So I finally got around to installing this FP and playing it. I really enjoyed it and Kudos to Amechwarrior for doing it. IMO it is good enough to be included as a standard FP in the next Update (Heavy Metal) as it is as good as anything HBS have done thus far (Flash Points that is).
That said my experience is as follows. Note: Mods I am running are BT Extended and the BD Archer for the Give Them Kell FP mod and the LOS lines and later the performance fix mods.
The only things I ran on my mechs from BTE are a couple PPC+++ and some extended GR ammo bins on my King Crab. Any other Lostech has been acquired through other FP's or found in store. Nothing was cheated in. In fact until about 2 weeks ago this save was pure vanilla. This career run is about 2000 days in. I primarily run long range mechs, heavy on LRM's, GR and PPC's with near max front armor. I personally have modded sight and sensor ranges to 400 and 500m respectively, I find the vanilla ranges ridiculously short considering the Mk1 Eyeball can easily see that far.
Pilots. 5, 4 @ 10,10,10,10, 1 @ 10,9,10,10. 3 pilots have bulwark, breach and multi shot, the other 2 a mixture of sensor lock, Master Tactician (+1 initiative) and either Multishot or bulwark
Mechs Used.
Grasshopper, 2PPC+++, 4 SL, JJ
Catapult C4, 2 LRM15++(2dmg), 2 LRM5++(2dmg), 2 ML, JJ
Victor 2 AC2+, 2 ML, 1 SRM6+++(4dmg,2stab), 1 SRM4+++(4dmg,2stab) JJ
Atlas 2 PPC+(3 ACC), 1 MPL, 2 LRM15++(2 dmg)
King Crab , 2 GR (2 extended ammo bins with 19 rounds each), 1 PPC+++ (10dmg, -5 heat etc), JJ
Mission 1: Assault base
Mechs: Grasshopper, Catapult, Atlas, KGC
This went fairly well, although the spawn point put me in direct line of sight of the defending lance with in 1 round and was also in range of the AC2 and LRM of 3 turrets on the base. Enemy was dispatched quickly whereupon the base was taken. The added fire from the turrets hurt my Grasshopper, removing the only cockpit injury point I had. During this period a reinforcement lance of mediums and heavies landed behind me but I was able to take the high ground in the base. I had to send the Grasshopper out as bait where it took a heavy hit from a PPC removing a torso. This put the pilot in the medbay for 10 days and removed my fastest heavy for the rest of the campaign
Mission 2: Intercept Convoy
Mechs: Victor, Catapult, Atlas, KGC
This mission started well with the convoy escorts charging straight up the hill towards my spawn point. The Demolisher and Victor were killed quickly whilst the Stalker and Shrek did some long range damage for a couple of rounds. But died soon enough. I sent the Victor charging off down the hill to spot the convoy, which was taking the long way around the road, whilst the other 3 mechs moved to the right to provide cover fire right down the road. This is when things went slightly pear shaped as a reinforcement lance of Assaults landed about 10 pips away. Fortunately there was a ridge and I was able to back away but not before the Atlas and Cat absorbed a lot of LRMs from the 2 Stalkers and Cyclops spotted by the Victor which also punched an AC20 into the Atlas LT. By the time I managed to jump the Cat down the hill out of LOS and also get the Atlas down there they both had open side Torsos. This left the KGC which had backed up outside medium weapons ranges to spot and snipe from range. A called shot to the head Eliminated the Cyclops and the combined 70 LRMs from the Cat and Atlas made short work of the Stalkers and the now AC20 less Victor. Meanwhile my lone Victor was having a field day stomping the 2 Demolishers, Shreck and HQ truck in the convoy. The Victor eventually made it back close enough to the main fight to finish off it's counter part with long range fire from the AC2's.
Note: I took the advice of not waiting around and launched again with the above mechs, however the mission got stuck in a infinite load, something which has never happened before in 1000+ hours of game play. After 3 Alt F4 and reloads I decided to repair my mechs. I also loaded at this point the performance fix mod and the game loaded straight away as normal. No Idea which fixed the issue.
The really cool feature I had here was when events started happening whilst I was waiting for my repairs. I had decided to wait the 10 days until my injured pilot was out of the medbay. This also gave time to repair the Atlas and Catapult. Then the events started, 1 about every 2-3 days. Assaults on the Argo killing Techs, blackmarket access being revoked, visits from the MRBC dropping my rating with The Capellans. After all this I certainly didn't want to hang around for the 25 days the Grasshopper was going to take.
