Your Role
1. Assaults are called assaults because they assault. That means they have big firepower and much armor but are slow and not very flexible. Assaults don't hide behind a rock until their team is dead, they gather up for a coordinated push into the enemy line to neutralize the opponent's assaults and heavies as quick as possible. MWO is a team based game, that means when you go on a lone run with your assault, you will probably die and hurt your team which loses a good amount of firepower.
Assaults go first, go together and need to be protected!
2. Heavies skirmish on the side of the assaults, providing their power for the protection of the assaults of a team and support them. Focus your fire together with the assaults and neutralize the greater threats first.
2. Mediums are more agile but lack a great amount of armor compared to assaults. That means, your place is BEHIND your heavies and assaults, preferably in the second line. Mediums can still deal a lot of damage and their main purpose is to protect their assaults and heavies, especially from enemy lights and flanks. The chances to win a match grows rapidly when the assaults still stand but an assault lance without medium support has a lot less chances to decide the match. Hence mediums that go alone into the enemy line are a waste for their team and almost always a guaranty for a lost match. Have patience, don't rush if your team is not rushing.
3. Lights are for scouting and to nag the enemy. Your purpose is to lock targets, report about flanks and mess up the fireline of the enemy by running among them and try to distract their firepower from your attack lances. Each shot the enemy tries to place on a squirrel, is spared on your assaults. You have speed, use it. Occasionally a light pilot will return to their team into the third line and watch for threats among the legs of the heavier mechs.
Basic Tactics
4. FOCUS FIRE. It makes more sense when a whole lance focuses fire on one threat than when each fires at another target. If you are not using voice and are not quick enough for text chat, just look where your team is focusing at, select the same target and eliminate. A filled red triangle means other members of your team have targeted that mech. Watch where your heavies and assaults are targeting at and support.
5. LOCK TARGETS. Locking on targets gives you information on their damage and weapons. Use this information. When you see a heavy with an open center torso beside a fresh assault with full armor, focus your whole firepower on the damaged heavy and then on the fresh assault. If you kill the assault first and the heavy still stands, he can still finish you off because the fight with the assault will have your armor damaged significantly. On the other hand, ignore stumps. Don't focus on that single mech that has ran out of ammo or lost his weapons. Kill the most damaged threat with the greatest firepower first. You might score a kill on the stump but lose the game because while sawing the stump mech down, another one would open your back or side torso.
Winning a match + kill assists eventually gives you more XP and money than losing one with 1-2 scored kills on your account.
6. NEVER FOLLOW LIGHTS. Unless you can meet with the speed of a light. A wolfpack of lights can be a huge annoyance and threat for the enemy. On the other hand if you spot a light don't hunt them, stay with your team. You can try to shoo them off but don't hunt them until the main targets of the enemy team are eliminated. Squirrel hunters die alone, always.
Edited by Jherek C, 13 October 2015 - 03:05 AM.