57 replies to this topic

[StUffz]

TTK and BWC are the proof that you don't have to drop with 10 assaults.

Edited by StUffz, 31 March 2015 - 04:36 AM.

[sycocys]

Timberwolf5, on 31 March 2015 - 03:06 AM, said:

The Atlas brigadeers disagrees with you.

I back the all assault wave attacks on Clans. Yesterday night I and a group of FRR mercs dropped with about 8 atlas's and won about 9/10 of our matches. Timberwolves and stormcrows had nothing on us. This was with a group of first-timers playing together.

Good luck mech warriors.

Give that a go against the 12 better man teams we usually run into on our borders and you'll see a very different outcome I assure you.
The Atlas side torso hit boxes are too big for its speed and its weapon mounts are in poor locations for that many of them to be effective against the good teams. They can manage on defenses because you don't have to try to waddle a team of them around a corner in formation with little to no cover fire, but on an attack more than 2 of them starts to become a detriment to your team.

They do have good armor overall, but they just can't maneuver well enough when rigged to be effective dps as your main assault, they are more suited to front line support as they have enough armor to sustain, but they need better assaults and heavies to protect their soft squishy spots until you secure your hold inside the gate at the least.

And I love the Atlas, just realized early on that its usefulness in CW is very limited and unlike standard drops it actually requires that you use other heavies and assaults as shields.

[Leeroy Mechkins]

Highlanders are nice now!
733P with 4LL 3LRM5
Heavy Metal with 3LL 2AC5

Edited by Leeroy Mechkins, 01 April 2015 - 05:03 AM.

[Shadow1212]

Agree with some of whats said and totally disregard a bunch it is all about dps to beat clans good to have a mix of long range weps as well as really high dps strikers and it still all comes down to team work and focusing your fire

[Odanan]

I always go with a Stalker in my first drop: it will usually do 1000+ damage before it is destroyed. When attacking Clans, you need to overcome them and make a hold inside their base. Sniping outside the gates against the Clans is usually futile.

I agree that IS needs to go heavy/assault in the first drop (unless when doing a all-light rush) because that drop will carry the match.

[Khereg]

Inveramsay, on 30 March 2015 - 12:08 PM, said:

What is the problem if I make a significant contribution to the team using LRMs? I don't get this hatred towards LRMs. If used properly they are very effective and using them properly isn't easy mode.

I'll try to keep the hate out of it. I think the main issue is that as a player's skill increases, the usefulness of LRM's generally decreases. In essence they become a crutch and hamper your skill and development.

LRM's are also a weapon that require team coordination to reach maximum effectiveness. Think of all the gadgets and tactics that revolve around using and countering LRM's: narc, tag, light spotting, active probe, target retention, radar deprivation, etc. No other weapon in the game is nearly as dependent on these types of accessories and cooperation.

Because of this, if your team builds itself around making the LRM boats more effective, they become "one trick ponies" that better teams will know how to counter. At higher levels of play, this becomes almost automatic for opponents as teams bring a lot of ecm, radar deprivation modules, and skill at using cover effectively. What works against one set of players will quickly become ineffective as you and your teammates move up the skill ladder and face tougher competition.

Conversely, if you and your teammates forego LRM's, you will be forced to learn other skills to compensate, which are too numerous to list here. Suffice it to say, however that those skills directly translate into making you a better individual player, and if your team shares the philosophy of eschewing LRM's, you will learn better team tactics that are not so equipment dependent.

Personal disclaimer: I almost never use LRM's and my unit does not advocate carrying them in CW or public queue (either solo or group). And, as an extreme example, you will almost certainly never see them on our competitive teams. We have some members who do use them on occasion, so I won't say you'll never see us bring them. For the newer members who use them, we give them guidance similar to what I said above and try to build up their confidence and ability with other loadouts.

