[Support, Tactics]
Clan War Aftermath: The Clan Raid
Introduction
About once a year the Mech Games & Tournaments Organizers hold a tournament event for Mercenary Clans to compete against each other.
Usually the tournaments is for normal sized clans (8 to 16 Commanders) to fight it out for honor and prizes.
From time to time the tournaments are for smaller units (Squad War for 4 to 8 Commanders) or bigger units (Faction Wars for 16+ Commanders).
What generally happens after the fighting is over and the prizes are distributed is some force will strike at the assembled clans. This can be Rogue A.I. Forerunners, mad scientists, pirates, extra galaxy aliens or whatever.
What they have in common is a huge force of Mechs, and to foil their evil plans of conquering the Galaxy and perhaps eradicate humanity, the battered clans are called upon to defeat those raids.
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| General Nova. Director of the Mech Games & Tournaments |
The Mech Games Organizers and the Galactic Senate authorities will provide the Clan leaders a strategic map to where the opponents are building up to strike, so they can start the action while the opponents are still in a preparatory phase.
But if that don't happen, the evil forces will be on their way to establish dominance.
These evildoers, while having huge forces of Mechs at their disposal, don't have unlimited numbers of them. And as is true for the clans, the quality of the Mechs and pilots vary.
In general, the smaller and weaker units will be sent toward the clans who fought in the lower tiers, while the top clans have to face the bigger and more powerful units.
Of course, any clan might elect to sit on their hands and let the assigned opponents wreck mayhem on the planet they are asked to defend.
Reasons can vary: The projected payout seem to small for the effort, other contracts have to be honored so there is no time or Commanders to handle the raid, or one feel the forces aren't up to the task.
These are valid points, and the clans who chose this approach is no worse off (albeit the targeted planet probably is).
Then you have those clans that try to hold back the forces of evil, but fail to eliminate them in the allotted time. Some might appeal to the Craftsmen for some help, and by shifting other clans into the planet, the clan in question might get some more time to finish off the raiders.
But sometimes the time run out, and there are still opponents left. These opponents will then withdraw, taking all the potential loot with them, and all the Commanders who fought have for their gallant defence is some ferrite and bioptics in addition to a boost to their fame-factor.
Spoils of War
Then you have the clans who succeed in the mission. They get to share the loot according to some set rules concerning how many of the opposing Mechs each Commander managed to destroy.
This loot comes in the form of Mechs, Equipment and Weapons.
Normally, all Commanders who killed a set amount of Mechs will get some Weapons as an award from the authorities.
Generally the most coveted prizes are the Mechs. While there is no guarantee you will get them even if you took out enough of the opponents to get into consideration, they are what most are aiming for.
The rest of the Weapons, Mechs and Equipment might be yours if you did well, or not. The RNG gods seem to be involved here.
Planning the Raid Thresholds
If we look at a hypothetical Clan and a hypothetical raid. We could have 10 Commanders, a raid consisting of 16,020 Mechs, and a threshold for getting a shot at winning one or more Mechs if you killed 1,000 of the opponents.
So if one Commander kills all the raiding Mechs he gets 16 chances to win each prize Mech. The flip side is none of the other in the clan get anything.
The worst result for the clan as a whole if the raid is finished in time, would be seven Commanders getting almost enough kills for two thresholds, while the three last got almost enough for one.
The Clan leader can set a limit on how many opponents each Commander should eliminate. By engaging blue on red inhibitors, the Commanders in question can not engage a wave of opponents if this limit is reached or exceeded. This blue on red limit can be changed by the Clan leader as the raid progresses, and will be automatically removed when there is less than two hours left of the allotted time.
If the Leader in the hypothetical clan decides to make it an even split, he could set the limit to 1,602 opponents for each Commander.
This will let all Commanders have an more or less equal share of the kills and theoretically the same loot.
But.
That gives the clan as a whole only ten chances for Mechs.
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Here is a detail to consider. When you engage the opposing raid force, the number and difficulty of Mechs in each wave varies. This will in all probability result in most Commanders killing a few more Mechs than the limit set by the Clan leader.
As the total number of opposing Mechs is just a few above what is needed for 16 thresholds, the effective number of chances to win Mechs is by most clans considered to be 15.
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But say this is a regular clan, and the Commanders and the Leader have decided that what chances you have for prizes in the raids should be averaged.
In that case the Leader set the blue on red limit to 1,000 until all have gotten there.
Then, according to an agreed upon plan, five commanders stop attacking. The leader raises the blue on red limit to 2,000 and the other five Commanders kill another 1,000 or so Mechs each.
At this point there will be some remnant of the opponents force left. If there is enough to let one Commander reach another threshold, he should be the designated finisher, if not, the full might of the clan will surely shatter the remnants.
Result for the clan will normally be 15 chances for Mechs. By changing who get two chances in the various raids the clan as a whole will be stronger than if one just divided the opposing Mechs totally freely.
Maximum Salvage
That leaves the question of the 16th chance for Mechs. A dedicated clan can, if they are willing to spend some additional time assure this chance, attempt to get all the possible thresholds with finesse and some luck.
What you need to do is first set the blue on red limit to say 30 below the threshold. Then everyone except the clan leader or Controller get to the limit. At that time the clan leader start his run. Using a weak formation he notices how many Mechs are left in the waves he cant fully beat, and assigns Commanders who lack that number of Mechs to reach the threshold to kill that wave off.
As said, this approach takes time, dedication, planning and some good luck, but those clans who are willing to do this will over time get an advantage over those who don't.
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(By Sten Hugo Hiller - 627184)
