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There are Heat Banks and Heat Exchanges. They're very rare.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
The problem is they're so rare.

Still haven't seen a Heat Bank or Heat Exchange.

Did get a TTS for Energy weapons though. That's nice.

I've never seen or heard of a heat bank or heat exchange.

I've seen a ton of those morale communicator things though, and a bunch of those TTS. I think I used a missile TTS for my lurm catapult but am usually inclined to take more ammo when it has a tonnage.

I tend to to go with injury mitigation or rangefinders over the morale stuff, my guys usually have pretty solid morale anyway.

I did finally see a Stalker in the wild! I wasn't able to 3/3 it so hopefully at some point I see another.

 Ouze wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
The problem is they're so rare.

Still haven't seen a Heat Bank or Heat Exchange.

Did get a TTS for Energy weapons though. That's nice.

I've never seen or heard of a heat bank or heat exchange.

I've seen a ton of those morale communicator things though, and a bunch of those TTS. I think I used a missile TTS for my lurm catapult but am usually inclined to take more ammo when it has a tonnage.

I tend to to go with injury mitigation or rangefinders over the morale stuff, my guys usually have pretty solid morale anyway.

I did finally see a Stalker in the wild! I wasn't able to 3/3 it so hopefully at some point I see another.

Just finished Campaign and have a coupel fo Heat Exchangers - still not sure if its worth it. Bought a couple of TTS's but have now sold as have plenty of +++ weapons that require no extra tonnage. Def recomend the Morale and hit mitigation mechs.

Finally seen a Stalker and King Crab inthe wild. Tried a 5 star mission against pirates and encountered a full assault lance but all with only 25% armour! Got a full King Crab from a head shot and only minro armour daamge

I just googled heat exchangers and now I am pretty salty I never found one. I have some mechs that absolutely cook.

Yeah some of them on my two Black Knights would be very useful.

One question. Is it possible to die in this game (by dying I mean the title character you create).

I've been cored a coupe times, and survived both although with an extensive medbay vacation (90-somethings days).

You can't die. Everyone else can.

[EDIT]: I did it! I finally got one! A Grasshopper.

Very nearly didn't until my character walked right up and punched the things cockpit off.

And thus the Blue Monster was born!

Sweet. I lucked out and got a Grasshopper early and he is absolute death. I kitted him with max small lasers, a flamer, and then medium lasers (and I think 1x LRM5 just to chip away at evasion). I usually get him up to mechs as close as possible and them melee and cook them.

 Ouze wrote:
Sweet. I lucked out and got a Grasshopper early and he is absolute death. I kitted him with max small lasers, a flamer, and then medium lasers (and I think 1x LRM5 just to chip away at evasion). I usually get him up to mechs as close as possible and them melee and cook them.

I keep one around for when I'm feeling silly. All the medium lasers and flamers it could carry. Thing is brutal in melee, although I'd kill for a way to extend the number of shots the flamers have.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
There are Heat Banks and Heat Exchanges. They're very rare.

Interesting, just did a quick search, and yeah, you're right. Over 2 playthroughs I've never even seen one, but they'd be lovely on some of the larger laser boats, extra heat capacity (and overheat) or just less heat generated is really good, but they must be insanely rare

I kind of wonder if maybe I've missed them; I realize that I only really read about half the loot list and tend to gloss over the heatsinks. If it was listed there I might have not even seen it.

I outfit my 'Hopper with Med lasers and MGs. MGs are good for head hunting and crit-ing out CTs in focus fire back shots.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
The problem is they're so rare.
Still haven't seen a Heat Bank or Heat Exchange.
Did get a TTS for Energy weapons though. That's nice.

I JUST got a heat bank!
That is a strange little thing, I threw my only Heat Exchange as well onto my Awesome with the 3 PPCs.
Triple tap death on that one... so worried of him getting a critical on those, at least no ammo explosion to worry about.
Yeah, my "spotter" is so hard to decide on: my one Rangefinder for better spotting distance or the Cockpit mod to save him from all the inevitable LRM headshots.
Defense Gyros I am always on the lookout for those: Defense against ALL hits and no tonnage to add... I can live with that. 3 slots though, easy to lose to those inevitable criticals.

