Mechacide?

[Weirdo]

It's not a suicide attack, it's a Mechacide attack The MechWarrior would hopefully eject.

If you read the rules for both ejection and self-destruct, it's still suicide. There is absolutely no way for a pilot in a tabletop game to eject from their mech and get out of the blast radius before it blows. Eject or not, you're just deciding if you want to be a puff of ash in your mech's wreckage, or a puff of ash next to it.

...okay, there's *one* way. IF there's a hardened building within two hexes of the warrior's landing point(which is always the hex immediately behind the mech they just abandoned), AND they didn't pass out or die from injuries during the ejection, it's possible to get in there and be protected from the blast. I do mean hardened, too. Anything less and the damage will still kill the warrior inside. Better hope the folks already in there are friendly.

[Col Toda]

The only TWOB seems to  have the booby trap system to make it quick and easy. So in the Jihad  it was done but not common .

During the Succession Wars it doesn't make sense because you can recapture battlefield salvage in a counterattack from a battlefield that did not enemy infantry present to start immediately salvage operations. 

During the Star League  it was done frequently in the Reunification wars using Fire Ship to wreak jump and warships . Normally done by one side that knows it is a forgone conclusion that they are going to lose . The reason is strategic  . If the cost of victory is so high that it would take centuries of occupation to break even and if the insurgency is too active you never break even on an invasion when those forces leave the next potential invader gets vetoed from within by the fiscal bean counters of the nation . It is at best a deterrent for the future not a successful strategy for The Now as anyone you  already fighting has too much treasure invested to stop .

[Starfury]

Sure, but you're better off running away or surrendering, unless you're a pirate facing Clan units, the mech Knights whose name escapes me, or the Colonial Marshals. And if you have jump jets you can always I am Jade Falcon someone or death frombabove.

[cray]

Let's say you're in melee combat against 2 or 3 'Mechs, you know your 'Mech is going to be destroyed anyway, why not blow it up and damage the 'Mechs attacking you?

Both times I've stackpoled in a game it was because I had a 'Mech on its last armor points and had been surrounded by the other players' 'Mechs who were gloating a bit too much over the upcoming coup de grace. Yes, yes, lean those 'Mechs a bit closer...

But that's out-of-character, gamer thinking. I wrote "The Great Myth" sidebar in Tech Manual because The Stackpole annoys me from a physics perspective (in and out of game).

[General308]

Can you blow your 'Mech up on purpose? You could use explosive ammo in your hull plus the 'Mech its self as AE damage

Self Destruct rules already exist