15 replies to this topic

[Bespoke Cheese Cake]

I have a question which I hope will start an interesting conversation. My personal experience with fighting Elementals has only been in MechWarrior 2 and 3. In the MW2 they were a bit of a pest to fight while in MW3 they were no more of a challenge than a small light mech. Having said all that here is my question: How many Elementals ( in Battle Armor of course) would it take to defeat an Atlas assuming neither party is able get help.

[Brian Davion]

that can really depend... the answer basicly is "as little as one elemental if it's the right elemental and he's got a bit of luck going for him" Ghost Bear (and later hells horses) Elemental, Jake Kabrinsky, is notable for defeating an Atlas by himself.

keep in mind in table top there is a chance ANY weapon shot can immediatly disable a battlemech (it's an absolutely tiny chance mind you) and sometimes those elementals just won't hit and the atlas will land some lucky hits. really the best answer you're going to get is comparing their "points values" in table top.

the basic AS7-D has a battle value of 1897

a 5 suit point of small laser equiped elementals has a BV of 332 points

so per Battle value, the game considers 1 atlas to be about as valueable as 20 suits of elemental armor.

that's the closest you'll get to an answer. but yet again... it'll vary. 1 elemental could take an atlas, or an atlas could take 100 elementals.

[martian]

Bespoke Cheese Cake, on 26 January 2016 - 09:51 PM, said:

I have a question which I hope will start an interesting conversation. My personal experience with fighting Elementals has only been in MechWarrior 2 and 3. In the MW2 they were a bit of a pest to fight while in MW3 they were no more of a challenge than a small light mech. Having said all that here is my question: How many Elementals ( in Battle Armor of course) would it take to defeat an Atlas assuming neither party is able get help.

That's difficult to say.

1) Elementals - as all infantry units - need the right kind of terrain. If the battlefield is some kind of salt flat, those Elemetals are going to be destroyed before they will get into range. Elementals need some hills and ravines, or some forests if possible. Ambush is the ideal tactic for Elemental.

2) As for how many Elementals you would need ... One Elemental can destroy the Atlas, as Jake Kabrinski demonstrated.
Star Captain Shaw managed to get at least four solo kills on Inner Sphere 'Mechs, the Warhammer included.

But keep in mind that Elementals are typically deployed in "Points" of five troopers.

3) And of course, the exact model of that Atlas would be important too. The old AS7-D is armed mostly with weapons with no minimum range, so with some luck it could kill Elememtal with one shot of its AC-20. The upgraded AS7-K would have problems with aiming its Gauss Rifle in the minimum range, but its AMS would be useful against Elemental's SRMs.

[Metus regem]

First question, does said Atlas have A-pods, MG's or Flamers? Yes, then my money is on the Atlas. If no, that Atlas is going to take a long time to kill those elementals, likely not before the Elementals kill the Atlas...

[martian]

Metus regem, on 13 February 2016 - 09:57 PM, said:

First question, does said Atlas have A-pods, MG's or Flamers? Yes, then my money is on the Atlas.

No Atlas model has ever had A-Pods, Machine Guns or Flamers.

Metus regem, on 13 February 2016 - 09:57 PM, said:

If no, that Atlas is going to take a long time to kill those elementals, likely not before the Elementals kill the Atlas...

Actually, it's no big deal that the Atlas lacks those weapons. Against Elementals, their effectivity would be very low anyway.

[SpiralFace]

Infantry hard counter assault mechs in fiction and in TT.

Some rules for you, Minimum range for armor vehicles is 1 hex. This means that Infantry can "get under" a battlemech's weapon ranges to attack it (although they do open themselves up to physical attacks.)

Once they get under their range, Elementals would DECIMATE an atlas.

First, they would attempt to leg attack it to blow out the mech's knee and leg actuators in order to slow it down, then they would simply swarm the helpless mech, while also crippling its already poor mobility to make it a sitting duck against other mechs as well.

