Heat sinks

[terran]

I've learned it's better take not fire for a round than to overheat and take heat damage and risk shutting down. Recently I've taken some heavy damage and had to rebuild a couple of mechs and wondered why peoples' views on the number of heat sinks to use are i.e, are they more valuable than other components when managing your tonnage?

[Hidden Gunman]

The best armed mech is no use if it can't shoot.

[irishmafia2020]

I find one of my best strategies is to hire a mercenary with the "coolant vent" ability. I have two in my current squad (both hired at planets) and they run my hottest energy weapon mechs. The other mechs use ACs and rockets, so they don't get as hot. Another strategy for dealing with heat is to use a melee attack when the mech is hot, which allows it to cool down for a turn. I'm not great at the heat sink balance though - I seem to always put to many medium lasers on my mechs!

[:WTF: Grendel]

Something I posted in another discussion...

Originally posted by :WTF: Grendel:

When you do mod a Mech, the idea (for me at least) is to design it around 1 or 2 choice weapons. Add those, add armor, add more weapons and heatsinks as needed to maintain the heat. From there you might need to adjust the loadout a bit, but it's easier working in that manner.

Another thing to note is it's not necessary to use every weapon hard-point. The ultimate idea is that you can go several rounds before you need to use less weapons to manage your heat. The more consistent damage you can dish out the better.

[red255]

Guts has a perk thats -50 heat for +8 heat for the next few rounds 4 turn cooldown. Basically amounts to 2 heat sinks of heat sinking but its top loaded to allow you to finish a fight.

Guts also increases the Heat capacity before you take damage you have 100 heat to play with, you start overheating at 60, guts increases that to 90 at guts 9.

a standard banshee sinks 30 heat with no heatsinks.

so if we have 60 heat of weapons. we generate a net of 30 heat a turn. and can fire for 3 turns before needing to shut stuff down. squeezing out a 4th turn of firing.

What I'm getting at, basically I like having enough heat sinks to keep my guys firing for 3 turns. If possible. without shutting things down. to the point of stripping off weapons to make tonnage for heat sinks.

but this is including the Cooling vents perk. Do the Excel spreadsheet to get the exact values.

depends on the unit and all that.

also keep in mind you can punch the enemy instead of firing your weapons to cool off.

[wesnef]

I make most of my mechs with 4-6 blocks on the Heat Efficiency bar in the mech builder. (Which isn't always accurate anyway, since it includes jump jets & short-range things like Small Lasers, which you don't use every round).

I'm fine with taking a turn to melee every so often, or switching a weapon or two off on alternating turns. Once you've got your pilots up to +30 max heat, you can move & alpha a good number of times before needing to cool off.

(Never really tried Coolant Vent, though.)

[:WTF: Grendel]

Originally posted by wesnef:

(Never really tried Coolant Vent, though.)

Very, very useful for energy builds

[terrycpa1972]

Certain biomes give you heat difficulties (lunar and martian spring to mind) so if you are having issues managing heat you should check to make sure it's not in one of those biomes. Still an issue but you don't necessarily want to build mechs just for those biomes (at least not early game anyway).

One tip to managing heat (especially if you use jump jets a lot) would be to vary the order you fire your mechs in. Because each mech when it shoots removes 1 evasion pip, you can alternatve the mechs firing order and use just 1 weapon (or whatever amount let's you manage your heat to your liking) to reduce evasion. The 3rd or 4th mech then fires for effect so to speak with a much better chance of hitting.

Sometimes it's a good idea to angle away from the enemy or sprint away from the enemy to spread them out and to vent heat. Of course it also depends on your style of fighting since if you are a brawler you can melee to reduce heat.

[red255]

Originally posted by Mirnoc:

For me, the trouble with Coolant Vent is its activation and adds heat during cd... Better guard or melee.

the ability to sink 50 heat with coolant vents is crucial in hotter biomes.

[terran]

Very helpful info, thanks

[wendigo211]

I generally use bracing to manage heat. All my pilots have Bulwark, so 60% (or 40% if I cant find cover) damage reduction is generally worth skipping a round of fire if I can get most of the enemies to fire at that braced mech.

