Josh Derksen, the guy who designed this, also made "Heroes of the Atari Cluster" a solo and coop fan expansion for Star Wars attack wing, and then went on to design Star Trek dominion wars for wizkids and several other great coop games. Playing battletech solo or coop sounds great, especially since you can recreate battles from the fiction that are less balanced and play together on the disadvantaged side against overwhelming odds.
The ACES announcement during the last kickstarter is the only reason I really got into BattleTech this last year. I don't have time to go to game stores and play the game against folks. What I do have time for is my children and spouse and friends who will always be casual players. This is a great opportunity to have fun and share the battletech lore.
Could be good for a DM running a rp session vs a handful of players so the dm doesn't have to worry about every unit on their side and the cards may do things the dm wouldn't making the actions a bit more like facing multiple people
I mean, I can’t get away from the farm especially during harvest and make it into the city to play a game for like two months sometimes, and I don’t have a computer so I might check this out. But outside of my case this doesn’t make sense. Maybe word of Blake cyborgs
At my local game store they primarily, if only, play Alpha Strike. They are also the only group of guys I know that even play the game in my area. The audience there are young guys that are usually from the military base nearby or partially retired old guys that just want to play quick games. Alpha Strike provides exactly that, 35-45 minute matches with more time spent doing stuff than calculating where things are hit. I personally flip flop between the two game modes, but I play Alpha Strike more just because of their preferences. If more places are like my game store then they are probably putting more investment into Alpha Strike product because that has more interest as a casual interest for people who want to get into Tabletop Gaming but not heavily investing their free time into it. As for the appeal of this particular product, there are people I know who enjoy doing RPG stuff using Alpha Strike's gameplay so this is probably for those people.
My customers have been excited about the plastic figures but not about the cards or rules. Alpha Strike is losing with the players at my store while classic is winning.
As for "why you wouldn't just play a game against yourself", I would say that a.) i certainly have an initial bias to a unit going into any sad-letech game I play, and b.) I can predict exactly what my "opponent" is going to do because i am going to do it. By implementing an "AI" system, you can have an "opponent" who, while having predictable behaviors, can still perform unexpected actions based on what the system told it to do.
Its getting more common. Especially board games based on video games like monster hunter or resident evil have these "AI" card systems (In monster hunter its used to determine the behavior of the monster on the board etc.) This opens up the potential customer market to people who live in regions without a solid hobby/tabletop community who otherwise would go "why bother? I have no one to play with" Im not surprised they focus so much on alpha strike either since the CBT takes alot of time and is very casual unfriendly (Its a really nice system but its also very very cumbersome) so their thinking more likely is that they will sell more with the much quicker and casual friendly rules system. You know... to attract a "wider audience" XD Thank god that battletech is a robust system and has a fanbase that will not abandon the classic version for the fast food version.
I prefer the cards to be replaced with actual AI. Like the old primitive kind, maybe even card based. It should be an app though. One fun thing, those coding llms aren't good at complicated things, but making an app for a game is right up their alley. That's what I'm doing for my own war game I'm making right now. I don't like doing math, but figuring out math is fun. Once I make my decision it should be calculated for me.
Appeals to the TTRPG crowd, since it allows you to play a campaign and it automates the opponents making the game pve rather than pvp. I can see a great use for this, not for normal games, but those of us who want stories.
This video confuses me: I can come up with several reasons why people want this (and they do, just google battletech or alpha strike solo play). For example: List/build/playstyle testing, no player available (yes, this is a thing), coop and narrative games, adding a third party, ... I want this and I was always looking for a good solo ruleset. Playing against yourself doesn't cut it - there is no real randomness or moment of surprise. So, yeah, it's certainly about "the kids today" and not about old farts like me...
i can see a use for it when playing a game of "a time of war" and using alpha strike rules for the mech fighting sections to help stop the DM vs Player mentality
I've played a couple games with automation in the rules. The first was the Wolfenstein board game; it's strictly a cooperative board game where the player control their heroes and the Germans are all ran by the "AI." The second was Trench Club, a World War I board game. It's nominally player vs. player, but it has an optional set of rules where nations can be run on automation instead of by player. I played Trench Club cooperatively with a friend using these rules and the result was a lot more time was spent arguing over what France was going to do on it's turn per the flowchart than anything else.
I played Aces as a beta with the Kickstarter and found it to be really fun. What's really cool about Aces is that my opportunities to play are exceeded by my wish to play. And with so many scenarios already published over the last 40 years, it's a neat idea to try them out versus an 'paper-AI' with a 'personality' that's not yours is a neat idea. If you play yourself against yourself, you kinda already have insight into your thought process. With the 'paper-AI' you can fight something that doesn't process like you're familiar with. With the opportunities of co-op play, it brings in more people who are into co-op more than PvP. Moreover, I find Alpha Strike easier to teach people and games can move much faster than in CBT. Overall, I think this can be really positive in growing Battletech overall, and for me, that's a good thing.
I'm mad about the kickstarter (I'm in Portugal, jave no idea when I'm going to receive my pledge...), but yeah, this is something I'd buy immediately, it's very hard to find people to play here, and it seems it would allow me to try a single player game! ❤
This is something i wanted to have, so much so i was trying to come up with my own version (it didnt work out that well) so yes im happy to see this come out, its a good for several playtypes, rpg narritive, co-op with friends, or you just wanna play around with some minatures you just painted, but cant find anyone at that time to play with, so for me this is a win
We had one demo rep for six sides gane hosts that would use an ace base of a scenario based on a turning point at Twycross. I remember I went ok, though I found a couple of problems, mostly other "AI" units getting in your way force you to break the bachal. The cards are meant to give advice, as far as I can tell. If you check out Buggel tech, they get an interview to talk more about it.
For solo gamers this is a well known thing, some of us are fine just playing both sides, others can't fathom that and need an AI. And it also let's people play cooperatively with each other, which as a guy I don't see much appeal to when playing with one other player, but I can see it having appeal when you've got four or five people, and then you can play together as a group. I'm definitely going to be buying the first one, even if I don't like Aces, I'll take those 'Mechs and the cardboard terrain.
I didnt have time to watch the stream, but an AI card system appeals to me since im mostly a party if 1 at the game table. The Snap Ship boardgame AI card deck works well which was most likely a heavy influence.
