Advantages of light 'Mechs

[PuppyLikesLaserPointers]

Perfect. That's the reality, for everyone have their own reasons and situations, so it is nothing wrong to have the different point of view.

But, it seems that it didn't gone so far from the OP, other than lights as the recon asset.

[Elmoth]

For me the conclusions are:

1. There are perfectly justificable reasons for light mechs to be common in the setting.

2. Light mechs are that, light, They are intending for recon and location of the enemy (quite important stuff) and exploitation after you punch a hole in the enemy line. These things are strategic in nature, since playing how your light mech lance murders a column of flatbed trucks or rearguard command post is rather boring on the tabletop, so we do not play them tactically even if it is extremely important in the strategic arena.

3. The phone booth combat of usual tabletop battletech games is harsh on light units, since it is a tactical (not strategic) game and mostly an "OK corral" shooting experience and there staying power and sheer volume of fire tends to trump it all. In this environment lights can still be useful, but is way more difficult to use them well (I wouldn't use them well since I am a casual player, for example), but fast mediums tend to be better for these slugfests.

4. Specialized vehicles operating in their terrain (or outside their unfavoured terrain) and niche role tend to be better than mechs of the same weight in the same role, but mechs are more flexible and absorb damage better. Vehicles can substitute for some of the roles of light mechs, but their fragility makes them less robust to perform these well and perform more than one of them. 


It has been a very interesting thread. Thanks all.

Cheers,
Xavi

[Minemech]

 I think that to appreciate an asset, you have to have an honest assessment of its strengths and weaknesses in various settings. It may be fun to field a Commando, but the thing is easy to cut to ribbons in most settings. The Commando is not representative of most lights.

[Kovax]

3. The phone booth combat of usual tabletop battletech games is harsh on light units, since it is a tactical (not strategic) game and mostly an "OK corral" shooting experience and there staying power and sheer volume of fire tends to trump it all. In this environment lights can still be useful, but is way more difficult to use them well (I wouldn't use them well since I am a casual player, for example), but fast mediums tend to be better for these slugfests.

I agree with points 1, 2, and 4.  Point 3 is more conditional, and as you say, it is way more difficult to use them well.  That may be part of why I enjoy it.  When it fails, it's nothing unexpected, and when it works, and your 20 tonner rips the opponent's expensive toy a new rear exhaust port, it's glorious and memorable.  Fast Lights on the tabletop are perfect for picking off stragglers of ANY weight class that wander out of the protective umbrella of the rest of their formation's firepower, forcing the enemy to cluster and make themselves more vulnerable to artillery and other dirty tricks.  The Light generally won't win the game for you, but it can very well make it much easier for the rest of your units to win it.

Sadly, I've met several players whose regular response to having to run a Light 'Mech as part of their force is to suicide the Light as quickly as possible, so they have one less thing to deal with.

The problem with Lights in BT goes from relatively situational use in 3025 to a serious issue in 3050, where Pulse weapons tend to negate the only real advantage that Lights have on the tabletop: speed modifiers.  The players' expectations for gunnery skills have also increased in the standard pickup games, so the 4/5 skill Regular pilots that constituted 90% of the opposition are now almost matched by the numbers of 3/5 skill Veterans being fielded, and that makes it much harder to avoid being hit.  With a 4/5 skill pilot shooting at you, speed = armor.  With a 3/5 skill pilot firing a pulse weapon at you, only armor = armor; speed isn't cutting it anymore, and Lights don't have the actual armor to stand up to that kind of abuse for long.

[Elmoth]

That might be is a problem with pulse weapons and BV of skill sets, then.
Cheers,
Xavi

[Arkansas Warrior]

“Light mechs” is entirely too broad a category.  A Panther is not a Spider, and trying to use them for the same thing is going to go very badly for one of them.  Maybe both.  I’m very real sense, the Assassin and Cicada are better light mechs than the Panther.  At least if you mean what most people mean when they say “light mechs”.  Lights have their rolls they can excel in.  If you try to use them in roles better suited for assault mechs, they’re generally going to fail.  The longer I’ve been around the universe, the more I’ve moved away from tonnage as a meaningful category.  Role, speed, and armament mean far more (and role is usually dictated by the other two).

