148 replies to this topic

[Bishop Steiner]

Koniving, on 17 April 2019 - 11:46 AM, said:

You know, looking at the 5A... they should have pulled a page from the Behemoth.


Here, it has two Gauss Rifles which combine to make a "unique" single barrel rifle with a backup generator. One in each side torso, and portrayed as a single barrel on top.

In MWO, they could have put an LT and RT ballistic slot...and have the two combine in a single mount on top, perhaps with a barrel-under-barel layout.
It would have significantly increased its value.

Interestingly I can't find where hat idea started. It's no in the TRO, but I here it stated often.

The Sarna entry lists it as this: "The design featured Large Pulse Lasers in each arm, twin Gauss Rifles mounted behind flip-open circular firing ports on each side torso, and an almost superfluous Small Pulse Laser located above the cockpit. "

Yet.... that is also not in any source I can find. Kind of frustrating.

Edited by Bishop Steiner, 17 April 2019 - 05:28 PM.

[RickySpanish]

Dee Eight, on 17 April 2019 - 04:20 PM, said:

Well... they can be tanky...

They actually are, inspite of the gun mount. Trouble I'm finding is they are not worth the 100T weight penalty with respect to agility and speed, as their mounts tend to make it difficult to make usage of the tonnage. For example, the 5A laser variant has lots of room left over for a useless, bigger engine or 2T jump jets. I switched to SHS on that build to actually make use of the free space, but 3 ER large 5 medium can be more effectively carried (or a close equivalent) on lighter, more agile chassis. The MAD II cannot trade with any other 100T 'Mech, at least not the standard pack variants.

[FLG 01]

It is ok. I still believe it needs better agility to make use of its overall favourable geometry, and then it could be great.

To be honest I love it either way because it looks like a true Marauder, especially the cockpit. Not being DoA is good enough for me - for now. It is fun.

Bishop Steiner, on 17 April 2019 - 05:25 PM, said:

The Sarna entry lists it as this: "The design featured Large Pulse Lasers in each arm, twin Gauss Rifles mounted behind flip-open circular firing ports on each side torso, and an almost superfluous Small Pulse Laser located above the cockpit. "

Yet.... that is also not in any source I can find. Kind of frustrating.

Isn't it kind of a running gag that the Bememoth sports the largest SPL ever?

Edited by FLG 01, 17 April 2019 - 06:02 PM.

[Koniving]

Bishop Steiner, on 17 April 2019 - 05:25 PM, said:

Interestingly I can't find where hat idea started. It's no in the TRO, but I here it stated often.

The Sarna entry lists it as this: "The design featured Large Pulse Lasers in each arm, twin Gauss Rifles mounted behind flip-open circular firing ports on each side torso, and an almost superfluous Small Pulse Laser located above the cockpit. "

Yet.... that is also not in any source I can find. Kind of frustrating.

Figure it comes with the territory of early BT being open to interpretation (one barrel twin gauss). (such as the 5 tube lrm20 on the Atlas and twin 10 racks on Atlas K, C and was it S or S2? Anyway those are just an LRM20 and there is a plethora of other oddballs between the art and the tabletop layout. But we know the single barrel is canonical as the later model/iteration features twin and then there is the one with triple barrels and each of these point it out as a change. In fact look up the twin barrel model as like the Atlas K it may fleshed out and discuss the previous model/Art's flaw as additional fluff.

[Anjian]

I think I am fairly convinced that I'm going to buy at least the base set, despite the large hitboxes and the 48kph speed.

[WrathOfDeadguy]

The speed, at least, isn't much of an issue. It's among the faster 100-tonners, insofar as any 100-tonner is "fast." It can't get to Boar's Head / Kodiak speeds, but it's at least as fast as most of the Atlas line and the King Crab, since it can run a 360.

[RickySpanish]

If you put a 360 on it you probably shouldn't be allowed near a Mechbay ever again. The point of 100T isn't to be fast, it is to bring more firepower than anything else.

[Y E O N N E]

That requires the appropriate hardpoints and placement. The MAD II is no Annihilator; if I could shove a 375 into the 4A, I absolutely would.