Mission 3: Destroy Black Market Warehouses (Target Acquisition)
Mechs: Victor, Catapult, Atlas, KGC
I didn't reaize (although I should have) that this was a Target Acquisition mission and though I might have left my self a bit slow but the firepower turned out to be very handy. I rushed the Victor towards the closest beacon zones and used the AC2's to take out the Air Defence command centre on the first round. This heralded the arrival of the militia lance which effectively kept the Assault lance of enemies bottled up in the top left corner for the whole match. The Victor held the first zone for 1 round until the Cat arrived to take over and then bee lined for the Zone in the pond, firing SRM's lasers and AC left and right as it ran. Meanwhile the Atlas was sprinting for the furthest Zone (on the right) with the KGC jumping and sniping the whole way to keep up. All the zones were taken with 1 round to spare. In the meantime our "friendly" allied mercs drop after having been bought off by the pirates. The Atlas and KGC are on the small Island to the South of the Target Stronghold with the Cat also moving in that direction. By the time the Long Toms drop and take out the Stronghold the Mercs have lost a Cycolps (to a KGC headcap) the Victor is a stick and the Zues is missing it's LRM arm. Of corse now I have to charge the remaining guns to get to the pick up point in time. I am really worried that I am going to have to eject the KGC but I manage to Run/jump into the zone with literally only 1 turn of the last round to go and only 1 pip into the zone. The Militia Orion finally goes down during this period but it is too late for that Assault lance to do anything.
Mission 4: Defend Base Warehouses.
Mechs: Victor, Catapult, Atlas, KGC
I like defend missions and this was fairly routine. The long range fire annihilated the Vaguard including a Stalker, Atlas and 2 Demolishers in 3 turns with the 6 turrets helping greatly, the 1 short range turret closest to the vanguard was taken out by the Stalker but the buildings took no hits. Que 2 more lances dropping on the flanks (I was expecting this) and turned the Victor and Catapult in that direction as soon as I was notified. The buildings took a couple of hits from LRM5's before I had a go at distracting the enemies with multishot from all the LRM launchers I have. By Round 9 all the enemies were dead having lost 3 more turrets, All buildings standing and only lost armor on my mechs.
At this point I decide to go after the Atlas II.
Mission 5: Take on the Rookies part 1
Mechs: Victor, Catapult, Atlas, KGC
I did not find this mission particularly difficult as liberal use of precision shot took out the most dangerous (or parts of) mechs. The addition of bespoke mechs with heaps of +stab damage weapons did knock over a couple of my mechs but no serious damage was done. Salvage was a smorgasbord of ++ weapon shopping.
Mission 6: Take on the Rookies part 2
Mechs: Victor, Catapult, Atlas, KGC
I was not expecting this mission and fortunately I always play to minimize damage because this mission could have left me having to drop a second heavy if I had lost one of my 3 Assaults, fortunately this was not so. Still the Atlas were still sporting some minor internal damage from Part 1. This mission had me spawn in a valley with little cover and no where to retreat to (map edge). Fortunately the AI is dumb and after getting my missile boats down low and in forest cover I was able to get the KGC and Victor up high on a ridge to the right where they spotted for missiles and sniped (at least 3 head caps during this mission), once in this position I just kept killing the mechs as they walked into visual range almost 1 by 1. The Atlas took a fair bit of LRM fire as the various enemies spotted for yet 2 more Stalkers and by missions end it had open torsos and arms but no lost or damaged weapons. Again a smorgasord of ++ weapons to salvage.
I really like the appearance of some custom mechs in these last 2 missions and the paint jobs looked awesome too.
My overall thoughts are that the FP design is great and difficulty is about right for people playing with fairly Vanilla build. Nothing I ran wasn't available normally (Except the PPC+++) but I would have just run standard PPC++(+10 dmg) if I didn't have them, the overall difference wouldn't be much. You could probably get rid of a few vehicles and replace with mechs. To make it harder for someone like me who likes to kill things at range maybe a few less short range enemies like Victors and Demolishers. Anything with AC20's gets pummeled until the AC20 is gone and for the most part they are dead weight to the enemy.
Anyway thanks for the great FP and if you want a suggestion for the next one then maybe another showdown with the "Muscle" is in order. Perhaps he wants his Atlas II back and he is hunting the player. Next time I am going to have to take him on and see just how good he is.
(sorry about the wall of text, but I couldn't do it justice any shorter)
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