31 replies to this topic

[Rugbypig]

2016 introduced the following mechs
Inner Sphere:
Warhammer - 70 tons - January
Rifleman - 60 tons - February
Archer - 70 tons - March
No mech in April
Phoenix Hawk - 45 tons - June
Cyclops - 90 tons - August

5 mechs - 1 Medium, 3 Heavies & 1 Assault = 335 tons

Clan:
No mech in April
Kodiak - 100 tons - May
Viper - 40 tons - July
Night Gyr - 75 tons - September
Huntsman - 50 tons - October
Linebacker - 65 tons - November
Marauder IIC - 85 tons - December

6 mechs - 2 Mediums, 2 Heavies & 2 Assaults = 415 tons

Result:
Phoenix Hawk (Meh) vs Viper (Ok) or Huntsman (Decent) = Clan victory

Warhammer (Decent), Rifleman (Ok), Archer (Ok) vs Night Gyr (plain Nasty) or Linebacker (Ok) = Clan Victory

Cyclops (Decentish) vs Kodiak (Hella Nasty) or Marauder IIC (Nasty) = Clan victory


IS losing the new mech war - badly

[RestosIII]

Rugbypig, on 27 December 2016 - 09:41 PM, said:

Warhammer (Decent)

Cyclops (Decentish)

Excuse me? The Warhammer is downright scary. And the Cyclops is great. Don't know what you're talking about with them.

[Hit the Deck]

Clan has indeed been getting better 'Mechs overall since Wave III.

But that also has to do with the better IS 'Mechs having already been released (IS has more 'Mechs).

I have said several times that IS needs new tech to spice things up because there aren't many interesting 'Mechs left for them in this timeline.

[Miodog]

Even counting the Warhammer and Cyclops as better mechs I think RugbyPig's point is still valid. Clan mechs overall this year are better than IS mechs.

[Davegt27]

the Warhammer is damn good I have 538 kills in my 6R (which is good for a potato)

(in FP my 6R does nothing so I cant figure that one out)

I don't know about the others
the IS really needs one great assault

[CK16]

Give IS mechs new tech, give the good IS mechs with new tech....profit!

AKA get to the good post invasion designs already! I mean they did just copy clans by then on alot of stuff

[El Bandito]

#balancebasetechfirst.



Otherwise no amount of IS mechs will put them on the same level as Clans.

CK16, on 27 December 2016 - 09:58 PM, said:

Give IS mechs new tech, give the good IS mechs with new tech....profit!

AKA get to the good post invasion designs already! I mean they did just copy clans by then on alot of stuff

See above. Even those "good" post invasion designs will be hampered by inferior tech. Not to mention that PGI is currently unwilling to introduce new tech. Take the example of Meta Timbie or NGyr. No IS mechs can put on the equivalent of their dual CERPPC + CGauss and perform as well as they do, cause of 15 ton IS Gauss and IS XL, even if there will be a super high mounted IS Heavy mech in the future.

Edited by El Bandito, 27 December 2016 - 10:10 PM.

[Snowbluff]

RestosIII, on 27 December 2016 - 09:47 PM, said:

Excuse me? The Warhammer is downright scary. And the Cyclops is great. Don't know what you're talking about with them.

Vouching for the Whammy here. Cyclops I'm not so good with, though.

[El Bandito]

Hit the Deck, on 27 December 2016 - 09:52 PM, said:

I have said several times that IS needs new tech to spice things up because there aren't many interesting 'Mechs left for them in this timeline.

As an Assault Buff, I am still waiting for the Devastator, and Longbow. They are timeline friendly. Not to mention there are the War Dog, and Flashman for Heavy class. (love the egghead!)

Of course, base tech needs to be balanced.

Edited by El Bandito, 27 December 2016 - 11:36 PM.

[Hit the Deck]

El Bandito, on 27 December 2016 - 11:36 PM, said:

As an Assault Buff, I am still waiting for the Devastator...

I guess it would be a nice King Crab alternative when people want to drive a "humanoid King Crab".