Thats not to say the mech wouldn't put up a fight, and in fact as swift stomp Physical attack can crush a single elemental quickly, but needless to say, if an elemental point got under your mech's weapon arcs at range 0 and you couldn't out run their Jump jets, you where pretty much screwed.

[martian]

SpiralFace, on 28 February 2016 - 01:12 PM, said:

Infantry hard counter assault mechs in fiction and in TT.

Some rules for you, Minimum range for armor vehicles is 1 hex. This means that Infantry can "get under" a battlemech's weapon ranges to attack it (although they do open themselves up to physical attacks.)

Once they get under their range, Elementals would DECIMATE an atlas.

First, they would attempt to leg attack it to blow out the mech's knee and leg actuators in order to slow it down, then they would simply swarm the helpless mech, while also crippling its already poor mobility to make it a sitting duck against other mechs as well.

Thats not to say the mech wouldn't put up a fight, and in fact as swift stomp Physical attack can crush a single elemental quickly, but needless to say, if an elemental point got under your mech's weapon arcs at range 0 and you couldn't out run their Jump jets, you where pretty much screwed.

It's not that hopeless, really.

1) Usually Atlas moving 3/5 can outrun Elementals moving 1/3 (depending on the terrain).
2) Elementals would have to make successful leg attack.
3) Atlas' legs are extremely well-armored - they are the best protected part of the 'Mech after Center Torso.
4) On top of that, Elementals would have to be lucky with crits.

[SpiralFace]

martian, on 28 February 2016 - 02:15 PM, said:

It's not that hopeless, really.

1) Usually Atlas moving 3/5 can outrun Elementals moving 1/3 (depending on the terrain).
2) Elementals would have to make successful leg attack.
3) Atlas' legs are extremely well-armored - they are the best protected part of the 'Mech after Center Torso.
4) On top of that, Elementals would have to be lucky with crits.

1.) 3/5 movement is only effective at out running elemental if the mech is in open ground, and is not impeded by terrain or has to burn movement points to change direction. In most cases where you would have to at the very least change headings, 3 jumping movement will eventually catch up with the mech unless its in compete open ground.

2.) Yes, but given the natural slow speeds of assault mechs, and a clan elemental's base stat line, this is not an entirely difficult thing to do. Especially if you are utilizing multiple elemental points.

3.) Armor is irrelevant vs Leg attacks, as you are mostly going for "crit chances" which you automatically get a chance to score regardless if you penetrate armor or not.

4.) The fact that you don't need to pen armor for a crit chance, and you get a damage cluster per BA in your point, At full unit strength, you actually get up to 5 Critical hit chance roles if you successful leg attack dependent on how many BA can successfully perform the leg attack. (Since each BA counts as its own damage cluster despite being focused on the same location. So at 40% chance to crit off of 5 rolls gives you an average of 2 crits per role.

On an atlas that only have Leg actuators and hips, a successful leg attack can EASILY cripples an atlas as a single Leg actuator hit puts its speed down PERMANENTLY to 2/3, at which point it is pretty much game over for the Atlas as its now too slow to pretty much run from anything, which frees up the BA to safely swarm the mech for even more massive damage.

If you bring at least 1k points worth of BA and have the ability to transport them to the front, they can essentially hard counter 3/5 assaults with leg attacks.

Its pretty nasty.

[martian]

SpiralFace, on 01 March 2016 - 04:31 PM, said:

1.) 3/5 movement is only effective at out running elemental if the mech is in open ground, and is not impeded by terrain or has to burn movement points to change direction. In most cases where you would have to at the very least change headings, 3 jumping movement will eventually catch up with the mech unless its in compete open ground.

The fact is that 3/5 Atlas is faster than 1/3 Elemental and can outrun it, even with some minor change of facing.

Plus, Atlas has a pair of rear-firing medium lasers, so it can successfully engage Elementals in its rear arc, even if running away.

Atlas doesn't have to run for the rest of the game. It just needs to get Elementals into position where it could use its AC-20, medium lasers and SRMs.

