Rating:    Reviewed by:  Terren Bruce

Operation: Flashpoint Have you ever read that BattleTech novel where the planet is invaded and it's up to a small unit of Mechs to fight the key battles which end up turning everything around?  "Which one?", I hear lot's of voices asking.  Pick almost any Gray Death Legion novel, any of the MechWarrior series of novels, Measure of a Hero, or even the MechWarrior 4 computer game and that will be the basic theme.  It's used over and over again in BattleTech literature and now you can finally be that unit in the Board Game... or you can even be a unit working for the "bad guys" and put an end to the pitiful rebel resistance.  That's right, your unit can choose to join either side it wants.  Take your own unit through an epic campaign set against the backdrop of the cataclysmic civil war engulfing the two most powerful Houses in the BattleTech Universe. That's right, it's time to start having some serious fun by joining in the long awaited FedCom Civil War!  Or if it's more to your taste, you can easily alter the background story and use the scenario book for a campaign set anywhere, anytime in the BattleTech universe.  In fact, by only changing a few names here and there, this scenario book would work perfectly for a campaign set in the recently concluded St. Ives Conflict. The Good: Operation: Flashpoint continues the trend of scenario book improvement that Operation: Stiletto started. The book is very open ended, making it useful for just about anyone who picks it up.  It's completely up to you whether you have the campaign run by a Games Master or you just play them 1 on 1 with a friend.  The battles flow together well, for the very first time it's actually like your running your own personal small unit, YOU ARE the unit commander going through your own adventure just like in the BattleTech novels.  Even Operation: Stiletto didn't have that feeling.  Besides the scenarios, there's some other stuff useful for any BattleTech fan.  3062 in Review has about 6 news articles from around the Inner Sphere, mostly dealing with the breakout of the FedCom Civil War.  There's also some great rules for gaining and maintaining media control on a planet, and also keeping public opinion on your side.  This is useful for any campaign, but especially for the recent St. Ives Conflict and the current FedCom Civil War.  The art is an improvement, if only because none of these pictures have ever been in any other sourcebook.  They're all new for this product, and the majority of them are nice to look at. The Bad: There isn't really anything really major I didn't like about this book.  It did lack the comprehensive force generation tables found in Operation: Stiletto, but then again I always hate it when they reprint material.  There is a table showing mechs used by each faction however.  With the release of AeroTech 2 just a couple of months prior to this books release, I expected to see an AeroTech scenario or two.  You won't find any in here though.  The only other thing I would want is if it used maps from Map Set #6 (which many are calling the best yet), but that wasn't around when this book was released.   Final Thoughts: My scenario book collection goes back to the Luthien scenario book (not the biggest collection by any means, but still pretty decent), and this is by FAR my favorite.  Even if you're not interested in the FedCom Civil War you should still pick it up.  Use it for any civil war, anywhere, anytime, in BattleTech history.  Or just use it as a campaign where a planet is invaded and a small unit has to go into hiding and fight a guerilla war.