38 replies to this topic

[Zergling]

Lots of people are unaware that taking both side torsos off a clan mech will kill it.

[Saint Scarlett Johan]

To expand on what Ego said about RnR, mechs like these: HBK-4P, AS7-D, and AWS-8Q were actually incredibly common. Mostly because mechs like this: JR7-F, where prohibitively expensive to run unless you were an ace light pilot, which was actually difficult as at the time, running into walls or other mechs would cause you to fall.

[Joseph Mallan]

GIANT TARGET, on 08 February 2015 - 05:52 PM, said:

Makes sense, thanks.

In MWO though, taking XL on an assault like AS7-K and AWS-9M is considered a bad idea (in general) but they're supposed to be superior technology in BT. I know MWO is not purely BT, but it seems silly that a lot of superior technology becomes inferior for the most part in the game, like LB-10X.

It is not inferior. It is a risk/gain decision. Is it worth the risk to have those easy sides to carry (up to) 9 extra tons of stuff? The thinking is that More weapons less TTK balances a more robust build.

The L-BX never struck me as being superior. More versatile but not superior. Again it comes down to style. I'm a "Hammer of god" style player, others are "Death by Paper cuts" style. Everyone has a preferred way to play, And that generally means there isn't really a wrong way to play.

Zergling, on 09 February 2015 - 02:02 AM, said:

Lots of people are unaware that taking both side torsos off a clan mech will kill it.

That is more armor than going through the CT though...

[Zergling]

Joseph Mallan, on 09 February 2015 - 02:28 AM, said:

That is more armor than going through the CT though...

I've seen people lose fights to Clan mechs, 'cause they fixated on the CT instead of taking off their badly damaged remaining side torso though.

[Joseph Mallan]

Zergling, on 09 February 2015 - 02:47 AM, said:

I've seen people lose fights to Clan mechs, 'cause they fixated on the CT instead of taking off their badly damaged remaining side torso though.

I didn't realize we were talking about badly damaged side torsos? Of course if the sides are damaged it will be easier. BUT from fresh, There is more armor on 2 sides than on the Center Torso. So depending on teh situation you are right and so am I.

[Kaeb Odellas]

Whatzituyah, on 09 February 2015 - 01:29 AM, said:

The whole problem with SHS is that there is not water on every map. That is a big reason because if there was water sure they would have a big advantage but if you have SHS and go to say Terra Therma your going to have a hard time.

Even in a fully flooded map, SHS would still be pointless. With the 10 engine heatsinks and 4 in the legs, you get the equivalent of 18 SHS. Meanwhile, in DHS land, you get the equivalent of 20 SHS in your engine alone.

[Kmieciu]

Joseph Mallan, on 09 February 2015 - 03:22 AM, said:

I didn't realize we were talking about badly damaged side torsos? Of course if the sides are damaged it will be easier. BUT from fresh, There is more armor on 2 sides than on the Center Torso. So depending on teh situation you are right and so am I.

If you try to core a competent Timber Wolf pilot, you will have to go through 3 torso sections. I say is actually easier to destroy both side torsos than to go through the CT, especially if he's got missile pods.

[Willard Phule]

Kmieciu, on 09 February 2015 - 03:54 AM, said:

If you try to core a competent Timber Wolf pilot, you will have to go through 3 torso sections. I say is actually easier to destroy both side torsos than to go through the CT, especially if he's got missile pods.

And has enough presence of mind to jump and/or twist the torso to spread the damage around.

In the solo queue, however, at least you still get close to 70% new players per match.....they like to stand still and shoot. Nothing says "pay me" like a stationary target.

[Taemien]

GIANT TARGET, on 08 February 2015 - 05:52 PM, said:

Makes sense, thanks.

In MWO though, taking XL on an assault like AS7-K and AWS-9M is considered a bad idea (in general) but they're supposed to be superior technology in BT. I know MWO is not purely BT, but it seems silly that a lot of superior technology becomes inferior for the most part in the game, like LB-10X.

'Superior' tech isn't always a straight up replacement. Even in BattleTech in both Table Top and Lore. For example you brought up LBXs as being inferior in MWO. Depends on how you look at it. In MWO it can be great when paired with lasers as a one-two punch once armor has been stripped. In TT, ACs have less cost and BV than their LBX counterparts. They also have less tech level's needed. This especially came into play in AToW where obtaining parts might be tough for some battlefield participants.