I also play the Elder Scrolls tabletop wargame and by routine, AI rules-controlled adversaries are a 3rd player in the games. It really makes things spicy; certain missions can be "rescue the third party from the opponent" or "you and your opponent both lose if you fail to storm the fort, but only one of you can win." And more! Third party AI-controlled units in a PVP game allows for some awesome missions and narratives that can spice up the rules. Lastly, I love Alpha Strike and wouldn't be playing either it or classic if it didn't get me involved first.
They’re taking a common mechanic for cooperative board games and applying it to a tabletop game, which as far as I’m aware is a pretty new idea, and kind of a gamble as far as whether people will be into it. I’m excited to try it with my gaming group.
I like having the option of cooperating/PvE board/tabletop games, the Solomon Kane game is the same sort of thing. It helps for people who can’t get people local to play with
Aces beta came out with the Merc Kickstarter. It was very well received at that time and people have been asking for the official product as a way to play coop and coop campaigns. I’ll I think it is a great tool to get new and younger players involved.
LAM Uribe was suppose to be a joke that Might be made later,not when kickstarter backers are still waiting on their products;this to me is another not needed add-on module boxset like the mercenary boxset which should've been a manual/book
I’ve been looking forward to it. This is a great way for me and my 7 year old to have a coop campaign where we are really on the same team, rather than me being responsible for being the bad guys too.
I run large multi-player co-op AS games (5-7 players), each running a lance, vs the beta test Aces running the opfor. They absolutely love the change of pace of playing co-op rather than against each other.
It's mostly for campaigns. I'm excited for it. I've played the beta and it was challenging. Can't wait to bring it to my group so we can do some larger campaigns. The system was first meant for 40k but GW was being shady with the designer so he went to CGL with it.
Cooperative and competitive options to give players different ways to experience the IP. - Old school scenario packs wanted a player to serve as a GM to play the opfor (even the new Hinterlands hotspot book needs someone to "take one for the team" amd play as Hell's Horses in a couple scenarios) - Modern BT and Alpha Strike are primarily competitive style games where two balanced forces fight it out. That appeals to a lot of the wargaming audience and is how I've played most games since I got into the hobby - Aces is designed to enable co-op without needing a GM to play the opfor. A lot of modern games have co-op so you can play with your friends instead of against them. Using video games as an example: MW5:M is great, but even more fun when you and your buddies are working together to take down Capellans
I detest alpha strike, but the majority of players at my local stores play it exclusively. The idea of cards in and of itself is not a bad idea, as sometimes I run into a problem of optimum moves versus optimum moves unless I load up Megamek. Having a "bot" that doesn't always make the best move can be helpful. Most of the time I'd rather just play the opfor myself or hop on Megamek
I for one completely get it. It's for people who prefer coop games rather than playing against people. It reminds me of me and my friend picking up Warhammer 40k again after like 8 years only because horde mode was made, which is basically playing with friends against AI. Playing against people can be stressful. This removes that problem.
5:55 Josh made Heroes of the Arturi Cluster, a co-op mode for X-Wing Miniatures, and then made Snap Ships Tactics which has solo and co-op modes. All have a similar if-then style of mechanics for the "AI" opponents. During Covid, a lot of companies and publishers got interested in solo modes, and this opens up co-op against an "AI" and there seems to be a segment of players who like that as a way to play.
Gloomhaven blew up, and this is how the enemies worked. I love the idea that the co-op groups who are finishing Frosthaven might come over to Battletech and trade bow and arrow archers for LRM Archers! As a battle tech player with a Gloomhaven group, this is a perfect product for a 4-player co-op in the BT universe! And, maybe, a way to get 3 more people painting up lances for the table 😉 EDIT: Typos
The entire point of this is to allow for Co-op games that don't require a GM who has to play the Opfor. This allows the GM to play as one of the players, which is way way more fun for that GM.
for someone like me i played for over 39 years and when i play a lot i find myself holding back a lot when teaching or playing in tournaments with people that are still under 5 years playing so that they have fun not i just not using the beating stick that in BattleTech now with this product it helps me not wanting to hold back instead there the AI card can do the teaching and i can Coach them on how to beat the AI. with the fist kickstarted i played the alpha stage of this product and seeing it in this stage is great to see it in better spot then they had it and have provided a lot of feedback to them with this. With this AI is a great teaching product and also great tool for GM as well.
I think there's a chance for some variant AS rules: one involved rolling for PiPs, or command orders each turn to issue to units. You only grt so many orders to issue units in a turn. If a unit doesn't get an order, they act as per the cards. Otherwise, they do exactly what you want them to do. Another option could be a mechanic for morale, representing your units faith in your leadership: If they lose faith die to leadership roles, acting against their character etc, they just go back to their behaviour on the cards. So there's way to incorporate them in games here too. Read up on some historical warhames and the behaviours of certain units for examples of this kind of thing.
The goal isn't to create a system necessarily for 1 player, but for multiple players to play cooperatively against a competitive game. Derksen's Heroes of the Aturi Cluster breathed fresh life into the dying X-Wing game in my area by doing exactly that. I don't know if Aces will do this, but in HotAC, one of the clever mechanics was letting your players level up. And this didn't mean "now you have a -1 to your to hit rolls" or something bland like that. In regular, competitive X-Wing, all named characters like Luke, Wedge, even obscure ones like Tycho or Tien Numb, had special abilities that allowed you to cheat the game system under certain situations. "Whenever adjacent to an enemy, you can do X," or "When your opponent does X at medium range, then Y," etc. These abilities were flavored from the lore and were really fun. Now, what Josh Derksen did in HotAC is take all those pilot abilities and allow you to buy them as you advance in levels. You can then have a Tien Numb ability and a Luke ability, to the point where at the end of the HotAC campaign, your character is destroying multiple ties and dodging laser fire like in the movies. It's awesome. If Josh has pulled this off in BT, it'd be great, because cooperative gaming is really popular right now. If you're not familiar with co-op games at all, I would first check out Pandemic, since it's kind of the granddaddy of them all. Get a group together, try to coordinate to save the world from deadly (and probably escaped gain-of-function lab experimental) viruses :)
And in full disclosure, I did create a supplement to HotAC called Star Flickers, but I seriously recommend HotAC to everyone even without the tiles I made.
