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Yeah, but large laser turrets. That being said, the weapon type hardpoints are pretty much just an invention from MWO anyways, to curtail customization in order to make variants viable and prevent people from gravitating to a small amount of "best in class" chassis...

Few Lights actually have Ballistics hardpoints as their factory models are so energy-heavy. And then the AC20 takes up a lot of crits as well, so much so that it often may not fit into a component even if you had the tonnage.

Still, you would receive a lot of lulz for driving this

Hehehe...

We need our urban mech.

I will stick with my atlas until they drop the clan tech.

Dire Wolves and Madcat Mk. IIs for all?

 Deathshead420 wrote:
I will stick with my atlas until they drop the clan tech.

And will be doing the same mostly with my Cataphract.

Probably going to slowly start saving up cash now, get me one of each module and then just start piling cash...

I want my Blood Asp...

Also, think I'll be rolling in this tonight.

http://mwo.smurfy-net.de/mechlab#i=42&l=7479277faadf4a364897fb1e405f73a6ba37e5ce

And this.

http://mwo.smurfy-net.de/mechlab#i=41&l=485cc779f75d88986a4a392b7715977eaffd170f

Should be fun. Still figuring out what to do with the 1-X though, any suggestions?

Should be fun. Still figuring out what to do with the 1-X though, any suggestions?

Atlas?

Bought a spider for quad MGs yesterday - loving itttttt. I would love it just for the awesome sound of the weapons, but they are actually decent now (haven't tried them for a few months).

They got better two patches ago, and then slightly nerfed this last patch.

Just bought myself a dragon 1c I think? whatever is listed first on the mech purchase list, heh. Ran it on Terra Therma...flanked with a Cataphract when we got bogged down in the volcano. Ended up running into multiple heavies, took one down and died. That's when the rest of my team showed up and punched the enemy in the nuts.

LOVE my Dragon.

Heh. My Dakkaphract (4 AC/5s) is really growing on me. I've pretty much put all my armour on my front (as I generally act like I'm in an Assault rather than a Heavy- stand and shoot) and I have the 4 ACs on chainfire- continuous, unpausing DakkaDakkaDakkaDakka!

So what does everyone think about the Pheonix project stuff? I am not a fan of any of the new mechs except the Thunderbolt. I know they arent allowed to have the original look but they lost that feel to me. For me it would be worth having if they would allow me to pick one rather than being forced to pay from the bottom to work my way up. I do like the two newer expansion mechs, the Wolverine and Griffin were always two of my favorites and the new imaging of them looks pretty cool unlike the first four. But once again we have to buy something from the original Pheonix Project to get them. No thanks.

So how do you guys think they will run the Clans? Are they going to have say two seperate hanger bays for each player or a seperate character entirely to play clans. They are trying to make things fit into the BT universe as closely as they can while being realistic. I think an additional player slot is the best bet since Clans pilots do not use money. Perhaps an honor system instead of payment. Destroy a lighter mech, get a paltry payment, destroy an equal mech get a baseline payment, destroy a heavier mech and get a larger payment in honor. Use honor to requisition new mechs. Do not destroy anything, dont gain anything, not even a free t-shirt.

I cant see them allowing clan pilots being on the same team as IS pilots. In the newer games 12(IS) vs 8 (clan) should be about the standard match size and should balance the ability of higher end clan equipment.

I'll wait to use my in-game money for it. I am so, so excited about the potential of this game once they get community warfare going, but I don't feel the need to encourage them to go for Phoenix mechs when they haven't done so many iconic house rides. Hatamotos, Vindicators, Orions all to me have a higher priority than the ubiquitous mechs that every merc has sitting around in their garage.

I really want to start acquiring house rank, and unlocking special skins that are based on more than my skill at plugging in my credit card digits.

Clans should have Honor to unlock custom rides. Dishonorable Clanners should be stuck with stock Omnis. Increase honor for kills above weight class, issuing a challenge (which should be a keystroke command which marks your target).

