ballistic mech builds?

[DrwHem]

i have been looking for a "gun mech" for awhile now. im up to the point in the game where 60 ton mechs are now starting to show up but the rifleman and jagermech just dont seem all that great with their low armor. they seem to focus on smaller guns. are there any mechs under 70 tons that you can successfully build around a few AC 10- 20 BF mounts?

[Zyrrashijn]

Tonnage and technology limit the ability to field multiple heavier ACs on mech in that weight range. Look out for Heroes like the IV4 or the Legendkiller those 60t mechs have more advanced tech that frees up the required tonnage.

[Bovril Brigadier]

About the best you'll get in game is the Cataphract and that doesn't really start to show till the late 3020s. That or the Gauss Hero Rifleman.
Could also consider Rifles if you want to trade rate of fire.

[kschang77]

Rifleman and Jaegermech are support mechs... They're supposed to "snipe" at enemies from long range. I had an Jaegermech with 2 medium and 2 light rifles. Pretty good headshot machine if you have the rest of your lancemates as meat shields.

[Brother Skolas]

got 2 gauss cannons loaded on my corsair atm

[kschang77]

Corsair... 95t asssault mech, no specific production date as per Sarna, probably in the 3030's. :)

[Bovril Brigadier]

Escrito originalmente por kschang77:

Corsair... 95t asssault mech, no specific production date as per Sarna, probably in the 3030's. :)

PGI homebrew non-canon design. Also not what OP was looking to discuss.

[Azrelus]

Can confirm, Rifleman/Jagermech are decent with a couple heavy rifles.

[Valen]

There are nothing wrong with a ballistic mech, However, You need to consider the ammo you will need and the fact that if your armor gets blown through - a critical on the ammo will cause it to explode. There is no CASE in this game for protection from ammo explosions.
Furthermore, Many of the Vanilla Ballistic mechs tend to be weak on the armor as they are considered support mechs.

While gauss cannons ammunition does not explode - the cannons themselves will explode if they are hit.

[Delta_Assault]

If you don't like the Rifleman and JagerMech's low default armor... give them more armor.

[Eagle_of_Fire]

Personally I am very partial of my one arm gauss Highlander I seem to get in every different kind of game I play. Either here or in Battletech or whever ever else really. Bought one in my first game and built it like that and man did it became one of my favorite right away.

But that's a 80 tons mech. You're not going to see that too much if at all yet. Like I said, I bought mine. One of the early HoIS missions bring you north to a much higher difficulty rating space right away (that Dragon mission, right?) so if you pile up your money you can easily find one over there if you look around while you fly to that far away destination.

[Spirit_OK]

Try Champion. For its 60 tons It has a large slot with a reasonable bunch of supporting weapons and nice speed.

[JtDarth]

Primarily ballistics mechs don't really exist in vanilla below 70-80 tons. the closest you will get is something like a Jager or Rifleman with a bunch of 'rifle' class weapons. Everything else can basically mount 1 ballistic and relies heavily on energy or missile for support.

[SolitaryWaffles]

not really "fully ballistic mech" but the Hero Jagermech is super fun to run around in as a player. First person makes you feel like you're in an AA turret with the way his arms move around. My current setup is:
Twin T5 Ac/2s or Light Rifles,
Twin T4 PPC's
Twin T4 MP Lasers
couple tons of ammo and heatsinks
430ish armour points?
Personally favour the light rifles over the ac/2s because they only weigh half the amount (3tons>6)
playing co-op with few friends this thing consistently put out as much damage as Battlemasters or Black Knights because he starts hitting hard from so far away.

The other option which i've come across which may suite you better is the Hero Quickdraw IV4 Zyrrashijn mentioned - Absolute MONSTER ballistic mech for 60 tons.

Twin medium ballistic slots in his arms, along with twin torso medium energy and twin small missile slots. Drop two LBX 10 AC SLD (Solid Slugs, not the normal shotgun LBX) in there and you can comfortably destroy things from 1+ kilometres or massacre at close range with the added srms and lasers. Far better then the aforementioned Jagermech for raw damage output because those Slug's:
weigh less then an ac/10, fire faster (T3 is every 2 seconds), longer range, faster projectiles, less heat, same damage output. Best weapon in the game IMO and probably the best mech i've found for sixty tons. the only issue is you'll need a few tons of ammo because of their fire rate

[Brother Skolas]

does anyone actually use the rifle's over autocannon?

[Eagle_of_Fire]

I do like to use rifles but that's mainly a question of weight more than anything else. Rifles are great in smaller mechs.