15 replies to this topic

[Mozgoth]

Hi. I'm new in the game.
I bought an atlas as7-s and i saw a lot of YouTube videos and all the guys always picks ac 20 on the ballistic hardpoint.
Why not a lb 20-c ac?

Pros:
-less Heat
-crit chance
-more range

Cons:
- 1 crit slot
- Spread

[Koniving]

Mozgoth, on 30 September 2017 - 05:26 PM, said:

Hi. I'm new in the game.
I bought an atlas as7-s and i saw a lot of YouTube videos and all the guys always picks ac 20 on the ballistic hardpoint.
Why not a lb 20-c ac?

Pros:
-less Heat
-crit chance
-more range

Cons:
- 1 crit slot
- Spread

LB20-C? You mean LB-20X (Battletech) or LBX-20 (MWO).

Two things.
One, the Inner Sphere versions of the LBX 2, 5 and 20 only just got released a month or two ago. So it is still new.

Two: The one crit slot is enough to make certain engines types completely unmountable. It cannot be mounted in an arm in its current form.

Personally... if there's more than one hardpoint, I usually pack in an LB-10X and an AC/5 together. For the Atlas S, I left my ballistic hardpoint completely empty and focused instead on heavier missile and energy weapons.

[Koniving]

Also, welcome to MWO.

LBX 20 has another pro. Like all LBX weapons, if you hit enemies where there is no armor, the random roll per 'bullet' (of which you fire 20 bullets at once like a shotgun) can do 2*1, 2*2, or 2*3 "Crit damage" to equipment (again, per bullet). (Maximum possible [though unlikely] of 120 equipment damage! Then 15% of the total damage dealt to equipment is added as bonus structure health damage. (20 base damage + maximum potential bonus damage of 18 = maximum potential of 38 structure damage from a single blow.)

The AC/20 under the same conditions delivers 20*1, 20*2, or 20*3 crit damage to equipment (it's just one bullet) which comes out to a maximum potential of 60 equipment damage. 15% of whatever equipment damage is successful then becomes added as bonus structure health damage. (20 base damage + maximum potential bonus damage of 9 = maximum potential of 29 structure damage from a single blow.)

Keep in mind in both cases chances of nailing the triple crits are slim as are even getting single crits. But for the LBX, getting at least the single crits is very easy and some of the bullets will almost always get at least that (as your total chances of getting a 'critical hit' is over 50% per bullet where for the AC/20 it is somewhere around the early 40% or less chance to get a single crit; though with the full 20 in a single blow you will instantly destroy any equipment critted. The LBX might require a few blows to destroy a specific piece of equipment, but by then it will destroy several at the same time.)

[Koniving]

(This is completely irrelevant but for fun.)

The naming convention is broken down as follows.
LB which the BT lore itself states that pretty much no one knows why it is the "LB" but supposes that perhaps it is named after Lutherin Bore or some such. (Lubalin Ballistics)
#X where # is the number of separate hits on the cluster table (for the tabletop dice roll) and X simply means "times."

As such, Lutherin Bore- Lubalin Ballistics-20 times.

It is read/pronounced "L B twenty Ex" regardless, though.

Like I said, this is completely irrelevant.
MWO, like a few Mechwarrior games, uses LBX-20 because it better suits the naming convention of the other autocannon classes.

The digits in the lore actually refer to a damage rating classification which is meant to convey that in a given amount of time, by the time this weapon empties its cassette (magazine) or fires for this amount of time, it will deliver approximately 20 units of damage to Armor or Structure with a Barrier Armor Rating (BAR) of 10 (as all military grade mechs have). So whether it fires a single shot (which btw in Battletech, doesn't exist), 12 shots (King Crab's Deathgiver AC/20s) or it fires a hundred shots (Victor's Pontiac 100 AC/20), it'll deliver about 20 damage in roughly the same amount of time.

<.< I like the lore and I'm looking forward to Battletech (PC) and Mechwarrior 5: Mercs.
Again this entire post is irrelevant to MWO.

