Repair Time

[Wayneable]

Am I the only one here that thinks the repair time / refit time for mech are a little too long?

I mean if a spider that has lost it´s arm and torso take 92 days to repair, I dont want to think how long it will take for a heavy/assault mech too.

It just makes to so hard to always have a lance of mechs ready for the next contract. And you do not have the time or money to wait for it to be ready.

It is something that needs to be looked at.

Or am i just doing something wrong?

 

[Lord Skeletor]

Totally agree. The wait is entirely too long.

 

[ZenTeapot]

Half the repair and quarter the refit time should be a good balance. Extended repair time also makes accumulating c-bills almost impossible.

 

[Frad in'Ryth]

Completely agree it's not balanced well.
I got through the first story line mission in bad shape lost my Blackjack and Spider to some lucky hits. My Vindicator and Shadow Hawk finished but torn to hell. I figured okay this'll be rough but I'm getting 1.6mil credits I'll ride out the down time with doing the .5 missions and just try to float till my lance is back up to strength. 139 days of repair and refit, being just under 1 million credits, burning 233k a month oh and the two missions that it showed me were a 1.5 and a 2 rating. My Locust wasn't going to be doing jack all on it's own.

I'd like to see either the repair/refit time left where it is but have all your mechs process at the same time not sequentially or greatly reduce the timers.
I'd also like to see the low payout milk runs still be available. They should be able to offer contracts based on the total tonnage of the mechs you can field.

I like to work through bad missions and not reload a game because of a couple of lucky shots the enemy got. But when one bad mission ends a campaign not because you lose the mission but because you can't afford to float through the repair time before you have a chance at accomplishing the next contracts there's something wrong in the game mechanics.

 

[rgreat]

It is cannon. Welcome to 3025.

You do not have omnitech to easily swap out stuff.

Want custom - be ready to wait.

And by the way, plan what you doing in mechlab ahead of time instead of randomly fiddling with setup.
Less moves you make - shorter the wait.

My setups usually take under 2 weeks to rebuild from stock.

 

[Wayneable]

It is cannon. Welcome to 3025.

You do not have omnitech to easily swap out stuff.

Want custom - be ready to wait.

And by the way, plan what you doing in mechlab ahead of time instead of randomly fiddling with setup.
Less moves you make - shorter the wait.

My setups usually take under 2 weeks to rebuild from stock.

I know it is 3025, I have play the table top game sense the 80´s, so i know what it is like to play in 3025. But even in the table top game repair didn't take this long, it was weeks not mouths for repairs.

And like Frad said it cant be right that you have to reload a mission from the start because the enemy gets a lucky shot in. You should be able to play the campaign throw with out doing something like that.

 

[TaurianMerc]

Repair time was of the things they took a long look at in order to balance, any shorter and you would quickly lose the sense of threat since mechs cannot be easily destroyed.
If you find you have a long repair queue forming, then maybe you need to look at how your are playing the missions- just because you can take a large amount of punishment doesn't mean you should.
Yes, RNG is always going to go against you at some point or other (as well as working in your favour) but you have the means to lower the chances of catastrophic damage.
Keep moving, speed and cover are your friends, don't stand around slugging it out.
If you can, keep a couple of extra mechs on standby, they may not be ideal, but they can try to fill in on missions carry you over until the next payday

 

[Wayneable]

Repair time was of the things they took a long look at in order to balance, any shorter and you would quickly lose the sense of threat since mechs cannot be easily destroyed.
If you find you have a long repair queue forming, then maybe you need to look at how your are playing the missions- just because you can take a large amount of punishment doesn't mean you should.
Yes, RNG is always going to go against you at some point or other (as well as working in your favour) but you have the means to lower the chances of catastrophic damage.
Keep moving, speed and cover are your friends, don't stand around slugging it out.
If you can, keep a couple of extra mechs on standby, they may not be ideal, but they can try to fill in on missions carry you over until the next payday

OK, so a three month wait time for replacing an arm and repairing a side torso on a spider is balanced? Sorry if i do not agree with you on that.

And it not like you have the money to have mechs i storage for when you need them, i try to have one light, but sometime if you are unlucky you will have more then one mech out of action do to repairs. If it is just armour damage that is fast and easy to get repaired, but as soon as any internal damage is taken the repair time sky rocket out of promotion.

If my spider would have been totally shot to crap, missing both arms and a leg, then I would not have had a problem with the wait time of three months. But we are talking about one arm shot of and side torso internal damage. Three months is a little much if you ask me.

 

[Bladewinder]

Why repairs take so long ? Because in this game you cannot lose mechs.
There is no threat of the mech getting destroyed, to balance out you sit out and wait for repairs.

This is to contrast with the other series where mechs can get destroyed and you lose them forever.
But in those games, you worked in the Innersphere, so contracts are relatively well paid, low chance of getting stabbed in the back (thanks to the MRB / MRBC) and mechs are easily purchased since all the big name industries are in the Innersphere.

Lost a mech ? Fancy something heavier ? Take a look at Coventry or Defiance finest catalogs and be on your way with a shiny new factory heavy or assault.

Not so for Periphery. You are not going to buy a factory fresh mech after your Blackjack blown up under you. Not because you can't afford it, but because there is no factory making a mech within 100 light years.