[Mohammed As`Zaman Bey]

“Light mechs” is entirely too broad a category. 

  It is a defined weight class. That being said, not all are fast, not all have eggshell armor. Not all are recon 'Mechs, although in campaign I played out a scenario where a randomly rolled lance was composed of Lights: 3 fast bugs hampered by an Urbanmech and the GM would not allow the lance to split up or leave the Urbie behind, which doomed that lance, as it was easily run down and slaughtered.
  Recon 'Mechs don't have to be Hussars but Hussars make decent recon, while a Mongoose is ideal as a fast command 'Mech that can keep up with just about any formation.
  The Panther is more a mobile PPC platform -solid enough to keep Mediums at bay, but certainly not a recon 'Mech.
  One has to wonder what niche the Urbanmech fills that can't be filled by a cheaper vehicle with more mobility.
  While pulse lasers and targeting computers might negate the speed modifier a fast 'Mech incur, those incur the price of being less efficient at damage to weight ratios. A PPC might be able to severely damage a fast Light but it has to hit first. A MPL might have a better chance to hit the same target but at reduced damage, meaning it may have to connect with a Light several times before striking the same location repeatedly.
  As much as I may swear by the Clan LPL, I don't use them to hunt Lights 'Mechs but Assaults. Clan LPLs make up for my movement and terrain modifiers I use to avoid being hit.

[Kovax]

  It is a defined weight class.

True.  A "Light" 'Mech is defined as being below 40 tons, regardless of speed, armament, battlefield role, or other factors (aside from the obvious point of being a 'Mech).

It is also true that Light 'Mechs are designed for different roles, either as scouts, scout-hunters, raiders, light support units, and so on, and some of those roles may be shared with heavier machines.  That means a 20 ton "bug" may have the same role as a 40 ton Cicada or Assassin, or a 45 ton Phoenix Hawk, while a 30 ton Valkyrie may share a role with a 50 ton Trebuchet or 70 ton Archer.  "Light" is insufficient to define a 'Mech's role on the battlefield, but it does strongly impact how much damage a 'Mech can withstand before suffering internal damage and loss of effectiveness.  Weight class also affects price and BV, so in some roles or situations one may be quite willing to trade away huge amounts of durability in order to drastically reduce cost.  In other situations, not so much.

[Agathos]

I think I've seen a few conclusions in this thread, depending on who is posting.

1. Light 'Mechs are dead, or at best suboptimal. There are too many fast mediums doing the same job, and too much firepower out there for them to survive.

2. Light 'Mechs are fine because they're cheap. Sometimes that's all the justification you need.

3. Light 'Mechs are fine scouts. This is because they are either disposable (see #2) or faster than even an XL medium can manage (contra #1). But scouting doesn't usually matter in a one-off tactical scenario.

4. You can still build a potent 'Mech-killing light 'Mech with the latest tech, but they aren't many official designs in that mold. (See the spinoff thread)

[monbvol]

I think I've seen a few conclusions in this thread, depending on who is posting.

1. Light 'Mechs are dead, or at best suboptimal. There are too many fast mediums doing the same job, and too much firepower out there for them to survive.

2. Light 'Mechs are fine because they're cheap. Sometimes that's all the justification you need.

3. Light 'Mechs are fine scouts. This is because they are either disposable (see #2) or faster than even an XL medium can manage (contra #1). But scouting doesn't usually matter in a one-off tactical scenario.

4. You can still build a potent 'Mech-killing light 'Mech with the latest tech, but they aren't many official designs in that mold. (See the spinoff thread)

1 and 2 are not helped either since the majority of fights are going to use no Tactical Operations rules at all and thus VTOLs really start chipping away at these considerations despite their relative fragility.

This does somewhat impact 3 as well but less so.

Which leaves 4 for most fights where a Light is going to prove itself superior to a VTOL.

Hovers and WiGEs have terrain restrictions that make it a more even debate.

[Jellico]

I would argue numbers matter more to recon than light Mechs.

I had the pleasure of being put into a Clan vs IS scenario where I had to expend my limited recon assets clearing a defended city while my opponent has the numbers to leave me dug in and go after my DropShips.

Fair play. But when it is 45 assets vs 100 you can use Annihilators for recon.

