Clan's mechs are too weak vs IS mechs

[P.J]

Come on, I am piloting a Stormcrow, and after the very first laser exchanges with light mech's laser, my armor is down at 91%, REALLY, after 3 shots of small lasers?

How do you think my Star did in this fight in the city vs the Kuritan forces on the last 4 mech that have an Awesome in it? I had 2 pilots that were already ejected, and the last 3 of us were below 40%. We failed, badly.

The damages are not consistent: even though we have clan tech, it doesn't really show. It takes 2-3 rounds of 5 clan mechs each shooting all its weapons at the same light mech to kill it. That's way too long for medium 50T clan mechs.

We should be able to do 1 clan vs 2 IS light easy without much damage, but we can't and we need to focus fire every time.

That's not how it should work if you are throwing over 25 mechs per battles + turrets, tanks and airborne to hit 5 clan mechs.

[Cuce]

Originally posted by Kel'Ithra:

My issue so far is their ideas of "Boss" fights especially those giant vtols. Also considering how much metal you have to clear through just the attrition itself will wear you out. Only time I felt squishy is the supposed "boss" fights and some of those extended waves of them throwing everything at you plus the kitchen sink.

I did notice that UAC20's felt useless, like they didn't cause any significant damage, and Gauss so far feels extremely underwhelming, like all it does is tickle mechs even light mechs.

Gauss is silly I agree, uc s though find their place towards the end

[isawaawasi5]

Solid shot UACs are great. If you get lucky with your jam chance rolls, a UAC20 can do 100 damage in about 1 second. And that's before upgrades.

[isawaawasi5]

Originally posted by Harukage:

Originally posted by gejamugan1:

Don't clan mechs run hotter as their weapons are more heat intensive than is version's?

It is purely PGI "blance" from MWO. Clan mech are much cooler, while it is IS mech literally cooking their pilots if they dare to use alpha-strikes. Clan double heatsinks are simply that good.
JFC people still can't understand how huge was the tech gap between Clans and IS at the time.

A lot of Clan mechs run very hot. Besides their hotter weaponry offsetting the gains from DHSs, they just pack so many weapons into a lot of their mechs. Look at most Mad Dog and Hellbringer variants, for example.

[enderbeta]

Originally posted by P.J:

Originally posted by panzerd18:

Clan mechs are glass cannons. They have immense firepower but are not as tough as their IS counterparts. Clans excel by using their superior weapons and destroying their targets at range.

That's not true - well, it shouldn't be else why everyone agrees that Clan tech is top notch for the same tonage and power usage?

It is top notch. Ton for ton they deal way more damage and can sustain more damage but you cannot just run up firing straight at them standing in front of them and not expect to get torn up in the process. They don't have shields or anything like that.

Use the terrain and surroundings to obstruct the enemies shots. There are lots of hills, buildings and rocks to move behind for cover while weapons are cycling between shots. I also like to chain my weapons so I can fire weapons off in salvos and do half and half so I'm almost constantly firing.

The AI is pretty dumb. You can get behind mechs and take them out from behind pretty easily.

Auto cannons are great weapons for fast cycles and a decent punch. The ammo is a bit low but while moving around waiting on lasers to cool scan for weapon cache's to reload your ammo.

[Harukage]

There was a quote from novells in a video about Mad Dog i saw recently on YT. Where it blasted a couple alphas at an IS mech, before starting to polish it with its 4 pulse lasers constantly ( 2 large 2 medium ), while also adding another point blank lrm salvo inbetween. IS Mecwarrior only could wonder how clanners do that. Any IS mech will just bake from within trying to pull that.
That is talking about how "hot" Mad Dog is. It is not really.

[yminale]

Clan mechs are not weak. The missions are just poorly designed. Any mech that faces wave after wave of cheap mechs and vehicles are going to break. Clan mechs can realistically take on 3 to 1 odds (and that's with range). Anymore and they get swamped. Also Gauss Rifles , AC/20 and ErPPC are head choppers. That's not modeled in the game.

[Nikushimi54]

Originally posted by panzerd18:

Clan mechs are glass cannons. They have immense firepower but are not as tough as their IS counterparts.

That sounds like some non-canonical nonsense made up for MWO for the sake of balance. In tabletop clan equipment is hands down better in every way. This is reflected in the BV cost of Clan/IS tech.

[yminale]

Originally posted by Nikushimi54:

Originally posted by panzerd18:

Clan mechs are glass cannons. They have immense firepower but are not as tough as their IS counterparts.

That sounds like some non-canonical nonsense made up for MWO for the sake of balance. In tabletop clan equipment is hands down better in every way. This is reflected in the BV cost of Clan/IS tech.