So HBI have to balance this out with the fluff as well.
Mechs are kinda rare in 3025 but many IS factories still churn them out.
But they are extremely rare in the Periphery where there are hardly any good mech factories.

 

[Spartakus]

I can live with damaged mechs spending a long time in the mechbay. What bugs me is that scrapping a mech and replacing it with a fresh salvaged one is instantaneous.

Also this is not a customization problem. Returning a side torso + arm to stock configuration takes just as long as turning into a weird frankenmech.

 

[Thisguy]

I can get on bored with long repair times since mech do not get destroyed and there needs to be a fear for your mech getting damaged, but the long refit time does not go with anything that was said above.
You don't need a factory to change the load out on a mech, you have a mech bay and a staff to do it.
8 days to remove the PPC that is the default, another 6 days to add the LRM you want instead, then another 4 days to add the LRM ammo, and 2 more days to remove the one heat sink you don't need with the PPC gone. 20 days to change out a weapon armament is ridiculous.
I would think there would not be any time to remove items or very very little, and half to a third of the time to load weapons.
The way it is now you are stuck using weapons you done like or want, or looking at the space screen letting time go by and losing money.
Hint: its not fun and doesn't add strategy that is fun or entertaining.

 

[Frad in'Ryth]

I can get on bored with long repair times since mech do not get destroyed and there needs to be a fear for your mech getting damaged, but the long refit time does not go with anything that was said above.
You don't need a factory to change the load out on a mech, you have a mech bay and a staff to do it.
8 days to remove the PPC that is the default, another 6 days to add the LRM you want instead, then another 4 days to add the LRM ammo, and 2 more days to remove the one heat sink you don't need with the PPC gone. 20 days to change out a weapon armament is ridiculous.
I would think there would not be any time to remove items or very very little, and half to a third of the time to load weapons.
The way it is now you are stuck using weapons you done like or want, or looking at the space screen letting time go by and losing money.
Hint: its not fun and doesn't add strategy that is fun or entertaining.

The Omnitech argument also falls flat because it's the same amount of time to install the stock parts as a custom part. Take the Blackjack for instance when replacing a missing arm I played around with what to put back in it. Stock AC2 and M Laser was 8 days (four for each) but if I wanted to install an L Laser was 7 days total. If I'm putting in the stock parts again shouldn't they be covered in the replacement time of the arm? I'd also like when I hit the repair all button if I have the parts in storage it auto adds them to the mech.

I agree having a longer replacement/repair timer make sense since if your whole LA/LT got "left" on a planet then it's going to be some work to get that mech back into working order. Unbolting/unwiring one weapon and attaching a different one shouldn't be this comically long. Should it be pricey? Sure make that the trade off on customizing your mech since that lines up with the fluff, but we have fully functional mech bays and technicians it's not like we've got that Spider jacked up in the garage and are working underneath on the weekend.

 

[Aza1979]

****SPOILER ALERT****

--> The repair and refit time speeds up when you upgrade your new ship. It just depends on the investments you are willing to do. A Leopard is only a mech transporter, barely any space to refit mechs inside. It's not a Union, ya know? <--

 

[Frad in'Ryth]

****SPOILER ALERT****

--> The repair and refit time speeds up when you upgrade your new ship. It just depends on the investments you are willing to do. A Leopard is only a mech transporter, barely any space to refit mechs inside. It's not a Union, ya know? <--

Interesting, see that's the kind of thing that maybe Yang should mention to us in one of his novel long conversation options. Something like "Hey Boss, I know it's going to take a while to hammer out these AC20 holes from your Blackjack. It's the Leopard, she's a fine transport but never meant to really be a MFB, if we could swing an <insert new sexy ship here> I could halve these downtimes."

 

[Aza1979]

****YET ANOTHER SPOILER****

--> Yang will tell you exactly that. Only later than you'd seem to have needed. <--

 

[Frad in'Ryth]

****YET ANOTHER SPOILER****

--> Yang will tell you exactly that. Only later than you'd seem to have needed. <--

Clearly I have a short attention span and need immediate gratification from my digital peons.
Now when do I get a Timber Wolf?

 

[Aza1979]

In any potential DLC expanding the timeline?

 

[GermanPartisan]

Repair times are totally fine and (SPOILER: will get WAY lower with time) - its part of the difficulty this game provides to manage resources for a while.

 

[Thisguy]

****SPOILER ALERT****

--> The repair and refit time speeds up when you upgrade your new ship. It just depends on the investments you are willing to do. A Leopard is only a mech transporter, barely any space to refit mechs inside. It's not a Union, ya know? <--

I am aware of this so you have to rush to it or until then you are stuck playing with armaments you don't like or wasting time/money. This game mechanic seems to limit and take away from the game more than it adds to it with strategy.

 

[GermanPartisan]

Actually you guys make this out to be way worse than it actually is - you always have 1-2 mechs on hold and transit between contracts in the beginning is also a solid 20+ days every time - so youll get at least one mech fixed up in between jobs ... Thats just part of the game and its difficulty level to have to manage these things - and also to actually have to withdraw from a contract if you feel you are taking too much damage.

Actually Managing your Merc Unit and mechs is part of the game. I like that and I hope they do not change that ever or the game becomes too easy.