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First off, unless you are a Founder, you probably only have access to Trial Mechs. I bet some of you are wondering how the crap to buy your own mech? (Or, in some cases, why would you?)
What the crap is a Trial Mech?
Well - think of a Trial Mech as one that you are being hired to pilot that does not belong to you. As such, you don't need to pay it's repair and re-arm costs. However, you don't earn as much money (c-bills) for each match, you can't accumulate Mech XP (pretty useful), and you can't customize it (very useful!).
Why do I want my own mech?
There are many good reasons to become a Pilot / Owner, rather than just a hired pilot:
1. You can costumize it! The Trial Mechs are like factory standard load-outs. Mass-produced for rich financiers who don't want to get their hands dirty and make a mech, only to hire some other fellow out to pilot the thing. The best Mech pilots know their machine inside and out because they have tweaked it to the best fit for their piloting style.
2. You can gain Mech XP each time you use it. Mech XP is useful for making your Mech perform better in various ways. Like handling heat more efficiently, or faster acceleration and breaking. Additionally - it's possible to convert Mech XP into General XP (GXP) by spending a small bit of Mech Cash (MC).
2b. You earn GXP by piloting any owned mech. GXP comes in handy later when you want to use advanced modules to further advance your favored role.
3. You earn more c-bills per match. This comes with a bit of risk, though - as you now need to repair and re-arm your mech from your own wallet. Assault Mechs, and those with expensive tech (Endo-Steel, for example) sometimes cost more to repair than what you get when you lose a match. A typical Light to Heavy mech is quite profitable to own, though, even when getting curb stomped all the time.
How do I get my own mech to pilot?
There are two routes to acquiring an owned mech, and reaping all the risks and rewards that come with having one.
1. Buy some Mech Cash (MC), these take you hard earned real-world dollars. Then use some MC to buy your own mech. They aren't cheap - but once you own it, it's yours until you sell it. (Note, you can only sell a mech for C-Bills). The least expensive Mech is only 680MC (About $2.75 at the going rate), the most expensive is 5,480MC, but you can get a solid medium Mech for 1515mc (About $6).
2. Save up your victories and buy it with C-Bills. The vast majority of Mechs are available for sale for C-Bills. At the time of this posting, there is only one unique variant that can't be bought with C-Bills - the Yen-Lo-Wang hero mech. The least expensive Mech (to date) is the Commando-1B, at 1.7million C-Bills. The Most expensive (the Atlas-K) at 13.7million C-Bills. Again, a solid medium Mech is well within reach at 3.7million C-Bills, or so.
3. Either way, the process in the interface is the same. First, click on "MECHLAB" at the top. Then, click on "Owned Mechs" in the lower left. Lastly, click on empty spot (lower center) and "CREATE NEW MECH" above the empty space. You will be presented with a list of all available Mechs on the right, with their class, tonnage, C-Bill, and MC prices. This is a good place to just look so you can see how much that mech you've been drooling over costs. Finally, once you have a mech selected, you can click on the "BUY MC" or "BUY CB" buttons (note: each button will be enabled only if you have enough of the correct currency).
A couple other differences between Trial Mechs and your owned ones:
- Trial Mechs cycle every now and again; the Mech you are piloting now might not be available in the future.
- Owned Mechs are yours forever (or until you sell them for C-Bills) and you can tweak and customize them over and over again.
Edited by EtherDragon, 30 October 2012 - 08:15 AM.
to buy one or even two additional MechBays per challenge (if possible). Also - look for sales, where MechBays can cost just 150 