I can see some use for it. Training mode for new players or maybe to test out different builds. I agree that playing against yourself is better but I've found a lot of ppl these days can't do that. Solo play for ppl who can't find people to play with (a major problem these days for a lot of ppl depending on where you live). A way to add a spanner in the mix of a battle when you don't have someone to act as a referee. I can see some (mild) potential here to add a third party that's hostile to both forces. Don't really care one way or the other (never even heard about this till this vid heh) but I don't hate the idea so long as it's optional. I mean, having more options to tweak a game to how you like it isn't a bad thing I guess.
I live in a town of 70,000 people and can’t find anyone to play Battletech / Alpha Strike with. Not even at the local nerd shops. All they want to play is 40k or 40k adjacent games.
I want most of the mechs, vehicles, and infantry counters that come in the box. However, as I don't like Alpha Strike system, Aces isn't something I'll buy ($80). I'll get the miniatures I want out of this set via the on-line secondary market and hope Catalyst will offer the counters separately at some point like they did with the Alpha Strike terrain. I use conventional infantry in my campaign, and the Mercenaries Box didn't include enough of those counters. The paper printouts available from Catalyst downloads seem a bit "tawdry" when I use them on the table. 🧐
I love this, as I can now play WITH my friends in my campaign against the AI rather than having to figure out how to pull punches to create an interesting scenario
Personally, I’m a HUGE fan of this idea. And I am one that is hyper critical of Catalyst. I just don’t have the disposable time I once did to devote large amounts of my time to gaming (unfortunately). So the ability to come and go as I please while playing a solo game is a huge perk for me.
2 situations come to mind: Solo play- there are people who like it. idk. if I'm going to play solo, computers exist for a reason. but there are some folks that like solo play tabletop games. Noncompetitive play- there are people that maybe like cool robots, but don't like head-to-head games. I can see the appeal of dungeon crawlers with mechs. It's not a product that's geared towards me, but I can see possibilities of its appeal. New minis are always a source of attraction and the strongest raw appeal to me. cardstock hills while not fantastic are a convenient option for terrain if they don't have access to better terrain. (Don't get me started on how depressing board setups are for 10th ed 40k and how that's the only terrain the flgs has.) Pulling in people who don't want to play Battletech/Alpha strike as a traditional war game is not a bad thing. Another appeal for coop games are small groups who have stratified skill levels. in example: player A, player B, and player C have a regular game night. player B wins against player A and player C 90% of the time. Player A wins against player C 75% of the time. The excitement stagnates a bit because the outcome is pretty safely determined.
Ok, I plan on using the prototype version of this to run the enemies of the RPG I want to run for my friends until I get better at the game myself, and to give the enemies a "default" more, not to be easy on then because things are rough or to hard on them because they went out of their way to do something stupid. The solo play modes seem to have been around for at least 7 or 8 years now. The earliest one I can remember is the Foallout miniatures RPG. Profressor HeyTeenEn and his crew help clue me into that Alpha Strike is cgl creation, it doesn't predate that company. So of course they're going to priorize it over pre-existing system (especially to their own detriment).
Mage dude, I can see where you are coming from. Sometimes it is difficult to get to a games store. Between Church, Wife, Martial Arts, food shopping, vehicle maintenance, it's difficult to make time. However, (I will not say but), the interaction with fellow gamers is awesome and you just cannot replace that. It's what makes the game fun. Sometimes you take a crit to the CT on your Whammy 6-R on turn 1 to the MG ammo, sometimes you get really lucky, and your Victor actually does its job and puts an AC/20 round right through the other player's Awesome's head. Such is life and it's what it makes it worth living. There is always next time.
More than just being a solo game, I think it opens it up more for a coop campaign. I really enjoy the Mercenary campaign play along with Hinterland, but I'd like to play along with friends rather than always being the opfor. I'm looking forward to this
IMO there are two primary use cases. The first is for groups who eschew adversarial play. Assuming that ACES actually works, it allows for all the human players to run cooperative against the "AI" opponent. The second is for people who lack a local gaming group. This is a way for them to play without having to play against themselves. It's not particularly unusual these days for people to have trouble finding consistent opponents.
I'm already struggling on the base game. This is going to hurt my head more. Glad it's all optional. Sorry about the stream last night. I still enjoyed listening to it, definitely was stressful.
Simple.. My desire to play exceeds my opportunities to play. Aces is like Heroes of the Atturi Cluster for X-wing. A way to do solo play (or cooperative plate) if you don't have regular options available.
It seem every other game company is trying to add in some AI component to their game for solo play. I’d experimented on this thing too onAlpha strike and also trying co-op so this is just another option they can add in for the game.
Sounds great to me. Out here in cornland, all we have is pokemon and other card game players. Not one single shop doing anything but that. We briefly had a 40k scene and now thats gone.
I don’t get this. Whenever I play with a group and we’re playing as a team we just play the standard game but role whenever our mech comes up. The RPG element is just us playing a role of a pilot and if we combat outside the cockpit we play it standard rules from a time of war.
A system that allows me to play Battletech solo would be nice. It would make learning the rules easier and I can test out various lists. Doing this for Alpha Strike is a non-starter for me because I only play classic.
I'm looking forward to aces, my previous experience of something similar was X wing heroes of the aturi cluster. I like it as running coop you can openly discuss tactics without influencing the opponent so it feels more social to me. It's extra nice when its bundled with a campaign which this is so there is some nice progresion. I don't really enjoy playing games against myself as i feel you can basically fall into a routine. There isnt much battletech in my area so going solo is also appealing.
My current work situation is not conducive to being able to meet with my group often, so I can get behind the “solo play” aspect of ACES. However, I cannot say the same regarding the “cooperative” facet. As much as I want to see new players, BattleTech/Alpha Strike is by its very nature a competitive game. Though the percentage of objective based games I have played in recent years is increasing, competitive “kill ‘em all” style games still far outstrip that number in my experience. Honestly, I would rather not deal with people that have to play the game as cooperative because they cannot put the fact that it is a game aside and might end up feeling some type of way about me if I table them/kill their favorite ‘Mech or character/something similar.
