41 replies to this topic

[Jonny Slam]

XenonCx, on 05 January 2015 - 05:07 PM, said:

So after all that buying, upgrading, and level grinding...did you end up with more or less C-bills than you started with? Just curious.

Less, after chassis, double sinks, Endo, bit and pieces and module for the ERPPC, I was down about 8 million taking into account the C-bills that I made grinding (thanks for all the free prem time PGI!!) as I was running on premium.

But that's okay, don't want to come across as whining about this, just a heads up to people on a budget (time or money) that it's a good idea to think about it and make sure the goal your going after will be something you will actually want and use when you get there!

And of course I should mention that I still got that sense of satisfaction when I popped the master lock, even if I don't dig the Cicada that much for playing. So it's still a win of sorts.

Edited by Jonny Slam, 05 January 2015 - 05:56 PM.

[LordKnightFandragon]

I do think before I grind.......I just decide not to....

[Jolly Llama]

I just master every type of mech I have and usually all three, if I like the chassis.

[El Bandito]

Direwhales are totally worth the hype and the grind--only if you know how to pilot the thing.

Edited by El Bandito, 05 January 2015 - 07:27 PM.

[Fate 6]

Wintersdark, on 05 January 2015 - 04:05 PM, said:

I far prefer leveling IS mech to clan mechs. In essentially every case, all the clan variants of a chassis are essentially the same. Sure, SOME have a single hard point different in the CT but that's rarely relevant beyond "this one variant is marginally better, but still essentially identical.

At least with IS mechs, particularly post quirkening, each variant feels like a totally different mech.

Nothing like levelling a Mist Lynx, just to have to level exactly the same terrible mist Lynx again... And again. It's horrible. Even with the couple good clan mechs, you're just paying millions of cbill to do exactly the same thing over and over. Wee.

At the same time, though, if there are multiple builds you like on Clan mechs then you can have a chassis for each. I almost wish I had 4 Kitfoxes because there are so many builds that I like. For some it's rough, but for the most part I've had fun because I can custom tailor each clan chassis to be either very different or exactly the same depending on my preference. The only ones I haven't like have been because of the chassis itself not because I have to level 3 variants of it.

[Wintersdark]

Fate 6, on 05 January 2015 - 07:45 PM, said:

At the same time, though, if there are multiple builds you like on Clan mechs then you can have a chassis for each. I almost wish I had 4 Kitfoxes because there are so many builds that I like. For some it's rough, but for the most part I've had fun because I can custom tailor each clan chassis to be either very different or exactly the same depending on my preference. The only ones I haven't like have been because of the chassis itself not because I have to level 3 variants of it.

Now we have Community Warfare and drop decks, I'd be buying multiples of single IS variants, no doubt about it. Hell, I'd already considered it in the past for IS mechs, but I felt just swapping builds around wasn't too much of a hassle.

I'm really looking forward to moving away from having to use 3 Stormcrows in my drop decks, so I can finally have three totally different loadouts that I can swap for attack or defense runs. Once you're pushing on a world in CW, you don't have time to **** around with loadouts. There's time to swap mechs in your drop deck, but not to hit the mechlab.

[PrivateDelik]

I suck so bad at holding back spending. I've bought and sold mechs and never pre-plan anything, and then end up with nothing in the end. I have like 2 mastered mechs that I hated, so I sold them all for one Clan Mech. =( Except my Cicada 3M, never selling that bad boy. All around, I'm a fail player, but I have a lot of fun!

[LordKnightFandragon]

El Bandito, on 05 January 2015 - 07:26 PM, said:

Direwhales are totally worth the hype and the grind--only if you know how to pilot the thing.

IT also helps to get on the side that atleast lives long enough to let you get all that damage.

[El Bandito]

LordKnightFandragon, on 05 January 2015 - 09:04 PM, said:

IT also helps to get on the side that atleast lives long enough to let you get all that damage.

True, but that is pretty much the same for all mechs. Can't do well even in my Timbergod if our Light lance is wiped out within 2 minutes into the game.

