BattleTech - The Board Game of Armored Combat
BattleTech Game Systems => General BattleTech Discussion => Topic started by: Weirdguy on 28 February 2013, 08:06:39
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I've never liked the autocannon-2 for my games (which were mostly 3025 tech level). My friends and I thought they were just too short on firepower to be worth the weight they took up.
Does anybody else think the AC-2 is a bit anemic?
What would BattleTech be like if in fact it had been an AC-3 with 33 shots per ton of ammo?
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The AC-2 can be useful if you are using TACs (Golden BB) or floating crits. Otherwise it is a nuisance weapon best used against aerospace.
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I've never liked the autocannon-2 for my games (which were mostly 3025 tech level). My friends and I thought they were just too short on firepower to be worth the weight they took up.
Does anybody else think the AC-2 is a bit anemic?
Yes.
It doesn't help that an equivalent energy weapon would likely weigh TWO tons and generate only 4 heat for the same performance. And I get these figures by comparing it to the closest equivalent pairing: the AC/5 vs Light PPC. Same damage, same range brackets, and tonnage is traded away for more heat in a 1 for 1 exchange.
I made a thread a while back asking if people would prefer AC weapons to be the same tonnage as equivalent energy weapons. Opinions varied. Some (like me) felt that the AC's lower heat would be more than compensated by the fact that it had to use limited quantities of dangerous explosive ammo; the penalties for ammo explosions far exceeded the penalties for overheating. Others insisted that this would imbalance things far too much in favor of ACs.
What would BattleTech be like if in fact it had been an AC-3 with 33 shots per ton of ammo?
Still anemic. Heck, I think the AC/5 is pretty anemic damage for the tonnage it demands, so this hypothetical AC-3 would still be grossly overweight for me.
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I've never liked the autocannon-2 for my games (which were mostly 3025 tech level). My friends and I thought they were just too short on firepower to be worth the weight they took up.
Does anybody else think the AC-2 is a bit anemic?
What would BattleTech be like if in fact it had been an AC-3 with 33 shots per ton of ammo?
I have. You can make an argument that the AC/5 should really be more like an AC/7 too.
In 3025 the baseline AC/2 still has the marginal use that it has a longer range than any other (non-artillery) weapon available, which can be useful on light, fast units like the Warrior helicopter and (maybe) the Vulcan.
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In 3025 the AC2 had a two point short range advantage over any energy weapon and less minimum range than an LRM. That actually made it incredibly flexible, rangewise, but the low damage was below the threshhold at which it was of use against the average mech armour.
Then 3050 came and that range advantage shrunk, the heat advantage was pu to shame and everyone and their dog started mounting more armour.
So yes, the AC2 is bad. The one thing that could make it worthwile isn't even in TW: Flak ammo.
My suggestion would be adding more alternate ammo types that halve the bin capacity, playing to the AC2's strength while not boosting the bigger ACs too much.
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The AC/2 is an inadequate weapon to use against Battlemechs. In 3025 play, it's a GREAT weapon for immobilizing vehicles, knocking down VTOLs, or plinking stationary or slow targets from beyond the range where they can respond. It's a niche weapon, not something that should be deployed in quantity, but I'd definitely want ONE in any company-sized unit during that timeframe, if you're using combined arms. After 3050, there's better stuff available. If you're playing "Mechs only" in any timeframe, then it's not very useful.
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Any autocannon under an AC 10 is a waste of space and tonnage, not including the ammo. Only a Davion could like the AC 2 or AC 5 class "weapons" :D. The energy and missle class weapons are far more appropriate in almost all circumstances.
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I like the AC/2... on vehicles. Gets better once you get specialty ammo. But still pretty meh.
If you allow for double-tapping from standard ACs, it becomes an okay weapon to me. Essentially a very long-range SRM4.
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About the only place I like the AC2 is on the Warrior, otherwise only on ack ack.
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I like the AC/2... on vehicles. Gets better once you get specialty ammo. But still pretty meh.
If you allow for double-tapping from standard ACs, it becomes an okay weapon to me. Essentially a very long-range SRM4.
Yeah, the lighter ACs make much better sense under Solaris type rules where they get a higher rate of fire than equivalent energy weapons. The AC/5 could fire twice in 10 seconds to the PPC's single shot. The AC/2 could fire FOUR times in 10 seconds. At those RoFs, they turn into decent, competitive weapons.
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Or you could just use the LAC's. They address the weight issues nicely, though at a slightly shorter range. The Ultra's I never liked anyway, and the LB's are anti-aero specialty weapons, IMO.
The basic version is quite frankly ready to die soon, I think.
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the AC/2 has never been about damage, but range. and since 'mechs, the primary target in most games of battletech are more than tough enough to soak up its plinking to get in close enough to deliver much more firepower it's just not a weapon for most battlefields.
they are fairly effective on both vehicles and aircraft due to their range though, so they have a place, if not on a battlemech. there's still a niche for them in the shape of cheap vehicles mounting them to avoid the excessive heat issues of energy weapons or the high cost of LRMs.
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Always figured they were best used on a static emplacement and only as a field repair on a mech. Only a nut would actually design a mech to use one from the ground up.
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I've had bad experiences going up against AC/2s, in various eras. Mainly due to how incredibly often I get through-armor critted...
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put five of them on as towed artillery on a PBI unit and suddenly infantry have a place in the open field of combat
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There are definitely uses and places for the AC/2. Honestly, I find the AC/5 harder to justify on the modern battlefield than the AC/2.
As Isanova says, infantry with AC/2 field guns can lay down a credible threat at a great distance. With 45 shots a ton, they also have extreme combat longevity for field gun infantry.
Kovax also made a great point that in 3025 they were fantastic for immobilizing vehicles before they can reach combat ranges, swatting VTOLs, and forcing a PSR on aircraft. What he didn't mention is that with special ammunition, they're still amongst the best weapons for this role
Precision ammo renders half the normal shots per ton, but that's still 22 shots for an AC/2! An AC/2 loaded with precision ammo can reliably hit any vehicle out to 21 hexes, and can very easily neutralize whole lances of vehicles before they can even get in range for their own weapons! While the LB-2X has around a 40% chance of a second location roll, the AC/2 with precision is more likely to hit in the first place, particularly against annoyingly fast but easy to immobilize units like hovercraft.
Loaded with flak ammo, an AC/2 is still a great way to eliminate VTOLs and force PSRs on aircraft. -2 to hit isn't quite as good as LB-X, but you're not giving up much, and you can carry a ton of flak and a ton of precision to give yourself the perfect tool to deal with any non-'Mech opponent you come across.
Finally, unlike the LB-2X's cluster rounds, the standard AC/2's bonuses for flak and precision ammo stack with that of a targeting computer! Using an AC/2 with precision ammo and a targeting computer to target a breached location can allow you to quickly finish off damaged enemy units at a significant distance, preventing them from escaping.
Honestly, it's the AC/5 that I feel has the harder time being competitive. The AC/2s range and special ammo gives it a lot of utility that can't be matched by other weapons. It's hardly the most impressive weapon, but it certainly has a role to play on the battlefield, albeit a small one. The AC/5, however, only does slightly more damage than the AC/2 but a large number of weapons of similar size have similar or superior range and damage output.
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The AC/5, however, only does slightly more damage than the AC/2 but a large number of weapons of similar size have similar or superior range and damage output.
Light PPC. Exact same performance characteristics (ie, damage and range brackets) as the AC/5 while being less than half the weight. Sure it generates 5 times the heat, but 5 heat in the DHS era ain't nothing to get excited over.
The AC/5 of course can use specialty ammo, but for its weight you can get other weapons that do substantially more damage
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As Isanova says, infantry with AC/2 field guns can lay down a credible threat at a great distance. With 45 shots a ton, they also have extreme combat longevity for field gun infantry.
When the first Tech III rules came out and field guns became playable.... boy where my friends in trouble. Bunch of mechanized with ac/2 field guns on higher ground....
Even today I couldn´t imagine playing Liao forces w/o field gun support.
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Man, 5 heat in the SHS era was nothing to get excited over either, but we just didn't have the thing then.
Heck, the LPPC and 5 SHS weigh the same as an empty AC/5. Even on an ICE vehicle, where you'll add 0.3 tons as a power converter, you still come out 0.5 tons on top.
Poor AC/5...
And yes, forgot about the Field Guns.
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Comparing weapons looking for parity doesn't really work, either.
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I remember when the Kracken came out. 100 tons with 8 AC2s. Now I myself thought not a bad idea becuse of the range of AC2 being 4/8/16/24 but thought 6 tons per AC just not worth it. Then came the Light AC2 and I tought hay this might work well being the Light AC2 is 4 tons each. Then my dissapointment that the Light AC2 range is 0/6/12/18. Just my thoughts sence I don't really have a hard numbers opinion. :D
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I like the AC/2... on vehicles. Gets better once you get specialty ammo. But still pretty meh.
If you allow for double-tapping from standard ACs, it becomes an okay weapon to me. Essentially a very long-range SRM4.
Rate of Fire.
I honestly think this would have been a good rule to add to the baseline game. AC-2's should be able to fire 3 times per turn, AC-5's twice, and AC-10's and 20's just the normal once per turn.
The reason I brought this up is because of an experiment I ran in Mechwarrior Online where I loaded up my Centurion-D with a pair of AC-2's just to try it out.
I ran out of 2 tons of ammo! I didn't drop down in damage dealt out at the end of game scoreboard either.
I would like to point out to everybody that both in the board game and in the video game the AC ammunition adds up to be about 100 points of damage per ton of ammo. An AC-5 has twenty shots per ton, while the big AC-20 is just 5 shots.
If you land every shot, it doesn't matter what size gun you used. In MWO the rates of fire between the autocannons make up the difference, and an AC-2 fires twice every second, while and AC-10 fires once every 2.5 seconds. That means the AC-2 and AC-10 are putting out the same damage per second, or DPS as they call it in online role playing games.
Of course there are other factors like aim, range, damage concentration on locations, ect. But, in general one is not better than the other it seems.
My concusion is If this works so well in the video game, we ought to bring this into the board game too.
Just spitballing ideas.
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Don't they have the ROF versions in the Rotaries?
In more seriousness, 2 shots per turn for the base AC-5 may be too much. It would be an Ultra without the jamming.
But they both could stand a little weight loss for the base models, imo. There is little reason not to change them out for an energy of the same size in many 'Mech cases.
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Rate of Fire.
I honestly think this would have been a good rule to add to the baseline game. AC-2's should be able to fire 3 times per turn, AC-5's twice, and AC-10's and 20's just the normal once per turn.
The reason I brought this up is because of an experiment I ran in Mechwarrior Online where I loaded up my Centurion-D with a pair of AC-2's just to try it out.
I ran out of 2 tons of ammo! I didn't drop down in damage dealt out at the end of game scoreboard either.
In MW3, I once loaded up my mech with a bunch of machine guns and (what I thought was) plenty of ammo. I got into point blank range of an enemy mech, opened up with the MGs... and ran out of ammo in less than 5 seconds of fire while doing NO DAMAGE worth noting on the other mech.
Don't they have the ROF versions in the Rotaries?
Yes. But it comes at the price of being a heavier weapon with shorter effective ranges and a chance to jam at anything other than the bottommost rate of fire.
In more seriousness, 2 shots per turn for the base AC-5 may be too much. It would be an Ultra without the jamming.
Yes, but then it'd also do a worthwhile amount of damage for its tonnage cost and compare favorably to other weapon types.
And presumably under these hypothetical RoF rules, the Ultra AC/5's RoF would also double so that it can put up to FOUR rounds down range in a single turn. Although IIRC under the Solaris Rules, the Ultra AC/5 had a slighly lower RoF than the vanilla AC/5 (3 attacks over 20 seconds for the Ultra vs 4 times per 20 seconds for the standard AC/5).
But they both could stand a little weight loss for the base models, imo. There is little reason not to change them out for an energy of the same size in many 'Mech cases.
Weight loss or damage increase. Either way, you're trying to get a good dps/ton ratio. Generally speaking, 1 damage per turn per ton of weapon is "average". At 10 damage for 12 tons of weapons, the AC/10 is near the bottom of what we'd call acceptable efficiency, and possibly is only there because 10 damage is 1 more than what normally protects a mech's head. Outside of the ACs, nearly every weapon I can think of has a higher damage than it weighs in tons.
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Never a fan of the AC/2 myself but keep this in mind: One AC/2 shell does the same damage as a SRM and twice the damage of a single LRM and with greater reach.
There are still better weapons per ton which makes the AC a waste and only weighs down designs like the Mauler and Bane/Kraken. Swap out the AC-2s on the Mauler with energy weapons and heat sinks, it's a much more dangerous design.
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If you're running lance on lance deathmatches, anything other than Medium Lasers need to be well designed to excel. But if you want to do a Succession Wars running battle between light and medium 'mechs while facing forced withdrawl, the shear range of an AC/2 becomes a potent asset. Being able to inflict light damage before your opponent can retaliate can force them to pull out before doing major damage to you, and the massive ammo supply that comes with an AC/2 allows you to take long range shots without worrying about the waste.
