LT. HARDCASE, on 04 March 2016 - 07:23 PM, said:
1. The Linebacker does not have nearly the hardpoint spread of the Stormcrow. It has not a single pod with more than 2 energy, and only 1 arm with more than a single energy mount. It can do 6M points, but 4 of those would be in its low slung arms. Can't boat more than 7 lasers, to the Stormcrows what, 13? Take the ballistic torso, and you lose 2 of those E points.
2. PGI is NOT going to make a 65 tonner smaller than a 55 tonner, not after the formulaic volume normalization work that's currently underway. Even If they went slightly shorter, it'd be significantly wider, ie the Ebon Jag. Worse hitboxes by default.
Linebacker seems like a worse Ebon Jag. Faster, sure. But the lacking tonnage hurts more. You even have both a ballistic RA and RT, like the Ebon, but you lack the ability to use both of them simultaneously.
Again, why not just take the Stormcrow?
This will be ridiculously lengthy, but I feel it's important to be detailed here.
In actual usage, you're not going to be using more than 6 energy slots, unless you're boating small lasers (which, let's face it, you're not). Looking at the Stormcrow, Hellbringer, and Timberwolf, the most popular and competitive laser vomit builds on those chassis aren't often using more than 6 energy slots, even if it's possible to mount more. The common combination 2x LPL, 4x CERML builds will work on a Linebacker, and it will run as well as on any of those mechs (though a little hotter than some).
Moreover, some of the more popular types of builds in upper tier CW or competitive play will combine SRMs or UACs with lasers. So if you can get yourself 3+ SRMs mounted, and a handful of lasers (which you can), or a single UAC-10 and 4-5 lasers (which you can), you're well within the meta for top-level team play.
To your point about size, you may misunderstand the effect shape has on size. Look at the composition of the Stormcrow. It's very tall and very upright. The limbs are fairly gaunt, which means the mass of the mech is focused heavily in the torso. That torso is not particularly deep, so the mass is distributed in a way which gives a large front profile for its mass. Compare that to the body composition of the Linebacker. Classic hunched configuration. Very efficient torso volume distribution. Compact. Fairly normalized limbs (not gaunt like the SCrow) so weight relatively distributed between limbs and torso within norms. The torso is very short, somewhat wide, but mostly unusually deep. This produces a very small front profile relative to mass.
The more compact a shape is, the less surface area it will have relative to volume. So the Linebacker's more efficient shape means less overall surface area to mass ratio. The deep torso means a greater ratio of surface area is focused AWAY from the front profile, which is the profile that players will see the most (hence why most armor is always focused in the front center torso) That front center torso profile is the smallest profile on the mech.
Taken together, this means quite a few things. First, that it will be shorter than a Stormcrow. Not only that, but it will be shorter than an Ebon Jaguar because of that mech's far flung mass. That much is guaranteed. Next, the front hitboxes will be very small because of the small front profile, and the front center torso hitbox will be the smallest of the 3 torso hitboxes due to the way the front of the Linebacker is designed. It will almost certainly have a smaller front center torso hitbox than the Ebon Jaguar - unless PGI consciously pushes the center hitbox out to the sides.
Exactly how small might the Linebacker end up? Well, using the Stormcrow as reference, at 55 tons... Assume bulking up the arms and legs to the general aesthetic in Linebacker art will take up most of the 10-ton weight difference between the two mechs, with limbs properly sized for a 65-ton mech. It's safe to say, based on mass distribution that the Linebacker and Stormcrow will have a torso of approximately the same mass/volume - with the Linebacker torso likely no more than 2-3 tons more massive than Stormcrow, if at all. So take the Stormcrow torso, in your head, crumple it into a ball like a piece of clay, and reshape it into the shape of the Linebacker torso. Basically that would look like taking the Stormcrow cockpit off the rest of the torso, tipping the torso forward 90-degrees, and then sticking the cockpit back on. That's a pretty small target to shoot at, right? Way smaller than the Stormcrow.
And that's the reality of body plan in a volumetrically-normalized world. Mechs that stand upright are going to look way bigger than a mech that's hunched over. PGI has no say in how they pan out. PGI will just build the model, and normalize it to volume. The body plan is heavily in favor of the Linebacker here. Mathmatically, it's a certainty that the Linebacker will be "smaller" than the Stormcrow in every way that matters.
So after you determine that the Linebacker can mount the same meta builds as tier-1 mechs (including the Stormcrow), and it can run as fast as a Stormcrow, and has better frontal hitboxes than that mech... and then you realize that you've got the benefit of extra armor and structure that an extra 10 tons affords you... the question should probably be, "Why take a Stormcrow?" I mean, unless you need the extra 10 tons in your drop deck. If you want to run the 2xLPL and 4xCERML build on a heavy mech, you then have to ask, "Why wouldn't I pick the Linebacker over the Hellbringer and Ebon Jaguar?" Hell, you might even take it over the Timberwolf and save yourself 10 tons.
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