151 replies to this topic

[Davers]

Hatboy, on 09 June 2012 - 08:47 PM, said:

Atlas is such an icon, people will use it no matter the penalty in battle. Im sure once youve tested the water though, the nerd attack from getting to pilot an Atlas will were off and the stalker will become more popular over time.

The Stalker and Atlas fulfill different battlefield roles. This is like saying the nerd attack from piloting a Hunchback will wear off and the Cicada will become more popular in time.

[Bullseye69]

Would take a awesome over atlas and awesome over stalker also. It al breaks down to what the lrm and srm do for you if you get hit and hit for max damage you take some damage.A PPC on the other hand one punch damage to one area or that how it did in board game. Yes it generates some heat but it one of the most powerful weapon you can get behind gauss and ac 20 as far as on shot damage and it use no ammo. Stick some heat sink in your feet and get into water for increase cooling capacity or just add more heat sinks.

Still remember the battle in battletech book warrior engarde between awesome and victor, the victor one because ***** awesome closed with him.

It not over till the assault mech come out and play!

[Morang]

Stock Stalker have no long-range single-locations punching weapons at all. Large Lasers = damage over time. LRMs = spread damage and less-than-100% hits. PPCs may have a travel time unlike lasers, but if PPC hits, it hits one location, and if PPCs are converged, alpha would be devastating. PPC also have greater range than LL (though less than LRM). Heat was also mentioned. Being 5 tons lighter, Awesome is also better armored than Stalker (15 tons vs 13.5) and have no ammunition-dependent weapons (so he never runs out or faces internal explosion). That's why Awesome.

[LackofCertainty]

Morang, on 10 June 2012 - 01:26 AM, said:

Stock Stalker have no long-range single-locations punching weapons at all. Large Lasers = damage over time. LRMs = spread damage and less-than-100% hits. PPCs may have a travel time unlike lasers, but if PPC hits, it hits one location, and if PPCs are converged, alpha would be devastating. PPC also have greater range than LL (though less than LRM). Heat was also mentioned. Being 5 tons lighter, Awesome is also better armored than Stalker (15 tons vs 13.5) and have no ammunition-dependent weapons (so he never runs out or faces internal explosion). That's why Awesome.

Ooo, you oddly reminded me of another thing I like more about the Stalker over the Awesome.

With the way hardpoints work, the stalker has way more potential for customization. I can pull everything off the Stalker, and then throw on 3 ppc's and a small laser, and I have a 5 ton heavier Awesome. I can't make a pseudo Stalker with the Awesome. Since the Stalker has 4 missile hard points and 6 energy hard points, there's plenty of different load outs you could make. On the other hand, the default Awesome only has 4 energy hard points. Basically all the default Awesome can do is Boat PPC's or boat LL's.

(unless I am mistaken in how hardpoints work in MWO?)

Edited by LackofCertainty, 10 June 2012 - 01:37 AM.

[chungus maximus]

Lazer Blazer, on 09 June 2012 - 04:23 AM, said:

Ive looked at the stalker and I thought YES. I looked at the atlas and I though walking target board. I can't understand why anyone would pick it over the stalker.

Stalker: sleek profile 2 LRM 10'S, 2 SRM 6's, 4 medium lasers and 2 Large Lasers. coming up over a hill All of its weapons are shown first.

Atlas: Wide and bulky profile. built to be shot at. Ac20, 4 medium lasers 1 LRM 20, 1 SRM 6 and coming up over a hill you would just see its head.

I do not get it.

I think the Atlas simply has the benefit of being an intimidating design. It looks mean as s***, as it was designed to. The Stalker doesn't have the skull cockpit, or the AC20 strapped to it's waist, or as much fan fare. I for one don't like the Stalker too much, but mostly due to having the old-school image of it burned into my subconscious

[hermione]

well on tt , the physical attack by using a punch from an atlass was stressed over using the weapons in its arms, the punch did more damage and had a 1 in 6 chance of hitting the head, plus you must remember the basic innner spear piliot was a 5 piliot, 4 gunner. with using the punch, if you failed to hit, no biggie, on the kick you had to make a pilioting roll if you failed, weapons wise the stalker by its use of srm/lrm had a greater chance to roll a head shot/critical hit {a 2 or a 12 on dice) both are excellent mechs, in stock 3025 form, both were designed to fill a role

[Agent KI7KO]

In a multi-mech brawl, the Stalker's LT/RT is very easily exposed. By comparison, there is a very high chance that if you shoot the Atlas while it was facing 90 degrees either way, you will probably hit an arm.

On the other hand if you keep facing your target in a Stalker, you can just angle your torso slightly off target and make it difficult for your enemy to aim at whichever L/R Torso you have that happens to be damaged.

Then there's cockpit placements.

Different body types, different tactics.

[zzzuk]

Sporkosophy, on 09 June 2012 - 04:54 AM, said:

No, Atlas has 4 Med. Lasers.

Yeah, you are right. Sorry for my mistake.

[Voiddog]

Atlas looks badass Stalker looks like a walking jawa transport

[Sychodemus]

The Stalker.

It isn't trying to impress anybody. It just wants to kill you.

[Kobold]

People seem to be overlooking customization.

We don't know for certain what hardpoints these mechs will have, but it would be fairly trivial to make significant changes to either. The Atlas could probably easily pack two LRM 20 racks and a couple PPCs and out duel an Awesome or Stalker at range, just because more tonnage = more armor and weapons and heat sinks. You can't make too many assumptions about what you opponent is packing.