Col. Dash wrote:So how do you guys think they will run the Clans? Are they going to have say two seperate hanger bays for each player or a seperate character entirely to play clans. They are trying to make things fit into the BT universe as closely as they can while being realistic. I think an additional player slot is the best bet since Clans pilots do not use money.

To be fair, no-one uses money except mercenaries. I think it's safe to say that the c-bill currency is just an abstracted way of recording a MechWarrior's progress. It wouldn't take much to simply pretend it to represent something more fitting like "requisition" or "standing" within the Clan. Same for House regiments.

The way I see it, there's no need for an extra account or extra Mech Bays, but a segregation still needs to happen. To keep things simple due to budgetary reasons, we should probably assume the most efficient approach. Everyone starts as a Lone Wolf, but you have a menu where you can switch to Mercenary, Houses, or Clans, thereby "unlocking" the affiliated systems.
The devs mentioned how the Houses will use an extra currency called Loyalty Points (to be used on things such as promotions, transfers to more prestigious regiments, and special paintjobs and insignia), and how the military leadership of a House will rest in developer hands at first, but that it may later be transferred to officers elected from amongst the playerbase. I would imagine that the Clans could simply copy this system.

Of course, a unique and special feature might be more fun. For example, it has been mentioned that mercenary companies will bid on contracts offered by the Houses in order to claim assignments to fight for specific worlds. Obviously, the unit demanding the smallest price would get the contract from the House.
It would be fun if Clan units would bid on assignments as well, but instead of bidding on the reward, they'd bid on how many 'Mechs they can bring. This would be very much in line with their background ... I'm just not sure if this system can actually be pulled off in a game, as I'd expect a lot of whining from Clan players who keep losing matches because they bid too small in order to win the contract.

Col. Dash wrote:I cant see them allowing clan pilots being on the same team as IS pilots. In the newer games 12(IS) vs 8 (clan) should be about the standard match size and should balance the ability of higher end clan equipment.

Shouldn't it be 12 vs 10? 3 Lances vs 2 Stars.
The difference in Tech should not create too much of a gap, although partially it could also be overcome by IS Warriors unlocking access to some Clan tech - not entire 'Mechs, but weapons and various upgrades. Balancing would still be an issue, obviously, but with any luck matchmaking would help somewhat.


As for the new Phoenis 'Mechs, I have to say, the Griffin looks amazing.
Still, I really don't know if I will get this package as well... I only wanted the Battlemaster. <3

My bad, yeah 12 vs 10.

I hope it is a long while before IS gets access to Clan tech. It was years in the actual game before the IS was able to unravel even basic Clan Tech and retrofit it onto their mechs. Even ten years later, IS omni-technoolgy is still clunky and negligably better than a standard chassis.

I wished they would implement the class system they had originally intended to have. That was a cool system and made a good reason to have multiple characters.

According to the schedule they put out a few months ago, the game is supposed to go live(yeah I know some of us have been playing for well over a year) by the end of summer. Somehow I dont see that happening with as few maps and mechs chassis to play on.

It still has gone a long way from when I started when there were about 8 mechs and 3 small maps(all day time(might have been a night port city, I dont remember), no weather varients) and people took beta testing somewhat seriously.

Hah, try 4 'Mechs and 2 maps. And it still was insane fun...

As for Clan tech: I know the delay, but I don't think the game can wait ~10 years - especially not if it can be used as another long-term goal for progression. Maybe a single Clan weapon will cost several millions of c-bills; that should give IS pilots something to work for!

Backgroundwise, it could be represented by battlefield salvage. With how customisation works in MWO, we all have omni-mechs already anyways, so it's really just the guns and some equipment we'd really have to worry about.

A fun idea might be that IS MechWarriors actually need to salvage whatever they'd like to fit on their machines for real, meaning that they couldn't fit, say, a Clan ER-Laser until they actually managed to defeat a Clanner who has one. And even then there might be a chance that the component is rendered unsalvageable due to being too damaged or something ...
But I suppose this would get too complicated. :(

Welp, upgraded my overlord pack to include saber.