One might think OmniMechs are better than BattleMechs. Ton for ton, weapon for weapon. Maybe. But in MWO they cannot mod their engines and such. In TT they have more restrictions. And of course in Lore they are prohibitively expensive. Even the Clans use BattleMechs quite frequently, even having Iconic designs such as the Kodiak, Annihilator, and Supernova.

What it really boils down to is you pay for the ability to be flexible. In all aspects, MWO, TT, Lore, ect. In MWO, each player equals a player and cost is not a concern, so things are balanced so players can equal one another. In TT things are balanced by its BV, higher BV units means you have less units overall. And in Lore/RPG you have costs and availability concerns.

If you wish to keep things simple and easy in all aspects of BattleTech.. stick to Lasers, LRMs, SRMs, PPCs, Autocannons, Flamers, and Machine Guns. If you want to get more complex and open some options.. be prepared to pay for it, in some manner or another. Either cbills, less units, or downsides.

[Lugh]

Rouken, on 09 February 2015 - 01:29 AM, said:

Those are builds lifted directly from table top, and if I am not mistaken, the CASE prevented major damage to the XL engine saving money even though the mech went out of commission.

Mistake number !)(*$#(*2398427342 of MWO, removing repair and rearm. Along with not time limiting the changing of a mechs internals around because it was 'boring'. It's not 'boring' it's and essential consideration of strategic warfare, do I want to take this assault offline for 7 days while I redo all its internals to get the weight savings of Endo?

It's a significant part of the 'thinking man's shooter' that is missing in this game, and it saddens me. Best techs ever, there could never be a dark age with instant engine changes.

[Ex Atlas Overlord]

Davers, on 08 February 2015 - 06:09 PM, said:

I doubt they will put Light Engines in game. If they do they just made STD and XL engines obsolete.

Kind of like how clan XL engines make all IS engines obsolete?

[Malcolm Vordermark]

Lugh, on 01 October 2015 - 04:40 AM, said:

Mistake number !)(*$#(*2398427342 of MWO, removing repair and rearm. Along with not time limiting the changing of a mechs internals around because it was 'boring'. It's not 'boring' it's and essential consideration of strategic warfare, do I want to take this assault offline for 7 days while I redo all its internals to get the weight savings of Endo?

It's a significant part of the 'thinking man's shooter' that is missing in this game, and it saddens me. Best techs ever, there could never be a dark age with instant engine changes.

Yeah, not being able to play a mech because I changed the build sounds terrible.

[Christof Romulus]

Rouken, on 01 October 2015 - 06:08 AM, said:

Yeah, not being able to play a mech because I changed the build sounds terrible.

Actually, funny story - but that was the advantage of Clan mechs and Omni pods.

Inner Sphere Battlemechs work almost exactly like Table Top Omni Mechs: You have "Pod space" or "Free Tons" that you can swap and cycle around RAPIDLY. So customization of an Omni Mech was limited only by free tonnage.

Table Top Battlemechs were all hard-wired. Modifications that we do in game would take weeks if not months of work - which is why Battlemechs were mass produced as they were, and in great numbers.

In Table Top, Battlemechs were incapable of changing their loadout between missions or campaigns, but Omni mechs were, which allowed them the ability to meet challenges with the best possible loadout.

So, since you're a clan player, you would never have that issue to begin with. =P

[Lightfoot]

However, Inner Sphere get to use the very tough ST Engines which survive the loss of both side torsos at the expense of speed so it's not all bad especially if you can mount CT weapons.

Christof Romulus, on 01 October 2015 - 07:32 AM, said:

Actually, funny story - but that was the advantage of Clan mechs and Omni pods.

Inner Sphere Battlemechs work almost exactly like Table Top Omni Mechs: You have "Pod space" or "Free Tons" that you can swap and cycle around RAPIDLY. So customization of an Omni Mech was limited only by free tonnage.

Table Top Battlemechs were all hard-wired. Modifications that we do in game would take weeks if not months of work - which is why Battlemechs were mass produced as they were, and in great numbers.

