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Armor Distribution


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#1 Amatsukaze

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Posted 17 February 2017 - 07:40 AM

I have been looking at a number of builds at Smurphys & it seems the meta is to go with paper thin armor on your back. While that might be good if dropping with a solid lance or star in PUG matches I think you are just begging for a Locust or ACH to climb up your keister with a couple of Alphas.

Is there a good rule of thumb for a more balanced armor distribution? Currently I am going with 75/25 (front/rear) in med & 60/40 in lights since I will take more hits in the rear as I try to make good my escape. My one assault I have at 90/10.

#2 TercieI

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Posted 17 February 2017 - 07:45 AM

I run 1-4 back armor. Most top players do this. It's a virtuous cycle. You use front armor when you're playing well, rear armor when you've made mistakes.

Try shifting a point to the side you died from every time you die. If you're playing well, it should almost all end up on the front.

Edited by TercieI, 17 February 2017 - 07:45 AM.


#3 Roughneck45

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Posted 17 February 2017 - 07:46 AM

Not really, it all depends on how you play. If you are using the back armor, go for it.

I usually increase the back armor for my fast brawlers but I never go above 18, and If I do that I make sure that I'm shielding with my rear when the time comes.

Edited by Roughneck45, 17 February 2017 - 07:47 AM.


#4 Boulangerie

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Posted 17 February 2017 - 08:42 AM

You should never really have to turn your back to the opponent, even when retreating try to run to the sides and keep your torso twisting so that they can only really hit your Rear on the "pelvis" area.

If you do get singled out a lot by lights, try to stay with your team more. Most of the time, you'll have a second to put your back up to a wall or rock and stay alive that way until your teammates can give you support.

I used to run 9-10 armor, and have since shaved it down to about 4-6. With light mechs, you control the engagement, so you actually need even less than on Mediums and Heavies, especially since your Rear torso hitboxes are usually pretty small. In an assault, it's tempting to take more, because you have more to spread around, but remember you will be taking the majority of fire from the front. If you are caught alone in an Assault, requiring one more alpha from the ACH probably won't save you anyway, whereas putting your back to a wall and calling for help can add 20 or more seconds onto your life.

#5 Champion of Khorne Lord of Blood

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Posted 17 February 2017 - 11:06 AM

I usually have 4-5 rear armor on assaults, 2-4 on heavies, 2-3 on mediums, and 2 on lights. These aren't percents, just the actual armor values.

There's really no point to loading up rear armor if you are looking to survive since logic dictates that you will be aimed towards the enemies most of the time since you have to look at them to shoot them, thus you'd get shot it the front much more often.

Besides that I've gotten good enough that lone lights never take out my rear armor. Most it ever does is help with someone grazing a laser over your back if you didn't see where they came from, even then you can twist the damage around, shield arm, and just rely on all the internal structure you have to take a few hits for you.

I run mainly solo queue matches with rather terrible teams to back me up, if I'm the only one shooting the enemy I better have my armor up front with me at least.

EDIT: oh also, putting that much rear armor on your light mech just means people can now one shot you from the front or the rear using dual gauss + dual ERPPC alphas. Just pick a side and hope you don't get shot on the other, and as a light you better be using cover because your armor alone isn't enough to deal with anything properly aimed at you.

Edited by Dakota1000, 17 February 2017 - 11:08 AM.


#6 Rintero Pryde

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Posted 17 February 2017 - 11:09 AM

Bout 10 to 12 armor in back works for me, as a rule of thumb. I may go less in Faction Play, because enemy mechs almost NEVER get behind in that game mode. Good situational awareness will keep a light from alpha striking you too quickly from the rear. Very, very rarely does a light grab a cheap kill off of me. Helps that I stick with the group when I play, but that ties into situational awareness as well. With 10-12, even when a light gets back there I have one of their alpha strikes to react.

I even use my back to deflect an enemy alpha when I've been cored in the front. You could spread up to two alphas across it, when done correctly. Gives you room to fire off more hits of your own, and often has been the difference between life and death.

Avoid remaining stationary. If I'm a light trying to find an easy back armor kill, I absolutely go for missile boats, lone wolves, or overly stationary mechs. Enemies like that always find themselves left behind in a big push, and so far isolated that even if they have a warning they go down. Just don't be that guy.

Always max your front armor, when possible. You can sacrifice about 5-10 in the legs if you find yourself in need a little extra. If your arms don't mount anything important inside them, their armor can also be used to pad more important components.

Edited by Rintero Pryde, 17 February 2017 - 11:11 AM.


