95 replies to this topic

[Aym]

Lan, on 27 June 2013 - 09:12 AM, said:

I partially agree. I don't mind shaving some off the legs down to 50-60 but on everything else I have full armor on every Atlas I run. It's the number one bullet magnet and you need all you can get. Granted, you loose torso more often then arms but skimping on arms is not something I am ready to do (1-2 pts to round off, maybe). Every so often they do take some hits when you torso twist and it's damn useful.

If you look at that guys video and the smurfy sheet I recreated, he's skimped on all torso parts, hell, the only thing he didn't tweak down was cockpit basically.

Yeah, but with 50 pts of armor in the arms they'll have 84 total health, that's more than enough for a "few hits" from the people who can't hold their fire while you twist.

[Just wanna play]

IMO you should choose based on personally preferences and please note i will sound weird saying stuff not many others say but i stand behind it

Just think
What do you value most? if you love the effects of ecm and the scalability of missile weapons and dont mind 2 salvos if you are going to have some lrm firepower use the ddc (ps i dont recommend try to make an atlas into an lrm boat), if you want to have a varied set-up that can do a little bit of (or a lot of) everything use the D as it has the most hard points but they are often considered hard to utilize all for one task so have many weapons for different ranges, it also has the ability to zombie and can fire lrm 10s or srm 6s in one group unlike the rs variant and the k variant. If you want to brawl and want to be as maneuverable as possible get the rs, with all of the energy weapons on the arms it can out gun any other atlas in many situations simply because it will have more weapons to use,

okay about the k, dual ams.... your immune to up 10 lrm salvos, an youd be surprised how common those are when facing inexperienced lrm boats.... (ecm has many counters and cant exactly stop dumb fired salvos) and you are also resistant to streaks and srms, but it gives up a ballistic hard point and missile hard point over the d which is its closest relative, imo its best used when your running with friends that also have plenty of firepower but could use more ams cover, you are still an atlas and you are still 100 tons and all of that tonnage has to go somewhere, you just have less weapons, it takes lots of deep thinking to decide if you want this variant (and be prepared to waste lots of money doing it)

IMO
Rs: Energy based brawler, although new heat for large pulses hurt this, i used to prefer an lpl and a medium laser on each arm but now lpls are hotter then ppcs, but it is also the worst with lrms as itcan only fire 5 at a time while others can fire 10
D: Mixed, effective with missiles, ballistics and energy weapons, both short at long range weapons due to abundance of hardpoints
K: More of a 4 man group mech,only 5 tubes for lrms/4 for srms, i recommend using weapons that have a wide effective range such as guass rifles maybe er ppcs/er large laserz, due note it can zombie better then rs and ddc
DDC: has ecm, arguable usefulness, as well as 3 missle hard points and abilty to fire any size srm launcher in one group and an size lrm launcher in up to 2 groups, worst variant for energy weapons and is there for most ammo depend variant but also usually coolest running for amount of damage due to weapons used, possibly best long range variant due to ability to mount lots of lrm launchers as well as 2 ballistics but that's not quite what its for.

Let me sort them, the further they are t the right the better they are in that category

Lrm/Srm use
DDC>D>K=RS

Ballistic use
D>/=DDC>k=rs
please note d is possibly above ddc due to less crit and tonnage taken up by ammo dependent weapons

Energy Weapons
Rs>D=K>DDC

ZOmbie Ability
D=K>RS=DDC

Anit Missile Ability
K>/<DDC>D=RS
DDC is hit or miss while K needs more tons to take advantage of its anti missiles solutions effectiveness and flexibility

Weapon Maneuverability (mainly applies to brawling)
RS>K=D>DDC

Heat
DDC>D>K arguable >RS
energy weapons trade heat to damage ratio for tonnage to damage
Threat level/Priority
DDC>D=RS>K

Price to buy and equip
RS>D>DDC>K

Edited by Just wanna play, 27 June 2013 - 07:59 PM.

[Johnny Reb]

If you ever want to skimp on armor it should always be the legs or arms! Never, the center.

Edited by Johnny Reb, 27 June 2013 - 11:41 PM.

[Tor Gungnir]

So now I am looking to replace my Medium Lasers. How are Large Pulse Lasers?

[Odnir]

The large pulse laser runs very hot. You get a bit over 10 damage from a hit with it. It has a shorter beam duration than a regular laser, so against a fast moving or twisting enemy you will be able to place more of your damage into a single location

Large pulse lasers are hard to advise for general purpose use. I used them in one of my Dragons that I played during the tournament, but for most people and mechs they are too heavy and too hot. They are the most beneficial when you will be fulfilling the following: fighting at short ranges; torso twisting a lot or moving so fast through cover you only face enemies for brief moments, so that the short pulse is a major benefit; can not afford the space or reduced point-blank-range damage of a PPC; cannot afford the heat of an ERPPC.

If you meet all of the above conditions, large pulse lasers may be a good choice for you. Generally speaking however you will find it difficult to close with the enemy on larger maps without making yourself vulnerable. The current playstyle at this date (as a result of current weapon balance and map design) favours a great deal of initial engagement at very long range. This makes large pulse lasers a frequent liability for slow-moving mechs. You are unable to fire at long ranges, and yet you have tied up many many tons of equipment when a medium laser, while weaker, is just a single ton and may free up weight elsewhere for your long ranged option.

