464 replies to this topic

[Mothykins]

I still see value in the LCT-3M ERPPC build - Not really a good light killer, but against Heavies and Assaults it seems to run acceptably - The high speed lets you move about the battle with ease and outrun any major threats, the ERPPC lets you reach out and touch them from across the map, and with a heat rating of 1.55, it runs cool enough to keep plugging away. I seem to have good survivability in it; It has better handling then the other lights, and is exceptionally twitchy to pilot. It still has issues with Streaks, but If I'm letting anything get close, I'm already in trouble; It's very much a support 'mech.

As you said, this is a Competitive play list, but I respectfully think that the 3M can be at least an 'average' 'mech. It's not as terrible as everyone seems to think.

Now, the 1V, no matter how much I enjoy piloting it, that thing is just... ugh. Amusing as heck, get's you feeling all good about all the firing and dodging and weaving and yeah, but... Vastly ineffective.

[Bront]

Cavale, on 10 November 2013 - 10:20 AM, said:

I still see value in the LCT-3M ERPPC build - Not really a good light killer, but against Heavies and Assaults it seems to run acceptably - The high speed lets you move about the battle with ease and outrun any major threats, the ERPPC lets you reach out and touch them from across the map, and with a heat rating of 1.55, it runs cool enough to keep plugging away. I seem to have good survivability in it; It has better handling then the other lights, and is exceptionally twitchy to pilot. It still has issues with Streaks, but If I'm letting anything get close, I'm already in trouble; It's very much a support 'mech.

As you said, this is a Competitive play list, but I respectfully think that the 3M can be at least an 'average' 'mech. It's not as terrible as everyone seems to think.

Now, the 1V, no matter how much I enjoy piloting it, that thing is just... ugh. Amusing as heck, get's you feeling all good about all the firing and dodging and weaving and yeah, but... Vastly ineffective.

The problem is that there are better mechs for it. You can do the same thing with any Jenner while having more armor, JJs, and possibly more weapons without losing much in the speed or size department, or do it from a Raven-3L with ECM along with almost all of the other benefits of 15 extra tons of mech brings.

The Locust is too squishy and requires too many sacrifices to do very much with at the moment. It's not a teir 2 mech because anything any of the variants can do, other mechs can do better (Due to either hardpoints or simply how many weapons you can mount).

1V - Spider 5K does it better, with JJ, speed, AND firepower

3M - Jenner F does it better with JJ, an extra hardpoint, armor and room for cooling.

3S - Jenner D does it better, as it's nearly impossible to top 8 missile tubes for SRMs, or 10 for LRMs, and the Jenner can fit more ammo, HS, and more weapons beyond the extra energy slot.

I enjoy my 1V on occasion, but I have no illusions it does anything better than another mech, or even as good.

Edited by Bront, 10 November 2013 - 11:30 AM.

[IrrelevantFish]

Cavale, on 10 November 2013 - 10:20 AM, said:

As you said, this is a Competitive play list, but I respectfully think that the 3M can be at least an 'average' 'mech. It's not as terrible as everyone seems to think.

Yes, it is. In addition to its extreme squishiness, its lack of ECM makes it tough to hide, even at long range, and it's lack of JJ's makes it tough to run. The Jenner may be 20kph slower, but it can often keep up long enough to kill or cripple.

These problems are only magnified with a sniper build, which often has to operate without any support. You can only do one thing well, and you can only do it so long as the enemy tolerates you doing it. If lights come after you, you'll probably be dead before you can make it back to the protection of your teammates.

Cavale, on 10 November 2013 - 10:20 AM, said:

Now, the 1V, no matter how much I enjoy piloting it, that thing is just... ugh. Amusing as heck, get's you feeling all good about all the firing and dodging and weaving and yeah, but... Vastly ineffective.

I actually find the 1V to be the most effective of the Locusts (ie, it's the third or fourth most useless mech in the game). I try to hover around the edges of brawls and swoop in to take out exposed internals or backs with MGs while my teammates are keeping them occupied.

In other words, it's like a SDR-5K with half the mobility, a quarter of the durability, and an eighth of the usefulness.

[luxebo]

Ok, thanks for the Jester rating. I think modifying the Pug list to be tier 1-3 is a good idea, as a lot of mechs are a lot more useful in Pugs than competitiveness. Like Cent D can do fine in Pugs because not as many people would directly know how to shoot the arm off, as they're Pugs.

[travelbug]

I'd second the tactics summary. Nothing complements the tier list more than a tactical subsection

[Itsalrightwithme]

Thanks to MavRCK and others who have constructively contributed the list and to the discussion. This thread has been very educational.

