V5.00ˆ  HeadhunterHDH-7R¾ 6ZNðBðBà@ML 2 1 1 1 —— 9 ecm   ¯ (Unknown)¯ (Unknown)[ (Unknown)x (Unknown)¯¯¯¯xx¯¯¯¯  [[âÿXÞ Created and built without solicitation by the tiny M'butto and McDougal Manufacturing Compnay in central Africa, the Headhunter was a strange attempt for the company to move into the larger market of defense contracts. The driving force for acceptance into the SLDF was Colonel Marcus M'Butto, chief of SLDF procurements. The speed of acceptance, plus the lack of adequate testing and even a need lead to a two year internal SLDF investigation. The result was to quietly accept the mech rather than have a public humiliation, and the early retirement of Colonel M'Butto, who immediately started a second failed career as a consultant to firms developing defense weapons. Records show that the main selling point was above average campaigning of the missile systems' ability to allow a light mech to destroy an assualt mech, while effectively detracting from the mech's many shortcomings. Armed with two single shot Headhunter missile systems and two Medium lasers (one rear firing) the Headhunter was designed for one highly specialized mission: to close with and destroy Heavy and Assualt mech's, preferably command mechs, in either covert action before a battle or in the opening stages. The idea was that the Headhunter would get as close as possible before a battle, quickly attack and destroy, then flee before defenders could mount any defense. The critical flaw in this was the fine line between when the target mech would power up and when the defenses would be active enough to force a retreat. This worked with spectacular results in computer simulations provided by McDougal Graphic Arts and Movie Effects (a subsidary of M'Butto and McDougal - later found to be the first contract ever undertaken by the company and located in Thomas McDougal's bedroom), but in SLDF simulations, this proved to be an extremely small window of oppotunity. The other tactic was to have one or two Headhunters in a company bent on a blinding attack across a battlefield once the commanding mech was identified. In simulation and field exercises, they would be held in reserve just out of range of the battle. When called forward, the company would make a mad dash to the target mech and attempt to create as much confusion as possible. The Headhunter(s) would use this opportunity to fire on the command mech, and then the entire company would beat a hasty retreat. This tactic was only marginally successful, and was doomed to be thought of as a last desperate measure at best, or a waste or men and material at worst.r The Headhunter is an example of a mech built to support a weapon system. The Headhunter allows for a dedicated head shot in the heat of combat The Headhunter uses a highly specialized targeting computer that finds and locks onto the unique electronic emissions of a mech's cockpit. This computer is built into the weapon system and the mech, each requiring the other component to function, which accounts for the large space needed for the weapon and the fact that the weapon was never considered feasible for mounting in another mech. Communication and gyroscopic signatures allow for the inital lock, but the pre-fire lock comes from when the Headhunter comes into close enough range to identify life support control computer readings. Once the trageting computer has these parameters met, it enters the prefire mode. (Game Play Note: This is the first of two turns required to fire the Headhunter, and a hit must be rolled at the end of the turn to allow a lock on the target. If the roll is a miss, there is no lock and the missile cannot be fired in the next turn) The maximum range for the compter to detect these signal ia 90 meters, and even that close the lock is weak at best. After prefire is achieved, the pilot may attempt to fire, but the following additional parameters must be met: Neither mech ccould have changed levels in the current or previous turns. The attacking mech must be motionless in the turn being fired, any movement prior to firing will place the system into safe mode due to the high probability of a miss. The attacking unit cannot use any other weapon (including AMS), doing so overtaxes the firing computer and again places the system in safe mode. The attacking mech cannot have recieved any damage in the previous turn, the targeting computer is sensitive and needs time to rest from the violent shaking from damage. The targeting computer gives no modifiers to firing rolls for the missile (but does for the laser), its onlyfunction for the missiles is to allow the mech to use the weapon. Heat cannot be more than 8 or the weapon will not lock. The target must be a mech; vehicles and VTOL units were not considered worthy targets for the missile so their signatures were not incorporated into the targeting computer (of course woods, buildings, battle armor and infantry cannot be targeted). The target mech cannot have moved farther than 4 hexes before being attacked or the weapon cannot lock onto it. This effectively eliminates most light and medium mech's from being targets. The target cannot do any jumping at all or the lock will not be achieved. (NOTE: If this star League weapon is somehow found and used after 3050, the target must be and Innersphere mech or a clan second line mech that is rooted in star league era technology. Omnimechs and newer clan designs emit electronic signatures too alien for the compter to understand). A shutdown mech cannot be targeted, nor can a prone mech due to interference from ground clutter. Finally, the unique nature of the weapon, there is a +3 added to all die rolls. AMS and ECM (including the ECM from the attacking mech) does affect the missile, any hit will deflect it and automatically cause a miss. If all the paramters are met, the