Some of these missions go too far, and it's frustrating.

[Cutter]

It seems like you just hang on a thread (down to you last mech) just to complete some of these missions. And, that is restarting a few times. I end up having to hang back just to pick off one at a time, and that seems so anti-clan way of battling.

[Rashktah]

Aff. The ammount of enemies is just crazy sometimes. Get one unlucky crit, lose an arm, have a Starmate hang back while glitching on a rock... you're toast, try again. From the start, why don't you.

[the.momaw]

Make sure you're putting points into your star's Evasion skill in the barracks. This contributes a HUGE amount to their survivability.

And don't overlook adding extra armor plates to your mechs in the mech lab. Any slot can have extra armor, it's a "miscellaneous" type item. It helps A LOT. Depending how much tonnage you want to devote to extra protection, you can almost make your medium mechs into assault mechs.

[Cutter]

Yeah, I ended up modifying mechs with Probes and extra armor. I should of used my xp to max out evasion though. I might start over even though I have the executioner.

[Imperialus]

Originally posted by Cutter:

I end up having to hang back just to pick off one at a time, and that seems so anti-clan way of battling.

What is funny is that hanging back and blasting is exactly how Clanners 'should' fight and how Clan players were able to dominate so hard in the tabletop back in the day.

Lore wise on the other hand Clanners fall into the category of "Drive me closer so I can hit it with my sword!"

Everything about Clan tech from heat buildup to speed to the range of their weapons and higher base gunnery skill pushes the player towards a gun line. Everything about the lore (and mission design of MW5C) pushes the player into knife fights.

[Cutter]

Originally posted by Imperialus:

Originally posted by Cutter:

I end up having to hang back just to pick off one at a time, and that seems so anti-clan way of battling.

What is funny is that hanging back and blasting is exactly how Clanners 'should' fight and how Clan players were able to dominate so hard in the tabletop back in the day.

Lore wise on the other hand Clanners fall into the category of "Drive me closer so I can hit it with my sword!"

Everything about Clan tech from heat buildup to speed to the range of their weapons and higher base gunnery skill pushes the player towards a gun line. Everything about the lore (and mission design of MW5C) pushes the player into knife fights.

I guess i will hang back and pick them off. thanks!

[the.momaw]

That and make sure that you are always having your team focus opponents down. If you let your team pick targets on their own, they will spread out your firepower and be less effective.

[Slow Poke]

Yeah, the Crater Investigation mission was my last straw. I'm not looking for an easy win. But I'm not looking to slog my free time away on 30 min missions with no checkpoints. The level design in the game is atrocious.

[hasdrubal]

Also, try different loadouts and customize them, including your teammates and according to their proficiencies (though some characters are less than optimal, I pointing at Mia and Naomi there), and do not forget to give specializations. Yuichi and Naomi are good with missiles, which is not so good a weapon in the hands of the player, but better in the hands of teammates, since they do not shoot or move in a very efficient way anyway. Go for Artemis versions though, else they will be peppering too much.

Note that early game though, ER Medium lasers are best even for teammates because of limited available weight on BM and do bring ECM BM with while you do not have enough evasion.

Another thing is fight grouped. That is obvious, but the way it actually works might sometimes be tricky: the most problematic thing is teammate speed. Try having a BM which is actually of the same speed or of a lower speed than your teammates. Else you will end up alone too often. Also, cycle while fighting to be sometimes in front, sometimes in the rear, sometimes right and sometimes left from your enemies and according to your teammates. It will help sharing the hits you receive among you and your teammates. And try getting in the back of your enemies if you can and don't end up presenting your own back to an enemy. Or try hitting the head with non cluster/non missile weapons (and learn where is the head for each BM).

And think to parameter the fire commands for your teammates. They use these. If the default is not optimal, then they will not fire optimally.

Personnally I prefer the Executioner A variant because of the lasers I can put on it (ER large 1x, ER medium 2x and the rest in ER small, with armor plates, double heat sinks, an active probe and upgraded fists). But that meets my style (jumpjets, masc, laser barrage and brawls), other styles might be good too. There was another guy boasting he liked the Dire Wolf with 6 PPCs for example. It is good for sniping, if you let your teammates take most of the hits in front of you. A bit tedious to maneuver though. I tried a 4 (or 5?) Ultra AC/5 Dire Wolf too, it was efficient and could bring enough ammo with (it feels but inefficient on teammates), but I find it too slow (in Mercenaries, I liked the Jagermech for the possibility to put 4 U-AC/5 on it by mid-game. It rocked. But in Clans, it's a bit trickier.

[hasdrubal]

Regarding where is the head, there is guide somewhere on the web, about where is the canopy for painting Battletech miniatures, it will help if are not sure where it stands on the mechs. You should find it on a search engine with the proper keywords (Battlemech canopy painting for example, I do not remember exactly how I did find it, may try looking on the forums for Battletech or on Camospecs).

