5 replies to this topic

[budgetcommander0451]

Does anyone have any advice on how I should set up the Stone Crusher? I really have no clue how to make this thing work without overloading in two bursts.

[epikt]

budgetcommander0451, on 05 January 2025 - 12:13 PM, said:

I really have no clue how to make this thing work without overloading in two bursts.

No matter what you do, as long as you're doing it well, a mech with 13 energy hardpoints will be toasty. And that's a good thing. Unlock all the heat related skills and practice fire discipline,...

edit: I checked my build, and it happens I switched to single heat sinks. Apart from a slower engine, it's better than the DHS stock in both heat capacity and dissipation.

Edited by epikt, 05 January 2025 - 03:48 PM.

[LordNothing]

annihilator has a cover problem given its high cockpit and relatively low guns. i always try for head shots on hill humping annis for that very reason. you need to expose considerably to hill hump. lateral trading is better for this chassis, so i split my loadout into left and right sides and assign to left and right mouse buttons (groups 1 and 2) respectively. then you have a minimal exposure option for trading from either side, and can do a 1-2 punch in the open.

Edited by LordNothing, 05 January 2025 - 09:49 PM.

[Void Angel]

The Stock build is good, but you can also swap over to Large Pulse Lasers in order to increase your firepower. Hammer people with that huge laser alpha, and then use the MLAS or LPL to keep up momentum or while you pull back into cover, depending on how close the enemy is. If you're looking for more sustainable firepower and less armor stripping, Something Like This might work better in your quickplay matches, and of course you could use epikt's Single Heat Sink build.

A word on the Stone Crusher, and on Annihilators in general: The Annihilator isn't scary just because it has a lot of hardpoints - it's also scary because it can spread damage better than almost any other 'mech in the game. You only need to waggle your nose at people, and that boat-shaped upper hull will spread damage across all your torsos, and your arms are in a position to block some fire as well (unlike the Stalker, which enjoys similar benefits.) This is what makes the chassis so powerful when played properly, but its generally slow speed make it difficult to recover from bad exposures, so you have to learn how to position yourself around the fight.

Which brings us to the Stone Crusher: the Stone Crusher is unique among other variants of the chassis in two ways: first, it has a huge number of energy hardpoints; and second, it has an engine cap above 300. This allows the Stone Crusher to field builds that other Annihilators find difficult, or simply can't use - not just because they don't have the hardpoints, but because they don't have as much speed.

So, like any energy-heavy build, you want to ignore all cooldown skill nodes, taking only heat generation, range, and duration. Then pick up the entire speed tweak tree and put the other skills you saved into radar deprivation, turn/twist nodes, or even more consumables.

[CFC Conky]

Shave the arms and legs a bit and you can get 32 single heat sinks in the Stone Crusher and still have room for 2xBLCs and 8xERML running a STD325 engine.

Good hunting,
CFC Conky

[Void Angel]

Or 33 SHS and 9 ERMLs, depending on how daring you're willing to be - though the difference from just the Blazer upgrade isn't much, even with the extra heat sinks. It's just not a large enough proportion of the overall damage output and heat cost. Still, it's always good to remember that duct-taping two LLs together into a BLC gives you slight efficiency upgrade in exchange for a longer burn time.