BATTLETECH

08611

SHRAPNEL,

Fragments From The Inner Sphere

CREDITS

EDITORIAL STAFF

Editor-in-Chief

L. Ross Babcock III

Senior Editor

Donna Ippotito

Editor

C.R. Green

PRODUCTION STAFF

Production Manager

Jordan K. Weisman

Art Director

Jeff Laubenstein

Book Design

Jeff Laubenstein

Cover Art

Jeff Laubenstein

Layout

Dana Knutson

Todd Marsh

Jim Nelson

Typesetting

Patrice A. Jones

Assistants

Tara Gallagher

Jonathan Marcus

BATTLETECH, Battlemech, Mech are Registered Trademarks of FASA Corporation. Copyright © 1988, All Rights Reserved. Printed in the United States of America. SHRAPNEL is a Trademark of FASA Corporation. SHRAPNEL was published by FASA Corporation, 1025 W. Van Buren, Chicago, IL, 60505

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION                                                    Jordan K. Weisman

OLD MECHWARRIORS NEVER                                   Ken St. Andre

BLACK CATS CROSS YOUR PATH                             Tara Gallagher & James Lanigan

THINK LIKE A LIAO                                               Susan Putney

DANCE OF VENGEANCE                                          William H. Keith, Jr.

AND THEN THERE WAS THE TIME…                          Mark O'Green

DISPATCH                                                          Elizabeth T. Danforth & Michael A. Stackpole

LEGION TEAM                                                      William H. Keith, Jr.

WHERE LIES THE HONOR                                       William H. Keith, Jr.

NATASHA KERENSKY: A BIOMEDICAL REPORT            Tara Gallagher & James Lanigan

PAINTING THE TOWN                                            Mark O'Green

THE RACE IS NOT TO THE SWIFT                            Bear Peters

FINAL EXAM                                                        Bear Peters

JUDAS BLIND                                                       Michael A. Stackpole

CONTRIBUTECH                                                   George O'Dahjungle

INTRODUCTION

-Jordan K. Weisman

The BattleTech game, supplements, scenarios, and other related fictional products are all offshoots of an idea that came to me in 1984, when my own imagination was captured by the strong images that the Japanese had created for their animated television series featuring huge, walking battle machines. Though the graphics for these man-like and insect-like monoliths were fantastic, the Japanese storylines still left my Western mind unsatisfied. And so I set off to create my own fictional universe where men used fearsome. 10- or 12-meter tall monsters of destruction called BattleMechs to carry their endless struggles for domination across the stars.

What I wanted was a universe that had a taste of the alien, but that did not contain aliens. As in other science fiction, we produced this effect of strangeness combined with familiarity by changing only one of the basic premises we take for granted in the ‘real world.’ In contemporary society, new technology is automatically superior to what came before. That means a computer that is only five years old soon becomes completely obsolete. It was that premise that we turned on its head for BattleTech.

In the 31st century where our game is set. anything built 200 years ago is dramatically superior to anything that can be produced today. Indeed, many machines and equipment can never be replaced, for the technology to construct or even repair them has been lost as a result of hundreds of years of interstellar war. This single change creates huge societal repercussions in the BattleTech universe, from a natural tendency toward a scavenger society to more subtle effects such as the huge importance of hereditary rights.

In my view of history, a given political situation usually grows out of several hundred years of decisions and actions by numerous individuals rather than as a result of a single person's influence or power. Thus, I rely on historical events to inspire the backdrops of my fictional universes. For BattleTech, I felt that the struggle among the five Great Houses of the Inner Sphere and the ideal of restoring the glory of the Star League era were analogous to the fighting among the Roman city-states after the fall of Rome. This analogy helped us flesh out our history because I wanted all the sides in the fight to be shades of gray, as opposed to a conflict between good and evil.

House Kurita is a good example of what I had in mind. Though the enemies of the Draconis Combine may consider them to be bloodthirsty, war-hungry maniacs, the Kuritans have their own history, background, and motivations as well as their own perception of who they are. The same goes for House Davion, whose rulers may show up as knights in shining armor or conniving double-crossers, depending on who you talk to. We try to see that each book is written from the fictional point of view of someone in the 31st century. That means players must always pay attention to who is providing the information and then add the appropriate grain of salt.

Once I had a good outline of my history, society, and technology. I showed it to Pat Larkin.and the two of us spent considerable time discussing the ideas and how they could he fleshed out. When Pat and I felt we'd worked out the bugs, he went ahead to produce the excellent history that is included in the basic game. It was that early, original material that inspired you to want to know more and we at FASA to further develop the background of BattleTech.

While Pat was busy writing the fiction. I began to design the game system. As a gamer, I have always felt that the best systems were those where you could vividly imagine the action in your head while playing, as though the game were a movie, with the player as hero. To keep from destroying the magic of imagination, I did not want a game with rules so complicated they interfered with the movie playing in our heads.

BattleTech started as a simple system, and that helped to draw more and more people into the game. Of course, as players became more experienced, they began to want more and more details. Though we have expanded the rules far beyond anything I everimagined at the start, players can still stick with simplicity by playing with the basic rules, and choosing for themselves whatever additional rules they want to include in the game.

While producing all the new books and products for the popular BattleTech line, we wanted strong visual images that would help players feel that the game universe lives, breathes, and feels real. As a result, our BattleTech artists and designers have established new high marks for graphic quality in the adventure game industry. BattleTech was also the first line in the industry to include interior color art and it is the first to feature extensive uniform and vehicle painting schemes.

In addition to rules and striking graphics, the richness of the the BattleTech fictional background made it a natural for straight, non-gaming fiction. With fans of the game clamoring for more. I called Bill Keith to discuss the idea of writing novels related to the game and he jumped at the chance to work in a longer fictional form. The result was the exciting trilogy of the Gray Death Legion.

This year, with the major figures of the BattleTech universe moving their realms again toward another major interstellar war. I felt that the motivations of the major characters in this drama needed to be discussed in a depth that game material cannot hope to do. Thus was Mike Stackpole's Warrior Trilogy conceived. To begin this enormous project, Mike first had to become a world authority on BattleTech (excluding us at FASA, of course). Only then could he begin to craft the major plots we had designed, together with hundreds of characters and minor plots that he created, into a tale that would take the Successor States to a new stage of struggle, intrigue, and war.