head hits injuring pilots

[HonorKnight]

I thought LRMs had the swarming mechanic, so the head would only be hit if the first hit of the salvo hits the head, if not all the remaining missiles had 0% chance to hit the head.

Yup. An LRM20 is no better at securing an injury via head hit than a single laser or AC shot due to clustering. https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/index.php?threads/clustering-and-hit-tables.1073700/

If you want to maximize pilot injuries, go machine guns or SRMs. Machine guns get 5 shots a around, and neither they nor SRMs use clustering logic so every projectile gets a chance to hit the head.

But more importantly, raise your tactics skill. Higher level tactics give a bonus to called shots, making it much easier to intentionally hit the head (either with machine guns/SRMs for injuries, or AC/20s for one-shots, or potentially even with an AC/10+ for one-shots if any AC/10 variants raise the damage by even 1 point)

 

[Jack Ryan]

I am more ok with head hits jarring my pilot than side torso destruction. That seem a little excessive considering how easy it is to injure pilots through knockdowns.

I think it's HBS's way of displaying threat. Now that all locations behave like the mech has CASE. In the lore and TT if a 3025 mech took an ammo hit ... It was pretty much game over for the mech and pilot. Ammo detonations would eat everything in a location and then transfer to the next, potentially lighting off all the ammo in the mech.

 

[stjobe]

I am more ok with head hits jarring my pilot than side torso destruction. That seem a little excessive considering how easy it is to injure pilots through knockdowns.

Well, your cockpit generally sits right next to the side torso that (probably violently) just disintegrated. It'd be weird if it didn't affect you at all.

Also, on head hits in general, there has to be some way for us to need more than the four-five 'MechWarriors we start out with, and injuries is the mechanic for that. Take enough injuries and the MechWarrior might even die outright (AC/20 or armoured-fist-through-cockpit-syndrome might spell the end for a MechWarrior rather abruptly).

As was noted by @MeiSooHaityu above, the only ways there's any negative effect on our MechWarriors (except possibly for the out-of-combat event system) is through injuries from head hits, knockdowns, and side torso destruction.

Contrast that with our 'Mechs, which get damaged (to one degree or other) just about every time we take to the field.

 

[Jack Ryan]

Besides, if the frequency of head hits seems too high, simply alter the percentage to Target the head to 4% at every angle (low or high ground) . It worked rather well in the beta. Still had 1-2 head hits per match with all the ordinance being lobbed around. That would be all you need to do to tone it down. IIRC certain angles of fire increase head hit chances to about 16%.

 

[HonorKnight]

Kiva has said she wants you to feel the need for more than 4 or 5 pilots; she wanted your pilots to be injured a LOT so you're forced to maintain a larger crew of a dozen or so pilots by the endgame to be able to keep doing enough missions to stay afloat as a company. If you have a lot more pilots, losing and replacing one now and then isn't so devastating - and Kiva wants us to regularly lose pilots (she estimated 10 dead pilots in the course of the campaign) without feeling like we have to reload any time that happens.

 

[Camicon Dachass]

Kiva has said she wants you to feel the need for more than 4 or 5 pilots; she wanted your pilots to be injured a LOT so you're forced to maintain a larger crew of a dozen or so pilots by the endgame to be able to keep doing enough missions to stay afloat as a company. If you have a lot more pilots, losing and replacing one now and then isn't so devastating - and Kiva wants us to regularly lose pilots (she estimated 10 dead pilots in the course of the campaign) without feeling like we have to reload any time that happens.

You know, I would have liked the ability to customize pilots I hire, but not being able to will make it easier for me to resist the temptations to re-do a mission where one of them gets Beta'd.

That's one thing I found out about myself when playing XCOM. The second I began customizing a character I was loath to lose them to RNJesus, so if they missed a 99% shot and then got blown apart by a 1% shot from some Xeno on its last legs I was loading a new game before the cinematic even finished.

Losing a pilot will hurt, but because I can't customize them I won't feel like I'm losing more than just a small part of my otherwise large and competent crew.

 

[Holy.Death]

Kiva has said she wants you to feel the need for more than 4 or 5 pilots; she wanted your pilots to be injured a LOT so you're forced to maintain a larger crew of a dozen or so pilots by the endgame to be able to keep doing enough missions to stay afloat as a company. If you have a lot more pilots, losing and replacing one now and then isn't so devastating - and Kiva wants us to regularly lose pilots (she estimated 10 dead pilots in the course of the campaign) without feeling like we have to reload any time that happens.

10 dead pilots per campaign doesn't sound like much, does it? I am feeling that the only way to actually lose pilots is not by injuries, it's by getting Core Torso of a pilot's mech destroyed by concentrated enemy fire, rather than through accumulating enough injuries. Even more so given the fact that destroying the torso (among other stuff) is much easier to do than wounding, especially when it comes to lighter mechs.

 

[Tovarisc]

10 dead pilots per campaign doesn't sound like much, does it? I am feeling that the only way to actually lose pilots is not by injuries, it's by getting Core Torso of a pilot's mech destroyed by concentrated enemy fire, rather than through accumulating enough injuries. Even more so given the fact that destroying the torso (among other stuff) is much easier to do than wounding, especially when it comes to lighter mechs.

Yet Cohh's pilot lost 2 HP out of 3 HP from 2 salvos of LRM's over something like 5 turns. This was with medium mech. You can totally lose pilots to injuries if you don't go guts on them.

 

[TaurianMerc]

I'm surprised nobody mentioned that as well as being knocked around and suffering neuro-feedback, any hits to cockpit (well anywhere really) have the potential to cause spalling. Your Mechwarrior can literally be shredded apart in his own cockpit!

 

[Iron Legionnaire]

I'm surprised nobody mentioned that as well as being knocked around and suffering neuro-feedback, any hits to cockpit (well anywhere really) have the potential to cause spalling. Your Mechwarrior can literally be shredded apart in his own cockpit!

Modern vehicles have spall liners and spaced armour to mitigate this sort of thing. Concussive effects are still a major concern, and uncontrolled falls certainly could easily injure or kill a pilot, along with more exotic stuff like neurofeedback and whatnot...

 

[TaurianMerc]

Modern vehicles have spall liners and spaced armour to mitigate this sort of thing. Concussive effects are still a major concern, and uncontrolled falls certainly could easily injure or kill a pilot, along with more exotic stuff like neurofeedback and whatnot...

Spall liners can reduce the threat of spalling I agree, but doesn't eliminate it.
As for spaced armour, I've not seen any on the mechs (largely because it wasn't it wasn't large in the public consciousness in the early days of BT)

 

[Iron Legionnaire]

Spall liners can reduce the threat of spalling I agree, but doesn't eliminate it.
As for spaced armour, I've not seen any on the mechs (largely because it wasn't it wasn't large in the public consciousness in the early days of BT)

Apparently modern composite armour does not transmit shockwaves as effectively as rolled homogenous armour either.

I know what you're getting at, but spalling these days is primarily a product of a HEAT jet or kinetic penetrator compromising the armour... At which point your pilot or crew is about to have a really bad day regardless. HESH's days as an effective means of killing tank crews are pretty much over for a variety of reasons, but yeah, it could still happen incidentally.

 

[Holy.Death]

Yet Cohh's pilot lost 2 HP out of 3 HP from 2 salvos of LRM's over something like 5 turns. This was with medium mech. You can totally lose pilots to injuries if you don't go guts on them.

That's a good news. I enjoy games in which combat is lethal enough to make any engagement a risky proposition, instead of being something trivial.