Your first impressions of Flashpoint?

[Stuckenschmidt]

Just had my first Flashpoint. A small and easy one (2.5 skulls) called Joint Venture in the Periphery, with House Steiner (blessed be their name) as employer.

Two missions. Convoy Escort and Base Defense, no time to repair in between. I brought my standard Lance (Atlas, King Crab, Highlander, Stalker). Since the missions were probably rather designed for medium Mechs, my Lance blew everything out of the water within a minute. On the other hand I could hardly keep up with the convoy, so I guess I was rather lucky to lose just one APC (hence no bonus for the optional objective to protect all vehicles). I wonder how that would have worked out against more heavy Mechs.

Payment was proper. 2 x 700.000 Bills for the missions and another 1 million for completing the Flashpoint. Plus some "rare" items (but since it was an easy Flashpoint, that item was a PPC++).

I can see the potential in this and I am looking forward to a more difficult one. I guess a 4 skull Flashpoint will be a nasty thing. So my first impression is considerably positive, although I need to see more.

Your opinion?

 

[Rustingbooger]

So what your saying is that a proper scout lance (4 Atlas's) will have to be reduced to something smaller. Drats, guess I better bring out some of the slighlty less worth scouts (Orions)

 

[MeiSooHaityu]

So what your saying is that a proper scout lance (4 Atlas's) will have to be reduced to something smaller. Drats, guess I better bring out some of the slighlty less worth scouts (Orions)

There needs to be some Flashpoints that are doable when you are playing Career Mode and starting out .

Besides, I am sure there will be Flashpoints where a Steiner Scout Lance will be the perfect solution.

 

[Rustingbooger]

A Stiener Scout Lance has nothing on my Clan Scout Lance 5 Dire Wolf's/Daishi's. Or my favorite fire support mech Bane 3.. All those beautiful missiles

 

[Kodan]

There needs to be some Flashpoints that are doable when you are playing Career Mode and starting out .

Besides, I am sure there will be Flashpoints where a Steiner Scout Lance will be the perfect solution.

Actually in one of the last two streams Kiva said that one of the Steiner Flashpoints (think she said it was the one for being ally) very specifically says to bring your Steiner Scout Lance.

 

[Gronk311]

A Stiener Scout Lance has nothing on my Clan Scout Lance 5 Dire Wolf's/Daishi's. Or my favorite fire support mech Bane 3.. All those beautiful missiles

Don’t you mean Clan Scout Star?

 

[Pewpew!]

Who are the cameos and what mechs were they in?

 

[OgreMkV]

Well, I restarted the campaign, so I haven't seen a flashpoint yet. Heck, I've barely seen any mechs.

Out of six battles (just merc contracts), I've seen a total of 6 mechs and only one of those wasn't a Locust or Spider (not including the first battle with the Shadow Hawk that Glich one-shotted in the head with a PPC, but we can't salvage from that battle).

So, five battles in, and my lance hasn't changed from the base. Well, I upgraded Glich's LRM5 to an LRM10.

Blech.

 

[stjobe]

Well, I restarted the campaign, so I haven't seen a flashpoint yet.

Flashpoints only occur post-campaign and in Career Mode, so don't expect to see any flashpoints for a while unless you start a Career Mode save.

 

[Eximar]

Who are the cameos and what mechs were they in?

Look through the mechdef files and you'll see.

 

[Gronk311]

I

Look through the mechdef files and you'll see.

can’t. I’m at work

 

[Pewpew!]

Look through the mechdef files and you'll see.

I haven't bought the game yet. Most games(including this one) are shoved out the door before they are ready.

 

[Masoz]

I haven't bought the game yet. Most games(including this one) are shoved out the door before they are ready.

Dude, the game has been out since April.

Anyway, I started a fresh career mode run. My favorite part in the campaign is when you have just started and are just scraping by, so I haven't reached any flashpoints yet.

It looks like the decided to scrap the randomized starting 'Mechs idea. You get start with a Vindicator, mini-Vindicator (Panther), Jenner, Spider, and Commando. As far as lights go, you can't get much better than this. You need to quickly get used to maintaining high evasion pips though, because all your pilots are garbage and these things have very little armor. I had to eject the Commando on the first mission because I forgot to move it for just one round even though it was behind cover.

My biggest worry was that it would be nearly impossible to keep my finances "firmly in the black" as it were without relying on the beefy story missions. Thankfully, it seems star systems have about double the contracts normally available to compensate for the lack of story missions.

That's all for now. I had work this evening, so I haven't dived too deeply yet. I did manage to headshot a Wolverine in the first star system on an .5 skull assassination mission, which was awesome start, but too bad I was only able to negotiate for 2 salvage parts... #MercLife

 

[Pewpew!]

