April Fool's Day for BattleTech Fans

For April Fool's this year, my list of BattleTech plotlines and story ideas and plotlines that were never fully considered.  Having been part of this universe for a long time, my sense of humor has been twisted rather tightly.  Most of these concepts and story ideas were discarded for damn good reasons, though in all honesty, I think that the powers that be missed some golden opportunities with some of the ideas I've toyed with over the years.  So, for a chuckle - here you go!   
 

Kerensky's Coup:  When Stefan Amaris offers Kerensky the chance to serve under him - he accepts.  While the Usurper secretly plots Kerensky's assassination, the old man kills the First Lord first and assumes control of the Star League.  The Rim Worlds Republic is shattered quickly as the SLDF units don't have to fight their way into the Hegemony.  The Star League never dies. 

The last scene of Endgame is Katrina and Victor sleeping with each other.  (Oh come on, you've all suspected that she secretly loved him…)

Kai Allard-Liao slips into an Elemental suit to prepare to do battle, but can't use it because it's too damn big (LIKE IT WAS SUPPOSED TO WORK?).  He climbs out and is squashed like a bug under the footpad of a Clan Vulture. 

Nicholas Kerensky proposes the idea of the Clans and is then sedated and locked up.  "Single combat when I have a fully company of 'Mechs at my disposal, what in the hell is he thinking?  Give up sex to reproduce using iron wombs?  And what is up with all that babbling about Smoke Jaguars?  What's he been smoking?"

The Inner Sphere is invaded by giant intelligent chicken creatures.  They are not only wiped out, but served as dinner to victors.  (Courtesy of Colonel Wayne Waco Rogers Roasters) 

The "What if I had a Jihad and no one showed up?" scenario.  At the outbreak of the Jihad Outreach is reduced to radioactive slag.  Only problem, Wolf's Dragoons isn't there.  Uh oh.  They got intel on the strike and moved against Terra.  Double uh oh.  The Dragoons shatter the Word of Blake there and declare themselves at the ilClan. 

The "Liao isn't as dumb as he looks," scenario.  Mad Max Liao, suspicious of the wedding of Melissa Steiner and Hanse Davion - orders his military to invade the Federated Suns at the time of the wedding reception.  They catch the Davion forces on their staging worlds, unprepared, and inflict massive casualties.  The Federated Suns crumbles, ill-equipped for a defense.  

Jerome Blake IS The Master.  Using lost Star League tech, Blake's brain is put in a cybernetic body and never steps down as the head of ComStar.  None of the religious mumbo jumbo ever becomes part of the ComStar culture.  ComStar essentially becomes a very big powerful corporation with its own army.  When the Jihad happens, its is ComStar putting an end to the Succession Wars. 

When Victor-Steiner Davion denies Trent a chance to command, Trent kills him.  "Any last words Mighty Mouse?" 

Kahn Ward is attacked by a marauding band of giant intelligent chicken creature which peck him to death. 

Primus Waterly named the First Lord of a new Star League.  Her plan to cripple communications works (Operation Scorpion,) bringing the Federated Commonwealth to its knees, then the rest of the Inner Sphere follows.  She kills Focht and establishes herself as the First Lord of a new Star League. 

House Liao's ultimate betrayal.  During the Clan invasion, House Liao strikes at House Marik and Davion, taking out manufacturing centers.  Without arms coming in, the Clans crush the other houses and Sun-Tzu Liao has backed a winner, earning him a place of honor in the court of the Star League. 

The Outbound Light doesn't find the Clans, they find the Wolverines.  The Wolverines tip off the Inner Sphere about what happened to Kerensky's children.  The Inner Sphere unites out of fear and armed with the intel given by the Wolverines - leads as preemptive strike into Clan space. 

Vlad kills Phelan Kell.  There should be more to this but just nurse it for a moment.  Ahh…

Devlin Stone is the son of Frederick Steiner (Focht) and Myndo Waterly.  She wasn't killed, but has been the true force behind ComStar all along.  I know - scary...

Snord's Irregulars launch a surprise attack on Terra at the end of the Third Succession War and seize the planet.  Cranston Snord becomes the new First Lord of a new Star League. 

Jerome Blake doesn't seize Terra - instead House Kurita does in a surprise assault.  With control over ComStar and Terra, it is a battle royale between the rest of the Inner Sphere and the Draconis Combine. 