[MischiefSC]

Lrms are feast/famine. They are not effective because of your skill but the other teams lack of it. They are dependent on the target not using cover, staying on the move, ams and ecm teamwork. Even with no team support at all I can generally peek, put 30-60 pts of precision damage on a target and back in to cover before lrms reach me. If I do take a hit its going to be light and spread over my mech.

Even worse it takes your mech off the line. Your teammates who are providing your target are also taking fire. When you have lrms boats on your team and the other team doesn't they are spreading your fire across 12 mechs while concentrating their fire on 11 or less of your team. The enemy is shooting at someone - by staying in cover to fight you are providing sporadic, unfocused and unreliable damage while forcing your teammates to soak all the damage.

Hence lrms are a selfish (intentionally or not) build to bring. You put out a lot of damage on a good match but its way less useful being scattered over a target. Its less helpful to your team. You survive longer by making your teammates face down the enemy for you, again protecting the lrms boat at the expense of overall team effectiveness.

Lrms are unique in that they provide all their benefits to their users at the expense of their own team. Any win using lrms could have been gained with direct fire, while losses due to enemy team competency can be overcome by direct fire builds.

While I get its not the intent bringing lrms boats is shafting your team to pad your score and decreasing your overall odds of winning.

[Sandersson Jankins]

YCSLiesmith, on 30 March 2015 - 09:26 AM, said:

dump the LRMs and replace them with heat sinks. as you learn to play without them your damage will go down but this is good. like rebreaking a bone to set it correctly, it hurts at first. eventually you'll consider 600 damage to be an average match.

unless you're talking CW in which case you will make fun of people who do 600 damage a match

Few days later, but I remembered this thread at work.

You're right, and I agree 100 percent. I am talking specifically about CW, don't ever play normals if I can help it. Only if I'm JONESIN FOR THEM SPACEBUCKS YA FEEL?

But I have little interest in joining a unit that does 12-mans. I LOVE rag-tag groups, and pug v pug matches. They're at a lower skill level, sure. But ya know what?

I like it! It lets me do more silly things, and feel cooler. I'm all about muh immersion, you see. And don't get me wrong, I do consider 600 damage "average" in a CW match for this mech. I aim for above 1k of course, seeing 1400 satisfies me right now. Seeing 2k is once in a blue moon and I usually hold my jaw open for minutes when I see it.

So no, I won't be the carry of the team, and I won't be the best. Probably. But I'll make up for my less-than-ideal builds with determination, improving player skill (cant consider myself "elite", only above average), and just not caring for super-builds!

You Kuritan boys have fun mashing clanners' (davion and vatborn alike hueeheue) skulls with the most powerful loadouts. That's awesome dude, and I'm glad you have fun with it. (I think you have fun )

But people have different ways to have fun!

[Sandersson Jankins]

Timberwolf5, on 31 March 2015 - 03:06 AM, said:

The Atlas brigadeers disagrees with you.

I back the all assault wave attacks on Clans. Yesterday night I and a group of FRR mercs dropped with about 8 atlas's and won about 9/10 of our matches. Timberwolves and stormcrows had nothing on us. This was with a group of first-timers playing together.

Good luck mech warriors.

Do remember this though; I dropped 5-6 times with you in the party one day. I had a lot of fun, and we performed well, with either close wins or close losses. But there was one common theme!

You usually took rather competent lead over all of us! A bit despotic (no offense), but that is needed with certain leadership styles. Leads me to think you're former/current military or a big buff of that sort of thing.

Anyway, without a strong lead, the full-assault group is in for a rough one, I think. If you're assuming we'll always have a strong lead....well, you might not be very wrong at all! FRR does seem to have many colourful characters running the show properly at most times. And for you, I guess it IS always true since I imagine you'll step up if nobody else does.

Sorry, gotta be devil's advocate at 5AM.

[multisoul]

Tasker, on 26 March 2015 - 07:06 AM, said:

To beat clan team, IS team need better players. The end.

Even players, clan mech win.

thats right or overwhelming numbers, never letting clan take a planet due to constant counterattack mode
or fighting against 12 clan mercenaries in trial mechs

[Sjorpha]

Perfect example of how even mathematical theory must adapt to the evidence of reality, not the other way around.