[El Bandito]

Hit the Deck, on 28 December 2016 - 12:01 AM, said:

I guess it would be a nice King Crab alternative when people want to drive a "humanoid King Crab".

Yep. At least it can sorta compete against MAD-IICs, using dual Gauss and Dual PPCs.

Edited by El Bandito, 28 December 2016 - 12:23 AM.

[Snazzy Dragon]

Rugbypig, on 27 December 2016 - 09:41 PM, said:

Result:
Phoenix Hawk (Meh) vs Viper (Ok) or Huntsman (Decent) = Clan victory

Warhammer (Decent), Rifleman (Ok), Archer (Ok) vs Night Gyr (plain Nasty) or Linebacker (Ok) = Clan Victory

Cyclops (Decentish) vs Kodiak (Hella Nasty) or Marauder IIC (Nasty) = Clan victory


IS losing the new mech war - badly

Phoenix Hawk is indisputably bad.

Viper is alright, but the hit and run niche it fills is really only useful in quick play.

Huntsman is one of those mechs that would have been perfect 5 tons heavier and not carrying ferro armor. As is it's starved for slots and tonnage, but it is a pretty adequate robot despite it.

Warhammer is one of the best mechs the IS has in its lineup; to insist otherwise is to make people laugh at you.

Rifleman is basically a jagermech with better geometry but less tonnage. Can't have everything, I guess.

Archer is a geometric disaster but it is ok build wise. I like the 8 SRM4+A build with a std 260.

Night Gyr is basically the dragonslayer, but with higher alpha and the ability to ignore map heat-- it is a very nasty poptart on tourmaline.

Linebacker is really good if you have the reinforcement and hero omni pods but otherwise it is barely passable; that's why they died out in popularity so quickly, I'd guess.

Cyclops is solid all around but that **** antenna on its head counts as CT, so it is easy to hose at long range even when it's hiding.

Most of the kodiak variants really are lackluster but the spirit bear and kodiak 3 are indisputably the kings of brawling and poking for assaults from either side, but I guess it wasn't obvious a 100ton clan battlemech would unbalance the game.. especially with such hardpoints

The marauder IIC is only viewed as OP because it is one of the best fire support mechs, which is the role most players fulfill naturally. There also aren't enough missile hardpoints on most of them for players to s*** fit them with LURMs. It melts on the frontline though and it hass a big butt that lights are easily able to eat.

Edited by Snazzy Dragon, 28 December 2016 - 12:39 AM.

[Anjian]

How time flies. Was it just a year ago when the Marauder was introduced in the game and we are headed to the theaters to watch the first Star Wars movie in years.

[Bradigus]

Snazzy Dragon, on 28 December 2016 - 12:38 AM, said:

Phoenix Hawk is indisputably bad.

Cyclops is solid all around but that **** antenna on its head counts as CT, so it is easy to hose at long range even when it's hiding.

Phoenix hawk arm armour quirks have at least elevated the 2 and 1K energy variants to viable status. The Kuroi Kiri hero is also really capable with either 3x Large lasers or 2x LPL & 2x ML.

The Cyclops antennae does not count as CT, or anything else. None of it counts as anything. Try it out in Academy for yourself. The cupola covering the cockpit does count as CT though, which is more or less a good thing as people will be more inclined to try and go for the CT instead of your side torsos, making certain builds more XL friendly.

[LordNothing]

i kind of think that the next few is mechs need to be really killer. seems like while is has been getting decent mechs, that the clan's equivalent mechs are at least a rung above.

[Hit the Deck]

LordNothing, on 28 December 2016 - 03:42 AM, said:

i kind of think that the next few is mechs need to be really killer. seems like while is has been getting decent mechs, that the clan's equivalent mechs are at least a rung above.

Tell me a hypothetical good but not-yet-existing IS 'Mech, what kind of a 'Mech would it be?

IS has practically exhausted the good 'Mechs it has, save for a few (like the Devastator Bandito mentioned above, but it performs similarly to the already existing King Crab).

[LordNothing]

Hit the Deck, on 28 December 2016 - 04:12 AM, said:

Tell me a hypothetical good but not-yet-existing IS 'Mech, what kind of a 'Mech would it be?

