Talk to me about...... The Men Shen

[Men Shen]

I always thought this mech looked cool but had never owned any or had the opportunity to play one. I know own Three of them all painted in warrior house hiritsu colors. My questions are these,

1. what variants do you guys like and why?
2. If you were going to use all three of them as part of a company how would you spread them out?
3. If I do all three in a lance should I use the same config or three different one?
4. If I do use all three in a lance what should be the 4th mech, another omni like maybe the Owens or some sort of raven or should I go with a Heavy

I hope this mech isn't crap but if all variants are crappy at least I have three cool looking Mechs

[Neufeld]

1. The A and F, are what I would pick for general use, while B, C and E are specialist configs.
The A seems like the most normal mech config with an LB 10-X and triple ERMLs for medium range work. The TAG can also be useful.
The F is brutal in close dual snubbies + TC anything within nine hexes will be in for a world of hurt.
The B is an anti-aircraft configuration due to the dual LB 2-X cannons.
The C is what you use against enemy C3 networks. Get in, jam them and use those accurate LPLs to kill off the spotter.
The E with the plasma rifle and LMGs should be used for hunting infantry and vehicles.

2. Depends on the general speed distribution of the company. If all the mechs are fast, then one in each lance, but if there are slow mechs included, then I would group them with other fasts.

3. Depends on the mission, terrain and expected opposition.

4. Something that moves 6/9 and jumps, like PXH-4L or PXH-5L for example.

[Mattlov]

I find the standard configuration to be quite a nasty bastard.  It is my preferred variant, but I haven't run any of the brand new ones yet.

The speed is nice for something this size.  You can really put whatever firepower it has on the enemy at the range you want, especially against heavier opponents.

[Men Shen]

I'v been trying to get the whole house hiritsu battalion going on, I'v got two companys so far, my force seems to be mostly light and mediums although at first it was mostly assault and heavies. my Foce is as follows

2 Duan Gung
3 Ravens
2 Owens
1 Sha yu
1 Vindicater
1 Blackjack O
1 Centurion
1 Wraith
2 Catapault
2 Yu Huang
2 Ti Tsang
1 Grand Titan
1 Orion
1 Huron Warrior
1 Lineholder
3 Men Shen

All of these are Cappellan Mechs except for the Centurion and Maybe the Lineholder. I think for the last company I need to get more assaults and heavys. thought

[Kit deSummersville]

I love the F version, but I am a bit biased, having designed it. 

None the less, I do use a pair of them in a lance in my regular campaign. The other two 'Mechs are an Apollo and a Huran Warrior M, with all the missiles. The Men Shens savage enemies with their snubbies and take pot-shots with the tag. Anyone tagged then gets a shower of semi-guided LRMs.

The best thing about the Men Shen is that it's an Omni, so it can be quickly reconfigured to whatever is needed. It has great speed, with the MASC allowing for quick bursts than can make reaching a +4 TMM easy. Use it as a cavalry 'Mech and it will do you well. Use it as a slugger and you'll be underwhelmed.

It is in the queue to be 'Mech of the Week somewhere in the near future.

[Iron Mongoose]

As has been said, the joy of the mech is that it is an omni, so it can be all things to all people (well, you know what I mean).  I actualy like the D very well, but most all the veriants are pretty servacable in their ways.  On the whole, its probably the king of the faster omnis, though there's fairly little compitition.

The problem with using them in your company is that you don't have too many omnis, so if you just throw them in a lance with other mechs, you'll tend to use the same veriant that complements that lance, which is fine one the whole, but I always feel a bit of a shame.  So I might make one recon lance for one of your companies with the two Owenses and two of the Men Shens.  Yes, the Owens is terrable, and its a shame to pair it with the Men Shen, which is excelent.  But, it alows the whole lance to switch roles from recon (which both mechs are actualy quite good at, given their hard mounted probes) to support with LRMs (not many, but some, and on very fast platforms) or screening support or flanking or close combat or anything else you can think of.  If you're willing to go custom (which is one of the few ways to make the Owens work anyway), you can even drop a C3 onto one of the Men Shens some of the time and use the Owens' C3s.

I'd probably put the other in a fast attack lance with the Wraith and Sha Yu.  Maybe add in a Raven, if only because I don't see of a way to use three, to make the lance a semi-scout lance, though definatly one that can do its share of fighting.  Perhaps a scout hunter lance.  Again, the presence of the omni Men Shen means the lance can go from recon emphasis to combat emphasis as needed.

