16 replies to this topic

[TheCharlatan]

Hello fellow Mechwarriors!

First let me tell you a thing: this game is awesome. I've been keeping an eye on it for quite some time (bad PC didn't allow me to play it) and all the negativity on the forums almost made me skip it. Luckly I tried it out in the end, and I'm loving it!

After trying a few trail mechs I've found my calling: being a light pilot. Anything going less than 120 km/h feels sluggish to me.

I've started by buying the Jenner-D, with which i'm learning the way of the striker with 4 ML and 2 SRM-4 (and a 300 XL, of course).

And here comes question number 1: as a striker, i often find myself with nothing to do. If the two teams just stick together and start shooting each other from medium/long range, i can't seem to engage, as as soon as i stick my head out at a range where i can inflict damage, half a dozen mechs start shooting on me. Often, the enemy team wins the war of attrition, and i can't turn the tide alone once the brawl begins.
So question number 1 is: what is a striker supposed to do in such situations? Should i just wait for the brawl to start or are there other tactics?

After the Jenner-D, i wanted to try MPLs, so i bought a Jenner K. However, MPLs just don't cut it for me. I don't feel like doing enough damage with a quick pass, and i don't have the range flexibility of MLs. It looks like i have to run circles around my enemies to really inflict damage, something that seems to always go wrong (sooner or later, enemy reinforcements arrive or i make a mistake, since I'm still a newb).

So i tried a 4 MLs and NARC, which is nice (but doable with the Jenner-D as well) and then 2 ER-LLs.
This last build made me discover sniping with light mechs, which really suits my gameplay style (being a PITA to the enemy team), so now i'm going to try the Ravens (after i elite the Jenners).
I'll probably buy a Huginn too, to support this great game.
The 2 ER-LLs seems more suit to the Raven-3L, so here we come to question number 2: what's the use of the Jenner-K? How do you guys build it?

Thanks a lot and happy holidays!

[Rogue Jedi]

Lights are, in my opinion, the most fun Mechs but they require a lot of ether skill or luck to do well in.

1) in a striker type light build, early game you can ether stick with the team, scout (but ensure you fall back as soon as you get noticed, before you get noticed is better) try to flank (preferably take a few other fast light/medium Mechs and try to not get noticed and get behind the enemy team), you want to attack from behind shortly after the rest of your team attack from the front, so the enemy have to chose between shooting at you or shooting at the rest of the team, strangely they usually chose to focus on the heavies and assaults.
something like a Jenner of Firestarter can devastate the enemy team if you get behind them while they are focused on killing your teams heavier Mechs, most Mechs have almost no armor on the back, so aim for the backs and you can often kill an assault in about 10 seconds.

unfortunately I sold off my JR7-K as soon as I completed basics on it, the D was just straight out better (exactly the same except 1 more missile slot), as my JR7-D(f) gets a 30% earnings bonus it is the only Jenner I usually use.
while I was leveling the K I used 4 ML + 1 SRM6.

the main reason most people get the JR7-K is as the third variant required to elite the Jenners.

edit: spelling

Edited by Rogue Jedi, 26 December 2014 - 12:11 PM.

[Tim East]

Don't have one, but it sounds to me like your problem is approaching your targets. Most Jenners I know from when they were the premier light seemed to drive strafing runs and backstabs, much like my Locusts. I guess you could play poptart a little bit in them too, since they have JJs.

I know that I drive lights with even shorter effective range than MLs, and the longest range weapon I mount on a light I regularly pilot is the MPL. I typically do not deathball with my allies; I tend to go alone and approach enemy formations from other directions than they are facing. A neat trick is to keep an eye on your minimap, since any mech you can see will be displayed there and the facing of that mech can be determined by the direction of the arrow. If anyone is facing you, get behind something and think before you engage.