[Xaat Xuun]

didn't read what you all wrote,

but I think it sucks for 100t mech, load out wise
I just have the standard pack , so the others I don't have, may be different, the 4HP I can work with, it's the only one of the 3 that can actually use a 100 toner load out, like a hundred ton mech should

all of these have heat problems, doesn't matter how many heat sinks, the ghost heat on them is nasty. chain fire is the only way, forget Alpha's.
sure you can alpha, then hide what feels like an eternity cooling down.

and that's about it for "Thoughts on the Marauder II"

if I need a marauder, it'll be the Marauder, not the Marauder II. Much better mech

[Y E O N N E]

It's a 100 ton Heavy 'Mech. The only one with proper Assault-grade firepower is the missile variant, the MAD-4HP. Its turning rate also makes the USS Nimitz appear damn spritely.

[RickySpanish]

Y E O N N E, on 17 April 2019 - 08:33 PM, said:

That requires the appropriate hardpoints and placement. The MAD II is no Annihilator; if I could shove a 375 into the 4A, I absolutely would.

Yup exactly, at 100T it really needs more hardpoints, as it is, a larger engine is often all you can use the extra tonnage for which begs the question - why not take a lighter 'Mech that can field the same firepower and use a smaller engine for the same speed? The only advantage is armour I guess.

Edited by RickySpanish, 17 April 2019 - 09:07 PM.

[Y E O N N E]

Sometimes the armor lets you bulldoze your way through even with the same firepower. But that requires sufficient speed and agility to actually use it, which the MAD II lacks.

[FRAGTAST1C]

The 9 missile hardpoint variant :- The problem lies with the game mode. Solo QP games almost never converge to anything under 300m from what I've seen in the past month. Seems like a new meta. I've tried SRMs and it wasn't fruitful simply 'cause of the distance. Of course I can do damage but that's not the point. The point is to make that mech viable as a brawler not as taking damage and dying after bursting out 600+ damage. I've tried it with 8 MRM 10s and it was ok but it loses its burst damage power even if you use the loadout as 2 MRM 40s.

2 Ballistic 6 Energy variant :- My Bounty Hunter runs the same loadout that this one can so I'm not sure why I need a 100 ton version only to be slow, big and lose my weapon placed in the stupid location that can be targeted from any angle.

8 Energy variant :- I've not yet tried it and am not really looking forward to it either.

[meteorol]

Played a bit with it (only basic variants), and more against it.

The first match in a fafnir was 1600 dmg, 8 KMDD, 5 solo kills, 4 of them consecutive against MAD IIs, which went down like a granny with a thigh neck fracture. Similar results when using an Anni. Both mechs are just plowing through MAD IIs in the blink of an eye.
Playing "good" assault mechs against it really shows how mediocre the MAD 2 is. The numbers one can currently achieve playing it are heavily inflated by the fact that every match has 5-7 equally bad assault mechs on the other team.

Anni, Fafnir and even KC and Dire forthright sh*t down the MAD II's throat, with zero effort. Subpar hardpoints, terrible hitboxes (that cannon lul), and the variant that could possibly add something interesting (4HP) has atrocious mobility values, even worse than the Anni, with zero relevant quirks.

There is little reason to use it at all.

Edited by meteorol, 17 April 2019 - 11:06 PM.

[Ruccus]

meteorol, on 17 April 2019 - 11:04 PM, said:

Played a bit with it (only basic variants), and more against it.

The first match in a fafnir was 1600 dmg, 8 KMDD, 5 solo kills, 4 of them consecutive against MAD IIs, which went down like a granny with a thigh neck fracture. Similar results when using an Anni. Both mechs are just plowing through MAD IIs in the blink of an eye.
Playing "good" assault mechs against it really shows how mediocre the MAD 2 is. The numbers one can currently achieve playing it are heavily inflated by the fact that every match has 5-7 equally bad assault mechs on the other team.

Anni, Fafnir and even KC and Dire forthright sh*t down the MAD II's throat, with zero effort. Subpar hardpoints, terrible hitboxes (that cannon lul), and the variant that could possibly add something interesting (4HP) has atrocious mobility values, even worse than the Anni, with zero relevant quirks.

