BattleTech - The Board Game of Armored Combat
BattleTech Game Systems => General BattleTech Discussion => Topic started by: Sartris on 20 March 2024, 01:30:54
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i did a study like this many years ago so i wanted to see where we are. what does natural obsolescence look like? the most obvious metric is to see how the tech is being utilized over the course of the timeline on new designs and variants. one can also look at which units are still being actively produced that utilize said tech. i'll be sticking to the former here as that doesn't violate my NDA by releasing internal data. so let's dig in.
for the purposes of this exercises, i'm going to define "modern use" as anything 3081 or later. it's where TO gear really begins to spill into mainstream unit design.
Total Units introduced 3081-3151: 1326 IS + 7 clan that have introtech equipment (there are an additional ~750 pure clan entries introduced but obviously they would not use introtech)
Weapon (#uses) - Most Recent year [notes]
AC/2 (1) - 3131 [DA industrialmech]
AC/5 (5) - 3134 [3 DA IM, a Mongrel, and a Scapha config]
AC/10 (3) - 3132 [IM, Storm Raider. The Blade XS is the only actual mech]
AC/20 (1) - 3100 [XTRO Royal Fantasy unit]
Machine Gun (85) - 3149 [most used introtech gear]
Flamer (23) - 3145 [16 mechs, 7 vees]
Vee Flamer (10) - 3084 [8 vees, 2 IM]
Small Laser (15) - 3149 [9 mechs, 4 vees, 1 IM, 1 ASF]
Medium Laser (79) - 3150 [efficient damage to heat will keep it around forever]
Large Laser (9) - 3132 [7 mechs, 1 vee, 1 IM]
PPC (14) - 3148 [9 mechs, 5 vees]
LRM-5 (22) - 3151 [18 mechs (6 Ares configs), 4 vees]
LRM-10 (19) - 3141 [15 mechs, 4 vees]
LRM-15 (34) - 3146 [15 mechs, 9 vees, 2 ASF, 2 Small Craft, 5 CS, 1 Zugvogel config]
LRM-20 (18) - 3135 [7 mechs, 2 vees, 1 ASF, 8 DS]
SRM-2 (20) - 3151 [12 mechs (6 Ares configs), 8 vees]
SRM-4 (37) - 3146 [15 mechs, 15 vees, 7 IM]
SRM-6 (37) - 3146 [20 mechs, 14 vees, 1 ASF, 2 DS]
Hatchet (23) - 3148 [we stay wanting to chop shit]
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Does the number of designs with Machine Guns meaningfully decrease if the designs that also have MG Arrays are excluded?
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excellent question. it turns out MG arrays have only be used three times after 3080 for IS units
Prey Seeker PY-SR30
Maxim (Escort)
Dreadnought MK II Land Train
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Interesting. In another thread we focused on the question of IS lasers being obsolete, but really it looks like it's standard autocannons that are going the way of the dodo.
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And thank god for that.
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lasers (excepting the medium) aren't far behind. six of the ten mechs that use the small laser have TSM. three of the four vehicles use small batteries of them (the lower heat helps with reducing required heat sinks). it's definitely become a utility item. use of the large laser seems mostly based around reducing heat. PPCs seem to be in the same boat, though you do see a bit of pairing with LPPCs for range synergy. Still, they are now very rare. Comparatively, the IS ERPPC is found on 96 units and the cERPPC on 40 mixed tech units (this was more than i expected).
the missile launchers will remain viable for a bit until clanspec LRMs become the norm (multiple factions produce them now so it's a matter of time).
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Of all the IntroTech weapons, missiles really are the most-obsolete. I'd always take ClanTech models without fluff reasons.
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yeah, they might have gone faster but there was never a viable alternative. NLRMs ain't it and MMLs didn't catch on as broadly as one might expect (77). clan LRMs are now on 104 IS units post 3081, which outpaces standard LRM installs. we're watching the process in realish time.
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Going to say most 3050 'upgrades' are the only models that will be forgotten in short order. A good number of 3070 field kits for intro tech mechs do better, the 'royal' designs are the same tech level and perform better in most regards. With a few exceptions, I can seeing most 3050 era models getting skipped over when players like progress in tech level.
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Of all the IntroTech weapons, missiles really are the most-obsolete. I'd always take ClanTech models without fluff reasons.
There’s almost no reason to run the IS version of anything with a clan counterpart without lore reasons.
Interesting. In another thread we focused on the question of IS lasers being obsolete, but really it looks like it's standard autocannons that are going the way of the dodo.
When you have LBx and ultras that are essentially purely better and without major caveats/sidegrade symptoms, makes sense.
LRMs aren’t being replaced because the IS spec competition all has huge asterisks.
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BV reasons, which are one of the places Clan LRMs also beat the pants off of IS LRMs. The increase for lacking minimum range is more than acceptable for the benefit, and then you also have more space to fit other things. The difference between an IS and Clan ER PPC is much more significant and much more palatable for the IS version.
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BV reasons, which are one of the places Clan LRMs also beat the pants off of IS LRMs. The increase for lacking minimum range is more than acceptable for the benefit, and then you also have more space to fit other things. The difference between an IS and Clan ER PPC is much more significant and much more palatable for the IS version.
Yeah. That’s fair.
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Wouldn't there also be the factor that one MechWarrior Dark Age came out (aka clicky tech) was initially joined the BattleTech canon, that good marketing people at Wizkids (using Heavy Metal Pro) created the first batch of stats for their line of dial based Mechs? Many of them were just using standard stats aka the regular text stuff because nothing of the advanced stuff or even Clan tech was even conceived of being added to interfere units except for actual Clan Mechs which hadn't added to their lineup. That I believe contribute to seeing more standard intro tech weapons being update available. Because of the limitations of what was available at that time in Canon.