Hi all,
The primary purpose of this thread is provide a BattleTech beginner's guide that doesn't have as much outdated informations as the ones written at game release. I've only been playing since the summer of 2020 and one of my primary annoyances was having to suss out which information was current (or DLC relevant), and which was out of date or core game only. I also want to write it for myself as a way to process what I've been thinking about. Am I qualified to write this article? No, but maybe something good may be had for you anyway.
Scope of the guide
This guide is meant to provide some basic advice for the early to mid campaign game with all DLCs. This advice MAY be relevant to career but I personally haven't focused much on career.
Starting Out
Don't sweat character creation, your choices don't have any lasting impact other than a few alternative conversation options that have zero impact on gameplay. The starting stat boosts will be surpassed in a few missions so live up your role-playing choices.
After the tutorial there's a final pre-mission which isn't very hard so long as you keep together and take down the turret generator fast. I stick to the right side. I won't ruin the end of mission fun.
Next up, you'll find yourself at a system with no missions other than a single travel mission. BEFORE taking it, go to the store and look around. This starting system has decent ballistic weapons that can seriously upgrade some of your starting mechs. I would highly consider taking any LBX or UAC you find with the possible exception of the 20 versions as they can be used, but are a little more tricky. But before we get to upgrading let's talk about some basic game management. This breaks down into 4 primary areas; Money, Reputation, Mechs, and Pilots.
Money Management
This is pretty basic. Have enough money at the end of every month or you lose. Costs are driven by 3 factors, Pilot salary, Mechs, and Argo Upgrades (you don't start with this but you have crushing loans at the beginning to replace this). At the very start you don't need to hire more than one extra pilot for 6 total pilots including yourself. My first priority is to get all 6 people to level 4 gunnery and guts. Guts for the extra health which can matter more than you think and gunnery so you might be able to hit something. Then go for the abilities which I go over in the pilot section. Pilot salaries can be found when looking at them and I find 6 pilots to be a nice early balance between costs and having backups when injuries come up. Suit yourself on how many for you.
Mechs are the next cost. It basically costs 12,000 per month per active mech. Early game, I run the starting 5 mechs until I can get a decent replacement for the light mechs, which happens pretty fast down the story line which I recommend. Once I get the 4th medium, I run exactly 4 mechs through mid-game with the exception of the occasional 5th slot for an "upcoming" mech which will take time to get into fighting configuration. Once you get into heavies and assaults, then feel free to go up to 12 mechs for a medium, heavy, and assault group of choices. A few missions will demand weight limitations and when you have those weights you will have missions providing enough income to justify having choices.
Argo Upgrades (and starting loan), I find to be of limited concern. The costs are there, but I find most Argo upgrades to be worth the monthly costs so long as the build costs don't prevent you from buying critical equipment.
Income comes from mission payments and mech salvage. When you sign up for a mission you get a choice for how much salvage vs money vs reputation. My basic philosophy is get the lowest possible setting to get 3 salvage choices and then maximize money. If I can't get 3 choices, then I go for the lowest setting that gets me one choice and max money. The rational for this is that mech chassis are the single most important early game need. Getting a heavy (or assault) is your number one priority. As that salvage can sometimes appear in unlikely missions you want to have 3 choices on the salvage screen to take the 3 parts if it comes up. You will kick yourself if you see an early game annihilator that you get lucky and generate 3 salvage for, but you don't have the choices to actually get it. I don't go past three parts because its rare in the early to mid game to have that many amazing mech parts to choose from. If I can't do 3, then I do 1 choice as then you get a little say in the salvage while maximizing money.
In general, each system should have enough doable missions to generate enough income to pay your monthly bills so its not really a tricky part of the game. You're only in danger of bankruptcy if you have an unfortunate convergence of issues likely selling most of your supplies for some prime tech and then getting annihilated in the next couple of missions (in ironman) or make some relatively dumb mistake in planning.
There's two more aspects which I will mention here. Storyline missions are tagged "Priority" which implies an urgency to take them. There is no urgency. They will stay until you attempt them so do not feel rushed into any of them if you don't think you're ready. There are also events which may have an option which requires money, so I try to have 1,000,000 in my account but its not critical. More critical is the 500,000 needed to enter the black market which brings us to...
Reputation (aka, I was supposed to be nice to the pirates??!!!)
The reputation system is pretty basic. For career there are additional considerations that I won't cover here. If you look you will notice that you gain a little more reputation with a faction than you lose with the OPFOR meaning you can actually be liked by everyone with careful management. But for the campaign you don't even need to worry about that. The only faction that matters is the "local" pirate faction. By local they mean galaxy spanning and by "pirates" they mean your easiest most common access to all of the best gear. It would have been a better game decision to name them black market forces or something along those line. Or if they really wanted pirates, have a black market faction AND a truly local pirate faction that operates like the local government faction. Instead, anyone deciding to hate pirates before they're in the know ends up having a bad play experience when they can't ever join the black market.
