Is it even worth having PPC/L Laser sniper mechs?

[Justin_760]

Im the kind of RPG player that gets hung up on the numbers. And so far it seems like ranged/sniper mechs are completely underpowered.

Take for example the Vindicator at the start of the game. You can mount a single PPC that does 50 damage, or 5 medium lasers that do almost 3 times the damage and STILL weigh less. 7 tons for the damage output of 2 tons of medium lasers. L lasers are the same, 40 damage for 5 tons and the M lasers still outperform them in all respects except range.

Am I building ranged mechs wrong? Or are they just supposed to have crap damage output in exchange for range? They just seem wildly underpowered. I feel like sniper units should be heavy hitters, yet when I try and build ranged mechs the attack rating is always severely lower than itd be if I just piled on lighter close range weaponry.

[terrycpa1972]

Mechs can only mount weapons for which they have hard points. Medium range lasers are lighter but that also means you are well into the enemy range as well. Also you are forgetting the heat cost.

[bloodyjack_69]

big weapons hit 1 location instead of spreading the damage all over your target. later game play when your stats are higher your more likely to head cap an enemy with a bigger gun then with a boat load of medium. even in early game you might get lucky with a ppc taken off a head that will not happen if you have 5 medium lasers.

[Lack of Stuff]

Depends on your play style and the role of the mech/pilot. Sniper builds will usually have less pinpoint dmg than brawlers for balance. From my own experience I can tell you that they are perfectly viable to run and I typically use both brawlers and snipers.

I prefer the LL over the PPC though just due to the heat but mixing in 1 or 2 PPCs for extra stability dmg and the reduced enemy accuracy can be handy. The new BNC-3S makes a good LL boat.

[wesnef]

Massed ML's do work well. But when comparing them to that PPC, you need to also take into account that the 5 ML's make more heat, and the PPC has longer range, does stability damage, and debuffs the target's accuracy.

(I still prefer LL's to PPC's. Much more heat efficient.)

Personally, I field mechs in both styles - I've got things with bulk ML's, but I've also got a Centurion with an AC5 & 2x LL. In my last Career, I had a Highlander 732B with 2x LRM15 and 3x LL alongside my 7xML/6xMG Grasshopper. They each serve a purpose and have their plusses and minuses.

[MortVent]

Snipers are good for things other than head hits. Take out thunderbolts at range with a pecision strike on the chest. Same with many other mechs, head hits are not the only way to take them out.

They can also be used to simply neutralize a threat, such as taking out the hunchback's autocannon before it closes

[Rainy Skies]

If you're actually sniping, an AC10 with + damage on it works wonders, or a gauss rifle.(sniping for head shots)
Otherwise what everyone else here says is correct, though I say you should equip what you can for your hard points and what you can sink for heat as long as tonnage allows, ride that red-line as far as you can.
With a few exchangers you can eventually just field PPC boats, handle the heat, knock things down and still be as cool as the other side of the pillow. You just need your heavier mechs for that as PPC's aren't light.

Early game though will likely just be medium/large lasers depending on your hard points and you should be maxing your armor as much as possible. I find that missiles and auto cannons really underperform on anything that's not a heavy/assault mech. (though I have seen a gryphon that can alpha for 432 before over heating)

[Lack of Stuff]

Originally posted by Azurus:

If you're actually sniping, an AC10 with + damage on it works wonders, or a gauss rifle.(sniping for head shots)
Otherwise what everyone else here says is correct, though I say you should equip what you can for your hard points and what you can sink for heat as long as tonnage allows, ride that red-line as far as you can.
With a few exchangers you can eventually just field PPC boats, handle the heat, knock things down and still be as cool as the other side of the pillow. You just need your heavier mechs for that as PPC's aren't light.

Early game though will likely just be medium/large lasers depending on your hard points and you should be maxing your armor as much as possible. I find that missiles and auto cannons really underperform on anything that's not a heavy/assault mech. (though I have seen a gryphon that can alpha for 432 before over heating)

I'm curious as to your PPC boat builds. Since HEXs give multiplicative heat savings and not additive I've never been able to make a build I was happy with by stacking HEX mods.

[danko9696]

IMO for sniping long range mechs can work relatively well but in general they're not as good as shorter range mechs, because you need spotting for them, and you need to kill fast and reliably enough sometimes so you don't get overrun without taking too much risks. And while getting closer implies an added risk, the amount of extra damage and killing power worth it with custom loadouts.

The fact that you're mostly limited to two Precision Shots per turn encourages maximizing the effect of that morale used with the most efficient use for it, and then another two mechs very effective without using morale. And those mechs are LRM boats. That's another point: unless you really want to snipe, LRMs outdamage any other long range setup when not using PS (acting as support), and that's not counting indirect fire, which is a huge advantage.

