As a general rule I always go for the Center torso. Especially for those mechs where I don't their hardpoints are. Of course, everything is incredibly situational I always go for injured areas first.
Assaults:
Atlas - Never for the head because the hit detection is really weird on that eye even if you're just testing on a stationary atlas in training grounds, just because your cursor is on it, doesn't mean that's where you need to aim to hit it, now imagine an atlas pilot that will be moving around twisting and shuffling his feet, it's just not reliable.
I usually aim for the center torso. However, now that I've played the Atlas a bit, I'll be aiming for the right torso almost everytime, because I know what it's like to feel helpless when you lose your ac/20/guass rifle, and then the enemy goes under your LRM range, leaving only couple lasers for defense. However, if an atlas is running ac/20 + SRM, I go for center torso so I can kill it as soon as possible, and if I miss it still hits the side torsos.
Highlander - Usually they are either poptarting, or charging the front line and dieing incredibly fast, for now I've just been hitting the center torso because of it's massive hitbox. I may put more emphasis on hitting the right arm though since it'll probably have a guass rifle or ac/20.
Stalker - Center Torso because it's extremely huge. Tiny arms, massive center torso = why bother looking around to use arms as a shield? Thus forth, most stalker pilots I see, if they have injured arms, I'll just finish the process since they aren't trying to move around much.
Victor - Right arm or left torso. Right arm doesn't have much armor compared to the others, and will probably be guarunteed to have something dangerous in it. Left side torso is easy to hit, and is where the rest of the weapons are located.
Awesome - Center Torso, sometimes the head since the head seems surprisingly easy to hit. Awesomes are either out of my sight trying to snipe, or in my face dieing, so never really think about where to shoot them, looking at their hardpoints it seems as long as they are alive they can hurt though.
Heavies.
Cataphract - Right torso. Disabling multiple weapons, if I miss, I'll hit the massive gun or center torso. Cataphract pilots have a tendency to think they can get away with XL engines. They do have a giant cockpit though, However, I'll have to test the hit detection on it because most cockpits in the game seem rather glitchy when it comes to cockpit shots.
Jaggermech - Center torso and/or head normally, arms if stationary. The arms too tiny to reliably hit if the jagermech keeps moving.
Catapults -
A1 - Ears. because I enjoy watching them run around defensless, especially if it's a splatcat.
K2 - Cockpit - Massive cockpit, and if you miss you get the center torso. not to mention they are practicly guarunteed to have some weapons in their tiny side torsos.
C1/C4 - Cockpit/center torso. There are times where I will take off their ears though if they have a build that's LRM boaty with no self defense, or they are mocking a splatcat build.
Quickdraw - Right Torso because I would imagine they like to have XL engines, and it would disable them mostly. Center torso if I start to think they don't have an XL after seeing them for a while though
Dragon - Center torso incredibly easy to hit target, However if the right arm is in my way, I'll probably shoot it anyways if I have a build that doesn't overheat like crazy. If the left arm is there, I will wait for them to turn and let myself cooldown since the left arm is usually just a shield. However if PPCs or something like that is in the left arm, I will probably wait for my chance to kill the center torso. Even if I think the pilot has an XL engine, I will not go for the side torsos, due to the speed, twists, hit detection, etc it's just not reliable to try hitting the side torsos on a dragon, better to focus on something that everyone is shooting at.
Mediums:
Trenchbucket - Center Torso, slightly towards right torso though. 7k I may aim for the right arm or left torso depending on where it's firepower is though.
Hunchback - Right torso, then center torso/cockpit. Unless it's 4sp, which I just go for the cockpit/center torso since it has balanced hardpoints.
Centurion - Legs because cents are what introduced me to the term zombies in mechwarrior. If you're legged, you're dead. Only exception is yen-lo-wang where I'll just shoot the right arm since that's the only area where it can have something that hurts.
Blackjack - Legs because they are huge and easy to focus fire on, and to make sure it cant run away later.
Cicada, and all lights except commando - Legs. A legged light is a dead light. However, if I see one running straight at me, I may just blast them in the center torso.
Commando - In the chest or head. Commandos by far are one of the easiest mechs to kill in the game, just blast them a couple times and they are dead. I never have troubles hitting commandos, so I just blast em away. Whenever I run a high alpha build and 1 shot them as they come around a corner, I feel sorry for the pilot.
Edited by Keeshu, 05 August 2013 - 06:15 AM.
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LexLuther, on 03 June 2013 - 08:23 AM, said:
