44 replies to this topic

[Z E T E T I C]

Currently, I consider running anything less than 65kph without ecm not viable in the solo queue.

I can think of many reasons why, but the result is not fun.

Do you agree?

[R Valentine]

My Madcat only goes 58 and I seem to do ok. Driving assaults is all about pathfinding. Following the team mindlessly is always detrimental to your health. Know where you spawn, where you want to go, and how you're going to get there before you leave the dropship.

[Brizna]

Driving assault in QP is frustrating and hard but it can be done. If you know you can't follow the nascar, don't. Once you realize this you can start hatching plans to not simply die alone, it will really depend a lot on the map, there are maps where actually not following the herd and finding a defensible position is pretty easy, in some others it is a lot harder, it is also going to depend a lot on your load-out, you really need weapons that don't have an obvious weak spot such as a minimum range. At any rate, when you are alone you have to resist the urge to poke and fire at the red guys, don't call attention to yourself, hide and wait for the teams to engage (mini-map attention here) and when that happens get out and you are very likely to find most of the enemy team showing their butts to your assault mech fire-power, then it's not you who is frustrated but the guys being fired at from both side at the same time.

[PurplePuke]

I strongly believe that newer players shouldn't drive assaults. They want to, 'cause assaults are badass. But it's hard.

[Anomalocaris]

Kiran Yagami, on 17 May 2020 - 01:33 PM, said:

My Madcat only goes 58 and I seem to do ok. Driving assaults is all about pathfinding. Following the team mindlessly is always detrimental to your health. Know where you spawn, where you want to go, and how you're going to get there before you leave the dropship.

I think part of the problem is the spawns are all messed up since the merge. You get stuck in alpha lance in an assault on some maps and your butt is hanging in the wind if the enemy decides to push your location early and/or you have no support.

That said, I agree that some people just shouldn't play assaults. One of them tends to be me. Outside of some Gargoyles or fast MAD-IICs, I just don't do well in them.

[Novakaine]

Don't think that anyone is going to support and don't lumber out off by yourself.
Stick with the heavy's and other assaults with comparable speeds.

[Brain Cancer]

The slower your speed, the fewer mistakes you can make when positioning even at the beginning of the game.

54kph is about as slow as you go without being totally at the mercy of your team, and that's holding the W key down from startup and zero deviation from the pack's path.

[ThreeStooges]

If you need ecm to play the game you're doing a lot of things wrong. I just got an atlas r since it was closest to the boars head. It runs lbx 10,ssrms 6 for anti-lights,bap, and 4 mls. It also crawls along with an lfe or std 350 with a mere 2-3 tons ammo. Like the guys say above you need to slam w and keep to your team mates.

Since I mostly run lights I know how to kill a fattie with ease. Fighting against them with a very poor mech with horrible acerlration,deceleration, torso twist and turn is always an uphill battle. I looked at the stats trying to find the fastest assault and wanted an 400 engine. So why atlas? To be the one assault that will go into a fight on these hiding lrm boat assaults or the sniper with one guass I constantly get stuck with while in a light. It can cram a 360 engine which isn't bad.

I've only managed 7,000 xp on it thus far and my best match I took 878 damage and did 450 damage. I've mapped out the skill tree already with how I want to make it with 55 points into various branches to better fight a light off alone. In qp you have to focus on 1-2 mechs vs yours to win or at least do enough in a match your team wins. First to 3 kills always wins in my experience. The more I can do with the atlas the closer we come to wining.

[FRAGTAST1C]

It used to be fine but in the current situation that has lopsided tonnage distribution and incredibly stupid spawns, bringing an Assault mech that's slow is extremely unhealthy if you're not a good pilot.

[Black Caiman]

The problem with too many assault pilots is they want to play from the rear. Guess what when youre in the back, and your team puts the pedal down, youre going to get left behind. You should be leading from the front to at least the middle of the pack. That's not to say you blindly charge to your death, but you need to bring your armor and firepower to bear. Plus, it gives you a head start when your team start to shift position. Once you've learned positioning on the map, and in regards to the enemy you can start to play more of the sniper role if you so choose. Its the hardest class to play in quick play and the least forgiving. You should graduate to assault mechs after learning the other classes, not the other way around.

[RickySpanish]

4 LB-10X Cyclops says hi!

[R Valentine]

Anomalocaris, on 17 May 2020 - 03:24 PM, said:

I think part of the problem is the spawns are all messed up since the merge. You get stuck in alpha lance in an assault on some maps and your butt is hanging in the wind if the enemy decides to push your location early and/or you have no support.

That said, I agree that some people just shouldn't play assaults. One of them tends to be me. Outside of some Gargoyles or fast MAD-IICs, I just don't do well in them.

You just need to learn the alpha lance spawns. On HPG, it's a godsend, since the Bravo lance spawn for assaults is a death sentence. Team rotating away from you while you're the furthest left and the enemy sprinting at you from the left= no bueno. Alpha lance spawn puts you smack in the middle. On Canyon, you just need to know how to get up the walls onto the radio tower or bridge. Even without JJs, you should be able to make the top of the cliffs in 30 seconds or less. On Frozen Classic, alpha lance spawn is highly preferable to charlie lance spawn. It's all workable. You just need to know where you spawn and adjust accordingly.

Edited by Kiran Yagami, 17 May 2020 - 09:12 PM.

[GuardDogg]

Yeah, driving assaults in MWO is not a good idea. Other classes (enemy) go hungry (damage points, and destroying em), and the armor is like wood other than metal. Furthermore, people chat about team effort, but then team leaves assaults behind, or alone. The line gets stretched from other mechs getting ahead of them selves. Stay with other classes first (Med, Heavies, then lights). When you think a light runs around a corner and bangs into a enemy atlas, that the light pilot would be scared and run away. Nope, it is the atlas that does the running away. Cause the lights, mediums can take down a atlas (assault) mech no problem. That is in MWO.

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Edited by GuardDogg, 17 May 2020 - 09:18 PM.

[Valdarion Silarius]

Any mech below 64.8 kmph is all about positioning in order to work. Now, if you have a potato team that leaves you in the dust then I can only say is welcome to Nascar Warrior Online™.

[dario03]

Just run something with lbx/uac10 with maybe some uac5 or backup lasers. Move toward enemy and shoot, if you get left behind turn around and shoot, profit.

[Ignatius Audene]

If I want to win I go light like flea or fast medium. So I can kill/cripple 2-3 guys early and game is won. Assault 0-3 before u are near the fight. Mixing tier 5 with 1 (even if it is only xp bar)is bad idea.

[jjm1]

It's probably best to just assume your team is going to turn and run the other direction in the event of an enemy push and waste any usefulness you could have provided in your role as a giant bullet sponge.

Sometimes they don't though, but you never know until its over.

[MeanMachinE]

ZETECTIC, on 17 May 2020 - 12:51 PM, said:

Currently, I consider running anything less than 65kph without ecm not viable in the solo queue.

I can think of many reasons why, but the result is not fun.

Do you agree?

Before the queue merge you really could not run any slow assaults at all (speed below 60 kph) in the solo queue. Now the situation is fortunately much better, though not perfect. I think 54 kph or more is mostly ok. Even a dire wolf with AC-2's or Annihilator with heavy gauss (pinpoint damage) can work really well. Some spawns on couple of maps are still hard for assaults if the team does not help them. Good thing that team support is now usually better, than before the queue merge.

ECM mostly helps against missiles and missile usage has not increased after the merge. In my experience it has probably gone down a bit, though hard to say. Some players don't for some reason see ECM mechs that easily as they only chase the red rectangle, but you should not count on this as more seasoned players will notice you easily.

[Tarl Cabot]

Anomalocaris, on 17 May 2020 - 03:24 PM, said:

I think part of the problem is the spawns are all messed up since the merge. You get stuck in alpha lance in an assault on some maps and your butt is hanging in the wind if the enemy decides to push your location early and/or you have no support.

That said, I agree that some people just shouldn't play assaults. One of them tends to be me. Outside of some Gargoyles or fast MAD-IICs, I just don't do well in them.

FRAGTAST1C, on 17 May 2020 - 06:28 PM, said:

It used to be fine but in the current situation that has lopsided tonnage distribution and incredibly stupid spawns, bringing an Assault mech that's slow is extremely unhealthy if you're not a good pilot.

Bad spawn locations, or more like spawn order has been here even before the merge, and is likely the reason narcaring threads kept popping up. Caustic is the worse map for the side where Charlie Lance spawns on the far left. Now with the merge, formed groups land in Alpha Lance. Said groups should not have an issue on being left behind unless they are not really communicating, especially with the rest of the team.

With that said, the worse part is said teams not utilizing most of the tonnage. There are already several threads already about the lopsidedness of games with most resting on the heads of those groups who do not bring the weight to the board while the team on the other side brought the weight.

[FRAGTAST1C]

Tarl Cabot, on 18 May 2020 - 03:19 AM, said:

With that said, the worse part is said teams not utilizing most of the tonnage. There are already several threads already about the lopsidedness of games with most resting on the heads of those groups who do not bring the weight to the board while the team on the other side brought the weight.

Each solo player is treated as a group-of-1. So, even if the group used all of their tonnage, the teams will still be lopsided.