Merc 2000, Who Plays?

[Rockwolf66]

As the thread title says who plays Merc2000?

I've never seen the rulebook but I have some Twilight2000/Merc2000 books. I was wondering how it played?

[Panther Al]

Pretty good in my mind. HAd to do a little fudging if you wanted some of the stuff not converted over as far as gear goes, and you have to wing more of the RP bits as well since the system is geared more to combat than other things.

But it allowed for some good games: Group I was in a long time ago did quite a few caper style missions - IE: the bad guys from Die Hard, or Heat, and so on and so forth as well as the white hat merc roles in some backwater.

[Adm.Lee]

I ran it in the mid-90s, maybe about 2 years of once-a-month games.

It ran fine, other than some rough parts of v2 rules that needed smoothing out. The big one of those was using XP to raise the PCs' initiative to 5 or 6, and totally dominate the battles.

I ran a lot of one-off missions, rather than ongoing operations, so resupply was never an issue. More SpecOps or caper kind of things than infantry warfare. I think I used the Barbados threesome from the Merc book, and a handful of the others.

My group was based in the Caribbean, with a hiring hall in Miami ("big Bob's House of Boom"). They eventually bought themselves a flying boat for transport.

[Olefin]

"("big Bob's House of Boom"). "

Damn - can I use that? That is one great name!

[The Rifleman]

Originally Posted by Adm.Lee

They eventually bought themselves a flying boat for transport.

They ended up being something like this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YdFN6agkNnQ

[Legbreaker]

Originally Posted by Adm.Lee

It ran fine, other than some rough parts of v2 rules that needed smoothing out. The big one of those was using XP to raise the PCs' initiative to 5 or 6, and totally dominate the battles.

In 2.0 the "fix", which is already in the rules anyway, is to simply understand and actually USE the rule on repetitive actions. Also implement the rules on explosive weapons combined with injury effects.
Using these elements in a combined manner, as well as lower initiative characters ambushing, NPC's and low initiative PCs can absolutely OWN the battlefield!

[Graebarde]

Ran several Merc operations/campaigns back in the day. We did the Sangria campaign from Recon using Twilight rules, twice I think with different groups.

[Adm.Lee]

1. Yes, you can use "Big Bob's House of Boom." There are already stores in Miami and Las Vegas, but somewhere in the Pacific should have one, too! See my agent for franchise opportunities! Come join the finest team in wholesale firearms and mercenary contracting!

2. I never saw or remembered "Tales of the Gold Monkey" in the '80s, my wife had, and she got us the DVDs last year. So it may have been like that to some of the players. At least two of us were heavy into Jimmy Buffett at that time, so that was more what I visualized-- especially the song "Jamaica mistaika." The two bad guy characters in his novel Where is Joe Merchant appeared, and I may have used parts of that plot, too. I had two opportunities to visit Grand Cayman then, too, so I had Caribbean sand in my brain.

3. Explosions, wounds, repetitive actions and ambushes: all done by me, but sometimes the PCs are the ones doing the ambushing, and that's just not pretty for the bad guys. It was all part of the v2 learning curve.

4. Sangria and Recon: I only had the Vietnam and Israeli books for that game, was that a good campaign?

I do know that I had about 2 dozen issues of Challenge back then, and I used a few of the scenarios in there. The only one I can remember was the hijacking of the uranium. The players were not happy to find that they'd done a nasty for the bad guys.

I also remember doing a few missions in the Biafran war. No one saw Roland, though.

[Tegyrius]

Originally Posted by Adm.Lee

I also remember doing a few missions in the Biafran war. No one saw Roland, though.

But did they deploy as a Learjet SWAT team?

- C.

[bobcat]

i saw Roland at Berkeley.

[Legbreaker]

Originally Posted by Adm.Lee

3. Explosions, wounds, repetitive actions and ambushes: all done by me, but sometimes the PCs are the ones doing the ambushing, and that's just not pretty for the bad guys.

Ambushes never are. They're effective, DAMN effective, that's why they're the tactic of choice in almost all situations. The best way to inflict maximum casualties on an enemy force for minimum investment of resources and manpower, with the lowest amount of risk.

Something to keep in mind is that NPC groups often have more manpower available than PCs. Weapons, food, etc might be in shorter supply, but the extra manpower allows them to send out patrols and post sentries more often and effectively, thereby giving them the advantage of situational awareness. Most PC groups are (in my experience at least) fairly mobile and fast moving while NPCs are usually restricted in long range mobility and often have a better understanding of the local area because of this.

[boogiedowndonovan]

Originally Posted by The Rifleman

They ended up being something like this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YdFN6agkNnQ

Holy Crap, Tales of the Golden Monkey!

when someone talks about mercs and a flying boat, I think of this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSKSpHdIrvo

I was part of a group that played Merc 2000 for a short while. We got around in an MV-22 Osprey and called ourselves International Response and Security or IRS for short. We screwed bad guys over just like the US government IRS.

fun times for the short time that game lasted.

[Rockwolf66]

Well I Was thinking about running a Merc2000 game with some people I know.

I was going to start them out with four semiautomatic AR-15 carbines, a L34 supressed submachinegun and a Colt Automatic rifle.

Vehicle wise they'll have a GMC suburban.

The only real issue is that none of us are clear about the vehicle rules yet.

[The Rifleman]

Originally Posted by boogiedowndonovan

Holy Crap, Tales of the Golden Monkey!

when someone talks about mercs and a flying boat, I think of this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSKSpHdIrvo

I was part of a group that played Merc 2000 for a short while. We got around in an MV-22 Osprey and called ourselves International Response and Security or IRS for short. We screwed bad guys over just like the US government IRS.

fun times for the short time that game lasted.

I forgot, they did use a flying boat! That one was a little bit meaner than the one poor one eye Jack had.

[Neal5x5]

Originally Posted by Rockwolf66

Well I Was thinking about running a Merc2000 game with some people I know.

I was going to start them out with four semiautomatic AR-15 carbines, a L34 supressed submachinegun and a Colt Automatic rifle.

Vehicle wise they'll have a GMC suburban.

The only real issue is that none of us are clear about the vehicle rules yet.

Check out the Merc 2000 adventure in Challange magazine#60. It has a good starting point for a group rather like what you have in mind, but the players have to acquire thier weapons and vehicle first. Also, for startup $ the players have to rip off a drug deal. Its on RPGnow for 2.50 or so.

[Tegyrius]

Originally Posted by Neal5x5

Check out the Merc 2000 adventure in Challange magazine#60. It has a good starting point for a group rather like what you have in mind, but the players have to acquire thier weapons and vehicle first. Also, for startup $ the players have to rip off a drug deal. Its on RPGnow for 2.50 or so.

Better yet, just get the whole bundle of Issues 25-77 for $34. Totally worth it.

- C.