32 replies to this topic

[Victor Morson]

This is another tip for new players that goes against a lot of folks natural instincts: If you have an arm that you aren't using for anything, it's now entirely expendable and you shouldn't waste much armor on it!

There's a lot of 'mechs that operate effectively with just one, or no, arms. Some of the best designs are torso-only with many previously front line setups like the 9A Cent playing to this strength. While sometimes it totally acceptable to put some light armor on the arms to help protect the side torsos (Many good Centurtion builds do this), this varies 'mech to 'mech.

Case in point, many Shadow Hawks will have an unused arm. An entire ton or more of weight is tied up in that arm's armor, so stripping it to 0 and just using the internal structure to stop some shots hitting your torso is fine! If you lose this arm in combat, you are still 100% combat capable.

Likewise, consider the need to armor the arm when mounting weapons, too! While sometimes it is in fact worth it, in many cases spending a ton or more of armor on an arm to carry a single gun is often massively inefficient. On some 'mechs, the arm armor is even heavier.

----

Long story short is if you can get away without arms on a build, all the better. If you can use just a single arm, that's good too. All of your tied up crits will get shoveled into the useless arm and won't impact you in the slightest from Endo / Ferro automatically as you fill up other areas of the 'mech.

So don't feel obligated to put on armor for a bad limb, and REALLY don't feel obligated to armor an unused limb at the expense of leg armor or protecting an arm that is actually being used.

[Atlai]

Good tips, stuff i already knew but for beginners this could be very helpful.

Thanks for your constant dedication to helping new players Vic.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

Smurphy is a good resource for checking out something like this, and for mech builds in general.

[Menson]

If you're using an arm as a shield like a zombie-cent or most of the T-Bolts & S-Hawks (or even the trench-buckets), wouldn't you want armor on your shield arm to absorb damage while it protects the rest of you? Also, loosing an arm right away sets off smoke which kind of makes you a target to other players who see you as "wounded prey" before looking at your paper-doll.

I can understand not putting armor on arms with no weapons if they are small targets like a raven or 'cada. Those arms are too small to use as well for shielding as the arms you can use in other larger mechs, but even then setting off smoke early in the game can give away your position if you are trying to hide behind something short.

(edited for spelling)

Edited by Menson, 07 December 2013 - 09:03 PM.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

Menson, on 07 December 2013 - 09:01 PM, said:

If you're using an arm as a shield like a zombie-cent or most of the T-Bolts & S-Hawks (or even the trench-buckets), wouldn't you want armor on your shield arm to absorb damage while it protects the rest of you? Also, loosing an arm right away sets off smoke which kind of makes you a target to other players who see you as "wounded prey" before looking at your paper-doll.

I can understand not putting armor on arms with no weapons if they are small targets like a raven or 'cada. Those arms are too small to use as well for shielding as the arms you can use in other larger mechs, but even then setting off smoke early in the game can give away your position if you are trying to hide behind something short.

(edited for spelling)

It depends on what you are comfortable with too. I've even seen Atlas mechs that have stripped too much on their arms and legs, so it can be done on any mech if the player is comfortable enough in doing so.

So say you have a Hunchback or Cataphract; shaving some of the limb armor can work to at least fit an extra 0.5 or 1 ton here and there.

Here's a HBK-4P for example, and a CTF-3D.

[Menson]

Praetor Shepard, on 07 December 2013 - 09:36 PM, said:

It depends on what you are comfortable with too. I've even seen Atlas mechs that have stripped too much on their arms and legs, so it can be done on any mech if the player is comfortable enough in doing so.

So say you have a Hunchback or Cataphract; shaving some of the limb armor can work to at least fit an extra 0.5 or 1 ton here and there.

Here's a HBK-4P for example, and a CTF-3D.

Vic's not talking about shaving some off the arms/legs to free up that awkward 0.5 tons. They're talking about removing all of the 32/36 points of armor out of the arm to put in one more ton of DHS/Ammo/Weapons. Internal HP is 1/2 the allowable max armor value. So that unarmored arm on most of the medium mechs is 15 or 16 points of damage that you can take to the internals to absorb damage and protect your torso. I think if you're using it as a shield, you'd want that shield to withstand some abuse before puffing out smoke.

[sneeking]

something to consider is once the arm is off hits to the exposed joint transfer damage direct to ct and bypass side torso altogether, not sure about all chassis but I know some will do this as the ct is actually T shaped.
therefore if the arm is lost you can now be cored by side hits even if you twist to keep core out of fire line.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

Menson, on 07 December 2013 - 10:14 PM, said:

Vic's not talking about shaving some off the arms/legs to free up that awkward 0.5 tons. They're talking about removing all of the 32/36 points of armor out of the arm to put in one more ton of DHS/Ammo/Weapons. Internal HP is 1/2 the allowable max armor value. So that unarmored arm on most of the medium mechs is 15 or 16 points of damage that you can take to the internals to absorb damage and protect your torso. I think if you're using it as a shield, you'd want that shield to withstand some abuse before puffing out smoke.