[massey]

Here's my conclusion.

In the game universe, political concerns prevent leaders from arming huge numbers of civilians.  That's a good way to not be in charge anymore.  This is true in every civilization in Battletech, so everyone has an incentive to not do that.  In addition, there are very effective military counters to fielding waves of infantry and conventional vehicles, so it's not like it would be an instant-win button anyway.  Those counters are typically not used very often, because everybody mostly sticks to Battlemechs, but they are available.

There's probably always some limited form of conflict going on in most areas.  That's why a lot of old Battletech scenario books had mechs start the game with damage.  There's always some jerk with an SRM launcher hiding in the bushes ("There's always a ninja in the closet...").  Vehicles are far more likely to suffer disabling effects from these attacks than Battlemechs are.  This means that they'll probably have far lower readiness rates in a real life conflict zone.  Yeah you can buy 4 hovercraft for the price of 1 light mech, but once you start using them they won't last that long before you need major repairs.  This ends up making mechs more reliable and dependable over the long haul.

Light mechs perform very well in scenarios that aren't covered by standard Battletech rules.  In a single mapsheet fight, they are at a disadvantage against heavier opponents.  But in a "real life" fight, lights are generally able to avoid situations like that.  Playing it out requires gamers interested in using lights though.

[SCC]

I've realized something I didn't earlier, so I'm going to say it now. Bug 'Mechs and other 'Mechs like them are like the scout car or jeep in many poorly balanced RTS games, you know the ones, fast, cheap, low down on the tech tree so you can pump a few out early to scout around, but after that you stop using them because their useless. Sure their good against infantry, but most games have anti-vehicle infantry, making them not a good option. Well that that Bug 'Mechs are.

[Kovax]

I've realized something I didn't earlier, so I'm going to say it now. Bug 'Mechs and other 'Mechs like them are like the scout car or jeep in many poorly balanced RTS games, you know the ones, fast, cheap, low down on the tech tree so you can pump a few out early to scout around, but after that you stop using them because their useless. Sure their good against infantry, but most games have anti-vehicle infantry, making them not a good option. Well that that Bug 'Mechs are.

Not quite.  The light scout car or jeep is fine for recon, until the enemy starts fielding a couple of squads of cheap SRM infantry.  The 20 ton bug 'Mech will continue to be useful for recon, because the SRMs won't generally immobilize it or take it out in one round of fire.  The problems are that recon isn't necessary on a battlefield of the size used in a typical tabletop game, and that you don't need to spread recon assets out far and wide, because even a campaign game with a large strategic map is severely limited in scope compared to a real-world conflict that might span hundreds or thousands of miles of front, with hundreds or thousands of units engaging in recon or other activities.

In real world navies up until the end of WWII, they typically fielded far more Destroyers and Light Cruisers than Battleships.  A Battleship is a huge investment, but that massive amount of armor and firepower is only justified if you're fighting another capital ship.  In most situations, the light escort vessel has sufficient firepower to handles things on its own, for a tiny fraction of the cost and maintenance, so you can field several Destroyers to cover a wider area or several distant areas, instead of one Battleship that can only be in one place at a time.  If you bump into something that you're not able to handle, you use your speed to get out of harm's way and call in a Battleship, which is free to respond because it's not forced to take on the more routine duties that a Destroyer can do.  Light 'Mechs in Battletech are like those Destroyers: quite capable of carrying out routine operations until something big comes to play hardball.  That's when they call in the heavyweights to do the serious fighting, while offering whatever support they can, so their heavyweights are more likely to win.

A real military using 'Mechs would have a LOT of Light 'Mechs, vehicles, and infantry for various routine scouting and raiding functions, and a few Heavies to duke it out with the opposing Heavies when needed.  The small maps and player knowledge of the battlefield and opposing forces makes recon less important or pointless in most games.  The close distances, higher gunnery skills, and later era weapons that increase the odds of hitting fast targets make Light 'Mechs relatively useless in purely Tactical games.  Still, a fast Light 'Mech can sometimes make use of an opportunity to backstab a far heavier design and come out relatively unscathed, so they're not entirely useless in spite of so many things working against them.  I do have issues with the proliferation of better gunnery skills: if everyone is "Veteran", why do they call regulars "Regular"?  Clan pulse weapons with extended ranges and targeting computers, in combination with better skills, further complicate matters, making Lights far too vulnerable at any range whenever Clan units are involved.  It makes for a faster game, yes, but anything that's not massively armored tends to evaporate.

