95 replies to this topic

[Koniving]

Lances107, on 11 April 2016 - 06:40 AM, said:

Is their certain tiers for certain skill levels, not the skill points in the game, but the skill of players? Recently it feels like I jumped into a whole new level of Mechwarrior online. Also someone mentioned you need four mechs for faction play. Do they need to be a light, medium, heavy, and assault? If not than can someone have say four heavies or four assaults? I do not have four mechs but the call to arms thing popped up anyways, so why is that? Would not only pop up if I had four mechs?

You joined a faction. It will send out to all faction members. You can answer it with trial clan mechs.

You need a minimum of 160-ish tons and a max of 250ish tons. Actual weights keep shifting.

Does it say tier v or tier IV now? If IV you moved up. If this new experience came when you started using the timberwolf then it's more to do with your mech. Tbr will draw a lot more attention and coordination

[Lances107]

Still do not understand the faction mech thing but I will take a look at the spike video on faction combat. As for LRMS yes I know how it feels when being bombed and I know how it feels to do the bombing. I have my Mad Cat set up with two racks of LRM 15s with 1080 missiles per, and two ER large lasers.

The question for the difficulty came after I was being dropped into maps like River City in the dead of night, now that was one crazy match. Also the other teams were not doing noobish things like sitting in one spot, they were constantly on the move, and constantly flanking. I had to adjust to the point of learning move and keep moving. My biggest problem is not the Mad Cat, I know how to use it, and I know not to treat it like a assault. My biggest problem is assault mech pilots unwilling to push forward in their assaults. Sometimes forcing me to do the assaulting forward in a Mad cat, I know not a good idea lol.

[Rogue Jedi]

Lances107, on 12 April 2016 - 01:28 AM, said:

Still do not understand the faction mech thing but I will take a look at the spike video on faction combat. As for LRMS yes I know how it feels when being bombed and I know how it feels to do the bombing. I have my Mad Cat set up with two racks of LRM 15s with 1080 missiles per, and two ER large lasers.

I will try to properly explain.

according to Battletech lore ^{(MechWarrior is based on Battletech)} about 3 00 years ago all of humanity was united under the banner of the Star League, until the entire royal family was killed off by Stefan Amaris, who tried to take command of the Star League, in a war which became known as the Amaris civil war General Kerensky lead the Star League Defence Force against Amaris's forces and won but in the aftermath the 5 great houses could not agree on who should take control of the league, leading to centuries of "succession wars" which destroyed much of the Star League's technology, when Kerensky realised what was happening he lead the bulk of the Star League Defence Force away to avoid them adding to the destruction.

Now fast forward to 3050 and the Inner Sphere is still controlled by the great houses who have finally started recovering some of the Star League’s advanced technologies, but as little as 30 years earlier they did not even have the knowledge to build new Mechs outside of the few remaining mostly automated factories which had been producing Mechs at about the same rate as they were lost, if a Mech was too badly damaged to repair it was cannibalized to repair others.

The SLDF became the Clans and because they had almost 300 years to improve on Star League technologies they came back with new Mechs and improved weapons, as well as on average much better warriors.

So that is where we are, to explain why they do not field each others tech base.
The Clans have their own superior equipment so while they could use the “inferior” Inner Sphere technology there techs refuse to touch it.
The Great Houses recognise that Clan stuff is more advanced so if they salvage any Clan Technology it is sent straight to research labs to learn its secrets and create more tech to match the Clans

Note in this game Clan equipment is not really more powerful than IS, with the exception of the Clan XL engine there is a significant downside for every advantage ether side has.


