101 replies to this topic

[IraqiWalker]

BigFatGator, on 24 August 2014 - 10:09 AM, said:

True, and that is probably the best use of a BLR1S, but you have a 85T mech carrying only five more tubes than this ALRM45 JM6-A: http://mwo.smurfy-ne...beffc36364d3ec6

The advantage of the BLR is more armor, 1T more ammo, and 5LRM, but is that worth the extra 20T and taking up an assault slot vs. a heavy slot?

The whole debate about helping vs. hurting team is kinda flawed since the right question isn't should a BLR be tanking or supporting, but rather what mech does each pilot bring to the party that works best with their skills and playstyle. We're all helping or hurting our team some based on the mech we pick.

I'm certainly not helping my team taking a RVN 2X or 4X into the fray while I level it out so I can unlock elite on my RVN 3L.

The other bit is that it's a game- if it's fun for you to boat missiles in an Assault, then I guess I've got nothing I can really say against that. Unless you do it in an Atlas. Then I'll call you names probably because that's just wrong.

This is a proper LRM boat build on a BLR-1S (in my opinion). No need for Artemis, since that's 4 slots and 4 tons wasted. You'll be firing indirectly for 95% of the time anyways.
You can also remove one of the internal DHS and add more ammo, or remove a ton of ammo, and add more DHS.

Sure, Assault LRM boats should be somewhat mobile, but I think the trade off in mobility versus sustained fire time, and saturation is not worth it. Get slower, but carry more, with bigger launchers, to make up for being slow.

[Escef]

Modo44, on 24 August 2014 - 08:25 AM, said:

It does not matter when you stand back because of the huge XL needed to make room for your LRMs. You are not tanking when you could, therefore weakening your team. And you are still dependant on the ECM v anti-ECM lottery.

Fool, I'm bringing ALRM50 with a 340XL BLR-1S, why should I tank? For that matter, tanking doesn't really work in this game. The best "tanks" in this game are fast, small lights that attract fire power without actually getting hit..

PhoenixFire55, on 24 August 2014 - 08:32 AM, said:

Lobby, any of those 77 mechs you want 1 on 1 vs me. I'll show you exactly how I deal with LRMs. I'm waiting.

1) Why would I want to play a game with you?
2) Why would I use LRMs in a 1-on-1, that's stupid.

[Appogee]

From a team perspective, LRM-boating Assaults usually leave the rest of the team out-tonned and out-gunned.

Sure, sometimes they will luck out and be the highest scorers ... if the rest of the team is already successful. But at higher Elo PUG matches, LRM-boating Assaults are often amongst the last to die, having sat at the back in safety, effectively denying their team tons of armor that could have been more useful during either the brawling of medium-range engagement phases of the battle.

No thanks.

Assaults with some LRMs - as part of a heavier-hitting and more diverse loadout, and who actively engage the enemy - are generally more useful for the team.

In competitive play, it is possible to create an effective LRM-heavy drop deck which has an Assault amongst its boats. But the whole drop deck needs to be configured with that in mind ... unlikely that such a deck will occur in random PUG play.

Edited by Appogee, 24 August 2014 - 10:20 PM.

[SethAbercromby]

i think both approaches are not wrong but misguided in a way.

You don't want to stick to the back with LRMs exclusively in an Assault. Specialized Heavies will do that task just as well, if not better. Contrary to that, always forcing yourself into enemy fire is reckless and will often get you killed too soon for the desired effect. In an Assault, you want specialization, but not at the expense of everything else.

LRMs are an excellent tool to cross gaps between yourself and hostile targets while you're still closing in or waiting for a good opportunity to strike, but you need to be capable to defend yourself at close range, or be able to push the front forwards to bring the fight to your enemies.

If you were to think of it as a RPG party, a Tank that doesn't get the enemy attention is just as bad as the Tank that rushes headlong into the fray and gets himself killed.

[Appogee]

SethAbercromby, on 24 August 2014 - 10:16 PM, said:

i think both approaches are not wrong but misguided in a way.

You don't want to stick to the back with LRMs exclusively in an Assault. Specialized Heavies will do that task just as well, if not better. Contrary to that, always forcing yourself into enemy fire is reckless and will often get you killed too soon for the desired effect. In an Assault, you want specialization, but not at the expense of everything else.