You want to have a strategy along the lines of Erich Hartmann's see-decide-attack-reverse. Use your superior engine power to rip through the enemy formation during the moment of their engagement with your primary forces. Tear into a couple of them at close range, and keep running until you make it back behind cover. Be aggressive. Properly timed extreme aggression tends to get a lot of people to look at you, so don't go in a straight line, even if you are really fast. Be the wind, cold and cutting, but ultimately intangible. If they do look at you instead of your allies, even in PUGs your friends will tend to sense this weakness and take advantage of it. It's won me a lot of fights. Just don't try it on a streak boat unless you're confident in your ability to shake locks fast.

[Tarogato]

Lesson one: Radar Deprivation.

Both the module and the mindset. The module makes it so that the enemy cannot retain a lock on you when you leave line of sight. Without it, you can disappear behind a hill, but the enemy can still see you on radar for a second or two. Radar Dep. takes that away from them. Always be playing around with what angle you approach from. The Jenner is probably my favourite mech for Caustic, because often both teams stalemate for a while and sometimes you get enemies on both sides of the caldera. During one of these stalemates I usually just run back and forth between both sides of the caldera, taking a single shot on each side before retreating. If I'm lucky, it'll draw an enemy out of position.

The Jenner K used to have an extra module slot - that was its redeeming feature. But then PGI revamped how modules work and they took away the extra slot, so the K was useless. The quirks for MPLas helped it, and it can wreck faces in the right hands, but it's still not as effective as a 6x MLas or 6x SPLas build on the F.

By the way, make sure you elite the Jenners. You have to own all three of them at the same time to unlock the skills. Speed Tweak is mandatory for light mechs.

Yes, the Raven does the 2x ERLLas build better. It moves a bit slower, but it has ECM. Personally I don't like it at all. I much prefer the nimble striker playstyle. I like wrecking havoc and getting all up in the enemies business and disrupting them. That said, some people do REALLY good with that Raven build, and if that's your colour of the rainbow, go for it. The Huginn is also a worthwhile purchase. The quirks it got make it the best mech as spamming SRMs and causing commotion and disruption. The Locust 3S is about on par with it, but Locusts are superhardmode, since they go *splat* so easily.

Oh yeah, and I gave up on using SRMs on my Jenner. Since I sold my K, I use my JR7-D for Narc purposes. It's nimble and very low profile, I can Narc much more effectively with it than I can with an ECM'd Raven. Having the Enhanced Narc module is mandatory if you want to run Narcs.

[7R1P0D]

Honestly I have the same problem, I have a ton of fast DPS mechs with terrible alpha and all I can do is play peekaboo against enemy mechs with twice as much alpha, because if I try to engange, I'll just run solo into a 3 vs 1

Only way you can fix it is by grouping up with friends who also have fast DPS mechs that'll follow you, or getting lucky and having someone on your team who has the same plan as you have and following them in. Hell even just getting one friend with me boosted my winrate for the day up to 80% over something like 20 games, and 8 of those games were total wipes, some against 10 man premades while we had a bunch of randoms (my favorite was getting a 12-1 win with some 10 man premade on our side versus another 10 man premade, then beating the 10 man premade we just won with12-0 in a group of randoms 30 minutes later)

Fast DPS mechs just shred slow alpha mechs if you get them 1 vs 1, or 4 vs 4, but they're usually in groups of 4, so you just gotta get your own group of 4 : /

Edited by Tripod, 26 December 2014 - 02:51 AM.

[Rogue Jedi]

Tarogato, on 26 December 2014 - 02:40 AM, said:

By the way, make sure you elite the Jenners. You have to own all three of them at the same time to unlock the skills. Speed Tweak is mandatory for light mechs.

to elite a Mech you need to get basic skills completed on all 3 but you do not need to own all 3 at the time

[Unnatural Growth]

I too, sold my -K after eliting it. I still have my -F and (Sarah)-D. I would build the -K like I built my -D. I'm running 4 ML's and an SRM6. Striker/harasser role. I prefer SRM's on the Jenner, as if you mount streaks, you must also mount BAP, and I just don't want to spare the tonnage for that. I use the SRM's against the backs of heavies or assaults when I'm striking the enemy line. I don't run pulse lasers, too hot and too heavy. An overheated Jenner is a dead mech.