Clan Mechs (cannot be used by the Inner Sphere factions in faction play)

Spoiler

Light
Mist Lynx, Arctic Cheetah, Kit Fox, Adder, Jenner-IIC

Medium
Ice Ferret, Shadow Cat, Hunchback-IIC, Nova, Stormcrow (coming soon Viper

Heavy
Mad Dog, Helbringer, Ebon Jaguar, Summoner, Orion-IIC, Timber Wolf

Assualt
Gargoyle, Warhawk, Executioner, Highlander-IIC, Dire Wolf (coming soon, Kodiak)

Inner Sphere Mechs (cannot be used by the Clan factions in faction play)

Spoiler

Light
Locust, Commando, Urbanmech, Spider, Firestarter, Jenner, Panther, Raven, Wolfhound

Medium
Cicada, Blackjack, Vindicator, Centurion, Crab, Enforcer, Hunchback, Trebuchet, Griffin, Kintaro, Shadow Hawk, Wolverine (coming soon, Phoenix Hawk)

Heavy
Dragon, Quickdraw, Rifleman, Catapult, Jagermech, Thunderbolt, Archer Cataphract, Grasshopper, Warhammer, Black Knight, Marauder, Orion,

Assault
Awesome, Victor, Zeus, Battlemaster, Stalker, Highlander, Mauler, Banshee, Atlas, King Crab

Quote

The question for the difficulty came after I was being dropped into maps like River City in the dead of night, now that was one crazy match. Also the other teams were not doing noobish things like sitting in one spot, they were constantly on the move, and constantly flanking. I had to adjust to the point of learning move and keep moving. My biggest problem is not the Mad Cat, I know how to use it, and I know not to treat it like a assault. My biggest problem is assault mech pilots unwilling to push forward in their assaults. Sometimes forcing me to do the assaulting forward in a Mad cat, I know not a good idea lol.

The problem there is if an assault e.g. Atlas ^{(or worse a King Crab or Dire Wolf)} leads a push it will take massive damage, and probably go down in seconds much the same as your Timber would, ideally you do not want anyone "leading" a push^{(as in out in front, visible to the enemy more than a second before other Mechs)}, you want everyone to push simultaneously to maximise confusion on the enemy and minimize the odds that your heavy hitters will go down with little to no damage, if someone needs to lead a push have it be a Spider or something similar which is hard to hit. fast and agile enough to evade fire, if 4 Mechs focus fire on a Spider with a competent pilot it is likely to last a lot longer than an Atlas in the same conditions.

Edited by Rogue Jedi, 12 April 2016 - 03:01 AM.

[Lances107]

Thank you for the history run down but I already knew allot of that. I should have been more precise my wording, I was looking at faction play. Once I watched the spike brave video, it made sense, but it leads to other questions. I will get to those questions soon.

As for the assault I understand what your saying, and I understand the key is to keep moving in one direction as a group, but it just gets old sometimes seeing assaults sitting in the way back rear of the line. Anyways I will keep that spider advice in mind.

Now I get the faction play in game but then I ran across this http://mwomercs.com/...g-master-tree/. Given the weight restrictions for dropping in on a world would be correct in assuming this course of action. The course of action being get a assault, medium, and light mech so I can do faction combat. After words worry about getting elite and master skills unlocked for my mechs. Good plan or bad plan?

[Rogue Jedi]

Lances107, on 12 April 2016 - 03:17 AM, said:

Now I get the faction play in game but then I ran across this http://mwomercs.com/...g-master-tree/. Given the weight restrictions for dropping in on a world would be correct in assuming this course of action. The course of action being get a assault, medium, and light mech so I can do faction combat. After words worry about getting elite and master skills unlocked for my mechs. Good plan or bad plan?

that sounds like a reasionable plan but you do not have to use each weight class, it is possible to build a deck with four of any Mech between 40 and 65 tons, or you can use any combination to reach the min or max tonage or anywhere in between, e.g. you could do Atlas (100 ton) King Crab (100 ton) Cicada, 40 ton, Locust (20 ton) for the currant 260 ton upper weight limit, or you could do 3 Locusts and an Atlas for the 160 minimum tonage, or literaly any combination of Mechs to meet the limits.

you can use Trial Mechs for faction play if you want, the most important thing is the willingness to work with the rest of your team, a new pilot in trial Mechs will be more useful to the group as a tier 2 pilot with fully upgraded and customized Mechs who insists on ignoring the team and doing his/her own thing.
the number one thing which will help is finding a group ^{(not nessicaraly a unit)} to drop with, the second you know you can trust your teammates to support you the game becomes a lot more fun especialy in faction play.

