20 replies to this topic

[Torothin]

Which of the heavy and medium mechs is considered a good long range sniper in the game?

[Noigatnoc]

Anything with high mounted guns on it (jagermech/blackjack excel for this). Ac2s, gauss rifles are generally what you want to go for in a sniping role

Edited by Noigatnoc, 05 December 2013 - 07:58 PM.

[Torothin]

I am hearing that the cataphract-3d is good???

[Mahws]

If you're looking to play as a 'Sniper' the things you'll want in a mech are ballistic or energy slots placed high in the side torso and jump jets. The high placement because it allows you to fire over cover whilst exposing little of your mech and the jump jets because they allow you to 'poptart' above cover to fire.

Mediums that fit the bill are Blackjacks and ShadowHawks. The Shadowhawk is widely considered one of the best mechs in the game and a good poptart, the blackjack can make for an okay poptart, but suffers heavily from its light weight.

For heavies Jagermechs and Cataphracts are both good choices. Jagermechs have good high mounted ballistic slots and Cataphracts are solid poptarters.

Good weapons are two or more AC/5, PPC and if you can handle the charge time Gauss Rifles. AC/2 may look like a good choice on paper, but they require you to fire for long periods of time to build up any damage and at long range will spread your fire too much to be effective. AC/10 and 20 are good as well for poptarts, but until you're comfortable with short range poptarting they'll be of limited use to you.

That being said if you expect traditional FPS sniper gameplay prepare to be disappointed. Long range direct fire support is more about pinning down your enemies and wearing down their armor than getting kills. Just because you can hit the enemy from 800m+ doesn't mean that you'll be effective doing so, good fire support should be behind the frontlines by a few hundred metres at most.

Edited by Mahws, 05 December 2013 - 08:04 PM.

[Torothin]

Unfortunatley I am playing a CR brawling ATLAS AS7-RS. So I know all about CR atm. It's what I am learning on.

[Alistair Winter]

Best: CTF-3D with 2 gauss, 4 medium lasers.

Coolest and stealthiest: Cicada with 1 gauss, ECM

Also, what Mahws said. It takes a lot of talent to be any kind of "sniper" in this game. New beginners will need to play more like "long range fire support", because it's no fun being a solitary sniper hiding behind a tree, when 4 enemy light mechs suddenly ambush you. And that tends to happen with new players who try to go full Rambo.

Edited by Alistair Winter, 05 December 2013 - 08:24 PM.

[80sGlamRockSensation David Bowie]

As for Snipers...

Mediums

ShadowHawk is the best, also a Jump Sniper
otherwise...
BlackJack or Cicada
A few o the BlackJacks can jump, one of the Cicada's has ECM.

Heavies

Jagermechs are the best Land Snipers
Cataphract 3D is the best Jump Sniper
Catapult K2 - Honorable Mention.

Assault

Stalker, Landsniper
Victor, Jump Sniper
Highlander, Jump Sniper



A jump sniper implies it can mount jump jets. Derogatory to be called a "Poptarter", usually in reference to players who only jump straight up and down in one static position. Fear the jump snipers, shoot back at the poptarters.

A land sniper is exactly how it sounds. High mounted weapons that can't jump but are great at hill humping. which is where you barely crest over a hill just enough that you can see over it and your high mounted weapons can clear the terrain without digging your shots.

Edited by mwhighlander, 05 December 2013 - 08:55 PM.

[Victor Morson]

Torothin, on 05 December 2013 - 07:59 PM, said:

I am hearing that the cataphract-3d is good???

One of the very best. However, I need to clarify on "Sniping."

Right now, sniping is considered 2 AC/5, 2 PPC. The 3D runs this very, very well. While it can fit 2 Gauss, it makes your 'mech too fragile, so it's not advisable.

The Jaggermech is a pure sniper 'mech, with high mounted guns and can equip twin Gauss, and ridge behind a hill. These are a pretty good 'mech but highly niche and very fragile.

My advice? Get the Cataphract 3D. Even if you want to brawl or midrange with it, the Cataphract family is the very best heavy series in the game, all around. You might check out a twin Gauss Jagger at some point, but PPC+AC5 Cataphracts are really powerful.
Likewise, 4 AC/5 Cataphract 4Xs are very good as well; they lack jump jets and are less well rounded than the 3D, but if you like the 3D, consider picking this up second (so you can buy three Cataphracts and master the chassis.)

..

If you're looking for a medium sniper buy a Shadow Hawk. 2 AC/5 1 PPC works great on it, and you could run Gauss+PPC in pugs pretty effectively. It's the very medium in the game right now without question.

Alistair Winter, on 05 December 2013 - 08:22 PM, said:

Best: CTF-3D with 2 gauss, 4 medium lasers.

It's actually really bad. Don't get me wrong, it's powerful and it's fun to play, but if you lose a Gauss, it's GG. That's why I gave up the 3D 2x Gauss ultimately. If they ever release another hero Cataphract with split ballistics and jump jets, I'm buying it in a heartbeat.

