81 replies to this topic

[Valdae Levien]

Allo guys. I'm primarily running a Victor 9K with the following set-up: The Red Witch

Not sure I've set up the armour right, but the weapons are spot on. Anywho, the thing's a killing machine. Must have jumped up to a 2.0 K/D ratio with that loudout, getting 7-9 assists and pumping out 600+ damage per round.

I can take down pretty much any mech 1 on 1, the only thing I ever struggle against is a Stalker. Obviously with it being the standard trial mech at the moment, I'm seeing more of these beasties on the battlefield.

What are your guys tips for taking them down? Shoot off the missile bays? Try and get behind them? If you're a Stalker pilot, what kind of scenario makes you think "Oh Sh*t!"..?

[Scav3ng3r]

You want to CT core a stalker ASAP, if you can't get the angle to do that, beat on the side torso's, all but 2 variants have no weapon hardpoints in the CT, so once a stalker loses it's side torso's,it's useless.

The best way to kill a stalker is from the back, they have limited speed and turning, so if you are in a faster mech it's fairly easy to get behind one and stay there.

I think anything light harassing a stalker makes a stalker pilot go "Oh sh*t!" That, or being surrounded, but hey, I think that goes for most mechs

[Madlancer]

What Scav3ng3r said is true, get behind him. I pilot stalkers they are good boats but when things try to circle them they run into issues. Get behind or beside him and wail him with your better speed.

Another thing you could do is look at what his loadout is. I usually check what the loadout is on a stalker before I shoot at him, if it has any ammunition you could always opt for the less honourable method of shooting his legs out. I know certain stalker/assault builds cut armour on the legs, and legs are where they might store their ammo.

[DLFReporter]

Like Madlancer said.
Shoot at the F'ing legs and be done with it. ^^

Edited by DLFReporter, 06 September 2013 - 03:19 AM.

[Valdae Levien]

Thanks for your response guys. My thought process is that the thing is so bloody slow there's little point in shooting the legs out unless ammo is being stored there. Good advice on side torso's, will give it a go!

[Chaosdrive]

Stalkers are such a hard one to place, on one hand their gigantic side torso's make taking their CT out pretty difficult, especially when you torso twist you expose absolutely no CT area to the enemies in front of you however this makes their weapons very easy to knock out.

Providing you knock out/hit only the side torso's of the mech then your having to do, let's say, 60 points of armour per side torso (Let's say for arguments sake the guy largely ignores back armour) totalling 120 point of damage before hitting internals, the CT would have 96 points of armour - However your damage would be spread everywhere.

There is also the legs, which can have up to 72 points of armour, totalling up to 144 points of armour however you also have to keep in mind that they will have all of their weapons until that second leg is taken out and that you can hit these legs from any angle.

Overall, I'd say that in pugs you are probably better off aiming for the side torso, it is much easier to hit and can go down pretty fast, it's also what your friendlies will also end up hitting more than half the time. I end up seeing more zombie stalkers than any other mech, even cents.
In a organised 12v12, or even an organised lance drop, you should decide between you which way you want to go, the hot-from-any-angle legs, the weapons or the CT.

If you can get behind the mech though, by all means wail on that back, even if you only succeed in stripping his armour another friendly will usually take advantage of that, I generally find that stalkers are behind/very close to their team though, making getting behind them in anything bar a light a suicide mission, and even then a stray AC/20 shot can ruin your day.


As for your other question, when I'm in a stalker three things worry me, a mech behind me, a high alpha strike to the side torso, and focus fire, really, those side torso's go down ever so fast with more one one mech shooting at it - It's like aiming at a gigantic, near static hunchback that doesn't have the slightest idea how to twist and turn.

[k0sh]

Valdae, on 06 September 2013 - 02:34 AM, said:

Allo guys. I'm primarily running a Victor 9K with the following set-up: The Red Witch

Not sure I've set up the armour right, but the weapons are spot on. Anywho, the thing's a killing machine. Must have jumped up to a 2.0 K/D ratio with that loudout, getting 7-9 assists and pumping out 600+ damage per round.

I can take down pretty much any mech 1 on 1, the only thing I ever struggle against is a Stalker. Obviously with it being the standard trial mech at the moment, I'm seeing more of these beasties on the battlefield.