Edited by Rogue Jedi, 13 April 2016 - 09:58 AM.

[Lances107]

Trust me I am more then willing to work with a faction team, the only time I dont, is when I got some music going in quick play. Someone is actually trying to get the team to move as one on ts, this does not happen much, but if I joined up with a group to do faction play on a regular basis team work would not be my failing. Obviously I wouldn't have music going.

I think I am getting the hang of this but one factor now eats at me. I was in a undamaged Mad Cat and a Atlas sneaked up behind me then used his weapon, I think it was a AC 20, and boom my mech was down. I laughed at how I died, and I have no issues that I died, or with that weapon/player. It kind of took my mojo away with the Mad Cat. I started looking at other clan mechs in the heavy catagory. The Mad Cat has by far the most armor and weapon rating to them all. The Thor and Loki have the lowest. Now I wonder what makes the Thor and Loki better? Why would anyone choose them? Is their something I am not seeing? For instances more damage resistant maybe because of the armor they use? My questions revolve around the idea, that I may be overlooking a important factor.

[Raubwurst]

No, all 'Mechs use the same armor (in aspect of damage resisting. Every point of armor eats one point of damage). Ferro Fibrous armor (upgrade) doesn't change this, but it needs less weight (but 14 slots).

The reason to choose another 'Mech are for example allowing other fittings due to other hardpoints. E.g. the Mad Dog (Vulture IIRC) can take far more missle launcher than your Mad Cat.
Another point is hardpoint locations. Some ,Mechs have the weaponry rather high (in line with the cockpit or above) which allows for firing them over hill tops without exposing you too much.
The shape of the 'Mech is another point. On IS side: compare a Marodeur and an Thunderbolt. On is very large looking at it from the side and one is very slim. These profiles can make a big difference. Another example: If you are frequently pushing: A 'Mech which is a big fat King Crab has a lot of surface on the front and can be hitted easily, whike an Atlas is slimmer and not that easy to hit (in the CT).
Further aspects are: Shield arms(no weapon in the arms, but big arms -> can tank damage with it), engine cap, (especially on IS side) quirks,...

[Koniving]

Weapon combinations, looks, the list goes on.

The Thor has an extremely limited weapon selection due to its hard point availability. What it has going for it is the highest jump ability of the Clan Mechs as well as both a design and quriks encouraging a few big weapons instead of a dozen small weapons. The Loki, better known as the hellbringer, is much more of a weapons platform able to bring more hardpoints than a timber wolf but weight and so many hardpoints doesn't favor big weapons.

Between the two the summoner/Thor has the best window view.

[Rogue Jedi]

Lances107, on 13 April 2016 - 01:58 AM, said:

I think I am getting the hang of this but one factor now eats at me. I was in a undamaged Mad Cat and a Atlas sneaked up behind me then used his weapon, I think it was a AC 20, and boom my mech was down. I laughed at how I died, and I have no issues that I died, or with that weapon/player. It kind of took my mojo away with the Mad Cat. I started looking at other clan mechs in the heavy catagory. The Mad Cat has by far the most armor and weapon rating to them all. The Thor and Loki have the lowest. Now I wonder what makes the Thor and Loki better? Why would anyone choose them? Is their something I am not seeing? For instances more damage resistant maybe because of the armor they use? My questions revolve around the idea, that I may be overlooking a important factor.

if it was an Atlas sneek up behind you and core your rear armor killing you unless it triggered an ammo explosion it would ahve had to do at minimum 46 points of damage, assuming it was an Atlas it was most likely the AS7-D-DC or the AS7-S, most likely firing 12-24 SRMs along with an AC20 and 2-4 medium lasers, total alpha strike probably of somewhere between 54 and 88 although it can get higher, if you had 10 rear armor it is possible you would have survived, but you cannot guarentee survival without packing 50+ rear armor which is not realy practicle.

no heavy Mech can have more armor than the Timber Wolf without quirks (although the Orion IIC matches it), as max armor is determined by weight, the most lightly armored Clan Heavy Mech is the 60 ton Mad Dog with 402 armor to the Timber Wolf's 462.

nothing makes the Summoner (Thor) better than the Timber Wolf, ok it can be slightly more mobile and, if you are good at twisting damage, maybe more durable but it is so inferior in podspace and hardpoints that I cannot recomend it.