[MarauderD]

I'm wondering if light mechs need a buff.  I know most people think they don't. 

Simple buff:  -2 to hit light mechs.  -1 to hit medium mechs.  Reasoning is they are small and unusually agile and bendy.  This is what they did in HBS' turn based BattleTech game.

I can say it didn't save light mechs:  by endgame, they were relegated by everything else. 

I can say it won't make light mechs awesome.  Because folks could still take a heavy with Pulses and negate that advantage.  But it would give them something.  Otherwise, anything not moving 12/18 or thereabouts just isn't fast enough to stay alive. 

I'll put my flameproof suit on now. 

[Weirdo]

I've realized something I didn't earlier, so I'm going to say it now. Bug 'Mechs and other 'Mechs like them are like the scout car or jeep in many poorly balanced RTS games, you know the ones, fast, cheap, low down on the tech tree so you can pump a few out early to scout around, but after that you stop using them because their useless. Sure their good against infantry, but most games have anti-vehicle infantry, making them not a good option. Well that that Bug 'Mechs are.

I have to ask, when was the last time you actually tried sending a Stinger or Locust against infantry? Pretty sure that as long as you're not in a city or talking about the crazy Clantech platoons or going up against someone who thinks a field gun is a standard-issue sidearm, they'll still prove quite effective.

[SCC]

Not quite.  The light scout car or jeep is fine for recon, until the enemy starts fielding a couple of squads of cheap SRM infantry.  The 20 ton bug 'Mech will continue to be useful for recon, because the SRMs won't generally immobilize it or take it out in one round of fire.  The problems are that recon isn't necessary on a battlefield of the size used in a typical tabletop game, and that you don't need to spread recon assets out far and wide, because even a campaign game with a large strategic map is severely limited in scope compared to a real-world conflict that might span hundreds or thousands of miles of front, with hundreds or thousands of units engaging in recon or other activities.

The Jeep I am talking about here is NOT a BT unit, and I'm not sure how you came to the collusion that it was. It's a generic RTS unit, if it were to have BT stats I'd say it'd have at least 20 armor on each location, move 5/8 and be armed with a machine gun or two, it'd also cost half of a Rommel or Patton to play

In real world navies up until the end of WWII, they typically fielded far more Destroyers and Light Cruisers than Battleships.  A Battleship is a huge investment, but that massive amount of armor and firepower is only justified if you're fighting another capital ship.  In most situations, the light escort vessel has sufficient firepower to handles things on its own, for a tiny fraction of the cost and maintenance, so you can field several Destroyers to cover a wider area or several distant areas, instead of one Battleship that can only be in one place at a time.  If you bump into something that you're not able to handle, you use your speed to get out of harm's way and call in a Battleship, which is free to respond because it's not forced to take on the more routine duties that a Destroyer can do.  Light 'Mechs in Battletech are like those Destroyers: quite capable of carrying out routine operations until something big comes to play hardball.  That's when they call in the heavyweights to do the serious fighting, while offering whatever support they can, so their heavyweights are more likely to win.

A real military using 'Mechs would have a LOT of Light 'Mechs, vehicles, and infantry for various routine scouting and raiding functions, and a few Heavies to duke it out with the opposing Heavies when needed.  The small maps and player knowledge of the battlefield and opposing forces makes recon less important or pointless in most games.  The close distances, higher gunnery skills, and later era weapons that increase the odds of hitting fast targets make Light 'Mechs relatively useless in purely Tactical games.  Still, a fast Light 'Mech can sometimes make use of an opportunity to backstab a far heavier design and come out relatively unscathed, so they're not entirely useless in spite of so many things working against them.  I do have issues with the proliferation of better gunnery skills: if everyone is "Veteran", why do they call regulars "Regular"?  Clan pulse weapons with extended ranges and targeting computers, in combination with better skills, further complicate matters, making Lights far too vulnerable at any range whenever Clan units are involved.  It makes for a faster game, yes, but anything that's not massively armored tends to evaporate.