Wolverines Triumphant.  Nicholas Kerensky is killed while fighting the Wolverines.  The Clans morph into a more benevolent society as Kerensky's extreme weirdness is stripped away.  The caste system is dissolved.  The Clans become a unified peoples, still militaristic, but not so Klingon-ish. When they do invade the Inner Sphere, there's no bargaining…it's all out war. 

What if the scientist caste was on top in the Clan heirarchy?  Rather than the Warriors, the scientists rule the Clans.  Technology leaps ahead centuries by the time of the invasion.  Bio-BattleMechs and stuff.  Nastier weapons.  Uber-Tech. 

The Smoke Jaguars win against the Star League.  Victor's head is held in Osis's hands before the Clans.  The Nova Cats get VERY nervous as a result of their betrayal. 

The Nova Cats have a vision about giant Chicken aliens invading the Inner Sphere.  Everyone laughs at them. 

House Marik wipes out Wolf's Dragoons as Joshua Marik takes the throne of the Free Worlds League.  He picks apart the loot from the Dragoons and uses it to rebuild the League into THE major force in the Inner Sphere.   He also figures out where the Dragoons came from and prepared his nation, but not the others, for the eventual invasion. 

Katrina takes X as a mate.  X = Kahn Ward, Thomas Marik, Lincoln Osis, Archer Christifori, or Sun-Tzu Liao.

The Knights of the Inner Sphere put on the play Spamalot II. 

What if we never changed the universe?  So a company of patchwork 'Mech defend an entire planet.  No factories, no regiments, and big merc units numbered twelve dudes and skimpily clad dudettes with 'Mechs.  Ice ships, pirates, and salvage means staying in the fight. 

One word:  Cylons. 

ComStar's network becomes self-aware and renames itself "Skynet."  Short android copies of Victor Steiner Davion are sent out to kill the leaders of the Inner Sphere.  (I have to admit, I'm still fleshing this idea out, but you get the idea.) 

Kahn Ward loses his arm in battle and Clan scientists replace it with a chainsaw appendage. 

All MechWarriors in the universe have the "Ghost 'Mech" capability that Morgan Kell demonstrated, and they use it a lot. 

The Word of Blake comes across a planet inhabited by giant intelligent chickens.  They use cybernetic implants on these creatures creating the Manei Cluckini, an army of killer chickens. 

"Everybody on Exodus…be back in one hour."  Kerensky wasn't the only one to go on the Exodus.  All of the major houses send out forces into the Periphery to create empires they might need someday.  Each of these mini-Exodus's cuts ties to their home governments during the Succession Wars and all come back as unique distinct cultures to invade the Inner Sphere. 

Richard Cameron sees right through Amaris and pops him with his laser before the coup unfolds.  The coup never happens and Rim Worlds League is laid waste as a result of Kerensky learning of their deception. 

Rather than fight a bloody Civil War, Victor has Katherine assassinated.  The Federated Commonwealth remains intact going through the Dark Ages. 

What if Kerensky came home sooner?  Rather than the civil war that led to the Clans, the SLDF remained intact and prospered.  In Kerensky's lifetime they came back to the Inner Sphere on a war to reestablish the Star League.  But instead of arriving in 3050, they come a century or two earlier. 

‘Mechs invade Endor.  While not a viable idea, I like the idea of crushing Ewoks. 

Three words:  Battlefield Nuclear Weapons.  Not as optional - as standard equipment. 

The Succession Wars don't happen.  Hell, Terra was pretty trashed anyway.  Why fight for control of the Hegemony worlds?  When the Clans arrive they find house governments with massive militaries that had not been battered by three centuries of warfare.  Surprise!

Daleks invade the Free Worlds League!  A little Dalek-on-'Mech action would be fun.  Question:  How many points does a toilet plunger ray gun do?  Answer:  5 but the range sucks. 

The arrival of Wolf's Dragoons results in their immediate attack and destruction.  The Inner Sphere learns of the Clans from their databases and sets off to attack the Clans first (or better yet, feeds them misinformation about the Inner Sphere prior to their own invasion.) 

House Ward is part of Clan Wolverine.  Phelan Kell tells the Wolves that capture him that he carries the Ward bloodline in his veins…and they kill him. 

Return to suggested Clan Names That Didn’t Make It Past The First Cut:  Turkey Baster, Iron Scrotum, Killer Sloth, Pregnant Hamster, Viper-Poodle, Pap-Smear, Smoke Stoner, Jade Prostate, Mammoth Shrimp, Amorous Armadillo, Snow-Weasel, Emerald Ball-Crusher, Pink Flamingo, Black Hemorrhoid, Fire Frogs, Azure Zit, and Rabid Monkey. 