LRMs are an excellent tool to cross gaps between yourself and hostile targets while you're still closing in or waiting for a good opportunity to strike, but you need to be capable to defend yourself at close range, or be able to push the front forwards to bring the fight to your enemies.

If you were to think of it as a RPG party, a Tank that doesn't get the enemy attention is just as bad as the Tank that rushes headlong into the fray and gets himself killed.

^ This. That's why I think LRMs can be part of a diverse Assault loadout.

I have a Highlander which has LRMs, ACs and SRMs. It deploys several useful volleys of LRMs at the beginning of matches, on the way to the battle. It tanks well in a brawl, and it delivers serious Assault punch at close range.

It doesn't have "backup weapons". It has "weapons"

Edited by Appogee, 24 August 2014 - 10:34 PM.

[Tiamat of the Sea]

My personal take on the issue is this:

NO 'MECH should be an LRM boat, with very narrow exceptions.

Carry a lot of LRMs? Sure.

But any 'mech that is boating LRMs outright is not going to have enough close-combat capacity to handle anything that comes after it within close range.

I used to have a Highlander with 4xALRM15, 1xML, 1xTAG. I could not take it out PUGing, I could not take it out in non-12-man teams. It had no way to protect itself in close range.

I have since refitted it with only 30 tubes, and nearly the same ammo- but the TAG is out for a second medium laser and an AC/10 is now in the right arm. Since that change, this thing is now incredibly useful.

I could tell a number of similar stories, but it basically boils down to this-

Boating any weapon that has a situation in which it is completely incapable and where the 'mech cannot compensate in some other way (Standard PPCs or LRMs on a 'mech with poor mobility, small lasers on a 'mech with poor mobility, Streak SRMs on a 'mech with no Beagle, TAG or PPC to cut through ECM and even just having one of those three options is still shaky...) basically means that there's going to be a significant portion of the time that your entire 'mech is useless. What's more, any intelligent enemy pilot will specifically endeavor to put you into that position and exploit the weakness.

Boating LRMs only really works in a large (6-12) team where you have dedicated spotting and people who are actively prepared to protect the LRM boat from light 'mechs and other fast-moving close-assault targets. That means a large team that is specifically prepared to support the LRM boat.

Frankly, requiring your entire team to compensate for your 'mechs shortcomings is as unreasonable as requiring your entire team to compensate for your shortcomings as a pilot. I would no more recommend an LRM boat than I would try to drive a poptart 'mech (I fully recognize that I suck so much at poptarting, Tourmaline Desert would be devoid of sand after a single attempt) or require a team to take me along instead of a jump-sniper that they need to fill a planned position.

I don't think any 'mech should be an LRM boat- and the closest that is reasonable in my eyes is a jumping, fast Medium 'mech with four LRM-5s or something similar that also has two to four backup medium lasers. That kind of mobility combined with basic backup weapons can compensate for the shortcomings of the LRM weapon system as a primary damage-dealing method.

As far as assaults soaking damage- well, that's kind of the point of them. They can't go fast, so they have to have lots of armor. It's a sensible tradeoff. Now, I'm not going to scream at someone for trying to run an assault 'mech as fire support- the Salamander is a mostly valid 'mech, and the Cerberus and Gunslinger are quite nice fire support 'mechs as well. By a similar rote, the ER Large Laser- toting Stalker, PPC-hauling Awesome, and long-range autocannon Dire Wolf are all viable 'mechs that aren't wasteful, really.

Deliberately exposing yourself to fire just to take fire is bad, no matter what you're driving- lasers don't have limited ammunition and you'll lose important bits eventually even if you're running enemy ammo bins dry. However, a lot of LRM-caddy assault pilots refuse to do things like get their own target locks at all, or camp in a pit and stay there the whole battle.

Heck, I've seen Catapult and LRM Griffin pilots do the same thing.

Again, that's wrong as well- you shouldn't be requiring your teammates to take all the fire either.

I wouldn't say that Assault 'mechs should deliberately soak damage, but they should definitely be willing to take a few hits to dish out a few hits- that's the proper use, after all. If I have more armor and weapons than you, then any time I can take less proportionate damage than I deal out, I'm gaining an advantage.

The original question, though, is posed as a kind of binary thing, and that's not really right- it's better to find a point in between the two extremes that works.