IS has practically exhausted the good 'Mechs it has, save for a few (like the Devastator Bandito mentioned above, but it performs similarly to the already existing King Crab).

its either going to need to be running new tech or bring in new levels of hardpoint inflation. 9 laser/missile hardpoints are becoming the new standard for the is, set by the archer, top dog and others. but those really arent that useful thanks to diminishing returns. you cant use them all and run a sane number of heat sinks (i had trouble making my hunch 4p do as well in fp as it used to). clan side you see mechs with 11+ laser points. perhaps the is gh thresholds on things like medium and small lasers need to exist. then on top of that have good hardpoint positions. seems many of the recent clan additions since and including the kodiak have had top notch positions. the ones on the cyclops were ok but not as good as the clan.

new tech is not totally against what pgi has done before, the cyclops had the tacticon sensor gimmick, or even masc falls into this category. it shows pgi is willing to selectively give new tech to new mechs, even though it tends to be rather restrictive, applying to a few variants but doled out in fairly small portions. bushie signifies an era where clan tech is being reverse engineered into is systems, so if the bushie had some support for new prototype weapons, that would be really nice. but i dont see that happening.

i also dont see is omnimechs going very far either. customizing hardpoints while being subjected to the same tonnage and slot requirements for is gear. and those are still a few years away too (unless you want an owens). unless of course is uses different rules for is omnis, like maybe have only one or two omnipods in a couple sections with a lot of fixed hardpoints elsewhere. sort of like how mw4 had omnipoints mixed in with specific type hardpoints. they might also come with additional slots, and armor/structure upgrade slot requirements are reduced.

i dont know exactly what mechs fit the bill.

Edited by LordNothing, 28 December 2016 - 05:14 AM.

[Bradigus]

Hit the Deck, on 28 December 2016 - 04:12 AM, said:

Tell me a hypothetical good but not-yet-existing IS 'Mech, what kind of a 'Mech would it be?

IS has practically exhausted the good 'Mechs it has, save for a few (like the Devastator Bandito mentioned above, but it performs similarly to the already existing King Crab).

There's the Bandersnatch, a 75-ton heavy battlemech which standard variant comes with an XL300, 3xLRM5's spread between the center and side torsos, 6x medium lasers (4 in the arms, 2 in the side torsos "rear mounted") and 2x LBX10's. It's second variant BND-01Ar removes the medium lasers in the side torsos and replaces it with ECM in the center torso, as well as a small laser (energy hardpoint could be placed in the head in this case). The third variant, BNDR-01B comes with future tech not yet in the game, but could be opted to have AC10's and 4x medium lasers in the arms, a PPC in each of the side torsos and a Streak SRM2 in the center torso. The notable custom variant BNDR-01A Bandersnatch Horus could pass as a hero, as it comes with AC20's in the arms, 1x medium lasers per side torso and an extended range large laser in the center torso.

Here's what it could possibly look like in MWO; (pardon the rough state of the concept)

Like a mix between the Warhammer and Night Gyr, with Huntsman style digitigrade legs.

Most importantly, it would offer inner sphere a 75 ton heavy with arm mounted ballistics. The basic variant with its 2xB 6xE 3xM offers a wide variety of builds right out the gate.

Edited by Bradigus, 28 December 2016 - 07:45 AM.

[Gas Guzzler]

Hit the Deck, on 28 December 2016 - 04:12 AM, said:

Tell me a hypothetical good but not-yet-existing IS 'Mech, what kind of a 'Mech would it be?

IS has practically exhausted the good 'Mechs it has, save for a few (like the Devastator Bandito mentioned above, but it performs similarly to the already existing King Crab).

Thunder Hawk, Cerberus, Nightstar...

The Thunder Hawk could do 5 or 6 AC5s and an XL engine. Its actually the 100 tonner that the IS deserves, but not the one it needs right now.

The King Crab sucks because its ballistics are SO low and SO wide... Its my least favorite Assault to play.

[Appogee]

Now compare the disparity in high-mounted hardpoints between IS and Clans...