[Kaeb Odellas]

I mastered the 3C before quirks.

I actually liked the stupid thing. Had some unreasonably good rounds in it, too. I took it for a spin a couple of times after quirks, but it just gets eaten up in the post-Clan, post-quirks world. Sad.

Edited by Kaeb Odellas, 05 January 2015 - 10:47 PM.

[Sagamore]

Kevjack, on 05 January 2015 - 03:48 PM, said:

Yeah your experience is exactly why I haven't jumped in on buying, upgrading, outfitting, and leveling 3 Thunderbolts.

Well hopefully you at least bought the 2B, because it's a killer with 5x MPLs.

Except at least 2 of the TDRs are high performers right now. 9S with ER PPCs and 5SS with Medium Pulses. I've had good success with the 5S as well with 4 Large Lasers and 2 Machine guns. The 9SE is also fun if you like Large Pulses.

I don't think you can go wrong with TDRs at the moment and you will definitely be using at least one of them in CW.

[Furious Zen Master]

Think how awesome it would be if we could take any mech we liked, customise it in the mechlab, load it with the modules that we wanted, unlock the skills etc etc and try it out in the Testing Grounds.
Call it Simulator or whatever, people would be much more confident that this is the mech they want to grind for, or spend money on. It would whet their appetite to try and get all the goodies that make a specific mech good, instead of having to rely on second-hand information from forums and youtube videos.
Some will say that if people don't make bad purchasing decisions PGI stands to lose money from all those "mistakes" that won't happen, I believe that if you let people experience what they can potentially own in this game they will be more interested in grinding/paying for things they didn't know they wanted.

[627]

Kaeb Odellas, on 05 January 2015 - 10:44 PM, said:

I mastered the 3C before quirks.

I actually liked the stupid thing. Had some unreasonably good rounds in it, too. I took it for a spin a couple of times after quirks, but it just gets eaten up in the post-Clan, post-quirks world. Sad.

This.

Did the same, with a PPC and 4 MGs. Bought it to complete my cicada swarm and always thought it is bad. Turned out it's a hell of a ride and tons of fun for me, became my second favorite bug after the X-5.

I even got it out yesterday after seeing it had the same quirks as the Thunderbolt (I tried that too to see what all the fuzz is about... yes it is OP). In the end hitting that PPC with 140kph is hard but doable but the game changed, not only clans but meta and bigger alphas and TTK.

You can only do so much with one PPC, that is right and the time of MGs is over. Actually that time lasted only a week I think after every Lurm QQ'er switched to making MG-is-OP-threads... those times

[Sagamore]

Major Tryhard, on 05 January 2015 - 11:32 PM, said:

Think how awesome it would be if we could take any mech we liked, customise it in the mechlab, load it with the modules that we wanted, unlock the skills etc etc and try it out in the Testing Grounds.
Call it Simulator or whatever, people would be much more confident that this is the mech they want to grind for, or spend money on. It would whet their appetite to try and get all the goodies that make a specific mech good, instead of having to rely on second-hand information from forums and youtube videos.
Some will say that if people don't make bad purchasing decisions PGI stands to lose money from all those "mistakes" that won't happen, I believe that if you let people experience what they can potentially own in this game they will be more interested in grinding/paying for things they didn't know they wanted.

I've also thought this. Why not let you try out any mech in training grounds? I also like how on the smurfy website it lists the most popular builds. How cool would that be to be able to choose the "top builds" of the past 2 weeks or something and try it for yourself against dummy targets.

I do agree with the criticism though: I probably would not have bought the Boar's Head (at full price mind you) or the IV4 (also on release day) if I could try before I buy.

[NextGame]

I'm done. All mechs owned (except the $500 gold skin ones), All mechs mastered, All pilot skills unlocked. The worst were garbage like the badder and the mist lynx, that effectively got completed via gxp. Cicada were middle of the road, although had some high points for example the C3 was good during the brief period when machine guns were worthwhile.