Doesn't work that way, the resources needed to build a 'Mech, as evidenced by their in-universe sacristy, in addition the the lore, mean that any 'Mech is comparable to a BB in your example in therms of cost.

I have to ask, when was the last time you actually tried sending a Stinger or Locust against infantry? Pretty sure that as long as you're not in a city or talking about the crazy Clantech platoons or going up against someone who thinks a field gun is a standard-issue sidearm, they'll still prove quite effective.

Wasn't talking about a Locust or Stinger here, was talking about my generic jeep.

[Elmoth]

Mech sacristy has been thrown to the wind for a hundred years of background. It is 3rd SW thing, but not anymore in 4th SW where they are just tanks with a crew of 1 guy in the big plot. Replaceable commodities.

[Kovax]

I'm wondering if light mechs need a buff.  I know most people think they don't. 

Simple buff:  -2 to hit light mechs.  -1 to hit medium mechs.  Reasoning is they are small and unusually agile and bendy.  This is what they did in HBS' turn based BattleTech game.

The problem with that solution is that anything which ISN'T a Clan Pulse boat won't be able to hit them at all, but a Clan pulse boat with elite pilot and targeting computer will still take them down easily.  Two Lights dancing around for advantage would never land a shot.  Pulse weapons SHOULD have gotten a -1, not a -2, and there really should have been some kind of tournament restriction on the percentage of high-skill gunners you can field, such as having at least as much 'Mech tonnage or BV piloted by Greens as Veterans, with at least 50% of the force being Regulars.  That wouldn't apply to scenarios, but would provide a guideline for a "normal" situation.

In the HBS game, misses remove chevrons, so even if you can't hit that Light, you shoot at it anyway so your lance-mates will be able to hit it when their turns come up.  Very unrealistic, and unfair to the side that's badly outnumbered.  Of course, the AI is incompetent enough that it can't fully exploit its advantage, otherwise it would wipe the floor with the player's single lance in most of the missions.

I recall one tournament where everyone took 2 or 3 gunnery skill and 6 or 7 in piloting, with everyone in an Assault or high-end Heavy.  Every round, nobody moved unless they absolutely had to, almost every shot hit, then half the 'Mechs would fall down when they failed their piloting skill checks.  It was disgusting, with no "tactics" involved after initial deployment; just a die-rolling contest to see who ran out of armor and internal structure first.

The underlying cause of the problem is that a 2D6 roll makes a +1 modifier very significant, and you can quickly stack a few such modifiers to turn an "easy" shot into an "impossible" one.  A 2D8 or 2D10 system, or 3D6, would have allowed a bit finer granularity of effects, but that wouldn't have fit the simple "beer and pretzels" style of game that the original developers intended.

[Renard]

Another possible way to interpret this thread is that everyone is playing matches with BV constraints that are too high.

If you cut the BV constraints substantially, you're going to have to pick smaller units, or field a very small force.  That means games will actually go faster, since many light mechs still pack substantial firepower (e.g. wolfhound, panther, jenner) and can hit another light mech hard. 

This might be more fun than lances of heavies and assaults shambling towards one another and chipping off 10+ tons of armor.

[massey]

An average planetary invasion would probably include an enormous number of battles that are far too boring to play out on the tabletop.  Nobody wants to play the grand battle of infantry platoon #1 vs infantry platoon #2.  That's why Battletroops failed.

However in an actual war, those fights would be incredibly common.  That would be 99% of all battles.  And that's where bug mechs shine.  They're tough enough that they can annihilate a standard infantry platoon and still have a little armor left.  Then they return to base and get armor repair, then go back out again.

Would a conventional vehicle work in the same situation?  Sure, but they're a lot more vulnerable to motive hits and lucky criticals.  Over the course of a long campaign, that adds up.  Plus a lot of light mechs can jump.

[SCC]

Mech sacristy has been thrown to the wind for a hundred years of background. It is 3rd SW thing, but not anymore in 4th SW where they are just tanks with a crew of 1 guy in the big plot. Replaceable commodities.

With the exception of the CC the Great Houses now have fewer regiments then they did at the start of the 4SW.

