338 replies to this topic

[Tesunie]

Craig Steele, on 14 January 2014 - 04:18 AM, said:

LOL, well I was on another thread concerning omni mechs (Timberwolf) and Sarna has an 80 year revision of when the Timberwolf was first produced from the canon Field Manuals.

Someone else had the reason for it but I understood it was something to do with owners of the IP rewriting history to suit a new game product / sales. Their product failed and the IP is now in other hands (alledgely, don't quote me?)

So yeah, personally I treat Sarna with a light hand. But they were certainly Star Legue mechs which is kinda why I assumed they had no variants.

After all, Canon is that the Star legue collapsed into the 1st succession war which wiped out 90% of IS manufacturing so no variations coming from that source.

Kerensky didn't start making mechs for decades after, too busy building colonies and the 2nd exodus so no variations form that source.

By the time the clans are formed they are still using IS / SLDF mechs (I have that source book if you want some samples) so still no variations and in any case, these variants are all "Clan busters" so not going to come from Clan space right?

There were lots of SLDF mechs (Crabs, Hussars etc) in the Comguard but canon is pretty clear these are stockpile mechs, not manufactured. A few in Combine but heavily toned down and again, not manufactured but stockpile.

I suppose you could take a view that variants were produced sometime after 3050 but canon has no factories producing the base mechs, so variants are hard to understand unless they are field variants.

In any case, its all redundant cause canon isn't exactly the be all and all with PGI, so if its got a basis more power to em

Some mechs started to be reproduced after the Helm Core was found, such as the Crab. Some of the Crab's variants were actually created by Comstar when they gave away some of their stockpile to the DC, as they downgraded things here or there to make it look like Comstar might have been making a lower grade version (they didn't want people to know they had so much high tech sitting around).

The mechs designated as "clan busters" are mech concepts and designs (mostly by Comstar again) that were either found effective against the clans, or they thought would be effective against the clans. The King Crab was considered a Clan buster design, as they replaced the arm AC20s for a pair of Gauss rifles to help counter the Clans long range (creating another variant). Many clan buster mechs where not "released" till after Comstar had issued the challenge to the Clans (I can never remember how to spell that planets name!), but the mechs had been in existence for some time before hand.

I only know about the Crab and King Crab clan buster history, someone else will have to cover the rest...

(And as for AC20s in the arm, in TT the AC20 that is place in the arm spills the extra crits into the torso, giving it a double weakness to possible crits. For this game, I'd suggest removing the upper arm aculator and keeping the lower aculator. Let the King Crab be a great side to side combatant, but let it's weakness be vertical combat. It's short, so that should increase this weakness more, giving it flavor but keeping the Atlas in a decent spot still too. (Or would it need two aculators/crits removed? I don't use AC20s much, and personally.)

Edited by Tesunie, 14 January 2014 - 10:49 AM.

[HammerSwarm]

Skunk Wolf, on 14 January 2014 - 05:31 AM, said:

Consider this.

PGI nerfed the Highlander AC20 variant, because 90% of the time if it ran into any Atlas variant it would walk away from the fight (albeit usually pretty roughed up) and the Atlas would be a smoking ruin.

The arm mounted AC20 was the deciding factor, it negated the slow torso twist.

This would obsolete the Atlas, something PGI has invested a lot of resources on.

Two things; The Atlas is a mech requested by General Kerensky and such was designed to be large, strong, and powerful. It was designed to win those 1 on 1 encounters with lesser mechs. The highlander gives up 10 tons and as such should probably lose a 1 on 1 to an atlas.

The king crab is 100 tons, and was also designed to General Kerensky's specifications to meet a different battlefield role. Area denial. The focus fire potential of the king crab to down light and medium mechs in a single blow really seals it as an area denial mech.

Atlas: Jack of all Trades, Fearsome, Lots of Armor
King Crab: Specialist, Area Denial, Ammo Dependent.

Seems like even though it could probably win a 1 on 1 with an atlas it might just have a battlefield role worthy of it's inclusion.

[Artgathan]

WHERE ARE THE CRABS?!?!?!?!!?!

They're so cool. An it'd give us a much-needed ECM Medium (I know the Cicada is there, but it fills a different role). The unique profiles would really make them stand apart from other mechs!

[80sGlamRockSensation David Bowie]

ECM crab? I would instantly go 100kph, ECM 2xPPC 4xmLas ~18DHS

Even better if it could jump with ECM

[Artgathan]

mwhighlander, on 15 January 2014 - 01:07 PM, said:

ECM crab? I would instantly go 100kph, ECM 2xPPC 4xmLas ~18DHS

Even better if it could jump with ECM

I don't think the one with ECM also has Jump Jets (unfortunately).

[Agent 0 Fortune]

I don't have anything against crustaceans, but the next mech I buy will be a Zeus.

[Coralld]

I so want PGI to put in Operation Cancer, I really, really do... I can see it now.

PGI: Hey guys, for this patch we are releasing Operation Cancer mech pack with the Crab and King Crab, so get your melted butter ready because the future is crabs.

What MWO would look like for the next month or so...

