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[Frith]

I'll start by saying that approximately 70% of my gameplay is in what most would consider LRM "boats." However, I do not build boats without additional weapons; my assaults usually have as many energy and/or ballistic weapons as most medium or even heavy builds. My most missile centric assault has 4 x C-LRM 20, 2 x C-ER LG LAS and 2x C-ER MED LAS. I won't run away from a direct fight, but I don't actively seek them either (unless I'm out of missiles).

I like the new trajectory. I think it makes sense that missiles fly faster and less ark if the mech has line of sight. I think it probably meets the goal of encouraging boaters to be more actively engaged in the firing line.

What I don't care for is the new timing for target locks. When I'm 800 meters away from someone calling for assistance, a long lock time means I'm not going to even attempt to lock their opponent to provide cover fire.

As a result of this, I'm adding Active Probe or Target Computer to all my missile boats. The trade off is that I'm removing a direct fire weapon to do it. On one, a medium laser came off, on another a machine gun and half load of ammo. So in short, to compensate for the decreased lock time, I'm reducing my ability to fight at line-of-sight, which obviously makes me less willing to do so.

I don't know if this was taken into consideration when the new missile locking parameters were being designed. I think it somewhat defeats the purpose of encouraging more involved missile boat combat, and I thought I'd share my opinion.