#7 - World Eater -

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Posted 17 February 2017 - 11:51 AM

I run about 2-4 on all mechs and have been able to survive a lot longer. If I'm getting cored in the back it's usually due to poor mech placement.

#8 Jables McBarty

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Posted 17 February 2017 - 12:08 PM

View PostAmatsukaze, on 17 February 2017 - 07:40 AM, said:

I have been looking at a number of builds at Smurphys & it seems the meta is to go with paper thin armor on your back. While that might be good if dropping with a solid lance or star in PUG matches I think you are just begging for a Locust or ACH to climb up your keister with a couple of Alphas.

Is there a good rule of thumb for a more balanced armor distribution? Currently I am going with 75/25 (front/rear) in med & 60/40 in lights since I will take more hits in the rear as I try to make good my escape. My one assault I have at 90/10.


Definitely shave off on the lights. At most you want 3/5/3 for their RT armor.

Here's why:

Lights all have solid agility, speeds, and most have really good torso-twist arcs. Use that to make sure that when you are running away from an enemy you are still only showing them your front torsos.

For example, the infamous Locust generally has 120 degree turn radius. This means you can be running directly away from an enemy and if you turn your torso all the way around they can't hit your RTs. If you run at a 60 degree angle from your enemy's LOF, you'll be presenting your full frontal profile, with both STs and the CT. Wiggle your torso a bit to spread damage, and if you are at the end of your torso arc, change your direction a bit to "torso twist" your entire 'mech.

Also make sure you are running in a serpentine fashion--never in a straight line.

If you are piloting correctly, you'll be finding your way mostly by the minimap, as you won't be looking where you are going about 90% of the time you are in a light.

And when you are looking where you are going, it should be because you are either shooting, or because you are taking a quick glimpse before engaging in additional evasive maneuvers. It's sort of like walking across the room with your eyes closed, but you get to open them for a second every ten steps or so.

EDIT: The exception to this is the UrbanMech. His torsos (like all torsi) extend down into the waist a little, so if you are aggressively using your 360 twist ability, you might be presenting your front torsos above the waist, but your rear torsos below the waist. As a result I tend to go 70/30 for armor on my Urbies since I am often moving around with my 'mech in reverse.

(Good urbie hunters know this and will target the crotch rather than the torsos)

Edited by Jables McBarty, 17 February 2017 - 12:11 PM.


#9 Koniving

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Posted 17 February 2017 - 01:45 PM

View PostAmatsukaze, on 17 February 2017 - 07:40 AM, said:

I have been looking at a number of builds at Smurphys & it seems the meta is to go with paper thin armor on your back. While that might be good if dropping with a solid lance or star in PUG matches I think you are just begging for a Locust or ACH to climb up your keister with a couple of Alphas.

Is there a good rule of thumb for a more balanced armor distribution? Currently I am going with 75/25 (front/rear) in med & 60/40 in lights since I will take more hits in the rear as I try to make good my escape. My one assault I have at 90/10.

Generally, you won't have enemies sneaking up on you. There's also the shapes of the mechs and how PGI tends to make rear armor...into somewhat flat, bland panels while most of your torso surface area is front. A Jenner is a prime example, of the entire torso area, literally one thick rectangular panel and two oblong rectangles on the back of where a Battletech Jenner's legs would be (but aren't because the Jenner was given a 'tacked on' pelvis for torso twist reasons)... are your rear torsos. Going at any speed greater than 81 kph, it would be almost impossible to consistently hit either of these three torsos long enough with lasers or ACs to do anything.

In fact, often I run 2 rear armor... get hit by about 6 ER ML... and am still yellow on the rears because they can't focus it long enough to matter. I also tend to twist and give my sides or front while running away, too.

This changes when you are using more humanoid 'Mechs, this is because the rear to front torso ratio is less -- but still -- lopsided. Rather than a 90/10 ratio of front to back, humanoid mechs tend to have a more 60 / 40 or 70 / 30 ratio. This makes armoring your rear sections a bit more important. For example, on Atlases (and interestingly Stalkers for a very different reason) I tend to do 30 to 40 rear CT armor if it is intended to fight in close quarters. This allows it to take a beating from all angles and keep trucking.
Showcase: Koniving's Atlas surrounded.

