BattleTech: Industries

Update Log



February 10th, 2002

The BattleTech: Industries pages have now been updated with information gleaned from the Periphery Field Manual. As this was one of the very last FASA publications, it has been notoriously difficult (and to date impossible) for me to get my hands on a copy. I owe many thanks to Aldous Castro, who has generously scanned the book for all relevant data, and has provided me with a run down on what's new in those far-flung regions of space.

The Industries pages are now about as complete and up to date as they are likely to be made, as the state of the BattleTech Universe is changing. Any further updates are likely to be small modifications or clarifications based on a previously overlooked passage in one of the Classic BattleTech tomes. The "New" BattleTech, in development by WizKids LLC, looks to give the game universe a fresh new start, but these web pages belong to the old school game and setting, and will likely pass into history along with the rest of the Classic BattleTech universe. For this reason, I am making a zip file available containing the BattleTech: Industries pages in their entirety. I hope that there were and still are some of you out there who have found this effort of mine to be in some way useful for your gaming sessions, and if this is the case then I wish the information to be accessible from a number of ancient Star League caches long after the original HPG goes offline.

You can find the download page by clicking here.


January 3rd, 2001:

A long overdue update to BattleTech: Industries has just been uploaded. Over the last, ahem... 16 months (sorry!) FASA has published several Field Manuals, which include the Capellan Confederation, Federated Suns, and the Lyran Alliance. All of the new BattleMechs and Combat Jumpships from those sourcebooks are now referenced. Also, the new AeroTech 2 rulebook provided some clarifications with regards to several aerospace fighter designs, along with the all-new Eisensturm heavy fighter. A few new conventional fighter designs are present in that publication as well, but no manufacturer information is provided, and therefore I have not included them in BattleTech: Industries.

The image map on the menu page has also been updated, and now includes all of the star systems mentioned in this work. Among the menu items is an "about" section, in which I give acknowlegments to the sourcebooks I have used as references. I have also given some insight as to why I decided to take on this project all those years ago.


September 14th, 1999:

Wow, less than six months and my new maps are already obsolete. Once again I've had to update them to reflect the current situation in the Inner Sphere. I've also added a cool (IMHO) starscape background to the maps.

The Capellan Confederation continues to gain territory, much of it now at the expense of the St. Ives Compact. With the capture of Indicass and St. Ives, the Confederation has laid claim to a large chunk of the Compact's (formerly) impressive industrial output. This situation has caused some trouble with the distribution of components. The St. Ives Cossack class BattleMech, for example, no longer has access to the Jackson Model 12 small lasers produced on Indicass. Instead, it now uses the Kajuka Type 1 "Stiletto" small lasers. More extensive component swapping was necessary for the Emperor, with the Confederation in posession of two factories now (and given deteriorating relations with the Free Worlds League) they are using their own industrial output to outfit them.

On the Clan front, the da Bears have taken advantage of Clan Wolf's weakness, and have captured three worlds. In response, the Wolves invited their allies, Clan Hell's Horses, to garrison three worlds along the Wolf/Ghost Bear border. Expect the situation to get messy.

In other news, all but one small craft have been removed. Only the NL-42 "Battle Taxi" has ever had a manufacturer specified for it. The remaining small craft, from Jumpships and Dropships, were long ago assigned to manufacturers according to my own "educated" guesses. Recently, I have had a change of heart, and decided that their unofficial placement would mislead some readers to believe thier manufacture to be FASA-official, which is certainly not the case.

For this same reason, I have also removed a number of support vehicles that I had previously added to "flesh out" the universe. Only a handful of these, such as the Davion MASH truck and the Kurita Daimyo mobile HQ and 135-K coolant truck have any FASA publication to back up their manufacture. Granted, they are being built somewhere, but I can only guess as to where. The remaining ordnance transports, MASH trucks, mobile HQs, coolant trucks, and enginerring vehicles have therefore been removed. Heavy APCs are an exception, as the assumption can be made that they are generally made wherever the standard model of APCs are built.


March 27th, 1999:

Created entirely new maps for the Inner Sphere and Periphery image map section. Though they don't differ significantly from the previous versions, they are more accurate and I feel they look a bit nicer. Some maps have been modified either for simplification purposes or to reflect geopolitical changes that have occured since 3059. Check the Capellan Confederation map to see the majority of these changes.

Anything that had previously been referred to as the "Ghost Bear Clan Occupational Zone" is now simply the "Ghost Bear Clan." In case you have not heard, the Clan has relocated entirely to its Inner Sphere holdings. They are firmly entrenched, and are not likely to budge anytime soon. Sorry Rasalhague fans. It is my opinion, though, that the Ghost Bears will be heavily influenced by their captives, and some sort of Rasalhague - Ghost Bear synthesis will emerge in the future.

Work on the Clan Homeworlds section has not gone anywhere for months, and likely will not until I am able to buy "Warriors of Kerensky," which likely won't happen for a month or three. I've gone and blown most of my gaming budget on Crimson Skies, which is an excellent product, by the way.


August 19th, 1998:

Updated Industries: 3060 with all of the Inner Sphere 'Mechs in production as of 3060, as per Technical Readout: 3060. I have also added a few Clan 'Mech designs that are manufactured within the Inner Sphere, at the planets Alshain, Arc-Royal, and Irece. The Free Rasalhague Republic and Marian Hegemony now have their own sections, and the "Independents" section is now labeled as the "Chaos March." Each of the surviving invading clans has its own entry, describing the captured Inner Sphere industies within their occupational zones. Finally, I have begun a new section on the Clan homeworlds, which will contain what tidbits of data I can glean from various FASA publications and likely no small amount of speculation on my part.


June 15th, 1998:

Made numerous modifications to bring my Industries:3060 more in line with Objective Raids. When I began updating the "Industries" section of Objective Raids nearly four years ago, I made several changes with an eye toward "optimizing" the production of many components, particuarly in the Free Worlds League.

Anyhow, I straigtened these things out, and my Industries and the OR Industries are now (almost) fully in-line with one another. Most of the discrepencies are due to omissions in the original OR. I have added text blurbs here and there to inform the reader of a number of those changes that were necessary, primarily due to incomplete, inadequate, or incorrect information provided by Objective Raids.


March 27th, 1998:

Removed the following 4 Star League-era fighters:
SPD-502 Spad
ZRO-114 Zero
THK-63 Tomahawk
GTHA-500 Gotha

I also removed the following custom-designed fighters:
TR-5 Tiger
F-60 Regulus
SFT-L2 Starfighter
TR-19 Thunderchief
F-200 Reaper

These designs were originally included as "padding" to compensate for the relative lack of upgraded fighters from FASA. I suppose that FASA will eventually get around to publishing more badly needed and hopefully well-designed Inner Sphere aerospace fighters. I removed the aforementioned placeholders to save myself the trouble at a later date.


January 18th, 1998:
Added new material from the Northwind Highlanders Scenario Pack (#1702):
Updated the Independent States map to include Northwind.
Added the Schiltron wheeled tank to Proserpina / DC (BE) and to Northwind / NH (CW).
Added the BKW-7R Black Watch assault 'Mech to Northwind / NH (CW).
Added the CRB-27 Crab medium 'Mech to Northwind / NH (CW)... (the overview for the Black Watch states that Cosara Weaponries is the current manufacturer of the Crab.)