I can't get my group to play competitive games, so i mostly play wargames (mostly Battletech) solo. With Aces I'll finally be able to play with my friends cooperatively. Doesn't seem that hard to understand.
If this helps people learn how to play solo im happy for them. As for me, ive been running BT solo for yrs. Dont really need this cause i already have a system to play.
This is probably aimed at folks that DM OpFor in alpha strike campaigns, having something that can take the onus of character killing situations off one’s shoulders helps, as players with low abilities to roll with punches given to them by the dice will probably be less likely to throw a hissy fit if the cards and their own luck did them in?
Personally it's something I'll be taking a look at. Unfortunately Battletech doesn't have a particularly big following in my area and my main opponent recently moved to the other end of the country. While I can play both sides against myself, I like the random factor a well crafted AI can introduce.
Not Alpha Strike, but I've played CBT by myself (mainly since I don't have people to consistently play with me), and I just...ran the OpFor myself, I don't see why something like this is needed.
CGL is competing against Games Workshop, 40K ect. This is just another way to play and also get minis out. I am looking forward to it as my game group can't always get together. Crabock puts out a card base AI for Star Wars Armada. Works well for a solo or cooperative game.
As someone who “gets” it, I’m going to try and explain it to the crowd that doesn’t understand the what or why.
The best way to explain the Aces format is to move a little away from the wargame aspect and move a little more towards the RPG side of the house. The general idea is a progressive campaign (of which this box set has) where the human players are cooperating as a part of the same force against the predetermined opponent instead of having a dedicated game master. You’ll have some friendly NPCs most likely in the form of additional mechs you and your friends control, unless you have a larger player base around the table where everyone is invested in a mech.
It’s a different game at that point, not really a test of combat acumen between two people. That may or may not appeal to people, and both options (yes or no) are perfectly valid.
The author, Mr. Derksen, originally wrote something like this as a fan made rule set for the X-wing miniatures game. I’ve played the heck out of that system, and it is actually pretty fun when you think of it as an RPG night. So when I saw his name turn up as the dev for the Aces format, my mind went straight to “it’s the same thing but in Battletech, this is awesome”.
It won’t replace playing Battletech against players, but rather be its own thing. And I actually really look forward to giving it a try within the context of playing an RPG combat.
TL;DR - this isn’t a wargame product, it’s an RPG product that doesn’t need someone to “sit out” and be the game enemy.
Hope that helps,
This, 100% is my thoughts as well!
Thanks for throwing this out there. I’ve played the X-Wing system and am actually really interested in seeing Aces. I like the idea of co-op play in a style like this especially when you don’t have enough consistent players to have a GM.
You could have saved yourself a lot of time by just saying its a mechwarrior RPG but with yugiho cards.
There have been many like it but this is pretty much one of those gundam cardgames.
My GM and I will skip this, mostly because it's Catalyst but also because having a GM with MegaMek is a much better way of doing things RPG-wise.
@@twinkzilla-5356 My tiny little BattleTech RPG group is just myself and my GM using MegaMekHQ. We're proof that even with a GM and one other person, you can play out an engaging campaign.
My wife prefers coop games. This is a way to try to get her to play with me.
Have to try it with wife myself.
This is made for me. Believe it or not, there’s been a few dice based AI charts that people have been making for years.
I’m (loosely) part of an Alpha Strike group that’s an hour north of my town. The stars align and I get to go every 6 months, maybe. Between work and a family member’s health condition, I can’t always go on Saturdays.
I can’t wait to get my hands on this.
In case anyone is wondering, all of the game stores in my town outside of the Warhammer store have closed down. I did walk in there once and met the girl who ran it and I’m not getting involved in that.
Preach Brother.
This for a demographic of people that prefer cooperate play rather than competition. It opens it up to a shit load more people.
Absolutely
But you can already do that, the card system is really only for those who can't stop themselves from meta gaming as the opposing force.
Based
@@KageRyuu6 sure can but still wouldn't be a bad idea to have an automated system for the opponent. Couldn't hurt. I didn't get Aces either until I saw some people say that it got their spouse into the game who wouldn't have played otherwise. If it's getting other people interested, putting new minis, and terrain out. How is this an issue?
@@KageRyuu6this makes it possible for the “game master” or opforce guy to also be a part of the party.
I don’t see any issue with it. My thinking is if it opens up another way to play the game and more people join for genuine interest of the game, that’s a good thing.
"Automata" systems for board games give your board games a "computer player." Which is good for people who can't find opponents, or for solo-narrative play.
I have hard time getting some one to played
3 ways this can be used:
1.) Wanna game? No one available? No problem! Shuffle up and deploy!
2.) List testing.
3. PvE or PvEvP campaigns. i.e. All human players run a house list, and the AI controls Clans.
Solo and Co-op games and expansions are just becoming more and more common. TCGs like Arkham Horror (I know it's an LCG). RPGs like Dragonbane and the One Ring. Miniatures games, like the Silver Bayonet and Forbidden Psalm. Board games have been done solo since the days of original Squad Leader.
Shoot, I'm not bad at battletech due to strategy, im bad because The Lord didn't give good dice rolling hands especially six siders for gator
My nearest LGS is around an hour from my house and there is no room for gaming as it is more of a comic shop than gaming. The next closest is also 90 minutes away in a different direction and it's a Warhammer store. Both of those are assuming no traffic on the roadways and no inclement driving conditions. My nearest gaming buddy that can afford to play, and also has the time to play games, is almost 90 minutes away too. The only thing I liked about the Mercs KS was Aces as it gave me a way to play BT without using MegaMek or setting up at the dying mall and seeing if there's a random person that wants to play.
I played the beta and like the system. The cards correspond with the mech roles. The system showed me different ways to look at the battlefield and it actually show me options that I would not have see. I feel that it works well for solo, cooperative, as an instructor, and as a system to test forces for competitive games.
Going off the other comments, it appears that I'm just out of touch on this one.
@@mageleader3699 nah, its just one of those things that Catalyst sort of neglected until someone woke up and went "hey lets go ahead and throw these group of people a bone."