That said the Ilya is also an exceptionally good choice for a hero.

mwhighlander, on 05 December 2013 - 08:54 PM, said:

A great list

I'm thinking he should go Cataphract 3D being new, and that being a real "must have" mech but this list is dead on.

[Alistair Winter]

Victor Morson, on 06 December 2013 - 12:12 AM, said:

It's actually really bad. Don't get me wrong, it's powerful and it's fun to play, but if you lose a Gauss, it's GG. That's why I gave up the 3D 2x Gauss ultimately. If they ever release another hero Cataphract with split ballistics and jump jets, I'm buying it in a heartbeat.
That said the Ilya is also an exceptionally good choice for a hero..

Each to his own. I've got 200+ matches in the CTF-3D and second only to the Victor 9B, it's probably my most effective build in the history of the game. Including the 3xUAC5 Ilya before the UAC5 nerf.
I stopped playing the CTF-3D a month or two ago, I forget. Not a big enough challenge. Maybe I should have kept playing a bit more, to get matched up against the high ELO guys. But then that's not really a big goal of mine, because when you get to the top, you have to stop using the fun builds.

If you lose a side torso, it's over. Sometimes you lose an arm, and it sets off a chain explosion that destroys the whole mech. But even with this fundamental flaw, the pros far outweigh the cons. It's similar to the YLW, except more extreme. The risk is greater, the reward is three-fold.

Of course, I don't particularly recommend any of those builds to new players. But the answer to the question "Which is the best sniper" is the CTF-3D in my mind. The CDA-3M is the coolest of all viable snipers, if only for the bragging rights when you get more kills and damage than anyone on your team, even though you only have a single weapon.

Edited by Alistair Winter, 06 December 2013 - 01:22 AM.

[Turist0AT]

Whant to be a sniper you say.. well remember couple of things.

Weapons have maximum range and you often die a horrible death, without backup and with the whole enemy team after you.
So dont sit back too far.

Mediums are faster too redeploy and can run away if things are getting too hot. Heavies... well you better kill that assault heading your way.

Preferd loadout for CTF-3D 2 Gausses(with lasersights(TAGs)) and ERPPC.
Quickdraw is a pretty nice sniper with 4PPCs in his cheast.
Or Stalkers or highlanders that can allmost cool all that energy.
Or Jägermech, with those highmounts.

Any mech can be used to snipe. you just need to consider.
Jump Jets (if you want to get on high places)
Energy hardpoints(if you want to cook terkey) how are they located, how many are there.
Balistic hardpoints (to ra'pe face with) same goes for this, how are they located: not so good on 3D but good on Jäger
Speed so that you can get into your fireing position

[Redshift2k5]

Long range, direct fire weapons are a viable focus. Arguably there are more long-range weapons in MWO than anything else.

Using them effectively in MWO is quite a bit different than being a sniper in other games, however. Your weapons won't have that much more range than the weapons used by most other mechs, since even a brawler mech might be using a weapon with a range in excess of 500 meters. You don't have 3-4 times the range of the mechs you're "sniping" at and you don't have any mechanic to provide you with cover from return fire and you must expose a larger portion of your mech to return fire in order to shoot effectively (you don't have a single skinny sniper rifle that you can use to shoot through a small, well-covered 'sniper spot')

If you try to stay a kilometer behind your team and 'snipe' you will probably fail. your team will be too far away to defend you from harassing lights and you'll be too far away to maneuver with them and focus fire. Move with your team. This does not mean 'be in a blob' but move when they move and into a position so you can fire on the same targets as they are. A lot of the targets you will be shooting at will be using weapons with roughly the same range as any of your 'sniper' weapons.

[Mawai]

Many snipers these days run a combination of ballistics and PPCs. PPCs can run quite hot though which can limit the number of shots you can take in a row.

All the Jagermech variants are good at range. The JM6-S is probably the most flexible with 4 Ballistic and 4 Energy hard points. The 4xAC5 loadout works really well on it ... but the mech is slow as a result. The lack of heat from the AC can let you take 10 or more shots in a row without heat problems - this is 200 damage if they all hit. This is generally not possible with a PPC/AC combination.

The main problem with the Cataphract is the low-slung arm weapon mounts. This means that it is more difficult to snipe from behind terrain. In a Jagermech, if you can see the target you can almost always hit it due to the high mount weapons. However, the extra tonnage of the Cataphract gives it more room for ammo or a larger engine and jump jets.

For sniping the zoom module is highly recommended.

[SniperCon]

To elaborate on the references to the CDA-3M sniper which I've played a good bit. My version of the design is based on the ShadowCat and has 2 medium lasers for backup, but only 3 tons of ammo.

ECM+Gauss has a unique place in the world of snipers. Compared to other sniper weapons (ERLL, PPC, and ACs) it is nearly impossible for an enemy to track the weapon fire back to it's source. ERLL is a long blue line giving away your position. PPC is a sizable blue bolt and is easy to see coming. Long range ACs are harder to see initially, but are rapid fire and easy to see tracers once you look for them.

The gauss round is very hard to see, but there is one giveaway. When you fire, a plume of sparks come out of the barrel like a muzzle flash. If someone is hit by a gauss they will be looking for the muzzle flash, but the cool thing is that the teammate standing next to them will often ignore it (don't know why but it happens). It is important to wait for your target to look away, but I can often get off 4-5 rounds without retaliation even if other enemies are looking in my direction.

