League play is a format for playing Battletech that appears in the Hot Spots: Hinterlands book. It involves players creating mercenary units of standardized sizes to accept mercenary contracts and battle each other for fame and fortune in the chaotic wild west of the ilClan era in the Hinterlands.

Yes, without access to that book you will have a very difficult time looking up missions, understanding repairs and purchases between missions, etc. You will also want to pick up the Mercenaries rules, either by buying the boxed set or as a free download from Catalyst’s Battletech website, because you will need those rules to properly use BSP assets and strikes.

You will need to create a Scale 1 mercenary unit using the rules in the Hot Spots: Hinterlands book (modified slightly by our House Rules — be sure to read those too!), and then submit your unit’s information using the form on the League’s homepage.

Yes and no. While this League is appropriate for beginner players, it probably isn’t appropriate for people who have never played Battletech before. It should provide a good experience for people who understand the basics and want to take things to the next level, but it might be overwhelming if this is your first experience with Battletech ever.

You’ll want to negotiate the current contract, following the rules from Hot Spots: Hinterlands for doing so.

Then, you’ll want to find other people in the League to play Battletech with you. You will probably have the easiest time doing that through your FLGS or the Arcadia discord server.

Our Seasons last from January to October each year. We take November and December off to give people a chance to take a break (10 months of League play is a long time!), and to give the League organizers time to fine-tune things for the next Season.

The following optional rules are used in the League and can be found in the BattleTech Manual: Backward Level Changes (pg. 15), One-Armed Prone Fire (pg. 30), Floating Criticals (pg. 45), Fire and Smoke (modified by the House Rules), Simplified Buildings (pg. 66), Enhanced Flamers (pg. 99), and Targeting (Active Probe, pg. 110).

You and your opponent are free to use any additional optional rules you want, so long as you agree on them (you should do that before your match starts, not in the thick of battle).

No, you can make a new unit if you want to. Be sure to review the House Rules when doing so, as there are some very relevant House Rules that apply to units created mid-Season to help keep players re-starting their units from falling too far behind!

None of the playtest rules are being used in the League.

A new edition of Battletech is expected to be released later this year. The League will use the current (i.e., “Total Warefare”) rules for the duration of Season 2. However, assuming the new edition is released on time, you should expect the League to adopt those rules in Season 3.

Alternate ammunition is permitted to be used but must be declared to the opposing player prior to playing the first turn of the Track, and any ammunition bin using alternate ammunition must be clearly marked on your record sheet.

Be aware that some alternate ammunition (Semi-Guided LRMs, for example) may change your force’s BV calculations.

It is your responsibility to know the rules for any alternate ammunition you use, and to bring the relevant rulebook with you to your game so you can show those rules to your opponent if requested.

Yes, but it is your responsibility to know the rules for any equipment you use, and to bring a copy of the relevant rulebook with you to the game so you can show those rules to the other player if requested.

You can use battlemechs, including omnimechs, but you cannot use industrial mechs (they have their own tab on the MUL for a reason). To keep things from getting too complicated, you cannot use LAMs or Quadvees either. If you have another weird edge-case unit that you want to use (Superheavy mechs, drone units, etc.) you are welcome to ask, but the answer is probably going to be “no” for the sake of everyone else’s sanity.

There aren’t actually clear rules in the Hinterlands book for this, so please use the following:

Repair Armor Only (No Dead Suits): Tonnage/2

Repair Structure (Less than Half of Squad Suits are Dead after Rounding Up): Tonnage x 2

Repair Crippled (Half or More of Squad Suits are Dead after Rounding Up, But Not All Squad Suits are Dead): Tonnage x 3

In all the above examples, “tonnage” is the tonnage of the entire Squad and not each individual suit. Paying this cost fully repairs the entire Squad. For example, a Squad of Inner Sphere Standard battle armor weighs 4 tons, so if 1 Suit was dead and the other 3 Suits just had armor damage, it would cost 8 SP to fully repair the Squad.

Battle Armor does not have a “destroyed but not truly destroyed” state. If all Suits in the Squad are dead, the Squad is truly destroyed, and a new Squad must be purchased.

Hiring a new Battle Armor Squad crew costs 100 SP for Gunnery 4 Anti-Mech 5 or 0 SP for Gunnery 5 Anti-Mech 6. This is in addition to the purchase cost of the new Battle Armor Squad Suits.

Battle Armor Squads that use consumables (for example: SRMs on Elemental Suits, mines on Fa Shih Suits, etc.) must pay a flat 10 SP rearm cost which rearms the entire Squad.

Finally, just to be clear: Battle Armor Squads cannot be salvaged.

Use the cost for the Prime configuration. This rule exists to prevent people from just purchasing the cheapest configuration and then paying a small fee to swap it to a much more expensive configuration.

The Merchant Quarter will list the battle armor type (for example: Gnome (Upgrade)). The player has the option of choosing the squad size and the weapon mount, but must pay the appropriate BV cost. For example, the Gnome (Upgrade) could be purchased as a 5-man squad with Bearhunter autocannons for 476 SP. Players must be sure to submit their chosen squad size and weapon mount when submitting a purchase and/or sale order for battle armor units.

At the beginning of each real-life month, the Bounty Board is updated to reflect all bounties claimed and to add any new bounties. This prevents players from easily being able to “bet on themselves” by immediately placing a bounty on a force they’re about to fight, as that bounty won’t become active until the next month.