32 replies to this topic

[1453 R]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 06 February 2017 - 11:05 AM, said:

No, Mektek didn't start the 360 torso twist as I believe both the Mad Dog and Summoner had it before Mektek even started modding.

Can confirm Summoner did. Used the hell out of that thing back in the day, specifically recall being glad of its 360-degree twist.

[Bishop Steiner]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 06 February 2017 - 11:05 AM, said:

No, Mektek didn't start the 360 torso twist as I believe both the Mad Dog and Summoner had it before Mektek even started modding.

I don't recall it on either on my discs, to be honest. I do remember the Raven had it though.

[FupDup]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 06 February 2017 - 08:56 AM, said:

Did MW4 really say it was an Omnimech, or did it have an Omni hardpoint that made every get confused and think it was an Omnimech?

I'm pretty sure that the MW4 Thany didn't have any Omni hardpoints. Not in Vengeance, BK, or MekTek's MP3. IDK about vanilla Mercs but I doubt that would be any different.


EDIT: I has evidence!

Vengeance:


Black Knight:


Mercs: MekTek MP3:


Note that the purple hardpoint in the right torso is "direct fire" (aka ballistic or energy allowed).


The Omnimech thing really just seems like it was made up to spice up the fluff for the mech. We can pretend that the Omni prototypes happened before MW4.

Edited by FupDup, 06 February 2017 - 07:14 PM.

[Wing 0]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 06 February 2017 - 11:05 AM, said:

No, Mektek didn't start the 360 torso twist as I believe both the Mad Dog and Summoner had it before Mektek even started modding.

The Maddog and Summoner did have 360 twists in those games before mektek even started mekpak mods. Been there and done it. Mektek did made several mechs to use 360 twists as well.

[CK16]

Damn forgot the Thanatos had enough slots for a HGR o.O that was always scary on a heavy! Think the Dragon did as well..

[Scout Derek]

CK16, on 06 February 2017 - 08:39 PM, said:

Damn forgot the Thanatos had enough slots for a HGR o.O that was always scary on a heavy! Think the Dragon did as well..

Victor too. that stock build was annoying to deal with on the story mode. a pair of them backed up by other Mechs made it hard for my lancemate ai to focus fire.

[RaptorRage]

To clarify where MW4 is concerned any of the Mechs that first appeared in it before they were made official in the Tech Readouts by definition can't be "lying" about their status as a BattleMech or OmniMech, because they appeared in the game first. Any decision after the fact to change how MW4 depicted them is basically a retcon, which is not to say such decisions are good or bad but just how things happened. But to elaborate for MW4 the definition of an OmniMech was simply any Mech that had at least one gray omni hardpoint present, and that was carried over by MekTek when they updated the hardpoints or added new Mechs.

Where things get interesting from a definition standpoint of how an OmniMech is determined in MW4 as well as a technical standpoint, the main reason MekTek started adding the new types of hardpoints was originally from a desire to not have missiles firing from obviously gun barrel type locations and when it came time to update the Vulture to have the Vulture C Gauss Rifle capability they didn't want to just update the arms into omni hardpoints where missiles could be used, so they came up with the Direct Fire slot which was blue and allowed only energy and ballistics. This was done by creating an omni slot and then restricting the missile type from being used. The Vulture C itself bacame a separate model in the game anyway and the hardpoints on the Vulture were reverted. Later on the other two slots types for Heat Generating (Energy and Missile) and Ammo Consuming (Ballistic and Missile) weapons were made to add more BattleTech variants to the various Mech layouts without making them full OmniMechs or adding several more slots. So when an OmniMech was made it kept some gray slots to carry any weapon type, but where a Mech needed to have more flexibility for variants but remain a standard BattleMech, the restricted hardpoints were used instead.

The final slot type added was the split slot. This was used to divide slots of the same weapon type in one location to prevent larger weapons from being carried. So for instance instead of giving the Annihilator the ability to carry two Heavy Gauss Rifles like the Fafnir, the ballistic slots were split to prevent that larger weapon from being carried while maintaining the Annihilator's loadouts. The split slots were actually restricted slots like the previous D-slots, H-slots and A-slots, but in this case were double restricted omni hardpoints. So in this case a split ballistic slot was an omni slot with both energy and missile types restricted.

[TELEFORCE]

Hello RaptorRage, I don't think I've seen you since MekTek was still maintaining MW4

Quote

To clarify where MW4 is concerned any of the Mechs that first appeared in it before they were made official in the Tech Readouts by definition can't be "lying" about their status as a BattleMech or OmniMech, because they appeared in the game first. Any decision after the fact to change how MW4 depicted them is basically a retcon, which is not to say such decisions are good or bad but just how things happened. But to elaborate for MW4 the definition of an OmniMech was simply any Mech that had at least one gray omni hardpoint present, and that was carried over by MekTek when they updated the hardpoints or added new Mechs.

