I have vague recollections of discussing the Phantom suits with jymset, including the Police stats, but I can't recall why we've held off on them. There may be a reason, so I'll limit this purely to an analysis of the design.
There's not really much that can be said about the Terra. In terms of mobility, it's as vanilla for a medium as you can get: 1 ground, 3 jump, move along, move along, nothing to see here. Its armor is top tier alongside the Elemental and Amazon, but lacks any bonuses; no stealth, no damage adjustment. At one time the armor would have been a major feature, but this is the post-Dark Age era, and even 10-point mediums are edging towards meh.
The APGR is the APGR is the APGR. It's the battle armor weapon par excellence, and is the armament you'll use 80% of the time. The ER laser you'll use 15% of the time, for those occasions where you don't care about infantry and value 2 points of extra damage over 3 hexes less range; perhaps ideal for urban or forest knife fights with little or no PBI presence, or if you're a fan of swarming.
The pulse laser instead swaps accuracy for range. The APGR will match its accuracy at certain ranges, but otherwise it might find use if you're using really crap troops or you're fighting stealthy foes or have some other reason to worry about target numbers. The recoilless rifle does nothing the APGR or pulse laser can't do or better, while the ER laser swaps damage for anti-infantry capability. Only filthy hipsters use the recoilless rifle.
The armament needs more cowbell, and while I understand the inclusion of the recoilless rifle, its slot would have been better occupied by a heavy flamer, leaving no useless mouths. The Bearhunter would have also been ideal, giving the suit a token dubious weapon, but one that's still Clantech with a definable role and signature flavor. A LBX would be possible, but seriously overegging the pudding in my opinion, since it would have given the Terra every decent Clan gun 400kg or less.
Without the Amazon and without Clantech becoming so common, it's possible to be a lot more enthused about the Terra. I also dislike that the Terra cannot be matched by a purely Clantech suit due to one component 'invented' by the Inner Sphere nearly a century ago in universe. I've railed against the mixed tech situation vis-à-vis chassis weights in numerous BAotW threads, so I'm not going to repeat that here. For me, the Terra isn't an example of a superb battlesuit design, it's a superb example of what is wrong with mixed tech.
Tarte au citron.
