5 replies to this topic

[AWOL 01]

With all of the Unseen mechs being released recently, how many of you would like to see the 2 quad mechs (that I know of) that are also Unseen? These would be the Scorpion and the Goliath.

Scorpion


(From Sarna)
Production Year: 2570
Mass: 55 tons (Medium)
Speed: 97.2 kph
Armament: 1 PPC, 1 SRM-6

Goliath


(From Sarna)
Production Year: 2652
Mass: 80 tons (Assault)
Speed: 64.8 kph
Armament: 1 PPC, 2 LRM-10s, 2 Machine Guns

[Mister Bob Dobalina]

Basically I think Quads could be a nice addition but most likely to satisfy a "have-to-have-it" feeling than to real battlefield value. Here are my thoughts towards the lore Scorpion and Goliath:

Scorpion: Would be e neat and fast Mech with a hard-to-hit low profile. Unfortunately that makes it hard for the pilot to hit something as well. If they would create a Scorpion they would have to rack up weaponry anyway. a standart PPC and a SRM6 won't compare what other 55t Mechs of comparable speed pack. And then there is the thing with the torso / turret. Because there simply isn't one. Actually, I may be wrong here if I am not remembering correctly, lore mentions Scorpions not needing that because they would be turning really, really fast.

Goliath: To roll up my opinion from the Scorpion bachwards I have to say that this one at least has a turret. But the whole design always looked a little like a cheap fast-brew. The Goliath looks like the took a wheel based tank and replaced the wheels with legs. Period. Again, they would have to beef up weaponry to make it a comparable Assault.

At that point I'd rather see resources used to improve gameplay and the expansion of CW and game modes than into Quad Mechs. But keeping the topic warm is quite legit although there might be reason why that type of Mech is so friggin rare during those centuries of Mech warfare .....

[AWOL 01]

I have to agree that there's more important things to work on, but it would be pretty cool to have them and it could definitely shake things up gameplay-wise. For example, quad mechs could be able to traverse steeper slopes, or not be slowed down as much when going over obstacles. Both would also have very high-mounted hardpoints, but the Goliath would have less places to find cover.

For the Scorpion I was thinking they could do something similar to what they did with the Nova. For anyone who doesn't know, the Nova originally looked like this:



So for the Scorpion they could simply give it a separate turret. They'd have to rework the hitboxes though, because in the Battletech TT game I guess they treated the arm hitboxes as 2 of the legs and the leg hitboxes as the other 2?

Alex Iglesias could definitely make both designs look awesome, so I wouldn't be too worried about the Goliath being a literal walking tank.

The Scorpion has 6 variants according to Sarna (1 with MASC), and 1 custom variant that could be made into a Hero mech, and the Goliath has 9 variants (1 with ECM).

PGI has also changed the hardpoints that some mechs are supposed to have, so it shouldn't be too much of a problem to give the ability for better loadouts.

And if I'm not mistaken, the only reason quad mechs weren't used as much was because they required a lot of maintenance originally, and once their technology improved there was still a stigma attached to them.

[Durant Carlyle]

There is an actual reason for quads not being in the game. I don't remember what it is exactly, but it might be an engine limitation or something.

[MarsThunder]

Imho, quad mechs are totally incompatible with current physics. Look at [impossible] mechs motion on declined surfaces.

[AWOL 01]

Doing a little more research it does seem like the main reason is because it would require completely new/separate animations from the bipedal mechs and, as MarsThunder pointed out, the animation problems with mechs on inclined surfaces, which would look even worse with a mech as wide as a quad. However, after Garth stated these problems on the forums he did say that at some point when there's enough resources and time he would like to add a couple, so I don't think it's out of the picture.

The general consensus seems to be that we would like to see quad mechs in-game, but not before other things are added/fixed. That does seem like a better option because right now there are about 6 quad mechs available on the timeline, but in a few years there will be a lot more.