While 'mechs like the Argus, Thanatos, and Mad Cat Mk. II appeared in MW4 before a BattleTech TRO, what the TROs did afterwards wasn't really a retcon because the MechWarrior games weren't canonical to being with It's still cool that the new designs made it into official BattleTech publications, though.

[Adgar76]

Hit the Deck, on 06 February 2017 - 08:02 AM, said:

The variants on Sarna seem to indicate that it's a BattleMech. MUL also says the same.

BTW, I've read that there are TT rules concerning changing the status of an OmniMech to a BattleMech, for example when you modify an Omni's engine then it becomes a BattleMech.

Weird, though all of that could be wrong since I myself am not well versed on the (TT) rules.

No, you are actually right:
http://bg.battletech...4.html#msg44734

[Bishop Steiner]

Adgar76, on 07 February 2017 - 03:33 AM, said:

No, you are actually right:
http://bg.battletech...4.html#msg44734

Yeah......though I find it hilariously stupid a rule. So.. changing the engine impacts how I can swap weapons in the arms? I mean I can get a potential impact on torso space, at least if one uses a larger engine, or swaps to a bulkier XL. That makes some sense, that it would impact your torso bay geometry and maybe make them non compatible... though so many omnis after the original TRO 3050 have such silly, contoured, rounded and stylized geometry that swappable pods would actually be all but impossible.....

But then, I also was willing to break some rules with Omnis and had techs install lower arm actuators in a captured Thor Prime. I suppose that also would technically have made it no longer Omni capable (and could see where it might have issues), but then, since the only weapon that got swapped was the missiles, (traded the LRMs for a SSRM6 rack with 1 ton of ammo, and then added a second magazine for the LB-X, and an ER Small Laser to the RT right next to the head), probably would not have been that big of a deal.

[TELEFORCE]

Bishop Steiner, on 07 February 2017 - 06:49 AM, said:

Yeah......though I find it hilariously stupid a rule. So.. changing the engine impacts how I can swap weapons in the arms? I mean I can get a potential impact on torso space, at least if one uses a larger engine, or swaps to a bulkier XL. That makes some sense, that it would impact your torso bay geometry and maybe make them non compatible... though so many omnis after the original TRO 3050 have such silly, contoured, rounded and stylized geometry that swappable pods would actually be all but impossible.....

But then, I also was willing to break some rules with Omnis and had techs install lower arm actuators in a captured Thor Prime. I suppose that also would technically have made it no longer Omni capable (and could see where it might have issues), but then, since the only weapon that got swapped was the missiles, (traded the LRMs for a SSRM6 rack with 1 ton of ammo, and then added a second magazine for the LB-X, and an ER Small Laser to the RT right next to the head), probably would not have been that big of a deal.

I think it's a stupid rule myself. It's pretty inconsistent with other 'mech construction rules. The one lore excuse I can think of is because of the way the gyro is set up to work with the chassis. But why can't it be recalibrated?

Also, arm actuators besides the shoulder and upper arm actuator are podded on omnimechs, so you didn't bend any rules there. You could give any omnimech a full set of arm actuators if you wanted to.

Edited by TELEFORCE, 07 February 2017 - 04:54 PM.

[Bishop Steiner]

TELEFORCE, on 07 February 2017 - 04:54 PM, said:

I think it's a stupid rule myself. It's pretty inconsistent with other 'mech construction rules. The one lore excuse I can think of is because of the way the gyro is set up to work with the chassis. But why can't it be recalibrated?

Also, arm actuators besides the shoulder and upper arm actuator are podded on omnimechs, so you didn't bend any rules there. You could give any omnimech a full set of arm actuators if you wanted to.

Unless you mount a PPC or Autocannon/Gauss, then it is illegal for an omnimech to mount lower arm actuators for some stupid reason.

There were a number of things we tossed out in my campaign. You didn't switch internal structure (while technically possible, it would be so time consuming and expensive as to be literally pointless.), and while not always enforceable on stock builds, when designing Omnis, I required ammo for a weapon to be in the same location or at most the adjacent. Stringing feed systems between swappable pods makes absolutely no sense, either.

There was a lot of stuff that was borderline nonsense (like a tech crew only being able to attempt a repair once, then they had to replace the part... or have a more experienced tech crew do it. I used that during high stress situations like combat repairs, etc... but if you have no time constraints, and such? I would allow one chance at repair... but unlimited replacement attempts... though any failures destroyed the spare part, and you had to get new parts to try again)

[TELEFORCE]

That's the beauty of Battletech tabletop campaigns. You can adjust the rules to fit your game. Kind of like how PGI adjusted the tabletop rules to fit their game