Game Terms and Mechanics

The list below is extensive. Notice that not all terms are used by all servers within their configurations. The Tabs may also have been renamed, although that is less common.

Interface Tabs

Battles Hosts - All megamek Hosts and Dedicated Hosts are shown on this table. Players may join a host by clicking on their line.

Black Market - Players don't always need to get their units from Factories, instead being able to bid on the Black Market for the units available. Some servers permit the players to see which kind of units are there, others show only their weight. Some ask for Influence or a minimum Experience before players may bid. Others have no Black Market at all.

Faction Status - On this table players may see their Faction's available Factories, Components and also the units residing in their Bays. Here you can buy new or used units, as long as there are enough components for a new unit or enough units were or autoproduced.

Faction Channel - Players from the same Faction may talk privately here, exchange information about their armies, exchange units among themselves and read the Faction's Message of the Day.

Headquarters - Here are the player's units represented, as well as the armies formed with those. Players may review their units as well as make repairs or exchange pilots, both options which vary as well in possibilities and difficulty from MekWars Server to MekWars Server. You may also define your units camo here.

Main Channel - All the chatting occurs here. The server's Message of the Day also appears here, right after login. Other campaign information like Faction Ranking may also appear here. Players may configure their clients to show information from other tabs also in main, go to File - Configure - Tabs.

Map - Sometimes called Planetary Map, the Inner Sphere or some other fancy name, here players may see the campaigns map, with its planets, as well as operation's ranges. Planets with a number beside them show the number of warehouses in it, while a * means they also have one or more factories. Clicking on a planet reveals more information, like its production, conquer points and terrain types as well as any other special information the campaign may have added.

Miscellanenous - All sorts of extra information, like general status, units produced/destroyed in a tick, etc, appear here.

Mod Mail - Staff members get this extra channel for private talking as well as reporting on the commands used by other staff members.

Parts Black Market - If the server uses Advanced Parts Repairs, those are shown here.

Private Channel - Unless configured for private tabs, all private conversations as well as personal commands given appear here. To talk in private with someone just double click on the players name on the list.

Repairs - This is the place for all information regardind repairs realized on units, including costs, time needed, rolls, failures and/or technician upgrades/deaths.

Roleplay Channel - This optional channel is sort of a second main channel, for use by roleplayers.

Terms

Active Duty - This means your armies are on the front-line and so are able to see all other armies which can be attacked. This is also called blinding, as the opponents don't have any idea of who the opponent is or which BV and army composition he or she has. While active, the players armies count toward production. Notice that the time needed to be active once the command is given, as well as the number of seconds one is not able to attack while going to the frontlines varies from server to server. Some servers show which players are active, by changing the icons by their names, others hide this information.

Army - In MekWars an army means a group of units organized togheter on the Headquarters. Armies must be legal for at least one kind of operation for players to be able to play against each other. They may need to have a number of commanders, or its units must have a minimum weight or speed to allow that. This is the main point of difference between the many MekWars servers.

Arranged Game - Game that happens upon understanding of both players and out of of the front-line, usually being started from reserve.

Attack From Reserve (AFR) - Some operations may be started from the menu Games - Attack from Reserve. They are started by the player who wants to attack, choosing planet and opponent. The opponent must then accept the attack.

Autoproduction - When a factory has its maximum number of units exceeded, the surplus have a chance to be transformed into a new unit which goes directly to the house bays or to the Black Market. This chance is variable per server. Many factions organize themselves so that players know when NOT to buy from a factory, so as to give it a chance to autoproduce a new unit.

Bays (Personal) - This is MekWar's hangar size limit. Number of bays needed by a unit class and weight vary from Server to Server. Som servers put a limitation to the number of bays a player may have, others enable more than this maximum, sometimes asking a fee per game played for the extra bays. Players start with a minimum number of bays set by the server and receive some more from planets owned by the faction which contain warehouses. Players may then later lease more bays on the menu Campaign - Bays - Lease.

Bays (Faction) - This confusing term stands for the place where the autoproduced Used Units

Blinding - The act of attacking players which are on active duty, without knowing who they are and what they are bringing is called blinding. This is the main form of play for most tournament servers.

