So the new Sword and Dragon campaign has some loose rules for using other mechs then the ones listed as available in the book.

Any thoughts on how to do the warchest points cost for these?

There is the "generic" cost listed for light, medium, heavy and assault in the campaign book. I think that referencing the BV of the costs of the mechs listed in the book to find how many WP the mech should cost could be used to calculate a more accurate number.

I'm eager to play in the new campaign if anyone is interested and I've got lots of plastic mechs, unseen and all!

-Pete

Looking at my copy, I don't think the point costs for the 'Mechs in the recruitment tables are based on Battle Value at all, but more as a sort of game balance between the two forces.  
If you look, the WP Cost column is identical between the two forces' tables, with approximately equivalent mechs for each "price point": e.g. Hornet and Spider, Wolfhound and Panther, Enforcer and Hunchback, Grasshopper and Grasshopper, Zeus and Charger, Atlas and Atlas.

I would say for any non-listed mech, to just use the Average Unit Cost, just to keep things simple (if anything, I think it would be modified more by availability for the two factions than BV).  

Plus, you can't read too much into the WP costs.  For example, a Hornet costs 75 WP to purchase for the Fox's Teeth.  An undamaged Hornet, even with no ammunition, can be sold for 90 WP.  So, technically, a Fox's Teeth player could net 15 WP each time they bought-and-sold a Hornet.  Repeat ad-naseum.

It would really help if a "make-you-own Warchest-based campaign" book is ever put out.  Last I heard from the CBT Powers-That-Be at classicbattletech.com was that no such product was even under consideration.

*edit* oh, and Rob (minigunshiper) and I have been slowly making our way through the campaign, if you would like to help run the OpForce for missions with us, we normally are in the store on Saturday or Sunday (probably Saturday for the near-future)
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I think I may have already played with you guys once That was fun.

The only official, "build your own campaign" rules that exist are from the book "Combat Operations". There are additional WP system campaign rules in Dawn of the Jihad but they are at a completely different scale then the rules in Sword and Dragon.

When I spoke with the designer of the book at Gen Con, and asked for a "build your own WP campaign" book, they said they weren't interested. I guess I'm not the only one who wants that. Oh well, I guess I will have to work on adapting the Combat Operations rules to the WP system. That will be tricky.

-Pete

One of my old college friends has been working on creating his own campaign system out of a hybrid of the Warchest system (ala Dawn of the Jihad and Sword and Dragon) and the system from Combat Ops (with the separate support points and such).  

He's essentially trying to blend the simplicity of the Warchest system with slightly less abstract nature of the Combat Ops system.  I don't know how far along with it he is, though.
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"The world and the universe is an extremely beautiful place, and the more we understand about it the more beautiful does it appear."  --Richard Dawkins
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www.reallypathetic.com

Awesome! That is exactly what I was shooting for. I started some preliminary calculations on doing this and it was going to be a lot of work. Let me know if your friend completes his conversion.

-Pete

Here are the alterations that Andrew and I came up with (so far).

Alterations for variability in the Classic Battletech Sword and Dragon Campaign.
By Andrew Erikson and Peter Franke

Rather then use the forces as described in the book; players may build their own mercenary company using 1500 total warchest points. Mechs may be determined randomly with the costs subtracted from the total points, bought as desired or any combination of the two. Players use the same pilots as the ones described in the book, distributed the same way among their new lances. Names may be changed for every aspect of the new force as desired. Each player chooses either the Davion or Kurita track to follow with their Mercenary force. Their opponent must follow the opposite track.
Instead of the mech recruitment tables in the book, any random mech generation tables may be used. Ideally the tables used in the Battletech Historical line of books. Here is a table describing the warchest point cost of the mech based on availability. When selling a mech, use these tables for a fully repaired and reloaded mech rather then the “average cost” as described in the book.

(die roll   -   cost)
Light                                                                  Medium
2   -   105                                                           2   -   135
3   -   100                                                           3   -   130
4   -   95                                                             4   -   125
5   -   90                                                             5   -   120
6   -   85                                                             6   -   115
7   -   80                                                             7   -   110
8   -   85                                                             8   -   115
9   -   90                                                             9   -   120
10   -   95                                                           10   -   125
11   -   100                                                         11   -   130
12   -   105                                                         12   -   135
>6/36 (two slot or especially common)   -   75         >6/36   -   105

Heavy                                                                  Assault
2   -   170                                                            2   -   230
3   -   160                                                            3   -   220
4   -   155                                                            4   -   210
5   -   150                                                            5   -   200
6   -   145                                                            6   -   190
7   -   140                                                            7   -   180
8   -   145                                                            8   -   190
9   -   150                                                            9   -   200
10   -   155                                                          10   -   210
11   -   160                                                          11   -   220
12   -   170                                                          12   -   230
>6/36   -   135                                                     >6/36   -   175

(Higher value tables)
Table B: +10
Table A: +25
Import or rare find (based on TRO description): +15 extra

For Opposing forces:
Table C (which is what we used for the base tables) should be used for generating Militia
Table B for Merc
Table A for House

-Pete