There are so many dissenting opinions from those who don't realize 12-man comp \neq 12-man pug \neq 4-man pug \neq solo pug; the meta for the different drop cases are quite divergent, and I wonder if this isn't good for the game. It makes the jump from 4-man pug drop to 12-man pug drop to 12-man comp drop quite hard to understand for most teams. If the meta for all cases were better aligned, this will may make the community more adaptable and malleable.

I wasn't a fan of the poptart days since one style/build trumps all others in pretty much all cases, but at least it was consistent whether you are playing solo, 4-man, 12-man pug, 12-man comp.

Anyway, thanks again to the contributors of this thread!

[MavRCK]

You guys are doing some great discussion and can explain clearly what makes a mech more viable than another. I don't need to do this list anymore.. you guys can.

[Metalsand]

My only question is that why would you ever recommend buying a Champion mech? A new player using a hero mech and premium time can earn about 20 MILLION over their cadet stage, more than enough to buy 1-2 mechs with their most optimal loadout. Besides champion mechs not being worth it, they also only give a lousy XP boost instead of a C-Bill boost, and it's only a 10% boost compared to a 30% C-bill boost. Any mech that isn't Hero class bought with MC is a waste of money because even buying extra slots is optimal in comparison.

[Itsalrightwithme]

MavRCK, on 13 November 2013 - 07:59 PM, said:

You guys are doing some great discussion and can explain clearly what makes a mech more viable than another. I don't need to do this list anymore.. you guys can.

Haha, you started something really good here, MavRCK.

Just thinking out loud, it may be good to have an evolving thread for various solo pug or 4-man roles, if you guys care to contribute. For example, one thread for 4-man LRM team, one for 4-man brawler-centric team, 4-man light/fast medium team. Or, a thread for particular weight classes (Assaults? Heavies?).

[Wintersdark]

Metalsand, on 13 November 2013 - 10:34 PM, said:

My only question is that why would you ever recommend buying a Champion mech? A new player using a hero mech and premium time can earn about 20 MILLION over their cadet stage, more than enough to buy 1-2 mechs with their most optimal loadout. Besides champion mechs not being worth it, they also only give a lousy XP boost instead of a C-Bill boost, and it's only a 10% boost compared to a 30% C-bill boost. Any mech that isn't Hero class bought with MC is a waste of money because even buying extra slots is optimal in comparison.

First, because for many people, time is limited but a couple bucks is trivial. If you're going to spend money, unless you play a lot you get a much better return on your dollar by purchasing a champion mech instead of Premium Time. For a month of premium time to be worth while, you'd need to earn ~10m cbills from the premium bonus alone, which is 66 hours of play. Or, you could spend that MC buying a Champion mech. Now consider that months of premium time are never on sale (and weeks or less - even when they are on sale - are spectacularly bad deals) but Champion Mechs are on sale all the time, that becomes and even better deal.

As such, yeah... buying Champion mechs with MC can be a better deal than buying premium time.

If you just needed one, it wouldn't matter so much. But you need 3 mechs. One champ, 2 regular works out pretty well, then.

The issue though is that you can't even begin to say what's worth the money (or "optimal" as you put it), because everyone's financial and time limits are very different.

[MavRCK]

Metalsand, on 13 November 2013 - 10:34 PM, said:

My only question is that why would you ever recommend buying a Champion mech? A new player using a hero mech and premium time can earn about 20 MILLION over their cadet stage, more than enough to buy 1-2 mechs with their most optimal loadout. Besides champion mechs not being worth it, they also only give a lousy XP boost instead of a C-Bill boost, and it's only a 10% boost compared to a 30% C-bill boost. Any mech that isn't Hero class bought with MC is a waste of money because even buying extra slots is optimal in comparison.

I stated in my recommendations that if you are going to spend MC on a mech chassis, then if there is a champion version of that mech chassis, that the champion version is always the better option to buy over the stock chassis version. That's becauset the champion version already has the upgrades (ie. double heatsinks, XL engines, Endo etc.) and the layout that most players would want to use - because champion mechs are based on those suggested by the community.

It's great to see people discussing mechs, layouts and tactics. Originally the tier list was not even accepted and faced a lot of criticism for even being valid -- heck, even being allowed to exist. Now, there's (begrudging) acceptance and we can focus on the fun part of analyzing mechs, designing optimal lances, tactics etc...

Here's a nice series of articles I've been reading and have enjoyed by Vercinix: http://mercenarystar...scene-metagame/

Edited by MavRCK, 14 November 2013 - 04:21 PM.

[Alaskan Nobody]

MavRCK, on 14 November 2013 - 04:10 PM, said:

It's great to see people discussing mechs, layouts and tactics. Originally the tier list was not even accepted and faced a lot of criticism for even being valid -- heck, even being allowed to exist. Now, there's (begrudging) acceptance and we can focus on the fun part of analyzing mechs, designing optimal lances, tactics etc...