So basically, AC/2 make terrible weapons for a straight forward fight, but they're great for wars of attrition wear surviving is more important than killing.
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If you're running lance on lance deathmatches, anything other than Medium Lasers need to be well designed to excel. But if you want to do a Succession Wars running battle between light and medium 'mechs while facing forced withdrawl, the shear range of an AC/2 becomes a potent asset. Being able to inflict light damage before your opponent can retaliate can force them to pull out before doing major damage to you, and the massive ammo supply that comes with an AC/2 allows you to take long range shots without worrying about the waste.
So basically, AC/2 make terrible weapons for a straight forward fight, but they're great for wars of attrition wear surviving is more important than killing.
See only a Davion could like them! :D his banner confirms the Davion obsessive AC is good syndrome.
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It has its uses- but it is a specialist's weapon.
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Never a fan of the AC/2 myself but keep this in mind: One AC/2 shell does the same damage as a SRM and twice the damage of a single LRM and with greater reach.
There are still better weapons per ton which makes the AC a waste and only weighs down designs like the Mauler and Bane/Kraken. Swap out the AC-2s on the Mauler with energy weapons and heat sinks, it's a much more dangerous design.
Does the Mauler live up to it's name? I don't know, but a few more ac2s would really help it out. Would the Mauler be a far more dangerous design without the ac2s? Sure, no question about it. Hell, using SSW within a few minutes I pumped its BV2 to just over 2k points, but also shaved off 10million cbills from the cost of the mech, upped its armor a bit, and removed the XL engine. The heat issue is gone, the LRM 15s can now fire a few more rounds and theres no need to change up your firing pattern. Also, anyone getting close is going to meet 5 medium lasers and a flame thrower.
In the end, the Mauler without the ac2s isn't a Mauler and just not as fun of a design.
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I've allways liked the consept of AC's, and fealt that they dodn't get what they deserved from the rules
Before I saw the light with MegaMek, I played a lot of Battletech RPG, and there I made houserules where ac's had a higher rate of fire than energy weapons. I allso made penetration-rules for ac's (and gauss-rifles), enabeling them to shoot through armor before the armor was destroyed. IMO that worked well, and I still play the old 3025-mechs with those rules when we rpg-play tabletop. (now with the new option rules on MegaMek, I allways enable the option that heatsinks becomes less efficiant if overheating, and I enable all positive AC-rules; ac2 and 5 add one damage, you can have rof on normal ac's, you can unjam ac's, separate to hit rolls, etc, etc., and I feel that when enabeling all those optional-rules, the ac's finally get the play-balance they deserve)
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Yeah, the acs lose out on a lot because of the rate of fire =1 shot per turn. Their "advantage" is low heat, and assuming that the rpg rules were correct, then weapons were capable of firing more often then allowed in standard play. An energy weapon based design is not likely to go crazy firing their weapons twice a turn very often, but a low heat ac design would want to fire twice or more per round.
Heck, if this was allowed there would be a whole new line of mechs opened up that are both Ac based and have additional cooling. Right now there really are those that are missile based, those that are energy based, and those that are gauss rifle based. There really isn't that many designs outside of those with ac20s that are ac based. Acs are more support for the other weapons that have higher heat costs. The ultras and racs help, but the loss of range hurts the smaller autocannons significantly. The additional weight of the ultras hurt the lighter classes significantly further putting them into supporting roles. Few designs really have anything to offer as far as acs go other then the kraken.
A change to the rules to allow at least the lower classes to fire twice would be nice. I also agree that the optional rule of allowing acs to fire twice per round does help, even if the chances of jamming increase to a point to make the ultras look safe.
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Fill them with precision ammo, harass light mechs at range...
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I really don't understand why people keep trying to make energy weapons and autocannons equal weight. Autocannons are heavy because they have to contain the multiple explosions that propels the projectiles. If they weren't heavy enough to withstand that they'd blow up. Not a good thing.
Energy weapons aren't physically as heavy but they also have to rely on additional devices (heat sinks and insulators) to keep them from melting. Melting isn't a good thing. Those additional devices bring up the total weight of the energy weapons. If energy weapons were made heavy enough to withstand the heat they produced they'd be as heavy or heavier than they are with the added heat sinks. Either way the weight between AC/s and energy weapons is already comparable. The advantage energy weapons have over AC/s is ammo. That is countered a little by a possible need for power amplifiers.
Double heat sinks do lighten the weight but only if the can be mounted. There's also lighter AC/s so that isn't much of an advantage. Energy weapons real advantage over AC/s is that modern "rated" engines come with free heat sinks. With Fuel Cell Engines that 1 heat sink isn't much but the 5-10 that come with fission and fusion engines is really hard to overcome, especially if they're double heat sinks. However, that doesn't mean AC's don't still have some advantages.
They can double the rate of fire, doubling their damage. They have different ammo types to use against different targets. They can divide their fire between two targets, and they don't have an armor type specifically designed to counter them. They also cost a lot less. Another advantage they should have but don't is that they should do more damage against infantry. They fire multiple rounds. They should hit more troopers.
All that being said, AC/s are still good effective weapons, even the AC/2. Especially if you're a cash strapped unit using a low tech vehicles/mechs. For the same weight as an ER Large Laser, heat sinks, and power amplifier, you can have 2 AC/2s, a targeting computer, 2 tons of ammo, and CASE.
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In the end, the Mauler without the ac2s isn't a Mauler and just not as fun of a design.
True, but when you consider that each pair of AC2s weigh the same as a single Light Gauss for the same range and twice the damage... :D
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True, but I get the AC2-equipped Daboku loooong before you get LGRs. Still...that's a neat idea. Makes me wonder...
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Hehe- but LGRs cannot pick apart fast moving targets with precision ammo.
I saw a single Mauler pillboxing half a century of hovertanks. I lost 2 Saracens- the AC2s slowing them down or immobilizing them and then they got finished off with the LRMs.
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True, but it can hit out further with those LGRs and a LOT harder. It took some cramming to fit, but darn if it doesn't kind of work (http://bg.battletech.com/forums/index.php/topic,27471.0.html) in this horribly overheated way. Well...leave one ERLL off...
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Hitting a hovertank at long range is not easy. That -2 from precision ammo helps a lot.
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I have kicked around all sorts of versions of the Mauler, including the LGR design. I think what it comes down to is really what do you think makes the design? Personally, I think the AC2s, some kind of missiles, and a pair of energy weapons make the Mauler. Clearly for me the ac2s are the center of the design that makes it something different then any other design, lose that and you have some random custom design. For other people it might just be a matter of long range weapons of each weapon type, nothing more, hence the LGR variant. It is similar to the KingCrab where it is a matter of having twin 20s, anything else can be changed, but it needs twin 20s to be a King Crab.
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Energy weapons aren't physically as heavy but they also have to rely on additional devices (heat sinks and insulators) to keep them from melting. Melting isn't a good thing. Those additional devices bring up the total weight of the energy weapons. If energy weapons were made heavy enough to withstand the heat they produced they'd be as heavy or heavier than they are with the added heat sinks. Either way the weight between AC/s and energy weapons is already comparable. The advantage energy weapons have over AC/s is ammo. That is countered a little by a possible need for power amplifiers.
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Even if you factor in heat sinks and necessary ammunition then at least for mechs energy weapons usually turn out to be no heavier than the equivalent ACs. For instance in 3025-play if you compare an AC10 with two tons of ammunition with a standard PPC you'll see that together with enough heat sinks to keep them heat neutral at the bottom line both weigh 17 tons. Even if we say that the higher range of the PPC is offset by the ACs lack of minimum range you still have to deal with the fact that the AC needs ammo that can a) run out and b) blow up. Furthermore the 10 SHS needed for the PPC have the flexibility to be used for other weapons (bracketing fire!) whereas the AC10 only contributes 3 SHS. The same also applies in later eras for instance with the LPPC vers. both the LAC5 and AC5, the UAC5 against he ERLL and so on. Throw in the free heat sinks from the engine and it gets even worse. As a consequence only few types really shine on their own (mostly class 20 ones and the LBX-AC10).
The only area where ACs seem to have a tangible advantage are combat vehicles because these need no heat sinks for ballistic and missile weapons.
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They can double the rate of fire, doubling their damage. They have different ammo types to use against different targets. They can divide their fire between two targets, and they don't have an armor type specifically designed to counter them. They also cost a lot less. Another advantage they should have but don't is that they should do more damage against infantry. They fire multiple rounds. They should hit more troopers.
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With the exception of special munitions all these rules are pure optional. And the reason they were introduced in Maximum Tech in the first place was because people wouldn't stop complaining about how inferior ACs were under standard rules. So hardly a convincing argument for ACs. Still I agree that some of the special munitions are kinda neat especially flak and precision ammo.
Considering the cost issue ACs aren't cheaper either. An AC10 costs 200,000 c-bills as does a PPC. A LBX10 vs. a ERPPC is 400,000 vs. 300,000. Factor in the cost for ammunition and the logistical tail and it becomes really ugly. Heat sinks with their costs of 2,000 (SHS) / 6,000 (SHS) arent that much of an issue either either. And lets not forget that a single unlucky crit into an ammo bin may cost you your entire mech.
As for the effect on infantry the issue of what they should to is irrelevant as long as the rules say otherwise. Unless of course if you implement house rules which is cool by me.
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All that being said, AC/s are still good effective weapons, even the AC/2. Especially if you're a cash strapped unit using a low tech vehicles/mechs. For the same weight as an ER Large Laser, heat sinks, and power amplifier, you can have 2 AC/2s, a targeting computer, 2 tons of ammo, and CASE.
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As i mentioned above if you are really cash strapped it is better to avoid ammunition carrying mechs. Even if AC2-ammo might be comparatively cheap replacing half your mech because of an ammo crit is not.
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ACs are the tubby girl at the dance. They are significantly overweight and no one wants to dance with them if there is a lighter option available. The boys all want to play with energy weapons.
Except for the AC-20, because damn, look at those cannons.
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I think that part of the argument posits that energy weapons are more expensive than guns. I suppose it would follow then that ammo expenditure is less expensive than energy weapon maintenance?
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ACs are the tubby girl at the dance. They are significantly overweight and no one wants to dance with them if there is a lighter option available. The boys all want to play with energy weapons.
Not so. Post-3062, precision ammo makes ACs very, very desirable as it gives a -2 against target movement mods. Against VTOLs and fast movers like light 'Mechs, it makes ACs act like pulse lasers. I actually like ACs with precision ammo as I use them against fast movers.
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ACs are the tubby girl at the dance. They are significantly overweight and no one wants to dance with them if there is a lighter option available. The boys all want to play with energy weapons.
Except for the AC-20, because damn, look at those cannons.
Well it helps that the AC/20 is the only AC that has a better than 1:1 damage/tonnage ratio. Even the AC/10 doesn't have that even though it's pretty close.
Not so. Post-3062, precision ammo makes ACs very, very desirable as it gives a -2 against target movement mods. Against VTOLs and fast movers like light 'Mechs, it makes ACs act like pulse lasers. I actually like ACs with precision ammo as I use them against fast movers.
There's still the "halve the ammo per ton" issue. I'm not sure even the AC/2 is worth taking even with Precision ammo because of the picayune amount of damage it does. The AC/5? Maybe. Sure, you can HIT the guy now, but can you actually HURT them in any meaningful way before they kill you or you run out of ammo?
Now Precision would be fantastic for the AC/10 and AC/20, but then you're running into ammo issues. Most existing designs that use these weapons don't carry enough ammo to use Precision without quickly running out of ammo. They're typically given 15 to 20 shots, which Precision ammo reduces to 6 (5 rounds per ton halved gets reduced to 2 rounds per ton) to 10 shots; most players consider that inadequate for your typical tabletop battle.
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There's still the "halve the ammo per ton" issue. I'm not sure even the AC/2 is worth taking even with Precision ammo because of the picayune amount of damage it does. The AC/5? Maybe. Sure, you can HIT the guy now, but can you actually HURT them in any meaningful way before they kill you or you run out of ammo?
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Actually i think that precision ammo works better for the AC2 than any other type of AC. Even at half ammo you still have 22 shots which is enough for most battles. On the other side you now have an excellent weapon to take out those pesky fast hover tanks and VTOLs at insane ranges since hitting and critting them is usually more important than actually breaching their armour. The other AC types otoh hand will indeed run into ammo problems. Especially the class 20 versions get the shaft because their 5 shots per ton are rounded town to two.
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Never had any hate for the AC2. I have usd the Vulcan several times over the years & have had it do right by me. The Jagermech ..... well I will swap the AC5's out before the AC2's. When playing floating crits I have had better more memorable crits happen with AC2's more than any other weapon.
