THE GREAT ONES


0, mighty BattleMech, standing on the field, looking for all the world like a knight of old, with PPC and laser instead of sword and axe. As noble as you seem, you are the steed, the charger, and the MechWarrior is truly the knight... Damn! I can't think of any more metaphors!



The roll call of famous `Mech fighters from Solaris is almost endless. Three centuries of names still invoke memories and images. On Solaris a `Mech pilot can win all the respect and notoriety of a Successor House MechWarrior without ever seeing real battle. Fortunes have been won and lost, and those who battle in the Solaris arenas live on in the memories of their fans and supporters.
The point at which the `Mech games moved from military exercise to sporting event is somewhat hazy. Certainly the first celebrities to come out of Solaris were the Star League Gunslingers and their Kurita opponents. Some of the first battles to the death were fought as part of the Hidden War between the Kurita room and the SLDF Warriors. Meanwhile the holobroadcasts poured money into Free Worlds coffers.
Many date the start of the Solaris Games with Colonel Daniel Allison's showdown with room Kaneda Fujima. Captain Wilbur Frews, MechWarrior Amanda Kazutoyo, and ronin Trent Latimore all fought duels in the Solaris arenas.
It was the institutionalization of the games and the bening system, however, that began the star tradition. The first Open Class hero was, without a doubt, Cabol Hirsch. A native Solarian and worker in the timber industry, he rose to prominence as a pilot of lumber-loading industrial `Mechs. Early victories in Class One Arenas in 2808 led to quick advancement, and by 2812 Cabol Hirsch was a genuine superstar, an undefeated Open Champion and the darling of his home world.
In the end, though, Hirsch's success was his undoing. Allowed to pick and choose matches because of his Open status, he began slumming almost immediately upon reaching the peak of his profession. He invariably fought weaker, less-skilled opponents, which made his victories come more easily. At first spectators were bored, then repulsed by the carnage Hirsch inflicted. Soon, he had acquired the nickname "Hitman."
Hirsch seemed unconcerned, living a fast, decadent lifestyle and squandering his winnings on drugs, women, and wagers on other `Mech matches. His final defeat came at the hands of the second great `Mech games star, Marco Moliotti.
Considered a strong beginner, Moliotti had also risen quickly through the ranks. Too quickly, some believed, expecting him to meet an early end at the hands of a more experienced fighter. When the brash and seemingly overconfident Moliotti challenged the champion in public, adding a stinging rebuke of Hirsch's lifestyle, many predicted the end of the young man's promising career.
The resulting battle, with Moliotti's outmatched Archer meeting Hirsch's top-of-the-line Warhammer, defied all expectations. Sluggish from the previous night's debaucheries, Hirsch lumbered his `Mech out and fought in an uninspired fashion, expecting his green young opponent to wither up and die before him. To Hirsch's surprise, then horror, Moliotti shrugged off his initial attacks and responded with unabated fury, felling the champion's Warhammer and pounding away mercilessly. Hirsch was able to eject before his `Mech was destroyed, but his career was in tatters, and Moliotti was the new Solaris champion.
At a press conference following the fight, Moliotti and his manager revealed that Hirsch had for some time been sabotaging his opponents' `Mechs, and only their own vigilance had prevented the same fate from befalling Moliotti. After police patrols began to comb the city in search of the missing ex-champion, his body was discovered on the banks of the Solaris River, a single bullet through his head. The subsequent investigation never proved whether Hirsch's death was suicide or a possible gangland execution.
Moliotti proved a worthy champion, retiring undefeated five years later. His success and sportsmanlike conduct (he never killed an opponent) became bywords for champions to come. Others followed, with varying degrees of success and popularity.
Moliotti's successor, a fiery woman named Andrea Haskell, served as champion for the following year before dying in the arena in a fight with her bitter rival, Drew Onada, a former mercenary.
The line of champions who followed Onada into history is impressive indeed. It includes Franqois Drullet, who piloted his damaged Stalker to victory over Mark Good's superior Atlas, and Oliver Two Horse, the only champion to reign non-consecutive years, defeating champion Maki Murahashi in a furious battle to regain the title he had lost the year before.
Many tales surround the warriors of Solaris, with both heroes and villains to spare. A leading villain is Norman Bales who, from 2943 to 2945, invariably left his opponents crippled or dead, until he met his own death in a fight with Hideto Moriyasu, husband of Nona Simkins, whom Bales had killed in battle the previous year.
Among the heroes is one James O'Gordon, who arrived on Solaris a dispossessed survivor of the destruction of his mercenary regiment, O'Gordon's Rifles. Through good luck and skill, he earned enough to reform the Rifles and lead them back to glory in the Inner Sphere.
As the games continued down through the decades and the Succession Wars began to rage across the Inner Sphere, Solaris champions came to represent the values of their respective native Successor Houses.
In the years just before of the Fourth Succession War, a string of champions came and went. After the retirement of long time champion, "Legend-killer" Gray Noton, warriors like Philip Capet, Hans Moder, Billy Wolfson, and Peter Armstrong were all major competitors. All were swept aside, however, by the arrival of Justin Xiang, an exile from the Federated Suns fighting under the banner of the Capellan Confederation. Wolfson, Armstrong, Capet, and others fell to Xiang's near-fanatical drive against all things Davion, and within a year, the new MechWarrior was generally considered the best on Solaris.
Xiang's unprecedented rise was followed by his mysterious disappearance, then reappearance as a confidant and aide to Capellan Chancellor Maximilian Liao. In a tale now well-known in the annals of the Inner Sphere, Xiang was eventually revealed as a Davion double-agent who played a major role in House Liao's downfall, eventually ending up, with his wife Candace Liao, at the head of the tiny St. Ives Commonality. His recent tragic death remains a mystery. but many suspect vengeful agents of then Chancellor Romano Liao.
It was not until after the War of 3039 that another MechWarrior gained fame comparable to Xiang or Hirsch. Amanda Hamilton, a down on her luck former mercenary, arrived on Solaris with a somewhat battered Stalker and driving ambition. By 2045, Hamilton had defeated 24 opponents, and many believed that the great Solaris champions finally had a worthy successor.
Hamilton's unexpected retirement in 3046, and her subsequent disappearance, left tans in shock and a gaping hole in the world of the Solaris Games. By the time of the Clan invasion, another name had replaced Hamilton sin the hearts of aficionados, a name borne by not one, but two, people.
Elizabeth and Tanya O'Bannon, sisters from Kentares IV, burst on the scene in 3046 Working their way up through Class One and Two arenas, the O'Bannons seemed unstoppable. Many critics attacked the pair when the truth about their background came out. Though their official publicity claimed them to be simple farm girls who made good, the pair were actually former F-C MechWarriors, who clearly outclassed their opponents. The furor over this apparent deception led to abandonment of the old `Mech vs. `Mech betting system. and the institution of a more sophistcated odds procedure.
The sisters weathered the storm of controversy and by 3050 were co-champions of the Open Class circuit. The days of The Frenzy that accompanied the Clan invasion were good for the O'Bannorts, and by the time the hysteria subsided in 3053, the sisters were rich beyond belief, with respective records of 28 - 4 (Elizabeth) and 26 -3 (Tanya). The sisters' fights are fewer these days, and there is talk of their retirement to start their own `Mech stable.

SOLARIS STARPORT


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Copyright © 1996 - 1997
Created by Wolf Pack Inc, Friday, August 29, 1997
Most recent revision Thursday, September 25, 1997