I am rather torn to put all the expensive weaponry into the torsos due to loss with the delicate arms BUT the arms do give a hit bonus.
My sniper guys I try to stay back and keep the hard hitting stuff in the arms and my closer "brawler" types to keep the expensive stuff in the torso.
Putting ammo in the legs seems like heresy BUT is a good tactic if you up the leg armor (Gives a whole new meaning to "death from above"!).

Yep, just before the last mission... feeling far from ready so may do a few more high-end contracts.
I want a Zeus dang-nabbit!

 Talizvar wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
The problem is they're so rare.
Still haven't seen a Heat Bank or Heat Exchange.
Did get a TTS for Energy weapons though. That's nice.

I JUST got a heat bank!
That is a strange little thing, I threw my only Heat Exchange as well onto my Awesome with the 3 PPCs.
Triple tap death on that one... so worried of him getting a critical on those, at least no ammo explosion to worry about.
Yeah, my "spotter" is so hard to decide on: my one Rangefinder for better spotting distance or the Cockpit mod to save him from all the inevitable LRM headshots.
Defense Gyros I am always on the lookout for those: Defense against ALL hits and no tonnage to add... I can live with that. 3 slots though, easy to lose to those inevitable criticals.

I am rather torn to put all the expensive weaponry into the torsos due to loss with the delicate arms BUT the arms do give a hit bonus.
My sniper guys I try to stay back and keep the hard hitting stuff in the arms and my closer "brawler" types to keep the expensive stuff in the torso.
Putting ammo in the legs seems like heresy BUT is a good tactic if you up the leg armor (Gives a whole new meaning to "death from above"!).

Yep, just before the last mission... feeling far from ready so may do a few more high-end contracts.
I want a Zeus dang-nabbit!

If it helps I went into the last mission really carefully with a (spcl) highlander, 2 Battlemasters and a Grasshopper (although with quite a few ++ weapons and Master/ Elite Pilots) - suffered only minor internals to one Mech and finished first time

Your probably more ready than you think.

I missed that the arms give you a to hit bonus,

Ammo in the legs is a must !

Yeah, special Highlander I made a bit more of a generalist, I think I may have to kit him out for long range as well the big gun is too valuable to risk.

My "spotter" I will throw everything I can (including pilot) for armor and evasion to protect him (rangefinder or cockpit equipment?? spot better or better protection?).
May have to throttle back on anything with ammo that could explode.
Jump jets and heavy on lasers and armor will be tough to balance.
I found having two forward mechs tended to spread out the aggro a bit, too much on one mech could be a mess.

Powerful PPC guy, huge LRM boat, Heavy duty sniper and an assault class jumping brawler to act as spotter.
This is the combo that seems to work for me right now.

I was toying with transferring my heat equipment into the Battlemaster chassis and making a more deadly mid-range mech.

I am liking how I have him now with the reduced medium lasers / heat sinks and I mounted an AC20 with an evasion pilot: he keeps lumbering forward caving face on anything he faces off with and the other-guys finishing them off (or knocking them down for him to victimize).
I keep both AC20 loads limited to the left arm and the SRM6 one slot of ammo in a leg.

I have found that the LRM boat and the sniper mechs are a "must have".
The jump-jet mech is mandatory for the hard to reach places and for a good evasion.
A linebacker Battlemaster may be the final piece of the puzzle to hit harder and keep those other mechs from closing on my two supports.

<edit> Thinking more on it, I had been unhappy with the Awesome being too slow to get into position. Jump jets and strong heat management staying at range is the way to go. Battlemaster going forward looks like the second guy to get up front and hopefully punching when I feel he is getting too hot. Rangefinder not needed, best cockpit mod I got on this guy I think. My spotter can cower behind him after doing his job.

Literally every mech I drop has jump jets*. If weight is a real problem it might only be a pair, but the one time I dropped without them it bit me super hard.

*I have only seen one mech so far that can't equip them but there could of course be more.