Still you can make room for a direct damage sniper and probably will work fine, mostly if you use it as support. You won't always have both two brawlers (if you have two) at attack range in order to use PS, and a long range sniper can be good for dealing with softer targets, although a LRM boat is much better for that. In short, I'd say they don't do very well as primary damage dealers. Not bad, but not nearly as good as optimized short range setups. And in that I think sensor/visual range also has a big part.

Originally posted by Lack of Stuff:

Originally posted by Azurus:

If you're actually sniping, an AC10 with + damage on it works wonders, or a gauss rifle.(sniping for head shots)
Otherwise what everyone else here says is correct, though I say you should equip what you can for your hard points and what you can sink for heat as long as tonnage allows, ride that red-line as far as you can.
With a few exchangers you can eventually just field PPC boats, handle the heat, knock things down and still be as cool as the other side of the pillow. You just need your heavier mechs for that as PPC's aren't light.

Early game though will likely just be medium/large lasers depending on your hard points and you should be maxing your armor as much as possible. I find that missiles and auto cannons really underperform on anything that's not a heavy/assault mech. (though I have seen a gryphon that can alpha for 432 before over heating)

I'm curious as to your PPC boat builds. Since HEXs give multiplicative heat savings and not additive I've never been able to make a build I was happy with by stacking HEX mods.

An Atlas-II 5xPPC 3xTEX++ 8xDHS 3xJJs works very well, with 7 net heat (mech bay heat isn't correct) and 17t armor. It's outperformed in damage by a 6xLL 2xAC2 or a 6xLL 1xAC5 setup but on the plus side it's better for regular attacks thanks to the debuff (-25% debuff is quite decent), while your brawlers are firing precision shots to other targets. Still I think the LL setups are superior in general, more than what the difference in damage make it seem, but I like more the PPC variant.

The bad: it's the only mech who can really mass PPCs. And for regular mechs as snipers the best I've found is a 4xLL 1-2xAC5 setup.

[Hidden Gunman]

Pounding for several rounds with LRMs can generally scratch enough armour off to make a single ppc/LL effective. The issue of massing those is heat buildup...it's counterproductive stacking weapons on a chassis where they can only fire all together once every three or four turns.

If you are going to set a mech up for uber accuracy, you are probably better off stacking a stalker with 4xSRM6s, and a few MLs, and accuracy mods...sure, it's medium range or less, but for anything less than top of the line opposition it's pretty much a one shot kill.

Even if it doesn't kill, it really strips armour for the next shooting.

[kschang77]

There are different approaches to sniper mechs.

1) Gauss rifle -- extremely rare, but can be occasionally found at flashpoints. With 75 damage to a single location, it can take out head in a single hit.

2) AC20 or AC10 -- much easier to find, but requires you being MUCH closer.

3) PPC boat (more than 2 PPC) depends on which PPC++ you get, you can go for damage (+10), Accuracy (+3 ACC), or if you prefer knockdowns, +30 stab damage. If you combine this with legging or chest hits, you can disable the mech by taking out the pilot. Or if you are lucky, just go straight for the head.

4) Multiple LLAS doesn't all hit the same spot. It's a lot like sandblasting enemy mech with LRM salvo. LRM has been nerfed enough that unless you deploy multiple Catapults (or use a LRM boat with more than 40 LRM per salvo) stab damage is rather minimal against heavy or assault mechs. OTOH, if you have +4 ACC LLAS it can do serious damage at range.

[kschang77]

PPC allows you to do damage at longer range and also do stability damage. No laser can do any stability damage. Sure, you do save some weight, but PPC has its uses, esp. those with extra accuracy or extra stab damage.

[Sam Look]

The best way to win at Battletech is not to be shot at!
If you have to walk out into the open to hit the enemy you can quickly end up in a world of hurt with no way of retreating, also turrets are just going to murder you without sufficient long range firepower to kill them from outside visual range.
You learn this the hard way if you have all your mechs equipped for medium range combat.

[danko9696]

Originally posted by Hidden Gunman:

Pounding for several rounds with LRMs can generally scratch enough armour off to make a single ppc/LL effective. The issue of massing those is heat buildup...it's counterproductive stacking weapons on a chassis where they can only fire all together once every three or four turns.

If you are going to set a mech up for uber accuracy, you are probably better off stacking a stalker with 4xSRM6s, and a few MLs, and accuracy mods...sure, it's medium range or less, but for anything less than top of the line opposition it's pretty much a one shot kill.

Even if it doesn't kill, it really strips armour for the next shooting.

Heat buildup, with LRMs? you can have a heat neutral LRM50 with 3xTTX++ (yes, nine tons just for that), -2 net heat, 3xJJs and 18t armor (quite high for a LRM boat). You only can have an bit issue with really massed LRMs like 70-75 tubes, and even then is only a tiny bit and very manageable, way more than heat in almost any brawler setup. Mostly because you don't need to jump in order to get into and outo combat or to maintain evasion. In fact you don't need JJs. You can just fire turn after turn. LRMs don't generate a lot of heat and they do more raw damage (+dmg variants) than any other long range setup. They're worse for PS, that's the catch, but as non PS support nothing compares to them once (important) you have high stats pilots to counteract the indirect fire penalties.