@@mageleader3699 honestly, when I first saw it I was confused a bit by it. Took some thinking for it to click for me too
Hi Mage Leader, AI decks are pretty common for modern board games that have cooperative elements. Also I think this was a stretch goal from the mercenaries kickstater. I got the beta test elements for it in my digital materials for the kickstater and it's a cool add on to allow people to automate certain units or forces.
There was a fan made game for X-Wing miniatures called Heros of the Aturi Cluster. It was a cooperative RPG campaign with the bad guys run by the automated system. I believe the creator of that was asked to make the same thing for alpha strike.
I played the system for X-Wing Miniatures and it was a lot of fun. I don't know if it will translate to well to Alpha strike, but my brother is all excied about it. I imagine I will be playing it soon enough.
The game dev who wrote the Aces enemy for catalyst is the same guy who wrote Heroes of the Aturi Cluster.
A group of my friends and I tried out that system back in the day
If it is the same designer, we will give it a shot. We remember those games fondly.
@@einrauser6103it is, he was actually on the streams Catalyst had for it participating as a player and the “op force” manager (the guy following the enemy logic and making final calls for the op force).
In between HotAC and Aces, he wrote an AI and campaign system for WizKids Star Trek Attack Wing. I never played it, but I heard it was a commercial success for them.
I fall under the "I can never find anyone to play with" category. I like the idea, but why set it up for Alpha Strike? Did they say if you can use it for CBT?
Catalyst has explicitly stated that they plan to later on release a version of the AI system for classic. This system as-is can only be used with Alpha Strike.
I'm sure the community can adjust the system to make it classic compatible.
No, but they are also making one for CBT.
They are working on classic. They said they did Alpha Strike first because it was an easier rule set to adapt into this
@@maroonmattadoor5022tested the prelease cards and they work well for classic to.
@@maroonmattadoor5022the battletech community can do anything and everything one thing I've realised getting into battletech is the community is very versatile and dedicated
I will use the heck out of this. I am an OTR truck driver who tends to get sat at truck stops for days on end waiting for loads. Now I can play AS even when I can't uber into town to a game store that may or may not have players that day.
Josh Derksen, the guy who designed this, also made "Heroes of the Atari Cluster" a solo and coop fan expansion for Star Wars attack wing, and then went on to design Star Trek dominion wars for wizkids and several other great coop games.
Playing battletech solo or coop sounds great, especially since you can recreate battles from the fiction that are less balanced and play together on the disadvantaged side against overwhelming odds.
The ACES announcement during the last kickstarter is the only reason I really got into BattleTech this last year. I don't have time to go to game stores and play the game against folks. What I do have time for is my children and spouse and friends who will always be casual players. This is a great opportunity to have fun and share the battletech lore.
I played the beta version co-op with my kids. We have had a blast with it, and are looking forward to the official release.
Lol with a name like that.... why is it not an aerospace focused game
Because practically nobody plays Aerotech
Could be good for a DM running a rp session vs a handful of players so the dm doesn't have to worry about every unit on their side and the cards may do things the dm wouldn't making the actions a bit more like facing multiple people
Sounds really fun. Wanted to try some mech rpgs for decades.
Coop. You can still play with friends, but both be on the same side. I'll definitely be checking it out
I mean, I can’t get away from the farm especially during harvest and make it into the city to play a game for like two months sometimes, and I don’t have a computer so I might check this out.
But outside of my case this doesn’t make sense. Maybe word of Blake cyborgs
I tried it out as part of the kickstarter and really liked it. I live out in the middle of nowhere and it's hard to find people to play the game
That's fair.
At my local game store they primarily, if only, play Alpha Strike. They are also the only group of guys I know that even play the game in my area. The audience there are young guys that are usually from the military base nearby or partially retired old guys that just want to play quick games. Alpha Strike provides exactly that, 35-45 minute matches with more time spent doing stuff than calculating where things are hit. I personally flip flop between the two game modes, but I play Alpha Strike more just because of their preferences.
If more places are like my game store then they are probably putting more investment into Alpha Strike product because that has more interest as a casual interest for people who want to get into Tabletop Gaming but not heavily investing their free time into it. As for the appeal of this particular product, there are people I know who enjoy doing RPG stuff using Alpha Strike's gameplay so this is probably for those people.
My customers have been excited about the plastic figures but not about the cards or rules. Alpha Strike is losing with the players at my store while classic is winning.
As for "why you wouldn't just play a game against yourself", I would say that a.) i certainly have an initial bias to a unit going into any sad-letech game I play, and b.) I can predict exactly what my "opponent" is going to do because i am going to do it.
By implementing an "AI" system, you can have an "opponent" who, while having predictable behaviors, can still perform unexpected actions based on what the system told it to do.
Its getting more common. Especially board games based on video games like monster hunter or resident evil have these "AI" card systems (In monster hunter its used to determine the behavior of the monster on the board etc.) This opens up the potential customer market to people who live in regions without a solid hobby/tabletop community who otherwise would go "why bother? I have no one to play with"
Im not surprised they focus so much on alpha strike either since the CBT takes alot of time and is very casual unfriendly (Its a really nice system but its also very very cumbersome) so their thinking more likely is that they will sell more with the much quicker and casual friendly rules system. You know... to attract a "wider audience" XD
Thank god that battletech is a robust system and has a fanbase that will not abandon the classic version for the fast food version.
I prefer the cards to be replaced with actual AI. Like the old primitive kind, maybe even card based. It should be an app though.
One fun thing, those coding llms aren't good at complicated things, but making an app for a game is right up their alley.
That's what I'm doing for my own war game I'm making right now. I don't like doing math, but figuring out math is fun. Once I make my decision it should be calculated for me.
I play coop narrative games with my group (like d&d). This means everyone play together against AI rather than having a GM
Appeals to the TTRPG crowd, since it allows you to play a campaign and it automates the opponents making the game pve rather than pvp.
I can see a great use for this, not for normal games, but those of us who want stories.
I think it will absolutely help!