I still oppose it, in a general sense - mostly because I have a lot more fun in the 'weaker' chassis - and most people see those as nothing more than a hurdle toward mastering the top tier chassis.
But even at first, it was not a serious "This Has To Die!" opposition, because for everybody like me, there are many more, who cannot stand the benefits of a 'weaker' chassis.

I have used the list in the past (and probably in the future as well ) to figure out which of those mechs are more likely to be the prime target - and thus need to be played more cautiously.

I at least - appreciate the time and effort that was put into this.

[Sarsaparilla Kid]

I skimmed through the thread but didn't see any discussion as to why the Victor 9K is Competitive Tier 1. With ballistics being king right now, and the 9K only having 1 ballistic hardpoint, the best you could do is an AC10 or Gauss (which is gimped by the charge time). The Heavy Metal, which is in Tier 2 has the same number of arm crit slots as the 9K but allows for 1 more ballistic hardpoint in the right arm, so you could at least stuff 2 AC5s in the Heavy Metal. What am I missing about the 9K that puts it in Tier 1 with the current meta?

[Abivard]

wow, just wow, but that statement about being on an island comes to mind.

[MavRCK]

Sarsaparilla Kid, on 16 November 2013 - 05:36 PM, said:

I skimmed through the thread but didn't see any discussion as to why the Victor 9K is Competitive Tier 1. With ballistics being king right now, and the 9K only having 1 ballistic hardpoint, the best you could do is an AC10 or Gauss (which is gimped by the charge time). The Heavy Metal, which is in Tier 2 has the same number of arm crit slots as the 9K but allows for 1 more ballistic hardpoint in the right arm, so you could at least stuff 2 AC5s in the Heavy Metal. What am I missing about the 9K that puts it in Tier 1 with the current meta?

If you skim through the videos, you'll find an hour plus long discussion with Ryan Steel on mechs including the 9K.

Hey everyone: don't forget to vote.. check out this fan art contest!!

http://mwomercs.com/...ing/page__st__0

Edited by MavRCK, 16 November 2013 - 08:32 PM.

[Sarsaparilla Kid]

Thanks, Mav, I'll look for it, but JagerXII said it's a Tier 2 at best...

ETA: Listened to the video...very interesting benefits related to mobility, though firepower not so much.

Edited by Sarsaparilla Kid, 17 November 2013 - 12:09 AM.

[Bront]

Sarsaparilla Kid, on 16 November 2013 - 05:36 PM, said:

I skimmed through the thread but didn't see any discussion as to why the Victor 9K is Competitive Tier 1. With ballistics being king right now, and the 9K only having 1 ballistic hardpoint, the best you could do is an AC10 or Gauss (which is gimped by the charge time). The Heavy Metal, which is in Tier 2 has the same number of arm crit slots as the 9K but allows for 1 more ballistic hardpoint in the right arm, so you could at least stuff 2 AC5s in the Heavy Metal. What am I missing about the 9K that puts it in Tier 1 with the current meta?

If you're going to use a Gauss or AC10, the 1 balistic hardpoint is all you need anyway, so the extra energy hardpoint is more useful than the extra missile hardpoint given SRM/LRM usage in top teir competition. Besides, it's listed as the last Teir1 Victor, so in the rating it's the inferior model. The other advantage it has is increased arm movement and can mount more JJ, so it can react to lights better and possibly jump-snipe a little better.

To be fair though, the 9K was my favorite Victor till the Gauss change. Gauss, 3 MLs, SRM6+SRM4 would wreck things.

Edited by Bront, 17 November 2013 - 08:50 AM.

[Sarsaparilla Kid]

Thanks, Bront...it's definitely more mobile, but an AC10 is not ideal outside of around 400m as the projectile drop and slower speed becomes a factor in being able to hit the same component as the PPCs. Maybe most engagements will happen in under 400m anyway, though...is there a statistic on that?

[MavRCK]

Sorry guys. Power was out tuesday and I am working lots this week - last week was a 100 hr week from hell. Combine that with few new things to comment and I feel that there's not much to do unless I do regular segments on tactics. Even then it's a lot of work.

I have an interview planned - might have others. Some refinements to the lists but the list is essentially set. The next modules are not ground breaking although I will need to explain UAV and artillery strike...

If there is a topic favoured by a lot of people I'd address that.

Edited by MavRCK, 20 November 2013 - 10:51 PM.

[Sarsaparilla Kid]

There was speculation that the Advanced Gyro module might reduce jump-jet shake...any confirmation on this yet, one way or the other?