Instead of building NAIS, House Davion builds a ‘Death Star.’  (Imagine me doing the quotes in the air like Dr. Evil and it’s funnier…)

FASA buys Steve Jackson games and introduces Ogres against BattleMechs.  (Somehow I picture House Marik fielding a lot of these – go figure.)

We introduce a Wave-Motion Gun for ‘Mechs and Spaceships.  Let’s face it, you wish you’d come up with that. 

And finally…Adam Steiner from the TV Series becomes Archon!  What?  What do you mean we did that?  WTF?  Huh?  It was mentioned in one of my books?  Aw crudstunk…

PS.  If you believe any of this, Google the definition of April Fool’s Day. 

My inspiration to be a writer? Star Trek!

I received an email from a fan recently that asked what inspired me to be a writer.  I had to think about that for a while.  Ultimately what drove me to being a writer was…brace yourself…Star Trek. 

I was a child of the 1960’s and 70’s.  When I came home after school, every day at 5:00pm, Star Trek was on.  This was not the sanitized Star Trek of The Next Generation, this was Captain James Tiberius Kirk.  Those shows rocked.  Say what you will about William Shatner, but you can’t bad-mouth James Kirk.  The man could beat a Vulcan and three-dimensional chess, beat the crap out of Klingon, and had no problems scoring with the ladies. Oh, I respect Picard – but the guy I’d like to sit in a bar and have a drink with is Kirk.  Three words here – Flying Leg Kick.   

Yes, the special effects were cheesy by today’s standards…but the stories were great.  It was the first time I watched TV and said, “the guys that write this are the real stars.” I remember looking at the show and thinking about the characters and their dynamics – how they interacted with each other.  For me I started thinking for the first time about the work that went into creating good characters and how important their dialogue was. 

And I saw the impact of good story telling.  You may not remember this, but when NASA rolled out the first space shuttle they had a contest as to what to name her.  The winner, by far, was Enterprise.  This was a case where fiction overtook the real world and made a deep impression on me.

I went to college at Central Michigan University with a business management major.  We had a kick-ass school paper then – the CM Life.  I decided I wanted to write an editorial column for the paper – to test out my creativity.  I drafted three columns, typed them (on a typewriter – boy am I dating myself!) and went over to the editorial offices to push for the job.  I was going to be competing against people that were going into this field as a career…business students simply didn’t write for the paper.  I remember thinking, “pull a Kirk here – bluff and bravado can pull this off.”  I met with the editor and got the job.  For three years I wrote columns for the newspaper and I didn’t take a single journalism class.  People were asking me “how come I never see you in my journalism classes?” and I would shrug.  The reality was I was taking classes at the other end of campus in the school of business.  James Kirk got me that job. 

My last year in school a role playing game came out from a little company called FASA based on Star Trek.  I played D&D and the chance to play sessions aboard the Enterprise was appealing.  I came up with an idea for a scenario set for the game and wrote it up.  I sent it into the publisher and waited.  Nothing.  I was bummed.  After I graduated I wrote them a follow-up letter and they came back and said they wanted to buy it!  But first, before that came out, they had a new game they wondered if I would write for – Battledroids (BattleTech).  So I became a part-time writer for them.  Eventually my Star Trek material came out – The Strider Incident.  That led to me writing other Star Trek sourcebooks and game product.  My experience there led me to write computer games tips books for Star Trek games for Brady Books.  Yup, you got it – Star Trek got me into writing for the game industry. 

When I was writing the tip book for Star Trek Generations I was sent out to California to meet with the programmers.  They had some of the props from the movie for filming the scenes in the game.  I got to sit in a Klingon captain’s chair straight out of the movie.  Face it, a number of you are jealous right now - aren't you?  Up close it was a little disappointing, it was a Chevy Vega bucket seat with a cheesy plywood base around it – but I didn’t care.  The guy from Paramount told me that the season wrap party for Star Trek Voyager was the weekend after I was slated to go back…and I could come if I wanted.  I couldn’t!  I always regretted that.  Three words – Seven of Nine. 

Writing game material led me to write BattleTech novels.  Writing those novels let me write business management books (Cubicle Warfare) and military history.  But, when you look back, the origins were me sitting on the floor of my Battle Creek home watching my folks black and white TV, watching Star Trek after school. 

Thank you Trek!  I owe you big time. 