Ive always wanted a sorta ai system so i can play battletech
This video confuses me: I can come up with several reasons why people want this (and they do, just google battletech or alpha strike solo play). For example: List/build/playstyle testing, no player available (yes, this is a thing), coop and narrative games, adding a third party, ... I want this and I was always looking for a good solo ruleset. Playing against yourself doesn't cut it - there is no real randomness or moment of surprise. So, yeah, it's certainly about "the kids today" and not about old farts like me...
i can see a use for it when playing a game of "a time of war" and using alpha strike rules for the mech fighting sections to help stop the DM vs Player mentality
I've played a couple games with automation in the rules. The first was the Wolfenstein board game; it's strictly a cooperative board game where the player control their heroes and the Germans are all ran by the "AI." The second was Trench Club, a World War I board game. It's nominally player vs. player, but it has an optional set of rules where nations can be run on automation instead of by player. I played Trench Club cooperatively with a friend using these rules and the result was a lot more time was spent arguing over what France was going to do on it's turn per the flowchart than anything else.
Its Alpha Strike Single player or Coop against an "AI". Lots of minature games like this, whats to get?
I played Aces as a beta with the Kickstarter and found it to be really fun. What's really cool about Aces is that my opportunities to play are exceeded by my wish to play. And with so many scenarios already published over the last 40 years, it's a neat idea to try them out versus an 'paper-AI' with a 'personality' that's not yours is a neat idea. If you play yourself against yourself, you kinda already have insight into your thought process. With the 'paper-AI' you can fight something that doesn't process like you're familiar with.
With the opportunities of co-op play, it brings in more people who are into co-op more than PvP. Moreover, I find Alpha Strike easier to teach people and games can move much faster than in CBT. Overall, I think this can be really positive in growing Battletech overall, and for me, that's a good thing.
I'm mad about the kickstarter (I'm in Portugal, jave no idea when I'm going to receive my pledge...), but yeah, this is something I'd buy immediately, it's very hard to find people to play here, and it seems it would allow me to try a single player game! ❤
same here.i am from usa
This is something i wanted to have, so much so i was trying to come up with my own version (it didnt work out that well) so yes im happy to see this come out, its a good for several playtypes, rpg narritive, co-op with friends, or you just wanna play around with some minatures you just painted, but cant find anyone at that time to play with, so for me this is a win
Along with co op battles this helps those who may have reasons they can not get to others to play.
We had one demo rep for six sides gane hosts that would use an ace base of a scenario based on a turning point at Twycross. I remember I went ok, though I found a couple of problems, mostly other "AI" units getting in your way force you to break the bachal. The cards are meant to give advice, as far as I can tell.
If you check out Buggel tech, they get an interview to talk more about it.
For solo gamers this is a well known thing, some of us are fine just playing both sides, others can't fathom that and need an AI. And it also let's people play cooperatively with each other, which as a guy I don't see much appeal to when playing with one other player, but I can see it having appeal when you've got four or five people, and then you can play together as a group.
I'm definitely going to be buying the first one, even if I don't like Aces, I'll take those 'Mechs and the cardboard terrain.
I didnt have time to watch the stream, but an AI card system appeals to me since im mostly a party if 1 at the game table. The Snap Ship boardgame AI card deck works well which was most likely a heavy influence.
Isn't Aces for solo play? Not sure if that's right. But if it really is, might be good if you can't find players...
Its for "solo" or "the DnD party vs the ai"
I also play the Elder Scrolls tabletop wargame and by routine, AI rules-controlled adversaries are a 3rd player in the games.
It really makes things spicy; certain missions can be "rescue the third party from the opponent" or "you and your opponent both lose if you fail to storm the fort, but only one of you can win." And more!
Third party AI-controlled units in a PVP game allows for some awesome missions and narratives that can spice up the rules.
Lastly, I love Alpha Strike and wouldn't be playing either it or classic if it didn't get me involved first.
They’re taking a common mechanic for cooperative board games and applying it to a tabletop game, which as far as I’m aware is a pretty new idea, and kind of a gamble as far as whether people will be into it. I’m excited to try it with my gaming group.
I like having the option of cooperating/PvE board/tabletop games, the Solomon Kane game is the same sort of thing. It helps for people who can’t get people local to play with
Still not giving CGL money though
Aces beta came out with the Merc Kickstarter. It was very well received at that time and people have been asking for the official product as a way to play coop and coop campaigns. I’ll
I think it is a great tool to get new and younger players involved.
LAM Uribe was suppose to be a joke that Might be made later,not when kickstarter backers are still waiting on their products;this to me is another not needed add-on module boxset like the mercenary boxset which should've been a manual/book
I’ve been looking forward to it. This is a great way for me and my 7 year old to have a coop campaign where we are really on the same team, rather than me being responsible for being the bad guys too.
I run large multi-player co-op AS games (5-7 players), each running a lance, vs the beta test Aces running the opfor. They absolutely love the change of pace of playing co-op rather than against each other.
It's mostly for campaigns. I'm excited for it. I've played the beta and it was challenging. Can't wait to bring it to my group so we can do some larger campaigns. The system was first meant for 40k but GW was being shady with the designer so he went to CGL with it.
Cooperative and competitive options to give players different ways to experience the IP.
- Old school scenario packs wanted a player to serve as a GM to play the opfor (even the new Hinterlands hotspot book needs someone to "take one for the team" amd play as Hell's Horses in a couple scenarios)
- Modern BT and Alpha Strike are primarily competitive style games where two balanced forces fight it out. That appeals to a lot of the wargaming audience and is how I've played most games since I got into the hobby
- Aces is designed to enable co-op without needing a GM to play the opfor. A lot of modern games have co-op so you can play with your friends instead of against them. Using video games as an example: MW5:M is great, but even more fun when you and your buddies are working together to take down Capellans
I detest alpha strike, but the majority of players at my local stores play it exclusively.
The idea of cards in and of itself is not a bad idea, as sometimes I run into a problem of optimum moves versus optimum moves unless I load up Megamek. Having a "bot" that doesn't always make the best move can be helpful. Most of the time I'd rather just play the opfor myself or hop on Megamek
As someone who works a job, playing alpha strike is my preferred way to play.
Quick solo play or little/younger siblings play and/or interduction
I for one completely get it. It's for people who prefer coop games rather than playing against people.
It reminds me of me and my friend picking up Warhammer 40k again after like 8 years only because horde mode was made, which is basically playing with friends against AI.
Playing against people can be stressful. This removes that problem.
