Max BV you can play against

[Wolf_Lord]

I'm just kind of curious how much is too much when playing against the bot. The higher the BV goes, the bigger the gap I think there could be. Eventually, though, there is a point where it is just tipped to the point of overwhelming. What is that tipping point that you have found?

Take my last game I played. I went Pirate Hunting. I had a company of 'Mechs, BV at 13,215, tonnage at 670. I went up against 10 'Mechs, 12 vees and 4 platoons of infantry. I played on a 2x2 map (canyon at 0 and 2, desert mountain at 1 and reversed coast2 at 3). They had a 4,300 BV and 430 ton advantage on me. I thought, eh, might be tough, but I can handle it. I was wrong. I held my own for a while beat them back to just under my BV, I had just under 45% left, and then, it all fell apart to a AC/20 happy Hunchback and Cyclops and their friends the Warhammer, Shadow Hawk, Wolverine, a Bulldog tank and the infantry platoons just waiting for me to round the mountainside. They refused to come out and fight earlier, so they were all fresh, the Zeus got blown up rounding the mountainside, my Victor died to the infantry shooting the head, not breaking the armor but getting the sixth hit in. My Thunderbolt and Archer went up in smoke, the Stinger literally was whipped around by his leg by the Cyclops and destroyed (I kicked and missed, he punched, destroyed the leg and the fall killed the Stinger, my description, so much more flair) and the Commando and Griffin just couldn't survive long enough. In hindsight, I should have retreated and come back with reinforcements and fresh 'Mechs.

So now that I've shared my utter defeat, want to see who has held out against really high BV/tonnage difference and won.

[2ndAcr]

 I have done 221,000 BV for me and almost 300,000 BV using 12 Princess Bots. Turns took a long time, but Princess always has trouble with 8/12 move anything. She can even take a while on a 6/9/6 move.

 But I have done some extremely large fights. So far biggest was 94 Mechs for me and 184 enemy Mechs if I remember the count right. Took me about 2 weeks to play the battle all the way thru. I won, lost 30 or so Mechs to the enemies utter destruction but have also lost fights I should have won easily. The big fight, I gave Princess about 2 Battalions worth of Elite pilots and they played hell with me. Lost several Mechs to head shots. The other's I made Veteran's.

[elf25s]

144 stingers against an atlas...
wanted to see how long atlas would last

best 13 stingers dead before atlas bought it

[Simon Landmine]

144 stingers against an atlas...
wanted to see how long atlas would last

"... in the interests of science!"

[Drifter]

Yeah I was wondering that 2, I showed up with 4 medium mechs at a bv of 3700 and the AI showed up with 9k in vehicles

[Rince Wind]

Really depends on the terrain and other factors. I've won against clan forces that had 36k BV vs. my 27k lances (yeah, not going to show up with a single lance against clan) and only had 2 mechs mission killed. They sent all their smaller mechs against me first, so I could dispatch them with little injury while waiting behind a hill.

I also had horrible phyrric victories against forces that were weaker or about the same in BV, where it was a brutal slugfest with both sides taking heavy losses.

[Kovax]

I can usually demolish a Princess force of similar BV with some minor losses, and beat a 20% larger force with fairly significant losses in the process.  By the time I run up against 50% higher BV, it's going to end up far too expensive even if I do manage to somehow pull it off; basically my own force will in all probability be reduced to little more than salvage.

The biggest advantage a player has against the AI at those odds is the ability to reload and try again, hoping for a couple of lucky critical hits.  The other advantage is the ability to outsmart or outmaneuver the AI and gain local numerical superiority in a few key places, to demolish part of the enemy force with only limited return fire, which becomes easier in a larger battle where "tactical" begins to blur into the "strategic" realm.

If the enemy has more than a 20% BV advantage, it's in my best interests to avoid combat.  In real life, armies try NOT to engage if they're clearly outmatched, or at least try to anchor themselves in or behind protective terrain (rivers, mountains, minefields, and fortifications) to even up the disparity.

[Drifter]

I don't think anyone is arguing that with the right tactics you could overcome the superior bot force in most cases.   But I think the point we should be focusing on is how the BV is determined for BOT forces in initial startup games.   Because if you are starting with like a sum of 20 mil and buying from markets only so you are not always going to get ideal mechs, going against a force with a 60% bv advantage on a flat wide open 16 x 17 board is not going to end well for a starting unit.

[firedude1218]

I can't usually win economically against more than 25% more BV of mechs. Vees are a different story since they pop so easily with forced retreat rules in, so something like 30-45% for me for vees.

[NickAragua]

The odds I can handle vary significantly based on the terrain and unit composition. Princess doesn't do too hot in urban environments or with dense woods (especially when it comes to hovercraft, but really with any ground-bound units), so I've been able to overcome better than 2:1 odds in dense city fighting. Open terrain against swarms of hovercraft? I can barely handle even odds.

[BlueThing]

I've beaten Princess with her having better than 2:1 advantage in BV, but it has always involved at least one of close terrain and inclement weather. Vehicle heavy enemy deployments with either of those greatly improve the odds of a lopsided victory.

I've seen a few battles where the AI had better than 3:1 in BV with double vehicles active. The worst was an old style chase battle where Princess started with a big BV advantage including 8 AC20s at point blank with my units. Thank goodness those have been improved. :)

[Rince Wind]

Ah, I just ignore chases most of the time.