[Escef]

One of the things I see happening here is the idea that assault mechs are also somehow limited to one role or a waste if they don't fill a specific role. Which is funny. I've frontlined with assaults and gotten beat like a red-headed step-child, and been happy if I got 350 damage in. And I've been a striker/harasser in a light, dodged enough firepower to drop 2 Atlases, and been disappointed to not break 400.

If I want to maximize my value to a team I don't take an assault at all, I grab a COM-2D. And despite this, my favorite mechs are my BLR-1G and BLR-3M, both 400XL energy boats.

[MasterBLB]

The author misunderstands that assault LRM boats have different role than being meat shields which is suppression.They have tonnage to carry both serious amount of tubes and plenty ammo for them,heatsinks to overcome ghost heat penalty,as well as some means for direct combat.Ex my HGN-732
I have enough ammo to shoot at any target and don't worry I'll run out of it soon.I don't even have to actually hit enemy mech,it's enough that I force it to seek cover,protecting my teammates this way as that mech is not firing at anyone..3xALRM10 have perfect combination of firepower,fire rate,bundle concentration and ghost heat to be deadly.I can also finish off severly wounded targets,or defend against light mechs;I can even increase my self-defense potential by sacrificing 2t of ammo which allows me to mount 2 large lasers.And remaining amount is still enough to suppress enemies.
But as my predecessors have already mentioned,it's not easy to use LRM boats potently,as it requires both skill of an operator and somewhat intelligent teammates.

And here is how it preforms in PUG matches:
HIGHLANDER HGN-732 70 40 30 1.33 80 34 2.35 30,163
it is probably the only mech I regularly deal over 1000 damage in a match.

[IraqiWalker]

Quickdraw Crobat, on 24 August 2014 - 10:50 PM, said:

Long post about not boating

yes, it's mech dependent, however, LRM boats can carry good back up weapons.

BLR-1S

4MLs, dealing over 20 pinpoint damage very quickly. While carrying, and firing enough LRMs to drop 6+ mechs with half-decent spotting. With good spotting I've literally reduced multiple lances to rubble in the same drop.

Spoiler

Not a single enemy mech had more than 40% left on it in that drop, and I was getting my own locks for a good third of it.

The BJ-3 and SDR-5K spotted rather well for the other 2 thirds of that drop.

We would have won too, sadly a couple of silly mistakes were made, and we ended up losing. I was brawling with the 4 MLs btw for a good 2+ minutes in that match, especially near the end.

[BOWMANGR]

Things are pretty simple. Simpler than you think. We need to put some things into perspective first.

People are so focused on the usual stats, Kills, DPS, Pinpoint damage vs Damage over Time and so on and they just completely forget the Armor.

Armor increases Time to Kill. For every point of armor you manage to apply damage to instead of Internal Systems damage you are increasing your Time to Kill AND more importantly the Time to Kill your teammates.

Assault mechs have the armor advantage. Mediums and Heavies can put out a lot of damage but they need Time to do it. This time is provided with three means: Lights who harass and essentially draw fire and opponents from the frontlines, your own pilot skill, positioning expertise and torso twisting ability and the amount of damage absorption that goes to armor instead of internals.

So for every Assault that stays back and just shoots missiles, you essentially deprive your whole team an amount of armor that could be otherwise used to increase your whole team's survivability. In exchange you can rain down damage via LRMs.

Now this is a simple trade-off. You trade armor for indirect damage.

The problem is that for a really minor increase in fire volume which goes downrange, you apply a severe armor PENALTY to your own team. Your armor as an LRM boat Assault will NEVER matter beyond your own survival. Usually a good LRM boat has almost no need for so much armor because you are either positioned correctly in order to avoid pesky Lights or you are taking fire from many enemy mechs because they broke the frontline and reached you which means that your team is already losing. And I have never seen an LRM boat to turn around a losing match, they just crumble under pressure.

So, piloting an Assault as an LRM boat offers a minor benefit and deprive your team of a major asset, your armor and tanking ability. For every 10-15 missiles you shoot more each volley, there is a Medium in your team that gets alpha-ed instead of you. Mediums can withstand few alphas and their gameplay style actually REQUIRES an assault in front tanking. You do WAY more damage {via not providing armor absorbion} to YOUR own team without even knowing it than the damage that you put out in an assault LRM boat compared to for example a Catapult or even a Kintaro.


Having said that, the lower range Assault class mechs which have specific missile hardpoints that scream "LRM boat", can be useful and their armor is not THAT much compared to a Cataphract for example so it MAY be acceptable although I would prefer a mixed loadout in that case instead of a full-on LRM boat loadout.

