Which Iic Are We Going To See?

So in the announcement yesterday, they said the April patch was being delayed into May. They also finished with the teaser "That said, we’ve got something very exciting lined up for later this year—and believe me, you’ll want to see it."

Emphasis in the original, and of course I only caught the reference when I read it aloud. To See > Two Cee > IIC. So it looks like we're not quite done with new chassis after all, and the next one in the pipe is a IIC rebuild.

So what sort of IIC are we going To See?

Sarna, super conveniently, has a IIC page dedicated to listing all of them, so no hunting and pecking through the site to scratch a list together. There are way more of these things than I thought there were, too. Looking through, likely candidates seem to be:

Locust IIC: Easily adapted from the existing Locust chassis as they're quite close in weight (unlike some IICs), and comes with a wide variety of MWO-friendly variants with very limited out-of-game tech. It would be a potent little skirmisher with a generally very laser-heavy armament that would likely compete favorably with Piranhas. Problems: it'd be a second new light Clan 'Mech in a row after the Fire Moth, and light 'Mechs traditionally post poor sales compared to larger designs, which would hit PGI particularly hard in their efforts to recover from MW5: Clans falling short. Still, it'd be a potent backstabber with more sticking power than the Fire Moth and better ability to carry skirmishing armaments, and its ease of implementation makes it attractive.

Likeliness Rating: 7/10

Griffin IIC: A little forty-ton spitkicker based on the original Star League Griffin. The base variant is extremely reminiscent of a jump-capable Arctic Wolf (the BattleMech versions, not the OmniMech versions), with a bunch of torso-mounted missile launchers and a delicious CT ERLL for Shenans. Half the other variants are minor flexes on this theme, while one of them mounts the horde of light ballistics needed for a quality APG platform. Several variants make use of IJJs, which would be cool to see dispersed more widely through the game. It honestly looks like it could be a high quality Little Jerk, but the original Griffin model would need to be heavily rescaled to fit a 40-ton frame, and again - lighter designs don't sell, even though they're objectively cooler and more fun. C'est la vie. There's also the fact that nobody really knows the Griffin-IIC exists, it's hardly burning a hole in the Nostalgia Wall. Sad - this feels like it'd be an actually useful and helpful inclusion in MWO.

Likeliness Rating: 3/10

Shadow Hawk IIC: A 45-ton rebuild of the original Shadow Hawk, with an actually pretty heccin' fierce base loadout at that weight and tech base. 4M/4E is quality in a clan BattleMech this size, especially with jump capability. A number of the variants available are also cash money, with one specifically mentioning "a pair of over-the-shoulder ERLL". 45-ton jump-capable Incubus, anyone? Admittedly, much like the GRF-IIC, this thing would need a ground-up model build rather than just bolt-on'ing the original SDH model, since the SDH is dramatically oversized for a 55-tonner, let alone a 45-tonner. Sad - it and the GRF both are thicc and sturdy little spitkickers with a lot of potential to go far in MWO, held back by being as resource-intensive to create as a brand new assault OmniMech.

Likeliness Rating: 4/10

Conjurer/Hellhound/Wolverine IIC: A 50-ton Clantech rebuild of the IS Wolverine, named the Conjurer/Hellhound because the Clans have a serious case of keister goblins over anything named/adjacent to the word 'Wolverine'. It's a pretty easy conversion from the existing Wolverine with only some new bolt-on geo needed, COM-IIC style. None of the variants are particularly impressive by MWO standards, though the design is apparently a real killer in the tabletop game. Would generally seem to receive a "woo I guess?" reaction from MWO without Captain Insaneo hardpoint inflation and quirks, so while easy to do it doesn't seem particularly rewarding for PGI. A shame; that IlClan-era art looks sick.

Likeliness Rating: 5/10

Thunderbolt IIC (won't let me link this one, so here: https://www.sarna.net/wiki/Thunderbolt_IIC): Raise your hand if you knew there was a Thunderbolt IIC before you read this thread. Yeah, me either. Introduced in 3085 (outside MWO's nominal timeline) to make use of surplus Hellbringer and Summoner parts, the 'Mech only has two variants and they both use weapons currently unavailable in MWO - improved heavy lasers and streak LRMs in the base variant's case, ER pulse lasers and a heavy-duty gyro in the single variant's case. Heavy-duty gyros are 100% worthless in MWO, and while improved heavy lasers and ER pulse lasers might be worthwhile in some way, Streak LRMs would be very difficult to implement. While we do have the base chassis for this one and it does look like it'd be an easy job to model some new TDR-IIC geo for it without rebuilding the whole 'Mech, the numerous other problems with the design means I'd be absolutely stunned if we saw this.

