Weapons percentages?

[TYRO3]

I have noticed something recently, the weapon to hit percentage is all over the place
I just finished one job and during the battle I had three enemies lined up side by side and
the percentage to hit varied as much as 40% and they were standing the exact same distance from each other, and the color was orange.

[WillieSea]

On the topic of headshots, were missiles nerfed to almost "never" hit the head?

Even when I do a precision shot to the head, with 4xLRM-20, perhaps 1 might, and I repeat, might, hit the head. Nothing like the machine gun which seems to always get several head shots.

[Strayed]

Oprindeligt skrevet af WillieSea:

On the topic of headshots, were missiles nerfed to almost "never" hit the head?

Even when I do a precision shot to the head, with 4xLRM-20, perhaps 1 might, and I repeat, might, hit the head. Nothing like the machine gun which seems to always get several head shots.

Which mech are you mounting those bad boy 4x LRM20's ?

In short, LRMs cluster. Sarna has a good cluster table to look up showing how clustering works. They don't hit just one location. And when they do hit, they cluster in groups of 5; usually 1 out of 5 missiles miss.

Generally speaking, LRM15s are more consistent than LRM20s (without Art 4 / TAG / NARC)

https://www.sarna.net/wiki/CBT_Tables

The CBT table is fairly analogous to Battletech (you'll have to scroll down to find the LRM cluster table)

*edit: link attached

*edit edit: In response ot the head shot thing; I'm not sure if you've noticed, but usually thats a very small % probability of a hit even for a MLAS mounted on an arm. LRMs are a saturation artillery weapon and meant to "soften" targets and cause stability damage.. SRMs are more your point and click rockets.. later in the timeline Streak SRMs are your brawlers fire and forget missile of choice for cockpit shots

[wesnef]

Oprindeligt skrevet af WillieSea:

On the topic of headshots, were missiles nerfed to almost "never" hit the head?

Yes. The chance to hit the head decreases with each missile. Odds of getting more than 1 from an LRM rack is very low.

[WillieSea]

So, what I am hearing is LRMs are hosed so they do not hit the head much at all. Even with precision shots.

Archer 2S and Catapult C4 are good missile boats.

[wesnef]

Yes, LRMs are great for a lot of things, but headshots is NOT one of them. Even with an Archer.

[Strayed]

Agreed with Wesnef there


When I get a called shot with my LRM-apult I always aim for locations where ammo is stored or in the case of a lasboat - I leg them. The way LRMs cluster greatly affects their ability to "single hit" locations.

If playing the SP campaign / career mode I find in my lance's tactics and my playstyle the +stability modded tubes work fantastic for me.



Yes, the Archer and C4 are good fire support mechs. Archer can make a good cav whereas the Catapult struggles to be an effective cav (because its ears are quite vulnerable)

As mentioned, the Archer works well as a cav with SRMs and JJs (skip MLAS; unnecessary heat/weight and not needed. can plug more heatsinks in instead to cool the JJs), especially since the Archer variant is the SLDF variant that has the Artemis system. As a LRM boat sitting at range with heaps of ammo... clustering works quite nicely with Art ;P

The C4 is good too if you fit it with LRMs, heaps of ammo, default armour (because you need more ammo!), and sit it at range supporting brawlers advancing and shooting on enemies backs once you get the brawlers to make the enemy turn around... back shots... everytime I get a mech expose its back to my LRM-apults I get the urge to call out the Commando unit's line from C&C Tiberian Dawn (the old dos or 95 version for those who aren't of my vintage hahaha.. dos......) "got a present for ya!"

[WillieSea]

So the understanding is the missiles were hosed because of game play mechanics, rather than some how missiles just can't hit the head?

So that means, I should stop trying to head shot enemy mechs with my missile boats. Got it.

[fmalfeas]

Another item a lot of people don't always notice - Any mech that is a 'command' mech in the vanilla game has some weird abilities.

The marauder has the -10% damage for your lance. But the Cyclops? +1 INIT. Yes, a lance of 4 Cyclops is a lance of four 90 ton mechs that all go at init 5 without tactical mastery.

[danko9696]

Oprindeligt skrevet af WillieSea:

On the topic of headshots, were missiles nerfed to almost "never" hit the head?

Yes, there are specific mechanics in play to avoid many headshots happening while using LRMs.

Oprindeligt skrevet af Strayed:

Which mech are you mounting those bad boy 4x LRM20's ?

In short, LRMs cluster. Sarna has a good cluster table to look up showing how clustering works. They don't hit just one location. And when they do hit, they cluster in groups of 5; usually 1 out of 5 missiles miss.

Generally speaking, LRM15s are more consistent than LRM20s (without Art 4 / TAG / NARC)

That doesn't apply here. LRMs don't cluster in groups of five but all missiles from the same weapon salvo apart from the first one are in the same cluster.

Oprindeligt skrevet af Strayed:

When I get a called shot with my LRM-apult I always aim for locations where ammo is stored or in the case of a lasboat - I leg them. The way LRMs cluster greatly affects their ability to "single hit" locations.

The way it works in general LRMs are bad for low base chance locations (limbs mostly) and good for high base ones (torsos). So unless you flank going for a leg is not very efficient.

Oprindeligt skrevet af fmalfeas:

Another item a lot of people don't always notice - Any mech that is a 'command' mech in the vanilla game has some weird abilities.