SpiralFace, on 01 March 2016 - 04:31 PM, said:

2.) Yes, but given the natural slow speeds of assault mechs, and a clan elemental's base stat line, this is not an entirely difficult thing to do. Especially if you are utilizing multiple elemental points.

You forgot to count possible terrain modifiers. Such modifiers make attack of Elementals more difficult. It's definitely no autosuccess.

By the way, you can do only one leg attack per turn against one 'Mech, no matter what number of Elemental points you have.

SpiralFace, on 01 March 2016 - 04:31 PM, said:

3.) Armor is irrelevant vs Leg attacks, as you are mostly going for "crit chances" which you automatically get a chance to score regardless if you penetrate armor or not.

Armor is not irrelevant because if you make leg attack against 'Mech that has weak, damaged or outright missing its leg armor, you can get two critical chances - one from hitting chassis and one from the special leg attack.

But in this case, Atlas with its extremely armored legs has nothing to worry about.

By the way, you get „chance“, as you said, but only if you were successful with your initial attack. That's not autosuccess. And it's quite possible your Leg Attack Crit roll won't net you a single critical hit.

SpiralFace, on 01 March 2016 - 04:31 PM, said:

4.) The fact that you don't need to pen armor for a crit chance, and you get a damage cluster per BA in your point, At full unit strength, you actually get up to 5 Critical hit chance roles if you successful leg attack dependent on how many BA can successfully perform the leg attack. (Since each BA counts as its own damage cluster despite being focused on the same location. So at 40% chance to crit off of 5 rolls gives you an average of 2 crits per role.

Why do you think that you get damage cluster or Crit hit chance per BA? The rulebook does not say so.

SpiralFace, on 01 March 2016 - 04:31 PM, said:

On an atlas that only have Leg actuators and hips, a successful leg attack can EASILY cripples an atlas as a single Leg actuator hit puts its speed down PERMANENTLY to 2/3, at which point it is pretty much game over for the Atlas as its now too slow to pretty much run from anything, which frees up the BA to safely swarm the mech for even more massive damage.

That's incorrect.

Atlas has legs padded with Single Heat Sinks.
Here you have a part of the record sheet:

SpiralFace, on 01 March 2016 - 04:31 PM, said:

If you bring at least 1k points worth of BA and have the ability to transport them to the front, they can essentially hard counter 3/5 assaults with leg attacks.

1 000 BV is good enough to buy you just some two Elemental points.

Should you want to deploy those two points of Elementals with some transport effectively, you would be somewhere in the range of around 3 000 BV or higher.

SpiralFace, on 01 March 2016 - 04:31 PM, said:

Its pretty nasty.

Not as much as you probably think.

Edited by martian, 02 March 2016 - 08:32 AM.

[Exilyth]

The hardest part for the elementals is getting to the Atlas.
Elementals/Battle Armor with magnetic clamps riding on omnimechs. Alternatively, any transport vehicle.

I'd still put my C-Bills on the Atlas though.

[Jaroth Corbett]

As Jake Kabrinski proved, you only need one Elemental.

[Karl Streiger]

Only because the AS7-K pilot was an idiot and deserved no better

[Vanguard319]

Well, if your Elemental's name is Jake Kabrinski, then one Elemental is more than enough. Generally though, a point of Elementals (5 troops) is considered a match against one mech.

[Karl Streiger]

There are several Mechs that hope you believe that tale.
While there are Mechs that are not so great in killing unarmored targets, a Gauss will end the life of most BA at range
Do you think the Nova and Supernova is there because of simple transportation - ba are bad when you let them close without a designated BA hunter (Kommodo, Nova Prime, Black Hawk KU prime) but without Mechs to fight the enemy they get slaugthered at long range

Ok i admit i don't know how the Combined Arms Nova /Supernova could work with those honour rules of the Clowns

[FLG 01]

[Karl Streiger]

I ve seen this picture first in the Clan Wolf Sourcebook - when the fight of Tamar City was described. While it could be this silly Alshain Avanger - it could also be Duke Kelswa who fall prey for a head hunter Elemental team.