People sure are unhappy about the development of this.

If you're happily enjoying the game, btw, you may want to skip that link.

I myself got bored of it, but as a founder don't feel betrayed per se; just annoyed the game hasn't evolved past what it started as gameplay-wise.

Wow, that article is extremely hyperbolic and just focussing on the small core of players who are against all of this. I never see people using cool shot, pop tarting still hardly happens, 3rd person has so many negatives that it didn't change anything to the core gameplay and 12v12 has only received praise from the people I run into every match.

TLDR: Haters gonna hate.

I do have to say I'm tempted to see if I could get a Light with a bunch of slots to load up with various Artillery and Air strikes.

Buuuttt... recently just bought myself a Stalker- the basic model- gonna load it out as a brawler with 4 SRM6s (with or without artemis? how does that help exactly?) and 6 Medium Lasers- but I'm finding myself dying rather more than in my Dakkaphract. I think one time my SRM ammo exploded in my arm or side torso, blowing my engine- can one get CASE on any Mech, or only certain variants?

Of course, that may have something to do with how Punch (my Dakkaphract) has both longer-range weapons and I put almost all it's armour on the front...

Case can be put on any mehc, also, never put ammo in your arms. Put in your cockpit, core and legs/side torsos first.

AFAIK artemis improves the spread on SRM's.

I always put ammo in my feet, since no one shoots at feet and they almost always last the game. Putting ammo in the side torsos seems almost worse than putting it in the arms.

 Ouze wrote:
I always put ammo in my feet, since no one shoots at feet and they almost always last the game. Putting ammo in the side torsos seems almost worse than putting it in the arms.

The best spots in order are: Cockpit, core, side torsos, legs, arms, in that order. Mainly because that's the order in which ammo is drawn from a location on your mech. So ammo in head get's depleted first then center etc.

You're also fethed anyway if you lose either of the first two, so it's not as if you're losing anything by shoving ammo in there.

Ammo placement depends on the 'Mech, imho.

Ouze is quite correct in that few people target the legs, at least on larger 'Mechs. Of course on a Light those are very popular components to hit, but you could argue that you're toast anyways when you're legged as a Light

I'm also not entirely averse against putting ammo into the arm, if this is where the gun is located and you feel too cheap for CASE. Few things are worse than a ton of ammo in your torso just waiting to explode and being dead weight because you've already lost the weapon that uses it - this is what you call "an accident waiting to happen". Ammunition explosions travel all the way through your 'Mech until their damage is "used up", so generally it's safer to put the ammo as far away from your engine as possible. The only exception to this is when you use CASE, in which case you should of course store it in your left and right torsos, as CASE will prevent an ammo explosion from travelling outwards.

Soladrin wrote:The best spots in order are: Cockpit, core, side torsos, legs, arms, in that order. Mainly because that's the order in which ammo is drawn from a location on your mech. So ammo in head get's depleted first then center etc.

How does the ammunition load sequence affect where you should store it? When you have X tons of ammo to put somewhere, isn't it somewhat irrelevant that the weapon would draw from the cockpit first? If you don't put that ammo into the cockpit the weapon will simply draw it from elsewhere.
The only reason for storing ammunition in the cockpit that I could think of is that this location is really, really hard to hit.

Avatar 720 wrote:You're also fethed anyway if you lose either of the first two, so it's not as if you're losing anything by shoving ammo in there.

I wouldn't be too sure about that. Crit damage is selected randomly from the things you place in a component - this includes items already pre-installed, which for the head component would mean: 2 slots of cockpit, 2 slots of life support, 1 slot of sensors. If you're hit in the head and those things take damage, you may still survive, because life support and sensors being destroyed has (as of this moment) no effect in MWO. If you have an ammo explosion, however, you can bet that the resulting explosion will take out everything at once, including the 2-slot cockpit and thus your pilot.
Of course, it could be argued that the head component is so vulnerable that if you are hit there at all it's likely to cause sufficient damage to kill all your crits anyways.