In most cases, the PPC or ERPPC is the favoured way (for good reason) to spend the same seven tons. The chest cavity of your Atlas of course won't fit one as they require three slots, which I think has been mentioned before somewhere in this thread.

[Tor Gungnir]

I reckon they'll compliment my 3 Short Range Missiles and I do have trouble with stupid little Light Mechs.

[Just wanna play]

Johnny Reb, on 27 June 2013 - 11:41 PM, said:

If you ever want to skimp on armor it should always be the legs or arms! Never, the center.

I say cockpit first (i prefer 8ish at max)

[Odnir]

Tor Gungnir, on 28 June 2013 - 07:00 AM, said:

I reckon they'll compliment my 3 Short Range Missiles and I do have trouble with stupid little Light Mechs.

An option you may want to consider for fighting light mechs is using SSRMs (edit: That's 'streak short range missiles') instead of SRMs. SSRMs require you to lock-on, but they always hit the target, provided the target is in range and not obstructed. SSRMs as of the time of this writing also *always* damage the center torso. A volley of 6 of them might only be dealing 9 damage, but it's dealing 9 damage to the CT, and it doesn't take many of those to chew a hole completely through any light mech. Because you are piloting an Atlas-D-DC with (presumably) an ECM module, you can switch your ECM module into Counter mode (J key) to turn off the ECM of any light mech that may be attacking you and preventing you from locking on to fire your SSRMs. It's a foolproof situation and you'll learn the knack of it in short order.

Edited by Odnir, 28 June 2013 - 07:27 AM.

[Koniving]

Tor Gungnir, on 28 June 2013 - 06:28 AM, said:

So now I am looking to replace my Medium Lasers. How are Large Pulse Lasers?

Back when twin large pulse lasers ran as hot as today's twin ER PPCs and did only 10 damage instead of 10.6, I had this experience with just 2 of them and 2 regular SRM-2s.
This stalker only had basic efficiencies and hadn't even unlocked them all yet.



Of course, it is not the weapon alone. It is how you use it. Who would suspect a stealthy Stalker sneaking up on enemies who are already fighting, and then disappears before the victim's friends turn to find out what happened?

Edited by Koniving, 28 June 2013 - 07:32 AM.

[Tor Gungnir]

Dang it, two Lrg. Pulse weigh too much. Guess I'll settle for standard Lrg. Lasers.

[Tor Gungnir]

Sorry to double post like this, but is there anyway the DC-C could both fit Lrg. Pulse Lasers and a 325 Engine...?

[Just wanna play]

Tor Gungnir, on 28 June 2013 - 10:45 AM, said:

Sorry to double post like this, but is there anyway the DC-C could both fit Lrg. Pulse Lasers and a 325 Engine...?

challenge accepted! um,, other requirements?? because considering what you said, i come up with this lol

http://mwo.smurfy-ne...fed42411d1e80bd

technically since those are to things you know you want and there isnt anything else you know you wa you can just build from there, max armor maybe add endo steel then see what other weapons you want

Edited by Just wanna play, 28 June 2013 - 10:55 AM.

[Tor Gungnir]

Weeeeeell. Some small missiles of sorts would be nice, and some sort of AC to strike out beyond the laser range I suppose?

[scJazz]

You aren't using Smurfy yet are you.

Stop screwing around!

http://mwo.smurfy-net.de/

[Tor Gungnir]

scJazz, on 28 June 2013 - 10:56 AM, said:

You aren't using Smurfy yet are you.

Stop screwing around!

http://mwo.smurfy-net.de/

I don't fully understand the MechLab yet...

[Just wanna play]

Tor Gungnir, on 28 June 2013 - 11:02 AM, said:

I don't fully understand the MechLab yet...

hmmm if you want ballitic that strike out further away then the lpls youll probably go with eithe r2 ac5s, 2 uac5s, or an ac10 which might compliment the lpls better then the others as well for brawling

are you going all out brawler or jack of all trades when it comes to range OR making it an extremely long/short range mech thats has lots of lrm firepower but can brawl just as well when it needs to or wants to

[Tor Gungnir]

Currently I try to lumber in as close as I possibly can.

[Just wanna play]

Tor Gungnir, on 28 June 2013 - 11:22 AM, said:

Currently I try to lumber in as close as I possibly can.

lol lumber.... good ol fatlas

how much time do you spend closing the distance??
perhaps you could do something like this so that you could still help out while on your way to the brawl (feel free to change it if you dont want the ecm, i originally set it up with out one but what evs)
http://mwo.smurfy-ne...3a68c2a3083c4dd

[Tor Gungnir]

Guess I'll save up for the Engine later as it appears I need Endo to make it work, eh?

[Dr B00t]

i would go w/ the atlas D...some would say get the DDC but that ECM will make you the focus of any firefight and you will die quickly unless you have some experience playing assaults...i have 3 atlai...all but the K

i think the only advantage the K might have is 2 AMS slots, which is a very situational bonus...the D has very versatile slots...the RS makes a pretty good energy focused mech


oh i would also recommend avoiding XL engines...a lot of players (myself included) aim for atlas shoulders due to the large weapon on the right, or hope for ammo in the left...or better yet they are running an XL and that is instant death

Edited by Dr B00t, 28 June 2013 - 12:06 PM.