If you have another fast ECM light in your team, suggest that the 2 of you pair up and go flank the enemy together. Lay in wait until the enemy blob engages your team, and swoop in to create havoc in the enemy line. This is also a great time to drop artillery strikes on them from behind, and launch a UAV to give locks to your team's missile boats.

If no fast ECM's on your team, you can scout solo, but must be very careful to stay out of sight using terrain to hide your movements. Or, alternatively, you can stay with your team and help drive away enemy lights trying same tactics against you. If you get an enemy mech in your lines, drive it away. If you find an enemy mech spotting your team from behind, go engage it and drive it off. Then return. Don't let it lead you back to enemy lines, it's trying to lead you to a trap.

Once the two teams are fully engaged, then it's time to strike from behind, keep your speed up. Speed is armor. If you're standing still or moving slow, you're doing it wrong. Keep moving, and never in a straight line. Try to keep your nose pointed towards your incoming fire as you run away. That center torso is 80% of your mech, the other 20% is legs. You're harder to hit from head on, and much easier to hit from the side. Pivot that nose towards your enemy as you run in the other direction. Allocate most of your center torso armor to FRONT, and only a few points of armor to REAR. Use terrain constantly to your advantage. You are small and low to the ground. It doesn't take much terrain to hide you. Get Radar Derp module as soon as you can, it is invaluable against LRM fire, Seismic Sensor is another must have imo.

If you're playing Assault Mode, then you have to be ready to go defend your base when it comes under attack. You're the one with the speed needed to cross the map to defend. If it's only one light standing on your base, drive it off or kill it. If it's an entire lance, fall back and ask for help, stating that it's multiple mechs on base. Don't wait until you're dead to do this, valuable time will be lost. If you're playing Conquest, then get Cap Accelerator module.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

Something you can consider as already mentioned is snip at the edges of the enemy to see if you can make an opponent or two shout "Squirrel!" and go off on a merry chase of your light.

That sort of distraction can make a few enemies turn their attention away from the rest of your team, and can spread the enemy out if they assume that they are being flanked.

With the Jenners, a specific tip to consider is decreasing the armor on your side torsos below 10 on the front, so here is a build example with an XL 300. Since the hit boxes are so small you can get away with that low of armor and most hits will be CT and Legs anyway. and you can also tinker with reducing arm armor to squeeze in a half ton of ammo or the fifth Jump Jet.

You want to take full advantage of your Jump Jets. They allow you to strike from angles that mechs without JJs can't access, so you also need to know the maps and learn them as best you can. Such as exploring them in Testing Grounds and using outside resources like smurfy's site. Jump Jets can also allow you to maneuver and make turns that make it hard for enemies to keep tracking you.

So playing a light striker also requires patience so that you can survive into the later stages of a match where many mechs can be hurting bad, and shouldn't take much to finish off at that point. So there will also be matches where if your team gets focused down that you won't be able to do much against fresh mechs who are then able to focus on fewer mechs, that's just how the cookie crumbles some times.

So the primary role for a fast light striker throughout a match is to scout and try to turn the tide to your teams advantage by being a distraction and occupying the enemy's attention as your team hopefully gets into good positions. This can be made easier if you are on comms but relaying grid coordinates and individually Targeting and cycling between a group of various mechs can also help. In my case I reassigned the Targeting Key to 'L-Alt' so that I can keep my fingers in place and use my thumb to target mechs. It doesn't interfere with using the Jump Jets on the default Space Bar because if you are using JJs you are often either moving around or in the middle of combat with an enemy already targeted.