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here's another thing to think about: What if the GM does something funky like make the environment a danger. Lets say that your planet that your on, has a hostile environment, full of really bad gases that don't react well to beam weapons or propellant-based munitions (like missiles or, oddly enough precision rounds LOL). suddenly that low flame (or reduced flame since any ignition occurs safely inside the barrel of the weapon in question) but otherwise poor damage weapon might be useful.
but yeah, everyone else arguments are valid. The AC/2 will never be a match for a PPC. no arguement there, but sometimes you roll a AWS-8Q.... sometimes you roll a VL-2T...
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here's another thing to think about: What if the GM does something funky like make the environment a danger. Lets say that your planet that your on, has a hostile environment, full of really bad gases that don't react well to beam weapons or propellant-based munitions (like missiles or, oddly enough precision rounds LOL). suddenly that low flame (or reduced flame since any ignition occurs safely inside the barrel of the weapon in question) but otherwise poor damage weapon might be useful.
Then why would any Dropship captain in their right mind would want to land on such a planet.
And why would anyone settle such a planet? Such an atmosphere would be far too toxic to breath.
The only kind of planet I can think of that would be like that would be one with a hyper-oxygenated atmosphere. You know, the kind that would set things like rocks and steel on fire with a spark. Without some extremely burn resistant plants on the surface to replenish the oxygen, random fires started by lightning strikes would have long since reduced the oxygen content of the planet to non-hazardous levels.
Same goes for other gasses like methane or what not. If the stuff is so ready as to spark on fire at the slightest provocation, natural events would have long since depleted the stuff unless there was something actively putting it back in the air.
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There are rules for poisonous atmosphere. Sometimes the resources or the strategic position of the system makes putting a unit on it viable.
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Grey death legion trilogy price of glory
they were fighting over control of inhabited domes on a a cold toxic planet, I want to say kinda like titan in our solar system basically you get a cockpit breach and you are dead within seconds
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Then why would any Dropship captain in their right mind would want to land on such a planet.
And why would anyone settle such a planet? Such an atmosphere would be far too toxic to breath.
Moons without atmosphere or poisonous/uninhabitable planets may have secret military installations, important mining facilities, spaceports, sealed environment colonies, or other juicey targets to fight over.
BattleMechs have fought in zero atmosphere and other dangerous conditions.
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If one has to reach for the box of obscure, highly unlikely possibilities, then your point is not really going to be valid. We could also say that you are going to play on a planet that is extremely dusty and is going to negate your energy weapons' damage significantly. It would have to be rather significant to reduce a ppc to that of the damage of an ac2.
Precision ammo is nice, but you need to customize existing designs to make any real use for 10s and 20s. 5s and 2s will work, most likely you can swap the ammo out. But, as someone already mentioned, even if they act like pulse lasers, how much damage are you really doing? A mauler could go from "likely to hit with ac2s" to "extremely likely to hit with ac2s", but that is a mere 8 points of damage. Even if using floating crits, which is nice, what are your chances of actually getting? Even still, what are the chances that you are going to ko the unit instead of busting a small laser that was extremely unlikely to ever come into play?
Is the tonnage put into ac2s going to yield enough of a chance of getting a knock out crit to offset the potential firepower gain if the tonnage was put into other types of weapons? If the answer is "yes", then by all means go with the 2s. If the answer is "50/50" then by all means rock what you like and no one can criticize. If the answer is, "well, maybe if the moon aligns with jupiter and the cat rolls over 5 times in the hallway as jack eats the last of the cheetos" then your selection is far from optimal and comes down to nothing but preference.
While I myself never went with what units that were designed to get the most munch out of the tonnage, sub-par weapons remain sub-par weapons in spite of preference. I won't argue that ac2s should not be used, or that anyone design a unit around ac2s to try and show that they can be a real threat, but I won't argue that they are on part with energy weapons for the tonnage.
I really like the Mauler. I really like the Kraken. I like trying to find something that is underused and trying to show someone that it can still be a valid choice, regardless of it being sub-optimal. I just wish that at some point the Devs will make certain things tourney legal level rules instead of optional. There really is the possibility of doing so without breaking the game. As it is, ACs have to great of a drawback in comparison to energy weapons. I can't stand davion, but I would like to see the existing weapon types given more of a distinction instead of it just having another name and slightly different stats. Stats that once the game has started make no true difference.
I would really like to see something along the lines of what we see in mechwarrior games when it comes to weapon cycles. The greater the damage the weapon does, the longer it takes to fire again. Smaller weapons can fire sooner then their larger counter-parts. It could make lower tech games a bit more deadly, which I feel is needed since playing rock'em sock'em robots can get old real fast. More high tech weapons would not be fired twice per turn by the player simply due to the higher levels of heat, which even with double heatsinks could be a serious pain.
An AC2 and 5 could fire twice a turn, much like the rpg rules. A 20 would not be ready to fire again before the end of the turn, but a 10 might. Add a +1 to hit for the second shot and the heat and the lighter cannons could become better though unlikely to truly match their energy based counterparts. Ac using mechs would still be balanced by the heat which can easily threaten to blow them up from the inside. Energy weapons would still have that advantage of being more accurate then a twice fired AC2 or 5, as well as hitting the same location instead of having to roll another location for the second round that hits. An ultra cannon could have the chance to jam(which lets face it should be the problem instead of burning out, right RACs?) increased for each burst. While 4 shots would be a significant change, the heat doubled and the risked increased by 50% in addition to the inaccuracy gain. To add even more to consider is the increased rate of fire's need for ammo. More ammo means greater risks of crits and heat related problems.
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Precision ammo is nice, but you need to customize existing designs to make any real use for 10s and 20s. 5s and 2s will work, most likely you can swap the ammo out. But, as someone already mentioned, even if they act like pulse lasers, how much damage are you really doing? A mauler could go from "likely to hit with ac2s" to "extremely likely to hit with ac2s", but that is a mere 8 points of damage. Even if using floating crits, which is nice, what are your chances of actually getting? Even still, what are the chances that you are going to ko the unit instead of busting a small laser that was extremely unlikely to ever come into play?
All true, if your only mounting the weapon on 'Mechs and only shooting at 'Mechs. I think the conclusion all the supporters of the AC/2 have come to is that it's not for 'Mech v. Mech combat, however, and is best either on tanks or towed by infantry firing at whatever, or on a unit that is trying to swat down hovercraft, light aircraft and VTOLs.
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I will say I've come to respect the lowly AC/2. Last time I played against a JagerMech, I got headcapped by the stupid things. Was playing a Lance on Lance battle. He kept the J at long-range and just kept plinking away at me. Every time he would fire at my command 'Mech (which was a Orion by the way) he kept hitting the head. It did take away but he finally killed my Orion. I even made him switch over to use my dice (not that I suspected anything funny, but come on, that kind of luck has to stop sometime!). He still kept rolling head hits. (Traitors.)
I don't fear a JagerMech, but I do respect it.
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yep
many moons ago in a rpg setting, my archer took a single range 24 AC2 hit in the back
TAC
BOOM!
crater
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Grey death legion trilogy price of glory
they were fighting over control of inhabited domes on a a cold toxic planet, I want to say kinda like titan in our solar system basically you get a cockpit breach and you are dead within seconds
Slight correction: Marik regular forces, posing as the Gray Death Legion, were genociding people in those inhabited domes; there was no fight for control. That was a setup caused by Precentor Rachan and Lord Garth of Irian, which would give Lord Garth the lostech 'Mechs in the Helm Castle Brian, and Rachan time to either claim or destroy the library core.
Not that there were many people in the Sirius system to begin with, since the world's domes had been falling into lostech by that point.
Anyhoo... AC/2s are interesting to me; I'm someone who still wants to see ballistic weapons be useful, and the AC/2 is surprising. Not too bad on the weight, plenty of reach in intro, and two can easily share an ammo-ton.
Many custom 'Mechs calibrate their armour protection to take X number of big weapon hits before going internal; even little scratches from the AC/2 can disrupt that, or do golden BB shots. Also, it's compact, making it less likely to eat a crit than its bulkier cousins.
It doesn't improve all that well; both the Ultra and LB-X versions trade away crit space for a bit of extra range (and quite a bit of extra cost.) The LAC and RAC versions trade away range. And as for that Light Gauss thing... it's a Gauss, which means that it can explode, and is easier to explode than compact AC/2 ammo.
For those who care about campaigns: while the AC/2 is admittedly a bit harder to acquire than most other introtech weapons (CDC, compare CCC for PPC and missiles,) it's cheap at 75k cbills and 1k per ammo-ton. Even precision only raises your ammo bill to 6k per ton, which is what you'd pay for regular AC/10 bins - and you get more shots.
But how do you use an AC/2 well? If you're facing things that aren't 'Mechs, just shoot. If you happen to be facing 'Mechs, just shooting will also work; they're nice opening weapons despite their low damage. Scratch their armour early, then watch their surprise as bigger weapons defeat the armour unexpectedly. Just watch the short range, and back them up with something beefier like some lasers, or heavier autocannons, or other units. :)
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Judging by how decent the AC-2 is in the game Mechwarrior Online, I honestly think they should add more mechs that have that weapon by default. The Mauler/Daboku, the Vulcan, ect.
I am not sure, but are there any 3025 or 2750 light mechs that had the AC-2?
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Judging by how decent the AC-2 is in the game Mechwarrior Online, I honestly think they should add more mechs that have that weapon by default. The Mauler/Daboku, the Vulcan, ect.
I am not sure, but are there any 3025 or 2750 light mechs that had the AC-2?
Only the Jackrabbit JKR-8T, 2764, at 25 tons. AC/2 and SSRM-2 - mainly fielded by the Amaris faction. A Large Laser refit was used by the RWR; and the WoB, for some reason, have a new upgrade with LAC/5 and ERML. The Nexus is also considered a Jackrabbit variant, but is a pure infighter with ML, 2 MPL, 2 SL.
Most older AC/2 'Mechs are medium, 40 and 45 tons; one Dragon and two Jagermech variants also mount it.
It's fairly commonly seen on heavy tanks, ranging from the Vedette-AC/2 to the Partisan's set of five. The Warrior H-7 VTOL is also noted for using it.
Only one classic aero mounts it: the Shilone.
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If you really want good AC's my advice is to break out the Rifle(Cannon)'s and ignore the reduced damage rule
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It's fairly commonly seen on heavy tanks, ranging from the Vedette-AC/2 to the Partisan's set of five.
Partisan is known for 4 AC/5. The AC/2 variant was an experiment. I wouldn't really expect a lot of those to be running around.
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Honestly it's a shame there wasn't a canon all-AC2 Rifleman in 3025 play. Shedding the tonnage of those guns gave you so much for that 'Mech, and the extra range over the AC5 made it shine in my opinion. It's only going to plink, but it's going to plink very well and from waaaaaay over there.
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Only the Jackrabbit JKR-8T, 2764, at 25 tons. AC/2 and SSRM-2 - mainly fielded by the Amaris faction. A Large Laser refit was used by the RWR; and the WoB, for some reason, have a new upgrade with LAC/5 and ERML. The Nexus is also considered a Jackrabbit variant, but is a pure infighter with ML, 2 MPL, 2 SL.
Most older AC/2 'Mechs are medium, 40 and 45 tons; one Dragon and two Jagermech variants also mount it.
It's fairly commonly seen on heavy tanks, ranging from the Vedette-AC/2 to the Partisan's set of five. The Warrior H-7 VTOL is also noted for using it.
Only one classic aero mounts it: the Shilone.
and the Clint that has 2, fairly useful in MM at least
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...
I would really like to see something along the lines of what we see in mechwarrior games when it comes to weapon cycles. The greater the damage the weapon does, the longer it takes to fire again. Smaller weapons can fire sooner then their larger counter-parts. It could make lower tech games a bit more deadly, which I feel is needed since playing rock'em sock'em robots can get old real fast. More high tech weapons would not be fired twice per turn by the player simply due to the higher levels of heat, which even with double heatsinks could be a serious pain.
An AC2 and 5 could fire twice a turn, much like the rpg rules. A 20 would not be ready to fire again before the end of the turn, but a 10 might. Add a +1 to hit for the second shot and the heat and the lighter cannons could become better though unlikely to truly match their energy based counterparts. Ac using mechs would still be balanced by the heat which can easily threaten to blow them up from the inside. Energy weapons would still have that advantage of being more accurate then a twice fired AC2 or 5, as well as hitting the same location instead of having to roll another location for the second round that hits. An ultra cannon could have the chance to jam(which lets face it should be the problem instead of burning out, right RACs?) increased for each burst. While 4 shots would be a significant change, the heat doubled and the risked increased by 50% in addition to the inaccuracy gain. To add even more to consider is the increased rate of fire's need for ammo. More ammo means greater risks of crits and heat related problems.
This idea has been brought up several times now but i am not quite sure whether this is really to way i would go to give ACs some boost. It simply messes up with way to many established designs which would either run into heat problems due to insufficient heat sinks or don't have enough ammo to really make use of these rules. Furthermore an UAC10 that can fire 4 times is simply to much for my liking.