The marauder has the -10% damage for your lance. But the Cyclops? +1 INIT. Yes, a lance of 4 Cyclops is a lance of four 90 ton mechs that all go at init 5 without tactical mastery.

The init and the Mara bonus don't stack.

[fmalfeas]

Well, that's a shame. Of course, that still means running a Mara and a Cyclops, especially if those two mechs with all their firepower have someone with Tactical Mastery piloting them, is brutal.

Nothing like an Init 3 Assault Mech and an Init 4 Heavy. Knowing they don't stack though pretty much screams that the other slots should probably be something like Warhammer or Rifleman, and Archer, just to maximize the power of your weapons. Especially if you can black market a Royal SLDF Warhammer.

[danko9696]

Oprindeligt skrevet af fmalfeas:

Well, that's a shame. Of course, that still means running a Mara and a Cyclops, especially if those two mechs with all their firepower have someone with Tactical Mastery piloting them, is brutal.

Nothing like an Init 3 Assault Mech and an Init 4 Heavy. Knowing they don't stack though pretty much screams that the other slots should probably be something like Warhammer or Rifleman, and Archer, just to maximize the power of your weapons. Especially if you can black market a Royal SLDF Warhammer.

IMO a init 2 Heavy with Ace Pilot is way way better than an init 4 heavy without AP.

With init 2 what you get is being able to kill even more easily very weak targets who were already very easy to kill before but it doesn't much against same weight. It helps but not much, you can just reserve up to 1 and then PS, pushing the other heavy into 1 too for the next turn, enabling you two salvos in a row. So dealing with same weight foes is very easy when you're above phase 1. And this is ignoring AP.

In contrast AP will help against all kind of targets, weak or dangerous, specially if you have JJs and long range weapons so you can keep firing them while they can't (or have difficulties) at you, but can be very useful too for medium range builds with hit & run (the previous case isn't hit & run).

[fmalfeas]

The init 4 is wonderful against obnoxious lights that won't stop scampering around with 4-5 evasion charges. They'll usually take a turn here and there where they are in a 'safe' spot to take a 0-1 evasion charge move in order to alpha strike. When they do that, your 4 init suddenly means that you take your turn *with* the little creeps, and have good odds of going before them.

In that moment you can remove a persistent and irritating thorn in one brutal strike before they can exploit their speed and init to restore their high evasion.

A lot better than having most of your lance sensor locking them or firing at low odds to deplete the evasion, since the rest of the lance can strike at other targets.

Mind you, the best answer to those little creeps is a Firestarter with high piloting skill and melee damage mods to just run up and put their fist through the engine. But that's not always available.

I like having a variety of options for dealing with various problems. Thus I tend to run a fast melee, a tanky brawler, and two long-to-medium killing machines...which is why I'm a fan of Warhammer and Archer, since those chassis have a really unfriendly bonus on them for that.

[danko9696]

Oprindeligt skrevet af fmalfeas:

The init 4 is wonderful against obnoxious lights that won't stop scampering around with 4-5 evasion charges. They'll usually take a turn here and there where they are in a 'safe' spot to take a 0-1 evasion charge move in order to alpha strike. When they do that, your 4 init suddenly means that you take your turn *with* the little creeps, and have good odds of going before them

I don't know why are you still fighting lights with heavies but in any case adding some TTS should solve any issue, instead of spending the lvl 8 skill slot.

With the lance you describe I think most ppl would think about how to deal better with heavies and assaults, not lights.

[wesnef]

Oprindeligt skrevet af danko9696:

I don't know why are you still fighting lights with heavies but in any case adding some TTS should solve any issue, instead of spending the lvl 8 skill slot.

For a random example - early in a Campaign, I try to farm up a Heavy before advancing the Priority missions. Most of the contracts are still in the .5-1.5 skull range. There's plenty of lights in those.

Also, that early in a Campaign, finding a TTS (especially a + one that doesn't weigh too much) is pretty rare. (honestly, though, I've never used a TTS, ever. Before the store updates, they didn't even show up at all until my pilots had high Gunnery; and even now only base quality ones are generally findable in the early days. And the mechs are too light & undergeared to waste weight on one.)



Meanwhile, in a Career, I'm going to fight every single mission on a planet I can manage (need to pump up the score numbers), and there's no reason to drop 1 skull on a 1 skull mission when I can drop 4 and plow through it.



edit: in the end, everyone has their preferred builds & tactics. You clearly love Ace Pilot & TTS's, and they work well for you. I've basically never used either in 1000 hours.

[danko9696]

Oprindeligt skrevet af wesnef:

Oprindeligt skrevet af danko9696:

I don't know why are you still fighting lights with heavies but in any case adding some TTS should solve any issue, instead of spending the lvl 8 skill slot.

For a random example - early in a Campaign, I try to farm up a Heavy before advancing the Priority missions. Most of the contracts are still in the .5-1.5 skull range. There's plenty of lights in those.

Sure, but if you already have a couple good heavies light mechs shouldn't be any issue. And I didn't say TTS are needed against lights. Just having more firepower should do the trick.

Would you be worried about lights if you had a full heavy-assault lance?. Because that's what I'm discussing with @fmalfeas. It seems to me he's building or planning such a lance, talking about Warhammers, Archer, Cyclops-Z, all for dealing better against lights.