As for the higher range Assaults. PLEASE DO NOT DO THIS. Whenever I see an Atlas LRM boating I'm sad... All this armor wasted for a minor increase in damage, it's not even funny. You may do 700+ damage and kill 3 mechs but if you lost 5 teammates' mechs because they didn't have your armor in front to tank damage, you actually did more harm than good.

The usual PUG scenario of an Assault mech LRM boat pilot is that he makes 500+ damage, his team dies and when he finally gets spotted and dies he cries that the team is useless this and the team sucks that but completely fails to realize that maybe the team lost because HE essentially deprived his own team 300+ of potential damage absorption via his armor that never gets used. Your stats may look like you did something but YOU actually may have lost the match for you team.

Now imagine 2 of those pilots in a single match. 2 Assault mechs with full armor just standing there launching missiles while Mediums desperately try to fight in the frontlines...

Now imagine it with 3 LRM Assaults. The more you add the worse it gets.

One can also note that you can actually use LRMs on Assaults if you like but as a means to apply some early long range damage as you approach the frontlines. This is not a bad thing to do in PUG matches. We are talking about the dedicated Assault LRM boat issue here.

tl;dr: Bottom line, the negatives of bringing an Assault LRM boat, far outweigh the positives of good Assault mech piloting in the frontlines.

[IraqiWalker]

BOWMANGR, on 25 August 2014 - 12:44 AM, said:

Now imagine 2 of those pilots in a single match. 2 Assault mechs with full armor just standing there launching missiles while Mediums desperately try to fight in the frontlines...

Now imagine it with 3 LRM Assaults. The more you add the worse it gets.

I don't know what you're talking about. That actually sounds like a fun game. All the mediums, lights, and heavies duking it out sounds awesome.

This all boils down back to one point:

It's mech dependent. Using a Victor as an LRM boat is an absolute waste. Using a BLR-1S, Stalker (all but the 3F, that should be a front liner), or an Awesome 8R, or 8V (the others should have LRMs or SRMs as supplement weapons, and get big energy guns), is a good trade off of an assault for an LRM boat. Using any other assault (with the possible exception of one highlander variant) in an LRM boating capacity is a waste of that tonnage. Especially on an Atlas DDC. Should they have LRMs? Yeah, that's smart. Should that be their main weapon? Absolutely not. LRMs should be a secondary or even tertiary weapon on most assault mechs that serve in a juggernaut or a brawler role.

[Escef]

BOWMANGR, on 25 August 2014 - 12:44 AM, said:

Armor increases Time to Kill. For every point of armor you manage to apply damage to instead of Internal Systems damage you are increasing your Time to Kill AND more importantly the Time to Kill your teammates.

Armor increases Damage to Kill. DtK goes up as tonnage and armor increases. However, TtK usually does not increase with DtK nearly as well as it does with speed. Anyone that has observed (or been) the light mech that zips through an enemy group and takes at best 5 to 10 damage from glancing hits should know this.

Armor is there for when speed and positioning fail. If you don't have any real speed (Dire Wolf) and your positioning is poor, no amount of armor will help you. As for using armor to tank, yes it can be done. Best example I can think of was watching a team mate in a PUG game square off against an Atlas with a BoomJager. BoomJager shut down, I was right next to him in a 400 XL BLR. I had plenty of armor and knew what was going to happen when he shut down, so I stepped right in front of him and sprayed lasers all over the Atlas's face. He took the bait and tracked me as I moved away. I bought that Jager time to power back up and finish the Atlas. I was disappointed to not get a kill out of the deal, but I did what I made the mech to do: grab attention.

[Kjudoon]

uglydisease, on 23 August 2014 - 03:30 PM, said:

I just had an argument with a friend about how to use assaults correctly. He proposes that Assaults are supposed to be meat shields and should never be lrm boats. I disagree, especially when it comes to pugging when you are in a slow moving assault the rest of the team almost never waits for you making it impossible to meat shield. Its not uncommon for an assault placed in a poor spawn location to be wolf packed by a group of lights that rip out the mechs back armor. This doesn't do much to help absorb damage for the team either. In most assault mechs I wind up with weapons like AC5s, PPCs, LL and Gauss because the front lines are usually farther away from you than in a faster mech. My friend contents that assaults should NEVER be lrm boats. This seems silly to me as Stalkers make for some of the best LRM boats in the game. Honestly I felt like he was being a bit an elite purest.

