Explains why Pirates are always tooling around in Poorly Maintained mechs.
#youlearnsomethingnew.
Ironman+Career Mode=World of PAIN!
- Thread starter Marc_Hicks
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#youlearnsomethingnew.
This beautifully segues into a post I've been wanting to make all day.When I make the thread about a mission being too hard, I'll let you know...
Yet somehow, I doubt that day will ever come...
Mitch and Kiva were quite clear that every single FLASHPOINT is winnable. Mitch was very clear about this point. You can win them. Not that you should try and not that they will be easy but every single one is winnable.
On a related note...
I suggest that we use...
#MitchMode for Easy
#KivaMode for Slightly Evil (wanted harder but Mitch pays the bills so she was forced to turn it down a notch, against her will)
#EdmonMode for Stupidly Hard
LOL oh man, I feel your pain. I can just imagine what was said out loud when that dropship came in....
Hey now, you're forgetting one! The UM-R60 has just as much range as the COM-1B, deals more pinpoint damage and has more armor.
I can understand the confusion. The Urbie is so awesome it can be hard to remember that it is only a light mech.
I'd like to see initiative determined on a mech-by-mech basis like melee damage, so each one can be placed where it needs to be relative to the power curve. Trying to get formulaic just results in some mechs getting screwed over, as we're seeing.No such major changes are needed. Just add the Assassin and Clint to the game
One of the unfortunate side effects of HBS trying to make lighter Mechs viable is that some other ones at the bottoms of weight classes are made even worse.
Cicadas, Dragons and Quickdraws were never great Mechs in tabletop, but they get extra hosed in this game. A Cicada should be a viable replacement for a Locust. Trading extra cost for more structure and melee damage.
If initiative was based on speed instead of weight class, that would help. Of course it would make Urbies and Panthers less useful. I think it would still make more sense to focus on the trade off made for a large or small engine instead of total Mech tonnage though.
If you think that is a world of pain, try starting an Ironman Career and only try doing pirate missions, or at least not any mission against another pirate group. It's rather hard to even find missions (although you'll usually find one mission at least per planet with an active pirate faction), at least in claimed space. On top of it all the normal stores will likely have increasing penalties to pricing, although once you are liked you have cheap access to the Black Market once it pops.
Started in Lindsay and finally reached unclaimed space:
Here's my rep so far mostly raided Taurians because they were there and they were Taurians (HAR! I'm a pirate, well I did one mission for Arano to pay for transit across their space):
But I'm almost always running near bankrupt and having to do skull and half missions with this:
Second to last battle has been the hardest so far, skull and half assassination mission with 2 lances (one light, one light-medium) and the target was in a Shadowhawk (with a second SHD-2H in the light-medium lance). Hard fights against another SHD-2D and a Quickdraw as well, finally starting to collect some good mechs:
But there is a good side to being a pirate, the mission descriptions are just awesome (I agree with Darius):
That is an awesome story
.
Just so you know, I am actually *relishing* the increased challenge, even if it can be frustrating at times
. Fortunately, I managed to earn over half a million C-bills from my last mission-with no casualties or mech damage! Still no new mechs though, even with only 3 mech parts required! Hopefully soon.Loving the new reputation system too, as it really makes my choices feel much more meaningful. The Taurians now like me, but I doubt I'll ally with them, given how many enemies they have
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Note, the vehicles are determined individually rather than by weight, but this is undoubtedly due to there being somewhere less than ten I think.
ABSOLUTELY.
The key is the comparison to what else is available and that I don't want to use a light just to use a light. Also, you're talking as if you can't customize them... but I have zero interest in ever playing stock-only. The Panther is FABULOUS when you don't have anything heavier... but it has the same movement profile as a Black Knight or Orion. The Panther is, as I said, strictly inferior to other mechs in the game... in that specific case, the Black Knight and Orion. I ain't gonna pay 21 usable tons just for better initiative. There's absolutely no way that tradeoff makes sense.
The Commando is a much less extreme example, but the Firestarter has the same movement profile and initiative while adding 1.5 usable tons. Maybe if you really want missile hardpoints you could make the case for the Commando, but personally for lights I tend to focus on energy and support... both of which the Firestarter has more of. (I don't care about speed when mounting LRMs, and for lights I'd rather have MLs than SRMs.)
Bottom line... once I have enough Firestarters, there is no longer any reason that I would ever go back to the Commando. And once I have enough of basically any of the 4-move mechs other than the Panther, there is no longer any reason that I would ever go back to the Panther. The Firestarter, Jenner, and Spider are the ONLY light mechs that fill a unique niche without any better mechs that have the same movement profile (or faster, in the case of the UrbanMech). Although technically, the Phoenix Hawk might improve on the Firestarter if it ever makes it into the game... but the hardpoint layout has a good chance of keeping the Firestarter relevant.
