Hiring Hall

Description[edit]

A hiring hall is a designated area on a world where mercenary units can go for training and to meet potential employers. They are essentially common meeting grounds, though some are more advanced than others.

Mercenary contracts throughout the Inner Sphere used to be brokered by ComStar, who provided a hiring agency through the Mercenary Review Board (MRB) that was based on Galatea, the Mercenary's Star (essentially, a hiring hall encompassing an entire planet). Through the MRB, ComStar held a monopoly on hiring, arbitration, general administration and other clerical services surrounding the mercenary business. Other mercenary guilds existed at times, but they were invariably short-lived.

The trust universally placed in ComStar was lost following ComStar's collaboration with the Clans, however, and the MRB subsequently collapsed in 3052. In its stead, the Mercenary Review and Bonding Commission (MRBC) was set up on Outreach, only returning to set up a satellite office on Galatea in 3067 after the 'Mech Riots damaged the trade there. This move proved to be fortuitous as the Word of Blake's first target during their Jihad was Outreach, which was conquered and devastated through the use of nuclear weapons. This made Galatea the old and new center of the mercenary trade.

The hiring hall on Outreach was run by the MRBC independently of Wolf's Dragoons despite Outreach being the Dragoons' homeworld. Even after the world was retaken by the Capellan Confederation, Sun-Tzu Liao declared it an independent barony and didn't interfere with the system's operations.[1] The Outreach Hiring Hall was located in the center of Harlech City, which during the Star League era had served as the location for the opening and closing ceremonies of the Martial Olympiad.[2]

Hiring halls in the classic sense only cater to the accepted and legitimate mercenary business and are expected to at least cooperate with the MRB/MRBC, if not featuring a satellite office.

In a broader sense, the term "Hiring Hall" can be used to refer to any mercenary hiring center, in a similar fashion to the term "Mercenary's Star". The following worlds were notable hubs of the mercenary business for a time at least:

Known Hiring Halls[edit]

See also: Category:Hiring Hall Worlds

References[edit]

  1. Chaos March (sourcebook), p. 45
  2. Chaos March (sourcebook), p. 78
  3. 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5 Field Manual: Mercenaries, Revised, p. 10
  4. Field Manual: Mercenaries, Revised, p. 17
  5. Field Manual: Mercenaries, Revised, p. 18
  6. Shrapnel Issue 15: "Planet Digest: Le Blanc"
  7. Field Manual: Mercenaries, Revised, p. 12
  8. Solaris VII: The Game World – Player's Book, p. 27: "Guild Hall"

Bibliography[edit]