When playing in a group the rules are a bit different I grant you but I still don't think there is anything wrong with using an assault lrm boat if the team is taking an lrm/tag/narc strategy.

Any opinions on this question.

Both are valid options. If you brawl, you're a meat shield. If you have lots of Missile Tubes, you're a great LRM boat. Know your role and play it.

[El Death Smurf]

I find lrms on a mixed armament load out to be appropriate, but dangerous to use as a crutch. 30missles or so on an assault helps you participate when your speed wont let you, but any more and you are wasted tonnage. if one of your three heavy gunners is rendered impotent by ECM, 3 AMS systems, proper cover usage, or lackluster spotting of targets then its an terrible risk not worth taking.

Assaults can not properly control their range of engagement. not like mediums or heavies can, and so they are the better missile platforms. its a shame when the team all dies because 2 of the assaults are sanding back hardly contributing, and then are easily picked apart.

look at it this way. by virtue of tonnage and tactics lights and assaults last the longest on the front lines (armor and speed) while mediums and heavies simply can't hold a lock or stay alive for very long. therefor, if you want missile support, leave it to the mediums and heavies. the assaults will have an easier time taking down enemies quickly, and the lights will be able to use TAG and NARC and UAVs to maximise team damage output while minimizing team exposure.

[PhoenixFire55]

Escef, on 24 August 2014 - 10:06 PM, said:

1) Why would I want to play a game with you?
2) Why would I use LRMs in a 1-on-1, that's stupid.

1) To prove you ain't a coward with no backbone to stand for what you said?
2) I said any mech you want. LRMs or not IDC.

Escef, on 24 August 2014 - 10:06 PM, said:

Fool, I'm bringing ALRM50 with a 340XL BLR-1S, why should I tank? For that matter, tanking doesn't really work in this game. The best "tanks" in this game are fast, small lights that attract fire power without actually getting hit..

Typical clueless lurmer. Go take a light mech and "tank" will ya?

[Escef]

PhoenixFire55, on 25 August 2014 - 01:53 AM, said:

1) To prove you ain't a coward with no backbone to stand for what you said?

Or maybe I don't want to game with *******?

PhoenixFire55, on 25 August 2014 - 01:53 AM, said:

Typical clueless lurmer. Go take a light mech and "tank" will ya?

I have taken lights and tanked. It works. Hell, I don't even LIKE playing with LRMs, I find them a bit boring. But, yeah, I'm a clueless lurmer. Sure why not? I mean, you've been at the game for 2 years, can't deal with LRMs, can't make an argument that doesn't consist of hyperbole and name calling... Obviously I'm no match for you, right? Go pull your head out of your 4th point of contact, guy.

[Draven Darkshadow]

less name calling and more reasonable arguments, some people in here are starting to sound like the freak that went ape when he was looking at my loadout with 3x lrm5 2xuac5 1xerll on my atlas while he only had 350 damage in his direwolf died 4 minutes before and i had 470 damage and was alive and finished the match. 2 kills and 7 assists as i recall while he had 1 kill and 5 assist or something like that

damage can be redirected to other parts of the body but eventually there is nothing to redirected to except for viral parts .

lrm softs up the enemy before going for the kill, no matter how you twist and turn you cant get past the fact that lrm is the major part of the game and ignoring the use of it seems rather silly

Edited by Draven Darkshadow, 25 August 2014 - 03:34 AM.

[BOWMANGR]

IraqiWalker, on 25 August 2014 - 12:54 AM, said:

I don't know what you're talking about. That actually sounds like a fun game. All the mediums, lights, and heavies duking it out sounds awesome.

This all boils down back to one point:

It's mech dependent. Using a Victor as an LRM boat is an absolute waste. Using a BLR-1S, Stalker (all but the 3F, that should be a front liner), or an Awesome 8R, or 8V (the others should have LRMs or SRMs as supplement weapons, and get big energy guns), is a good trade off of an assault for an LRM boat. Using any other assault (with the possible exception of one highlander variant) in an LRM boating capacity is a waste of that tonnage. Especially on an Atlas DDC. Should they have LRMs? Yeah, that's smart. Should that be their main weapon? Absolutely not. LRMs should be a secondary or even tertiary weapon on most assault mechs that serve in a juggernaut or a brawler role.