Instead i would suggest to adjust the the damage values of established AC types. A set of house rules that i want to put to the test sometime soon would increase potential damage per ton to 120 and revise the damage values for all ACs as follows:
ACs, UACs, LBX-ACs and HVACs
2 → 4 (30 shots per ton)
5 → 7 (17 shots per ton)
10 → 11 (11 shots perton)
RACs and light LACs
LAC 2 → LAC 3 (40 shots per ton)
LAC 5 → LAC 6 (20 shots per ton)
RAC 2 → RAC 3 (30 shots per ton)
RAC 5 → RAC 5 (24 shots per ton)
Also remove any minimum ranges and perhaps use the direct/glancing blow optional rule and i think ACs would be highly competitive with energy weapons without overshadowing them. Another possibility to give at least the newer AC-types some boost is to allow them to use standard weight specialty ammunitions. At least that would finally explain why so many AA units use UACs when LBX-ACs would be so much more better (e.g. several marks of the Jagermech or the Partisan).
Honestly it's a shame there wasn't a canon all-AC2 Rifleman in 3025 play. Shedding the tonnage of those guns gave you so much for that 'Mech, and the extra range over the AC5 made it shine in my opinion. It's only going to plink, but it's going to plink very well and from waaaaaay over there.
That's why i made one for my AU as a regular Marik variant. Add flak ammo and every ASF around will hate you with a passion. 8)
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Honestly it's a shame there wasn't a canon all-AC2 Rifleman in 3025 play. Shedding the tonnage of those guns gave you so much for that 'Mech, and the extra range over the AC5 made it shine in my opinion. It's only going to plink, but it's going to plink very well and from waaaaaay over there.
Blasphemy! The RFL-3N's weapons configuration is a thing of sheer beauty! The 'Mech exists to melt the enemy's face and then melt its pilot, in that order. Don't decrease its firepower!
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I am not sure, but are there any 3025 or 2750 light mechs that had the AC-2?
COM-1C. O0
6/9, medium Laser and AC 2.
Would love to drive that one in MWO.
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and the Clint that has 2, fairly useful in MM at least
Clint is 40 tons. :)
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Can't say I'm a huge fan of the AC/2 unless it is on a Tank.
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If you want to balance them, drop the weight. Replace AC 2 and AC 5 with the weight and crits of the Light AC 2 and 5. The AC 10 could use a 2 ton drop as well.
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Nah, just bump the 2 to 3 and the 5 to 7. Then change the ammo to 34 and 15. That way, you have a small laser with long reach and an autocannon that is almost equivalent to a large laser. Plus, not a lot of designs in the lower class can take a 3 or 7 point hit to the back. Heck, even the larger class can't.
EDIT: This also gives them more diversity in damage compared to the LRM and SRM cluster damage values while not diminishing the value of other weapons. AND, it doesn't create any construction changes to the canon variants, just fluff changes. Even when you look at the more modern ballistics like Rotary AC's and Ultra AC's, both Clan and Inner Sphere, after these changes it does nothing to break the game. IMO, it creates more incentive to make use of these ballistics.
Look at the JagerMech after you do this. It can now force a PSR with only its ballistics (if they all hit).
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For ACs I always house ruled the damage up to 5, 5 up to 10 and 10 up to 15. Balance didn't seem to be a problem.
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Nah, just bump the 2 to 3 and the 5 to 7. Then change the ammo to 34 and 15. That way, you have a small laser with long reach and an autocannon that is almost equivalent to a large laser. Plus, not a lot of designs in the lower class can take a 3 or 7 point hit to the back. Heck, even the larger class can't.
EDIT: This also gives them more diversity in damage compared to the LRM and SRM cluster damage values while not diminishing the value of other weapons. AND, it doesn't create any construction changes to the canon variants, just fluff changes. Even when you look at the more modern ballistics like Rotary AC's and Ultra AC's, both Clan and Inner Sphere, after these changes it does nothing to break the game. IMO, it creates more incentive to make use of these ballistics.
Look at the JagerMech after you do this. It can now force a PSR with only its ballistics (if they all hit).
Yes, but then the name "AC 2" doesn't make sense. :)
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AC-2's are really annoying against Mechs. Even in 3025. Because of their ranges if you have a mobile mech you can stay out of range and constantly hit the opposing player.
Also they make Aerospace fighters face plant into the ground and explode.
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Magic Bullet AC/2 ammo:
When you declare an attack with an AC/2 firing Magic Bullet ammo, pick -2 or +2. If it hits, this number is applied to the damage location table roll (minimum 2, maximum 12.)
I'm not actually serious, but a 1/6 chance of hitting the head or causing a critical (user's choice) would be scary.
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I'm surprised to see the AC/2 to get this much love to be honest but I guess it's just a question of how much you value range over damage.
I'm a knife fighter myself so I rather use the tonnage for Med Lasers or SRMs if not a PPC but I can see why the other guy may want a AC2; to stay the hell a way from me >:D
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Man, 5 heat in the SHS era was nothing to get excited over either, but we just didn't have the thing then.
Heck, the LPPC and 5 SHS weigh the same as an empty AC/5. Even on an ICE vehicle, where you'll add 0.3 tons as a power converter, you still come out 0.5 tons on top.
Poor AC/5...
And yes, forgot about the Field Guns.
To be fair, if you try to fire the LPPC within 3 hexes, it can explode. The AC5 just would get a small penalty.
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To be fair, if you try to fire the LPPC within 3 hexes, it can explode. The AC5 just would get a small penalty.
Only if you disable the inhibitor, which is an Advanced rule. :)
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Only if you disable the inhibitor, which is an Advanced rule. :)
If you aren't, then it can't fire at all.
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If you aren't, then it can't fire at all.
Uh huh? You can fire a PPC at point blank range. It is at the same +3 to hit as the AC-5. So I'm not sure what you are trying to say?
And I've still not seen a solution that actually truly works as well as the ones I've adopted. Some searching around should find my views on the matter, I've stated them often enough by now.
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If you aren't, then it can't fire at all.
Minimum range simply means you start stacking +1 THMs per hex, it has nothing to do with 'can't fire at this range'
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Minimum range simply means you start stacking +1 THMs per hex, it has nothing to do with 'can't fire at this range'
I guess, but it doesn't seem right to do that with a weapon that can explode firing at close range, whether the rules say you can or not.
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To be fair, if you try to fire the LPPC within 3 hexes, it can explode. The AC5 just would get a small penalty.
I guess it's been cleared up, but under standard rules the LPPC can't explode. They both get the same penalties.
It'd be cool if they made those the standard rules for PPCs though. Because honestly, if I was firing at Long Range (at +4) and I was firing at Medium Range (at +2) I'll gladly fire at point-blank range if it's just a +3. If it's a +3 and/or a chance to blow the gun up... it'd make life more interesting and introduce an actual penalty.
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If you want to balance them, drop the weight. Replace AC 2 and AC 5 with the weight and crits of the Light AC 2 and 5. The AC 10 could use a 2 ton drop as well.
That wouldn't be bad. I could really go for something as simple as that since it always seemed that it would make sense that the LAC would just be the 3050+ version of the standard cannons. How weapon tonnage never seemed to drop kinda bothered me about the most heavy and under used weapons in the game for their damage output.
Of course x-pulse should have been allowed under tourney rules, just another maxtech item that should have gone L2 with TW.
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Even if you factor in heat sinks and necessary ammunition then at least for mechs energy weapons usually turn out to be no heavier than the equivalent ACs. For instance in 3025-play if you compare an AC10 with two tons of ammunition with a standard PPC you'll see that together with enough heat sinks to keep them heat neutral at the bottom line both weigh 17 tons. Even if we say that the higher range of the PPC is offset by the ACs lack of minimum range you still have to deal with the fact that the AC needs ammo that can a) run out and b) blow up. Furthermore the 10 SHS needed for the PPC have the flexibility to be used for other weapons (bracketing fire!) whereas the AC10 only contributes 3 SHS. The same also applies in later eras for instance with the LPPC vers. both the LAC5 and AC5, the UAC5 against he ERLL and so on. Throw in the free heat sinks from the engine and it gets even worse. As a consequence only few types really shine on their own (mostly class 20 ones and the LBX-AC10).
To use bracketing fire /you have to spend tonnage/crits on more weapons. That makes the energy weapons heavier and usable only part of the time. The AC/10 though keeps firing. The big advantage is that the PPC gets 10 tons free. The AC/10 only gets 3 tons. That's 7 tons is what allows you to be able to bracket fire.
The only area where ACs seem to have a tangible advantage are combat vehicles because these need no heat sinks for ballistic and missile weapons.
AC/s really shine on combat vehicle, and even more so on support vehicles. There are no free heat sinks on support engines so energy weapons really end up using up a lot of weight.
With the exception of special munitions all these rules are pure optional. And the reason they were introduced in Maximum Tech in the first place was because people wouldn't stop complaining about how inferior ACs were under standard rules. So hardly a convincing argument for ACs. Still I agree that some of the special munitions are kinda neat especially flak and precision ammo.
I don't see AC/s as inferior so while it's true the rules are optional, their existence does balance out some of energy weapons advantages, if they're used.
Considering the cost issue ACs aren't cheaper either. An AC10 costs 200,000 c-bills as does a PPC. A LBX10 vs. a ERPPC is 400,000 vs. 300,000. Factor in the cost for ammunition and the logistical tail and it becomes really ugly. Heat sinks with their costs of 2,000 (SHS) / 6,000 (SHS) arent that much of an issue either either. And lets not forget that a single unlucky crit into an ammo bin may cost you your entire mech.
It's still a factor. The PPC heat sinks cost 14,000-24,000 times as much as an AC/10 and a ton of ammo. While the costs of additional ammo will eventually cancel out that difference you don't have to pay that right away. True, ammo explosions are a bad thing but so is having your mech shut down do to heat. and unless your mech has a big engine, each heat sink hit will increase the chances of that happening.
As for the effect on infantry the issue of what they should to is irrelevant as long as the rules say otherwise. Unless of course if you implement house rules which is cool by me.
True. That's why I said they didn't have that advantage. :)
As i mentioned above if you are really cash strapped it is better to avoid ammunition carrying mechs. Even if AC2-ammo might be comparatively cheap replacing half your mech because of an ammo crit is not.
That's presuming you can afford all those extra heat sinks. That also presumes that you're going to lose your ammo to a critical hit. You can still lose your mech because it over heated do to lost heat sinks. Granted it'd take longer but it can still happen.
If you really want good AC's my advice is to break out the Rifle(Cannon)'s and ignore the reduced damage rule
O0
For ACs I always house ruled the damage up to 5, 5 up to 10 and 10 up to 15. Balance didn't seem to be a problem.
Interesting.
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AC/s really shine on combat vehicle, and even more so on support vehicles. There are no free heat sinks on support engines so energy weapons really end up using up a lot of weight.
After using free Heat Sinks (If any) Ballast weapons are better then Energy, true, but you're ignoring MISSILE weapons
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In 3025 era games on paper the AC/2 seems like a waste .
When it's properly used in a combined arms environment it's advantages
become more apparent .
If you combine it's long short range of 8 with a fast chassis you get something
that can get where it needs to to disable hovers and VTOLs as well as force a
PSR on aircraft .
A Vulcan or the double AC/2 Clint are cheap enough BV wise that you can usually
afford to improve their gunnery .
In an introtech environment with combined arms units they are often your best weapon
against units that otherwise you couldn't hit at all.
Now the AC/5 -given the choice I would replace it on just about everything it's on .
A MAD that switches the AC/5 for an AC/2 ,puts the ammo with the AC, adds a hs, and adds
a ton of armor would be great .
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Slight correction: Marik regular forces, posing as the Gray Death Legion, were genociding people in those inhabited domes; there was no fight for control. That was a setup caused by Precentor Rachan and Lord Garth of Irian, which would give Lord Garth the lostech 'Mechs in the Helm Castle Brian, and Rachan time to either claim or destroy the library core.
Not that there were many people in the Sirius system to begin with, since the world's domes had been falling into lostech by that point.
correction
the fight for control of the domes by the grey death was "off camera" before the novel starts, but greyson "remembers" a few blurbs about it including one of his pilots dieing because of a minor cockpit breach.
the on screen action is yes rachan and marik framing the GDL and using demolition nukes (if I remember right) to blow the domes and then hunt down most of the survivors as if the GDL were attempting to "cover up their actions"
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correction
the fight for control of the domes by the grey death was "off camera" before the novel starts, but greyson "remembers" a few blurbs about it including one of his pilots dieing because of a minor cockpit breach.
the on screen action is yes rachan and marik framing the GDL and using demolition nukes (if I remember right) to blow the domes and then hunt down most of the survivors as if the GDL were attempting to "cover up their actions"
I must have missed that, or else it's been THAT long since I've read the old trilogy.
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After using free Heat Sinks (If any) Ballast weapons are better then Energy, true, but you're ignoring MISSILE weapons
They're good on vehicles too. However, they're more dangerous in ammo explosions than AC/s. They also have equipment and armor especially designed to counter them, rendering them less effective.
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They're good on vehicles too. However, they're more dangerous in ammo explosions than AC/s. They also have equipment and armor especially designed to counter them, rendering them less effective.