Based on this the stealthiness of the gauss can be combined with the stealthiness of ECM to make a neat combo. The Cicada and Atlas can both do this, but the Atlas doesn't make the sneakiest mechs.

My favorite strategy is sneak around the edges of the map behind cap points on conquest taking out 'Mech's legs. Targeting the leg doesn't give away that you are behind them, and once they are legged you can easily keep out of their range while still pegging them with gauss rounds.

All that being said, the snipercada is more fun than it is effective. A single gauss takes too long to kill undamaged 'Mechs and with a 225 engine, you are easily caught and destroyed by lights if you give away your position or are randomly discovered.

[Victor Morson]

Alistair Winter, on 06 December 2013 - 01:20 AM, said:

Each to his own. I've got 200+ matches in the CTF-3D and second only to the Victor 9B, it's probably my most effective build in the history of the game. Including the 3xUAC5 Ilya before the UAC5 nerf.

I stopped playing the CTF-3D a month or two ago, I forget. Not a big enough challenge. Maybe I should have kept playing a bit more, to get matched up against the high ELO guys. But then that's not really a big goal of mine, because when you get to the top, you have to stop using the fun builds.

If you lose a side torso, it's over. Sometimes you lose an arm, and it sets off a chain explosion that destroys the whole mech. But even with this fundamental flaw, the pros far outweigh the cons. It's similar to the YLW, except more extreme. The risk is greater, the reward is three-fold.

Like I said, it's definitely powerful and fun to play; you can get away pugging with it pretty effectively despite the risk, but ultimately it's WAY too dangerous to run like that. Twin Gauss Jags are just all around a better bet if you like twin Gauss.

The Ilya might not be super competitive as twin Gauss (low mounted guns and no JJs) but it's way more survivable in a pug if you happen to have one, though.

SniperCon, on 06 December 2013 - 07:16 AM, said:

To elaborate on the references to the CDA-3M sniper which I've played a good bit. My version of the design is based on the ShadowCat and has 2 medium lasers for backup, but only 3 tons of ammo.

I don't know if I'd recommend that for a few reasons, but it's far, far better than I expected out of a Cicada with a Gauss. About the best you can get with the goal of a Gauss Cidada, really. Would be a fun pugging Cicada.

[Rekkless]

any shadowhawk or the phract3d

Edited by Rekkless, 08 December 2013 - 12:36 PM.

[Ngamok]

Honorable mention are the Dragons. You can Left Torso snipe with them because their LT mounts are right at your cockpit. The Flame has a ballistic there. The 1C has 2 and the 1N has 1 energy slots at cockpit height. You can easily peak around a corner on the left side and snipe with only exposing your left arm and shoulder.

[Kataiser]

No love for the AWS-9M? That thing's a really solid energy sniper. It can carry some heavy, ER firepower with good armor and a lot more speed than anything that can pack its loadout.

I'm currently using http://mwo.smurfy-ne...53d3f1e44f66f14

It's fast, has lots of range, and is ridiculously self-sufficient if you are dropping solo. If you're really precise, you can clean up entire lances after the big dumb balls hit, without even getting touched.

And I know people that drop the 3 ERLLas for 1 ERPPC + 1 PPC, or drop the ERPPC for an ERLLas, a DHS, and some 1t of something. It's a really strong sniper for single-player drops nowadays.

Edit: Aside from that, I'm gonna agree with the Shadow Hawk/CDA-3M/CTF-3D/Jager/Highlander. All depends on your play style.

Edited by Kataiser, 10 December 2013 - 12:32 PM.

[Victor Morson]

Kataiser, on 10 December 2013 - 12:29 PM, said:

No love for the AWS-9M? That thing's a really solid energy sniper. It can carry some heavy, ER firepower with good armor and a lot more speed than anything that can pack its loadout.

The Victor replaced the 9M as the fast 80 tonner, complete with decent hitboxes and a great hardpoint layout. That's why there's no love for the 9M, or the Awesome in general.

Ngamok, on 10 December 2013 - 08:43 AM, said:

Honorable mention are the Dragons. You can Left Torso snipe with them because their LT mounts are right at your cockpit. The Flame has a ballistic there. The 1C has 2 and the 1N has 1 energy slots at cockpit height. You can easily peak around a corner on the left side and snipe with only exposing your left arm and shoulder.

Dragons have the worst hardpoint layouts ever, with the exception of the Flame. I advise STRONGLY against Dragons but if you must own them, buy a Flame.

[Alaskan Nobody]

Kataiser, on 10 December 2013 - 12:29 PM, said:

No love for the AWS-9M?

According to Vic, it isn't God Tier, so it isn't worth using, EVER.

[xMEPHISTOx]

Torothin, on 05 December 2013 - 07:48 PM, said:

Which of the heavy and medium mechs is considered a good long range sniper in the game?

Short answer...Cata3D for heavies and Shawk5M for mediums.
These imo are the best snipers for there resepective weight classes.