[orcryst]

ok, so you have a wave of timberwolves and your solution is to get bigger guns?

why not teach people to to aim, and what to aim at? i 1 on 1 atlas's, direwolves, timbers, and warhawks all the time in a BJ-1X, sometimes, being a good pilot is better then bringing a bigger or meaner mech...

[Jonathan Paine]

If you are attacking as IS, having a few fatties to head the charge is very beneficial. While it is mostly the Stalker/Thunderbolts(Battlemasters rightly used) that will do most of the damage, having a couple of Atlas DDC's provide initial soak&ECM is incredibly valuable. For those willing to sacrifice drop-weight and who have the skill to take advantage, the dakka crab really has no equal (until ammo runs dry)

Edited by Jonathan Paine, 03 April 2015 - 09:01 AM.

[Leeroy Mechkins]

I understand some players just don't like the slower speed of assaults.
However they do have an important role, surviving tough fights and pushing through the enemy.

Personally, I don't like slow mechs and had to adjust to assaults.
So my Stalker 5S is 65kph, not super-fast, but acceptable.
2 LPLs, 4 MLs, good DPS, alpha, good heat management plus 2 AMS.
It leaves enough tonnage in my drop deck for a Thunderbolt, a Jagermech and a Firestarter.

My point is don't fear trying out Assaults because they appear slow. They have a use in CW.
And adding one to the drop deck doesn't mean you can't use heavies, meds, lights as well.
More variety.

Edited by Leeroy Mechkins, 04 April 2015 - 03:10 AM.

[MischiefSC]

Being a good pilot in a bigger mech is better than being a good pilot in a smaller mech in CW, with the exception of light rushes. We'll see if even that is true after the JJ animation fix on the 21st.

Making the enemy have to shoot you more often to kill you while you're able to kill them in 2 clean hits is a simple, direct advantage. Some of the best overall tactics involve a mix of heavy/assaults and a strike lance of fast mediums or a 4 light gen-rush group.

Overall though it is true; 12 solid heavies with an inter-supportive loadout and comparable speeds is probably the best cold killing loadout.

If nobody brings LRMs. If someone brings LRMs, then you just hope the other team is bad.

[Michael Costanza]

As an aside, in the OP, there is no real math in there unless you count adding and multiplying tonnage (and opinion of tonnage).

But overall, what your drop deck should be and what order you drop in should depend on (in order of priority):

#1 Are you on a team?
#2 Attack/Defense?
#3 What map you are on?

No single dropdeck stays the same with all three criteria and even on a pug drop, I commonly swap in and out mechs based on attack/defense and map.

Edited by Michael Costanza, 04 April 2015 - 12:06 PM.

[Leeroy Mechkins]

IDEAL ATTACK FORMATION:
5-8 Assaults in the middle to provide the wall of cover and main firing line.
2-4 Heavies/Mediums at the sides and back to cover against flanking, and to do flanking.
1-2 Lights to scout ahead and destroy gens.

Out of which 1-2 should have ECM.
1-2 can be LRM boats depending on the map. YES for Hellbore and Boreal!
All bring UAVs and Arties.

IDEAL DEFENCE FORMATION:
The same as above, except 2-4 can be LRM boats depending on the map and 1-2 of the lights/meds/heavies should carry TAG/NARC.

What do you guys think? Does this work?

Edited by Leeroy Mechkins, 04 April 2015 - 08:07 PM.

[Novawrecker]

orcryst, on 03 April 2015 - 07:42 AM, said:

why not teach people to to aim, and what to aim at? ... being a good pilot is better then bringing a bigger or meaner mech...

hey, Hey, HEY!! We shall not have this Common Sense Fuckery up in here!

All kidding aside, teaching people the above is considered "too much hard work over super-cheese builds" (quote from several players on VOiP).

Edited by Novawrecker, 05 April 2015 - 08:24 AM.