How are they more dangerous? Anything past 20 or 30 damage in an internal explosion is pretty much an instakill of the mech carrying ammo (or at least instant destruction of a side torso if you're using CASE). That's like 2 or 3 shots for most weapons regardless if their missile launchers or ACs. The lighter ACs have less damage per shot, but they have lots more shots to burn through per ton too and are thus more likely to have that much damage left or more when the ammo bin gets critted.
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And due to the fact that Missiles use the cluster hits table and the light weight you're likely to have more then one launcher, burning through ammo faster
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I guess, but it doesn't seem right to do that with a weapon that can explode firing at close range, whether the rules say you can or not.
It doesn't explode. Reread the rules on using PPCs.
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How are they more dangerous? Anything past 20 or 30 damage in an internal explosion is pretty much an instakill of the mech carrying ammo (or at least instant destruction of a side torso if you're using CASE). That's like 2 or 3 shots for most weapons regardless if their missile launchers or ACs. The lighter ACs have less damage per shot, but they have lots more shots to burn through per ton too and are thus more likely to have that much damage left or more when the ammo bin gets critted.
True but they're also bracket fire weapons more than AC/s. That means you're not going to be using them for every shot leaving ammo sitting in the bin. In this case the LRM has an advantage over the SRM as SRMs have more shots. More so than AC/s. And yes the AC/20 has the same range as SRMs but the AC/20 has less than hald as many shots as the SRM-6.
And due to the fact that Missiles use the cluster hits table and the light weight you're likely to have more then one launcher, burning through ammo faster
That is both a plus and a drawback. It's a plus because you can possibly do more damage and reduce the damage a possible ammo explosion can do. It's bad because you have to fire more to be sure you do as much damage as and AC.
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Yes, but the LRM's can do that damage from a longer range and are lighter
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Yes, but the LRM's can do that damage from a longer range and are lighter
It's still direct fire vs a scattered volley. If you roll bad and only one of your LRM's hit, your only doing half the damage of a AC-2
Don't get me wrong, I rather pack a LRM launcher any day and my dice hate me when I roll for LRMs.
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Yeah, the AC-20 is the big winner on whether or not to put AC's on vehicles, it's almost as good as LRM's on a damage-per-ton basis and it's a single cluster, the AC-10's an edge case, but the AC-5 loses out to LRM's and generally the AC-2's simply too marginal
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I'm not even sure how or why missiles were brought into the conversation. They are completely different animals due to their spread out damage, their ability to fire indirectly as well as their nice collection of special munitions.
The AC2 against an LRM5 is a rather obvious fight. 2 tons for 3 points of damage, on average > 2 points. Throw in the difference in tonnage and the ac2 is left with only one advantage, that it has slightly longer ranges. The advantage is soon destroyed by the difference in tonnage, where the same number of tons of LRMs going to yield far more damage ( 3 LRM5s= average of 9 points of damage with a max of 15) and still be under the 10 free single heatsinks of a standard engine in 3025 play.
The Ac2 loses out in 3050+ play as it never sees a boost in firepower. Meanwhile the LRM5 can be loaded with various munitions to make it far more flexible then an ac2 with any of it's own special munitions. A -2 to hit with a 2 point weapon is unlikely to make a significant difference when the LRMs get 3 chances to hit in order to yield one more point of damage. The ability to bring some mine laying LRMs can hinder a light mech trying to make its way towards your units, thus negating it's MP advantage by forcing it to run around the mines or risk taking what is going to amount to some decent damage against a light mech's legs.
As much as I like the Ac2 for being the underdog and oh so niche, it is hard to suggest that the ac2 can even begin to compare to the lrm5 stack. Anything the ac2 can do the LRm5 can do better. :(
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I'm not even sure how or why missiles were brought into the conversation.
people like to diss ACs. personally though, i consider AC/2's special munitions to be more useful, since precision is better against VTOLs and hovers than what LRMs get, and AP is a great way to REALLY piss someone off with pointless crit rolls ::).
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people like to diss ACs. personally though, i consider AC/2's special munitions to be more useful, since precision is better against VTOLs and hovers than what LRMs get, and AP is a great way to REALLY piss someone off with pointless crit rolls ::).
The AC2 is the Urbanmech of Battletech weaponry. I just wish the Devs would give the Ac2 and the 5 some love. I will admit it is hard to go with an ac2 over a stack of lrm5s, but it all comes down to what you are trying to accomplish with the design. I personally hate the guass rifle for being so optimized that I will try to avoid using them in any designs that I create.
I remember one game back in the days where a few of my friends decided to finally play IS, but only because they planned on using nothing but mechs armed with ac2s and 5s. They misread the AP rounds' rules and got the mods for crits wrong thinking the lighter cannons had a better chance instead of the larger ones. I suppose they could have gone with it thinking the lighter cannons had longer range, therefore their rounds likely traveled faster, therefore had a greater chance of punching through armor, though doing less damage due to the size of the round. I think a unit with several ac2s could be fun to try out with Ap rounds just looking fora chance to blow off a limb of a mech early in the game. If you can get enough of those units going then you'll eventually hit that 12 you need.
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I will admit it is hard to go with an ac2 over a stack of lrm5s-
play a campaign, realize just how much paying more 30 times the cost for ammo between the two really is for what is largely the same overall damage. Proceed to steal all LRM ammo at enemy depots, laughing in a slightly mad way
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Yes, but the LRM's can do that damage from a longer range and are lighter
They also generate more heat so they're good for vehicles but not so good for mechs, especially lower tech ones.
I'm not even sure how or why missiles were brought into the conversation. They are completely different animals due to their spread out damage, their ability to fire indirectly as well as their nice collection of special munitions.
The AC2 against an LRM5 is a rather obvious fight. 2 tons for 3 points of damage, on average > 2 points. Throw in the difference in tonnage and the ac2 is left with only one advantage, that it has slightly longer ranges. The advantage is soon destroyed by the difference in tonnage, where the same number of tons of LRMs going to yield far more damage ( 3 LRM5s= average of 9 points of damage with a max of 15) and still be under the 10 free single heatsinks of a standard engine in 3025 play.
The Ac2 loses out in 3050+ play as it never sees a boost in firepower. Meanwhile the LRM5 can be loaded with various munitions to make it far more flexible then an ac2 with any of it's own special munitions. A -2 to hit with a 2 point weapon is unlikely to make a significant difference when the LRMs get 3 chances to hit in order to yield one more point of damage. The ability to bring some mine laying LRMs can hinder a light mech trying to make its way towards your units, thus negating it's MP advantage by forcing it to run around the mines or risk taking what is going to amount to some decent damage against a light mech's legs.
As much as I like the Ac2 for being the underdog and oh so niche, it is hard to suggest that the ac2 can even begin to compare to the lrm5 stack. Anything the ac2 can do the LRm5 can do better. :(
The amount of damage LRMs can do depends on the dice. Those of us who are dice challenged rarely get half damage from missiles. A 10 ton 1 point weapon isn't much fun. Especially when it generates 6 times the heat. Quirks, the missed shot rule and other equipment help but former two are optional the latter tends to add weight. Even when they are available and the optional rules are used you've only got 6 shots compared to 45. Shots that cost a whole lot more.
That's not to say we can't get a lucky shot and the alternative ammo can be fun. :)
AC/s also have alternative ammo. They can also make use of the above rules and equipment I mentioned above to improve accuracy. They're not effected by anti-missile defenses though. All the extras don't help when you're missiles only do half damage. If they get to the target at all.
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Never had any hate for the AC2. I have usd the Vulcan several times over the years & have had it do right by me. The Jagermech ..... well I will swap the AC5's out before the AC2's. When playing floating crits I have had better more memorable crits happen with AC2's more than any other weapon.
<points to your user name, the best 'Mech ever in the 3025 setting>
I think we can agree that you missed a rather important 'Mech which makes the best possible use of the AC/2, ever.
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To use bracketing fire /you have to spend tonnage/crits on more weapons. That makes the energy weapons heavier and usable only part of the time. The AC/10 though keeps firing. The big advantage is that the PPC gets 10 tons free. The AC/10 only gets 3 tons. That's 7 tons is what allows you to be able to bracket fire.
As hard as i try i fail to grasp your logic here. How does bracketing make energy weapons heavier? A bracketing setup allows weapons to share heat sinks together so energy weapons get even more attractive.
I don't see AC/s as inferior so while it's true the rules are optional, their existence does balance out some of energy weapons advantages, if they're used.
Interesting logic.
It's still a factor. The PPC heat sinks cost 14,000-24,000 times as much as an AC/10 and a ton of ammo. While the costs of additional ammo will eventually cancel out that difference you don't have to pay that right away.
Could you explain your math to me here? The 10 SHS a PPC needs to keep heat neutral cost 20,000c which raises the PPCs cost by just 10% to 220,000 c-bills. An AC10 with three SHS and two tons of ammunition costs 200,000c + 3 x 2,000c + 2 x 6,000c = 218,000c. The difference is that ammunition is a consumable while heat sinks are not. So no later than the time at which you have to replace four rounds of ammo the PPC will become the cheaper weapon.
True, ammo explosions are a bad thing but so is having your mech shut down do to heat. and unless your mech has a big engine, each heat sink hit will increase the chances of that happening.
[sarcasm mode]
True, breaking your spine is a bad thing but so is breaking off a fingernail.
[/sarcasm mode]
There is world of difference between having an ammo bin hit and a heat induced shutdown. The former will cripple or destroy your mech whereas the latter depending on the situation may range from a potentially dangerous but temporary tactical disadvantage to an irrelevant passing inconvenience. Furthermore the heat scale i can manage in most cases. As for the crits to my heat sinks: I take them over a crit into an ammo bin (=loss of mech) or the weapon itself (loss of a primary weapon system) any day of the week and twice on sundays.
BTW a PPC padded with 9 SHS has only a 25% chance that a crit takes out the weapon. A crit to an AC10 with 2t ammo and 3 SHS in the same location has an 58,3% chance to take out the AC, a 16,7% chance to blow up the ammo and only a meager 25% chance to be a merely inconveniencing loss of an heat sink.
That's presuming you can afford all those extra heat sinks. That also presumes that you're going to lose your ammo to a critical hit. You can still lose your mech because it over heated do to lost heat sinks. Granted it'd take longer but it can still happen.
I didn't presume i can afford the heat sinks anymore than you presumed to have the funds to buy ammo for your AC. I just calculated the costs which you apparently did not. I also do not presume that i will lose my ammo because of a critical hit i just don't ignore the considerable risk ammunition presents when there is a perfectly safe and equally effective alternative available. You on the other hand presume that a heat induced shutdown will most likely cost me my mech although a) the shutdown causes me absolutely no direct damage, b) even enemy units in firing range have absolutely no guarantee that they can finish me off until i can restart, c) heat induced ammunition explosions only occur if i were using an ammo-dependent weapon (like an AC for instance!) and d) i have considerable influence on my mechs heat output.
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I seem to recall that repairs on ACs were generally easier than repairing energy weapons.
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As hard as i try i fail to grasp your logic here. How does bracketing make energy weapons heavier? A bracketing setup allows weapons to share heat sinks together so energy weapons get even more attractive.
You have to add the other weapons to fire. That means extra tonnage for them. Combat Fusion Engines give a cheat by coming with 10 heat sinks free. So as long as stay balanced and keep to the same weight you can bracket all you want. The thing is not every unit uses those engines and combat vehicles still have to add extra heat sinks to remain heat neutral.
Low tech mechs are also a problem. You start with 18 tons for PPC, power amplifier, and heat sinks, on a low tech mech, and you remove 2 heat sinks to add 2 medium lasers to bracket fire. You're going to be overheating right from the start. You're going to have to bracket fire eventually or you risk shut down and/or a fuel explosion. That doesn't sound like a good idea to me.
Interesting logic.
Perhaps I should have said, alternative rules balance things out even more?
Could you explain your math to me here? The 10 SHS a PPC needs to keep heat neutral cost 20,000c which raises the PPCs cost by just 10% to 220,000 c-bills. An AC10 with three SHS and two tons of ammunition costs 200,000c + 3 x 2,000c + 2 x 6,000c = 218,000c. The difference is that ammunition is a consumable while heat sinks are not. So no later than the time at which you have to replace four rounds of ammo the PPC will become the cheaper weapon.
Who said you had to buy 2 tons of ammo? I also said that the cost was lower initially but would go away over time. You also added in the cost of heat sinks with the AC/10. I'm presuming this is going on a mech? If it's for a vehicle the cost for the AC is lower since you don't have to buy heat sinks. You do have to buy a power amplifier for anything low tech though. That's another 20,000 for the PPC. Coolant does have cost but I'd have to hunt for it. Coolant can also break down, if those rules are used.
[sarcasm mode]
True, breaking your spine is a bad thing but so is breaking off a fingernail.
[/sarcasm mode]
One is less devastating than the other though.
