Build a BattleTech Force for the Table - Reactor Ops

[@DeepBarney]

As someone new to the hobby/tabletop this awesome!

[@braedentrefethen5437]

This looks absolutely fantastic! I'm super pumped to use this in the future! To offer a small critique, I think the Eras list might be more intuitive if they're arranged chronologically as opposed to alphabetically. That aside, this is a brilliant game aid. I'm especially excited to see the inclusion of a C3 calculator, that's awesome!

[@BattleMaster-1G]

Noted!

[@BattleMaster-1G]

...and I just made an update to fix this. Thanks again for pointing it out.

[@myles5276]

Thank you for making this tool sir. As a narrative total warfare dm it can help me keep everything in order even up to a battalion. Beats my notebook writeups.

[@arcanedream8330]

This looks to be a fantastic tool, and something that has been sorely needed for decades.

[@BattleMaster-1G]

Thank you for your feedback!

[@TheTorlock]

Dude...effing fantasic. Good for you. Havent played with it yet but i love the video and will be fiddling tomorrow as i catalog my stock of models and start thinking about how to organize everything for paint projects and campaigns

[@VickyAmaru]

Looks like just what I've been looking for. Excited to try it out. I'll spread the word.

[@thecommuterzombie]

You successfully spread the word 😆

[@Darkmast668]

This is beyond incredible! My play group are just starting up a Chaos Campaign and this is like it was tailor made for us!

[@jameshamilton56]

Looks like a great resource to the BattleTech community! I will be looking at that to help with both force building, and force composition to paint my 'Mechs and vehicles.

[@jackfraser1807]

This is amazing and was so desperately needed. Bravo.

[@thecommuterzombie]

This looks like an excellent tool. Thanks for putting in the work.

[@dndsl3436]

Looks cool. I'll share it with the rest of my group.

[@seanmaclean1341]

I was actually **just** looking for something like this last night!

[@justinbingham4420]

This looks incredible. Thank you!

[@KRohlyPoly]

Do you have plans to include alpha strike rules? It looks amazing, though! Great work.

[@daaurpoj]

What is the best way to give feedback on this website? I think it's a tool with a lot of promise for bridging the gap between the MUL and MML while still being convenient to use. I noted the era filter seems to be filtering by production era instead of availability era; I think the latter would be more useful for list building than the former, would it be possible to add in availability era as another filter criteria?

[@BattleMaster-1G]

The best way to provide feedback is through Patreon, where I can directly hear from those who are committed to supporting the project, allowing me to focus on meaningful input.

[@yoooztoobz]

Amazing, great work!

[@whitefoxplays]

Great work! Can't wait to try it.

[@caseysmith9040]

Are you looking for any help? I was actually considering starting a similar side project, but this looks like a great start! Also, the filters on mobile display below the filtered results. It may be more intuitive to place the filters first then the results. Do you have somewhere to report bugs or request features?

[@AlexAshpool]

Looks great.

[@BazztheBazz]

This looks great!

[@barker262]

The quirks list; does it include description/in game effects? I’ve never seen a quirk. It sounds like a great way to bring the old technical read out descriptions to life.

[@BattleMaster-1G]

Not currently. Wanna be careful about replicating too much stuff, such as game rules. Reactor Ops lets you find units with specific quirks, and then you can read about the quirks in the "BattleTech Manual".

[@usachev2010]

Found only 11 options with large pulse lasers fot smoke jaguars during clan invasion which ia not right for sure

[@BattleMaster-1G]

It's likely right for mechs in MUL that are listed for "Faction Availability = Smoke Jaguar" during the Clan Invasion. It's likely not right if you expect that filter to also encompass "Faction Availability = Invader Clans (Common)", which it currently does not - although folks seem to expect that it should. I'm going to revisit this over the weekend.

[@usachev2010]

@@BattleMaster-1G thanks! I tried checking both smoke jaguar and invader clans and found 0 results unfortunately

[@Xenos_hive]

First succession war periphery charger here I come

[@mrpacobeto]

solaris skunkwerks had a tool that adjusted bv based on the number of units you have vs your opponent. Is something like that possible in the future?

[@JohnDoe-hc7jf]

Good work man! =) You are using the MUL or API for it somehow? And do you plan do get the Alpha Strike Lance special abilities and Lances added, too?

[@BattleMaster-1G]

No API. The data is in a db. AS support is a longer term goal.

[@Logajam.]

About 80% overlap with Megamek. Sorting by faction is something they need, and I'm pestering them about. They don't have the analysis capability at all. Randomly wondering, if you pick 6 c3i units, can you assign them to different networks. Aka 2 3 mech networks instead of a full 6 mech network.

[@BattleMaster-1G]

If you prefer MegaMek, by all means use the tool you like! I am also a MegaMek fan. My own take is that I view this project as quite distinct from MegaMek, as it's geared toward quick force generation for table-top play, rather than playing BattleTech on a PC. But YMMV. Regarding C3: Currently you can only assign 1 network per type. I may revisit this in the future.

[@Logajam.]

@BattleMaster-1G Definitly a future idea. I use sub dividing into smaller networks to keep the C3 force multiplier from getting out of hand. But I'm probably an edge case.

[@AlexDenton0451]

​@@BattleMaster-1Gtwo things, 1 your name is my favorite Assault Mech period, you have splendid taste, and 2 your project also gives access to MegaMek capabilities without having to both have a PC, which is a surprisingly high requirement since phones have replaced them, and the technical knowhow to install several pieces of software to make MegaMek work. I say bravo, great work, and thanks a ton! I'll send this to my local group.

