Carrioncrows, on 16 March 2014 - 12:38 AM, said:
well that blows.
What's the point? Not like pilot death is a "Thing"
Why not just have Case Prevent one explosion, then gets used up.
Another ammo pop happens, well that's it.
You're not quite getting it are you?
If CASE worked as it did in the Battletech universe, this is exactly what happens. The ammunition explosion happens (whenever ammunition is hit, or cooks off due to heat), and the force is redirected out the back of the mech. This destroys the location (usually a side torso), but prevents damage being passed on to the adjacent part.
For a Standard engine, this usually means one side of the mech is blown off, but the mech continues to walk and possibly fight with the rest of the mech intact.
For an XL engine (pre-Clan), this renders the mech non-functional. However, this saves the pilot (usually very valuable due to training and helps morale), but also makes repairs much cheaper, and salvage much greater. Clan XL Engines since they occupy one less critical space per side are still functional, albeit running much hotter. Since MWO designs are directly from Battletech with few variations, you havce mechs with XL engines and CASE in the side torsos (like the Centurion CN-9D).
What Reppu's reply has said is that in MWO, CASE doesn't stop transfer of damage, but reduces it to one ton (which kind of sucks if CASE is only protecting a ton of ammo). This means you end up with a damage cascade, which based on the explosive force of a ton of ammunition of any kind will destroy the mech.
This doesn't matter so much for XL engines, since pilot death, and Repair and Re-arm are not factors in this game (unlike BT and real life). However, it makes CASE now useless for Standard engines. Effectively CASE now serves zero function in the game.