If you can get either some Raptors or Firestarter Os, you could make a bit stronger omni lances, but its a bit of a hard sell for a warrior house. 

[RedMarauder]

I've never been a TAG fan as you can't make any other attacks to use it.  Give up a mech's attacks that do potentially more damage, or try to guide an easily-shot-out-f-the-air by AMS missile?  And then get the mech that can't attack for several rounds, due to having to keep the TAG on target, get shot up, too?  Call me a stickler for liking the damage I do be immediate.

[Kit deSummersville]

I've never been a TAG fan as you can't make any other attacks to use it. 

Sure you can. You make a TAG attempt prior to the attack phase and then fire the rest of your weapons during the attack phase.

[Dread Moores]

What Kit said. That changed in Total Warfare (or Master Rules? Can't recall which). And it was one seriously welcome change.

I've used a Men Shen a few times before, but not much. I'm very likely adding one for an upcoming late-Jihad, early Republic campaign. I'll be rather curious to see how it performs. I do really like that Beagle though, especially since I use the TacOps rules for them. And it has some of the best stock medium Omni loadouts I've seen yet.

[Moonsword]

What Kit said. That changed in Total Warfare (or Master Rules? Can't recall which). And it was one seriously welcome change.

Total Warfare.

[Ian Sharpe]

The Men Shen is a long time favourite, I even didn't mind the hardwired BAP and lack of CASE.  The Prime and A are my preferred variants, able to use MASC and flippy arms(tho the A only has one arm with weapons) for some nice backshots on Mechs they just ran past, like a bigger, nastier Jenner.  Loved the dual LPL model for the ease of converting the mini, which works out well now that the SNPPC and PR variants are around. 

[Dread Moores]

I've never been a TAG fan as you can't make any other attacks to use it.  Give up a mech's attacks that do potentially more damage, or try to guide an easily-shot-out-f-the-air by AMS missile?

Bolded for emphasis, as I just noted that part. If you're referring to Arrow IV missiles, AMS doesn't have any impact on them, and it never has. Semi-guided LRMs, sure.

[Moonsword]

If you want to get around that, saturate the AMS - multiple launchers can very easily punch right past it.

[JadeHellbringer]

A quick few notes on the 'E' configuration... since it's my fault.

There was no question, going into the design process, that the Men Shen needed a plasma rifle in one of it's new configurations. Why wouldn't there be one, after all? There's three things that make a Capellan ride these days- stealth armor, plasma weapons, and LRMs to deliver mines, and since this can't carry stealth armor and LRM configurations of Omnimechs are boring, that left me with one obvious path. I'd also been pondering an urban warfare version of another unit from 3060 (which didn't make it into the book, sadly), and so I was on an urban-combat kick anyway.

The rifle got two tons of ammo, adequate for most missions. The LMG arrays were priorities for me as well- I wanted to make sure that infantry, always dangerous in urban combat, weren't a concern. This Men Shen can savage infantry forces, and do so at twice the range a normal MG-toting Mech can thanks to using LMGs. Normally I wouldn't go with that much MG ammo, but with two four-gun arrays the Mech ate through one ton too quickly.

The Beagle was a late addition, after pondering an AMS I realized that an urban infantry hunter was going to be better off being able to spot an ambush early with the job it does. The remaining two tons went to a pair of medium lasers, to give a little extra boost to the Mech's firepower against an armored target. I went with standard mediums since in the tight confines of a city, the extra range from an ER laser wasn't going to be a great deal more useful- so why gain the extra heat? Firing all weapons and running keeps the Men Shen E nice and cool, with a couple of points to spare even.

Among the changes I'd pondered during the process were adding TAG in place of a laser or a ton of ammo, adding CASE to keep exploding MG ammo from wiping out the Mech, dropping the Beagle and lasers for jump jets, and even tinkering with a targeting computer for the rifle, but I felt the final version in the book was the best option in the end.

Not the flashiest unit, not likely to be used by players in anti-Mech fights unless forced... but if I ran a Capellan Mech company, I'd sure want this thing leading the charge into a hostile town.

[Kit deSummersville]

Uhh, Hellbie, the Beagle is fixed equipment.

[Moonsword]

Uhh, Hellbie, the Beagle is fixed equipment.

Well, the important thing is that it's still in the right spot.

[Men Shen]

Best part is it being an omnimech, you can tailor fit it for any mission, using any config you want.

[blackjack]

Best part is it being an omnimech, you can tailor fit it for any mission, using any config you want.

Exactly. off subject. your house forces could use a Lao Hu & Thunder... great brawlers