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http://www.reddit.co...is_game_i_give/
These are some outside-the-game, and inside-the-game tips I have learned very quickly.
The first tip and one of the most important is to bookmark Meta Mechs and SmurfyMechlab
The second is to LEARN. I have gotten better at this game only because I have been learning, and I will keep learning to improve. Don't go into this game thinking you know a lot your first, second, or even 100th match.
Meta mechs is a great list of meta-game, or, top tier most used mechs that you can build and be ahead of mechs slapped together. The Smurfy MechLab allows you to look at other popular builds, as well as build your own mechs from scratch to see how they will fit together before you buy them, and brainstorm new ideas.
Now that we're through that, let's start with some outside the game tips.
- 1. Turn off "Arm Lock". It seperates the aim from your torso and your arms, allowing you to aim with a wider range with your arms (small circle) so that you can hit things that are further away from your torso. (x symbol, crosshairs). However, if you enjoy having your torso and arms be aiming at the same place all the time, and you prefer not to be aiming off screen, then keep them locked.
- 2. Don't buy -anything- for your first 25 matches. This way you will get a big pool of money to spend on whatever you want, through "Cadet bonuses", a large sum of C-Bills, almost double, especially with your free Premium Time. I ended up with roughly 10m C-Bills, but I had over a 50% win rate, and over a 1.0 KDR.
- 3. Make use of your free premium time. You earn a flat 50% bonus to your C-Bills earned, and if you play well you can have 2 mechs in no time. Start on a weekend, and play it out. That's what I did and I have 2 mechs now!
- 4. This one is more personal rather than one I learned, but for your first mech - buy a clan mech. This is because variants of a clan mech have interchangeable parts, such as the arms and legs. Different parts can hold different gear and weaponry, making your mech more versatile when you go back to the mech lab. (Special note - if you have already figured out your play style, and know what you want - save up and buy whatever mech you know you want.)
- 5. Don't join a faction. One of the first things I did was join a faction with a full contract. I had no idea what I was doing. Later on, some people wanted me to play with them but because I had the full contract, it would have cost me 1m C-Bills to cut the contract, roughly 7-8 games worth of income. If you just grind out and find a group of people to play with defending or play solo attacking, it can still be fun.
- 6. Don't be scared to play the trial mechs for an extended period of time. If you're in the game for the long run, you will just be saving up cash. The standard mechs don't seem to be too awful - in the public matches and faction matches I have outperformed many people due to positioning. It's not about what you have, it's how you use it. (and trust me, from what people have told me about this game - if you get into it, you'll be here a while)
- 1. This is not Call of Duty (Or other generic FPS). You cannot walk up to someone, shoot them, and expect them to drop instantly. It takes time to kill an enemy mech, which is why positioning is so, SO important.
- 2. Heat is your worst enemy. A quick way to help with this is to nagivate with the arrow keys and Right Control to re-group your weapons into groupings you know that you will like. Thanks to the people below, I now know that you can do this! For mechs you know you wouldn't overheat, I'd suggest alpha firing (I'm not sure what the default key is - I changed mine to E) your mech once when you spawn and see how much heat it creates with all the weapons fired at once. Then, when fighting, you know how many times you can fire all of your weapons before overheating. This has helped me greatly, especially since a lot of the meta mechs are energy-heavy.
- 2a. 2a. "This is one thing I'd advise you to avoid. It's rarely a good idea to be using chain fire. Instead group your weapons into logical sets (e.g. arms, torso, left side, right side, high mounted, low mounted; whatever make sense for the way that mech is played) and learn how much heat firing one of those groups will generate. If you don't have the spare heat to fire a big burst you should be doing what you can to protect yourself with terrain or twisting. Chain fire extends your face time with the enemy without increasing your overall DPS. Instead of chain fire a more advanced technique would be learning when it is safe to use override to finish off an enemy." -Bear 4188, reddit
- 3. STICK. TOGETHER. I cannot count how many times I've seen entire lance groups of people (4) run off and do their own thing, only to be trapped by the enemy and not get a single kill. Know that from day one that unless you're out scouting and know what you're doing - you need to stick with your team, or relatively close to your team.
- 4. Press R. Press R a lot. This locks on your target making them easier to hit and if you're the only person targeting them and have vision, marks them for other players on your team to mark onto.
- 5. Under most circumstances, don't run away. I've learned this one the hard way, playing a medium mech without a strong engine, if you have a bunch of people shooting at you don't turn around. I think every mech (don't quote me I'm still new) is weaker in the back. You will get killed 10x faster from behind. It's better to go down with a fight, unless you know you can make it out functionally.
- 6. Waggle. When missiles are coming at you, wiggle your arms or turn sideways to help spread the damage between body parts. This way you won't get one part focused down completely.
- 6a. Spread your damage. A subset of the wiggling, if you take heavy damage on one side and still have weapons on the other, switch your sides around to spread the damage. This goes for legs and arms. It might be harder to shoot at an angle when peeking, but at least you'll still have your other arm!
- 6b. Peeking. While you're wiggling to avoid damage, a great way to get some fire in is to peek around from walls and then go back and hide behind them. This has helped me on HPG Manifold, hiding behind those HUGE walls from rockets.
- 7. Now this one might take a while, but learn your enemy. "Information is ammunition. -Battletech Episode 1" If you know the weakspots, target them and it will make things much easier. For quick reference, most clan mechs have arms, and with that the weapons are generally located on the arms. If you take out the main weapons, the mech can't do much. When in doubt, aim for the legs, or aim for one specific point. If a mech can't walk very fast, it's a sitting duck for your team mates to take out, and if you fully damage one part, you can move on to the next, or if it's the torso, they're dead.
- 7a. (Learn your enemy subset) The different mech classes, being Assault, Heavy, Medium, and Light. Just to add a quick point here, the way health works in this game is that each individual part of the mech has it's own health, and destroying it may not kill the mech itself. Aiming for the torso is usually your best bet when you start off, as it contains the engine and will make the mech go boom. Now, with Assault mechs, they can be a bit tricky. They vary a lot in design, so aiming for one particular part is tricky to say. I personally try to shoot them in the legs, when playing a long range mech, and shoot them from behind in a fast medium or light mech as they can't turn around fast enough. For Heavy mechs, it's almost the same thing, except it's a bit more viable to go for the torso this time. Again with Medium mechs, a lot of them have arms so if you want to disarm them literally, that is a great choice. Especially on players who build all their weapons to one arm, and leave one arm as a dummy shield. Light mechs are quick and unless you're playing one yourself it will run circles around you. Don't panic. If you try to follow him around and shoot like crazy you will never kill him. Back yourself up towards a wall and stick to a 180 degree playing field, this way he will have to stop to run back the other way and you can focus on taking out his whole puny body down at once.
- 8. Spend your skill EXP. I didn't know about it until just now, and had 40k xp for one mech saved up to spend on it. Sweet sweet small-upgrades. Note that trial mechs still earn you exp.
Edited by Zakizdaman, 23 February 2015 - 02:52 PM.
