83 replies to this topic

[Mercurial]

Alfred VonGunn, on 27 May 2012 - 03:08 AM, said:

WHich is first came out YEARS ago it was ammo.. didn;t know of teh change.. But that makes no sense either... WHy would teh Gauss RIfle overload and explode but Lasers and PPCs don't?

Because Gauss Rifles are finicky new tech compared to Lasers and PPCs. But the more important reason is because game-balance wise it's ridiculous to make Gauss Rifles the only ballistic that doesn't have this drawback. As if it wasn't good enough already.

[Alfred VonGunn]

Alexander Johannisburg, on 27 May 2012 - 02:59 AM, said:

being that the Hollander is a 35 ton mech, any mech of the same weight should be able to mount a GR, having said that, the critical space needed (as mentioned) prevents the lights from mounting one, i believe. Because Inner Sphere mechs has specific hardpoints available to them on specific designs (which is why, if you played MW4 the mechs has the red/yellow/green boxes on the equip screen) and it was not until omni mechs were first "discovered" by IS engineers that the IS mechs started to use the omni-technology. now, why the IS never looked into omni tech is beyond me... seems to me, building a modular design for one system (IE ballistic weapons, or energy or missile) it seems only natural that you would, in the interest of decreasing overall maint. cost and difficulty make all your weapons use the same modular system, meaning no more square, triangular, or round pegs/holes, only round holes/pegs for everything, only makes too much sense. but hey, what do I know, right? lol

My understanding was that mechs with a specific loadout (IE every single mech except omni's) had to have the same loadout unless it was a specific variant, which had been produced for specifically those and no other weapons. so no matter what unless it was a variant, your hunchback had to have that AC in the shoulder, and nothing else and nowhere else. some of that was, in my eyes, an agent of the "fall of man" after the starleague, and how nobody knew how to change things and the rest was to keep the visually striking silhouettes so targeting comps and sensors and eyes and everything could tell a mech apart from 1-2 km away by look alone.

The thing your forgetting in the WHY of this is that.. If you know a certian Regiment has X number of Hunchbacks and Y number of Ravens ect.. You also know EXACTLY what they will need for ammo and parts... Toss in customized mechs and Omni-mechs and you have created an logistical nightmare... since you now have to have a LOT more different things shiped to that unit just in case..

[Sesambrot]

Alfred VonGunn, on 27 May 2012 - 03:08 AM, said:

WHich is first came out YEARS ago it was ammo.. didn;t know of teh change.. But that makes no sense either... WHy would teh Gauss RIfle overload and explode but Lasers and PPCs don't?

I'm not sure about Lasers and PPC, but the GaussRifle uses very big capacitors to provide the enormous amount of energy required when firing. Those capacitors, when hit, may overload and explode... Exploding capacitors are nasty!!!

[RealSoladrin]

Sesambrot, on 27 May 2012 - 03:13 AM, said:

I'm not sure about Lasers and PPC, but the GaussRifle uses very big capacitors to provide the enormous amount of energy required when firing. Those capacitors, when hit, may overload and explode... Exploding capacitors are nasty!!!

A partical cannon also has capacitators, that's for certain. XD

[Sesambrot]

RealSoladrin, on 27 May 2012 - 03:15 AM, said:

A partical cannon also has capacitators, that's for certain. XD

agreed, at least it should...
...but I'm not sure it does in BT...

[Cruxshadow]

Alfred VonGunn, on 27 May 2012 - 03:08 AM, said:

WHich is first came out YEARS ago it was ammo.. didn;t know of teh change.. But that makes no sense either... WHy would teh Gauss RIfle overload and explode but Lasers and PPCs don't?

Supposedly Gauss weapons require large banks of capacitors that lasers and PPCs don't require. It has to do with energy to heat ratio.

[Anixantheas]

Alexander Johannisburg, on 27 May 2012 - 02:59 AM, said:

building a modular design for one system (IE ballistic weapons, or energy or missile) it seems only natural that you would, in the interest of decreasing overall maint.

Depends on how much you want to go into "actual mechanics" Think of it this way. Different size lasers require different power couplings, power requirments, and coolant leads. A small laser may only require a single coupling while a large laser may require far more to adequately power the sytsem. Most producers of mechs did not want to put all the spare parts in. An ammo feed for a 50 Cal gun is going to be huge while the ammo feed for a 22 is much smaller, combine that with the requirements of a Guass ammo feed system you are going to have a nightmare for the IS who is currently slowing beating themselves back to the stone age.

Also as a side history note the 2750 (tech manual) Mercury IS an "omni" design, the mounted laser was designed to be swaped out with other lasers of a certain style, however it was only designed to work with a laser system and was mainly in place for easy field maintainence.