Edited by Koniving, 03 October 2017 - 07:34 AM.

[Bishop Steiner]

Koniving, on 30 September 2017 - 06:52 PM, said:

(This is completely irrelevant but for fun.)

The naming convention is broken down as follows.
LB which the BT lore itself states that pretty much no one knows why it is the "LB" but supposes that perhaps it is named after Lutherin Bore or some such.
#X where # is the number of separate hits on the cluster table (for the tabletop dice roll) and X simply means "times."

As such, Lutherin Bore-20 times.

It is read/pronounced "L B twenty Ex" regardless, though.

Like I said, this is completely irrelevant.

It's actually quite cute how people have made this into some great mystery... instead of just letting common sense explain the meaning. You can look it up in your TRO 2750, then use Occams Razor and simple logic. IIRC the first mention is under the Champion Battlemech.

The first of these weapons was made by Luballin Ballistics. It was a Class 10 Autocannon. The Roman Numeral for 10 is? X.

Hence you have: LB-X Autocannon. *Ta-daaaaaa!*

But because hands weren't held, things were not explicitly spelled out and FASA's QA and Editing made Palladium Books look professional.... (same editing we can thank for the idiotic King Crab hand actuator controversy (it had none, if you're curious), and that couldn't decide which way the Thug's knees bent from one TRO to the next......(backwards for the record)), you get latter day lore purists who have made a huge kerfuffle out of the whole thing.

Made worse by the later, non QA addition of the Clan Weapons with the odd 2X, 5X and 20X..... instead of the much more commonsense LB-II, LB-V and LB-XX designation.

But then since inconsistency and editing and in continuity errors were such a major part of FASA that they actually made it into canon by calling it all Comstar Misinformation, and couching future corrections as Wolfnet edits telling the "accurate" info... what should one expect?

That boys and girls, is the IP we know and love. Who cares if we screw it up...we can always blame it one Comstar. (Hence why people are also screwing up the placement of the Dervish's lasers, the Assassin's cockpit and other sundry items, to this very day!)

None of which is relevant really to MWO.

Now... if you are talking IS LB-20X vs IS AC20? Here is all you really need to know. The extra range is really a lie, because of spread making it all but useful.... and crits? Situationally kind of nice.... but a 20 pt chunk of PPDFLD? Is always nice. And in 9 out of 10 instances? Better than crits. And because of it having one single projectile, the ac20 has better practical, useful range. 14+ ton investments ain't for situational maybe sometimes an advantage.

Now for the Clan.... it's a bit murkier, because the Clan AC20 is a what...4-5 shot burst? Vs a single shot with 20 projectiles. So With the Clan LB at least you get FLD.

So basically, 99% of the time if you are IS take the std AC20. And probably 99% of the time, if you are Clan? Take the LB.

Cheers.

[Champion of Khorne Lord of Blood]

Mozgoth, on 30 September 2017 - 05:26 PM, said:

Hi. I'm new in the game.
I bought an atlas as7-s and i saw a lot of YouTube videos and all the guys always picks ac 20 on the ballistic hardpoint.
Why not a lb 20-c ac?

Pros:
-less Heat
-crit chance
-more range

Cons:
- 1 crit slot
- Spread

To get to the point short and sweet:

The reason people pick the AC20 over the LBX20 is because that one extra crit slot of the LBX20 means that it cannot be mounted on a mech that is running an LFE engine.

Since LFE engines are so much better than STD engines you'd be crippling yourself heavily to bring an LBX20 in most cases. In general the spread of the LBX20 alone already counters the few pros that the LBX has, it has a higher effective range by stats, but a lower effective range than the AC20 due to the spread, you'll just be doing more damage to what you aim at at 270m with an AC20 compared to an LBX20. The crit chance also only comes in once armor is removed and isn't really that huge in the first place. The lower heat is nice, but since the AC20 allows for a lighter engine you can just get more heatsinks with one.

[The Basilisk]

Koniving, on 30 September 2017 - 06:52 PM, said:

(This is completely irrelevant but for fun.)