There is world of difference between having an ammo bin hit and a heat induced shutdown. The former will cripple or destroy your mech whereas the latter depending on the situation may range from a potentially dangerous but temporary tactical disadvantage to an irrelevant passing inconvenience. Furthermore the heat scale i can manage in most cases. As for the crits to my heat sinks: I take them over a crit into an ammo bin (=loss of mech) or the weapon itself (loss of a primary weapon system) any day of the week and twice on sundays.
I agree. Ammo explosions are not a good thing. However, Heat can be just as bad and can still cost you your mech and possibly your life. There's two differences between the two. One's quick compared to slow. The second is one doesn't leave your enemy as much as the other. And if your in a low tech mech the risk of heat induced explosion is still there.
BTW a PPC padded with 9 SHS has only a 25% chance that a crit takes out the weapon. A crit to an AC10 with 2t ammo and 3 SHS in the same location has an 58,3% chance to take out the AC, a 16,7% chance to blow up the ammo and only a meager 25% chance to be a merely inconveniencing loss of an heat sink.
And there's that second ton of ammo again. I'll have to take your word on that.
I didn't presume i can afford the heat sinks anymore than you presumed to have the funds to buy ammo for your AC. I just calculated the costs which you apparently did not. I also do not presume that i will lose my ammo because of a critical hit i just don't ignore the considerable risk ammunition presents when there is a perfectly safe and equally effective alternative available. You on the other hand presume that a heat induced shutdown will most likely cost me my mech although a) the shutdown causes me absolutely no direct damage, b) even enemy units in firing range have absolutely no guarantee that they can finish me off until i can restart, c) heat induced ammunition explosions only occur if i were using an ammo-dependent weapon (like an AC for instance!) and d) i have considerable influence on my mechs heat output.
I did calculate the costs. You missed some. And if funds are not an issue, CASE will be installed. I also didn't ignore the risk of an ammo explosion. It is a concern. You however did ignore what heat can do to a pilot. You also ignored what heat can do to a fuel tank. You also presume that not only can you restart your mech right away but that your enemies will be too far away to take advantage of your immobility. You also presume that there will be a critical hit to a full ammo bin when every shot reduces that chance.
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Ton-for-ton the A/C-2 is the poorest weapon one can get. You have to buy special, very expensive ammo for it to be even marginally effective. Yes it has a tremendous range, but it's nothing more than an overweight machinegun when it comes to firepower. And without that special ammo, it's not even good against infantry.
The A/C-10 is the best you can get for the money in 3025 when it comes to ballistic weapons. Yeah the range is almost half of the A/C-2's, but the firepower is 5x better.
So, in my opinion, no, they aren't worth a darn.
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You have to add the other weapons to fire. That means extra tonnage for them. Combat Fusion Engines give a cheat by coming with 10 heat sinks free. So as long as stay balanced and keep to the same weight you can bracket all you want. The thing is not every unit uses those engines and combat vehicles still have to add extra heat sinks to remain heat neutral.
Please note that during my entire post i never even referred the free heat sinks that come with an engine. I only compared weapons on a one-to-one basis under the assumption that you install enough heat sinks to keep the unit in question heat neutral and have enough ammo, so that you can can stay functional for the duration of a single battle. By doing that i already was generous towards the ACs because i took away the option to seriously overheat which strongly favours energy weapons. So I am actually loading the initial setup in favour of ACs and they still come up short!
Nevertheless i agree that the AC10 has a real weight advantage over the PPC in a tank and but even then there are exceptions. But in the end battletech is more about mechs than tanks.
Low tech mechs are also a problem. You start with 18 tons for PPC, power amplifier, and heat sinks, on a low tech mech, and you remove 2 heat sinks to add 2 medium lasers to bracket fire. You're going to be overheating right from the start. You're going to have to bracket fire eventually or you risk shut down and/or a fuel explosion. That doesn't sound like a good idea to me.
First you might want to recheck the rules: Mechs don't need power amplifiers which is true for any other unit that uses a fusion engine. Second: You really need to stop comparing apples to oranges. A PPC + 10 SHS is heat neutral as is an AC10 with 3 SHS. If I subtract 2 heat sinks from either one and add two medium lasers i get exactly the same amount of over heating. The difference is: With the PPC i can fire those two ML alone and don't build up heat whereas if i had paired the MLs with the AC i would gain a +5 net heat. So as long as we are talking about mechs or ASFs your entire argument about heat is moot.
Perhaps I should have said, alternative rules balance things out even more?
What i meant was: How can it be that ACs are not inferior to energy weapons when by adding rules that seriously increase their firepower and versatility they just get balanced? Either they were balanced before and got overpowered by the optional rules or they are balanced with the optional ones in which case they were inferior beforehand.
Furthermore lets not forget that is ACs + optional rules against energy weapons under standard rules. Again apples to oranges.
Who said you had to buy 2 tons of ammo? I also said that the cost was lower initially but would go away over time. You also added in the cost of heat sinks with the AC/10. I'm presuming this is going on a mech? If it's for a vehicle the cost for the AC is lower since you don't have to buy heat sinks. You do have to buy a power amplifier for anything low tech though. That's another 20,000 for the PPC.
If you think that 10 shots of ammo for an AC10 are enough be my guest. In nearly any combat scenario you will either run out of ammo early on which leaves you with 12 tons of useless equipment and a serious loss of firepower or you have to seriously husband your ammo never taking shots unless the TNs are really good whereas the PPC can fire all day and can easily afford to try even a tricky shot.
And a single ton of ammo costs as much as three SHS. So when you say 'over time' you should really say 'over the time of no more than two engagements'. This is not a case where the operating costs make themselves felt only in the long term. Sure i wasn't counting the power amplifier because i was mostly referring to Mechs and ASFs but even then 20,000c is a little more than 3 tons of ammo. Hope you never do any life fire excercises.
Coolant does have cost but I'd have to hunt for it. Coolant can also break down, if those rules are used.
Under standard rules coolant does not have a cost. If have checked tactical operations and i did not find any repair costs given for coolant failure either. Given that a standard SHS including coolant costs a measly 2,000c it will in any case by irrelevant compared to the ammo costs of your AC.
One is less devastating than the other though.
I agree. Ammo explosions are not a good thing. However, Heat can be just as bad and can still cost you your mech and possibly your life. There's two differences between the two. One's quick compared to slow. The second is one doesn't leave your enemy as much as the other. And if your in a low tech mech the risk of heat induced explosion is still there.
As i showed earlier overheating is irrelevant. It's a strawman argument here. But even then it is a bad one as the likely results of both are completely out of proportion.
I did calculate the costs. You missed some. And if funds are not an issue, CASE will be installed. I also didn't ignore the risk of an ammo explosion. It is a concern. You however did ignore what heat can do to a pilot. You also ignored what heat can do to a fuel tank. You also presume that not only can you restart your mech right away but that your enemies will be too far away to take advantage of your immobility. You also presume that there will be a critical hit to a full ammo bin when every shot reduces that chance.
Care to elaborate on the costs i missed? I still don't see them except for the power amplifier which is not needed for anything with a fusion engine. As for CASE that's something that i did consider as i said that an ammo explosion "will either cripple or destroy" your mech. The former is for a mech with CASE in case you haven't noticed.
BTW could you point me to where i get the rules for heat induced fuel explosions? Because to my knowledge, there are none.
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They also generate more heat so they're good for vehicles but not so good for mechs, especially lower tech ones.
The amount of damage LRMs can do depends on the dice. Those of us who are dice challenged rarely get half damage from missiles. A 10 ton 1 point weapon isn't much fun. Especially when it generates 6 times the heat. Quirks, the missed shot rule and other equipment help but former two are optional the latter tends to add weight. Even when they are available and the optional rules are used you've only got 6 shots compared to 45. Shots that cost a whole lot more.
That's not to say we can't get a lucky shot and the alternative ammo can be fun. :)
AC/s also have alternative ammo. They can also make use of the above rules and equipment I mentioned above to improve accuracy. They're not effected by anti-missile defenses though. All the extras don't help when you're missiles only do half damage. If they get to the target at all.
Actually, I have historically dice challenged. IF I am GMing an RPG game then the dice will roll so many 5's and 6's per die that it would force me to change up my dice in the hopes of getting dice that are not hot as hell. However, when I am playing a game of BT, my dice were always low. I ended up with green pilots in all of my units the vast majority of the time while everyone else had elites, vets, and their worst would be 1 average pilot. Thats what I had to play against all the time, and yes we did roll pilots and never used BV to balance anything. To make things worse I would roll low the entire game. But, I never was so unfortunate as to reliably roll so low as to manage 1 point of damage out of 10 tons of LRMs. With LRMs I would average the average number of missiles.
Even if you did roll rather low it is unlikely that you would continue to roll 1s all day. There is no way that an ac2 is ever going to outperform any lrm launcher, even a lowly 5, over the course of the entire game. The average, even with nothing but low and mid range rolls are going to still leave you outperforming an ac2. The additional flexibility of an LRM launcher over that of a 2 makes it hard to suggest that the weapon can even compete with a single LRM5 the vast majority of the time.
If someone wants to use ac2s then okay, go for it. As I mentioned at several points I like the AC2, and unit designs that are clearly underpowered. It is difficult to get others that do not have a soft spot for the underdog to really see why they should opt for it over other weapons or units that do far more damage. The ac2 is just to niche to ever have a solid argument for it's use. People are resorting to talk about the costs of ammo as a merc unit on some backwoods planet that is extremely low tech, with a cousin that has a strange ability to blow up a ppc with a monkeywrench while workign on it when a goat sneezes in a north-western direction at 3 a.m.
For the most part the ac2 is never going to be worth that much unless it is used in great numbers as a single 2 point slug is not going to bother many units. Now if you are pumping out 10 two pointers per turn and can maintain some distance to maintain that range advantage, now you are talking. General purpose, low number, 3025 standard tech rounds...ac2 still sucks. Thats coming from someone that likes the damn thing. It would require a large number of units with ac2s that are fast, that have a lot of room to run around and expend a lot of ammo. That would make it great for an RPG or campaign that is being GMed where you can use a bunch of the vtol armed with an ac2, the warrior I think it is, to harass a unit before or while your main units are moving up to their position. Once the vtols are within striking range for the opposing force, withdraw them. Other then that, ac2s armed units are going to be hard pressed to take on a much more conventional force.
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I'll grant the AC-2 and LB-2X are fantastic AA weapons simply because of their reach. I still feel they are too heavy and the LB-2X could stand to lose a crit but oddly enough I have never complained about their damage output because you really never have needed much for most things that AC-2s and LB-2Xs are great against.
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Don't forget that AC/2s are really good for field guns. A normal generic motorized can haul around 4 guns, might not do all that much damage, put the range will keep them out of trouble.
Militia's PBI poor man's artillery.
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Finally, unlike the LB-2X's cluster rounds, the standard AC/2's bonuses for flak and precision ammo stack with that of a targeting computer! Using an AC/2 with precision ammo and a targeting computer to target a breached location can allow you to quickly finish off damaged enemy units at a significant distance, preventing them from escaping.
Targeting computers and LBX clusters do stack. What isn't allowed are aimed shots. I'm surprised that a person who has played the game as long as you have has confused this point for so long.
As for the OP, AC 2s don't have the a single strength to justify their penalties.
If they did 3 points of damage that would fix certain problems.
If they had their short range extended by 2-3 points (with appropriate adjustments also made for the other brackets) it would fix different problems.
If they even had built up more heat but weighed less that would address other most different issues.
In the end a lot of things can be done because as it currently stands the AC 2 doesn't excel in situations it is meant to excel at. Other weapons out perform it to easily.
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I would dismiss the AC2 with the wave of the hand, but for the number of times that i have been TACed by my opponents 3025 Black Jack, I just cant. In a rifleman i would rather have the AC2 than the AC5 if allowed to make that swap.
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Targeting computers and LBX clusters do stack. What isn't allowed are aimed shots. I'm surprised that a person who has played the game as long as you have has confused this point for so long.
No, they don't, never have and most likely never will
TW p143 When firing cluster munitions, LB-X autocannons lose the benefits of the firing unit’s targeting computer
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Don't forget that AC/2s are really good for field guns. A normal generic motorized can haul around 4 guns, might not do all that much damage, put the range will keep them out of trouble.
Militia's PBI poor man's artillery.
That would be a great use for them, a logical use for them too. I am rather rusty on what is now tourney and what is L3 play(yeah, that rusty I just said L3), but if they are not legal in all games then it is more of a reach then legal special munitions. Of course i am wondering just what the BV would be for something like that, and at what point does it become better to get a long range mech. ???
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I noted the fact that autocannons really seem to get screwed over in these two threads:
http://bg.battletech.com/forums/index.php/topic,5896.msg131490.html#msg131490 (optimising the original 3025 'mechs (aka Munchkinism Unleased!))
http://bg.battletech.com/forums/index.php/topic,6702.msg151185.html#msg151185 (what if fusion engines only came with their "free" heat sinks?)