(The Stalker is an exception, though oblong, the fact is the Stalker has a 55/45 ratio front/rear CT surface area. The STs are definitely 85/15 for their ratio which is also why it sucks with XL engines... but it tanks like crazy since a destroyed limb reduces any damage hitting its hitbox by 60% before transferring it inward. The front CT can therefore tank more damage than XL engined Kodiaks if you went for both of the Kodiak's side torsos instead of CT. The Stalker's rear torso however is super vulnerable. This problem is magnified by the fact that Stalkers are terrible at turning and have abysmal torso twist ranges.)

Of interesting note, the Commando is the only 'Mech with a near perfect 53/47 ratio of front to back torso hitboxes, which is among the reasons why many people are less than adoring of them. Even when first introduced, players considered them a challenge to play, a "hard mode" that was very rewarding if you were willing to learn its nuances. [Much the same is true of the Dragon; it is a fantastic 'Mech if you're willing to learn to master the 'o' crosshair and its uses.. but the generations of MWO players whom have come after 2012 have been spoiled with Armlock and might never learn advanced controls and ITC [Individual Tactical Combat].)

Continuing with the Commando since I know you have adopted a few.. Lordred, famous for the Camera Commando and fighting with the HUD off and a finger on the screenshot button, uses a 70<% rear, 30>% front armor allotment. As the complete opposite of me, he spends most of his time giving his back to the enemy like a turtle (partly due to filming allies) and flashes to look at them just to unload missiles and off he goes again. Of course since he is usually filming someone, that someone tends to take the brunt of any frontward firepower on the chance that he tries to film enemy units.

Edited by Koniving, 18 February 2017 - 09:09 PM.


#10 WrathOfDeadguy

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Posted 18 February 2017 - 12:54 AM

The problem is that you can only put alpha-proof protection on one facing.

Since you don't have enough points to put equal (or even significant) amounts on both facings and expect to survive, the only reasonable thing to do is frontload. If you are playing the game properly, you will be facing the enemy most of the time. Furthermore, it is almost always possible to limit rear torso damage even when retreating by using torso twist to tank hits with your arms or, if your twist range is great enough, with your front sections. As you get better, you'll learn to run at oblique angles rather than directly away from an enemy you're fleeing, so that you can not only face them with your front armor but also return fire to discourage pursuit.

A 35-ton light can mount 44 points of CT armor. That is gone facing the alpha strike of a medium 'Mech. Unless you're trolling around with all your armor in back, you're never going to be able to safely tank that hit from behind. If you go 40/4 or 42/2, then you can tank that hit from the front... and survive with enough health left to stay in the fight. If you go with more than ~10% of your armor in the rear, then you cannot reliably face a medium 'Mech because pretty much any decent pinpoint build is going to core you out in one good hit from either direction. Nevermind what it'll do to your RT or LT- if you're in an IS light, a 40-point side hit is an instakill if you don't have your front RT/LT fully armored... but merely crippling if you do.

It gets much, much worse the larger the enemy you're facing is. Once you're fighting larger heavies and assaults in light 'Mechs, a few more points of armor on the front is literally the difference between survival and instant flaming death. A 30 or 35 tonner can only take 50-70 points of damage through the CT before going pop (depending on quirks), and if you're in a 20 or 25 tonner then you're dead from 40 points or so. That's assuming you take the hit with your strongest section, with all but 2-4 points of armor frontloaded. You need that front armor. You're going to die anyway if you take a hit like that from behind, even with OP's 60/40 distribution. 40% of 44 points is still only 17-18 points. That's not even enough to protect you from another light 'Mech. It's Locust-grade armor, and the only way to make that work is to not get hit at all... which defeats the purpose of putting so much armor on the back in the first place.

Frontloading will become more and more necessary as your PSR increases. You can gradually change it as you rise; that's fine... but you need to be working towards a point where you are comfortable frontloading, especially in your light 'Mechs. A 60/40 armor distribution is a death sentence at Tier 3 and higher- you're facing enemies with the effective armor load of a 'Mech 10 tons lighter than what you're driving, and that just isn't enough against things like PPC+Gauss heavies and assaults which can deliver 35-50 points to a single component.

Back armor is, ideally, for keeping minor cuts (incidental laser scratches or the odd bit of friendly fire) from turning into major wounds. Front armor is for keeping major wounds from killing or crippling you.

#11 Rogue Jedi

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Posted 18 February 2017 - 02:32 AM

please go minimal back armor it makes killing Mechs so much easier for my Machine Gun fast Mechs.

In my opinion front armor is for protecting against heavy, assualt, and slower medium Mechs, where as rear armor is for protecting against Light and fast Medium Mechs. if you are good and observant you should usualy be able to dictate which armor you present to the enemy.