[@yegorzarubin91]

No intro year filter and sort?

[@BoardgameBlizzard]

This is Great! Is there a place to report potential bugs? (Clan Tech, Clan invasion, Smoke Jags...seems to be missing most of the 3050 clan mechs)

[@BattleMaster-1G]

Keep in mind the "Homeworld Clans" and "Invading Clans" general categories. I would try confirming it's a bug by looking at one of your mechs on MUL, on the details page, and see if in fact it's listed as Smoke Jaguar, or just a generic Clan designation. This is the way Reactor Ops should reflect MUL; other parts of MUL may aggregate mechs for a given Clan Faction in different ways. For example, from the faction page, MUL lists a given Clan Faction AND the general category (Homeworld/Invader) when presenting units. I still need to work out a good way for general bug reporting. Patreon supporters who help fund the infrastructure have access to bug report chat.

[@BoardgameBlizzard]

@@BattleMaster-1G I get it...I assumed the list would automatically include the "Invading Clan" listing when I selected one of the Invading Clans for the Faction. Thanks for your work on this...very helpful!

[@mrwhatshisname]

Awesome that you include C3 calculation! now if only you also did AIV and semiguided / TAG it'd be perfect

[@Xenos_hive]

Maybe the factions could have expansion tabs so you can click clans, inner sphere, periphery nations, com star etc then those expand so you can click which inner sphere or which clan faction without having to scroll past the rest?

[@BattleMaster-1G]

I've thought about that. Not too hard to do.

[@nyandyn]

Suggestion: add CGL miniature force packs to the filters

[@BattleMaster-1G]

That might be fun. How would that work? Would the search display each available model for a chassis in a box?

[@TrickyTidy]

So cool! I absolutely love the the analytics part of the force list. It has a bunch of info I always think about but never get to see easily. I did notice a bit of weirdness with the filters though. I was trying to build a Nova Cat force in the Clan Invasion era and it doesn't return any units from the Clan Common list. Maybe there's some logic about the filters I'm not getting, but intuitively it should work that a Clan faction should have access to stuff in the Clan Common list too. And selecting both in the faction selector seems to filter out all the units because nothing is returned. For now I'll likely build a list using another tool, but assemble it in Reactor Ops to get that juicy force analysis data. Regardless, this looks awesome, keep up the great work!

[@BattleMaster-1G]

Noted. I had a different take as I was playing with it before making it live, which was that the specific faction filters should include the common groupings. These are the things that it's hard for one to person to anticipate in advance, so the feedback is useful. The solution is not difficult, but I'll need to think about what the exact user expectation is... In the short term I will likely better organize the factions and include some tool tips with a clear explanation.

[@TrickyTidy]

@@BattleMaster-1G Thanks for the quick reply! Yeah some tooltips can definitely help clear up confusion. I guess full control of the filters would require something like AND/OR logic for filters in the same category. That can get kind of funky though if trying to apply logic between each filter. Might be enough to just have an option to select either AND or OR for all filters in a category. Alternatively, where applicable, maybe after selecting a specific faction filter there's a sub-dropdown that expands with a "Include Clan/IS Common List?" toggle. Anyways, UX is always a struggle lol But I really like the data you provide in the force composition itself. :D

[@johnboyjjb]

This looks great, and my initial impression after 5 minutes of playing is that it works really well. The automated lance building is something I would love. Other things that stand out: an ammo bomb location would be worth calling out in survivability (when explosive ammo is the only thing in a location) being able to add a generic unit from the search and then populate the "card" with relevant details to allows for customs a unit movement chart which would demonstrate how a lance or company movement complements each other (or doesn't) expanded damage over distance chart - an average damage over distance filled as a sand chart would demonstrate how different lance mates would change long range, mid range, and short range damage potential It might not be appropriate based on your definition of how they work, but era list and faction list exclusivity de-emphasis could be interesting. e.g. I choose Clan Wolf and everything before Early Succession Wars gets shifted from black to grey. Era or intro date is not a sortable column once results are delivered. I generally prefer paginated results to infinite scroll but most places allow one to choose the number of results displayed. I'm super interested in seeing where this goes.

[@johnboyjjb]

As I continue to play, I built a force in FIrefox. And then, wanting to compare it against a different force I opened a new tab in Chrome and was happy to see that they were separate instances. But then it made me think it would be nice in a future state to be able to compare complete forces.

[@johnboyjjb]

Force cost formatting - 9956913 vs 9,956,913

[@johnboyjjb]

Weapon filters are "and" logic. It would be nice to have "or" logic too. I want a mech with a large laser. ER and Pulse would be fine too. Currently this 3 different search attempts.

[@TheManyVoicesVA]

Oh my God. This is amazing. This will save me alot of time. One complaint after using it: I would like to be able to see my force's total BV without opening a new tab. Having them go into a panel where you can just see the mech's name and BV on the right hand side, with the ability to adjust the G/P skills in said box. I do worry about copyright issues with this though. Putting features behind a paywall may be ill advised. CGL doesn't like people making money off their IP. My suggestion would be to keep the Patreon rolling, but make some Megamek battle report videos or something and put those up.

[@BattleMaster-1G]

Duly noted! Gotta respect the IP holder.

[@TheManyVoicesVA]

@BattleMaster-1G ya I'd hate to see a Harmony Gold fiasco strike you lol.