 Ouze wrote:
Literally every mech I drop has jump jets*. If weight is a real problem it might only be a pair, but the one time I dropped without them it bit me super hard.

*I have only seen one mech so far that can't equip them but there could of course be more.

I had not checked all my Mechs and keep finidng - oh i can add this or that - now i have a Atlas to play with I had some spare tonange so 4mgs for when that killer punch misses.

I am assuming that most Assaults still can;t jump. Will have to check that as well and if my Kintaro can

How do you guys feel about the Atlas, btw?

Well if it's one you can fiddle with and give it jets, then it might work.

Last night was a bit of a mess for a mission:

Me:
Stalker - full LRMs
Battlemaster - Full MLs, LL and SRM6 with some heat reduction goodies. Fielding a well built up pilot/shooty pilot for him but new to the group.
Highlander - special one, kitted out more for sniping.
Highlander - More for spotting and middle range work with huge evasion.

Supposed to be a seek and destroy a lance, 4 skulls so this should be fun.

Just get into it and told "reinforcements detected", great, immediate 2 lance combat.

First mech I see is an Atlas right in front of me...
Victor was right next to him.
The "afterthought" was the Thunderbolt on the right flank.
My first introduction to the "laser" Banshee on my front left flank closing in.
A close formation lance on my left flank closing fast was 2 Highlanders, a Cataphract and another Victor.

Battlemaster ran a fast stall tactic on the lance to the left (a pretty good chewing).
We focused pretty much everything on the Atlas and knock it down a bunch and kill that AC20.
Managed to perform a retreating fight toward the Thunderbolt.
Got almost all 3 mechs in front of me put down when the Banshee does a last hail mary and did a physical attack on my Stalker and blows it's leg off.
Now it cannot move worth a darn and a fast approaching lance on the left starts to victimize it as the Battlemaster runs away to go deal with the Thunderbolt.
The Stalker falls down 3 times and i finally elect to eject.
Battlemaster finally takes out Thunderbolt and comes running back.
Some shooting and then melee and the Battlemaster claims a Highlander as a victim.
The Victor gets a lucky physical hit and takes the Battlemaster out in one hit also killing my "new" pilot.
The other highlander dies and another quick few shots and my spotter Highlander drops.
It is now just the deadly Victor and my remaining Highlander and I am out of Gauss ammo so only hitting with PPC.
Much jumping back and sniping and we both get chewed up.

The game ended when we had shaved both our torsos off and went through two rounds of melee with me finally winning.

I got the Atlas for salvage and lost the Gauss and a pretty good pilot.
I do not have the heart to re-load that was the single best nail biter I have ever played.
We ran out of everything except the enemy... it was glorious.

I finally salvaged a Catapult!

Only faced two of them so far, taking 1 piece each time. Now I have the third piece, and a standard Catapult. I think the only heavy I'm missing is a Cataphract.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
I finally salvaged a Catapult!
Only faced two of them so far, taking 1 piece each time. Now I have the third piece, and a standard Catapult. I think the only heavy I'm missing is a Cataphract.

Got the Crab?
I have not laid eyes on that one yet.
I find the Stalker is the enhanced version of the same thing: a torpedo with legs and big boxes of missiles for arms.
It is looking like the Catapult may be the better mech since it has really good jump capability.
I am increasingly finding standing off at long range is the way to go.
Many Assault mechs are designed for short or mid-range murder.

 Talizvar wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
I finally salvaged a Catapult!
Only faced two of them so far, taking 1 piece each time. Now I have the third piece, and a standard Catapult. I think the only heavy I'm missing is a Cataphract.

Got the Crab?
I have not laid eyes on that one yet.
I find the Stalker is the enhanced version of the same thing: a torpedo with legs and big boxes of missiles for arms.
It is looking like the Catapult may be the better mech since it has really good jump capability.
I am increasingly finding standing off at long range is the way to go.
Many Assault mechs are designed for short or mid-range murder.

Only seen one Stalker so far - quite a few mechs not seen - and thats not including the Unseen"

Anyone seen anything on when we get some fo the extra stuff like legendary figures etc?