Likeliness Rating: 1/10

Phoenix Hawk IIC: The Great Memelord himself, if what I've heard from tabletop circles is accurate. In some ways more of a Charger IIC than a Phoenix Hawk IIC, with a base variant that certainly made decisions. A Mr. Gargles-sized engine is at least not hardwired into the thing this time. Surprisingly? The various variants the dumb thing offers add a surprising amount of MWO-style flex for the chassis, though each tends to focus hard on a single category of weapon. You either get ballistics, missiles, or beams - the streams do not often cross on this one. That said, the introduction of Improved Jump Jets in the Grand Summoner pack means the PHX-IIC-7 is not off the table, and that could legit be a quality 'Mech in MWO. It would require a whole new model, though - or at the least, they'd have to base the MWO PHX-IIC off the Charger, not the Phoenix Hawk.

Likeliness Rating: 7/10

And some runners-up for IIC variants we don't currently have the base IS 'Mech for, which means they're all Likeliness Rating 1/10 but man it's nice to dream sometimes:

Wyvern IIC: This thing only has two canonical variants, one of which uses a weapon unavailable to MWO (ER Flamer). That said? The base variant comes with 2M/6E/2B minimum, with jump capability. That's a pretty hefty amount of burn for a 45-ton Clan BattleMech. The single canonical variant is mostly a downgrade from those numbers, but eh. With only two variants and one out-of-timeline weapon (even if substituting a normal Flamer for an ER Flamer is a piss-easy fix) and no base IS Wyvern, seems vanishingly unlikely. But it is a fun little jerk in my favorite weight range, and could serve as a reasonable alternative to my poor, poor Grendel.

Guillotine IIC: Possibly one of the most boring possible IIC rebuilds out there, for a sphere heavy 'Mech we never got because it is also boring. A mix of heavy energy and extraneous subweapons, with a decent compliment of energy hardpoints and not much else, with only a single canonical variant. Doesn't even have Rec Guide art yet, it's that unimportant and forgotten. It's a 70-toin Clan BattleMech with jump capability, which is technically a hole in the lineup in MWO, but man. Whether or not it'd perform, I just cannot find it in myself to get excited for this thing.

Viking IIC: THIRTY-ONE TONS OF HEAVY ARMOR. BREAK UPON THE UNYIELDING GRANITE OF THE DOMINION'S MIGHT AND DESPAIR, FOR YOUR FEEBLE WEAPONS HAVE NO HOPE OF PIERCING ITS MIGHTY HIDE.
.
..
...assault-weight dedicated LRM boat with out-of-timeline armor tech that would probably be nightmarish to try and implement properly in MWO, with zero canonical variants. Nah dog.

Stinger IIC: I'm not actually recommending this one. I'm only putting it here to point out to readers that this is the most goober-lookin' 'Mech I've ever seen. Seriously. The art for this thing looks like the artist was high and the art tools they were using were high. It looks like the kind of thing a maybe-too-dedicated fan would build to go LARP a game of BattleTech RPG out in the woods. This 'Mech looks like the nameless mooks the latest Power Rangers villain sends to stir up trouble prior to getting their faces pushed in by the sentai squad on its way to deal with the actual monster of the episode. It looks like somebody with no familiarity with BattleTech heard a description of a 'Mech once and then tried to draw that description from memory after a bender. It looks like it's the star of a story about a red-nosed 'Mech that gets picked on by other 'Mechs for its shiny red nose and you expect it to save Christmas but it turns out its red nose was a faulty targeting system that gave it away in the fog and it got its fool head blown off by a real 'Mech shooting at its shiny red nose while Santa facepalms and goes about delivering his presents undeterred because who the hell is gonna shoot down Santa Claus anyways.

Who signed off on this art, and why weren't they stopped? I suppose we'll never know.

The Loyalty Wolverine 7D has burned me REALLY hard on the chassis in general.

I SHOULD be able to do something moderately interesting with a 55 ton chassis, but it's hardpoints are simultaneously awkwardly placed AND limited, in addition to having no survival quirks, that I struggle to do anything better than ANY other chassis in it's weight.
The IIC would be an awkward duck. Nothing really stands out about it, and it feels like it's going to try and be a trooper mech, a jack of all trades layout where y'shoot the right arm, or the left torso to neuter it's loadout.

No variant has ECM ( Which means the Hero or PGI Special is the ECM variant behind a paywall).

Every Battletech content creator I've taken a gander at always considers the mech from the perspective of the Tabletop Game, where things like hitboxes don't matter and BV Efficiency by virtue of not having an XL Engine is better than building a good 1v1 mech. It's a really different world.

Which Iic Are We Going To See?

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