Buildtables - When a player buys a new unit, the units exact type is determined by its Faction's buildtables. They have a list of the percentual chance for a given type of unit to be obtained. Most servers enable players to check out the buildtables through the Help - Buildtable Viewer menu. Every server has its own set of buildtables. Some servers also make use of specific buildtables for the different BattleTech eras, or Subfactions. Such differences aren't shown on the Buildtable viewer.

Camo - This is the hangar units camouflage, chosen in MekWars through the Headquarters tab.

C-Bills - This is the typical currency of the BattleTech universe. Servers may change its name though. C-Bills may be used for almost all possible transactions in the game: buying units, repairing, as the cost to use start some Operations and so on.

Commander - Some Operations ask for armies to have a number of commanding units, whose death counts as a victory condition.

Components - Those are used to produce units on the factories. Each MekWars server defines how many components are necessary for a given factory to produce one unit. Components are obtained through being active or during battle, the quantity depending on house production.

Conquer Points (cp) - This represents the value of a planet, and is usually 100 on most servers, which is why many people also call it just "%". Through combat factions may conquer the planets and, upon reaching a certain minimum level, obtain control of it.

Cycle - A common term among all servers to determine the duration of the campaign. After a Cycle is declared finished, Server Admins usually reset all accounts and changes to the planetary map, thus reseting/restarting the campaign.

Dedicated Host (Ded) - Those are independent hosts, often set by the server administration to help people play which are behind firewalls and so can't host themselves.

Defection - All players start on the training faction and are able to later on defect to one of the main factions in the campaign. Some servers ask for a minimum experience before a player is able to defect. To Defect go to Campaign - Other - Defect.

ELO - This is a common measure of success on chess and other games. More information here. Some servers show this value by the players name, others hide it.

Total Economic Value - Represents the total number of components a faction is able to produce from all its planets.

Experience - Another measuring unit in MekWars, it is obtained after playing games. Experience is mostly used as a representation of number of games played, but it also controls access to many features inside a server, like heavier units, defection to factions and subfactions or types of operations available to a player.

Faction (House) and Subfactions - The teams to which a player may defect to are called Factions. They determine the players color, buildtables and any other settings dependent on the Factions resources. Some servers also make use of Subfcations, which demand a given experience and/or winning rate for players to join them. Subfactions control access to other resources or different kinds of operations.

Faction Ranking - This number shows the total of Conquer Points of a faction and whether it was changed for more or less. Ex: Draconis Combine (+14/2314), means that the Draconis Combine has a total of 2314, and, since begin of the Campaign its total was raised by 14, i.e., it started originally with 2300 points. Some servers use this number as a victory condition for the whole campaign, thus ending a cycle.

Factory - To buy new units players need to have factories. Those need components to produce units, quantity varying by unit kind and weight. When a player buys a unit, the components get used and the factory needs some time (measured in ticks to refresh. Factories have also a maximum quantity of components they can hold at a time, with any surplus giving chances for autoproduction. If a factory planet gets conquered, all of it factories go to the other faction.

Farming - While on active duty players collect components for their faction and influence for themselves. That is called farming.

Fluff - Unit assigments or funny texts and images near a players name are called Fluff. Fluff is also a general term for all imaginary stuff surrounding the game, like the characters of the BattleTech universe or the kinds of units the Great Houses use.

Host - A player hosting a game uses his computer as the basis for the MegaMek interface. That is done through the Host - Start a Game and Join menu. Players may also help others who are behind firewalls and such to play by the creation of dedicated hosts or "deds".

Influence (Popular Support) - MekWar´s second main currency, Influence (or Popular Support as the Shack and now some other servers have it) is used as a control based on active play of the game. It is mainly used as extra cost for units, or to start operations. It is also common for many servers to use it as non-coded currency for campaign changes. Its earned usually by active duty, bought with Reward Points or winning games.

Logo - Players may set their logos on Campaign - Other - Set Logo.

Maintainance Costs - Servers which do not use repairs end up having this: Techs get assigned to units to maintain them. If a player has more units than techs to maintain them, unmaintained units get a chance to be destroyed while the player is in active duty or in combat.

Mercenaries - Some servers utilize the mercenary code, which enables special factions to be able to hire their services to others for a given ammount of time or a set ammount of conquered terrain or components.

MotD, Faction MotD and Server MotD (Message of the Day) - MotDs are messages set up by house leaders and or server administrators with information for the players. There are always at least two MotDs, that of the server, which appears right after login, and the one which appears on Faction Channel.