As for the Hellbringer (Loki) its major advantage over the Timby is ECM, other than that the other 65 ton Omnimech, the Ebon Jaguar completely outclasses the Hellbringer due to higher mounted hardpoints and more podspace than even the Timber, however I am not saying the Helbringer is bad as even without ECM the Helbringer can still be useful with a plentyful supply of hardpoints.

but there is definately more to the story than tonage and podspace

[Lances107]

Good information, now I just need to decide. I think its time I use that website to run things down and get a feel for how they will pan out.

So this is what I came up with the Mad Cat prime had better center torso armor but the Thor prime had better overall armor when I was done. While the Mad Cat lacked armor in the legs and arms. The set up I ran was as follows I think effective. I placed a AC/10 on the Thor with one ammo package, I then placed a ER ppc on the Thor, and lastly I placed a LRM 20 with one ammo package on the Thor. The result being a long range, mid range fighter. The AC should help at close range if anyone gets too close.

The Mad Cat prime I loaded it with two LRM 20s each one stack of ammo, two ER large lasers, and three small pulse lasers with AC 2 with one stack of ammo. The thing thats bothering me about my set up with the Mad Cat prime is the pulse lasers. In Mw4 I would combine pulse with acs for a hammer down rip the other guy to shreds if he got too close. I noticed in Mechwarrior online, pulse fires fast but not that fast. Maybe I am wrong.

Anyways I am betting you guys have spent allot more time with this tech in the field, then I have at least on Mechwarrior online, so if you could please give m your thoughts that would be great.

Oh tried to save the URL and address to show you from that one website but it did not work.

Edited by Lances107, 13 April 2016 - 11:09 AM.

[Raubwurst]

Lances107, on 13 April 2016 - 10:35 AM, said:

Oh tried to save the URL and address to show you from that one website but it did not work.

Do you mean Smurfy?
Have a look at the top of the page, looking like this:

Click on "Save&Share" and post the "plain Link" in here

For the Mad Cat: You have spend a lot of your tonnage on long range weaponry (ER Large and LRMs), thus you don't have much left for your mid to close rang. You won't get enough fire power there to "hammer down" every one coming near.
Generally it is a good idea to concentrate on one, close range or long range (with little support for enemies getting close).
And btw. one ton of ammo for and LRM 20 is definitly to few LRMs for the high weight of a launcher.

[Rogue Jedi]

Lances107, on 13 April 2016 - 10:35 AM, said:

So this is what I came up with the Mad Cat prime had better center torso armor but the Thor prime had better overall armor when I was done. While the Mad Cat lacked armor in the legs and arms. The set up I ran was as follows I think effective. I placed a AC/10 on the Thor with one ammo package, I then placed a ER ppc on the Thor, and lastly I placed a LRM 20 with one ammo package on the Thor. The result being a long range, mid range fighter. The AC should help at close range if anyone gets too close.

The Mad Cat prime I loaded it with two LRM 20s each one stack of ammo, two ER large lasers, and three small pulse lasers with AC 2 with one stack of ammo. The thing thats bothering me about my set up with the Mad Cat prime is the pulse lasers. In Mw4 I would combine pulse with acs for a hammer down rip the other guy to shreds if he got too close. I noticed in Mechwarrior online, pulse fires fast but not that fast. Maybe I am wrong.

Anyways I am betting you guys have spent allot more time with this tech in the field, then I have at least on Mechwarrior online, so if you could please give m your thoughts that would be great.