pilot fires the missile and it homes into the cockpit without missing, doing 12 points of damage. If a miss is rolled, it misses. It does not function like a streak missile. UWith only 16 being built and 11 of those thought lost to Kerensky's Exodus, there is very little history on this mech. Add to this the fact that most sane pilots would not want to use it (only the bravest, most suicidal, or mechwarriors looking for an amnesty would consider it) and you wind up with a mech that is highly specialized to the point of obscurity. Some pilots even tried to avoid piloting the mech in testing and simulations, considering it to be a waste of time. The only recorded use of the Mech in combat was in the opening hours of the Amaris uprising, when a lucky and unusual set of circumstances allowed a Headhunter to destroy an Atlas. While the capabilities of the Headhunter pilot are not questioned, historians cast a shadow on the abilities and experience of the Atlas pilot as being the only explanation for the outcome. ¶No variants are known to exist, in fact there are no known examples at all in the Innersphere, although two are unaccounted for. It never drew enough serious interest to even attempt modification by SLDF scientists Information from sources in the Clan Nova Cat indicate the design was considered useless upon arrival in clan space. It found favor for a short while with Clan warriors who either wanted to prove themselves for misdeeds in trial of refusal, or with older warriors who wanted an honorable death to end their careers. Most are believed destroyed in these endeavors. The only known Headhunter left is a non-operational one used as a static display in a museum on Strana Mechty.‘ Mechwarrior Abigal Brizendine The only recorded successful use of the mech came on the opening day of the Amaris uprising. Mechwarrior Abigail Brizendine, of the 146 Royal Battlemech regiment, was on temporary duty to the Battlemech testing facility near Moscow. Most of the mechs, including her Battlemaster, were destroyed in the opening bombardments from rebel aerospace units. One operational Headhunter (nicknamed the "Eights and Aces") was assigned to the facility for the purpose of somehow improving the mech to make it more favorable to mechwarriors. With more important and promising mech projects to work on, the headhunter was given a low priority and was sent into storage in a warehouse at the farthest corner of the research facility only three days prior. Mechwarrior Brizendine was the one who piloted it to the warehouse, and when she saw all the other mechs destroyed, immediately went to the warehouse. Unforunately, only the Headhunter was capable of use, as it hadn't been processed for long term storage yet. When a Amaris Atlas crashed through the inner perimeter gates of the facility, it found the headhunter waiting just off to the right, about 20 meters from the gate. The pre-fire sequence was completed just before the mech enter the facility (the targeting computer actually finding and identifying the life sensor readings), allowing the firing phase to be entered. Surprised, and probably amused at seeing one light mech defending the inner perimeter, the Atlas hesitated. This allowed the Headhunter's computer to finish the required computations and decide it could launch. One missile blazed From the Headhunter into the Atlas's cockpit. destroying it outright. The other mech's in the assualt lance regrouped and thoroughly pounded the headhunter, who was not able to get off the other missile before being forced to eject. Mechwarrior Brizendine ejected and managed to escape, only to be badly wounded in guerilla activities outside Ansbach a year later. She formally retired from the SLDF after liberation as the only pilot with a confirmed kill using the headhunter system in combat. Nothing is known about her after her retirement, but most historians beleive she somehow managed to leave in the Exodus, which may account for the Brizendine bloodname in Clan Wolverine records that were found in sealed computer core on Huntress. Star Colonel (Retired) Octavius Reynolds The last operational Clan Headhunter was issued out in 2847 to Octavius Reynolds of Clan Coyote, a 108 year old mechwarrior who somehow managed to get into a trial of refusal over a woman. Honor was intact, but neither the Headhunter or Reynolds was at the end of the trial. It is a strange irony that one of the Star Leagues most enbarrasing failures found more use in the technology advanced Clans than it did in the Inner Sphere. The Headhunter never made it out of R & D to be assigned to any active SLDF unit, spending their entire careers in storage, testing, or hard luck mercenary units during the opening days (literally) of the first Succession war. In the Clans, it was never formally assigned to any unit, although several assignments were attempted in different clans. The only times they were ever piloted in combat were special instances at the requests of mechwarriors in trials of refusal and in Solhama units in Clans Coyote and Wolverine - and then again only at the request of the mechwarrior. Clan Nova Cat recieved one, and promptly placed iit in storage. It was returned unused to the Battletech refurbishment facilty on Strana Mechty after 187 years to be cleaned up for its starring place in the "Ingenuity or Insanity" display at the Kerensky Museum of Science & Battletechnology¿Firing example: turn one, mech can move, but not in the second turn to hit roll to lock on in forst turn 2d to hit roll needed in the second turn all parameters must be met in the turns  [ none ] Headhunter 0 12/hit@' †0050040030020010010012750"M'Butto And McDougal ManufacturingCentral Africa, TerraKalTek ExtralightKallon Light Shield AM'butto and McDougal 101Lockheed/CBM Comset 86b M'Butto And McDougal Killer 1000 (Unknown)