First, for the person who asked about win rate.
Battlemaster - 1.67 W/L Ratio
Timberwolf - 1.19 W/L Ratio
So even in the W/L Ratios, I am seeing the Battlemaster outperforming the Timber Wolf by a significant margin. However, I don't view win rate as an accurate gauge of performance because winning or losing depends entirely too much on the 23 other players also playing.
Also all I do is Solo PUG.
Now, let’s take a look why the Battlemaster outperforms the Timber Wolf. Honestly it is a very simple reason but let’s look at them in detail.
My Timber Wolf – Prime mounts 2 C-ER PPCs and 4 C-ER MLs plus a boat load of DHS to cool all these energy weapons. It does not mount JJs.
My Battlemaster – 1G mounts 1 Standard PPC, 1 AC/10 and 6 MLs a 350XL engine and again all the DHS I can mount to keep those energy weapons cool.
Now let’s analyze.
Armor-wise, my Battlemaster has a slight edge with about 10 extra armor on the CT and 4-5 extra on the side torsos. Firepower however goes to the Timber Wolf with just a slight edge (8 more damage on alpha). Timber Wolf also has a major range advantage with its C-ER PPCs giving at least 270m more range than either the PPC or the AC/10 mounted on the Battlemaster and the C-ER ML giving it 180m more range than the MLs mounted on the Battlemaster. Also The Timber Wolf has roughly a 15 kph speed advantage.
Now on paper it becomes pretty obvious that the Timber Wolf is a superior mech. I has virtually the same armor, has more alpha, longer range on all its weapons and is faster. However in practice the Battlemaster is not only out performing it, but actually dominating the Timber Wolf.
That being the case, you have to ask, “How can this be?!” Well as I mention, it is simple. The answer is two things.
One, the Battlemaster has superior shape and hitboxes with the ability to torso twist to protect and spread damage. The Timber Wolf on the other hand, cannot twist and effectively protect its CT and even if it does twist its arms provide no protection.
The second is that a range advantage can be easily negated and once the Battlemaster gets into effective range of its weapons, the fast rates of fire and shorter beam durations gives the Battlemaster a pretty huge advantage.
In conclusion, as I mentioned in my original post, I am comparing at 75 ton Clan mech to a 85 ton IS mech but the reason I am comparing the two is because of their similar weapons loadout, armor and and somewhat similar speed. Also the claim is that the Timber Wolf is P2W because it is grossly overpowered. That being the case, it should handily outperform a mech with similar weapons loadout, armor, slower speed and a worse movement penalty even if it is 10 tons lighter. If it can’t even come close, then I am not sure how one can conclude it is overpowered or pay-to-win which is the underlying point of my post.
Edited by Viktor Drake, 01 August 2014 - 06:18 AM.