In Table Top, Battlemechs were incapable of changing their loadout between missions or campaigns, but Omni mechs were, which allowed them the ability to meet challenges with the best possible loadout.

So, since you're a clan player, you would never have that issue to begin with. =P

In all fairness Clan Mechlab should also allow the changing of jump-jets, Endo and FF just for balance of the mechs. That would allow players to fix PGI's fubars like the Summoner, etc., which are actually caused by the Gauss Rifle charge-up and DHS 1.4, things which PGI imported into MWO and are Battle Tech violations.

Edited by Lightfoot, 01 October 2015 - 07:47 AM.

[Lugh]

Joseph Mallan, on 09 February 2015 - 02:28 AM, said:

It is not inferior. It is a risk/gain decision. Is it worth the risk to have those easy sides to carry (up to) 9 extra tons of stuff? The thinking is that More weapons less TTK balances a more robust build.

The L-BX never struck me as being superior. More versatile but not superior. Again it comes down to style. I'm a "Hammer of god" style player, others are "Death by Paper cuts" style. Everyone has a preferred way to play, And that generally means there isn't really a wrong way to play.


That is more armor than going through the CT though...

Not always. And if the target is a good Twister, it may only be possible to kill it that way.

[Luscious Dan]

Austin Danger Powers, on 08 February 2015 - 05:52 PM, said:

Makes sense, thanks.

In MWO though, taking XL on an assault like AS7-K and AWS-9M is considered a bad idea (in general) but they're supposed to be superior technology in BT. I know MWO is not purely BT, but it seems silly that a lot of superior technology becomes inferior for the most part in the game, like LB-10X.

LB-10X is inferior because they can't get the dual ammo types to work. It's still lighter and uses fewer crit slots than a regular AC10. If you could switch between slug and scatter, LB-X builds would be a thing.

The Atlas Overlord, on 01 October 2015 - 04:49 AM, said:

Davers, on 08 February 2015 - 06:09 PM, said:

I doubt they will put Light Engines in game. If they do they just made STD and XL engines obsolete.

Kind of like how clan XL engines make all IS engines obsolete?

Light Engines could be pretty neat. Certainly balances things out a little, not as much weight savings as a regular XL but on some of the bigger engines you'd still be looking at 6+ tons saved. Can't remember how they are priced relative to IS XL tech in the lore.

Edited by Luscious Dan, 01 October 2015 - 08:03 AM.

[Sarlic]

Egomane, on 09 February 2015 - 01:44 AM, said:

I actually liked the repair feature back then, though it was possible to abuse it for farming. Even I abused it in a sense, as I took advantage of the auto-reload, to never pay for ammunition. It was fun to see that, unless you had a really fantastic game, the loss of your fully tricked out mech, would cause a negative income once you payed for your repairs. It made all the low tech stuff viable in a sense.

Or all those people who would shoot at your dead mech to increase your repair costs .

That was so painful!

[Apnu]

Austin Danger Powers, on 08 February 2015 - 05:45 PM, said:

Is there any lore-based justification for this "feature"? Why not make IS mechs run at 1/2 speed if an ST gets taken off and you die just like clan when both STs are destroyed?

In the lore, the IS XL engine takes up three slots in each torso. The Clan mech takes up two. On the TT, a mech is dead if it takes three engine hits. When resolving critical hits after the armor's gone, each slot could show up on a d6 roll. Also if all the internal structure for a location is gone, that whole section drops off. So its possible (and I've seen it happen on the TT) that a mech losses all internal structure to a torso, but take no engine hits, then the torso falls off, automatically removing 3 engine slots, which is three engine hits, which is a dead mech.

For Clans, if the torso falls off, that's only two engine hits. The mech can still operate. It operates at +10 heat for each round and that's a big problem, but it dead yet.

Russ and Bryan wanted MWO to inherit as much as possible from the source material, hence this situation.

So that's why IS mechs die when the torso is shot out and Clan mechs live in MWO.

[Hotthedd]

Sarlic, on 01 October 2015 - 08:05 AM, said:

Or all those people who would shoot at your dead mech to increase your repair costs .

That was so painful!

That could have been mitigated by increasing the amount the winning team got paid in salvage.

Griefing a dead 'mech like that would also cost the griefer in C-bills.