And one Consumable I highly recommend is taking a UAV. Placed behind an enemy it can keep them illuminated for LRMs and allow the team to adjust to the bulk of the enemy.

Other Modules I recommend are Seismic Sensor and Target Info Gathering. Seismic is useful because there are plenty of times where it it prudent to stay still behind cover and wait for an opportunity to strike so being able to see if someone else is trying to sneak up on you is invaluable. Target Info is nice so that you can focus down damaged components faster where you can save you fire a second later and hit the cherry red RT instead of grazing the still armored Rear RT and Right Arm for example.

---

Also have you lowered your mouse sensitivity settings? Due to Eliting and the XL 300 engine, Lights are often hyper-responsive and it is easy to over or under shoot when trying to stay on target so play around with those settings.

Also try running without throttle decay to see if graduating your speed can work to your advantage. And what I do is I have assigned the key 'E' for 100% throttle to get that boost and get into the habit of of using JJs and the Full stop key (think it's key 'X' default? need to double check) for moving around.

Since an unpredictable Light can avoid a lot of damage by practicing different maneuvers when moving around.

[AaronWolf]

As a light pilot myself, I can say that you have to use some odd tactics with the Jen-K. I at one time used a 4ML + SRM 6 XL engine K, which I loved for skirmishing/flybying and acting like a pet bird. (Floating around heavies.)

The problem with PuGs, is that a lot of players are far too timid in their Assaults/Heavies in some occasions, and TOO aggressive at times, so its hard to do a lot sometimes.

Same issue with the Huginn.

But where these types of mechs shine is in the mid game usually. Where enemies have had armor stripped or damaged, we can easily cut through and get to the juicyness inside.

The K still isn't the grandest in my mind, and I sold it long ago-but here are some simple rules to use when playing in one:

1.Go where your assaults go. Even if you stand behind a hill and do little to nothing for a bit. Just be patient.

2.You see other lights, chase them off your heavies/assaults. But never leave your assaults to try and hunt down those lights.

3.If the rest of the stuff can't be done, figure out the best path to flank the enemy and pepper them with some fire if possible.

Sometimes being a PITA up close can draw fire to you-and not to your team, so they can move up or get better firing positions/push in.

4.Weigh each engagement, play cautiously. Take educated guesses on things. Always 'er on the careful side. "Is that Stormcrow near his buddies on that side of the hill? Probably, lets not engage him."

5.Test fire some shots on the legs of enemies sometimes. Especially those whom have ammo based weapons. (A lot of people leave armor off their legs, don't notice the damage as often, and also, put ammo down there a lot of the time.)

A lot of this you may already know, either way, I hope it helps somehow!

Goodluck dude!

[mailin]

One thing that I really enjoy about driving my lights is that they really require me to be thinking all of the time. Being successful in a light is really all about situational awareness and good decision making. Because Jenners don't have ECM you need to be more careful than a 5D. If you can find a 5D to run with though, it can be extremely rewarding for both of you. I know that I love, love, love having the additional firepower of a Jenner with me when I'm in my 5D.

You just need to be constantly deciding whether to engage, flank or disengage. It's better to be a little too willing to disengage at first. You can always re-engage or attack from a different angle. The single most important thing is to keep an eye on your minimap. Enemies may only appear on there for a moment.

[InspectorG]

I like Jenners, but you may want to get the Firestarter series if you want to CW. Jenner CT is a liability. FS has godly itboxes...though i hate the way they handle.

Good advice here so far in this thread.

Also watch some of the good light pilots on youtube and twitch.

Get a Locust, E, 3M, V. If you can consistently pull 150+ damage, 1 kill in a Locust, you are a solid light pilot, as far as non-comp goes.
You will die MANY times in learning so.

Dont think kile the mediums, heavies, and assualts do. It leads to pain.

You have to be more of a Rat or Weasel. Courage and bravery are not your thing...unless its the end of the match, they you can be the hero.