The naming convention is broken down as follows.
LB which the BT lore itself states that pretty much no one knows why it is the "LB" but supposes that perhaps it is named after Lutherin Bore or some such.
#X where # is the number of separate hits on the cluster table (for the tabletop dice roll) and X simply means "times."

As such, Lutherin Bore-20 times.

It is read/pronounced "L B twenty Ex" regardless, though.

Like I said, this is completely irrelevant.
MWO, like a few Mechwarrior games, uses LBX-20 because it better suits the naming convention of the other autocannon classes.

The digits in the lore actually refer to a damage rating classification which is meant to convey that in a given amount of time, by the time this weapon empties its cassette (magazine) or fires for this amount of time, it will deliver approximately 20 units of damage to Armor or Structure with a Barrier Armor Rating (BAR) of 10 (as all military grade mechs have). So whether it fires a single shot (which btw in Battletech, doesn't exist), 12 shots (King Crab's Deathgiver AC/20s) or it fires a hundred shots (Victor's Pontiac 100 AC/20), it'll deliver about 20 damage in roughly the same amount of time.

<.< I like the lore and I'm looking forward to Battletech (PC) and Mechwarrior 5: Mercs.
Again this entire post is irrelevant to MWO.

Not to play the smartass but its Lubalin Ballistics Type X. (where the X stand once for the roman 10)
The weapon producer Lubalin Ballistcs was the first manufacturer that used the variable ammunition and variable spread concept for its Autocannons of category "10".
Since the LB-X Autocannon 10 was the first of this type of cannons the term LB-X stuck to the whole branche.
In the Battletech TT sources the main feature of LB-X Autocannons is that they can switch ammo types. They can fire either a series of HEAP slugs or cluster rounds that split up in a defined distance to the their target (there is no dice roll for LB-X ammo the slugs always hit all if the weapon to hit roll was a success, reason the LB-X is not a shotgun but submunitions cluster ammo that splits right before impact)

Regarding to LB-X weapons in MWO...well its what Dakota1000 said:

AC20 one big boom to one zone or 20 smal impacts with the "what if" chance of scoring a crit if the armor is already down and if you score a crit and if the weapon does hit at all and does not hit everything around the mech instead of the mech.

So again the LB20 is not favorable because its too big to mount light engines, because you will waste lots of dmg most of the time and because you have a hard time focusing damage except at facehugging close range.

Edited by The Basilisk, 01 October 2017 - 12:49 AM.

[Koniving]

Bishop Steiner, on 30 September 2017 - 07:58 PM, said:

Figured I had it a bit off on the name. There's a company called Lutherin something but Lubalin does sound more accurate (after all whatever person or company that has made it has been extinct for quite some time).

But LB-1010 sounds a bit ridiculous and we're not looking at the LB-II, LB-V and LBXX and they never drop the X no matter what number they put in. Murr. No mention of Lubalin in the Tech Manual.
Spoiler goes into hunting for it...

Spoiler

I see Sarna is putting it as more concrete rather than supposed. It was in one of the manuals that it was a common belief to stand for something like Lubalin Ballistics, but as it was written in character by a technician, he also says in the next sentence "to be honest I'm not certain that's the case." Though he fails to give his supporting argument and just moves on. I need to hunt it down, though I believe it was either CityTech second edition or one of the Merc handbooks. If not then maybe it was under BattleTechnology (Yes I know they are no longer canonical but they were, their age, unavailability, the sheer amount of "Unseen" plastered in them and more importantly the fact that they are written before many of the major changes to rules and thus the lore are likely why they were made non-canon. Still, many of the things it establishes are carried over even in Catalyst's products, including reasoning for such limited range, as well as slightly modified versions of BattleTechnology's then newly introduced advanced rules, which are found in TacOps and Strat. Sadly "Sniper shot" got replaced with a passive ability and I think that was terrible, as Sniper Shot required two turns but produced a high chance of success and yield. Shame it was written before Gauss Rifles even existed).