[Satan n stuff]

Given the efficiency of magnetically propelling a slug across the map compared to shooting a bunch of electrically charged particles at something the gauss should have much smaller capacitors than a PPC. A kid in high school can build a coil gun powered by 12 Volt batteries. Now imagine a kid building a lightning gun powered by the same batteries with the same size capacitor bank, yeah that's not happenning.

Edit: There are technologies to make an efficient lightning gun but I don't think BT has electrolasers.

Edited by Satan n stuff, 27 May 2012 - 03:30 AM.

[WraithTR1]

Alfred VonGunn, on 27 May 2012 - 02:32 AM, said:

I just hope they move away from teh TT bs and make it so Gauss RIfle ammo DOES NOT EXPLODE... There is no reason that is should since it has no gun powder and no other explosive in it.. A ammo hit to Gauss rifle should just destroy the feed and disable the gun.. nothing else...

The only type of Gauss Rifle that I can find that it mentions it's ammo explodes when hit was the experimental Silver Bullet Gauss Rifle that fires a fragmenting round that seems to contain an explosive charge. The earliest book I believe I have that has the Gauss Rifle in it is TRO 2750 that just explains what the Gauss Rifle is, the range, weight, critical space, and ammo (10 shots instead of 8). Nothing about if the ammo or GR explode when critted. The next earliest is the original TRO 3050 and it states that the GR ammo causes no explosion.

[WiCkEd]

Alfred VonGunn, on 27 May 2012 - 03:08 AM, said:

WHich is first came out YEARS ago it was ammo.. didn;t know of teh change.. But that makes no sense either... WHy would teh Gauss RIfle overload and explode but Lasers and PPCs don't?

When? Link? I've been playing B-tech for some time and the ammo has never been more than nickel slugs the size of basketballs. It's never been explosive (I know it's not nickel so calm down, you know who you are)

[Sassori]

Gauss Rifle ammo doesn't explode, the Gauss Rifle does. If your Gauss Rifle gets crit, you aren't using it anyways so doesn't matter if it does a meager amount of damage. It's still better than taking a hit to a single ton of Machine Gun ammo. You can fit a Gauss Rifle onto a Centurion's Right Arm if you can find the weight as it's significantly heavier than the AC-10. You can fit a Gauss Rifle into the right torso of a hunchback as well if you find the extra ton. Gauss Rifle's weigh 1 more ton than an AC-20 IIRC.

There will be plenty of mech's capable of fitting Gauss Rifle's the problem is the weight. The Hollander has tissue paper armor and is pretty danged slow for that Gauss Rifle. It's not a very stable weapon platform.

P.S. To those talking about logistical nightmares? The BattleMech itself is a logistical nightmare. There are mass produced variants for every mech I believe, if not then nearly so. Then there are custom variants like: Dang my AC-10 got shot off, guess I'll put an AC-5 there instead and use the extra tons for more armor or whatever.

The BattleMech is not the same thing as a tank, you plan for reloads and armor based on what you've got, and you salvage whenever possible. It's not like modern militaries.

[Alfred VonGunn]

WiCkEd, on 27 May 2012 - 03:37 AM, said:

When? Link? I've been playing B-tech for some time and the ammo has never been more than nickel slugs the size of basketballs. It's never been explosive (I know it's not nickel so calm down, you know who you are)

I started playing BT when it was still called Battledroids before teh first law suit in 1983.. You expect a link to stuff prior to the internet:). We did everything in books then...

The Mercs yes have all the various odd custom stuff. But for the most part the House units stayed standard. ANy of the books when they talk about custom mechs they are the exception not the rule.

[Satan n stuff]

Christopher Dayson, on 27 May 2012 - 04:23 AM, said:

Gauss Rifle ammo doesn't explode, the Gauss Rifle does. If your Gauss Rifle gets crit, you aren't using it anyways so doesn't matter if it does a meager amount of damage. It's still better than taking a hit to a single ton of Machine Gun ammo. You can fit a Gauss Rifle onto a Centurion's Right Arm if you can find the weight as it's significantly heavier than the AC-10. You can fit a Gauss Rifle into the right torso of a hunchback as well if you find the extra ton. Gauss Rifle's weigh 1 more ton than an AC-20 IIRC.

There will be plenty of mech's capable of fitting Gauss Rifle's the problem is the weight. The Hollander has tissue paper armor and is pretty danged slow for that Gauss Rifle. It's not a very stable weapon platform.

