Luthien Armor Works

Overview
The company known in later years as Luthien Armor Works was originally founded as New Samarkand Armor Works, a highly secret division of New Samarkand Metals. This new division was established in 2461 at the orders of Kozo Von Rohrs, the highly-paranoid Coordinator of the Combine at the time, and was given responsibility for developing the first Combine BattleMech after a recent raid had enabled the Combine to acquire this coveted technology. Coordinator Von Rohrs also used his newly established Draconis Elite Strike Teams to keep a very close watch on NSAW as they developed the Gladiator BattleMech. Such was the secrecy surrounding the project - and the scrutiny under which the project was kept - that it would take until 2468 for the first iteration of the Gladiator to reach full production. The Gladiator fell out of favor rapidly after a disastrous battle between DCMS and LCAF forces on Nox in 2475, but NSAW would continue to grow despite the Gladiator production lines closing down by 2488.

When the capital of the Draconis Combine was moved from New Samarkand to Luthien, NSAW moved en masse to the new capital and became Luthien Armor Works. Luthien Armor Works - or LAW for short - would become the largest BattleMech producer in the Draconis Combine. At the start of the Jihad, three nuclear warheads were detonated inside the LAW OmniMech facility, destroying it completely. The EMP and radioactive fallout rippled through the other LAW facilities, inflicting massive damage. The corporation's headquarters tower collapsed as a result of this strike. While many believed that this was the work of the Word of Blake the actual perpetrators were members of the Black Dragon Society, who detonated three nuclear devices built into the heart of the LAW facility as a final failsafe to insure that invading forces would never capture the plant intact.

In 3025, Luthien Armor Works best engineers designed a Dragon variant: the Grand Dragon. Although it had yet to see action, the Grand Dragon promises to be a fearsome opponent.

Luthien Armor Works started to recover after making some drastic cutbacks. It was reported in 3070 that Luthien Armor Works had managed to avoid complete financial collapse by opening several new manufacturing facilities and releasing additional manufacturing licenses to various partner companies. Luthien Armor Works was also rumored to be attempting to stabilize itself in the medium term by entering into partnerships with companies dealing in transportation and shipping throughout the Pesht Military District. However, in 3074 the ISF exposed the CEO of LAW, Hoek Botterfield, as a member of the Black Dragon Society. He was executed on Benjamin. During the Jihad upper management of Luthien Armor Works hired Gannon's Cannons to escort a team of engineers to survey the damage. This found them put in the crossfire between several Word of Blake and Black Dragon Society units.

Most of Luthien Armor Works' facilities on Luthien and Dieron were destroyed by the Word of Blake. Most of the resources that would formerly have gone to LAW factories has since been redirected into new companies. In fact the amount of time and effort required to rebuild these facilities would absorb massive amounts of capital. As a result of this, as of 3079 the Dragon has no plans to rebuild these facilities. LAW is therefore focusing its efforts on the production lines at Abiy Adi, Nykvarn, Savinsville, and New Samarkand. These lines came through the Jihad relatively intact. The Combine government tacitly approved LAW hiring the Kouki no Otakebi mercenary unit to garrison those facilities LAW had or were constructing near the Outworlds Alliance border, in part because of the fact that every member of the Kouki no Otakebi was a former member of the DCMS.

When Clan Nova Cat settled in the Combine, Luthien Armor Works partnered with them to introduce Clan designs. These partnerships were usually authorized (as in LAW-Barcella), but the Mualang Alpha plant was not.

By the thirty-second century, production line on Luthien would be restored producing new designs, including least one OmniMech design.

Manufacturing
Luthien Armor Works has manufacturing centers on the following planets:

Abiy Adi
Note: Since the start of the Jihad, the facility on Abiy Adi, suffers no losses of capital and personnel, and have a full production volume of 100% in 3079.

Irece
Note: The LAW-Barcella facility receives its Clan technology from the Nova Cats.

Luthien
NOTE: These lines were destroyed during the Jihad. Items produced on these production lines would not available after 3072. However, by the thirty-second century LAW would regain its building capacities once again.

Nykvarn
Note: During the Jihad, the facility on Nykvarn, suffers no capital and personnel losses, and the operating capacity of the factory has the main production volume of 90% in 3079.

Savinsville
Note: During the Jihad, the facility on Savinsville, suffers no capital and personnel losses, and the operating capacity of the factory has the main production volume of 75% in 3079.

Note
Confirmation of the agents responsible for the destruction of the LAW facility in 3070 was made by one of the BattleTech Line Developers on the official Catalyst Game Labs forum:

"Ahhh, now I remember. Those were supposed to be setups for the follow-up story to "Eye of the Beholder." Which I never got around to.

Suffice to say, the nukes were set off by the Black Dragons deep in the LAW-Luthien facility; it was a failsafe originally built into the complex as a last ditch "****** you" to any would-be conquerors.

The BDS set them off. The sequel story was supposed to show the Blakist ROM team actually catching wind of the plan and trying to stop the action, but failing at the last minute."

- Ben "GhostBear" Rome, Assistant BattleTech Line Developer, 10 Oct 2013