5:55 Josh made Heroes of the Arturi Cluster, a co-op mode for X-Wing Miniatures, and then made Snap Ships Tactics which has solo and co-op modes. All have a similar if-then style of mechanics for the "AI" opponents. During Covid, a lot of companies and publishers got interested in solo modes, and this opens up co-op against an "AI" and there seems to be a segment of players who like that as a way to play.
Theres a guy literally making an AS version of megamek. Just... hire him.
Who is this guy? Any youtube vids ?
IIRC Megamek has added Alpha Strike card generation - but also has EXPLICITLY said they are NEVER going to include Alpha Strike gameplay.
@@zacharyscrivens198 ua-cam.com/video/_nZqo7syCTQ/v-deo.htmlsi=C6A7iPcBALm7K9KD
Megamek is too cumbersome to be quite frank.
Gloomhaven blew up, and this is how the enemies worked. I love the idea that the co-op groups who are finishing Frosthaven might come over to Battletech and trade bow and arrow archers for LRM Archers!
As a battle tech player with a Gloomhaven group, this is a perfect product for a 4-player co-op in the BT universe! And, maybe, a way to get 3 more people painting up lances for the table 😉
EDIT: Typos
Aces seems like it's supposed to be a means of playing TTBT solo.
The entire point of this is to allow for Co-op games that don't require a GM who has to play the Opfor. This allows the GM to play as one of the players, which is way way more fun for that GM.
for someone like me i played for over 39 years and when i play a lot i find myself holding back a lot when teaching or playing in tournaments with people that are still under 5 years playing so that they have fun not i just not using the beating stick that in BattleTech now with this product it helps me not wanting to hold back instead there the AI card can do the teaching and i can Coach them on how to beat the AI. with the fist kickstarted i played the alpha stage of this product and seeing it in this stage is great to see it in better spot then they had it and have provided a lot of feedback to them with this. With this AI is a great teaching product and also great tool for GM as well.
This is for solo play and maybe coop, easy
I think there's a chance for some variant AS rules: one involved rolling for PiPs, or command orders each turn to issue to units. You only grt so many orders to issue units in a turn. If a unit doesn't get an order, they act as per the cards. Otherwise, they do exactly what you want them to do.
Another option could be a mechanic for morale, representing your units faith in your leadership: If they lose faith die to leadership roles, acting against their character etc, they just go back to their behaviour on the cards.
So there's way to incorporate them in games here too. Read up on some historical warhames and the behaviours of certain units for examples of this kind of thing.
The goal isn't to create a system necessarily for 1 player, but for multiple players to play cooperatively against a competitive game. Derksen's Heroes of the Aturi Cluster breathed fresh life into the dying X-Wing game in my area by doing exactly that.
I don't know if Aces will do this, but in HotAC, one of the clever mechanics was letting your players level up. And this didn't mean "now you have a -1 to your to hit rolls" or something bland like that. In regular, competitive X-Wing, all named characters like Luke, Wedge, even obscure ones like Tycho or Tien Numb, had special abilities that allowed you to cheat the game system under certain situations. "Whenever adjacent to an enemy, you can do X," or "When your opponent does X at medium range, then Y," etc. These abilities were flavored from the lore and were really fun. Now, what Josh Derksen did in HotAC is take all those pilot abilities and allow you to buy them as you advance in levels. You can then have a Tien Numb ability and a Luke ability, to the point where at the end of the HotAC campaign, your character is destroying multiple ties and dodging laser fire like in the movies. It's awesome. If Josh has pulled this off in BT, it'd be great, because cooperative gaming is really popular right now.
If you're not familiar with co-op games at all, I would first check out Pandemic, since it's kind of the granddaddy of them all. Get a group together, try to coordinate to save the world from deadly (and probably escaped gain-of-function lab experimental) viruses :)
And in full disclosure, I did create a supplement to HotAC called Star Flickers, but I seriously recommend HotAC to everyone even without the tiles I made.
With the aces deck, you can set up unique scenarios.
I mean, you can do that with the game itself, too.
I can see some use for it.
Training mode for new players or maybe to test out different builds. I agree that playing against yourself is better but I've found a lot of ppl these days can't do that.
Solo play for ppl who can't find people to play with (a major problem these days for a lot of ppl depending on where you live).
A way to add a spanner in the mix of a battle when you don't have someone to act as a referee. I can see some (mild) potential here to add a third party that's hostile to both forces.
Don't really care one way or the other (never even heard about this till this vid heh) but I don't hate the idea so long as it's optional. I mean, having more options to tweak a game to how you like it isn't a bad thing I guess.
A good use for this is for campaigns were all humans are on one side and ai on the other
Can’t wait for aces and co-op play
I live in a town of 70,000 people and can’t find anyone to play Battletech / Alpha Strike with. Not even at the local nerd shops. All they want to play is 40k or 40k adjacent games.
I want most of the mechs, vehicles, and infantry counters that come in the box. However, as I don't like Alpha Strike system, Aces isn't something I'll buy ($80). I'll get the miniatures I want out of this set via the on-line secondary market and hope Catalyst will offer the counters separately at some point like they did with the Alpha Strike terrain. I use conventional infantry in my campaign, and the Mercenaries Box didn't include enough of those counters. The paper printouts available from Catalyst downloads seem a bit "tawdry" when I use them on the table. 🧐
I love this, as I can now play WITH my friends in my campaign against the AI rather than having to figure out how to pull punches to create an interesting scenario
Personally, I’m a HUGE fan of this idea. And I am one that is hyper critical of Catalyst. I just don’t have the disposable time I once did to devote large amounts of my time to gaming (unfortunately). So the ability to come and go as I please while playing a solo game is a huge perk for me.
2 situations come to mind:
Solo play- there are people who like it. idk. if I'm going to play solo, computers exist for a reason. but there are some folks that like solo play tabletop games.
Noncompetitive play- there are people that maybe like cool robots, but don't like head-to-head games. I can see the appeal of dungeon crawlers with mechs.