Dude, the game has been out since April.

Anyway, I started a fresh career mode run. My favorite part in the campaign is when you have just started and are just scraping by, so I haven't reached any flashpoints yet.

It looks like the decided to scrap the randomized starting 'Mechs idea. You get start with a Vindicator, mini-Vindicator (Panther), Jenner, Spider, and Commando. As far as lights go, you can't get much better than this. You need to quickly get used to maintaining high evasion pips though, because all your pilots are garbage and these things have very little armor. I had to eject the Commando on the first mission because I forgot to move it for just one round even though it was behind cover.

My biggest worry was that it would be nearly impossible to keep my finances "firmly in the black" as it were without relying on the beefy story missions. Thankfully, it seems star systems have about double the contracts normally available to compensate for the lack of story missions.

That's all for now. I had work this evening, so I haven't dived too deeply yet. I did manage to headshot a Wolverine in the first star system on an .5 skull assassination mission, which was awesome start, but too bad I was only able to negotiate for 2 salvage parts... #MercLife

I'm talking about Flashpoint not the base game.

 

[SQW]

Just had my first Flashpoint. A small and easy one (2.5 skulls) called Joint Venture in the Periphery, with House Steiner (blessed be their name) as employer.

Two missions. Convoy Escort and Base Defense, no time to repair in between. I brought my standard Lance (Atlas, King Crab, Highlander, Stalker). Since the missions were probably rather designed for medium Mechs, my Lance blew everything out of the water within a minute. On the other hand I could hardly keep up with the convoy, so I guess I was rather lucky to lose just one APC (hence no bonus for the optional objective to protect all vehicles). I wonder how that would have worked out against more heavy Mechs.

Payment was proper. 2 x 700.000 Bills for the missions and another 1 million for completing the Flashpoint. Plus some "rare" items (but since it was an easy Flashpoint, that item was a PPC++).

I can see the potential in this and I am looking forward to a more difficult one. I guess a 4 skull Flashpoint will be a nasty thing. So my first impression is considerably positive, although I need to see more.

Your opinion?

Wait, so despite having 15 mechs in your bay, you can't switch mechs in between flashpoint missions? Does this hold true for every FP missions? If so, that's a pretty bad way of implementing this. There's no tactics - just RNG on whether your follow up mission fits your first mission's lance profile. Since ALL missions are search and destroy, it's pretty awful that a player picks his/her heaviest mechs only to get shafted on a random convoy destroy mission through the woods later on.

 

[samz812]

so when you say there is no time to repair inbetween deployments do you mean if you take any structure damage you cant repair or can you replenish armor as normal, also i was under the impression that if you have other mechs available and ready to go in the mech bays then you can swap out to them. is this not true anymore?

 

[Stuckenschmidt]

When you look at the Flashpoint Info Window, there is the line "Consecutive Deployments". If it says "Yes", then you can`t repair your units between missions. At least that`s how I understand it.

EDIT:

I guess it is also worth checking, whether the "Tonnage Requirements" mention any restrictions.

 

[SQW]

When you look at the Flashpoint Info Window, there is the line "Consecutive Missions". If it says "Yes", then you can`t repair your units between missions. At least that`s how I understand it.

So if it says yes, then you are effectively stuck with whatever mech you start mission 1 with? Can you re-armor or reload ammo bins in between? In situation like this, I think most players would play safe and go with the biggest mechs in the stable instead of picking a balanced lance on the off chance you need speed more than firepower in mission 2+.

 

[ZeroAffex]

Wasn't sure where to ask this but.. did the updates to abilities like Bulwark and buffs to Sensor Lock/Sure Footing make using Light Mechs more viable later in the game? With games like this, I love to play with low damage/high speed/high evasion mechs or in the case of Stellaris for example, Corvettes/Destroyers mingled in with a few Cruisers/Battleships and maybe a Titan depending on the role of my fleet. Light mechs seem very appealing to me but from what I heard they are basically cannon fodder once the difficulty ramps up. Anyone know if Light Mechs are worth using now or very least having 1 on hand just to Sensor Lock for increased damage from other mechs? Thanks for your time and understanding ( I am very new to Battletech the game and the universe xD ) Cheers!

-Zero

 

[Gronk311]

so when you say there is no time to repair inbetween deployments do you mean if you take any structure damage you cant repair or can you replenish armor as normal, also i was under the impression that if you have other mechs available and ready to go in the mech bays then you can swap out to them. is this not true anymore?

I watched xwynns Flashpoint stream yesterday. He was able to swap out mechs after mission 1, but not repair mechs he had brought with on mission 1. Weapons and armor (I think) were refilled.