So, keep the black market "local" pirate faction in neutral or better reputation and always have 500,000 ready to pay the initiation fee when the random event fires inviting you to the black market. Choosing to have the pirates hate you is choosing for a higher difficulty game (which you may want, but you should know that you are choosing it). The reason being is that black market access is the dividing line between early game and late game. I don't care if the event fires on day 2, as soon as you have access you have easy access to late game mechs and weapons and will roll over the opposition quickly. The game ain't perfect.
Mech Management
Which weapon is best is common question of, well ANY game with weapons. In BattleTech you'll see discussions that revolve around PS (precision shot) load outs. Be careful of these analysis as a starting player. It's not that they are wrong, its that they often involve Marauders and high level pilots, neither of which you will see early. You also won't be seeing very many ERML++s either so you can't play along there as well. Instead, maximum total damage for the lance is your primary goal. Unless you have an AC20 tearing off torsos in one shot (which only works on small enough mechs) the difference between a PPC doing 50 to one location and an LB-2-X doing 48 to multiple locations is minimal. And that's because as a lance, your damage is getting spread out anyway, even with liberal usage of PS. Your 50 point PPC hit is great, but not enough to kill a mech on its own (outside a lucky head shot). So when your next mech fires, there's no guarantee of hitting the weakened spot.
These discussions also tend to miss out on high variance vs low variance weapons. An AC20 is a high variance weapon. It can kill ANY mech with a lucky 1% chance to the head. But when it misses, it does zero. There are times when I'm good with the occasional miss. There are many more times I'd prefer more predictable damage. An LB-2-X hit is 12 packets of 4 damage each. So if I have a 50% chance to hit, I know I'm going to connect with about 24 points of damage. If I only need to deal 20 damage to kill that SRM carrier about to fire, I'd rather have a LB-2-X firing than the AC20. (The LB-2-X also produces almost NO heat).
Armor should in general be set to max and then reduce the rear panels until you get to an even half ton. Expert players can play an entire encounter without getting hit. Good for them, the rest of us get hit, and as a beginner you'll get hit a lot. Max armor means you keep your weapons operating longer and have less repair bills (no charge for buffing the armor after a battle). Even LRM boats never meant to see the enemy can get surprised at times so I even armor up them. Start with max armor, then as you gain experience, choose your own style.
Heat management is the next big question. Which I will have to edit in later. My 6 year old is up and I'll have to finish some other time.
The primary purpose of this thread is provide a BattleTech beginner's guide that doesn't have as much outdated informations as the ones written at game release. I've only been playing since the summer of 2020 and one of my primary annoyances was having to suss out which information was current (or DLC relevant), and which was out of date or core game only. I also want to write it for myself as a way to process what I've been thinking about. Am I qualified to write this article? No, but maybe something good may be had for you anyway.
Scope of the guide
This guide is meant to provide some basic advice for the early to mid campaign game with all DLCs. This advice MAY be relevant to career but I personally haven't focused much on career.
Starting Out
Don't sweat character creation, your choices don't have any lasting impact other than a few alternative conversation options that have zero impact on gameplay. The starting stat boosts will be surpassed in a few missions so live up your role-playing choices.
After the tutorial there's a final pre-mission which isn't very hard so long as you keep together and take down the turret generator fast. I stick to the right side. I won't ruin the end of mission fun.
Next up, you'll find yourself at a system with no missions other than a single travel mission. BEFORE taking it, go to the store and look around. This starting system has decent ballistic weapons that can seriously upgrade some of your starting mechs. I would highly consider taking any LBX or UAC you find with the possible exception of the 20 versions as they can be used, but are a little more tricky. But before we get to upgrading let's talk about some basic game management. This breaks down into 4 primary areas; Money, Reputation, Mechs, and Pilots.
Money Management
This is pretty basic. Have enough money at the end of every month or you lose. Costs are driven by 3 factors, Pilot salary, Mechs, and Argo Upgrades (you don't start with this but you have crushing loans at the beginning to replace this). At the very start you don't need to hire more than one extra pilot for 6 total pilots including yourself. My first priority is to get all 6 people to level 4 gunnery and guts. Guts for the extra health which can matter more than you think and gunnery so you might be able to hit something. Then go for the abilities which I go over in the pilot section. Pilot salaries can be found when looking at them and I find 6 pilots to be a nice early balance between costs and having backups when injuries come up. Suit yourself on how many for you.
Mechs are the next cost. It basically costs 12,000 per month per active mech. Early game, I run the starting 5 mechs until I can get a decent replacement for the light mechs, which happens pretty fast down the story line which I recommend. Once I get the 4th medium, I run exactly 4 mechs through mid-game with the exception of the occasional 5th slot for an "upcoming" mech which will take time to get into fighting configuration. Once you get into heavies and assaults, then feel free to go up to 12 mechs for a medium, heavy, and assault group of choices. A few missions will demand weight limitations and when you have those weights you will have missions providing enough income to justify having choices.