That falls under the unreliable narrator, which under the Designer Notes of 1st Somerset Strikers (one of the few times anything is actually written out of character beyond straight game rules) state that the novels, sourcebooks, etc. are all written by fictional narrators whose personal feelings and biases influence what they write. So, we're meant to be left to question it as supposed.

Other, less canonical names given to it as part of the in character confusion (or attributed to this when really it was probably the lack of communication between authors) include Light Barrel - Extended Range (but this can't be an actual name because the other IS versions are heavier, and use Ferro-Fibrous in their construction as opposed to the Endo used in the LB-10X's construction). and Large Bore-Extended.

Sarna helped me a bit.
The LBX name is in the Champion under Technical Readout 2750. Considering how old this thing is it may be one of the earliest mentions. It is specifically written out as "The Champion's weaponry consists of one Lubalin Ballistics 10-X autocannon" and is written as the later commonly accepted canonical proper.

So the X representing the roman numeral for 10 is unlikely. Given how it is written, and how it was quickly given 2, 5 and 20 versions for the Clans shortly after, the X is much more likely to represent "times" as a way for the players to note we need to make each shot check for successful hits that many times.

Interestingly, absolutely nothing is known about the brand name Lublin Ballistics.
Got indirect confirmation, the very first mention is under the Champion entry in TRO 2750 so that is the proper way to write it. (As such if it is a roman numeral, then the proper name of the LB-10X is the Lublin Ballistics-10 10.) You can imagine my skepticism here.

Side note, found my confirmation that the LB-X cluster round "is an exceptionally large single projectile that "fragments" in midair within proximity to the target, each fragment contains an explosive charge." The end result is "Flak-like" though the end result is commonly described as a 'shotgun' to simplify the description. Combine the following lores into one package.
Technical Readout: 2750, p. 8 "Star League Technology - Weapons - LB 10-X Autocannon"
Era Report: 2750, p. 98 "Museum Technica - Offensive Military Technologies - LB-X Autocannon"
TechManual, p. 207 "Weapons and Heavy Equipment - Heavy Equipment - Autocannons - LB-X Autocannon"
Of interesting reading:
https://www.quora.co...-does-flak-work

(Last edit I swear...)
This confirms the interjection of the similarities between the LB-X weapons and the Mech Rifles, as both possess superior range to their autocannon counterparts, largely attributed to the fact that they fire tank-main-cannon-sized projectiles as opposed to AA-gun sized projectiles. This also explains why standard (non-cluster) ammo for the LBX is one, incompatible with regular ACs and UACs, and two, nearly 3x more expensive than an equivalent ton of traditional AC ammo. Big. Damn. Bullets.(Maybe now you'll understand my obsession with Mech Rifles)

Edited by Koniving, 01 October 2017 - 06:29 AM.

[justcallme A S H]

Dakota1000, on 30 September 2017 - 10:14 PM, said:

To get to the point short and sweet:

The reason people pick the AC20 over the LBX20 is because that one extra crit slot of the LBX20 means that it cannot be mounted on a mech that is running an LFE engine.

Since LFE engines are so much better than STD engines you'd be crippling yourself heavily to bring an LBX20 in most cases. In general the spread of the LBX20 alone already counters the few pros that the LBX has, it has a higher effective range by stats, but a lower effective range than the AC20 due to the spread, you'll just be doing more damage to what you aim at at 270m with an AC20 compared to an LBX20. The crit chance also only comes in once armor is removed and isn't really that huge in the first place. The lower heat is nice, but since the AC20 allows for a lighter engine you can just get more heatsinks with one.

At least someone actually helped rather than engage in a LORE circle jerk. AC20 over LBX20 anyday for IS.

Pin point damage = king. Forget a crit roll if you've already opened, one single AC20 shell is usually enough to destroy the component with whatever other weapons you fire at the same time.

Edited by justcallme A S H, 02 October 2017 - 05:09 PM.

