Couple of suggestions after playing through the Campaign.

[cbradshaw007]

1. Moving mechs around in the Mech bay. Easier to organize what I am using.
2. Moving the Pilots around to organize them. Allows for grouping by role, experience, etc.
3. When bringing a mech out of storage, the ability to have the stock loadout done as well. Or an option to bring a mech to factory specs. Click one button and wait for the techs to work.
4. Please fix the warning of incoming reinforcements after I have shot the last enemy on the field. Its just weird.
5. Contract variance after the campaign. The idea that the only contracts you can get are 4-5 with an occasional 3? At this stage Two things need to come in to play, your faction rank with the governing body and payment. Give me options for small jobs, maybe i want to have use for my light mechs.
6. Add missions with caps on tonnage. This will allow for the light and medium mechs to have a role post story.
7. I saw this before, the ability to nickname mechs. This would help to identify roles for loadouts.

 

[mjbroekman]

Click on the mech chassis name to rename the mech. The new name shows up on most screens, though the 'Send to Storage' screen when you salvage a mech is not one of them (yet).

WRT #6, tonnage caps won't change the role of lights / mediums. New contract parameters will. Having time limits to get from point A to point D through point C would be one thing. Having a 'stealthy recon' or 'stealthy evac' contract where hitting waypoints and getting to an evac zone without destroying enemy units would be another.

Introducing different terrain effects or opfor effects based on tonnage would encourage the use of different lance loadouts as well. For example, making ice easier to traverse in lighter mechs (heavier mechs would break through into the water below and be even slower than in normal water) or making a "Ruins" map where heavy mechs would fall through ruins and take damage from (or just not be able to pass through because the terrain can't support the weight...or (as others have suggested) having the mission include mines that trigger at certain tonnages, so you want to take lighter mechs or risk having the legs blown off your heavy mechs.

Forcing tonnage caps is more immersion breaking than anything else...you have a Leopard dropship capable of delivering 400 tons of mech and 200 tons of aerospace fighter to a planet's surface. Nothing should stop you from taking as much or as little tonnage as _you_ want for a given set of mission parameters.

Maybe have mission bonuses for taking a certain lance composition because it gives the impression that the contract was handled by a different employer. For example, taking an assault lance on recon mission gives the impression that it was Steiner behind the contract when in reality it was Liao that hired you...maybe that would give a 25% bonus on contract payout for "deflecting blame". Or running a destroy base with a lance of jenners and locusts might give the impression that Liao hired you when in reality it was a Davion contract.

There are a lot of "real" contractual reasons that could be implemented to make lights and mediums 'more useful'...but artificially forcing tonnage limits is heavy handed and unnecessary.