There is little reason to use it at all.

You're likely plowing through severely underskilled mechs with your mastered mech. Everyone targets whatever new mech comes out that month before the pilots have a chance to skill them up, and I think once the Marauder 2s get 40 or 50 skill nodes their performance will be more representative of what they can do.

I think my most skilled up Marauder 2 has about 15 to 20 skill nodes on it. Yes I could just buy my way to 91 nodes, but I like the sense of accomplishment in mastering a mech through playing it so I generally only put about 7 to 9 nodes in it for some radar deprivation to start.

[meteorol]

Ruccus, on 18 April 2019 - 12:01 AM, said:

You're likely plowing through severely underskilled mechs with your mastered mech. Everyone targets whatever new mech comes out that month before the pilots have a chance to skill them up, and I think once the Marauder 2s get 40 or 50 skill nodes their performance will be more representative of what they can do.

I think my most skilled up Marauder 2 has about 15 to 20 skill nodes on it. Yes I could just buy my way to 91 nodes, but I like the sense of accomplishment in mastering a mech through playing it so I generally only put about 7 to 9 nodes in it for some radar deprivation to start.

The thing is, i instantly maxed the basic variants i got, and even a fully skilled MAD 2 is considerably worse than an Anni or Fafnir. Like, no competition. Can't hold a candle to them.

Edited by meteorol, 18 April 2019 - 12:13 AM.

[Sjorpha]

As mentioned it's hard to say when the queue is full of other Mads, you obviously can't measure a mech against itself.

As a 100 ton gunboat it's clearly outclassed by Annis and faffnirs etc, so you have to make use of the larger engines to find a niche for it, 325 and up.

This Imo makes the 2 variants that can boat energy and missiles the strongest as they can go close to 60kph. The 4a can run 3lpl, 5mpl, lfe 355 and 2 jets so it's like slower wubshee with jumpjets and structure quirks, which is ok. The 4HP can run 8 srm6 with artemis and std350, it's a pretty unique brawler that hits harder than any other srm bomber in the game, it also has high tightly clustered hard points and to gun turret so it can peekaboo before fully engaging, I think it might be pretty good especially in Faction Play as first wave on brawly invasion maps.

The other variants are weaker I think but they're all interesting at least. The 4L with its ecm and gausspeep quirk is a bit undergunned for a 100 to ner using the intended loadout but what it does is unique for is assaults. The hero is a fun mech with the jam quirk but not being able to fit 4uac5s kinda ruins it, I wish they'd removed the lower actuator on the ballistic arm variants.

In any case it's a very fun mech to play, I think I'll be playing it a lot even if it turns out it's weak.

[FRAGTAST1C]

Sjorpha, on 18 April 2019 - 01:40 AM, said:

This Imo makes the 2 variants that can boat energy and missiles the strongest as they can go close to 60kph. The 4a can run 3lpl, 5mpl, lfe 355 and 2 jets so it's like slower wubshee with jumpjets and structure quirks, which is ok. The 4HP can run 8 srm6 with artemis and std350, it's a pretty unique brawler that hits harder than any other srm bomber in the game, it also has high tightly clustered hard points and to gun turret so it can peekaboo before fully engaging,

3 LPL and 5 MPL, you say? What's the heat management like? I'm trying 3 LL and 5 ERML and I can barely alpha twice. With all the skill nodes dedicated to heat and cool runs, then it'll be better I think but the Pulse vomit looks like it's extremely toasty.

As for SRM 6 bomber, how do you play that when both the teams never engage at anything closer than 300m. The moment I try to flank and get the damage off, I die having barely done 600 damage.

[Prototelis]

Why are you attempting a flank in one of the slowest assaults in game?

[FRAGTAST1C]

Prototelis, on 18 April 2019 - 01:53 AM, said:

Why are you attempting a flank in one of the slowest assaults in game?

'Cause every match I've played so far has both teams sitting a minimum 300m away and never closing in. If I try to push forward, none of the team mates come with me and I do barely 600 damage before I explode.