[Jingseng]

Bishop Steiner, on 30 September 2017 - 07:58 PM, said:

It's actually quite cute how people have made this into some great mystery... instead of just letting common sense explain the meaning. You can look it up in your TRO 2750, then use Occams Razor and simple logic. IIRC the first mention is under the Champion Battlemech.

The first of these weapons was made by Luballin Ballistics. It was a Class 10 Autocannon. The Roman Numeral for 10 is? X.

Hence you have: LB-X Autocannon. *Ta-daaaaaa!*

But because hands weren't held, things were not explicitly spelled out and FASA's QA and Editing made Palladium Books look professional.... (same editing we can thank for the idiotic King Crab hand actuator controversy (it had none, if you're curious), and that couldn't decide which way the Thug's knees bent from one TRO to the next......(backwards for the record)), you get latter day lore purists who have made a huge kerfuffle out of the whole thing.

Made worse by the later, non QA addition of the Clan Weapons with the odd 2X, 5X and 20X..... instead of the much more commonsense LB-II, LB-V and LB-XX designation.

But then since inconsistency and editing and in continuity errors were such a major part of FASA that they actually made it into canon by calling it all Comstar Misinformation, and couching future corrections as Wolfnet edits telling the "accurate" info... what should one expect?

That boys and girls, is the IP we know and love. Who cares if we screw it up...we can always blame it one Comstar. (Hence why people are also screwing up the placement of the Dervish's lasers, the Assassin's cockpit and other sundry items, to this very day!)

None of which is relevant really to MWO.

Now... if you are talking IS LB-20X vs IS AC20? Here is all you really need to know. The extra range is really a lie, because of spread making it all but useful.... and crits? Situationally kind of nice.... but a 20 pt chunk of PPDFLD? Is always nice. And in 9 out of 10 instances? Better than crits. And because of it having one single projectile, the ac20 has better practical, useful range. 14+ ton investments ain't for situational maybe sometimes an advantage.

Now for the Clan.... it's a bit murkier, because the Clan AC20 is a what...4-5 shot burst? Vs a single shot with 20 projectiles. So With the Clan LB at least you get FLD.

So basically, 99% of the time if you are IS take the std AC20. And probably 99% of the time, if you are Clan? Take the LB.

Cheers.

that doesn't sound like occam's at all =p

[Burning2nd]

lol woe... hypothetical conversation about fake weapon manufactures lol

you guys are something else

This is the deal with the atlas,
you can put your weight in that shoulder if you want.. but remember that once you loose it.. your dead in the water anyway
personally i run my atlas with lbx10 some short range missiles and some med range lasers.. other times ill run with less projectile, more missile more laser some times range missle range laser and short projectile...

experiment.. there are lots of combos for the S and BH and DC And now with the light engines you even got a little more variance.. people would laugh when i would say im running a xl 400 but when a atlas runs @ 71.2 and comes over a hill and hits you with a 65 alpha over and over and over... people turn and run quick...

like i said.. a atlas with out its shoulder is worthless anyway.. you might as well just be dead..


but to answer the question directly... yes Ac all day (if u need that cannon ball thrower)

[justcallme A S H]

My Atlas are SRM/AC20 and MPL... No point LBX'ing at all IMO

[Damnedtroll]

Easier to aim the lbx, bigger punch the ac20 and light engine friendly

[justcallme A S H]

Yeah if I threw a handful of chips in your general direction I'd be likely to hit something rather than taking the risk of a single potato hitting what I wanted...

Edited by justcallme A S H, 03 October 2017 - 02:43 PM.

[Damnedtroll]

justcallme A S H, on 03 October 2017 - 02:37 PM, said:

Yeah if I threw a handful of chips in your general direction I'd be likely to hit something rather than taking the risk of a single potato hitting what I wanted...

Yeah if you want to stop something, ac20 is the best cutter in the game if you hit the spot, you are not wondering after 2 shot why it's not dead from the cloud of lbx pellets.

Edited by Damnedtroll, 11 October 2017 - 03:32 AM.

[Throe]

[deleted by user]

Edited by Throe, 20 November 2018 - 11:39 AM.