One quick 'n' dirty fix I can think of to re-balance autocannons would be to make all regular autocannons act like Ultra autocannons. Ultra's would then be changed to be unjammable. I'd also double the number of shots a ton of ammo provides. This way, players no longer have to be quite as mindful of wasting autocannon shots with high to-hit numbers (do you really want to fire your ac/20 with a to-hit number of 10, if you're only carrying 10 shots for it?), but they would still have to contemplate the heat effects of double-tapping with the larger autocannons (this rule would also explain why a stock standard 3025 Hunchback has so many heat sinks! :) ). Not quite sure how the rules for LB-X and light autocannons would be modified (maybe double the number of shots a ton of ammo gives you, but don't allow double-shots with these weapons?).
Thoughts?
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Ha! How about saying that ACs don't generate heat in mechs, just like vehicles? Change nothing else, just that.
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Ha! How about saying that ACs don't generate heat in mechs, just like vehicles? Change nothing else, just that.
Doesn't help the AC/2 or AC/5 much since they already generate next to no heat.
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Light AC construction stats with standard AC combat stats. ??
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Ha! How about saying that ACs don't generate heat in mechs, just like vehicles? Change nothing else, just that.
Considering that the vehicle rules say that non-energy weapons don't generate heat this would be a change in (and a house rule) that only serves to nerf AC's in vehicles, and likely make a good deal of existing designs illegal/unworkable
The problem with using AC-2's as field guns is that they suffer the same problems when mounted in 'Mechs, only more so. Infantry can not attack an airborne target unless it attack the hex the infantry unit is in, which is one of the main reason to use AC-2's and then it may not be possible to use AC-2's as AA
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I would have to agree that ac/2's are probably one of the least useful weapons in the game, but they are not completely useless against aerospace and vehicles. That is not really enough to justify their weight and almost complete worthlessness against mechs.
I mean hey, they take a while to run out of ammo! :D
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I would have to agree that ac/2's are probably one of the least useful weapons in the game, but they are not completely useless
No... The distinction of being completely useless goes to AC/5s. AC/2s at least have one of the longest ranges even in the post 3050 era and are hard to beat when it comes to tonnage/crit efficiency.
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Here is the way I look at the AC/2. As a long range sniper weapon, for harassing, but not actually for killing or AAA. I don't play many games at all where the objective is to not kill the opposing team, which means the AC/2 is more of a specialized weapon. Especially before targeting computers and specialist ammo. The only use would be as AAA, like on the Pike. Now RAC/2 I can find a use for, using specialized ammo, I can find a use for AC/2's. Otherwise on mechs they should be replaced with large lasers, or LRM-10s. The Kraken with 8 UAC/2 can be useful, but 32 max dmg from a 100 ton machine is laughable, so it is relegated to shooting down ASF's and VTOL's, where a lucky hit can bring it down. Otherwise you can never do enough damage to use your range advantage, without playing 9 map boards 3x3, and withdrawing while firing.
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Now, I do really like the RAC/2, something to me like a really long range crit-seeker that I can find a lot of use for.
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I've never liked the autocannon-2 for my games (which were mostly 3025 tech level). My friends and I thought they were just too short on firepower to be worth the weight they took up.
Does anybody else think the AC-2 is a bit anemic?
What would BattleTech be like if in fact it had been an AC-3 with 33 shots per ton of ammo?
The AC/2 is a worthless weapon. The AC/5 mediocre. In general the ACs are the great underperformers. Their rules are arbitrary and nonsensical, like the minimum range. It seems the game developers dumbed down the stats to get round numbers or to favor energy weapons, in this way they screwed up the game like they butchered the original TRO 3025 to use a standard cookie cutter template for all 'Mechs. FASA was not a wargame publisher and it shows. Lots of people can come up with their own house rules that are way better than the official rules. I encourage you to do the same.
I changed the AC/5 to an AC/7 same stats, without minimum range. It worked. Now is one of the best weapons around.
I upgraded the AC/10 to same range as the PPC, and as well I increased the range of the AC/20 to 1-4, 5-8, 9-12
I tried keeping the range of the AC/2 and give it 3 points of damage. Didn't work.
I finally settled on 4 points of damage and same range as PPC, with no minimum, that was satisfactory, but even then, after much playtesting and redesign of 3025 mechs, I had to drop the tonnage to 5 tons to make it worthwile. Ammo load was rounded to 40 shots per ton, and finally works. It takes 2 criticals, to reflect the long barrel.
Fluffwise, is an useful weapon against aircraft when paired with a antiaircraft targetting sensors. It makes a decent suppresive weapon against infantry, but larger caliber cannons are of course better.
In between the AC/4 and AC/7 I developed the AC/6, a short barreled cannon like those seen in the Hermes and Wolverine. Weighs 6 tons, does 6 damage, and has 25 rounds per ton. 2 crits, to allow it to be mounted in the center torso.
I have playtested this and it works. Of course there are other possibilities to squeeze in the gaps, like a shorter range AC/3, or AC/8 o 12, but I stuck to four basic types for Battlemechs. and playability figuring out those are the standard Star League calibers that everybody uses for logistic sake.
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I have found upping the damage does not work very well. It actually further devalues Light mechs as they can't stand up to even more weapons fire than before.
Using the rate of fire improvement rules is not all that workable with the vast majority of the AC-2 and AC-5 using units as they for the most part only have a single ton of ammo and upping the ammo to compensate is workable and is part of my solution.
As a result I use two ton diet, 1 critical reduction(for all but the 1 critical AC-2), removed the minimum ranges, and changed the ammunition counts to be more sensible. I can't use the last one in Megamek yet but I've managed to implement all the others and used them against the bot and the results have pleased me greatly.
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AC/2 actually have one (marginal) benefit unmatched by any other weapons of its era, unlike AC/5.
Although, technically speaking, AC/2 were released after AC/5.
As I've heard, the original BattleDroids only had one autocannon...which later became AC/5. Thus, all other autocannon calibers have the benefit of coming after the original.
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<points to your user name, the best 'Mech ever in the 3025 setting>
I think we can agree that you missed a rather important 'Mech which makes the best possible use of the AC/2, ever.
SHHH!!! Its suppose to be a subliminal message!
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I think the problem with the AC-2 is the concept behind it, units BT are supposed to be mobile, which means there's things that block long range firing so a weapon based on sniping, long range but low damage, isn't going to work out too well
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I think the problem with the AC-2 is the concept behind it, units BT are supposed to be mobile, which means there's things that block long range firing so a weapon based on sniping, long range but low damage, isn't going to work out too well
Depends on your definition of sniping. I wouldn't consider slowly plinking away at your target for while until it finally dies of letting you shoot at it sniping, since usually you want the target dead before anyone can react...
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I think the problem with the AC-2 is the concept behind it, units BT are supposed to be mobile, which means there's things that block long range firing so a weapon based on sniping, long range but low damage, isn't going to work out too well
long range, low damage isn't a good formula for sniping. it is, however a fine tool for suppressive fire to keep low-end forces on the defensive instead of closing on your perimeter and providing a suitably hostile airspace for incoming aerospace trying to conduct strikes on your forces. two points isn't a hefty sum, but it can rapidly add up when trying to maneuver through slowing terrain while saving your heavy forces for more pressing conflicts.
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As a fan of things that go boom when they fire, I have always been rather disappointed by the lackluster performance of autocannons compared to other weapons in Battletech.
In 3025 tech level of play they aren't that bad. They're still outshone by energy weapons, but not by too much. The real issue comes from one simple piece of tech. The double heatsink. Sure autocannons see a benefit from it too, but while energy weapons were designed to offset their low weight and compact size by generating a lot of heat saw a massive bonus from this one piece of technology, and nothing similar has ever befallen autocannons. Special ammo makes them not entirely useless.
However I realise that Battletech is in and of itself a game, so balance between weapon types is not that important, if there are penalties to using better equipment. Like higher cost of whatever is the determining way of balancing a force. Be it C-bill cost or battlevalue (or it's replacement). And that is my request to The Powers That Be. That when it comes to work on the ruleset that will be used to balance a force, that it is recognised that energy weapons are superior to autocannons.
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I almost always, if I can get the other players to agree, play by Solaris VII rules. It's so much more true to the fluff it's ridiculous. You'll never go back once you've really tried it.
Heat neutrality? Non-freaking-existent.
AC/2's and 5's? Really -do- get 3-4 times the ROF of lasers and PPCs.
And it's an official rules set, not a house rule.
Play any "stupid-looking" AC design in S7 and you will suddenly realize why Davions love them their ACs.
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How do Rifles(Cannon) fair under the S7 rules then?
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How do Rifles(Cannon) fair under the S7 rules then?
they don't exist in the s7 boxed set rules
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The Solaris 7 rules have been "decannonized"... at least insofar that they've never been updated to reflect new developments in BT. Of course, if they had remained canon, they would have screwed up game balance something fierce since the RoF rules screwed up how the weapons were balanced. Designs that were balanced under standard BT rules were turned into heat hogs under S7 rules.
A PPC and AC/20 could only fire once in ten seconds. In contrast, the Medium Laser, SRM Launchers, and AC/5 could fire twice in 10 seconds. The AC/2 and Machine Gun could fire FOUR times in 10 seconds. This made those weapons much nastier (and hotter running) than they are in standard BT play.
The AC/10, LRM Launchers, and Large Laser though had an oddly rated RoF cycle that limited their fire rate to three times in a 20 second period, which unfortunately doesn't square well with standard 10 second turns, making trying to implement RoF rules difficult and clunky for those weapons.
Still, it would have been nice if there was an official "House Rule" that implemented S7's RoF rules in standard play. The simplest I think is to just treat a rapid firing weapon making multiple attacks as multiple weapons by rolling each shot as an independent attack.
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Game play is an abstract of how those things worked "in reality".
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I was going to attempt to defend the venerable AC/2... but as I thought about it, I realized I avoid fielding units with them whenever possible. I guess that sums up my subconscious opinion.
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Game play is an abstract of how those things worked "in reality".
Yes. And I think the Solaris 7 rules are considerably LESS abstract than standard Tournament rules, and thus are a much better model of how the "real" mech combat works.
Well except for the shorter ranges of course. ;)
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Don't forget that AC/2s are really good for field guns. A normal generic motorized can haul around 4 guns, might not do all that much damage, put the range will keep them out of trouble.
Militia's PBI poor man's artillery.
I'll concede your point there. Getting plinked in the rear every round by even half those guns can add up after awhile and it can often mean the difference between a damaged or destroyed target. Keeps the unit out of any real harm and they're *cheap*.
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How much does the extra range AC-2's have help in that situation?
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How much does the extra range AC-2's have help in that situation?
While AC/2s do outrange everything in a 3025 game, it's not by much. My understanding is that if you want to get decent TNs for your AC/2 (so that you don't run out of ammo before you do significant damage), you have to get close enough that you can be shot at. And most AC/2 users are pretty fragile, especially if they're light and speedy because of all the tonnage the AC/2 eats up.
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Just realized something, if you're using Field Guns you want to use something that can do some damage. Why? Infantry ignore just about every stealth based to-hit penalty
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I submit to you that the AC/2 is actually a terror weapon.
Imagine a fast light scout mech operating on it's lonesome, pre-invasion, armed with an AC/2 and maybe some SLs (for that pesky Locust or similar ultra-fast). Not only can such a scout range out and find the location of the enemy battalion's flank, but he can take potshots of opportunity... blow up a civilian truck when behind enemy lines... even fire on a discovered enemy HQ before the enemy even notices him. Sure it will be in trouble if an attack chopper hones in or a HK hover squad tracks it, but it is still a mech with all the tricks and maneuverability that affords. If combined with some of the quality sensors a few lights were purported to have (pre BAP and such though)
It's basically everything the Hussar was intended to be, only the Hussar can do it better due to SLDF's erLL.
Just imagine using LOS rules with a pilot very, very good with the gun. Not quite a mech sniper, but mayhaps you could lay suppressing fire on that lone enemy mechwarrior frantically trying to get back to his cockpit after doing his business on a long patrol. Or imagine taking tracer rounds and modifying them with extra phosphorus to light an enemy village or hayfield on fire from distance... heck it's probably one of the best uses of tracer round ammo as it is IMO.
It's just not well suited for the kinds of games you can do in tabletop, and isn't arguably intended as an anti-mech weapon. Same holds true for most scout mechs.
Just realized something, if you're using Field Guns you want to use something that can do some damage. Why? Infantry ignore just about every stealth based to-hit penalty
If you want infantry that can contribute in an open field battle, set them up dug-in on the canyon cliffside to help cover your mobile HQ.
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Ton-for-ton the A/C-2 is the poorest weapon one can get. You have to buy special, very expensive ammo for it to be even marginally effective. Yes it has a tremendous range, but it's nothing more than an overweight machinegun when it comes to firepower. And without that special ammo, it's not even good against infantry.
The A/C-10 is the best you can get for the money in 3025 when it comes to ballistic weapons. Yeah the range is almost half of the A/C-2's, but the firepower is 5x better.
So, in my opinion, no, they aren't worth a darn.
Sure it doesn't do much damage but the long range means you can hit the target before, and possibly more times, it hits you. Hopefully. That's really true with infantry. They have few weapons that can fire back.