Enemies should NEVER see you.
HIDE, but not for too long...THERE IS ALWAYS SOMEONE AFTER YOU...spooky.
PEEK-A-BOO only twice from the same spot, 3rd time you get dual Gaussed from 600m away. You likely wont survive it.
MAX ARMOR on legs...always.
Crab hunting and Whale hunting are valid sports in MWO, gotta catch them all!
LEARN the maps, where long range snipes and LRM boats like to camp. This is where you find gold.
HANG with your team heavies/assaults, you get BONUS for it!!! Plus enemies like to shoot fat guys first! Win, Win!
DONT scout until you are very confident as a scout, its really unneeded in public drops. Sniper Raven 3L is an art i have no interest in. Others could advise you better on that.
BALLISTIC and LRM heavies and assaults: SHOOT the RIGHT LEG/RT. Chumps skim leg armor and put ammo down there...BOOM!!!!
MANY assaults/heavies have their big gun in the Right torso. Atlas, DireWhale, Warhawk, (right arm-though frequently XLengine)Victor.
Know what enemy loadouts use XLengines...side torsos have less armor than CT. Basically, anything Dual Gauss/Dual Big AC, or triple AC5. 4 LPL, maybe. LRM boats often run XL.

Solo Whale hunting.
Look to the sky, lots of LRM from one, non-moving spot?
Look at radar, most red triangles far away from RM launcher?
If yes, bingo!!!
May your way around the map avoiding conflict and be sneaky about it.
Get behind Boat.
Now, dont rush!!! View it as an important date with a pretty girl/guy you want to impress.
Order an appetizer, get position.
Plyafull chit-chat, decide if you want to poke the rear CT/RT or the right Leg?
Monitor body language, do you have her full attention? Perhaps a witty insult or gentle praise? Shoot that rear RT.
Dont be rude, make the conversation about her. Does she wiggle in her seat, play with her hair? Shoot the rear RT again and SLOWLY move to stay behind.
YOU INSULTED HER!!! She is running off!!! Quick! Shoot that RT before she calls a cab!
NOW, if she stayed and ups the ante with the banter, NOW the main course comes! Bob Apetit!!! He turns to FIGHT you!!!!
Dinner is served. You dont need to run around full speed circles. WATCH his butt, haha, stay behind it, most Assaults have poor torso/arm reach.
Keep stabbing but keep looking for his friends, guests arrive often at the worst times...
HE dies...AH, victory for you. Stand over his scrap for 1 second so he can see that his 100 ton Direwhale was defeated by a 20 ton Locust. Brag to your team and run off into the sunset, or, they hell away from the enemy team cuz you are the last one standing...

Vulturing...
Similar to hunting but, its essentially clean-up at the end of the match.
You will be insulted...dont worry. Insults will stop after you kill an enemy and save the day!!!

You want to run away from where the enemy was. mae them spread out and look for you. They will insult you, so will your teammates for 'wasting' their 'time'.
Now, you have to be picky.
DONT shoot first sign of an enemy and learn the art of the tactical power-down.
You want cored, hopefully orange CT/RT, or beat up legs.
Save the full armor-sand bagger for last. He either sucks, is out of ammo, or let his team do all the work.
You have to be very scared and cagey.
It pays to know the maps in this situation, you essentially wait for them to look into the usual hiding spots then ambush them from somewhere else. Classic.

Modules:
Radar Dep, seismic for wall-hacking
Weapon modules if need be.

Hope this helps.

[TheCharlatan]

Thank you guys.
All the tips are being very helpful.

I'm trying the Jenner-F and Raven-3L right now and i'm loving them both. Very different from one another, which keeps the games fresh.

I'm still doing some silly mistakes ("let's flee from this guy by running in the middle of the enemy team!" or even better "lrms are raining on me...let's crash in a wall!) but i'm getting a little bit better every game.

However i had the chance to be part of the slaughter of a dire whalr with another light... now that was fun!