P.S. To those talking about logistical nightmares? The BattleMech itself is a logistical nightmare. There are mass produced variants for every mech I believe, if not then nearly so. Then there are custom variants like: Dang my AC-10 got shot off, guess I'll put an AC-5 there instead and use the extra tons for more armor or whatever.

The BattleMech is not the same thing as a tank, you plan for reloads and armor based on what you've got, and you salvage whenever possible. It's not like modern militaries.

Actually it is, you don't need to have an inventory for every single mech as the military as a whole will be using every available weapon and ammo type anyway because there aren't that many of them. There aren't nearly as many kinds of weapons you can put on a mech as you've got for warfare in real life. There are dozens or hundreds of different kinds of weapons and ammo available for any modern weapon class that's why modern militaries standardise their equipment. Not doing so would be a logistical nightmare.

Edited by Satan n stuff, 27 May 2012 - 04:40 AM.

[WiCkEd]

Alfred VonGunn, on 27 May 2012 - 04:30 AM, said:

I started playing BT when it was still called Battledroids before teh first law suit in 1983.. You expect a link to stuff prior to the internet:). We did everything in books then...

The Mercs yes have all the various odd custom stuff. But for the most part the House units stayed standard. ANy of the books when they talk about custom mechs they are the exception not the rule.

Do not try to start a ******* contest with me. Battledroids...either way you're spouting game rules that haven't been used in over 20 years. Why on earth would they fall back to that? Even in the early 90's Gauss Rifle ammunition did not explode. Why are you even talking?

[Sassori]

***** n stuff, on 27 May 2012 - 04:39 AM, said:

Actually it is, you don't need to have an inventory for every single mech as the military as a whole will be using every available weapon and ammo type anyway because there aren't that many of them. There aren't nearly as many kinds of weapons you can put on a mech as you've got for warfare in real life. There are dozens or hundreds of different kinds of weapons and ammo available for any modern weapon class that's why modern militaries standardise their equipment. Not doing so would be a logistical nightmare.

It's /ALREADY/ a logistical nightmare.

For example: Your force is defending a planet. That planet may not even have the capability to make ammunition or replacement weapons for your mech's. Therefor you've got to import them from another planet that is /weeks/ away, minimum, as they're not going to use a command circuit for ammo distribution.

This lack of real supply chain, lack of instant communication with the people who make the decisions, and lack of ability to even commandeer supplies on many battlefields means that no matter how you try to standardize it just won't work.

Take into account also that not every Successor State can even produce every mech. Let alone the type of weapon that is in use for that mech. Standardization simply cannot exist because of the technological aspects of interstellar travel and the vagaries of mech construction.

Given the wide range of weights available for mech's alone standardization simply isn't an option, and this isn't even counting things like conventional forces like infantry, tanks, aerospace fighters, vtol's, etc.

The PPC in a Panther isn't the same PPC in an Awesome. They might share stats, but they have different connection sequences, mounting options, etc. Then add in Dropship weapons, varying autocannon ammunitions etc.

Standardization simply does not exist in the BattleTech universe, not on the scale that it exists in modern day militaries. The closest to do /that/ are the Clans with their omnimechs.

[Carl Wrede]

Alfred VonGunn, on 27 May 2012 - 04:30 AM, said:

I started playing BT when it was still called Battledroids before teh first law suit in 1983.. You expect a link to stuff prior to the internet:). We did everything in books then...

The Mercs yes have all the various odd custom stuff. But for the most part the House units stayed standard. ANy of the books when they talk about custom mechs they are the exception not the rule.

I am sorry but either you are deliberately lying or its been such a long time since you played the TT that you have forgotten the rules.

Gauss Ammo never exploded in the TT, the Gauss Rifle itself did. And yes i actually have been playing the TT since the 80s.

[Satan n stuff]

My point was that any faction is going to be using mostly the same mech types with a lot of ammo being interchangeable between them, a PPC doesn't even use ammo and it's not going to get shot off every battle unless the pilot is incompetent and if they are then they won't survive long enough to rack up the repair bill. The part about BT being a logistical nightmare is probably true, but really any war is.

[RealSoladrin]

Thanks for completely derailing this thread guys.

[Satan n stuff]

Thread Derailment Lance: kicking you when you're down.

[John Clavell]

RealSoladrin, on 27 May 2012 - 02:26 AM, said:

I was just wondering, of the currently available mechs, which one would be the fastest one capable of mounting one of these weapons? I love Gauss weaponry so with the lack of a Hollander I'm wondering how I should I go about putting one of these things in.

Until we play, I guess it's hard to say for certain in all cases. However a good few Mechs should be able to mount it. The Dragon and Hunchback, I'd assume, depending on crit slots and tonnage availability. Id have to check the Hunchback screenshots. Obviously the Atlas.