Mechbay & Customizing Mechs

Brief guide with general advice on how to navigate the Mechbay and customize Mechs.

Adding and Removing a Mech to a Mechbay Slot

To add a new Mech to an open slot, click on the storage tab. There you can see Mechs and the qnty (has to be at least 1). Click on the Mech and "unpack" it - it normally takes 1 day and will fill/take the first open Mechbay slot.

Note: currently (as of early May '18) you cannot move Mechs around to different slots. The developers have heard complaints and we'll see if they make changes!

Once the Mech is "Unpacked", you can then customize it.

To store a Mech already in a Mechbay, click on it and click on the bottom right icon "Send to Storage." Be careful because the Orange button scraps the Mech for a few C-Bills. NEVER SCRAP A MECH, always store it and sell in the store, you will almost always get more C-Bills as long as the faction/world your on doesn't hate you.

Customizing Mechs

A few points of advice on custmozing your Mech:

1) Top left panel/area provides projected Mech performance and tells you what you can and cannot put in the selected Mech.

2) You do not always have to fill or use every hardpoint. Make sure you have a nice balance of firepower and heat efficiency so you can fire you weapons as often as possible. It's better to have 4 medium lasers (25 dmg each = 100 dmg total) you can fire every turn than 1 large laser (40 dmg) you can fire every turn.

3) Medium lasers are some of the most powerful weapons (heat efficient with decent damage), especially when paired with high gunnery Mechwarriors as well as using precision strike.

4) Use all tonnage on your Mech, leave nothing on the table. Increase armor or remove a weapon or support weapon so you can add an extra heatsink.

5) Jump jets on all your Mechs - while this is a personal preference, jump jets allow you to reposition, build more evasion and, when the time is right, DFA! Jump jets let you take advantage of the terrain and can allow you to put a hill between you and the enemy quickly. They can also help you reposition to make sure you facing your enemies. I put jump jets on ALL my Mechs.

6) Equipment Upgrades/Mods - periodically review your inventory as you'll pick up interesting pieces that could prove useful. I leverage cockpit mods (increase the number of injuries your Mechwarrior can take) and rangefinder and morale boosting mods.

7) Have fun! Try different things out and find the setup that suits your play style!

Check out the YouTube video I put together for a few more details (covered most of it in the above).

[Shadowcoast]

Interesting, thanks for sharing! I tend to like JJ to position my mechs but every type of play style works!

[Levie]

I've been leaving jump jets off my snipers, and only really using jump jets for my brawlers.

[Dominic Paine]

I tend to go without Jump Jets a lot of the time, but I will often have ONE mech that's jump-capable in order to get over paths they couldn't otherwise get to, and pull a DFA if the risk is worth it.

I prefer the tonnage to go to ammo, armor or heat sinks, but sometimes you need something that jumps.

[Shadowcoast]

@Putinator[GER] while I agree with you on AC's being a strong candidate - it is dependent on the Mechs and hardpoints you have. I DISAGREE strongly on the jump jets - they give you versatility and allow you to position your mech to spread damage between sides, gain more Evasion Chevrons and get behind enemy mechs to deal substantial damage.

[ElLegolo]

I have never used Jump Jets. They just take tonnage that you could use for guns or armor and DFA is too high risk. Maybe they would be a good choice on light mechs and some bad medium ones.
Also lasers are worse than autocannons, depending on your playstyle. They build up barely any heat, deal stability damage, are much more terrain versatile (due to barely any heat) and they can kill most vehicles and turrets in one shot. Sure, an AC20 weighs much more than a bunch of lasers, but lasers need a lot of heatsinks and the AC can even one-hit mechs if you land a lucky headshot