Game 142: The Extraction of Juan Romero - Mission Briefing

[NorCal CBT]

Mission Briefing

Game 141: The Extraction of Juan Romero

Date/Location:

March 3065 / Alarion, Lyran Alliance (Class A)

Mission Briefing:

As Miss Black begins the briefing, you notice that the XO is nowhere to be seen.  “XO Thames is currently on-planet finalizing contract details with our client and will be joining the briefing remotely,” she says as she brings up a remote feed to the briefing room’s display.

XO Thames is sitting in a cheaply furnished office and wearing a laborer’s uniform.  Seated next to him is a woman with olive skin, long, black, curly hair, and brown eyes wearing similar garb.  There’s a window behind them where you can see large hauling trucks full of random materials driving by frequently.  It’s fairly noisy wherever they are–you can hear lots of banging and other sounds.

“Hello commanders.  I’m sure you’ve all heard the saying ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend’,” XO Thames says.  “In this case our new friends are the Commonwealth Liberation Front.  I’ll let their leader tell you more.”  He motions to the woman sitting next to him.  

“Good afternoon.  You can call me Doge.  We use codenames here to protect identities in the event of capture.  I lead the Commonwealth Liberation Front.  Our goal is to end Alarion’s involvement in the Civil War and depose Duke Anatoly Serfass who is a puppet of Katrina Steiner.  Our organization is small, but we’re gaining new members all the time, and we’d like you to help us secure a new high-profile convert to our cause.”

The image of a man with dark skin, black hair, and blue eyes rimmed by the thick frames of his glasses appears on the briefing room screen next to the remote feed.

“His name is Dr. Juan Romero,” Doge explains, “and he’s a senior technician at the Ioto Galactic Enterprises manufacturing facilities on Alarion.  Dr. Romero is ready to put his skills to use for the CLF, but he’s under heavy guard and can’t leave on his own.  That’s where you come in.”

Miss Black triggers the next slide which has a map of the Ioto Galactic Enterprises facilities.

“Our job is to extract Dr. Romero safely from the facility where he works, and give the First Lyran Regulars a black eye if we can,” Miss Black explains.  “Just don’t hang around too long.  The First has increased their presence at the site since your last appearance there, so you can expect reinforcements to show up quickly once you make a scene.”  

“Be careful where you’re shooting,” Doge adds.  “The pickup area contains facilities for processing explosives and combustible materials and we don’t want any collateral damage.  Also, the CLF can help with ground troops and transports if needed.”

“Thank you, Doge,” Miss Black says.  “We’ll be in touch through Bian Lian,” she states.

“Freedom for Alarion, freedom for the Commonwealth,” Doge replies before killing the remote feed.

Objectives:

Primary - Extract Dr. Juan Romero from the building at Nav Point Alpha and get him off your home edge

Secondary - Destroy the First Lyran Regulars forces protecting the facility

Special Rules

Executing the Pickup

Dr. Juan Romero will be located at the building designated as Nav Point Alpha on your map.  There are two ways you can extract him:

1. The Chauffeur Pickup: Any unit ending its movement adjacent to the nav point can signal to Dr. Romero.  In the next turn’s movement phase, Dr. Romero will leave the building he is in and move into the hex of an AA unit adjacent to the building.  This could be the same unit that signaled or a different one.  Dr. Romero is considered to be picked up at the end phase of that turn, meaning there’s a window of opportunity where he could be fired upon.  The signaling unit does not need to remain stationary to make the pickup.

2. The Daycare Pickup: Infantry can be sent inside the building to secure Dr. Romero and escort him to any friendly adjacent unit.  Again, Dr. Romero is considered to be picked up in the end phase of the turn in which he is escorted outside.  Note that this is a three turn process as you would need to unload infantry, move them inside, then escort Dr. Romero outside.

Dr. Romero

Dr. Romero is unarmed and can move 1 hex per turn.  When moving alone, he is treated as a one-man infantry stand.  When moving with an infantry platoon, he moves at the platoon's speed.  Damage applied to the accompanying infantry is applied to the troopers as normal, with Dr. Romero being the last man in the platoon.

When picked up by a mech or vehicle, he is considered to be inside that unit.  When riding in a mech, head hits will apply damage to Dr. Romero, with six head hits or cockpit destruction killing him alongside the controlling mechwarrior.  When riding in a vehicle, Dr. Romero is considered to be the last crewman when determining crew/commander deaths resulting from vehicle destruction.  In the event of a ‘Crew Killed’ critical hit, Dr. Romero perishes along with the crew.

Tonnage Allotment

Each player may bring four units–there is no tonnage limit.  The Commonwealth Liberation Front can provide you with two heavy wheeled APCs and two platoons of foot rifle ballistic infantry that do not count against your unit limits.  These are optional; You don’t have to take them.

Players

William + Devin

Meta Tags

• Homebrew - This mission utilizes custom rules and mechanics that are not part of any printed rulebook

• Deadly - There is a higher than normal chance of pilot death in this mission

• Extraction - This mission involves getting an objective off-board within a time limit

• VIP - This mission involves one or more VIPs that are directly connected to mission objectives

• Time Sensitive - Success or failure of mission objectives hinges on completing them before time runs out

• Urban - The mission takes place in an urban environment

• 

Spreadsheet

Mercenary Company v142

Map

XO Thames to provide when available.

[NorCal CBT]

Hi everyone,

Apologies to William and Devin for this taking so long.  There's been a lot to do for this mission, but I finally have a map.

