I posted this in the Blaine Pardoe thread, but I feel it also fits here.
Honestly, the act of cancelling bothers me far more than who is getting cancelled. So while this is despicable on CGL's part, and spits into the face of someone who's diligently added to their IP for close to forty years, the larger part of me probably would just be as annoyed if it hit someone from "the other side" (the smaller part of me would admittedly beam with
Schadenfreude about how it must feel if the shoe's suddenly on the other foot for once).
As for CGL and Battletech, I've never played the tabletop. My financial investment in the IP consists of one book from the nineties (which, I think, was three novellas?),
Mechwarrior 4 (the original), HBS's
Battletech game, and
Mechwarrior 5. No sourcebooks, no miniatures, no further novels. I've mainly enjoyed it through free content, like quests and many an excellent fanfic. The
universe interests me. The official narrative? Less so.
It's also not really going to infringe on my enjoyment of the IP, for the simple reason that I don't give a damn about anything post-Jihad. I'm solidly interested in the pre-Jihad universe. Everything past that temper tantrum? Really not my cup of tea.
Thing is, at least in my opinion, the people creating the game/setting wrote themselves into multiple consecutive corners, and I feel they always ended up finding the wrong exit.
Like, the Clans. Never been that much of a fan, but as a narrative tool they worked. They were the proverbial flash in a pan - and then way overstayed their welcome. The setup of "genetically enhanced super warriors with advanced technology and alien tactics rampage across the Inner Sphere, coming from an unexpected attack vector" was great.
But the post-Tukayyid universe for them shouldn't have been to persist as parts of the IS, but rather the panicked realization that they had hundreds if hostile worlds to govern and garrison, nowhere near a fraction of the troops to do so, absoluetly no ideological foothold with their new populations, and all their doors left wide open to be exploited by COIN hard by even the most incompetent IS agencies around. Faced by constant brushfires, incursions, insurrections and widespread civil disobedience, forced into ever more draconian measures, the Crusader clans should have withered away and grinded down to a point where they either faced absorption into their host populations, outright destruction (as the IS powers would naturally use every chance to pounce on them), or - and this I would have liked the most - be forced to retreat back into staging areas like the Elysian Fields, for example. So some clans would end up going back to Clan space (likely facing absorption by their rivals there) while others would loot the everloving crap out of their occupation zones, set up shop in the worlds near them like the Elysian Fields, and actually try and figure out how to beat the IS at their own game (in turn becoming something
else than the original clans). That'd leave the former occupation zones in a nice balkanized state similar to the CC after Hanse's wedding gift.
Yet, through authorial fiat, somehow they thrive and start beating the IS nations at their game without actually adressing their own inherent weaknesses.
This whole official post-Republic, post-Jihad, Clan-centered near era does absolutely
nothing for me. And it's probably amplified by the fact that some factions sound like they were named by a ten year old playing DnD for the first time. I mean, the
Scorpion Empire? The
Wolf Empire? *snorts* It's not helped that to bring it about some of the more interesting, not fully explored factions of the setting were all dissolved.
So, no, I'm happy with the old stuff. I simply
don't need CGL or who ever might hold the IP in the future to enjoy the setting. I can just make it up myself. Or enjoy others doing so.
@LordSunhawk has been doing a massive Deep Periphery quest for ages now. Drakensis and dozens of others write fanfiction just as good or even better (and more interesting) than the official stuff. You don't need official products as well.
MattPlog for example creates Battletech art for custom 'mechs, vehicles and ships by the bucketload. Don't like the official stuff? Band together, get creatives on board, do your own stuff. Wanna illustrate your original worlds and star systems? I can write and illustrate you one of those "Touring the stars" supplements as well. Battlemats to play your battles on? No need to rely on official stuff there either; pretty sure there's enough out there on DriveThruRPG or other places than can be used. Hell, I threw
this together the other evening in about three hours (and it's not even finished), and most of that spent creating and/or finding textures.
TL;DR: you don't need to support a publisher to support an IP you like. By the power of the internet you can do it/have others do it for you without throwing money towards people that despise you.