Hey Game Fans, we’re taking a short break from Special Abilities to show off an important part of Alpha Strike, Lances. Come take a look!
Lances are the standard organizational unit for the game, filling the role of squads and squadrons in other games. Today we’re going to take a look at four of the specific Lances and the standard packs you should be able to find at your local battletech retailer. Let’s take a look at the first four Lance Packs
The Assault Lance
The heaviest units in Battletech, Assault class battlemechs are hard to kill and carry heavy weapons. Some commanders will form their assault ‘mechs into lances of their own. These Assault lances aren’t the fastest in the field, but they are hard to shift off of their locations. They carry enough guns to hold that location against a determined attack by anything short of another Assault Lance.
- At least 3 of the units in the Lance must be size 3 or larger, and size 1 units aren’t usable.
- All units must have an Armor value of at least 5, and at least 75% must have a medium range damage value of 3 or higher.
- At least 50% of the Units must have either the Sniper Role, or one unit must have the juggernaut role.
- For meeting these requirements, 75% of the Unit gains the either the Demoralizer or the Multi-tasker Special Pilot Ability.
Now the default Striker Lance pack you can get from a variety of sources comes with a Victor a Blackjack, a Grasshopper, and an Atlas. If you were to pick up this Lance Pack, you’d find double sided dry erase cards for each of these mechs, (one side has a low tech version of the mech, the other side has more high tech gear). In addition, you’d find a unique pilot, a history of a faction, and a card detailing this lance’s special abilities. Finally, you’ll find a stat card for a metal miniature produced by Ironwind Metals.
Support Lance
Support Lances are formations that back up other formations in the field. Composed of a variety of units, Support Lances provide additional resources to other formations. They act in close support of other more specific lances within a company.
- Support Lances have no specific requirements. They have to be designated as supporting another Lance.
- They copy the Special Pilot Abilities of the Lance they are supporting.
Now the default Support Lance pack you can get from a variety of sources comes with a Charger, a vindicator, an Awesome, and a Firestarter. If you were to pick up this Lance Pack, you’d find double sided dry erase cards for each of these mechs, (one side has a low tech version of the mech, the other side has more high tech gear). In addition, you’d find a unique pilot, a history of a faction, and a card detailing this lance’s special abilities. Finally, you’ll find a stat card for a metal miniature produced by Ironwind Metals.
Pursuit Lance
Pursuit Lances are an evolution of the Scout Lance. Designed to hunt down and destroy enemy scouts, the Pursuit Lance is generally fast enough to keep up with most scouts. They also have enough firepower to destroy lighter elements and can threaten medium and heavy machines.
- All the units in the Lance must be size 2 or less, and 75% have a minimum speed requirement
- At least one of the units needs to have a medium range damage value over 1.
- For meeting these requirements, up to 3 units in the formation gain the benefit of the Blood Stalker Special Pilot Abilities.
Now the default Pursuit Lance pack you can get from a variety of sources comes with a Centurion, a Jenner, a Wolfhound, and a Clint. If you were to pick up this Lance Pack, you’d find double sided dry erase cards for each of these mechs, (one side has a low tech version of the mech, the other side has more high tech gear). In addition, you’d find a unique pilot, a history of a faction, and a card detailing this lance’s special abilities. Finally, you’ll find a stat card for a metal miniature produced by Ironwind Metals.
Battle Lance
Battle Lances are the most common lances in the game, and can be filled with an amazing variety of units. They are intended to simply take the fight to the enemy and hopefully smash them into the ground. With the wide range of potential units in a Battle Lance, thy can end up doing a lot of different things in the field.
- 50% of the units in a Battle Lance must be size 3 or higher.
- At least 3 of the units need to belong to either the Brawler, Sniper,or Skirmisher Roles.
For meeting these requirements, the Lance gains the benefit of the Lucky (6) Special Pilot Ability. 
Now the default Battle Lance pack you can get from a variety of sources comes with a Hatchetman, a Zeus, a Banshee, and an Orion. If you were to pick up this Lance Pack, you’d find double sided dry erase cards for each of these mechs, (one side has a low tech version of the mech, the other side has more high tech gear). In addition, you’d find a unique pilot, a history of a faction, and a card detailing this lance’s special abilities. Finally, you’ll find a stat card for a metal miniature produced by Ironwind Metals.
Conclusions
Those are just four of the standard lance packs you can find in the Alpha Strike line. Next week we’ll probably catch the other four, and then we’ll get back to Special Abilities and other crazy things. We might even put together another scenario for you tinker with. That’s it for us this week, Game On, Game Fans.
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About the Author: Zardoz the Magnificent
Trained as a school psychologist, i look at the overlap between education, psychology and games with the direction to utilize the latter two components to improve the first