Only the Hellbringer/Loki can be described as a glass cannon. Most clan mechs have decent to good armor. Several like the Stormcrow, Mad Cat/Timber wolf, Dire Wolf and Puma have maxed out armor. Also the Clan mechwarrior is Elite class in both piloting and gunnery. They are suppose to fight in the long range bracket at full speed which gives them huge bonuses to evade.

[Nikushimi54]

Originally posted by yminale:

which gives them huge bonuses to evade.

Evasion was a concept created for BTPC. In classic tabletop it's not called evasion, just standard hit table modifiers and it caps at +4 to hit if the target moved ten hexes or more. It also works in reverse the shooter takes a +2 penalty for running and a +3 penalty for jumping.

As for the pilot stats, that's also factored by BV.

[Tr0w]

Originally posted by isawaawasi5:

Originally posted by Harukage:

It is purely PGI "blance" from MWO. Clan mech are much cooler, while it is IS mech literally cooking their pilots if they dare to use alpha-strikes. Clan double heatsinks are simply that good.
JFC people still can't understand how huge was the tech gap between Clans and IS at the time.

A lot of Clan mechs run very hot. Besides their hotter weaponry offsetting the gains from DHSs, they just pack so many weapons into a lot of their mechs. Look at most Mad Dog and Hellbringer variants, for example.

Realistically Mechwarriors aren't supposed to fire every single weapon at the same time, alpha striking is a last resort attack. Gamers though build almost everything around worthwhile alpha strike potential.

[LanceShields]

responding to OP's first post.

I'm at the point where i have all the mechs unlocked. It wasn't until the 4th planet where i started having issues. Armor/Ferro pods are your friends. Also... since clan lasers are so much better than IS ones, the game almost favors using energy builds. Also make sure you build to your pilot's strengths. Honestly the Nova was a beast for a WHILE. It wasn't until i got the mad dog that i started switching some of the novas out.

I am playing on expert... So here's a piece of advice... don't brawl IS mechs where they are strong. Kite them, limit the amount of mechs that have LOS on you at once... etc. ERMLs and MPLs have a surprisingly long range. For lower weight classes, try to pack on a bunch of ERSLs, like 8-9 of them if you can. They have quite high DPS and they aren't that short range.

[Balm]

You bring shame to your clan.

[OKOK]

Clan usually use energy weapon due to double heatsink. This alone is just way too important.

[Mike]

I'm assuming the clan mechs XL + double heatsinks combo for engines help their heat issues. I just feel like many mechs engines are too big for the chassis. I would rather a smaller engine + more armour, like you can do with IS mechs is my preference. Maps are too cramped/ not open to enjoy those higher speed chassis to me most of the time.

[Sir_Blaze]

Originally posted by Doom monkey:

Originally posted by Andy Wankski:

I dunno, I seem to recall in the BT cartoon, the IS forces that opposed Jade Falcon when they invaded did bugger all against their mechs. Yeah I know, cartoon cheesiness and plot armor. But iirc, they were using centurions, wolfhouds, maulers among others which should've done something to even the clam mechs.

I read a lot of the books, never played TT, but in the books, the IS catches up tech wise quite quickly, but right off the bat, they are getting totally annihilated.

The only reason the clans dont' just roflstomp right to terra is because the IS abuses their honor system. And not to mention that the clans do this themselves when they take the lowest bidder to win a fight, and then often honor the result if they lose.

so even though they could say easily take a planet, one commander says "i can do it with 8 mechs, and the other says, haha I can do it with 3!"

So they send 3 and lose, and then that's that.

But almost without fail, those 3 mechs absolutely crush the IS mechs in front of them, it's just a matter of numbers at that point. And then the IS fighting dirty, like using artillery or IEDs.

Part of the reason why the IS get mauled at the start is that they're out of position they don't realise they're getting attacked till the last moment and they have their garrisons on the borders with other nations,
another part is the skill of individual clan pilots is superior to IS pilots on average, i believe IS start at 3's across the board where as clanners start at 4 in the original table top out of a 6 skill max, where a 3 needs a 4 to hit on d6 and a 4 needs a base 3 to hit on a d6, clanners tend to have arm mounted weapons which i think gave a +1 to hit where as IS went more towards a torso based mounting system then there were other +'s and -'S around.
After all that Clanners generally had a ranged advantage and especially in the innitial forays did massive amounts of damage, but they lost when it became a melee as that was how the IS were used to fighting.

Helm tech was well disperesed towards the great houses and a lot of the factories were already refitted and pumping out better grade mechs than previous moddles but it was a trickle down mechanic all the top units were given their new shineys first with the provincial backwaters betting them last and boarderguards with the perifery were those back waters. so most hadn't had replaced garrison units yet
Also due to the year long break it allowed the IS to form alliances reorganise troops and also retrofit clan tech from the battles they had one and tech they stole to catch up even further