53 replies to this topic

[Greyhart]

I have a couple of things to ask, but the main one is;

1. Do you find that you mainly use MC or CBills purchase new mechs?

As I figure it you get about 100,000 CBills per match and a reasonable Mech will be about 10 mil CBills.

This means at least playing a hundred games. Doable but is going to take some time. So do the majority of people buy with MC?

2. I am currently thinking of getting a mastery pack. Any suggestions for a new player on which is a good starting point. I'd prefer IS rather than Clan.

3. Is there any good basic guides to CW? Also do you really need to be in group / unit (forgotten the word for it that isn't clan or guild) or is simply PUGing viable. Is there any easy way to look at the various units out there?

4. How does the friends list actually work? I've seen it but seems like it is not the most integrated system.

Edited by Greyhart, 24 March 2015 - 02:43 AM.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

I recommend Heros and Mechbays for MC.

The Stalker mastery pack has excellent value and it includes the Misery Hero.

[Koshirou]

1. Cbills only. I don't feel like spending hundreds of Euros on the game. I already spent more on it than I would pay to purchase an AAA title.

2. Can't comment on all of them, but for one I would not take the Dragon pack. It's missing the best Dragon variant (1N). The Raven pack looks pretty solid since it contains two chassis you will want to keep (Huginn and 3L), so if you like light Mechs that should work.

3. Not aware of any guides. Joining a group helps a lot, but only if you are actually coordinating on TeamSpeak. House Kurita has its own TeamSpeak server for this purpose, and I assume other houses do as well. This is also the best way to learn, since there is really no introduction or tutorial for CW provided by the game. TeamSpeak groups are going to have experienced players who can clue you in.

4. The most integrated system, it is not indeed. You can only add friends manually by clicking the corresponding button and typing in their names.

[daPaule]

I personally just bought Phoenix package and now clanwave3. In addition I've bought some heroes and a solo "normal" mech with mc. Rest was grinded, currently 116 mechbays ;-)

Edited by daPaule, 24 March 2015 - 02:54 AM.

[BSK]

I use mainly real life money, got all packages so far and I am back at 100.000.000 c-bills after the weapon module sale. I would recommend the Resistance package. You get almost 4 times as much as if you had to buy it with mc and except the Grasshopper all those mechs are pretty easy to handle.

[Tarogato]

Never. Ever. Buy. Standard. Variants. With. MC. ... Don't buy Champion variants either.

If you don't have the patience to deal with the grind, then I suggest purchasing mechs in packs. Mastery packs are a good way to go - they come with all the mechbays you need if I'm not mistaken, plus they get you a Hero mech. The Stalker bundle is indeed a very good deal. I would also recommend the Hunchback and Raven bundles as well. You could also purchase the Resistance package if any of those mechs suits your fancy. All four chassis in it are good actually, and you get lots of extra goodies to go along with it. (total of 16 mechs I think, all with mechbays)

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Friends list. Yeah, it's clunky. PGI... plz.
Too add somebody, you have to remember their name, click "Add friend" and type their name in. That's it. That's all it is. Incredibly simple, and incredibly dumb.
You can double click their name to start a chat with them, or click to open a menu and invite them to a group (if you have command of the group you're in)

---

CW!
Well, it's a long story. CW is great for farming a couple mechbays, since you get a free mechbay at Rank 2 in every single faction. So if you're new to the game, I'd recommend taking short contracts and faction-hopping. Try to get the free mechbay in as many as you can muster. Yes, you can do this completely by solo pugging, but... you will be canon fodder. As a new player, CW will be very rough and you'll be likely to be paired with or against large organised teams from time to time. You will get stomped, but you can at least get a taste for the CW game mode, the maps, and the free mechbays. The best you can do is to share with your team that you are new and ask them what you can be doing to be useful. Some teams will be more patient with you than others.

Aside from mechbay farming, I recommend staying away from CW as a new player for all the reasons I said above: you'll get roflstomped repeatedly and it isn't fun, plus you'll be a liability to your team. The key to CW is to play with a group and to go into it with a solid and well thought-out dropdeck. The current Innersphere tonnage restriction is 240 tons (250 when facing against the Clans), so you'll need to own four mechs that come close to that limit without exceeding it. Don't start playing CW for real until you have four mechs owned and Elited in the Skill Tree. It will take months to get to this point, so have patience. If you don't know where to start... you can't go wrong with bringing three Thunderbolts to CW and filling the remaining tonnage with whatever you have that fits.

If you don't know where to start as far as eventually finding a home or group to play with, unit to join, or even which faction to choose, feel free to contact me. I know of several units in the FRR all with differing philosophies but all with very welcoming attitudes and very helpful veteran members - we could help you find one that fits.

[SethAbercromby]

or real money, I've bought a Founders Tier (Founders Atlas), the Phoenix Packages (Locust, Shadow Hawk, Thunderbolt, Battlemaser, Griffin, Wolverine), the lowest tier of the Clan Wave I (Kit Fox) and recently the Resistance Package (Panther, Enforcer, Grasshopper, Zeus). I have only bought one normal 'Mech with MC (Stalker 5S) bacause I had just started the game and it was terrible to grind for (I have no regrets), but I've also invested into Hero variants (Pirate's Bane (Locust), Yen-Lo-Wang (Centurion), Jester (Catapult), Protector (Orion) Misery (Stalker)).