Good hunting!

[Tim East]

Tripod, on 26 December 2014 - 02:48 AM, said:

Honestly I have the same problem, I have a ton of fast DPS mechs with terrible alpha and all I can do is play peekaboo against enemy mechs with twice as much alpha, because if I try to engange, I'll just run solo into a 3 vs 1

Peekaboo usually ends very badly for me in light mechs. I much prefer the strafing run.

mailin, on 26 December 2014 - 11:32 AM, said:

One thing that I really enjoy about driving my lights is that they really require me to be thinking all of the time. Being successful in a light is really all about situational awareness and good decision making. Because Jenners don't have ECM you need to be more careful than a 5D. If you can find a 5D to run with though, it can be extremely rewarding for both of you. I know that I love, love, love having the additional firepower of a Jenner with me when I'm in my 5D.

You just need to be constantly deciding whether to engage, flank or disengage. It's better to be a little too willing to disengage at first. You can always re-engage or attack from a different angle. The single most important thing is to keep an eye on your minimap. Enemies may only appear on there for a moment.

This guy is spot-on with what I was talking about. See the enemy and their disposition, decide the best approach (or not to at all) attack swiftly and viciously, and reverse out of there before they can fill you full of holes. Situational awareness is super-important.

Also you get rewarded each time you successfully disengage now, which can often tell you if you're being chased by anyone fast enough to keep up with you. Free money for the win.

[Koniving]

I've got the simplest tip for you. Go for the legs and try not to fight from in front of the enemy.

Lights are called Anklebiters for a reason.

[Senor Cataclysmo]

Hey,
I've been a light pilot for a long time; mostly since I started playing. On my old account I mastered the Spiders and had so much fun in them and I'd recommend them as a light pilot.

I've seen someone state that radar deprivation is an awesome thing for lights but modules are so expensive and I haven't go around to equipping them yet so, while they may be good, they're not 100% necessary.

With the Striking tactics there's two sides of this to me. There's how you build your 'mech and how you use your 'mech.
Building: Striking 'mechs often make good light-brawlers because they have highburst damage which means that they have weapons that they fire all at once, or in quick succession, and get away quickly while their weapons cycle. The Ice Ferret (A clan mech) is a medium but plays like a light 'mech because of its speed and armor. I mount it with 3x SRM4s and a MPL. This has high burst-damage in the form of the SRMs with a pokey weapon for criting. Remember, you want high alpha damage, not high DPS for strikers. My high burst damage Ice Ferret can get ~800 damage in a match, quite easily.

Playing: You play strikers like you have no armor. I always maintain that a light's greatest weapons are its legs because they will be what ensures you can continue dealing lots of damage even if you don't have very strong weapons; maps like Crimson Strait and Frozen/River City are best because of the sharp corners that buildings provide. I try to think that a sharp corner will give you protection as soon as you're behind it and you'll be behind it with little movement, whereas smooth corners, like on Caustic Valley's Caldera, will mean you have to move a lot further to be safe. Ideally, you want to hit the enemy with your alpha then be around a corner before they even know you're there. One of the best bits of advice I can give you as well is that sometimes you shouldn't fire straight away; I've gotten so many kills by waiting behind a target that doesn't know I'm there until my targeting data is full and I can target the parts with no armor. Then I alpha, and I get out of there ASAP.

If your team is in a war of attrition, I go with one of two choices; I stay with them and poke as best I can or I go behind the enemy and provide scouting or damage and confusion if there's cover for me to get into as soon as I've fired. Do remember that this is a team game and that sometimes a lights speed can help your team by distracting the enemy for the assaults to attack can be useful too, even if you die.

Happy Hunting!

Edited by Senor Cataclysmo, 27 December 2014 - 09:43 AM.