No-Play List - Some servers enable players to put other players on no-play lists, thus making it impossible for them to play against each other, no matter if both are at the same time in active duty.

Operation - This is the main term for all kinds of missions players may accomplish on a server. They are also the main point of difference between the different servers. Operations may demand starting costs from defender and/or attackers to initiate them, they have different payouts, they may also give special units, mines or even entire armies to the players. Payouts in all forms vary widely from server to server. Map sizes and conditions are also defined by the operations, as well as which planets may be attacked and what effects the operations have upon those for both sides, winning or losing.

Pay Out - Defines the output of operations, usually in form of money, influence, reward points, conquest or components.

Parts - Usually confused or even used as another name for components, parts actually represent the individual pieces of mechs on servers using Parts Repair rules. They may be bought on the Parts Black Market tab, or obtained through salvage and scrapping of mechs.

Pilots - Are obtained through the menu Campaign - Personal - Pilots and divided by unit type and weight. Some servers enable players to exchange pilots between units of the same type and weight, others don´t. Some also enable retirement. As players fight, their pilots skills increase and they may as well gain special powers if the server uses them. Pilots who flee in combat have a chance to be captured by the enemy.

Planet - Planets represent the factions area of dominion. They vary in terrain, may possess factories or warehouses. Planets may also be classified as Homeplanets of a faction, or possess special definitions which limit the type of operations which can be launched upon them.

Production - This determines how units get produced for the factories or for the used units bays. Production is results from the Total Economic Value of a Faction being multiplied by the total of multipliers brought by players in active duty or in battle. Every army active is worth some points, and each operation has a specific value. Every tick MekWars calculates the total and multiplies by the economic value of the faction, the resulting number is added to all factory types. Example:

The Capellan Confederation has an total economic value of 1000. Two of its players are fighting operations worth x1 and x1.5. Other three players are active, their total of 5 armies, as this server puts a value of 2 per army, they give an additional (5 * x2) x10 multiplier. The faction total per Tick is 1.0 + 1.5 + 10 = x12.5. Every Tick the Cappies will produce 12.5 * 1000 = 12500 components for all its possible factory categories.

Factories have a maximum number of components they may hold, if production on a tick puts the factory total at a higher threshold it may autoproduce a unit.

Repairs - The campaign structure of MekWars enables a number of different forms of hangar administration, one of those being the use of repairs.

Reserve Duty - Players whose are armies are not on the front line are in reserve duty. All players login automatically in reserve. Most servers also set that after combat players get automatically sent to reserve and can´t get attacked after a game.

Rolling - When people ask each other to "roll", they mean a normal 2d6 die cast. In MekWars that is done through the command /roll written in main channel. This command automatically rolls 2d6, if you want other parameters, write them beside, for example: /roll 3d10 means 3 dice of 10 sides each are cast and totalled.

Reward Points - The third MekWars currency, Reward Points may be generally used for special effects: getting rare mechs, refreshing factories, repairing units, etc. All those possibilities are also limited as per individual server rules.

Solaris Training Company (SOL) - After login and clicking on "get started", players are always assigned to the training faction Solaris. Some servers change its name but the idea remains the same: a place where one can battle without fear of losing units. Training operations leave no damage on units and many servers enable players in SOL to reset their units, receiveing a bunch of new units to experiment. After some time fighting here (usually between none or three battles), players are allowed to defect to one of the main factions.

Tasking/Restasking - Starting an Operation is known on the servers as (re)tasking.

Techs - If the server uses Repairs, that is the name of the technicians which repair the units, they may be bought on the Campaign - Personal - Techs menu. Technicians have varying degrees of skill, they may level up or die as well while repairing units. If the servers do not use Repairs, then the name Tech substitutes that of Bays, and stands for the quantity of personal needed to keep the units maintained.

Terrain - Terrain defines which kind of map players should expect when attacking a planet. Few or lots of forest, hilly terrain, rivers, cold/heat, gravity, night attack, rain or urban terrain are all possible features of MekWars maps. Some servers also set specific Boards for some planets or operations, which don´t vary per planet, except for weather conditions.

Tick - That is MekWars' basic time unit. Server Admins may set their own quantities. Every tick information gets sent to the server, active players farm Influence and production.

Warehouse - Those are the number of extra bays a planet gives to the all factions players.