The Twilight of the Clans that Never Was

Okay, now picture this without the 'Mech and a warship instead...

I’ve told this story before at Gen Con but never in my blog.  This is the story of the original first story of the BattleTech book set, Twilight of the Clans.  For people who write novels in a shared universe, or writers in general, this is a story to help you see some of the thought process that went into a big event in the BattleTech universe. 

When this idea was first floated up, Sam Lewis told me, “We’re going to take the fight to the Clans and wrap this phase of the universe.”  Prior to the Gen Con BattleTech summit, we were given preliminary assignments.  Somehow I got the first book of the set.  My job, “pave the way for the Inner Sphere to get to the Clan homeworlds.”  Bill Keith was to follow me with a two book set about the attack.  Mike was to tie the bow on the entire affair. 

The BattleTech summits were really just meals with the authors where we could brainstorm ideas, talk about the next year’s products etc.  I always got a chuckle watching the serving staff bring us our food while we talked about how we could kill Melissa Steiner-Davion.  They must have thought we were crazy – but then again, it was Milwaukee and Gen Con…they probably just ignored us. 

The original plan I came up with was to hijack a Clan warship and take the information of the route to the homeworlds from their navcomputer.  That was what I drafted at least.  There was a ground battle at a spaceport (you had to have some ‘Mech combat after all) then the team would make their way to the ship in orbit, seize her in a furious shipboard battle against Elementals – and the route to the Clan homeworlds would belong to the Inner Sphere.  I called it Exodus Road, the route back along Kerensky’s exodus route.

There were flaws with the idea in terms of a novel.  One was that it was going to lack cool ‘Mech battles which were the mainstay of the novels at the time.  That made everyone, including me, a little nervous.  At the same time it would get us onto a warship which opened up some cool possibilities. 

To execute this book I had to map the Clan homeworlds (an honor I might add) and map out the planet that Bill would be attacking.  The map I drew up was originally for Strana Mechty.  My thinking (and Bill’s at the time) was that we would be hitting that planet for the main assault. 

Bill came up with a great idea for the attack – one he shared with me and I was allowed to contribute to (albeit in a minor way).  The Inner Sphere fleet would jump on Strana Mechty.   Their target, the Clan’s central genetic repository which was a massive pyramid.  The premise he floated was that the Clans kept all of their genetic material in one secure location, never really fearing an external attack.

The assault would come in several parts.  One DEST team was going to seize Kerensky’s flagship (which held his coffin) orbiting the world and use it to augment the planetary bombardment.  This was my little contribution to all of this – I loved the idea of using the McKenna’s Pride to bombard the Clans.  The rest of the forces would drop on the pyramid and take it.  Holding their precious genes they would force the Clans to submit.  Sure it was blackmail, but it would work…I was sure of it. 

But we all know that the Clans would come in – with everything they had.  The battle would be horrific.  In the end the Inner Sphere would beat the clans (thanks to the bidding system) but the losses would spell the end of the Gray Death Legion (Bill told me that Gray would simply walk off into the jungles, horrified at the level of war he was forced to unleash).  Holding the Clan genes as a bartering chip, they would force the Clans into eventual submission. 

Bill and I both thought it was awesome.  And to this day, I still think so. 

But at the breakfast summit we bounced the ideas off the other writers.  Sam Lewis and others were concerned about my thought of simply stealing the map of the Exodus Road from a warship.  As I remember it, “Blaine, the Clans wouldn’t be that stupid.”  (Notice that he didn’t say they weren’t stupid in general – just not that stupid.)  I preferred to think of it as arrogance on their part, but ultimately Sam said, “Let’s make it a traitor to the Clans that betrays them.”  Thus the concept of Trent was born in a hotel restaurant in Milwaukee.  I remember thinking, “oh boy (sarcasm) a traitor as the lead character in a book.  Yeah, people will bond with that guy.” 

Mike Stackpole, (if I remember correctly) suggested that we didn’t have to go after all of the Clans, we needed to wipe out one of them.  There was some discussion about which one we should target too – a fairly active debate.  Ultimately the Smoke Jaguars were chosen as the sacrificial lambs of the Clans.  So, my map of Strana Mechty was changed, albeit slightly, to become Huntress – the new target of the assault. 