Oh tried to save the URL and address to show you from that one website but it did not work.

your ammo setup sounds way too low, for an AC10 or LRM20 1 ton sounds way too low, one ton of ammo is just 9 shots for an LRM20, I would recomend more like 4 tons for an LRM20, as for the AC10 1 ton is 60 shells but it fires 3 with each shot so that is 20 shots, again that would be too low for me, I would take 2 minimum, preferably 3.
But of course that is your decision.

the Timber Wolf can always have 4 more points of armor than the Summoner on every componant except the head, if the Summoner has more armor than the Timber Wolf then something is wrong, however with quirks the Summoner gets up-to 15, points of structure on some componants, meaning the Summoner does have more total hitpoints and is more durable than the Timber Wolf.
if your Mech still has armor your weapons and ammo are safe, where as if you are down to structure you can suffer critical hits knocking out weapons and other equipment, if you suffer a crit on a slot containing ammo any ammo remaining in that slot will explode, dealing the total damage to that componant, 40% of the damage is then transferred to the next componant, and if it is enough to destroy that componant and your Mech is still alive as well 40% of that damage is transferred to the CT

Edited by Rogue Jedi, 14 April 2016 - 05:11 AM.

[Lances107]

I did not buy any new mechs because I wanted to sleep on it, this morning I will use that website again, and make sure this is what I want to do. Oh its been a long time since I used a website with that setup, for this reason I may have done something wrong. Here is the URLs and website address information I copied down. More then certain I copied the wrong link.

Thor prime
[smurfy]http://mwo.smurfy-ne...c299fb26349b423[/smurfy]
SMN-PRIME
Mad cat prime
[smurfy]http://mwo.smurfy-ne...ee8f331da7f1820[/smurfy]
TBR-PRIME


I wish to ask a question, but I feel as though it could erk some people. Please do not be offended, as I am planning on staying in mechwarrior online for a long time to come. I was surprised by the lack of posts, and groups recruiting in the Jade falcon forums. Is this all a result of the current faction play set up, and the fact that they are changing it soon?

[Rogue Jedi]

Lances107, on 14 April 2016 - 03:16 AM, said:

I did not buy any new mechs because I wanted to sleep on it, this morning I will use that website again, and make sure this is what I want to do. Oh its been a long time since I used a website with that setup, for this reason I may have done something wrong. Here is the URLs and website address information I copied down. More then certain I copied the wrong link.

Thor prime
[smurfy]http://mwo.smurfy-ne...c299fb26349b423[/smurfy]
SMN-PRIME
Mad cat prime
[smurfy]http://mwo.smurfy-ne...ee8f331da7f1820[/smurfy]
TBR-PRIME

sorry to keep picking your builds apart, I am just trying offer useful advice, but in both cases you seem to be trying to fit on too many big weapons and sacrificing survivability and longevity to have a big punch for a one minute in combat, rather than something which can keep fighting effectively into the middle or end of the match, if that is what you want then fair enough although you will usualy do a lot better if you can fire fewer or lighter weapons for several minutes rather than a reasionable punch for just one.

my main issue with the Summoner prime build is lack of ammo, you have enough to fire the AC10 for 78 seconds, the LRM20 ammo will last about of a minute of continuous fire., other than that, you have 0.5 tons of free space which could be devoted to more ammo or armor and you may want to downgrade the LRM to a 10 or 15, or possibly even totaly removing it, to give extra tonnage for ammo or armour, also you are a bit low on armor especially on the back, arms and legs.

Never leave any component completely unarmoured, if there is no armor some crazy light ^{pilot (like me)} will sneak up behind you and rip your back out because he/she can see your back is unarmoured, but with just 1 point your back shows as being armoured, the visual indications give you an idea of what proportion of the original armour is left but if you have 100% of 1 point of rear armour it shows as undamaged armor.
As you get better you will find a lot of people start specificly targeting legs, but if your legs rairly take damage then that low leg armor is fine.
concidering most of your firepower is in the arms I would want as much armor on them as possible.


the Timby again does not, in my opinion, have enough ammo for the LRMs, although you do have enough for the AC2.