Yes the AC/10 does 5x the damage of an AC/2 but that's only good if you're in range or using the alternative range rules. Otherwise it doesn't help.
Please note that during my entire post i never even referred the free heat sinks that come with an engine. I only compared weapons on a one-to-one basis under the assumption that you install enough heat sinks to keep the unit in question heat neutral and have enough ammo, so that you can can stay functional for the duration of a single battle. By doing that i already was generous towards the ACs because i took away the option to seriously overheat which strongly favours energy weapons. So I am actually loading the initial setup in favour of ACs and they still come up short!
Nevertheless i agree that the AC10 has a real weight advantage over the PPC in a tank and but even then there are exceptions. But in the end battletech is more about mechs than tanks.
You were also bracketing fire. That requires you add more weapons which increases the weight. Unless you have free weight heat sinks. Depending on the engine, that's up to 10 tons free. That, AC/s can't compete against, even more than unlimited ammo. You can always add more ammo but you can't make it weightless.
First you might want to recheck the rules: Mechs don't need power amplifiers which is true for any other unit that uses a fusion engine. Second: You really need to stop comparing apples to oranges. A PPC + 10 SHS is heat neutral as is an AC10 with 3 SHS. If I subtract 2 heat sinks from either one and add two medium lasers i get exactly the same amount of over heating. The difference is: With the PPC i can fire those two ML alone and don't build up heat whereas if i had paired the MLs with the AC i would gain a +5 net heat. So as long as we are talking about mechs or ASFs your entire argument about heat is moot.
First Mechs with Fuel Cell or ICE engines require power amplifiers. TM page 74, TO page 308. Second by removing heat sinks for medium lasers you are no longer heat neutral, rendering your argument moot. Third, riding the heat curve can be done but is dangerous, more so with a low tech mechs or ASFs is in atmosphere. Fourth we're talking weapons not mechs/vehicles. A PPC has the same advantage in a fusion powered combat vehicle that it does in a mech. 10 free heat sinks. The AC/10 though only gets free heat sinking in vehicles. It's still going to generate 3 heat in a low tech mech.
What i meant was: How can it be that ACs are not inferior to energy weapons when by adding rules that seriously increase their firepower and versatility they just get balanced? Either they were balanced before and got overpowered by the optional rules or they are balanced with the optional ones in which case they were inferior beforehand.
Furthermore lets not forget that is ACs + optional rules against energy weapons under standard rules. Again apples to oranges.
Balance depends on the engine. Just by themselves, the only advantage the PPC has is its ammo free. Under standard rules it also has a 3 hex increase in range. However, it also has a 3 hex minimum range. So both weapons technically have a 15 hex range. The PPC just gets to fire first. Under standard rules.
And standard rules gives the PPC advantage by making the game simpler. Weapon's fire doesn't just stop when it travels 15 or 18 hexes and weapons that do fire multiple rounds can aim them at more than one target.
If you think that 10 shots of ammo for an AC10 are enough be my guest. In nearly any combat scenario you will either run out of ammo early on which leaves you with 12 tons of useless equipment and a serious loss of firepower or you have to seriously husband your ammo never taking shots unless the TNs are really good whereas the PPC can fire all day and can easily afford to try even a tricky shot. [/quote
No but then either I need a Long Tom Cannon to hit anything and even then I still miss, or combat ends with my mech/vehicle/pilot/crew gone before I can fire all ten rounds. So while I do think more ammo is better, it doesn't help me.
And a single ton of ammo costs as much as three SHS. So when you say 'over time' you should really say 'over the time of no more than two engagements'. This is not a case where the operating costs make themselves felt only in the long term. Sure i wasn't counting the power amplifier because i was mostly referring to Mechs and ASFs but even then 20,000c is a little more than 3 tons of ammo. Hope you never do any life fire excercises.
If you only have X amount of money do you go with the more expensive mech and make payments or the less expensive mech with more maintenance/rearming? And case is only 50,000c. But if money isn't an option, Reflective Armor is only 30,000c a ton. I reduce your PPC's damage by half and make my mech safe. Heck, why don't I add in a Blue Shield PFD too. It's only a million c-bills. Now your PPC will only do 2 points of damage to my AC/10's 10 points. And to make sure my rounds hit your unit I'm using precision ammo at 6,000c and a 120,000c targeting computer. After all money doesn't matter. And since money doesn't matter I'm sure you'll counter with DHS, and a PPC capacitor. And if your feeling really lucky you might overcharge your PPC.
Under standard rules coolant does not have a cost. If have checked tactical operations and i did not find any repair costs given for coolant failure either. Given that a standard SHS including coolant costs a measly 2,000c it will in any case by irrelevant compared to the ammo costs of your AC.
Under standard rules, I suppose that's true. However, if alternate rules are used then coolant failure becomes a problem until you replace the coolant. I don't know how much coolant is in a mech but I do know that it costs 3,000 a ton. But I suppose it could be recyclable. If you have something to do that with, like a coolant truck.
As i showed earlier overheating is irrelevant. It's a strawman argument here. But even then it is a bad one as the likely results of both are completely out of proportion.
It is very relevant. Some units aren't allowed to overheat. That increases their weight or cost. Others can ride the heat wave but at a risk.
Care to elaborate on the costs i missed? I still don't see them except for the power amplifier which is not needed for anything with a fusion engine. As for CASE that's something that i did consider as i said that an ammo explosion "will either cripple or destroy" your mech. The former is for a mech with CASE in case you haven't noticed.
There's the Power Amplifier which can be needed. Fusion engines are also more expensive than lower tech ones. That also affects the cost. And you don't need to have CASE to survive an ammo explosion. Although it is certainly recommended! The damage done depends on how much ammo is left when it explodes and it's location. An Urbanmech can survive an ammo explosion. Not a big one but it can.
BTW could you point me to where i get the rules for heat induced fuel explosions? Because to my knowledge, there are none.
Total Warfare page 160.
Actually, I have historically dice challenged. IF I am GMing an RPG game then the dice will roll so many 5's and 6's per die that it would force me to change up my dice in the hopes of getting dice that are not hot as hell. However, when I am playing a game of BT, my dice were always low. I ended up with green pilots in all of my units the vast majority of the time while everyone else had elites, vets, and their worst would be 1 average pilot. Thats what I had to play against all the time, and yes we did roll pilots and never used BV to balance anything. To make things worse I would roll low the entire game. But, I never was so unfortunate as to reliably roll so low as to manage 1 point of damage out of 10 tons of LRMs. With LRMs I would average the average number of missiles.
Even if you did roll rather low it is unlikely that you would continue to roll 1s all day. There is no way that an ac2 is ever going to outperform any lrm launcher, even a lowly 5, over the course of the entire game. The average, even with nothing but low and mid range rolls are going to still leave you outperforming an ac2. The additional flexibility of an LRM launcher over that of a 2 makes it hard to suggest that the weapon can even compete with a single LRM5 the vast majority of the time.
True. I often missed. I did get higher rolls but I had to fire a lot of ammo and most got shot down. With AC/s I know I'll do some damage if I get a hit and with the smaller AC/s I have more chances to hit. LRM's do have nice flexibility but then AC/s have some nice options too.
If someone wants to use ac2s then okay, go for it. As I mentioned at several points I like the AC2, and unit designs that are clearly underpowered. It is difficult to get others that do not have a soft spot for the underdog to really see why they should opt for it over other weapons or units that do far more damage. The ac2 is just to niche to ever have a solid argument for it's use. People are resorting to talk about the costs of ammo as a merc unit on some backwoods planet that is extremely low tech, with a cousin that has a strange ability to blow up a ppc with a monkeywrench while workign on it when a goat sneezes in a north-western direction at 3 a.m.
Lol. Everything has a cost including cousins.
For the most part the ac2 is never going to be worth that much unless it is used in great numbers as a single 2 point slug is not going to bother many units. Now if you are pumping out 10 two pointers per turn and can maintain some distance to maintain that range advantage, now you are talking. General purpose, low number, 3025 standard tech rounds...ac2 still sucks. Thats coming from someone that likes the damn thing. It would require a large number of units with ac2s that are fast, that have a lot of room to run around and expend a lot of ammo. That would make it great for an RPG or campaign that is being GMed where you can use a bunch of the vtol armed with an ac2, the warrior I think it is, to harass a unit before or while your main units are moving up to their position. Once the vtols are within striking range for the opposing force, withdraw them. Other then that, ac2s armed units are going to be hard pressed to take on a much more conventional force.
It is the Warrior and I agree. They're not worth much but they're not worthless either. All that plinking does add up. The other unit either has to put up with it or kill it. Putting up with it is bad as armor is reduced. And there's always the chance of a lucky crit hit. Trying to kill it distracts from their main mission and can separate the units forces making them easier to take on by other forces.
snip
Thoughts?
There are rapid-fire rules for AC/s. And I like that sometimes you have to be sure you'll hit before you take a shot. Otherwise a Pulse Laser would be better.
snip
So basically you have 3-4 different sized ACs with the same range??? And every mech with AC/s needs to be redone? How's that a good thing?
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Quite Right . They eventually come out with the light AC/2 and AC / 5 . Precision ammo and a targeting
computer makes it a reasonable choice . Also AP ammo vs WOB Opponents with Advanced Cyberware
may actually kill the pilot without killing the mech . AC /2 is a compromise weapon for hover tanks.
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Long time ago I was fighting my friends Clan forces with my 3025/3050 IS forces and I had a trio of Pike Fire support tanks and Rhino all hull down on a hill as part of the defences of a city. The three pikes concentrated on one mech at a time, blazing away at anything that came within range. Whilst they didn't kill anything it did force him to spread out his bulked out Star to deal with them and they did manage to really maul a Timberwolf through AC/2 spam/LRMs before they went down.
Whilst I groan when I see AC/2 boats like the Bane/Kraken and the like they do have their place, especially with precision ammo which i've never used.
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It just occurred to me that the AC2 is also excellent against weapon emplacements. Since it has a greater range than any other weapon in 3025 play short of artillery you can just stay out of range of any non AC2 equipped gun-turret and whittle it down. Sure, its only 2 points at a time but since a ton of AC2 ammo has a 90 point damage potential it just takes a little longer.
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It just occurred to me that the AC2 is also excellent against weapon emplacements. Since it has a greater range than any other weapon in 3025 play short of artillery you can just stay out of range of any non AC2 equipped gun-turret and whittle it down. Sure, its only 2 points at a time but since a ton of AC2 ammo has a 90 point damage potential it just takes a little longer.
That's why well designed turrets are either in a limited field of fire, backed up by a mobile force, or (like Mechcommander) hidden until use.
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Or incorporate AC-2's into their weapons load out or are supported by infantry field guns using AC-2's
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That's why well designed turrets are either in a limited field of fire, backed up by a mobile force, or (like Mechcommander) hidden until use.
Wait. What if the TURRET is armed with massed AC/2s precisely because of the range thing?
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Wait. What if the TURRET is armed with massed AC/2s precisely because of the range thing?
Be kinda inefficient IMO, since you're at a disadvantage in +TH... and specially to have a turret that can't shoot back at a light hover that gets too close. If you're going to invest in the power generation and construction of a building, and man it, it should cover a key area and be vitally strong. An AC/20 or three at a key part of a pass any ground unit has to pass makes a lot more sense than plinker turrets in the event of a ranged bombardment. That's what the Pike is for.
Near as I can tell most turrets are covering starports and are heavy in the firepower, to help counter a direct enemy landing incursion as well as defending against the port being taken easily.
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nah the tower has an AC2 turret bur the first level is manned by SRM infantry with infernoes
>:D >:D >:D
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nah the tower has an AC2 turret bur the first level is manned by SRM infantry with infernoes
>:D >:D >:D
Or build multiple towers with the AC/2 towers being covered by towers with shorter ranged, but more powerful weapons.
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or mine everything between 4-9 hexes away from the fort
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Or have a hanger near the turret with a reaction force - 4 Saladins makes for a nice surprise, as do LRM/SRM carriers or any other cheap unit with firepower.
These turrets are protecting something ya know, and usually that's a military base of some kind. ;)
- Shane
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Or have a hanger near the turret with a reaction force - 4 Saladins makes for a nice surprise, as do LRM/SRM carriers or any other cheap unit with firepower.
You'd want this regardless of what kind of turrets you have since the other side may be so unsporting as to bring artillery.
Wait a sec. Isn't max AC/2 range just outside the MINIMUM artillery range? Meaning if someone brought AC/2s to plink at your turrets from beyond even LRM range, then you should have artillery (turreted or mobile) on hand to blow them away.
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Arty has no minimum, just that at under 17 hexes it's direct fire not indirect
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Arty has no minimum, just that at under 17 hexes it's direct fire not indirect
Which is effectively a minimum since Arty gets penalties for direct fire, yes?
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I can't remember, but at under 17 hexes you don't have to worry about flight time and the target moving
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If Line of Sight is blocked inside of 17 hexes Artillery can still be fired upon said hex indirectly. As such there is no minimum range for Artillery in conventional terms.