What are your guys tips for taking them down? Shoot off the missile bays? Try and get behind them? If you're a Stalker pilot, what kind of scenario makes you think "Oh Sh*t!"..?

I think it's when you meet triple uac5 or 4xac2 because of explosions you can't see a thing and it's tearing you apart in seconds. Or when I get tag on me and get cloud or lrm's from every direction. These are the "Oh Sh*it" moments for me.

[Stormwolf]

Shoot at it until it dies.

[Dvorak]

Valdae, on 06 September 2013 - 02:34 AM, said:

Allo guys. I'm primarily running a Victor 9K with the following set-up: The Red Witch

Not really what you were asking for help with, but just in case it's helpful... you'd have more free tonnage to work with after a few tweaks to your setup.

C.A.S.E. doesn't help mechs with XL engines, so move the ammo to the legs and pull out the CASE. Endo-Steel saves you more tons for the same number of crit slots as FF.

You end up with three tons and change more to play with as well as more slots free. You could add a heat sink & give the SRMs Artemis, for example, or add an AMS w/ammo in the head. Plus more armor. Probably other options, as well.

Edit: I am terrible at inserting smurfy links. Removed.

Edited by Dvorak, 06 September 2013 - 04:59 AM.

[Dvorak]

Oh, one other tip: move one of the heat sinks in the chest into the engine. You get more crit slots back *and* double heat sinks in the engine provide more cooling than ones outside of it.

[Autobot9000]

There are 3 solutions:

1) Mount 2 U/AC5s (and some SRMs) and win the shootout, just because PGI can't balance the U/AC.
2) Get to the stalker's rear, because in particular the 5M (trial mech atm) can't twist it's upper torso far enough nor does ithave the speed to do so.
3) Pick one of his side torsos and target fire that until the Stalker is dead. Once That side torso is gone, not only has the Stalker lost half of his guns, but also the guns fireing to that particular side, so strafing along the side becomes more effective. Any additional hit to that side torso (which is easy to hit) will directly transfer to the CT (which is hard to hit).

Watch out for the configuration of the Stalker. From my observation 50% are balanced loadouts (short/long range = MLs+LLs, SRMs+LRMs), the other 50%s are boats, i.e. SRMs+MLs or LRMs+LLs/PPCs. You don't want to engage a boat at its optimal fighting distance at any time.

The worst thing you can do: Try to aim for his CT. You will have to crunch though CT armor (93-98) plus all the shots you missed are going randomly to his side torsos (62 each). This way you will spend far more than 100 points while receiving full damagae. Remember, stalker is a DPS machine.

[Clit Beastwood]

Valdae, on 06 September 2013 - 03:52 AM, said:

Thanks for your response guys. My thought process is that the thing is so bloody slow there's little point in shooting the legs out unless ammo is being stored there. Good advice on side torso's, will give it a go!

it's *always* worth at least tickling their legs - I've accidentally hit a fresh stalker in the legs with an erll and it went straight to red. muahahahaha! no armor! I like lasers for that - trigger an ML and rake it all over an enemy mech... whatever gets hurt the most becomes my focal point. If I'm in my spider and I have a fresh stalker to myself, I dismantle it bit by bit (one leg, arm, arm, side torso, side torso, then other leg)

[justjay]

Dvorak, on 06 September 2013 - 05:06 AM, said:

Oh, one other tip: move one of the heat sinks in the chest into the engine. You get more crit slots back *and* double heat sinks in the engine provide more cooling than ones outside of it.

pretty sure only the 'included' (as in, one per 25 engine rating, up to 250) are true 'double' heat sinks, all the rest, even the ones put in the extra free slots, are only the 1.4 heat sinks.

but yeah, swap FFA for endo, and drop the case, and put the HS's in the engine slots, and then you're much better off.

also, take the SRM ammo out of torso and put it in the head instead.

Edited by justjay, 06 September 2013 - 07:06 AM.

[DukeDublin]

Taking out a stalker always works better with an optimised mech. Without changing your mech too much I made this VTR-9K.

Case removed (only stops damage from spreading, so an ammo explosion w/case would still kill your XL engine).

Ammo to the legs because the armour is higher there.

Ferro swapped to Endosteel for extra tonnage.