True, I have tried taking off that much on Cents to keep a bigger engine and more ammo for example: http://mwo.smurfy-ne...df13eca4f36bfb3. It depends on how you run your mech and how you get targeted.

When I got to trying that Cent build, I was getting legged with greater frequency, since those players knew about hitting the torso areas, and would rather just shot out the legs, so I could have my arms that low and still be okay.

So, I think that the advice would need to be more specific to various builds; say if you are running in a group maybe dropping armor would not be an issue, but taking that same setup going solo could end up being a liability.


And I've preferred keeping at least 1 armor point for when an opponent would target me to see how my armor is doing no matter how low I've gone with my armor allocation.

Edited by Praetor Shepard, 07 December 2013 - 10:42 PM.

[Victor Morson]

sneeking, on 07 December 2013 - 10:23 PM, said:

something to consider is once the arm is off hits to the exposed joint transfer damage direct to ct and bypass side torso altogether, not sure about all chassis but I know some will do this as the ct is actually T shaped.
therefore if the arm is lost you can now be cored by side hits even if you twist to keep core out of fire line.

Arms get blown off, and as such, damage won't continue to transfer from missing arms.

Also yes, sometimes putting some armor on an arm you plan to use on a shield is worthwhile; if you're left with some off tonnage, by all means, slap it into shield arms on a Centurion or the like, even if it's a few points. It's more optional than anything, really, though.

Praetor Shepard, on 07 December 2013 - 10:39 PM, said:

True, I have tried taking off that much on Cents to keep a bigger engine and more ammo for example: http://mwo.smurfy-ne...df13eca4f36bfb3. It depends on how you run your mech and how you get targeted.

When I got to trying that Cent build, I was getting legged with greater frequency, since those players knew about hitting the torso areas, and would rather just shot out the legs, so I could have my arms that low and still be okay.

Yep, though to be fair, that's more specific to the Zombie Centurion than generally armless mechs. Most veteran players go for the legs on them now because they are borderline impossible to kill through torso shots.

Generally I'm really paranoid about putting ammo in legs for that reason, too.

PS: You really should strip out the AMS / drop some ammo and add Artemis on there. It'd make a huge difference with that configuration.

[Burke IV]

Victor Morson, on 07 December 2013 - 11:11 PM, said:

Arms get blown off, and as such, damage won't continue to transfer from missing arms.

Thats interesting..

Just not mechwarrior tho is it? I was trying to think of a suggestion to guide players away from arm stripping, but the best i could come up with was to lock the arm values together and that is afar from ideal. Im not familiar with centurions but has nobody ever tryed to get good with the arms on? You could strip the arms off HBK-4J aswell but just feels a bit weak.

Edited by Burke IV, 08 December 2013 - 05:12 AM.

[OneEyed Jack]

sneeking, on 07 December 2013 - 10:23 PM, said:

something to consider is once the arm is off hits to the exposed joint transfer damage direct to ct and bypass side torso altogether, not sure about all chassis but I know some will do this as the ct is actually T shaped.
therefore if the arm is lost you can now be cored by side hits even if you twist to keep core out of fire line.

Incorrect.

It has nothing to do with the shape, or even if the arm is visibly attached to a spot that is CT on the hit boxes. Damage transfer is always arm>>side torso>>center torso. Never arm>>CT. You can be hit in the CT from the side because you can rarely get an angle that doesn't allow a shot at the CT (just because you turned doesn't always mean you are facing 90 degrees from another mech, particularly if it's moving), especially since there are often protruding parts that count as CT, such as heads and Jager antennae.

[sneeking]

ok, I was seeing the damage glow right through the whole section and assumed they are linked.

so it's just a graphical thing thats not counted.

[Bront]

Armor is what you make of it, and armor you don't use is wasted.

So, find your mech gets it's torso blown off first? You can strip the arm armor down a bit. Not getting legged? You might not need so much rear armor. Finding your rear armor is rarely touched? Move some to the front. Your head pristine all the time? Drop a little armor off there.

Now be careful, and be sure to test some of these changes out in live matches (more than 1) and see if you're giving up too much. It often depends on your playstyle as well. Twisting helps, but some mechs simply tend to lose some parts faster than others.

[Koniving]

Mixed feelings here. The way I see it is less about the weapons the arm carries but more about can the arm be of use to protect you.