I'm guessing you don't pilot Mediums very often right? A Medium mech can do tremendous amount of damage for its tonnage as long as it has an Assault up front tanking damage and providing another target for the enemy. If said Assault is way back shooting missiles that may or may not do anything then the Medium pilot will have to be extra careful and he won't perform just as well. That is a fact.

A team that has Assaults that tank along with their Mediums will CRUSH a team with Assault LRM boats any time, any day, all year, every year.

Your second paragraph I agree with and is essentially the same thing that I posted. There are 'some' dedicated Assault variants that can fit the LRM boat role but still if we want to judge what they bring to the table, again a brawler Assault or even an Assault with a mixed loadout is still better. Damage numbers and kills doesn't matter at all if you lose because your teammates didn't have someone tanking. Guess who tanks best? Yep, the guy with the armor.

Escef, on 25 August 2014 - 01:09 AM, said:

Armor increases Damage to Kill. DtK goes up as tonnage and armor increases. However, TtK usually does not increase with DtK nearly as well as it does with speed. Anyone that has observed (or been) the light mech that zips through an enemy group and takes at best 5 to 10 damage from glancing hits should know this.

Armor is there for when speed and positioning fail. If you don't have any real speed (Dire Wolf) and your positioning is poor, no amount of armor will help you. As for using armor to tank, yes it can be done. Best example I can think of was watching a team mate in a PUG game square off against an Atlas with a BoomJager. BoomJager shut down, I was right next to him in a 400 XL BLR. I had plenty of armor and knew what was going to happen when he shut down, so I stepped right in front of him and sprayed lasers all over the Atlas's face. He took the bait and tracked me as I moved away. I bought that Jager time to power back up and finish the Atlas. I was disappointed to not get a kill out of the deal, but I did what I made the mech to do: grab attention.

Although I agree that Lights can in essence 'absorb' firepower from the enemy, this is NOT tanking. Because a higher ELO player in an assault will leave the pesky Light to his team's Mediums and he will continue to crush bigger mechs. A tank absorbs damage AND returns damage back. A Light just harasses which can be equally effective for reducing firepower going downrange but it does nowhere near the damage a brawler assault can do while tanking.

A Medium pilot cannot rely on a Spider to keep the enemy occupied for long, not it can rely on a Spider to hide behind while advancing.

What I'm trying to say here is that a whoping 25% of your team is relying on YOUR armor as an Assault to be able to bring their own game to the table. If you just sit back shooting missiles you effectively don't allow your Mediums to act as force multipliers. They just shoot stuff as everybody else but die more easily. A flanking unnoticed Medium can bring the pain. A Medium mech in head-on combat is just a worse brawler than a Heavy or an Assault.

Assaults standing back to shoot LRMs increase the indirect fire of the whole team but sacrifice a bit too much to do it. Therefore it is NOT worth it. The negatives are simply more than the positives. It is actually that simple.

[Barkem Squirrel]

Everyone has a taste as to what role works well for you. Each mech will preform differently for anyone to some level.

Now having assaults up front right off the bat is a bad idea. You commit assaults where they are useful. They are not great for peaking around the corner, but great for nailing that cicada or jenner that is peaking.

One thing I have learned with running LRM boat Assaults, think twice before charging if they have the range. On terra therma I had two atlases (1 DDC) a victor and a wang decide to flank to the north around the caldera. It took me torso twisting through the target lock to take them down. First the Wang, then the Victor, Atlas DDC and finally the last atlas was a stick. That is when two lights showed up and I could ignore that mech and flank the other team while our team came at them from the center. I had over 900 damage with 5 kills that match. This was with a Battlemaster 1S, 2 ALEM 15, 2 ALRM 5, 3 ML, TAG, BAP, AMS. Sure I due not use the LRM 10's and only have 2 ML's more than the Jagger A, but the damage this thing puts out speaks for itself. Now the Jagger A preforms about the same for me and it uses 2 MG's.

LRM boat Assaults are dangerous due to a few things: the amount of armor, number of double heat sinks for cooling, number of missiles carried, number of tubes for the hard points, the number of back up weapons, the ability to have Artemis, BAP and TAG. One thing to remember is these assaults are putting out damage all match and at the end you have a mech that is lightly damaged, even if you were providing close fire support. During a match I will use ML's on my targets due to how close I like to be. It surprises me how many kills in the stalkers and battlemaster I get with the ML's.