There are usualy at most 4 Mechs in the match which are likely to (through no fault of your own) be able to get behind you and go for your rear armor, so naturaly you want to focus the bulk of your armor to what the other 8+ Mechs are likely to do, but go too low on the back and you will occaisionaly get me or some other pilot of 120+kph Mechs get behind you and kill you quickly.

#12 Exard3k

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Posted 18 February 2017 - 02:56 AM

Strong rear armor helps new and below average skill players. Weak rear armor helps experienced players.


Don't go paper rear armor because you see things on the interwebs. Use paper rear armor because ,you as a player ,feel like you have better use for these points at the front.

#13 IraqiWalker

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Posted 18 February 2017 - 03:07 AM

I rarely go above 14 on rear armor. Even on assaults.

This is two fold:

1- It makes sure I rarely give my back to my enemies

2- It rewards a light who gets behind me and wrecks me. If they played well enough to do that, they deserve the bloody kill.


I also knew a player who always had 1 armor on his rear torso for his atlas builds. It was his own way of challenging himself, and rewarding the enemies that play well.

#14 G4LV4TR0N

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Posted 18 February 2017 - 04:07 AM

Recently I've been in game where some guy put all his armor on back. How do I know? Well, it took me few minutes to circle his whole party and start poking his back. Initially it seemed to be a bug but then after hitting him for 30 seconds I've switched target to back of exactly same mech of his ally and destroyed it in 5 seconds.

Edited by G4LV4TR0N, 18 February 2017 - 04:08 AM.


#15 Tahribator

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Posted 18 February 2017 - 05:02 AM

Like Terciel said, most experienced players run 1-4 armor at the back. When you reach a certain level of awareness you'll be greeting most of the incoming damage with your frontal torso.

However, if you're a new player, I'd refrain from skimping on rear armor. The reaction times of the beginners tend to be horrible and they tend to get hit from behind by the heaviest hitter, because they don't pay attention to who's shooting them from where.

I'd go with ~5-10 if you're new. Keep reducing as you die less to rear hits.

#16 Amatsukaze

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Posted 20 February 2017 - 09:43 AM

I appreciate the replies guys. I took the advice & dropped my armor to 4 on the RT & didn't have single back kill death last night. I guess my paranoia was unfounded & I actually found I stayed in the fight longer. That extra armor up front really pays off Posted Image

#17 Tana Sebrle

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Posted 21 January 2018 - 02:31 PM

Ok, I'm not entirely sure where to look, so I'm just going to post here. Is there a formula of sorts that calculates armor points to damage? Meaning, 2 points of back armor will protect against how much damage? Maybe it was already covered and I missed it.

#18 B L O O D W I T C H

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Posted 21 January 2018 - 02:44 PM

View PostTana Pryde, on 21 January 2018 - 02:31 PM, said:

Ok, I'm not entirely sure where to look, so I'm just going to post here. Is there a formula of sorts that calculates armor points to damage? Meaning, 2 points of back armor will protect against how much damage? Maybe it was already covered and I missed it.


2 points of back armor can absorb 2 points of damage.

#19 Koniving

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Posted 21 January 2018 - 02:58 PM

View PostTana Pryde, on 21 January 2018 - 02:31 PM, said:

Ok, I'm not entirely sure where to look, so I'm just going to post here. Is there a formula of sorts that calculates armor points to damage? Meaning, 2 points of back armor will protect against how much damage? Maybe it was already covered and I missed it.

Its pretty straight forward.

1 point of armor or structure can absorb 1 point of damage.

There are only TWO exceptions to this.
1) "Armor Strength" quirk... no longer in use in the game as a quirk... actually reduced damage done against armor in a specifically stated section by whatever percentage stated.
2) "Missile doors." Each missile door provides 20% (recently up from 10%) damage resistance, aka 20% additional armor strength, in the specific body section it is in while the door is CLOSED. But only seems to work if the space has a missile launcher equipped. The "quirk" is removed instantly if you open the door and re-added when the door shuts. You can manually control the door with /.

#20 Koniving

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Posted 21 January 2018 - 03:04 PM

Wait. Forgot the third exception, and it isn't actually an exception but something worth noting as it is a mechanic that isn't shoved in your face.

Critical damage, an entirely separate damage system that hurts your equipment, weapons and ammunition, takes 15% of what the total critical damage dealt is and then applies it to your structure. So an AC/20 does 20 damage to armor, but to structure it does 20 damage to structure + 0 to 60 damage to components, of which 15% makes the total structure damage between 20 and 29 damage to structure.





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