The underlying cause of the problem is that a 2D6 roll makes a +1 modifier very significant, and you can quickly stack a few such modifiers to turn an "easy" shot into an "impossible" one.  A 2D8 or 2D10 system, or 3D6, would have allowed a bit finer granularity of effects, but that wouldn't have fit the simple "beer and pretzels" style of game that the original developers intended.

3D6 is less swingy then the other options, and 2D10 is what MW3 used, so I vote for that. Interestingly this actually makes campaign play a bit better, as improvements are more gradual, I'd also suggest splitting skills up more.

To stop people from just buying up higher grade Pilots, I'd suggest taking a page out of SITS and making people ROLL for their Pilot's skill levels.

Another possible way to interpret this thread is that everyone is playing matches with BV constraints that are too high.

If you cut the BV constraints substantially, you're going to have to pick smaller units, or field a very small force.  That means games will actually go faster, since many light mechs still pack substantial firepower (e.g. wolfhound, panther, jenner) and can hit another light mech hard. 

This might be more fun than lances of heavies and assaults shambling towards one another and chipping off 10+ tons of armor.

This is a terrible idea, it's encouraging one style of play over other's one that apparently not very popular.

An average planetary invasion would probably include an enormous number of battles that are far too boring to play out on the tabletop.  Nobody wants to play the grand battle of infantry platoon #1 vs infantry platoon #2.  That's why Battletroops failed.

However in an actual war, those fights would be incredibly common.  That would be 99% of all battles.  And that's where bug mechs shine.  They're tough enough that they can annihilate a standard infantry platoon and still have a little armor left.  Then they return to base and get armor repair, then go back out again.

Would a conventional vehicle work in the same situation?  Sure, but they're a lot more vulnerable to motive hits and lucky criticals.  Over the course of a long campaign, that adds up.  Plus a lot of light mechs can jump.

Vehicles take more motive crits, but those are easy to fix, bug 'Mechs taking heavy damage are not.

[Adastra]

With the exception of the CC the Great Houses now have fewer regiments then they did at the start of the 4SW.
3D6 is less swingy then the other options, and 2D10 is what MW3 used, so I vote for that. Interestingly this actually makes campaign play a bit better, as improvements are more gradual, I'd also suggest splitting skills up more.

To stop people from just buying up higher grade Pilots, I'd suggest taking a page out of SITS and making people ROLL for their Pilot's skill levels.
This is a terrible idea, it's encouraging one style of play over other's one that apparently not very popular.
Vehicles take more motive crits, but those are easy to fix, bug 'Mechs taking heavy damage are not.

I don’t see how encouraging a particular style of play, even a less used one, is a bad thing, and regardless it’s not as if anyone’s suggesting that people be forced to use less BV. It’s merely a suggestion for how to run games that allow for light mechs to have a place. Might not be the best way to do it, but not because it’s inherently bad to run smaller games.

[massey]

I've said before (maybe in this thread, maybe elsewhere) that the Battletech rules are not wholly representative of the "reality" of war in the Battletech universe.

Alpha Strike takes the same units and presents them in a different format, with different game rules, and different points of balance.  So does Battleforce.  So do the Solaris rules.  So does Battletroops.  The "reality" of combat is maybe somewhere in between all of those.  Whatever that reality is (represented by some unwritten system that we haven't quite nailed yet), light mechs are totally worth it there.  The fact that their value doesn't come across in one particular set of game rules, doesn't mean they aren't good.  It just means the games we are playing don't quite get the balance perfectly accurate.

A MASH unit has great value in a real war.  So do fuel trucks, ammo trucks, and coolant trucks.  On the tabletop, those units are virtually useless.  They exist in the game because they're the sort of things that exist in real life.  But at the scale of the game as commonly played, they don't act as anything other than a target.  That's fine.  We don't have to play LogisticsTech where those units come into their own.  It's enough to simply recognize why they are there.

[massey]

Vehicles take more motive crits, but those are easy to fix, bug 'Mechs taking heavy damage are not.

I have a philosophy about vehicles in Battletech, and why we don't see them as much as you might think.  This is purely my own head-canon, so you are free to disagree.  You won't hurt my feelings.