One measure of a mech I use is, can I average over 300 damage. With the assault LRM boats I am doing over 500 damage on them, but the medium and heavy LRM boats that I have are averaging over 400 damage.

How you tweak a mech, till it preforms the best for you is good, but the thing that speaks for itself is the damage you put out with it. Sure you will have those matches where the other team rolls you, and do little damage. Then there are the string of 700, 800,900,1000,1200 damage matches. Even now I am testing the command console and still doing 500 to 900 damage in most matches, that is with 3 tons taken up in the head.


One thing to remember, in PUG matches with a team that works well together and is aggressive, you will not fire 1000 missile. The other team dies to fast. You might even be lucky to get 400 damage. There your role is suppression of movement by fixing them in place with LRMs. This allows the team to death ball them or as I like to say rolling thunder. Get into a box formation and move. We did it in the army with tanks and bradleys and it works well in MWO.

[IraqiWalker]

PhoenixFire55, on 25 August 2014 - 01:53 AM, said:

1) To prove you ain't a coward with no backbone to stand for what you said?
2) I said any mech you want. LRMs or not IDC.



Typical clueless lurmer. Go take a light mech and "tank" will ya?

Now you're just being inflamatory, and your argument literally makes no sense. Your whole "challenge" (more like chest puffing), is based around the LRM argument. That can't be done right in a 1v1 environment, and I hate to break this to you, but 1v1 would prove literally nothing. This game is not played 1v1, it's 12 v 12.

Also, this is a discussion in regards to a specific topic, and your posts are getting WAY off topic, either get back to it, or go post somewhere else.

BOWMANGR, on 25 August 2014 - 03:45 AM, said:

I'm guessing you don't pilot Mediums very often right? A Medium mech can do tremendous amount of damage for its tonnage as long as it has an Assault up front tanking damage and providing another target for the enemy. If said Assault is way back shooting missiles that may or may not do anything then the Medium pilot will have to be extra careful and he won't perform just as well. That is a fact.

A team that has Assaults that tank along with their Mediums will CRUSH a team with Assault LRM boats any time, any day, all year, every year.

Your second paragraph I agree with and is essentially the same thing that I posted. There are 'some' dedicated Assault variants that can fit the LRM boat role but still if we want to judge what they bring to the table, again a brawler Assault or even an Assault with a mixed loadout is still better. Damage numbers and kills doesn't matter at all if you lose because your teammates didn't have someone tanking. Guess who tanks best? Yep, the guy with the armor.



Although I agree that Lights can in essence 'absorb' firepower from the enemy, this is NOT tanking. Because a higher ELO player in an assault will leave the pesky Light to his team's Mediums and he will continue to crush bigger mechs. A tank absorbs damage AND returns damage back. A Light just harasses which can be equally effective for reducing firepower going downrange but it does nowhere near the damage a brawler assault can do while tanking.

A Medium pilot cannot rely on a Spider to keep the enemy occupied for long, not it can rely on a Spider to hide behind while advancing.

What I'm trying to say here is that a whoping 25% of your team is relying on YOUR armor as an Assault to be able to bring their own game to the table. If you just sit back shooting missiles you effectively don't allow your Mediums to act as force multipliers. They just shoot stuff as everybody else but die more easily. A flanking unnoticed Medium can bring the pain. A Medium mech in head-on combat is just a worse brawler than a Heavy or an Assault.

Assaults standing back to shoot LRMs increase the indirect fire of the whole team but sacrifice a bit too much to do it. Therefore it is NOT worth it. The negatives are simply more than the positives. It is actually that simple.

A couple of things here (Yes I do pilot mediums).

1-Mediums need the assaults and heavies to tank for them, because they are facing off against lots of assaults and heavies. In your scenario, the assaults are already out of the equation playing the role of artillery. Meaning a LOT less threat to mediums now. Heavies will be the front liners when possible, and the meidums can play front and second line roles without much of a problem.

2- Yes, a medium can in fact rely on a light to provide a distraction. It has been done. However, since it's not the usual role, it's not easy to pull off. Especially since the medium is now the bigger mech. However, plenty of teams will focus down the light, then there are others that will try to get a quick kill on the medium and then deal with the light. It's not as obvious as "do I shoot that 45 ton medium, or that 100 ton Atlas?"