Actually, the 3C DOES drop down to the same speed as a Jenner... so it ends up with 14 tons usable. Which is, in fact, the optimal spot on the engine power curve for that speed... it's only the lost initiative (for just a half ton usable) that kills the 3C.
The 2A is one of those mechs that is ABOVE the optimal spot in the engine power curve, which is never a good idea... but ends up being the kiss of death when you have so little tonnage to spare in the first place.
Edit: Almost forgot to mention a minor bit of trivia... the CDA-2A is the only mech in the game that doesn't have enough usable tonnage to max its armor.
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Dekker would have words with you because he killed plenty of meds and even a few heavies with his cicada. It's only a bad mech when in the hands of bad pilots. lol
While he dies in everyones game. Mine made the other pilots look like amateurs with the subpar mechs he used. And still lives in the campaign version at 1.3k days.
If he used a Cicada well, I'd bet good money it was a 3C and not a 2A.
3C is actually worse than the 2A. Sure you can mount more armor, but it's slower and has less energy hardpoints than the 2A, and it's not like the Cicada chassis can make real use of those 2 Ballistic hard points that the 3C has over the 2A (are you really trading the PPC for a single AC-2 or AC-5?). The 3C is just basically a slightly faster Panther with a little more armor and internal structure and a little less punching power with the loss of the SRM for 2 MGs.
The 2A is great at its design role, a light mech hunter-killer. It's as fast as a Locust and better armed, better armor with better internal structure than a Panther, and you can make a hot discoball with it using 6 MLs and 2 SLs simply by dropping a half ton of armor. Yeah it doesn't stack up well against other mediums, but it was never designed to fight against medium or heavier mechs, and its fast enough to run away from them.
Some mechs are designed to punch down on a lower weight class, like the Cicada or the Dragon which are really designed to be hunter-killers of the weight class below them. They are as fast or faster than any mech in the weight class below them with better arms and armor yet don't quite match their own weight class due to engine considerations to match the speed of the class below them. You put one in your medium or heavy lance to chase down those annoying lighter mechs that run after their morale breaks, prolonging a fight that should have ended or worse tempting you out of position with your heavier mechs. If you don't have to deal with that then they become your flankers, hold them back and let other mechs get the OpFor's attention and then just roll around the side and hit the flanks.
I'm wondering if a stripped-out, up-armored CDA-2A will make Target Aquisition easier . . . hmmm.
Dekker! Front and center, I got a job for you.
Dekker! Front and center, I got a job for you.
Explains why Pirates are always tooling around in Poorly Maintained mechs.
#youlearnsomethingnew.
That is an awesome story
Yeah unfortunately I'm probably going to have to start over since it's an Ironman save and well I think I shouldn't have upgraded the Argo as fast as I did. It's either that or break my own house rule because I'm stuck on a planet with only missions against pirates. I think when doing a pirate only run, you can't upgrade anything costing more than 90k (except the lounge just because of how many events pop that involve it) until you get a full medium lance, otherwise you just can't run the missions to support it effectively. Right now I'm struggling to make the monthly with a monthly in reserve, watching my cash slowly drop down as repair costs are mounting trying to fight harder and better paying missions with a light lance. In hindsight, it would have been better to spend the c-bills on even a Blackjack at this point.
Given the math behind the construction rules, that is... a very odd stance to take.
Although at least you're arguing for the hardpoints. I don't by any means think they are worth giving up OVER half the usable tonnage, but at least I don't think you're insane for claiming they are.
Edit: 6 MLs and 2 SLs should be more tonnage than it has available, though. Unless they fudged the numbers to make it suck less... I'm looking at the tabletop numbers at the moment and don't have the game on this PC.
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It has 4 ballistic, 4 support, 1 energy slot... so yeah in a strange way it does suck more.
Maybe I just don't understand what builds you would actually use.
With that little tonnage available, I really can't imagine mounting more than 2 MLs on the 2A... and I'd much rather have a single LL or PPC.
Edit: Come to think of it, though, we are getting WAY off topic here. I will try to refrain from commenting further on this tangent.
Welp. 1107 days remaining, score is 54,727.
I have not come close to bankrupt yet (despite what Darius nags me with) but I have had misfortune of needing to spend time down because a mission put an entire Lance in the refit state. On the other hand it's getting kind of clear the first 100-200 days are going to be make-or-break for your outfit.
I have not come close to bankrupt yet (despite what Darius nags me with) but I have had misfortune of needing to spend time down because a mission put an entire Lance in the refit state. On the other hand it's getting kind of clear the first 100-200 days are going to be make-or-break for your outfit.
Opportunity advantages in the early game will magnify in the late game. That is straight up math/game theory.