Bill’s thinking of the genetic repository seemed sound but there was a lot of debate that the Clans wouldn’t keep their genes in one place.  There was some logic in that – but we were talking the Clans.  Logic alone didn’t work with these folks.  Bill pointed out that going after one Clan didn’t make sense.  The Clans would clamor for a chance to wipe out the Inner Sphere task force.  Holding their genetic material as hostage seemed to be good way to blunt all of the Clans pouncing on the Inner Spherers.  Politics, it was decided, would leave the Smoke Jaguars isolated and forced to fight alone. 

Bill’s invasion obviously had to change as a result of all of this.  Bill never complained to me but I think he was pretty disappointed.  He had really mapped things out pretty well.  It is hard sometimes to work in a shared universe.  Bear in mind I was still trying to figure out how I could make a Smoke Jaguar turn traitor.  Bill ended up taking a pass on doing the novels.  The Gray Death Legion didn’t die on Strana Mechty – it clung on for several more years. 

Some things did get reused, though in different ways.  I loved what we came up with about stealing General Kerensky’s flagship (McKenna’s Pride) and using it to bomb the planet.  So, when I did Betrayal of Ideals (the infamous Wolverine saga) I leveraged the scene and finally got it into print.  That little scene is a private tribute to Bill Keith. 

I liked the final product of the Twilight Series with one minor exception, how Trent was dealt with. Mike and I sent some emails back and forth about the scene.  He argued strongly that Victor would never fully like or trust Trent.  I felt that made Victor a little two dimensional.  Trent was a man of honor just like Victor.  In the end, Trent’s alleged demise seemed somehow inappropriate.  (Don’t worry folks, I laid a plan to resolve this several years ago – you will one day see this in a slightly different perspective.) 

So there you have it, a nugget of BattleTech history.  What are your thoughts?  Would you have liked the story that was originally proposed?

BattleTech Flashbacks

It dawned on me a few years ago that I’ve been writing material for BattleTech and MechWarrior for a long time – over a quarter of a century.  One, it made me feel old.  Two, it stirred up some memories that were fanned even further at GenCon this year.  (I really wanted to sit down and play the board game but I wasn’t able to.) 

For those of you that don’t know, BattleTech is a robust science fiction universe that has millions of printed words supporting it.  It has been PC/Xbox/Sega games, board games, toys, a cartoon series, comic books, novels, and, well, just about everything else.  For over a quarter of a century the BattleTech universe has grown and expanded.  It is huge, with thousands of followers.  It is something I’m proud to have contributed to (in my own little ways). 

When I got involved in BattleTech it was by accident.  My last semester of college I wrote a scenario set for the Star Trek RPG from FASA.  I reached out to them at the end of the semester and Ross Babcock said, “I love it.  But before we publish it, would you like to write for BattleTech?”  I had no idea what it was.  Ross sent me a copy of Battledroids (the name of the game before it became BattleTech) and some material on the universe. 

I got hooked quickly.

BattleTech was more simple in those days.  You defended a planet with a company of ‘Mech.  New ‘Mechs weren’t manufactured, you had to salvage your damaged gear to keep functional.  It was big robotic fighting machines slamming it out with lasers and missiles.  Hell, I admit it, I loved it.  The fact that you could construct a ‘Mech made the game variable, more interesting than the usual board game fare

Ross sent me copies of the rough sketches of some of the ‘Mechs for the original (first) Technical Readout and said, “Here…write up some descriptions of these.”  He said that I was writing along with a handful of other authors and whoever did the best, would get more to do.  We got paid a whopping $50 per ‘Mech, which seemed fantastic.  I mean seriously, I was getting paid to do this?  (I still have those original copies in a binder along with the original dot-matrix printer version of universe guide.)   

I must have done pretty well because I was getting BattleTech work two years before the Star Trek scenario I wrote (The Strider Incident) was finally released.  I wrote anything and everything I could for BattleTech.  The book opportunities kept coming.  Ross handed me a three sentence description for a mercenary unit called Snord’s Irregulars.  With that kernel of thought, I cranked out two supplements. I asked once where the name Cranston Snord came from and the answer I got was that it was from an old BC cartoon, the punchline to the joke of “Who is buried in Grant’s Tomb.”  Back in those days, a good idea got jotted down and shot out to those of us writing and we turned it into a product. 

The universe changed with the 4^th Succession War.  Suddenly there were new ‘Mechs, regiments of troops (where did those come from?) and deep politics.  Keeping track of the universe, for years, was every writer’s responsibility.  There was no database to go to for continuity checking.  Every year the product became more complicated, more complex, more challenging.  I loved it!

