Author Topic: 'Mech of the Week: Crimson Hawk  (Read 12269 times)

Colt Ward

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Re: 'Mech of the Week: Crimson Hawk
« Reply #30 on: 12 November 2014, 23:48:05 »
I wonder, would the Crimson Hawk be a design that shines in BV balanced games?  I mean you can pretty much get six Crimson Hawks for three Burrocks.
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GreekFire

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Re: 'Mech of the Week: Crimson Hawk
« Reply #31 on: 13 November 2014, 07:37:57 »
I wonder, would the Crimson Hawk be a design that shines in BV balanced games?  I mean you can pretty much get six Crimson Hawks for three Burrocks.

It's the cheapest way to get 2 ER Larges onto the battlefield, and the Crimson Hawk 3 is the cheapest 'Mech with one outside of the Locust IIC 3.
Thing is, there are a lot of single ER Large 'Mechs in their general BV area that I think I'd much prefer having.
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cold1

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Re: 'Mech of the Week: Crimson Hawk
« Reply #32 on: 13 November 2014, 12:37:06 »
Build a one off star around it  O0

Wait, 5 Crimson Hawks is a point isn't it?  You Spirits treat them as protos don't you?

It's 5 on 1 but none of that dezgra Hellion stuff! ;D


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Re: 'Mech of the Week: Crimson Hawk
« Reply #33 on: 13 November 2014, 17:16:01 »
Heh.  If only.
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GreekFire

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Re: 'Mech of the Week: Crimson Hawk
« Reply #34 on: 14 November 2014, 12:35:23 »
Originally posted by wantec on the older, deader forums:

Quote
Today we're gonna take another walk down Clan-tech lane. This 'Mech is one that is new, and yet not totally new at the same time. Today's 'Mech is the Crimson Hawk.

The Crimson Hawk is new to the Jihad timeline, appearing in TRO3075 and on the cover, but it is also old, first appearing as two unique figures in the second MechWarrior: Dark Age set, Fire For Effect. It appeared as a unique or non-unique figure in four other sets, Death From Above, Liao Incursion, Age of Destruction, and Wolf Strike. The Crimson Hawk, as the name suggests, was initiall conceived and designed by Clan Blood Spirit scientists. Due to some internal design problems, and the Blood Spirit's lack of resources, only a few prototypes were built. During a trade trip to York, a Diamond Shark commander noticed a partially built Crimson Hawk in a hanger. The Sharks won a Trial of Possession in which only two warriors of the defending Binary survived. The prototypes and entire design team were transported to Itabiana in the Inner Sphere where they finished the design, working out all the bugs.

Like the Pack Hunter, the Crimson Hawk is a Light 'Mech with big gun(s). It is only 25 tons, using an XL engine and jump jets to move 5/8/5. I know what some of you may be thinking, "why is that thing only going 5/8/5?" Well running the numbers, it needs to free up 1.5 tons to bump the speed up to 7/11/5, and it needs to free up another 1 ton to get those extra 2 jump jets to get it to 7/11/7. It already uses Ferro and adding Endo Steel only frees up 1 ton. The only way to get the tonnage you need is to trade in weapons. You could trade both ER Large Lasers for an ER PPC, but then you've just got a Pack Hunter that went on a diet and traded the SFE and Endo for an XL and standard structure. And for those folks interested in min-maxed designs, the most efficient use of a 7/11 XL engine is at 40 tons and for a 7/11 SFE you want 35 tons.

To leave behind all the theory and go back to what we actually have in front of us, the 5/8/5 speed of the Crimson Hawk, while it doesn't sound great for a Clan Light 'Mech, it can still get you a +3 movement modifier. While the armor is maxed out, it is only a 25-ton 'Mech, so that means only 89 points of armor total, so getting the highest movement modifier possible is the best bet. Fortunately the Crimson Hawk's weapons help in this area. A pair of ER Large Lasers means you can stand back at long range (well, run or jump around at long range) and take shots where your opponent may not even be able to fire back. Even if they are able to fire back, their long range modifier (+4) plus your movement modifier (+3 hopefully) means that they're not likely to hit unless they have some combo of a good gunner, targeting computer, and/or pulse lasers. The one drawback shows itself in the typical Clan-style of mounting more weapons than the heat sinks can handle. In the case of the Crimson Hawk, there are only 10 double heat sinks, meaning jumping and firing both weapons puts you up to +9 heat, dropping your speed to 4/6/5, and sticking you with a +1 to-hit for your weapon attacks.

Overall I think this is a decent second-line harasser 'Mech which gets better the more terrain there is on the map, there's just a few drawbacks. I can see why the Blood Spirits never quite got it into production (though they might have preferred the Pack Hunter to the Crimson Hawk), and I can also see why the Diamond Sharks love to sell it to whoever's got the cash.

My rating: 5/10, I really like the look of the Crimson Hawk, and I loved it in MechWarrior: Dark Age, but the stats don't quite add up to a good design in most situations.

How I would improve it:
If I've got to make changes to it, since it's about as good as it can get at it's tonnage, and avoiding the skinnier Pack Hunter route, I would remove one ER Large Laser. Then I'd add 2 ER Medium Lasers and a Targeting Computer. The heat issues are only slightly improved, but it gives you better numbers while you jump and snipe at long range.

How I would use it:
I kinda covered this a little earlier, but first off I would only use the Crimson Hawk in places where there was some hills or woods hexes. You don't want so much terrain it cuts off the long ranges, but you need enough to either jump into woods for the extra defensive modifier, or to jump behind when you need to cool off. Since it's going to be jumping and sniping, the better the gunner, the better things will be.

