Deeber, on 30 August 2018 - 07:58 AM, said:
A large factor in this is the fact that I own more mechs than I did previously (so the novelty value has worn off a bit, and the gaps in my arsenal are fewer), but the thought of having to skill up new mechs is a non-trivial factor as well. When I was in the lower tiers, this wasn't such an issue, but I'm now regularly facing players who are far, far better than I am ... so playing MWO is a real 'uphill battle' experience nowadays.
A post I made earlier today touched on this a bit with the Vulcan. There are builds that are more or less viable depending on how skilled up the mech is, so you have to think about builds you can use from the outset and when you can move to different or more advanced builds.
It's actually part of the game I like; the theory-crafting of a new, unskilled mech then taking it out and seeing how it does. Once you get skill points in it you can then move to certain nodes (magazine capacity, cooling, speed tweak, etc.) and start exchanging things like heatsinks, ammo, or engines and reallocate the weight savings towards firepower.
My starting build with the Vulcan was a simple AC10, 2xMedium Laser build with 2 1/2 tons of ammo. It was a cool build, the AC10 provided a decent punch and recycled quickly enough to be ready when I needed it, and the medium lasers were adequate backup firepower. Getting some skill nodes in it has allowed me to try builds based on weapons like a snub-nosed PPC, Heavy PPC or AC20, something I wouldn't have considered with an unskilled Vulcan. If you build your mech and adopt a play style around how many skill nodes it has instead of how well it will do when fully skilled up you might have better success from the outset and be less discouraged by its performance.
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