'Mech of the Week: Black Hawk (Standard)

[JPArbiter]

one thing that was not mentioned, barring reactive armor, this thing is a beats for hunting down Battle Armored units thanks to those streak missiles.  all four launchers can pulverize many an older inner sphere suits and seriously damage clan point's ability to do Leg/Swarm attacks. 

[Colt Ward]

Hmm, yes . . . Clan SSRMs work pretty well for that if you can hit since all the missiles hit and if you are at 10/11/12 hexes then nearly all the suits cannot respond.  Only a few can respond regularly at 8 or 9 hexes (AP Gauss, Magshot, King David, ML armed suits) so that is a interesting use.

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

To be honest, I'd think that the 3 with its quartet of ER Medium Lasers would have the advantage in hunting down BA.  Better range and it only takes two hits to knock out most BA while not significantly overkilling weaker ones.

[Colt Ward]

Yeah, I meant to skim up and find which had the ERML and SSRMs . . . it would do the job the Kimodo? was said to do in 3050s.

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

Not quite as well: the Komodo had 10 medium lasers so it could pretty easily wipe out an entire Point of Elementals in one round.  The BH second line can't really do that in any configuration.

[Colt Ward]

Hmm . . . a HE spread of ATMs, if all of them hit along with the lasers might but . . .

The Komodo had the problem of to use the MLs it had to come in range of the SRMs . . . and after the 3050s it really cannot stand off from BA squads/points any longer.

[Kit deSummersville]

Hmm . . . a HE spread of ATMs, if all of them hit along with the lasers might but . . .

The Komodo had the problem of to use the MLs it had to come in range of the SRMs . . . and after the 3050s it really cannot stand off from BA squads/points any longer.

Thus the AMS

[Colt Ward]

Sure . . . and the smart Clan commander would encourage his light or lighter medium mech pilots to tackle the Kimodo . . . I always felt Elementals, and other later 1/3 or 1/4 BA, were better off going after assaults or other mechs they could catch like 4/6 heavies.

It would be interesting to see how chewed up a Kimodo would get in 3070 going after AP Gauss armed Elementals.

I want to swear that one of the dossier mechs had ERMLs and SSRMs, which to me would have been perfect to make the Blackhawk a deadly BA hunter since it would put them beyond range.  Regular SRMs could have worked as well since infernoes would be even deadlier but then you have to get 9 hexes or closer.

[Empyrus]

To be honest, I'd think that the 3 with its quartet of ER Medium Lasers would have the advantage in hunting down BA.  Better range and it only takes two hits to knock out most BA while not significantly overkilling weaker ones.

That's my thinking.
Either that, or the original Nova Prime, or some other 'Mech (IS or Clan) building upon that idea with a large bank of medium-class lasers.
Streaks seem to be better fit for general crit-seeking or vehicle hunting, IMO.

[Colt Ward]

Mostly it was the 12 hex range which lets them get beyond most of the current BA weapons . . .

 . . . I had someone underestimate a Theseus RL a few months ago and park their Timberwolf B 2, 3 or 4 hexes away from the BA . . . which still had loaded RLs.  The elite pilot's mech took a pounding from the recoilless and RLs, critting either the engine or gyro and smashing up the armor enough it made the mech vulnerable to just about anything else along with opening a arm.  Sure the point died, but it wrecked that Timberwolf.