AMS added for utility.

More heatsinks.

Artemis added to the SRM6.

[Valdae Levien]

Hello piglets, you're all a bloody lovely bunch!

There's a lot of micro strategy to this game, so I've still got a lot to learn. Regardless, I'm looking forward to getting home later and taking some of those fat blimps down with my new config

[Scav3ng3r]

DukeDublin, on 06 September 2013 - 07:33 AM, said:

Taking out a stalker always works better with an optimised mech. Without changing your mech too much I made this VTR-9K. Case removed (only stops damage from spreading, so an ammo explosion w/case would still kill your XL engine). Ammo to the legs because the armour is higher there. Ferro swapped to Endosteel for extra tonnage. AMS added for utility. More heatsinks. Artemis added to the SRM6.

Case works with XL engines, didn't you know?   Also, case only works about 70% of the time, so you still die to 3 out of 10 ammo explosions!

Also you didn't do anything to fix his build where it counts XD  You just took off Ferro added endo, added AMS, added Artemis, and removed the CASE XD   He has a major ammo issue you totally didn't address XD

Valdae, I actually improved your build XD   I actually have 2 builds for you, Build A, and Build B

First thing I did was, take off the Ferro and added Endo, then I took off the CASE, cause really, you don't need it, and the first thing I did was add 3 tons of UAC/5 ammo.  Dude, only 50 rounds is NOT enough especially if it's your only ballistic XD  I also added another half ton of armor back onto your mech.

The second build is an augment of the first one, where I took off 1 ton of UAC/5 Ammo, I removed a heatsync, and I removed the SRM 6 to add 2 SRM 4's and a second ton of SRM ammo.

As far as optimizing your build goes, can't get much better than that, you'll now last much longer in fights due to having the ammo you need.  Your heat shouldn't be an issue as long as you don't touch those PPC's in close combat.

Edited by Scav3ng3r, 06 September 2013 - 12:39 PM.

[Corusmaximus]

As a stalker pilot I can say the only thing that makes me go "oh shooot" is walking into focus fire without my team, or 3v1 light attacks out of range of my team. Anything else I can handle.

1v1 lights die. 2v1 I give lights a bad time.
Don't bother with my legs, they have more armor than my CT.

[Mahws]

Scav3ng3r, on 06 September 2013 - 12:25 PM, said:

Case works with XL engines, didn't you know? Also, case only works about 70% of the time, so you still die to 3 out of 10 ammo explosions!

Not sure what you're talking about here? Have you got a source for that? Because as far as I've read and tested that's not how CASE works at all.

All case does is stop ammo/Gauss Rifle explosions carrying over to other components once the component the CASE is in is destroyed. As such it's useless for XL engines because once your side torso is gone you're dead anyway.


@OP, on another note, ammo explosions don't happen. There's a 10% chance of your ammo exploding when it's critted (which is pretty rare before the 10% chance) or when the section it's in is destroyed. Although it's still best practice to hide your ammo in your legs/head (where they're the least likely to get hit) honestly you can shove it just about anywhere, I can count the number of times I've seen ammo explosions happen since closed beta on one hand.

As for your armor, I'd suggest moving a lot more of it to the front. The Victor is a fast and maneuverable assualt, so you need to worry a lot less about things getting behind you. And with an uAC5 build you need to be facing your enemy and not twisting much to get the most out of your weapon, so you'll want more on the front. I'd suggest no more than 20 points of armor on your rear torsos.

Edited by Mahws, 06 September 2013 - 06:03 PM.

[Corvus Antaka]

stay really close to the stalker, try and stay to his side or behind him, either leg him (lots dont take enuff leg armour), or just rip a side torso off, then finish him. jump over their heads. they turn like slugs.

[Scav3ng3r]

Mahws, on 06 September 2013 - 06:00 PM, said:

Not sure what you're talking about here? Have you got a source for that? Because as far as I've read and tested that's not how CASE works at all.

All case does is stop ammo/Gauss Rifle explosions carrying over to other components once the component the CASE is in is destroyed. As such it's useless for XL engines because once your side torso is gone you're dead anyway.

Nope, CASE works with XL engine, but why you would put ammo anywhere else by legs, CT, and Head are beyond me.