So yeah, as it turns out I did buy most of my 'Mechs with actual money, though that's because I end up investing all of my C-Bills into the new 'Mechs I just purchased...

Edited by SethAbercromby, 24 March 2015 - 03:21 AM.

[YCSLiesmith]

Tarogato, on 24 March 2015 - 03:16 AM, said:

Never. Ever. Buy. Standard. Variants. With. MC. ... Don't buy Champion variants either.

word.

[Rogue Jedi]

Both,
I have purchased many (probably about 30) Mechs with cbills, I have also purchased Mechs with MC (mostly Heroes/Champions when on sale) as well as buying most of the preorder packs.

[Egomane]

Except for the early access packages I bought with real money, I have always paid for my mechs with cbills. With one exception, as I really wanted the Ember for some reason when it was released.

If you just play along, there is no need to buy MC mechs unless you are changing your mechs or refit them very often.

Most of my MCs went into mechbays for all of my mechs as well as some colors and other cosmetic items.

[Molossian Dog]

C-Bills. Always.

My 40 Mechs were grinded the hard way.

I am not paying 30$ for a frigging item in a game. You get a full game for that. I would feel bad having made that purchase. Like someone successfully fleeced me.

And with my luck I´d probably buy it a week before itself or its main weaponry would get nerfed. At that point I´d probably bite into my monitor out of rage.

Edited by Molossian Dog, 24 March 2015 - 03:47 AM.

[YCSLiesmith]

Molossian Dog, on 24 March 2015 - 03:39 AM, said:

C-Bills. Always.

My 40 Mechs were grinded the hard way.

I am not paying 30$ for a frigging item in a game. You get a full game for that. I would feel bad having made that purchase.

And with my luck I´d probably buy it a week before itself or its main weaponry would get nerfed. At that point I´d probably bite my monitor out of rage.

fortunately the timber wolf will never be nerfed, because it is the most iconic mech in the entire game.

[jss78]

I'm sure there are a lot of us, perhaps in the older end of the spectrum, who really don't have the time for the grind (families, grueling jobs, etc.). Yet we do like walking about in giant robots shooting stuff, and dropping a bit of MC can get us going. There shouldn't be any shame in this.

I did buy the Blackjack mastery bundle to get going, and haven't regretted one bit. In the big picture this is a very cheap hobby -- for comparison, try sailing or golf, or even going to the damn cinema these days.

(I guess using MC on the standalone mechs is a bit dubious, considering how much better deal the mastery bundles are, and considering how frequent various discounts are.)

[Molossian Dog]

YCSLiesmith, on 24 March 2015 - 03:46 AM, said:

fortunately the timber wolf will never be nerfed, because it is the most iconic mech in the entire game.

Agreed. And irrelevant. I couldn´t use TimberDerps in CW anyways.

If this is a rather ponderous set up for a "die clanner" go do that in another forum. kkthxbai

[YCSLiesmith]

nah, everyone should get a timber wolf regardless of clan affiliation, they're insane

[Hayashi]

C-Bills. MC is for Mechbays, Hero variants you can't build with C-Bills and decoration items/colours/patterns.

You'll eventually be swimming in plenty of spare C-Bills at one point. I'm spending the vast majority of mine on weapon modules now, rather than Mechs, because of how much comes in.

And on average you should actually be getting 150k C-Bills per match, given the standard assumption of 1:1 win-loss rate. 100k is what you'd get if you do nothing but lose nonstop.

Edited by Hayashi, 24 March 2015 - 04:23 AM.

[Fire for Effect]

Never bought a mech with MC always C-Bills...

Its quite a few now

[Greyhart]

The amount per match was for simple calculation purposes.

I'll likely get a mastery pack to get the ball rolling but look to use cbills for everything else. Time is a major problem for me. Also I am useless at the game, but still find it fun.

The Timberwolf is my favourite from MechWarrior 2

I think I'll be looking at heavy or medium mechs from the mastery pack

Edited by Greyhart, 24 March 2015 - 04:42 AM.

[YCSLiesmith]

the timber wolf is pretty much everyones favorite mech. its why they put it on the box

[TheArcher]

I've bought a few heroes (happily) and (regretfully) one champion with MC. All others have been CBills. I don't have any idea how "good" the prices are compared to PGI's costs to keep servers running 24/7 and continue development. I think the real question is how much you value your time/cash and how easily you can replace the cash. Do you have the free time to grind? Would it be easier to work some overtime/odd jobs to get the mechs faster? Would you rather spend the money on a movie or other activity? I'm assuming your comfortable with your emergency and retirement savings stashes.

For CBill rewards, I doubt I'm averaging 100K/match. I've been running a NARC/ECM RVN-3L eight months of the past year, and it doesn' get a heck of alot of damage even though it has a 1.25 W/L. If I use 2 consummables, that takes 80K out of the reward.

Edited by TheArcher, 24 March 2015 - 05:24 AM.