Josef Nader, on 08 April 2014 - 04:10 PM, said:
As far as clan lights vs the Ryoken, the lights are going to have a much smaller profile, and more maneuverable and responsive in a fight. They're going to turn tighter, twist faster, and generally be significantly more maneuverable. Most significantly, they're going to be a -lot- harder to hit at range, if you compare the size of our current 30 and 35 ton lights to the size of our current 55 tonners. Again, saying the Clan lights are superceded by the Stormcrow is short sighted. Also, there is a mere 7 ton difference in pod space beteeen the Stormcrow and both the Adder and the Kit Fox. The Stormcrow has 23 tons free and the Adder and Kit Fox have 16 tons apiece. The difference is there, sure, but its not as huge as you might think.
Will the Stormcrow be tougher and hit harder? Sure. The lights will be more agile and a smaller target. That counts for a lot.
The elephant in the room here is that engine ratings have a direct effect on your mech's agility. Smaller engines give less agility than larger ones. For some examples to illustrate this, I'm going to show the Smurfys agility stats for a 55 ton, 35 ton, and 30 ton mech. I used the TT stock engine ratings for the Ryoken, Puma, and Uller in them.
Notice how the speed for torso + arm yaw/pitch is basically the same between all of them, with the Kintaro being slightly faster for torso yaw. Not shown in these pictures is that they also have identical rates of turning (68.79 degrees per second). The only difference between them is the max range of arm/torso yaw/pitch, in which case it's still very close between the three of them. I can't find anywhere that shows their acceleration rates so I can't compare those.
Of course, these aren't the stats of the actual Ryoken/Puma/Uller so we can't make a final verdict yet, but there appears to be a very consistent pattern between all mechs of a given weight and their agility stats for a given engine rating. As homework, you can try giving the same engine ratings to Jenners, Ravens, and the other 55 ton mediums to compare that they'd exhibit the same exact details (only differences being yaw/pitch limits).
(I chose the Kintaro because Shads have a small yaw/pitch range and Wolvies/Griffins have a high one. The KTO seems like a nice midway point between them. I chose the Firestarter for the 35 tonner because it has lower arm actuators, versus Jenners and Ravens that don't. I chose the Spider for the 30 tonner because it's the only 30 tonner we have).
Josef Nader, on 08 April 2014 - 04:10 PM, said:
Finally, playing slow lights isn't nearly as horrific as people make it out to be. Is it a different playstyle? Sure, but the days of light mechs outrunning the server's ability to keep track of them have long since past, and having a max engine light no longer grants invincibility. People still act like it does, and this rigid thinking has ensured lights get played a certain way with no variation. As someone who's been actively experimenting with lights mounting the same engine as Clan lights and they're quite viable. Low profile, agile, and responsive, I've gotten some solid performance out of slow, firepower focused lights. When I can start squeezing some real firepower on them, I imagine they're going to become a much more serious threat.
It's not about lagshield. It's about playing to your strengths. The analogy that I keep coming back to over and over again is the Charger assault mech. It was built with a very large engine, sub-par armor, and very little armament. It ended badly. The natural strength of the assault class is armor and firepower; trying to build one to be fast is idiotic. People who want to play the Charger would be completely better off in a heavy or even a medium because those classes are better at doing the Charger's job than the Charger was.
And that's the opposite situation that slow lights face. You will never, ever, not in a million years be able to carry the armor of a medium (provided that the medium in question isn't under-armored intentionally). The battletech construction system prevents this, period. You also will not have as much firepower as a medium (that is well designed), for the same reason. But you
can, however, have high efficiency out of your engines that let you move faster than them with a smaller engine than they have. That gives you an ability that no other weight class can replicate. It's the "deadly skill" of the lights, just like how Aquaman's special skill is communication with sea creatures or how Spiderman's skills are webslinging and his Spidey sense. It's what makes them special. There's a reason the Urbanmech is a bad light (it's iconic and people love it, yes, but only
because it's bad).
Not taking advantage of your class's natural strengths is like trying to train a fish to climb a tree or using a spoon to perform heart surgery. Or, like trying to use Aquaman for his raw strength as opposed to the Hulk or Superman for their strength. Every job has a tool that is best and optimally suited to accomplish it. People who understand the battlemech construction system are "rigid" in their thinking because the system itself is rigid. It was designed to have "bests" hardwired right into it.
Edited by FupDup, 08 April 2014 - 05:01 PM.
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