In design, I aim for enough heat sinks to cover 60-70% of an alpha strike. Most of the time that's around 4-6 pips on the heat efficiency meter (same as wesnef, so maybe that's a sweet spot). I find that's enough heat sinking to take out a lance before you have to start cooling down.

[ShroudedInLight]

Managing heat is a core mechanic, but that doesn't stop it from being complicated. As folks have mentioned there are ways around overheating. Mechs cool 30 heat by default and every ton you sacrifice to basic heatsinks gets you another 3 cooling. Mechs start to overheat at 60 by default and shutdown at 100 heat. When building a mech in the mechlab, its a wise idea to balance your tonnage, weaponry, and heat generation. No sense shooting all the weapons on your mech if its going to overheat every other turn when you could shoot 2 less weapons every turn for the whole fight.

As far as heat philosphies go, there are a bunch. You could try to build your mechs to produce low heat, but the more space you spend on Heatsinks the fewer weapons you can mount. You could stack on additional weaponry well above your heat sinking level in order to allow for stronger Alpha Strikes. Of course, it means you need to modulate your fire most of the time, but lets you go to the nines when you need the firepower. You can build for moderate heat generation, call it 12-20 heat per turn in order to get about 3-5 turns of combat before forcing a break in the action. You could build a unit with jump jets in mind, going for a really low heat generation on the weapons (like with a ton of ACs) in order to jump every turn for evasion.

The second thing people mentioned is Guts, investing heavily into guts expands the overheat limit allowing your pilot to take the mech hotter without penalty. Coolent Vent is a very handy ability as it basically does the same thing, it gives you a turn or two more to run your mech before you need to cool down.

You can even build your mechs specifically for these pilots, though it might be tough if all your Coolant Vent and high Guts units are in the lab for injuries and you have to fight in these really hot mechs without their designated pilots.

There are other things you can do to help heat generation for instance you can moderate your behavior on the battlefield. Jumpjets build more heat the further you travel, mechs build heat by running or walking (though its not much), and mechs cool the most heat when they spend the turn standing still or bracing. You can also turn off un-needed weapons, like any single shot weapon with less than 50% accuracy. Some hazards in the envirorment raise or lower heat generation (ice, water, fire, radiation) while other whole biomes can cause your units to just sink more or less heat than usual.

Personally, I have a mix of mechs that I run in different biomes. I have a lance of "Lunar" mechs that I deploy only on those tougher missions that restrict my heat generation.

[Big mean bunny]

I tend to aim for about 75- 80% heat sink rate overall. If i have range bracketed weapons like LRM's that would be switched off at short I ignore their heat when looking at short medium weapons heat.; just remember to switch them off! Brawling mechs can factor in a cooling off turn when in melee so can be a little hotter as long as jump heat is factored in.

If you see a heat exchanger in a shop get it. They work well if all your weaponry fire in a turn is likely to be 90+ heat. They will not replace heat sinks totally but can enable some crazy heat heavy loadouts. Heat banks are only good for mechs that need high alpha and or jump but intend to retreat brace or melee the next round.

There is nothing wrong with a cooling turn, you can use it for a flank, remove instability, sensor lock or token evasion pip removal/breeching shot single weapon use, DFA!!

[danko9696]

First, decide how often do you want to alpha the way you're going to play that mech. Perhaps you're building a burst damage mech who fires very high damage one or two consecutive turns while jumping and then retreat, or a front line brawler with less damage but who may fire several turns in a row. Or a LRM boat who is expected to fire almost every turn if required. Then adjust the damage and the heatsinks accordingly.

Thermal exchangers are super useful in many builds, although not alone. You still need active heat sink. But there are two important things to consider: if you don't alpha then TEX become worse due to how they work, they become less effective; and they don't help with the heat from jumping. As a rule of thumb try to buy all regular TEX and TEX++ you can, mostly regular TEX (TEX+ are not so good as the previous ones).