Argo Upgrades (and starting loan), I find to be of limited concern. The costs are there, but I find most Argo upgrades to be worth the monthly costs so long as the build costs don't prevent you from buying critical equipment.
Income comes from mission payments and mech salvage. When you sign up for a mission you get a choice for how much salvage vs money vs reputation. My basic philosophy is get the lowest possible setting to get 3 salvage choices and then maximize money. If I can't get 3 choices, then I go for the lowest setting that gets me one choice and max money. The rational for this is that mech chassis are the single most important early game need. Getting a heavy (or assault) is your number one priority. As that salvage can sometimes appear in unlikely missions you want to have 3 choices on the salvage screen to take the 3 parts if it comes up. You will kick yourself if you see an early game annihilator that you get lucky and generate 3 salvage for, but you don't have the choices to actually get it. I don't go past three parts because its rare in the early to mid game to have that many amazing mech parts to choose from. If I can't do 3, then I do 1 choice as then you get a little say in the salvage while maximizing money.
In general, each system should have enough doable missions to generate enough income to pay your monthly bills so its not really a tricky part of the game. You're only in danger of bankruptcy if you have an unfortunate convergence of issues likely selling most of your supplies for some prime tech and then getting annihilated in the next couple of missions (in ironman) or make some relatively dumb mistake in planning.
There's two more aspects which I will mention here. Storyline missions are tagged "Priority" which implies an urgency to take them. There is no urgency. They will stay until you attempt them so do not feel rushed into any of them if you don't think you're ready. There are also events which may have an option which requires money, so I try to have 1,000,000 in my account but its not critical. More critical is the 500,000 needed to enter the black market which brings us to...
Reputation (aka, I was supposed to be nice to the pirates??!!!)
The reputation system is pretty basic. For career there are additional considerations that I won't cover here. If you look you will notice that you gain a little more reputation with a faction than you lose with the OPFOR meaning you can actually be liked by everyone with careful management. But for the campaign you don't even need to worry about that. The only faction that matters is the "local" pirate faction. By local they mean galaxy spanning and by "pirates" they mean your easiest most common access to all of the best gear. It would have been a better game decision to name them black market forces or something along those line. Or if they really wanted pirates, have a black market faction AND a truly local pirate faction that operates like the local government faction. Instead, anyone deciding to hate pirates before they're in the know ends up having a bad play experience when they can't ever join the black market.
So, keep the black market "local" pirate faction in neutral or better reputation and always have 500,000 ready to pay the initiation fee when the random event fires inviting you to the black market. Choosing to have the pirates hate you is choosing for a higher difficulty game (which you may want, but you should know that you are choosing it). The reason being is that black market access is the dividing line between early game and late game. I don't care if the event fires on day 2, as soon as you have access you have easy access to late game mechs and weapons and will roll over the opposition quickly. The game ain't perfect.
Mech Management
Which weapon is best is common question of, well ANY game with weapons. In BattleTech you'll see discussions that revolve around PS (precision shot) load outs. Be careful of these analysis as a starting player. It's not that they are wrong, its that they often involve Marauders and high level pilots, neither of which you will see early. You also won't be seeing very many ERML++s either so you can't play along there as well. Instead, maximum total damage for the lance is your primary goal. Unless you have an AC20 tearing off torsos in one shot (which only works on small enough mechs) the difference between a PPC doing 50 to one location and an LB-2-X doing 48 to multiple locations is minimal. And that's because as a lance, your damage is getting spread out anyway, even with liberal usage of PS. Your 50 point PPC hit is great, but not enough to kill a mech on its own (outside a lucky head shot). So when your next mech fires, there's no guarantee of hitting the weakened spot.
These discussions also tend to miss out on high variance vs low variance weapons. An AC20 is a high variance weapon. It can kill ANY mech with a lucky 1% chance to the head. But when it misses, it does zero. There are times when I'm good with the occasional miss. There are many more times I'd prefer more predictable damage. An LB-2-X hit is 12 packets of 4 damage each. So if I have a 50% chance to hit, I know I'm going to connect with about 24 points of damage. If I only need to deal 20 damage to kill that SRM carrier about to fire, I'd rather have a LB-2-X firing than the AC20. (The LB-2-X also produces almost NO heat).
Armor should in general be set to max and then reduce the rear panels until you get to an even half ton. Expert players can play an entire encounter without getting hit. Good for them, the rest of us get hit, and as a beginner you'll get hit a lot. Max armor means you keep your weapons operating longer and have less repair bills (no charge for buffing the armor after a battle). Even LRM boats never meant to see the enemy can get surprised at times so I even armor up them. Start with max armor, then as you gain experience, choose your own style.
Heat management is the next big question. Which I will have to edit in later. My 6 year old is up and I'll have to finish some other time.
- 13