It's not a product that's geared towards me, but I can see possibilities of its appeal. New minis are always a source of attraction and the strongest raw appeal to me. cardstock hills while not fantastic are a convenient option for terrain if they don't have access to better terrain. (Don't get me started on how depressing board setups are for 10th ed 40k and how that's the only terrain the flgs has.) Pulling in people who don't want to play Battletech/Alpha strike as a traditional war game is not a bad thing. Another appeal for coop games are small groups who have stratified skill levels. in example: player A, player B, and player C have a regular game night. player B wins against player A and player C 90% of the time. Player A wins against player C 75% of the time. The excitement stagnates a bit because the outcome is pretty safely determined.
Ok, I plan on using the prototype version of this to run the enemies of the RPG I want to run for my friends until I get better at the game myself, and to give the enemies a "default" more, not to be easy on then because things are rough or to hard on them because they went out of their way to do something stupid.
The solo play modes seem to have been around for at least 7 or 8 years now. The earliest one I can remember is the Foallout miniatures RPG.
Profressor HeyTeenEn and his crew help clue me into that Alpha Strike is cgl creation, it doesn't predate that company. So of course they're going to priorize it over pre-existing system (especially to their own detriment).
Mage dude, I can see where you are coming from. Sometimes it is difficult to get to a games store. Between Church, Wife, Martial Arts, food shopping, vehicle maintenance, it's difficult to make time. However, (I will not say but), the interaction with fellow gamers is awesome and you just cannot replace that. It's what makes the game fun. Sometimes you take a crit to the CT on your Whammy 6-R on turn 1 to the MG ammo, sometimes you get really lucky, and your Victor actually does its job and puts an AC/20 round right through the other player's Awesome's head. Such is life and it's what it makes it worth living. There is always next time.
More than just being a solo game, I think it opens it up more for a coop campaign. I really enjoy the Mercenary campaign play along with Hinterland, but I'd like to play along with friends rather than always being the opfor. I'm looking forward to this
Didn't they start developing this in 2020? I could see how this idea might pop into someone's head during the lockdown days.
IMO there are two primary use cases. The first is for groups who eschew adversarial play. Assuming that ACES actually works, it allows for all the human players to run cooperative against the "AI" opponent. The second is for people who lack a local gaming group. This is a way for them to play without having to play against themselves. It's not particularly unusual these days for people to have trouble finding consistent opponents.
The other option for this might be fighting against an in Universe AI?
I'm already struggling on the base game. This is going to hurt my head more. Glad it's all optional.
Sorry about the stream last night. I still enjoyed listening to it, definitely was stressful.
I'm just glad you were there, friend.
I’m a fan of scenario books, and have wanted for a long time a box that includes scenarios and the opposing force all in one.
So solo mode like in the new Kill Team for when you can't find a game I guess.
Simple.. My desire to play exceeds my opportunities to play. Aces is like Heroes of the Atturi Cluster for X-wing. A way to do solo play (or cooperative plate) if you don't have regular options available.
It's useful for 2ppl to play vs the deck.
I don't have anyone to play with so I've been wanting something like this.
Makes sense when all the friendless people invaded the hobby and ran out the fans.
It seem every other game company is trying to add in some AI component to their game for solo play. I’d experimented on this thing too onAlpha strike and also trying co-op so this is just another option they can add in for the game.
Sounds great to me. Out here in cornland, all we have is pokemon and other card game players. Not one single shop doing anything but that. We briefly had a 40k scene and now thats gone.
I don’t get this. Whenever I play with a group and we’re playing as a team we just play the standard game but role whenever our mech comes up. The RPG element is just us playing a role of a pilot and if we combat outside the cockpit we play it standard rules from a time of war.
This is kinda cool. While it doesn't solve my biggest problem with the game, which is GATOR/SATOR, this does add an interesting new wrinkle.
A system that allows me to play Battletech solo would be nice. It would make learning the rules easier and I can test out various lists. Doing this for Alpha Strike is a non-starter for me because I only play classic.
I'm looking forward to aces, my previous experience of something similar was X wing heroes of the aturi cluster. I like it as running coop you can openly discuss tactics without influencing the opponent so it feels more social to me. It's extra nice when its bundled with a campaign which this is so there is some nice progresion. I don't really enjoy playing games against myself as i feel you can basically fall into a routine. There isnt much battletech in my area so going solo is also appealing.
I'll be able to play this game with my kids, as a cooperative game. Its a good idea! Not everything has to be matched play/competitive games.
My current work situation is not conducive to being able to meet with my group often, so I can get behind the “solo play” aspect of ACES.
However, I cannot say the same regarding the “cooperative” facet. As much as I want to see new players, BattleTech/Alpha Strike is by its very nature a competitive game. Though the percentage of objective based games I have played in recent years is increasing, competitive “kill ‘em all” style games still far outstrip that number in my experience. Honestly, I would rather not deal with people that have to play the game as cooperative because they cannot put the fact that it is a game aside and might end up feeling some type of way about me if I table them/kill their favorite ‘Mech or character/something similar.
I can't get my group to play competitive games, so i mostly play wargames (mostly Battletech) solo.
With Aces I'll finally be able to play with my friends cooperatively.
Doesn't seem that hard to understand.
Battletech Aces sounds like a solution looking for a problem. But, ok.
Having a randomized 'AI' system is nothing new. Having it be card based rather than dice is an odd decision, if one were to ask me though.
If this helps people learn how to play solo im happy for them. As for me, ive been running BT solo for yrs. Dont really need this cause i already have a system to play.
This is probably aimed at folks that DM OpFor in alpha strike campaigns, having something that can take the onus of character killing situations off one’s shoulders helps, as players with low abilities to roll with punches given to them by the dice will probably be less likely to throw a hissy fit if the cards and their own luck did them in?
Personally it's something I'll be taking a look at. Unfortunately Battletech doesn't have a particularly big following in my area and my main opponent recently moved to the other end of the country. While I can play both sides against myself, I like the random factor a well crafted AI can introduce.
Not Alpha Strike, but I've played CBT by myself (mainly since I don't have people to consistently play with me), and I just...ran the OpFor myself, I don't see why something like this is needed.
For PvE, co-op campaigns, etc.
CGL is competing against Games Workshop, 40K ect. This is just another way to play and also get minis out. I am looking forward to it as my game group can't always get together. Crabock puts out a card base AI for Star Wars Armada. Works well for a solo or cooperative game.
There will be fixes I'm sure.
Six sides will work out the bugs.