[mailin]

Another thing to note about light pilots. We don't like fair fights. By this, I mean we don't like to go up against other lights. Even if you have streaks, if you get an enemy light on your tail, try to drag him back to your team. All good light drivers know this and try to take advantage of people who start chasing the squirrel. Similarly, if you can get 2 or three mechs to chase you, they are no longer focused on the friendlies that can do a LOT more damage. If you can also drag them back to the rest of your team to be subsequently focused upon, you have again done your job.

In many ways the role of the light is to seek out the enemy and get the enemy pilots so flustered that they make mistakes, even though they know that they should know better. It's essentially psychological warfare.

[Shade4x]

TheCharlatan, on 26 December 2014 - 12:44 AM, said:

Hello fellow Mechwarriors!

First let me tell you a thing: this game is awesome. I've been keeping an eye on it for quite some time (bad PC didn't allow me to play it) and all the negativity on the forums almost made me skip it. Luckly I tried it out in the end, and I'm loving it!

After trying a few trail mechs I've found my calling: being a light pilot. Anything going less than 120 km/h feels sluggish to me.

I've started by buying the Jenner-D, with which i'm learning the way of the striker with 4 ML and 2 SRM-4 (and a 300 XL, of course).

And here comes question number 1: as a striker, i often find myself with nothing to do. If the two teams just stick together and start shooting each other from medium/long range, i can't seem to engage, as as soon as i stick my head out at a range where i can inflict damage, half a dozen mechs start shooting on me. Often, the enemy team wins the war of attrition, and i can't turn the tide alone once the brawl begins.
So question number 1 is: what is a striker supposed to do in such situations? Should i just wait for the brawl to start or are there other tactics?

This right here is what seperate's good light pilots and bad light pilots. There are a couple of things you can do. The first is scouting/spotting. Get in a position where the enemy will not notice you, or have a hard time hitting you, and get locks, and start making a mental list of what type of mech's are on the field. This will also let your teams LRM boats to rain fire upon your enemy.

The other option thing you can do is make them turn around. You can do this by positioning yourself behind them, and hitting them in the back with weapons from a safe distance till they notice you. Once they turn around, you leave. This with any type of charge, cordinated or not, can wipe a team.

Then when your team is engaging theirs, go take out the LRM boats, they often do not have enough weapons to take out a decent light pilot. The other option is to run to the back of a big mech, like an atlas, and just spam damage in its back. You have to constantly judge your speed during a circle strafe so that you can stay behind em, but it works, just remember, the mech has to be out of position, or the preoccupied to even try this.

Quote

After the Jenner-D, i wanted to try MPLs, so i bought a Jenner K. However, MPLs just don't cut it for me. I don't feel like doing enough damage with a quick pass, and i don't have the range flexibility of MLs. It looks like i have to run circles around my enemies to really inflict damage, something that seems to always go wrong (sooner or later, enemy reinforcements arrive or i make a mistake, since I'm still a newb).

See Above advice. Circle strafe is to keep their backs in front of you, not just for the sake of running circles. Stay at their backs.

Quote

So i tried a 4 MLs and NARC, which is nice (but doable with the Jenner-D as well) and then 2 ER-LLs.
This last build made me discover sniping with light mechs, which really suits my gameplay style (being a PITA to the enemy team), so now i'm going to try the Ravens (after i elite the Jenners).
I'll probably buy a Huginn too, to support this great game.
The 2 ER-LLs seems more suit to the Raven-3L, so here we come to question number 2: what's the use of the Jenner-K? How do you guys build it?

Thanks a lot and happy holidays!

First off, sniping "suits" everyone's gameplay style, because people tend to play this game like a wuss. The only decent light snipers tend to be clan. The rest are just a waste of a fast mech. I would try the spider and the raven for the ECM, and master one mech (buy 3 variants) before making any judgement calls. You get a huge speed boost.

Jenner K is a throw away mech. You just buy it to master it, then ditch it for the F or the D. I would build it with 4x MLas and an SSRM-2 or a Srm4.