As much as I could I would keep the Crimson Hawk at the edges of the battle, keeping as much range as possible in between it and the enemy. Actually things are going to be pretty similar to the Pack Hunter, you just need to cool off more often if you fire both lasers and you're less likely to head-cap an enemy 'Mech, meaning you're less likely to be shot at.

Variants
The Crimson Hawk 2 variant is fluffed as a Blood Spirit design. With all their salvage from the Star Adders, the Blood Spirit version replaces the ER Large Lasers with two Heavy Large Lasers. With the Heavy Lasers you gain headcapping power, but jumping and firing just one laser will overheat the 'Mech, not to mention the fun rolls you get if you fire both lasers while jumping. Overall, it's a small change, but it's a really bad idea.

If I were given this version, I would drop the second Heavy Large Laser for 2 more double heat sinks, a targeting computer and a Heavy Medium Laser. Now at least you can jump and fire the Heavy Large Laser without overheating, and you have the targeting computer to offset the +1 attack modifier. And if I had to use it as is, I would keep it to urban areas or broken terrain where I could get in close and the shorter range of the Heavy Lasers isn't going to hurt me as much.

My rating: 2/10, using Heavy Lasers means you give up your range advantage and you add in the extra hurt of having a +1 attack modifier and bigger heat issues.

The Crimson Hawk 3 variant is unique to TRO3075, not having been seen in any MechWarrior: Dark Age set. It's a modified design from Clan Wolf in Exile, which uses improved jump jets, but as far as I can tell, it only uses 6 improved jump jets, not 7. The arm-mounted ER Large Laser is replaced with an ER Medium Laser to free up tonnage for the jump jets. The fluff says the internal structure was "reinforced" to handle the jump jets, but if Endo Steel is used, the design is 0.5 tons underweight. The nice thing about this version is that you can jump and fire the weapons for +/- 0 heat, so maybe the Exiles are working on a buddy for their Pack Hunters.

If I were to tweak this one, I would suggest that Endo Steel be used (if it's not already) and that 0.5 tons of armor be shaved off (which brings it to 86 out of 89 points of armor) in order to make room for a 7th improved jump jet. This allows it to get the same movement modifier as the Pack Hunter when jumping, greatly increasing it's survivability and offsetting the armor lost. Also, I would consider swapping the ER Medium Laser for a pair of ER Small Lasers or a Heavy Medium Laser for cloe-in work. Both will give you an added punch up close. If I had to use this version stock, I would use it like the main version, just with the ability to use the ER Medium Laser when someone gets closer.

My rating: 6/10, A good attempt at improving the design. The ability to jump and fire both weapons without heat issues is great, even if it lost some firepower in the process. I can't give it too much of a rating until I can see the record sheet to see how the tonnage is addressed.

I find it interesting that his main suggestion at improving the design has now become pretty much canon with the appearance of the Crimson Hawk 4.
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Col.Hengist

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Re: 'Mech of the Week: Crimson Hawk
« Reply #35 on: 14 November 2014, 14:49:20 »
Wait, 5 Crimson Hawks is a point isn't it?  You Spirits treat them as protos don't you?

It's 5 on 1 but none of that dezgra Hellion stuff! ;D

With our limited resources? 5 is a cluster  :D
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Diablo48

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Re: 'Mech of the Week: Crimson Hawk
« Reply #36 on: 14 November 2014, 19:21:15 »
That is interesting, and his comment about playing with the movement curve got me thinking about how to get the speed up so I broke out SSW to see what you can do if you pull the Jump Jets.  The answer is that you can get to 8/12/0 with no other changes, and switching to Endo and dropping 3 points of armor lets you hit a very respectable 9/14/0 and make the Crimson Hawk a very dangerous 'Mech.  Larger would still be better (a 30 ton frame could get to 10/15 and add a bit more armor), but just dropping the Jump Jets and kicking the engine up would put this guy up to an 8 or 9 instead of the 5 it is.


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cold1

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Re: 'Mech of the Week: Crimson Hawk
« Reply #37 on: 14 November 2014, 21:26:20 »
That is interesting, and his comment about playing with the movement curve got me thinking about how to get the speed up so I broke out SSW to see what you can do if you pull the Jump Jets.  The answer is that you can get to 8/12/0 with no other changes, and switching to Endo and dropping 3 points of armor lets you hit a very respectable 9/14/0 and make the Crimson Hawk a very dangerous 'Mech.  Larger would still be better (a 30 ton frame could get to 10/15 and add a bit more armor), but just dropping the Jump Jets and kicking the engine up would put this guy up to an 8 or 9 instead of the 5 it is.

I like it better at 8/12/0 for sure. 


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Fragger

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Re: 'Mech of the Week: Crimson Hawk
« Reply #38 on: 17 November 2014, 15:15:57 »
Am I the only one who thinks the Crimson Hawk mini has stubby legs?

Replace them with Arbalest legs, looks so much better!

GreekFire

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Re: 'Mech of the Week: Crimson Hawk
« Reply #39 on: 18 November 2014, 03:05:59 »
I like it better at 8/12/0 for sure.

Kinda makes it a non-omni Fire Falcon.

Replace them with Arbalest legs, looks so much better!

But what do I do with the Arbalest, then?  #P
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Col.Hengist

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Re: 'Mech of the Week: Crimson Hawk
« Reply #40 on: 18 November 2014, 11:55:38 »
Sit it on top of a manticore?
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