I'm an old school D&D player.  I don't know if they still have it, but they used to have a set of "wandering monster" tables.  As you walked around the countryside, there was a chance you'd get attacked by a group of orcs.  Or maybe a dragon.  Or an ogre, or whatever.  You'd roll on the table and see what happened.  One time our party got attacked by a pack of bears.  I think the GM kind of screwed us on that one.

Anyway, Dragon Magazine published a joke article, with a "wandering damage" table.  Rather than bother with monsters, you could cut out the middleman and just take damage.  Guys at our store thought it was funny and adopted the term. 

My philosophy is that, in any sort of prolonged Battletech conflict (not an objective raid, but really any kind of planetary invasion or long-term occupation), you would encounter wandering damage pretty regularly.  This sort of thing would be a fact of life in Battletech warfare.  Much of this philosophy probably also stems from playing Crescent Hawks Inception a lot when I was a teenager, when there was no shortage of random jerks with SRM launchers popping up and shooting at you for no reason (in the game, not in the 90s), as well as old Battletech supplements where mechs always had some lingering damage on them.

Maybe some partisans planted a roadside bomb.  Take two 5 point hits on the side chart (mechs take hits on kick chart).  Or maybe an infantry squad is hidden in that building with an AC-5 field gun, and they will open fire when you get into medium range (you get no target movement modifier because you don't think you're in combat and you aren't trying to evade).  Or perhaps some guys with SRM inferno launchers have set up in that alleyway and are waiting for you to pass by.  Or somebody rigged up explosives on the bridge and are going to collapse it when you go over.  Or whatever. 

Ambushes like this would not normally be powerful enough to completely destroy a unit.  You're basically looking at some guys who take a pot-shot and then run away.  In an instance like that, they are far more likely to cause serious damage to a vehicle than they are a mech.  And these sorts of attacks would happen all the time.  That's why you would want light mechs.  They're a lot less likely to get immobilized than a vehicle (which would then be dead as the ambushers run back to finish it off).  And on the off chance that they get lucky and get a through-armor-critical and put 3 engine hits on you, well losing a light mech is a lot better than losing a heavy.

[Adastra]

Actually, here's a question: can non-superheavy mechs be carried as regular Dropship cargo? Obviously that takes time to unpack and you probably can't do as much or any maintenance in transit, but can you do it? Because if you can, then the issue of Mech bays only fitting 1 can be significantly less relevant. You might only use said bays for units that are going to face combat almost immediately, while cargo space is used for the rest. In such cases, you could carry more light mechs for a given amount of cargo, which puts them on more even footing with conventional vehicles, and gives them more applications. If you could carry 5 Locusts in cargo for every Atlas, it becomes a lot easier to justify why you would choose to do so.

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

Actually, here's a question: can non-superheavy mechs be carried as regular Dropship cargo?

Yes, but cargoed mechs are typically only ones that are being sent to the factory or off to New Avalon for use at the NAIS.  You don't put mechs in cargo space to send them somewhere you're planning to fight.  That space is used to store ammo, armor, and replacement parts.

[Adastra]

Yes, but cargoed mechs are typically only ones that are being sent to the factory or off to New Avalon for use at the NAIS.  You don't put mechs in cargo space to send them somewhere you're planning to fight.  That space is used to store ammo, armor, and replacement parts.

Perhaps it's not standard procedure, but it doesn't seem like a bad idea on the face of it. A standard Mech bay weighs 150 tons (if I'm not mistaken, having a mech inside doesn't add to that weight? If it does then that bay is even heavier), so if you chose to carry your mechs as cargo, you'd be saving at minimum 50 tons per mech assuming they were 100 tons. If you're hauling 20 ton mechs, you're saving a whopping 130 tons per mech, which is a massive improvement. It also allows you to use more general transports to carry reinforcements for long campaigns.

[Elmoth]

A leopard can carry 150*6=900 tons of mechs I stead of 400 of you pack it as cargo. Same with the other dropships (storage physics be damned), so if you can secure the drop area for a while AND carry the necessary techs to unload the mechs, it might not be a bad move if you plan to stay around for a while. For example because you are invading I stead of raiding.

[Elmoth]

This is standard procedure in my gaming RPG group. The players store conventional fighters and 1 or 2 mechs as cargo, be keep 3 mechs ready for action. Sometimes 3 light vehicles as well in the 4th bay. Or more cargo.