renzor51, on 12 December 2018 - 05:28 PM, said:
I've been eyeing the Shadowhawk for my next mech, but I'm wondering:
Up until now, I've just played as a clan mech. Will the Shadowhawk not take an ECM? Is that just an omnipod perk of clan mechs that you can install ECM's?
Certain mechs can take ECM. Some clan mechs can take it, and if it's an Omni mech, than the Omnipod with ECM can be placed on any omnimech of the same chassis (AKA: Any variant of the Kit Fox can take the ECM arm pods.)
As all (current) IS mechs are Standard Battlemech (not Omnimechs), their hardpoints are all locked. If it says it has 4 missile hard points, than it only has four missile hard points even if another variant might have more/or less. IS mechs would have to have an ECM hardpoint to be able to take ECM, so many IS mechs do not have access to that equipment.
As far as I know, there are no Shadowhawks that have access to ECM. None of them have the hardpoints for it (to my knowledge).
As for the Shadowhawk, it's a tall medium mech. It's best strength are the high mounted shoulder weapon points, which are right at cockpit levels. This helps with being able to poke over an obstacle to shoot a target, while revealing as little of yourself as possible to get the shot off. it also can have good shield arms if you know how to use arms for spreading damage, as many of them don't exactly have many hardpoints in the arms.