Coolant Vent: it can help some very niche setups focused on very high burst damage very hot setups, but in general the skill is roughly equivalent to two regular HS or one DHS. Not exactly because HS/DHS are always working while you really don't want to use Coolant if you don't have >50 heat, that makes them less effective than it seems for sustainable cooling. In general the skill is quite decent in the early (where it's unlikely you have a lvl 8 skill) and mid game. In the late game they worth 1t of equipment, and for a lvl 8 skill it cannot compete with others, mostly Ace Pilot and Master Tactician, which are clearly way better than just 1t of weight. Still there is the exception above but even then it is very hard to make good use of it.

Very often you'll find quotes saying that heat neutral is not good, not efficient. And that I agree, but it can be deceptive. Because you need to account for JJs (if you use them) and hotter biomes. So a -2 heat alpha mech could alpha+jump two times and alpha again in Martian before needing some cooling.

Melee, unless you do it because you really like it, it's a risky proposition. It is effective but if you fail then you're exposed. And even a light mech with no weapons left can do significant damage to you if at melee distance.

Originally posted by Big mean bunny:

There is nothing wrong with a cooling turn, you can use it for a flank, remove instability, sensor lock or token evasion pip removal/breeching shot single weapon use, DFA!!

There is nothing wrong in principle. But only if that's what you really wanted. If your idea was to fire but had to do other thing in order to cool the mech, and if that happens often then it's time to rethink the setup, probably dropping some damage and adding more cooling.

Originally posted by Big mean bunny:

If you see a heat exchanger in a shop get it. They work well if all your weaponry fire in a turn is likely to be 90+ heat. They will not replace heat sinks totally but can enable some crazy heat heavy loadouts. Heat banks are only good for mechs that need high alpha and or jump but intend to retreat brace or melee the next round.

One Heat Bank++ can be nice if you don't have many DHS, because it's way worse than those.

Originally posted by red255:

Gso if we have 60 heat of weapons. we generate a net of 30 heat a turn. and can fire for 3 turns before needing to shut stuff down. squeezing out a 4th turn of firing.

That's very optimistic. It assumes heat neutral map and you're not jumping. And JJs increase heat by a lot, even with only three of them. A Banshee without JJs will be a often a lot less effective and you'll not be able to take full advantage of LoS management. A lower damage (or better cooling mech) may not have as high of a punch but he'll have better choices available when deciding when and who to fire upon.

[terran]

I hadn't considered jump jets as I'm still quite early on and my tactic de jour is jumping around and into trees and behind hills etc for the evasion pips. Only recently have I got a few mechs who can stand up to a few hits/ had money to repair them.

[L37]

It depends on mech role a lot.
Personally for me rule of thumb is 1 jump + 2 alpha strikes for short range brawlers, ~3 alpha strikes for snipers (no JJ-s here) and LRM boats have to be able to shoot a lot, both in terms of heat and ammo, at least in neutral climate.
Obviously better heat management is always welcome, but ability to do it without sacrificing firepower only appears late-game with some lostech.
Later on i also use coolant vent on brawlers, with reasoning that it is basically 50 free heat/extra shot in case when it is used in last turn of combat (and late game with alpha-focused loadouts if combat does not end in 3 turns something went REALLY wrong). In long combat it is MUCH less useful.

If something went wrong, i am out of heat capacity and enemies are still standing... a lot of times it makes sense to shoot at least some weapons. Overheating is too expensive to even consider apart from may be some very special cases. Melee is useful if you can against lighter mechs or tanks, against heavy-assault ones not so much, shooting whatever you can is often better. Bracing and skipping turn - only when there are no other possibilities, letting enemy shoot you, even braced, for extra turn is kind of bad.

Early on it is often useful to exploit the fact that all mechs no matter the size have 30 free cooling (10 heatsinks). It makes high-heat weapons useful on lights for example.

Also water. In case your lance is running hot loadouts a pool of water available usually means that you can murder your enemies even faster than usual, and AI usually fails to take advantage of it.

Climate is very important too, and choosing colder climate is always an option when struggling with heat. With the exception of story missions.