Am I dumb or are the ranged crab things really really strong?

[Sparky]

My first 2 missions went perfectly fine. I killed a giant ranged worm thing and got a lot of gold chunk things. But on my third mission I noticed a new enemy type. Some sort of crab that can shoot. It 1-shot every single mech the second it showed up.

Am I missing something to fighting it? I just seemed like a normal enemy but my mechs didn't even have time to shoot at it.

[Lantantan]

Figuring out the game is half the fun here, so my spoiler free advice would be you look in the in-game manual bestiary and you avoid non-basic enemies unless you have specifically tweaked weapons that can defeat their armour. If you want more help than that, just ask!

[Revile]

You can see what new enemy types come up when you go to select a new mission. These will tell you the gimmicks they have and gives you a little clue on the tactics some enemies use.

[scavenger]

This only works with surface enemys. When you are on a tile where there is a enemy base so you need to go underground, you will be facing enemies that aren't listed on the map.

[Def]

Those crabs deal 10 damage a pop. I suggest having at least 15 armor minimum to combat them. Even then it's best to kill them first before they get you.

[POPDOG3]

Bullet type enemys are the most deadly type the only real counter to them is to kill them quickly and have repair drones to patch up the hull damage you will take after your armor gets shredded off by the stray shots that will end up being fired off before you take them out.
High pilot safety is also important to keep them from being killed while the mech is still up, metal frame and a good cabin help a lot.

[Avenger93]

Originally posted by zxzc77:

My first 2 missions went perfectly fine. I killed a giant ranged worm thing and got a lot of gold chunk things. But on my third mission I noticed a new enemy type. Some sort of crab that can shoot. It 1-shot every single mech the second it showed up.

Am I missing something to fighting it? I just seemed like a normal enemy but my mechs didn't even have time to shoot at it.

What you likely experienced is the illusive sniper bug.

But in all honesty, the same way the damage types you inflict are lopsided with some clearly way more useful than others (explosive and laser are better than kinetic and all 3 are VASTLY superior to thermal), the damage types the enemy inflicts on you are also greatly lopsided as well.

By far the DEADLIEST enemy damage types are bullets. Kinetics. Of which, disregarding bosses, the primary exponents are the caecilia (my mortal enemy) and the sagittarius (the one you encountered). Why? They only hit the passive armor stat of your mech. if they overmatch it, they instantly do internal damage and CAN crit your systems. if not, they SHRED your armor until they do.

Both those enemy types fires FAST. either continuous steady fire or volleys. if a single mech catches all shots from a volley, you are practically guaranteed to take internal damage unless you maxed out protection. If both caecillias and sagittrius are on the same map, it becomes much worse. The only mitigation to this is having sufficient repair drones AND NOT BEING IN MELEE so the drones can patch the armor up between shots landing on it.

But there is one other aspect to bullets. They can always roll to hit the cockpit. a cockpit hit damages the pilot. considering how many bullets can hit in rapid succession a single mech ... can you see why I called it the sniper bug? I've lost count of the infuriating number of times I've had perfectly healthy mechs go down because a volley of a caecillia or a bunch of sagittarius shots all decided to roll extremely well and simply turned the squishy piloting the mech into paste leaving a mostly intact but useless warmachine behind.

[newageofpower]

Long range, massive burst, fairly durable, shreds your armor. Sagittarius are rated the most threatening non-boss/miniboss enemy for a reason.