MarsAtlas, on 05 September 2013 - 07:48 AM, said:
Most of these are based on opinion and experience, and I couldn't really find any answers with the search function. I don't need long explanations, just a short yes or no will work for them.
-Realistically speaking, are there any downsides to an XL engine besides the loss of slots? I know that if either side torso is destroyed, the whole mech goes, but I'm just wonder what people's personal experiences with them are, and if that really matters at all that much. Some mechs are already built so that if they lose a side torso they lose most of their power anyways.
-Is the anti-missile system worthwhile on slower mechs? Off of my (admittedly very limited) experience, it doesn't destroy many missiles in a salvo, and the only time I noticed it really protecting my mech from any substantial damage was when I was moving fast enough to dodge some of the salvo. I don't see any reason to believe that AMS would be useful on a a brawler.
-Does the heat being conferred onto a target mech from a flamer stack? I couldn't find a straight answer for this one. Basically, if one flamer brings the target mech's heat up to, say, 20%, would using two flamers at once instead of one bring it up to 21% or higher? Additionally, regardless of that answer, in your opinion, are flamers even worth the tonnage and slots on mechs that could effectively use them? I have a, lets say, "ambitious" mech design that utilizes two of them, but the training grounds hasn't provided me with any useful information.
There used to be other disadvantages that better balanced the XL advantages. One of them was that repairs associated with the loss of the engine were much more expensive, making your death by loss of CT absolutely devastating, and death by ST quite devastating (but not as bad as there is less damage to 3 slots compared to the center torso's much larger number). This actually made death by legging or headshot preferable.
Repair and rearm, a then badly designed mechanic based too strongly off of World of Tanks, could have been a great aid as an early level balancing mechanic for community warfare (i.e. you can't rush to upgrades early on until you rank up in CW and thus earn the rank to earn enough money to make up for losses, thus allowing you to ease into the game rather than rush into the top level tech right off the bat), as well as a hindrance to boating by charging you for surpluses of ammunition.
But it was removed as Community Warfare took forever to come up, and repair and rearm punished you harshly for failure. So much that you could potentially lose 6 times more than you can possibly earn (fully upgraded mech, endo, XL, ferro, DHS in an Atlas loaded with ER PPCs and a Gauss Rifle).
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An AMS is helpful. But alone it's never enough. Twin AMS can stop the short range Streak Missiles from a single light mech before they hit you (except a COM-2D at close range, but if that 2D is at 270 meters twin AMS will shoot down all 6 missiles). If you stack 3 twin AMS mechs or 6 single AMS mechs, most LRM-30 (twin LRM-15), LRM-20, and LRM-40 (4 LRM-10s) combos can't even touch you.
But that ammo will run out fast. And if the enemy has any intelligence at all, they'll pack an LRM-5 to drain your AMS, as it always fires at maximum speed and it doesn't conserve ammo. So whether 90 missiles are coming or 5 missiles are coming, it's always firing full speed. Draining ammo insanely fast. Someone with an LRM 5 or many LRM-5s can just stream missiles knowing they won't hit you but knowing you'll run out of ammo quickly...
They can then follow up with mass LRM-spam, and you'll be absolutely helpless.
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It..kinda-does. Really flamers are about worthless at the moment. For their intended purpose they do absolutely nothing unless it's a Catapult A1 with 6 SRM-6s (and that was before penalties). For some reason it works wonders against them.
In the mean time, I use flamers to blind people and create smoke screens. Flamers in the face cause lag on older computers with bad video cards. Even against good computers, it causes a huge wall of flames and distorts vision, throwing off their aim.
(Screens!)
At a distance, I'll throw flames on the ground to create a smoke screen as shown here.
Edited by Koniving, 05 September 2013 - 09:01 PM.
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