[Critical Rocket]

A discussion about a what if scenario involving a Highlander and the Atlas is moot anyway because you would never deploy them against one another. The risk is too high for losing either mech which in the Succession war era was a big hit. Also the Highlander was designed originally as an urban assault mech where the Atlas was a frontline behemoth to lower enemy morale and do big damage to pretty much everything. Mechwarrior Online doesn't take any of this into account obviously because it would be incredibly hard to tailor the game that way, hence the reason you could add any number of mechs now and use their variants because the timeline is out of whack. Provided it was around between 2750 - 3050 I don't see an issue with variants, probably even give some wiggle room for variants during the invasion since you know, gameplay.

That aside Hammer's points on the King Crab are valid since it's a specialised design rather than a jack of all trades 100 tonner. When (and yes that is up for debate) drop weight limits come in for things like private matches we could very well see different mechs taking on new roles on the field and a mech like the King crab is exactly what you would want defending a base from a rush, nothing wants those dual AC's pointing at them.

[Flying Judgement]

any gold variants ?

[General Taskeen]

Flying Judgement, on 21 January 2014 - 09:59 AM, said:

any gold variants ?

I lulzed.

[Will9761]

Crabs are delectably tasty when cooked. I'd get it.

Edited by Will9761, 21 January 2014 - 05:25 PM.

[Belorion]

They should just go for it all with an IS response to the Clans package.

[Bishop Steiner]

care to guess which way I voted?

[HammerSwarm]

Flying Judgement, on 21 January 2014 - 09:59 AM, said:

any gold variants ?

Naugh I'd settle for my a fore mentioned Cancer(Krakinos) themed camo. One golden boy is enough for me.

Belorion, on 22 January 2014 - 01:51 PM, said:

They should just go for it all with an IS response to the Clans package.

Had they planned it better they could have run a Clan Pack vs. an Inner Sphere loyalist pack with eight additional IS mechs.

Bishop Steiner, on 23 January 2014 - 06:16 AM, said:

care to guess which way I voted?

The right way?

James Heywood, on 21 January 2014 - 09:49 AM, said:

That aside Hammer's points on the King Crab are valid since it's a specialised design rather than a jack of all trades 100 tonner. When (and yes that is up for debate) drop weight limits come in for things like private matches we could very well see different mechs taking on new roles on the field and a mech like the King crab is exactly what you would want defending a base from a rush, nothing wants those dual AC's pointing at them.

Amen to that. The differing role alone is why this should be the second IS 100 ton mech. The atlas is Iconic, and Fearsome. It's not suited for every battlefield role. With tonnage limits we may see the need for mechs of certain roles, and with more organized team play you might have a base defense with actual tactics. For area denial I want the best 100 ton mech for the job, and that's a king crab.

The thought of actual tactical game play and mechs fulfilling the role they were designed for is why I play Mech Warrior.

[Phoenix Branson]

Bump for Justice!

[Butane9000]

Only problems with the 50 ton crab is

A, we have a ton of mediums
B, we have more then enough 50 ton mediums
C, variants are very homogenous

Now the 100 ton would be awesome to have. Extremely unique design and variants.

I feel it'd be inappropriate to vote myself because I have sworn not to give PGI any money until they release all their extremely delayed content they've been promising.

[Bishop Steiner]

Butane9000, on 25 January 2014 - 07:53 AM, said:

Only problems with the 50 ton crab is

A, we have a ton of mediums
B, we have more then enough 50 ton mediums
C, variants are very homogenous

Now the 100 ton would be awesome to have. Extremely unique design and variants.

I feel it'd be inappropriate to vote myself because I have sworn not to give PGI any money until they release all their extremely delayed content they've been promising.

I'm OK with 50 tons more mediums..... at least. They are the most common mechs in the IS after all.

[HammerSwarm]

Butane9000, on 25 January 2014 - 07:53 AM, said:

Only problems with the 50 ton crab is

A, we have a ton of mediums
B, we have more then enough 50 ton mediums
C, variants are very homogenous

Now the 100 ton would be awesome to have. Extremely unique design and variants.

I feel it'd be inappropriate to vote myself because I have sworn not to give PGI any money until they release all their extremely delayed content they've been promising.

Given the likely mech release schedules and the promised features release schedule I think you'd be safe to vote because with 1 mech a month we won't see the King Crab or the Crab before February 2015. You should be safe voting .

I take exception that the crab is largely redundant.

• Unique body shape. No 50 ton mediums have the reverse jointed legs. All mediums 45 to 55 tons are "humanoid". I'll give the crab special credit and call it's shape unique.
  
• Wide ranging variations with similar weapons load-outs. JJ, ECM, Extra speed or weapons.
  
• All Lasers. Few chassis without ammo dependency are in game. My count was 3 mediums, only one in the 50 ton range. This will matter if and when we get a game mode where you need to survive more than a few minutes.

At this point in the life of this thread I hope people would agree that these chassis were an unfortunate over look by a dev team doing their best to see all mechs included in game. I think it would truly be to their benefit to include as many mechs as possible as quickly as possible.

[CuriousCabbitBlue]

~throws money at the screen~

[Jarl Dane]

At first I had no interest in crabs.

But then I read your topic post and I realized how cool a big 'ol fat crab scuttling in and out of a cave would be; stopping 'mechs from getting around him, blowing them up in the confined space..closing and opening his pincers at will..

I'm in. Let's do this.