Soladrin wrote:Wow, that article is extremely hyperbolic and just focussing on the small core of players who are against all of this. I never see people using cool shot, pop tarting still hardly happens, 3rd person has so many negatives that it didn't change anything to the core gameplay and 12v12 has only received praise from the people I run into every match.
TLDR: Haters gonna hate.

Ya, plenty of outright lies in that article. For example, the only change in armour values was doubling them compared to TT values way back around the start of Closed Beta. "Ghost Heat" details also did not have to be "wrangled" from the devs but were announced in a Command Chair post before the feature even went live. And that it curbs high damage alphas is not an issue, it's an intended feature and the whole point this was even introduced.

The only somewhat valid criticisms I see there are the consumables and 3PV, but the former is indeed rarely used (in fact I've only ever seen it once in spectator) and the latter is merely an annoyance but certainly not a gamebreaker. What the article is correct about is the studio kind of misleading people by breaking certain promises - they've since apologised for making them at all, and although I still do not agree with the choices they made, I have to agree that promises are just never a good idea in this industry.

Soladrin wrote:AFAIK artemis improves the spread on SRM's.

And by "improves" he means "lowers".

Why do you care in what order ammo is pulled from? It seems that you're unnecessarily increasing your chances of an ammunition explosion right next to your engine unless you have CASE.

edit: ninja'd!

That was a horrible article and very untrue. It caters to a tiny few disguntled players and judging by the 12 vs 12 part, the power gamers who were used to being the so called elite players. This game is live and well and improving with almost every patch. Just remember the game is still in Beta and devs are perfectly allowed to make changes to see how they work. Succh is the life of a beta tester which in effect we are until the game is officially live.

 Ouze wrote:
Why do you care in what order ammo is pulled from? It seems that you're unnecessarily increasing your chances of an ammunition explosion right next to your engine unless you have CASE.

edit: ninja'd!

This is aimed at Lynata too.

First off, by the point that I can get an ammo explosion there I'm already dead regardless, you know, it being my cockpit or core. Secondly, because I use up ammo rapidly it's already dried up most of the time anyway. Thirdly, I have never had an ammo explosion anyway in the last 3 months, they have become a rare thing the current version, hell, has anyone actually noticed it even still happening?

I perferr to stick 1 ton in the head, except for with catapults which suffer from a large cockpit. I then tend to spread it between the legs (unless its a light mech) and the locations the weapons are located. This is since weapons draw ammo from their own location before moving onwards to other locations. I wish it cleaned out the head last though. Dam waste not keeping it their till the end but it would make sense irl since you really wouldn't want to have much more than an ejector seat pushing you out of a cockpit.

Soladrin wrote:First off, by the point that I can get an ammo explosion there I'm already dead regardless, you know, it being my cockpit or core. Secondly, because I use up ammo rapidly it's already dried up most of the time anyway. Thirdly, I have never had an ammo explosion anyway in the last 3 months, they have become a rare thing the current version, hell, has anyone actually noticed it even still happening?

Don't get me wrong, I'm storing ammo in the head component as well - but it doesn't have anything to do with the loading sequence, just that this area is very rarely hit.

No idea about whether or not ammo explosions have been nerfed, though - this is one of those details that are really hard to spot, I think. The only time I truly noticed it was in a slo-mo gif showing how it looks like...

Ledabot wrote:Dam waste not keeping it their till the end but it would make sense irl since you really wouldn't want to have much more than an ejector seat pushing you out of a cockpit.

That, and it makes sense mechanically. If you imagine the autoloader like a sort of conveyor belt carrying shells and missiles, then obviously its end will be empty first. Basically, the ammunition being loaded is actually from the location nearest to the weapon - but that place simultaneously "restocks" itself from the next component, and all the way to the head.