[saliddry]

i play expertmode ... im level 9 now and the game is way to easy.....
i know how tobuild my mechs...

after the 2nd mission as star commander i had VIpers with assault level armor 630+ with 6 er-small lasers 1-2 shooting everything ..next good mech is the nova.. you can put armor in all parts...12 er-small..... also assault mech armor levels ...

there mechs that are bad cause you cant put armorplates in center or other parts .stormcrow or maddog jump into memory ..not a single free slot in center

my star of 3 vipers and 2 novas run so good i ignored all other mech unlocks ...will get madcats at level 10 for sure

you cant run with ♥♥♥♥ mechs as glass cannons and than cry that you die

+ allcrewskillpoint go into evasion only ..push that up first..... in research focus on less armor damage taken ++++if ya want structure damage taken

[StormShepherd]

I am a LONG TIME VETERAN of the MechWarrior Franchise, from 3, 4 and all its expansions, and about 10 years in MWO, followed by about 1000 hours of MW5, am fairly good at maximizing builds in many ways to optimize killing other mechs. Yes, the late stages of this game are unfun. They feel like slog-fests.

I have been putting 1T of Armor Pods on every upper body limb of every mech I have Heavy or Assault, and have a few MWO META builds in Clans, and yeah. My brawler Timberwolf (4MPL 4-SRM6) can mop an entire star with armor to spare without support. The moment you gain 500 ton drop decks it feels like your only option is 5 Dire Wolves, which is just so not fun. Heck, even the missions before your only options were 4 Dires and a Timberwolf with LRMs. There's just TOO MANY enemies per mission, to the point that it completely betrays lore. Mechs are highly valuable, resource intense pieces of complex machinery. In The Battle of Tukayyid, it was considered a monumental loss for Clan Nova Cat for Alpha Galaxy to lose their entire bid of 30 MechWarriors (which likely means 30-50 mechs) in a suicide run by an aerospace fighter. There are missions where you slog through 20-30 mechs in that one mission.

Mech combat is pretty much an accuracy/DPS race, and against an AI that's stupid, because they basically 'roll the dice' on hitting you when and where with whatever weapon group it decided it could fire.

You will have to modify your mechs to have a chance, playing to the messed up meta that PGI created in MWO, but even early in the game you could tell PGI has a 'Volume of enemies' issue, same as in MW5 Mercs. Even from a lore context when they say Mechs were rare in post Succession War society - which is true, and many of them were very limited in weapon choices - but then in the pirate missions they turn around and show like 20-30 mechs a mission at you, which kind of breaks their suggested lore. The pirates have like 200 mechs between their 2 battalions. Even a well stocked Clan Galaxy tended to field only 30 to 50 mechs for an entire Batchall.

[Spatan555]

Originally posted by Cutter:

It seems like you just hang on a thread (down to you last mech) just to complete some of these missions. And, that is restarting a few times. I end up having to hang back just to pick off one at a time, and that seems so anti-clan way of battling.

My only complaint is that in some missions after you defeat a boss, (either a dropship or a mercenary) from a fight, several Mechs will storm at you and it can be frustrating because your lance mates and yourself are too damaged. The chapter should end right there after that battle.

[Bovril Brigadier]

Originally posted by StormShepherd:

There's just TOO MANY enemies per mission, to the point that it completely betrays lore. Mechs are highly valuable, resource intense pieces of complex machinery. In The Battle of Tukayyid, it was considered a monumental loss for Clan Nova Cat for Alpha Galaxy to lose their entire bid of 30 MechWarriors (which likely means 30-50 mechs) in a suicide run by an aerospace fighter. There are missions where you slog through 20-30 mechs in that one mission.

The Clan Invasion is notorious for playing fast and loose with the established lore itself. If anything there are far too few Mechs as keep in mind FASA literally wrote the Clans using about 15 Mechs to take on over a hundred closer to 200 and coming out on tops, something that has never really been retconned over the years. Which is why when PGI essentially is being lore accurate its not believable.
The loss of the Cat's Maw btw was a monumental loss not because they lost 30 good Mechwarriors and 150 Elementals, but because of all the supplies that went up in flames with it.

[Axeface]

I'm finding it too easy. Im on hardest difficulty and I havent lost a mech yet, not once. At most lost 2 arms. Im quite far in with only direwolf left to unlock?
These types of posts (that I also saw for MW5, a drastic difference to my experience there too) makes me wish that they added more robust difficulty options so people can tailor it to their own needs, because the ease of these games is the main thing I finding incomprehensible. The current difficulty options just dont cut it. Give us 'economic difficulty' (I have 68 millon kerenskies and nothing to spend them on... same deal in MW5) among other things.

Overall point I want to make, posts like these scare me because for me its already far too easy, any nerfing to the game would be catastrophic to my enjoyment.

Perhaps its my approach. Mechwarrior games are all about attrition. So I naturally gravitate immediately to stacking evasion, adding armour to mechs, and careful positioning of my star.

[StormShepherd]

Originally posted by Axeface:

I'm finding it too easy. Im on hardest difficulty and I havent lost a mech yet, not once. At most lost 2 arms. Im quite far in with only direwolf left to unlock?
These types of posts (that I also saw for MW5, a drastic difference to my experience there too) makes me wish that they added more robust difficulty options so people can tailor it to their own needs, because the ease of these games is the main thing I finding incomprehensible. The current difficulty options just dont cut it. Give us 'economic difficulty' (I have 68 millon kerenskies and nothing to spend them on... same deal in MW5) among other things.

I'm not sure how you have that much money since you have to spend a good bit to build a decent Star - although you should still be able to float 30m most of the time - but the problems don't start to get really bad until the mission before unlocked the Dire Wolf, and then it's pretty much all of them from there on.