[wanderer]

Kobold, on 11 June 2012 - 07:44 AM, said:

People seem to be overlooking customization.

We don't know for certain what hardpoints these mechs will have, but it would be fairly trivial to make significant changes to either. The Atlas could probably easily pack two LRM 20 racks and a couple PPCs and out duel an Awesome or Stalker at range, just because more tonnage = more armor and weapons and heat sinks. You can't make too many assumptions about what you opponent is packing.

Well, aside from the Atlas incinerating itself under the heat load.

Let's look at the basics. Atlases have 20 heat sinks stock, one ballistic hardpoint (occupying one side tors), two missile hardpoints (both in the other side torso), four energy hardpoints (one per arm, two in the CT which are a max of 1-crit weapons each, or using one HP with a 2-crit weapon), and 36 tons of weaponry.

LRM-20's weigh in at 10 tons, six heat per shot. PPC's, 7 tons, 10 heat per shot. You could get two PPC's, an LRM 20 + a few tons of ammo, and have some room for a few medium lasers and heatsinks to handle the extra cooling needed. 4 big long-range weapons would be pushing things past what it could reasonably keep firing without shutdowns or blowing the LRM ammo in overheat. Stalkers can actually carry a comparable loadout, just with less armor- but that's not surprising given it's 15 tons lighter.

Stalkers will make better missile/energy boats. Atlases have only the arm hardpoints to really use for big energy weapons, and likewise only two missile hardpoints. You're going to see more of them packing mixed loads, especially to take advantage of a Gauss Rifle-able location.

[Woska]

Why choose?

Get one of each.

[phelancracken]

A stalker has flipable arms as well people. The LRMs and LLs were mounted torso with the smaller weapons mounted in the arms. So getting behind a Stalker could still be VERY painful. If a Stalker can get into water, it's heat management issues just got better. Quite a few 3025 mechs have heatsinks in the legs so standing in water improved heat management. As other posters have stated, you stay out of AC/20 range, the Stalker has the firepower advantage. Granted, heat can be an issue, but people who know how to manage heat that's part of the game.

Here is where the Stalker has the advantage. In long over 12 turn games, IIRC, the Atlas only has 2 tons of LRM ammo, once it's gone, the mech is a range 9 mech max unless you have the 7-K variant. Okay the Stalker only has the same amount of LRM turns worth of ammo, but those LLs reach out to range 15. Big difference and it's a difference that could make or break winning battles in very long games. Now a lot of the 3050 designs of the Stalker are crud. I look at them and go, what the heck were the designers smoking??!!!! Not adding DHS to designs with heavier high heat weapons? Putting Narc on an assault......okay, unless the enemy is stupid they aren't going to let an assault NARC them. Most of them won't even get that close to an assault willingly unless they have a superior mech.

As other posters have mentioned, different roles for the mechs. Variety adds the spice to life.

[Kenaris]

Blu C, on 09 June 2012 - 04:58 AM, said:

Correct, 4 ML on the Atlas. Technically 2 of those should be rear firing, however since that is difficult to actulaly make doable videogames tend to just mount them forward firing.

I just remembered another reason to take the Atlas over the Stalker (though it isn't really relevant to MWO): Two fully articulated hands. In the tabletop that makes the Atlas probably the MOST dangerous close combat 'Mech in the game because it's punches hit for so much damage.

Good Job maybe my Atlas can now give people the finger before it gets blown up... lol

[Davers]

Atlas will also be better at charging then the Stalker too.

[Todd Lee]

My biggest issue with the Atlas is the fact that its head is so exposed in comparison to many other mechs. I've always just tried to keep my distance and headshot it with ER lasers as much as possible.

[phelancracken]

Davers, on 11 June 2012 - 12:20 PM, said:

Atlas will also be better at charging then the Stalker too.

True. Atlas has 15 more tons of mass to charge with to create damage. However, as they both have the same movement, it's not like either one is going to burn up the track getting anywhere.

[Elkarlo]

Arnie1808, on 09 June 2012 - 04:47 AM, said:

I would watch out the Lyran's wouldn't like you bad mouthing their favourite scout 'mech

Thats Totally wrong, their favourit Light Scout Mech is the Griffin. It's even stands behind the Throne.
Then they have as Med serves the Grasshopper and the Heavy Scout is the Banshee.. The Atlas is along with the Light Firsupport Mech Zeus the mobile Workshorse Mech of Lyrian Commonwealth...

Back to Topic:
In the Tabletop the Atlas is overarmored... it is more likely to loose a AS-7D due to Critical's then to Armor breakthrough.
15 Tons normal and with Clans 16 tons is the stastik optimum. A full armoured Mech is more likely to die on Head or Reaktor Breakthrough... the last 3-4 Tons are wasted. ( Personally i drove severaltimes a costumized AS with 2x lsr 15 instead one Lsr 20 on the tabletop, he got several times hammered because the oposition force knew that he was "light" armored. One time he had 1 Armour Point torso center left and he died... Critical on Engine... in 5 Matches he died 4 times, everytime thanks to Crits... he was simply picked out because he was far more Dangerous then a normal As7-d, but his side won, still 15 Tons on armour to eat and he had the Firepower of a Katapult and Quasimodo combined)

Edited by Elkarlo, 11 June 2012 - 12:47 PM.

[Rougeskra]

Simply put Stalker. They are both good. Just like the Stalker.