Just got achievements and factions to go I guess, and the grind there is so far out that I dont really care about them.

More mechs and more maps (particularly cw maps) plx.

Edited by NextGame, 06 January 2015 - 12:17 AM.

[Lockon StratosII]

Kaeb Odellas, on 05 January 2015 - 10:44 PM, said:

I mastered the 3C before quirks.

I actually liked the stupid thing. Had some unreasonably good rounds in it, too. I took it for a spin a couple of times after quirks, but it just gets eaten up in the post-Clan, post-quirks world. Sad.

I still like the stupid thing. Actually I might even dare to say I like it the most out of all CDAs but then again take it with a grain of salt cause I am one of the cicada nuts that didn't pilot anything beside them since they were released so I might be a bit biased

If you want to make it worthwile you have to disregard filling all those ballistic hardpoints, play a range game, that is where the old lady excells: XL300, ERPPC, AC2 with 2 tons of ammo, radar derp, seismic and advanced vision.
Play hit and run, try to find nice marks but stay at distance and don't expose yourself for too long.

On a side note this variant would/will be godly if/when they release mech rifles/magshot

[Wolfgang2685]

Regarding the Cicada 3C: I initially had low performance when trying a big engine with 1 ERPPC, then i switched to 1ERPPC +4 machineguns with a slightly smaller engine.

Finally i switched to ERPPC + AC5 both in the same torso with XL300. This is the true way to run this mech. It turns into an AC15 with insane range, while running around the battlefield faster than clan light mechs.

[C E Dwyer]

Roadkill, on 05 January 2015 - 04:02 PM, said:

Did that change? I haven't played CW since the first couple of days, but when I played xp was awarded to the Mechs that earned it. You're even told (or were) which Mech earned how many xps on the game end screens.

At least that's what I remember from those 3 games (which took 4 hours).

The xp you earn is spead over how many mech you use, so if you lose its going to be four if you are in a team that crushes the other side, then it could be just one or two mechs

[Jonny Slam]

Lockon StratosII, on 06 January 2015 - 02:21 AM, said:

I still like the stupid thing. Actually I might even dare to say I like it the most out of all CDAs but then again take it with a grain of salt cause I am one of the cicada nuts that didn't pilot anything beside them since they were released so I might be a bit biased

If you want to make it worthwile you have to disregard filling all those ballistic hardpoints, play a range game, that is where the old lady excells: XL300, ERPPC, AC2 with 2 tons of ammo, radar derp, seismic and advanced vision.
Play hit and run, try to find nice marks but stay at distance and don't expose yourself for too long.

On a side note this variant would/will be godly if/when they release mech rifles/magshot

Wolfgang2685, on 06 January 2015 - 03:12 AM, said:

Regarding the Cicada 3C: I initially had low performance when trying a big engine with 1 ERPPC, then i switched to 1ERPPC +4 machineguns with a slightly smaller engine.

Finally i switched to ERPPC + AC5 both in the same torso with XL300. This is the true way to run this mech. It turns into an AC15 with insane range, while running around the battlefield faster than clan light mechs.

Thanks guys, I did try these as well and while they were okay my problem was this:

The ballistics screw with my ERPPC shots. And the ERPPC screws with the ballistics. First, those rounds hit well before the PPC round land down range (especially the AC2) alerting the pilot. And the ERPPC reveals my location much more then the ballistics do.

Anyway, I guess it's just a question of playstyle, and the thread wasn't to bash the Cicada, it was to just a cautionary tale about where you spend you C-bills and hours.

Cheers!

[ShadowWolf Kell]

Didn't read all the thread, just parts of it so if this was said already, I apologize.

One of the major caveats of getting a new mech is learning to adapt your playstyle to mesh with the mech and sticking with it so you get a feel for it.

The Cicada is a good example because you can't play it like a medium, and you can't really play it like a light. That said, you'd be amazed at how much damage you can rack up with just a lone PPC and playing as support for your team to finish off mechs the rest of the team has opened up, or suppressing fire to help your team push forward.