On Centurions, ditching the arm armor is generally a good idea simply because you actually get harder to kill when the arms are gone due to a bug in hit boxes. At least this was the case before the changes, I have not tested after.

On Hunchbacks, let's be honest those arms aren't protecting jack so if your weapons are not highly concentrated in the arms you could sacrifice the armor.

Catapults are another prime example, if all your weapons are in the torso, then those arms won't do jack for you.

In an Atlas, those arms could be used to protect you. Same with many other mechs including Cataphracts.
True example story.

Spoiler

With my first Muromets builds, I took on an Atlas one on one (everyone else is chasing bases and I found him in the cup ahead of the ship crash).

We brawled for a minute and a half approximately. I eventually won with only a laser and a machine gun left. He was a full out brawler rig with an AC/20, 3 SRM-6s (when each missile would do up to 27 damage with a bug) and 2 PPCs. My original equipment was 3 Medium Lasers, 2 MGs and an AC/20 with a standard engine and DHS, no unlocks.

After I hit him the first time with an AC/20 he started anticipating my timing, literally jerking his arms left or right to catch my shot (and successfully taking it into the arm again and again) which kept his side torsos alive long after he lost his weapons in them.

When he finally could peg me good (I was doing the same thing to him with my arms), it became apparent that I wasn't going to win and as it happens before I lost my most of my weapons completely I noticed his legs were getting orange from passing lasers over them. I finally lost all my weapons into it. But with a single ML and MGs after his first leg went out, I stripped the armor of his second leg and killed him by it. I then thanked him for an awesome brawl, where he said "If I had my lasers you'd be dead you (non-sporty expletives) legging pay to win (expletives)."

[Atlai]

Koniving, on 08 December 2013 - 11:13 AM, said:

I then thanked him for an awesome brawl, where he said "If I had my lasers you'd be dead you (non-sporty expletives) legging pay to win (expletives)."

Lol the same thing happened to me in my 3D, i faught an Atlas one on one once and killed him by running around him after he did considerable damage to me, i had one arm large laser and two medium lasers left and i finally got the kill.
I told him that was a great fight and he flipped out about how i should have just faught him like a man and not circle him but stay still so we could have a fair fight.....

[Koniving]

Mason West, on 08 December 2013 - 11:35 AM, said:

I told him that was a great fight and he flipped out about how i should have just faught him like a man and not circle him but stay still so we could have a fair fight.....

The funny thing was we did stand still about 10 meters apart shooting at each other without moving for more than 30 seconds. My opponent, the Atlas, was the first to move because he was on his way to losing his arms with how much damage he soaked up from my AC/20 by blocking the shots. The ups and downs of the hills and no lag compensation made it really hard to get shots to hit at that point, which partly led to me giving a quick strike against his legs to find out if it would be worth trying. Turned out to help me win.

[Bront]

Koniving brings up a great point about armor though. Twisting is a great way to make the most of the armor you have.

That said, how much armor you have on your arms may depend on your mech. I don't max my arm armor on my Atlas because I rarely need all of it (I lose the torso first). That doesn't mean I'm saving tons of armor, but a half-ton certaintly seems to not hurt, and on my DDC, an arm falling off is a single ML for me, so it's hardly a huge loss.

On the other hand, I max out the arm armor in my Victors, because most of my firepower is in the arms, and while twisting helps me stay alive, it means my arms take some punishment (and potentially even more for mechs that like to strip off arms). Another strange example for me was the Raven 2X, who had an "arm" shield that for the 18 matches I played it, was the first part of the mech I lost, so I didn't remove too much armor from it because it was taking damage before other parts of my mech.

Ultimately, it's a combination of the mech, your build. your playstyle, and your experience. Find what works best for you, but I recommend experimenting a bit rather than just blindly taking forum advice

[Nick Makiaveli]

Damage does transfer from "missing" arms and legs, even after they are gone, the hitbox is still there. If I am wrong, then please show me a quote and I will delete this to not confuse newbies.

That said, if I need the weight, then yes a unused arm is the first place I would start. But if I have spare weight, you can bet I will up the armor.

Everyone should rotate to spread damage, there's just no reason not too unless you are chain firing.

[Victor Morson]

Nick Makiaveli, on 08 December 2013 - 07:49 PM, said:

Damage does transfer from "missing" arms and legs, even after they are gone, the hitbox is still there. If I am wrong, then please show me a quote and I will delete this to not confuse newbies.

You are definitely wrong.

This is the case with Left & Right Torsos, but not limbs. Limb transfer damage can happen, but it must come from an explosion (Gauss, ammo). I do not believe internal damage will transfer if it's "left off" a blown off limb, unlike TT.

[Burke IV]

Mechs without arms.... might aswell call it walking online tanks.