Originally posted by kschang77:

There are different approaches to sniper mechs.

1) Gauss rifle -- extremely rare, but can be occasionally found at flashpoints. With 75 damage to a single location, it can take out head in a single hit.

2) AC20 or AC10 -- much easier to find, but requires you being MUCH closer.

3) PPC boat (more than 2 PPC) depends on which PPC++ you get, you can go for damage (+10), Accuracy (+3 ACC), or if you prefer knockdowns, +30 stab damage. If you combine this with legging or chest hits, you can disable the mech by taking out the pilot. Or if you are lucky, just go straight for the head.

4) Multiple LLAS doesn't all hit the same spot. It's a lot like sandblasting enemy mech with LRM salvo. LRM has been nerfed enough that unless you deploy multiple Catapults (or use a LRM boat with more than 40 LRM per salvo) stab damage is rather minimal against heavy or assault mechs. OTOH, if you have +4 ACC LLAS it can do serious damage at range.

1) Gauss rifle: if the enemy is in cover/braced and it's not previously damaged or bad maintained then you can't headcap with it. And when you can still is nowhere close to shorter range setups, even long range setups at LL distance.

2) Range of AC10 is the same than the LL, and you didn't say needing to get much closer with LLs.

3) PPC boats are underperformers. Only the 5xPPC Atlas-II is good (but not super good). And it's my favourite mech loadout. Also that's a more efficient setup. The +++ version has +3 acc +dmg (in addition to +1 inherent acc) and they don't have recoil like PPCs or Gauss (yes, they both have).
** Edit: something changed in 1.6, not sure, perhaps even before, but PPC effectively seems now not to have recoil, although it has set it in the json file. So ignore this point **

4) Why do you say it's like sandblasting? the point of a sniper is using it with Precision Shots, and using multiple weapons actually increases the chances of doing a lot of damage when you aim at a location, like in a 4xLL 2xAC5 King Crab compared to a 5xPPC. Because when you miss, you don't miss so much damage. LRM boat raw damage (not stab damage) is much higher than with other long range weapons.

Originally posted by kschang77:

PPC allows you to do damage at longer range and also do stability damage. No laser can do any stability damage. Sure, you do save some weight, but PPC has its uses, esp. those with extra accuracy or extra stab damage.

When you do enough damage stability is irrelevant. And if you speak about accuracy, LL+++ +20% to base hit and no recoil vs +5% from the PPC++ (dmg) and -10% recoil (Gauss also has considerable recoil).
** Edit: something changed in 1.6, not sure, perhaps even before, but PPC effectively seems now not to have recoil, although it has set it in the json file. So ignore this point **

Originally posted by Sam Look:

The best way to win at Battletech is not to be shot at!
If you have to walk out into the open to hit the enemy you can quickly end up in a world of hurt with no way of retreating, also turrets are just going to murder you without sufficient long range firepower to kill them from outside visual range.
You learn this the hard way if you have all your mechs equipped for medium range combat.

For that kind of support a LRM boat (+dmg) is much better than any direct damage mech. No LoS required and massive damage at very long range from home, capable of reliably killing what no other long range kind of mech can and in a safer way.

Two LRM boats, one very high damage mech and a wildcard that can be another LRM boat, or a long range direct damage mech. That allows you to complete a decent percentage of 5-skull missions untouched, and more often than not without being hit at medium or short range. Many missions the brawler wouldn't fire even once. He was just to spot and to fire massive aimed spikes to any isolated mech getting too close, but avoiding combat (and LoS) otherwise.

And another example: I can't kill all vehicles reliably with my 5xPPC++ (dmg) even when they're not in cover but I can kill any vehicle almost for certain with my LRM boat, cover or not, and without PS.


Edit: correct skipped point 2 and misplaced response to point 3 of kschang77. Also done remarks regarding how recoil works now for PPCs (didn't test yet Gauss).

[Nuee]

I'm probably (certainly weird) but I tend to to go for ml's rather than ppc and LL's, for head shots. The more weapons fired means a better chance for that 18 percent to hit that headshot (or shoulder shot especially for hunchbacks).

[Hidden Gunman]

@Danko, you misunderstood my comment, I was referring to heat buildup with ppc/LL.


The reality is that this debate simply boils down to preferences in how you fight, and the situation you find yourself in. Long range sniping is fine when you have the space and the time to settle down to it, but it won't be the best tactic in all situations.

When you use them are energy weapons worthwhile compared to missiles or ballistic weapons? That's the tossup. Each type has limitations, it simply boils down to what your choice is.