We will be re-using the factory map we used for the previous mission with the following modifications:

• The storage containers will be replaced with level 2 medium buildings
• The single large factory building in the northeast corner of the map will be replaced with an arrangement of buildings as depicted in Ioto Galactic Enterprises R+D

Also note that your target building, Nav Point Alpha, has been set.

Since I can't afford to reprint this map at the moment, the layout you see in the linked file will be laid over the top of the map with terrain pieces and you can just ignore the building as written on the paper map.

Let me know if you have questions.  I will try to address them in your Saturday evening as I wake up for breakfast.

Allen

[Tom Ramirez]

Yes, will the op force receive a preview of our unit sheets?

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[NorCal CBT]

Yes, I can make that happen.  Give me a couple minutes.  I'll send it to you and KC directly.

Allen

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[Devil Crayon]

Ugh, Allen.  This mission? It was _A_Problem_. 

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[Tom Ramirez]

It was... daunting. Mine and KC's op-force got some mid/late game reinforcements that shifted the game balance heavily in our favor. Even with a wildcard third party interrupting our defence, it became extremely difficult for the players to achieve their objectives.

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[NorCal CBT]

I talked with Thomas about how this mission went your Sunday evening / my Monday morning.

I did notice that I forgot to include Asymmetrical Force Composition into the meta tags.  Sorry about that guys.  Despite that oversight on my part, I can only design for how I think you guys will play and you surprised me on this one.  I knew the Archer and PIlum would hang back, but I had imagined that you would keep the rest of your forces mobile and potentially use your lighter units for spotting indirect LRM fire if you didn't want them to get too close to enemy units.

The Black Marauder also factored into how OpFor's force was built.  I'm ready to admit I may have overcompensated a little.

While I know people aren't happy about it, the outcome of this mission stands.  The crew of CQ's Condor, DP's Epona, and DP BA Squad Gamma are alive and MIA along with Dr. Romero.

I will try to have a debrief written this weekend, but please have some patience.  There's some interesting possibilities I'm brainstorming with and I don't have as much free time as I used to.

Allen

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[Devil Crayon]

I'm all for a challenging mission, which this was even before the initial reinforcement, due to the limitation of our force size requirements and the forces available to be fielded.  It became effectively impossible with the arrival of 350ish additional tones on every edge of the board, especially with the ability to place them anywhere along each edge, combined with one round's less-than-optimal movement placement. 

I understand the desire to pressure us to extract Dr Romero quickly and not stand and fight, but this was just too much. 

The necessity to stand in place repeatedly, especially after the OpFor deduced our mission, was an additional impediment to the viability of this mission. 

If it was built as a Force-fail, hurray you succeeded.   No one enjoys those in any game setting, though. 

I'm fine playing forward with the outcome as it stands, but I don't understand the intention of the design if it wasn't a forced-fail scenario. 

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[Thomas F.]

This is partially my fault. I messed up with adding an additional op4 unit at the end there.  3 should have come onto the board, NOT 4.  

Secondly, I think AA could have moved a bit differently and spread out op4.  you were clustered, and that meant they were clustered.  The choices of available targets were always at a minimum.  (you guys hid your units behind the buildings really well.... maybe too well?) leaving only 1 viable target .... the epona.

There were 4 map sheets but AA used 1 ¼ of them.  Your units had mobility, maneuverability and better to hits .... for the most part....  sorry William

Op4 needed 10+ to hit you guys when you did move.  

For instance, if you had deployed all your jump units in the stacks op4 would have had to maneuver to counter that.
Yes you would have taken fire, it would have sucked to get a unit popped by a lucky hit but that would have meant the epona could have had more space/ time to fulfil its mission.

Maybe a note for the future is that the mission briefings should ONLY be sent to the active players?  
But I think KC and tom did pretty good, they were responding to a force on the board and moved accordingly.  Most of their units rarely had targets.  

Having 4 heavy/ assault reinforcements pop onto the field on each edge was ROUGH, I agree!  If the die rolls had been all 5's however, AA would have gotten to decide what side they all came in on and that would have made a world of difference!

The assaults were 3-5's.  would have taken forever to get into position.... IF the rng had been different.

Its rough, and losing units/ pilots is terrible because it takes so long to get them back.  I sympathize, Its happened to all of us  (Look what happened to Toms commander!) 
The mission was a tough one, I totally agree, but could have been accomplished.

T-

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From: norca...@googlegroups.com <norca...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Devil Crayon <devil...@gmail.com>
Sent: Monday, October 20, 2025 4:32 PM
To: norca...@googlegroups.com <norca...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: Game 142: The Extraction of Juan Romero - Mission Briefing

 

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[Devil Crayon]

I'm sorry, reading back over that, it comes across much more harshly than I intended. I wanted to provide more detailed feedback than "mission bad" and got wrapped up in my head.  

I appreciate the work that goes into this and it was overall a fun mission. 

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[Chekhovs Gunslinger]

I do think keeping the mission briefings confidential to the players could be beneficial. I didn't re-read the mission briefing beforehand for that reason and had mostly forgotten what the player's goals were supposed to be. If AA had made a feint that they were going for the cargo stacks instead of the buildings, I probably would have genuinely fallen for it and positioned my units there.

In the opposite vein, I definitely dropped the ball with too much player knowledge about the Black Marauder: instead of engaging and letting it carve throught the OpFor, I gave that thing a wide berth. (I did check the lore afterwards, and the first rumors shouldn't be appearing until 3074. So OpFor should have had no inkling what was going on. Oops.)

-KC

On Mon, Oct 20, 2025 at 5:39 PM Thomas F. <thom...@hotmail.com> wrote:

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