The Clan UACs are outright superior to Clan standard ACs, they take up less slots, cost about half as much, and have the opportunity for increased rate of fire, however they can jam if you double tap, if you just keep fire held down you cannot jam, the only possible advantage to a regular Clan AC is if you want to tap the trigger like crazy but never jam
.
again you have no back armour, and little leg armor

consider downgrading the LRMs for more ammo, also if you fire 2 LRM20 together the missiles will spread out a lot and some will miss, even if you target is the perfect LRM landing pad like a King Crab, chain fired that will not be so much of a problem, however LRM 10 and 15 tend to be much more effective than LRM20.

Quote

I wish to ask a question, but I feel as though it could erk some people. Please do not be offended, as I am planning on staying in mechwarrior online for a long time to come. I was surprised by the lack of posts, and groups recruiting in the Jade falcon forums. Is this all a result of the current faction play set up, and the fact that they are changing it soon?

This is new player help, the opinion of most of the people who frequent this forum is that the only stupid question is the one not asked.
it is extremely unusual for someone to be offended by a question asked by someone in this part of the MWO forums.

As for Jade Falcon Loyalist recruitment I do not know, it is very possible they are putting a hold on recruitment to see what happens on Tuesday with CW Phase 3 before deciding if they stay loyal or go Mercenary.

Edited by Rogue Jedi, 14 April 2016 - 05:55 AM.

[Koniving]

In general everyone has been advised against permanent (loyalist) contracts altogether given the States of phase 1 and 2 as no matter what you are basically mercs. No point in it.

Phase 3 is supposed to offer relatively different experiences either way so there would be a purpose behind it rather than being mercs stuck with a pledge of loyalty and a bill when you want to change up.

Edited by Koniving, 14 April 2016 - 09:52 AM.

[Lances107]

Please do pick apart my set ups. I did not see until just a few minutes ago. For some reason I was thinking maxing the center torso value covered the rear too. It does not, which is why I keep getting destroyed every time I retreat. The bad end is I mucked around with the Thor, but have no way of knowing its default armor numbers? Is their anywhere you can get that information? As for these changes do you happen to have a link with the information, so that I might read up on them?

Thanks.

[Dan Baxter]

Smurfy is a good resource, as you can select practically any 'mech in game and then select the "tools" tab, which will allow you to select "stock armor", among other options.

[Lances107]

Believe me I have been using smurfy. I did a test run on a gladiator assault mech and came up with this.
EXE-C(L)
[smurfy]http://mwo.smurfy-ne...f7379de29621eaf[/smurfy]

This I do not understand.

SHOULDER
UPPER ARM ACTUATOR
FIXED ARMOR SLOT
LOWER ARM ACTUATOR
HAND ACTUATOR

This really is a learning curve for me. In MW4 I could set just about any mech to anything I wanted provided it had the space. Mechwarrior online seems to have less space for more weapon systems. Its a learning curve but if it was simple, I would not be enjoying the game as much as I am now.

I also hear the joystick is a bad idea for mechwarrior online, I have been using it anyways, but something that has been happening. At least seems to, The weapon groupings jumping, even though I am not pressing a button to have the selction jumping. It could just be just me. I really get to get better at torso driving, understanding mwo setup for mechs, and shooting more accurately. Oh well time to take a nap and think on this, it just does not seem to add up, the damage needed, and the tonage available.

[Lances107]

I am confused on the gauss rifle. When I used it on a trial mech it had a charge up. Today spectating after my death, after follwing another mech in, a player was able to fire the gauss without a charge up. Something else I notice his weapons kept auto higlighting with yellow squares. The yellow square oddness, I have seen it once before, while spectating. Could anyone give me the run down on the gauss?

I though maybe it was a pilot skill, but their was nothing their on this. The only article on the forums I could dig up was from 2013. Please anyone, could explain how what this person did was possible without chargeup.

[Roughneck45]

Lances107, on 15 April 2016 - 10:00 AM, said:

Please anyone, could explain how what this person did was possible without chargeup.

It's not.

Perhaps the sound wasn't coming through when you were spectating?

For the yellow squares, most players assign the gauss rifle to every unused weapon group so that you get the visual cue of the yellow squares as well as the charge up audio.