How to PREVENT headshots and pilot injuries.

[MinenSpecht]

Seriously. Every day 5+ Threads about how bad it is and how horrible.

There are 2 ways to avoid this.

The Easy way:

You know why everytime you enter the system there is a "visit store" button? Just visit the store and look for cockpit module... the more++ the better.

It will prevent you from being hurt when getting the occasional missile to the head.

You also should ALWAYS scroll down and look for modules in the salvage list after combat Especially in missions on former star league worlds.. 2/3 of a mech are nice but gain you nothing. A cockpit++ module will gain you more money by keeping the pilot healthy.


Problem solved.


The tactical way:

Always keep the enemy to your side. Never face them head on. Some mechs like the Griffin even have an arm shield to protect the cockpit.

Use this to your advance to present this side to your enemy and you will notice way less headshots.


If you can not prevent it:

Hire at least 2 more mercenaries to compensate for the injured pilots and use them from time to time to skill em properly.

[Lyngs]

This should be in a noob guide. Only hardcore fans will see this as obvious I think.

Good you brought it up.

[MinenSpecht]

It has been 9 hours and I see more headshot whine threads.

[suralargonus]

I take a lot of hits to the head...but I deal. What I CAN'T find is the cockpit modules. I've found all of ONE so far. I keep looking, but no luck. I suppose I could go around and hit planets...but meh. I have plenty of pilots, and plenty of mechs.

[Bishop-Six]

Yeah i deal with it too, but these head shots injuries are really to much. Mostly first contact, first shot of enemy= 1 pilot injured but mech is over 90 % Armor...

Nerf Clammers!

[nyanko]

I have eight mercenaries at all times to make sure if one lance get badly injured, I still can go on a mission right after.

[Nemund]

Side on doesn't change the hit chance of a head. You can see this by looking at hit chances on enemy heads when side on.

[Jeffreyac]

finishing my playthrough, and for me, the poor AI is the one who should be in our threads complaining. I've had exactly one head hit/crit with lethal damage, fairly early in the campaign - took out Glitch. The AI, on the other hand, has had to deal with about 10 or so - some on called shots, some just plain stupid RNG antics - so, yeah, remember to look for when it happens to the other guy for those who like to whine!

(incidently, yeah, there's the occasional injury from a lucky missile or something. So what? That's why you have more than 4 pilots, and rotate them out to gain them all skills, right? :) )

edited to add: some of the AI headshots have made for some epic gameplay. I had an early merc mission that went poor (honestly before I really understood some of the mechanics), had two mechs shot up and running away in an effort to live, one damaged but combat ready trying to snipe from a distance with the remaining weaponry, and one combat ready trying to fight the two remaining mechs (one of which outweighing him by a significant margin...) His heat goes through the roof trying desparately to keep fire up - and then he gets knocked down and pummelled. Knowing the end may be near, he stands up and throws a punch at the larger mech - which somehow connects to the cockpit, with lethat damage, dropping the bad guy like an unstrung puppet! The lighter enemy mech running around gets knocked down and has his legs blown off next round (wthe cooling I saved with the melee attack allowed for a full volley for a change!) - win for the good guys!!

[RasaNova]

Originally posted by Jeffreyac:

finishing my playthrough, and for me, the poor AI is the one who should be in our threads complaining.

Got a good chuckle from this... Too true, I score WAY more headshots and injuries than the AI. But they don't have the advantage of Steam forum access.

[kknd]

Originally posted by RasaNova:

Originally posted by Jeffreyac:

finishing my playthrough, and for me, the poor AI is the one who should be in our threads complaining.

Got a good chuckle from this... Too true, I score WAY more headshots and injuries than the AI. But they don't have the advantage of Steam forum access.

Pretty sure the whole 'doesn't have a strategic layer to manage' thing makes it even out when it comes to your headshots and the AI. Sure you might get more (not my expeirence personally) but until it takes out the pilot it doesn't matter any.

Meanwhile a single SRM dinging off the head is enough to cause me to be down a pilot for a week.

[Invasion_Dec]

Yes the cockpit mods effectively protect your pilots from having to visit the med bay, provided you don't play like an idiot letting them get knocked down and leaving LRM/SRM carriers untouched.

You can take it further by having your lance outfitted with predominantly long range weapons. That will eliminate much of the risk of injury from SRMs and amassed short range lasers.

To put into perspective, the default chance to land a headshot is 2-6%. A cockpit mod+ negates two injuries. PIlot will then only have to visit the med bay on the third injury for just bleeding, while without the mod or +health from guts would have otherwise been outright incapacitated.

[Teralitha]

Just hire extra piots.

[RasaNova]

Originally posted by Teralitha:

Just hire extra piots.

That's my take on it. Of the 2 pilots I've lost, one was soup before he even saw the AC20 round coming, and the other was me being greedy trying to take one last shot for an easy kill(and whiffing it.) In general, with guts the only cost of injuries is time in the med-bay. And that's why they make more pilots.

[AbsynthMinded]

Initial game mechanic was to hire lots more pilots. However the game does not put enough empasis on that. Players want to keep the Original team. The Cockpit Mod, did not appear till recently. Added in as a mitigation. The tactics of positioning is not covered deeply enough, and should have a specific mentionin the initial tutorial.

That said.. My main complaint is that under equal fire conditions, the AI appears to get way way way more head hits than I do in practice. The DEVs insist its all the same mechanics and rules, that all the statistics say it is a clean RNG. I just want to see their data which proves it, to within acceptable margins.

[RasaNova]

Originally posted by AbsynthMinded:

Initial game mechanic was to hire lots more pilots. However the game does not put enough empasis on that. Players want to keep the Original team. The Cockpit Mod, did not appear till recently. Added in as a mitigation. The tactics of positioning is not covered deeply enough, and should have a specific mentionin the initial tutorial.

That said.. My main complaint is that under equal fire conditions, the AI appears to get way way way more head hits than I do in practice. The DEVs insist its all the same mechanics and rules, that all the statistics say it is a clean RNG. I just want to see their data which proves it, to within acceptable margins.

For the sake of argument, let's say the devs DID code in some secret algorithm that lets the enemy get 30% more headshots than the player for reasons of making a more challenging game without having to spend time and effort on improving the AI. Can we just accept it and still enjoy that unfair mechanic, given that most of the time it just means we need a few extra pilots aboard the ship?

Having said that, I still haven't noticed any headshot advantage from the AI, other than them being able to field things like srm/lrm carriers, or getting more opportunities to take shots at me due to outnumbering me.

I do agree though that the game is not very forthcoming with information, about even some of the basic concepts... Manual, HBS! Please?

[AbsynthMinded]

During the Escape Mission, that initial lance of lights and a medium. They get to open up with a full round of fire on me. 2 Head hits off the jump. 2 more later on. I get nada 1. I feel this is kinda typical. My tactics in general practice are so cautious for initial contacts it boarders on pathalogical now. And thats after I found Cockpit Mods for armor.