Likely good news here;

Paradox has bought up HBS

The reddit comments had one of the PDX guys answer some questions/concerns, and it looks like they'll mostly leave HBS alone and throw them some more resources. As a lover of most of PDX's games I'm curious how this works out, and I'm hoping we'll get some excellent DLC/expansions for the game in the not so distant future.

I'd also kill for a CKII/EUIV style game set during the succession wars.

Also, I finally beat the game. I think I spent too much time grinding out two full assault lances, so the final missions were a little easy. I'll probably tool around for a bit and play with my shiny new toys, but I figure I'll end up modding the game until I break it for my second run.

 Talizvar wrote:
Got the Crab?
I have not laid eyes on that one yet.
I find the Stalker is the enhanced version of the same thing: a torpedo with legs and big boxes of missiles for arms.
It is looking like the Catapult may be the better mech since it has really good jump capability.
I am increasingly finding standing off at long range is the way to go.
Many Assault mechs are designed for short or mid-range murder.

Oh no, no assault 'Mechs yet other than a Victor, as it's the only one I've seen all play through.

Beyond that nothing heavier than an Orion/Black Knight.

The Catapult's issue is only 1 missile slot per arm.

A fellow player over on Reddit had a cool image idea.

I expanded and made a shirt.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07DK4VV6K

 Blacksails wrote:
Likely good news here;

Paradox has bought up HBS

The reddit comments had one of the PDX guys answer some questions/concerns, and it looks like they'll mostly leave HBS alone and throw them some more resources. As a lover of most of PDX's games I'm curious how this works out, and I'm hoping we'll get some excellent DLC/expansions for the game in the not so distant future.

I'd also kill for a CKII/EUIV style game set during the succession wars.

Also, I finally beat the game. I think I spent too much time grinding out two full assault lances, so the final missions were a little easy. I'll probably tool around for a bit and play with my shiny new toys, but I figure I'll end up modding the game until I break it for my second run.

Big fan of the support Paradox gives their studios for ongoing content. Big hopes for Battletech.

Hmm. Not completely sure if this is good or bad. It could mean extra money so HBS can climb the final barrier between good ideas with mediocre execution and excellent games, but...

I guess I'm not terribly sold on paradox's direction these days. EUIV feels worse and worse to me with its revisions, stellaris is a pile of dog turds and will remain that way regardless of how much polish they dump into the mix, and CK ii desperately needs a new user interface.

They've got so much going on internally, I'm not convinced acquiring HBS will actually help anyone. Just another distraction for PDS and another layer of management hoops for HBS.

Personally I like the direction they are taking Stellaris in. But then I'm more pleased that its not Crusader King 2 in space and is in fact closer to Sins of a Solar Empire.

I can understand some don't like the changes, though personally I don't relaly get the insane hate that hyperlanes gets (esp as late game you've got other means of transport anyway). Plus making you actually have to engage space stations to conquer systems at least makes static defences of use; in the earlier versions static defences were almost useless because you could just fly right around them or even ignore them totally if they weren't in a perfect position near a key planet.


I think Battletech getting more resources and freedom to expand their product is great. We have a greater chance of seeing new mechs, new maps, new missions heck even a new campaign or game mode.

None of that relates to my issues with Stellaris. Its purely a number increment game. You wait for numbers to get bigger, then you expend them to build a space station or increase your fleet, or whatever. Then you wait for more increments. And repeat.

When war comes you commit your forces, hope they will intersect with the enemy forces at some point and your numbers are bigger when they do. Then you wait for numbers to increment some more.

There are shockingly few game play decisions to be made, and most of them converge over time.
Everything eventually becomes owned, and the end game happens at you without much of a mid game occurring at all.

As for BT... I doubt very much that publisher ownership results in more freedom. (Or that it will help with the legal issues faster).

More mechs is larger a matter of advancing the timeline (or seeing the legal mess finally die once 2021 rolls around and HG loses the robotech license, assuming the Japanese companies don't wade in its place).

Maps and even campaigns were in HBS' power even without paradox, though the latter would be more costly.

Meanwhile they're still on the hook for some of the kick starter promises that got put off to post launch.