Every year I went to Sam Lewis for what I lovingly called, “My annual grovel for a novel.”  I would bring three to five ideas and pitch them.  For two years I was sent packing with, “maybe next year.”  One year I met Sam at Gen Con and pitched five ideas.  The last one I had written the night before leaving for Milwaukee, a hurriedly scribbled idea that I had put no real thought to.  Sam chucked the first four ideas but latched onto the last one – Highlander Gambit.  He loved the idea of a Death Commando coming home to the Northwind Highlanders.  I remember thinking, “wow, I sold a novel idea – and I really have no idea what I am going to write…holy crap!” Somehow, in a matter of a few hours, I had a detailed chapter-by-chapter summary done.  The story, the characters…they all seemed to just come to life.  As a person that dabbles in playing the bagpipes, I simply loved writing about mercenaries that wore kilts.   

The novels are beyond fun to write.  It’s not just the stories, the political intrigue, and the battles.  It is about characters.  I still write books that I enjoy reading, though I admit I haven’t cracked one of my own books in years.  They are still stories that I think hit the mark.  With more than 12 under my belt (if you check the fine print in Star Lord, you will find that I did the rewrite on that novel – and I could do a whole blog entry on that bad experience alone, trust me), I would do another one in a heartbeat. 

I was asked by a fan this year at the Catalyst Game Labs booth, “which is your favorite novel you wrote?”  Wow.  That is tough to answer because I like all of my novels for different reasons.  I can narrow it to two.  First, from the original series of novels, Exodus Road.  The Smoke Jaguar character of Trent…turning traitor to the Clans was neat.  I mean seriously, the main character is someone you like but he is a traitor!  Trent was complex in many respects.  Exodus Road is the story of someone that put honor above politics, even if that meant killing the very thing he loved. Trent became the instrument that spelled the end of the Smoke Jaguars.  Imagine that kind of emotional burden.   

Second, from the Dark Age novels, Surrender Your Dreams tops my list as a favorite.  Surrender should have been a dud of a book.  I was told, “give us three stories of Knights of the Republic trapped outside of Fortress Republic.”  I toyed with doing just that, three separate little novellas.  That seemed lame and I figured the readers would rebel against that approach.  Then I thought, “why not stitch the stories together?” I wanted some ties back to the original series of novels.  Since I precipitated the demise of the Smoke Jaguars in Exodus Road, I thought, “what if we told the story of what happened to the survivors of that Clan – what they became.”  The Fidelis were born.  No longer the Jags of old, they were something else, something cooler. 

I was watching Pulp Fiction and I got the idea of jumbling the order of the chapters.  A lot of thought went into that.  Some readers hated it.  I didn’t and wouldn’t change a thing.  The book has everything, the ghost of The Master, Redburn, and even Devlin Stone (albeit in a message.)  I know some people didn’t like Surrender Your Dreams, but I thought it was neat and stand solidly behind it. 

I don’t get the play BattleTech too often any more.  My kids and my friend and his kids played the Wizkids game MechWarrior.  I know purists swear long and hard about that rendition of the game, but I liked it…and so did the kids.  We waged some massive battles, raining artillery everywhere, letting loose with Alpha Strikes.  It was fun.  I collected the BattleTech comics and the toys too.   

Back “in the day” we used to get all of the authors together every year at GenCon for a brunch.  We would talk, brainstorm ideas, hear the latest changes in direction in the universe, get a run-down of what was in the product pipeline – that kind of stuff.  These meetings were a lot of fun.  We don’t do them anymore, but I wished we did.  Sometimes egos got stepped on but overall, these were fun to attend.  It was a chance for those of us on the inside track to talk and joke about BattleTech in a way only we could. 

I am still writing BattleTech too.  Two weeks ago I finished an installment in my series for BattleCorps continuing the story of Raul Tinker in Son of Blake.  I have a plan for this series that goes through the end of the Jihad.  When done, the installments are a novella all on their own and tell the story of the Jihad from the Word of Blake’s perspective.  I would really love to see the Wolverine Saga published as a book (Betrayal of Ideals).  BattleCorps had kept BattleTech fiction alive and well. 

As much as I harp about the good old days, there were things then that drove you nuts as a writer.  The universe got so big that you had to ask for help to keep track of all of the subtle changes - for example.  The current product leadership under Loren and Randall is, well, great.  Like myself, these guys have a love of the product and the universe and kept the classic board game brand going when everyone else saw it as dead.  BattleTech is making a resurgence, at least that is the buzz I’m hearing and witnessing.  I don’t think our best is behind us.  The best is about to come!