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how does the RP work? is that only after you're vetted and all that?
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Aug 16, 2022 04:34
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Hello Thread! Crossposting from the Steam thread, as it's probably better to ask here: Serephina posted:I've JUST gotten my copy of BTech to finally work on Linux, something like three years after purchasing it (not sure to be more angry at Unity, the devs, or Paradox's support). I'm about 12 hours in currently, and have a sinking realization that it might be doing the same bad thing every MW/BT game has done: Big mechs are better, there is no valid reason to use a bunch of lightweight mechs once you get heavy stuff, as you are limited by pilots, not tonnage. Oh, and it seems like I have minimal customization options with these light mechs, with almost all hardpoints & slots being unused, as of course the fundamentals of the game seem to be tonnage = better with no lightweight equipment. I got a bunch of people saying that there's a huge mod scene for this game, but from what I can tell everything needs either modtek or BTML or whatever, all of which appear to be (after a quick glance) Windows executables. Are there any mods which don't need that (and use the built-in mod manager?), which address my quoted bugbear about small mechs being bad/obsoleted? Just skimming nexus modsite and can't find quick filter options regarding compatability etc. I've got a grim feeling that I'm being excessively hopeful here...
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Aug 19, 2022 11:48
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I don't have any advice on modding, but don't sleep on light 'Mechs. The Firestarter is a strong contender for the best 'Mech of the base game, and is still really strong even after DLCs. With the right pilot build (bulwark and sure footing) and a +3 defense gyro, you can turn a Firestarter into the best evasion tank in the game. Bigger 'Mechs suffer evasion penalties so their evasion pips do less than you'd think, light 'Mechs actually get an evasion bonus, and evasion is exponentially stronger the more of it you have. As long as you can limit the number of things shooting at it to 2-3 enemies the Firestarter is almost untouchable; and the AI will tend to prioritize shooting at it because it's a light 'Mech with weak armor. You can also turn a Firestarter into a melee powerhouse if you find enough of the good (light weight) +melee damage arm mods. It's fast enough to actually make use of them for hit-and-run attacks provided you reserved to go last and pull it out of the fire ASAP the turn after. You can also pick up some really powerful medium assassins, like the Royal Griffin that can remain useful into the endgame through a combination of evasion, mobility, and firepower. Unfortunately, the "bigger is better" flaw is badly exacerbated by the lack of 'Mech variety in the 3025-era. BattleTech the tabletop game wasn't entirely sure what light 'Mechs were for in the 3025 era and a lot of the real powerhouse light 'Mechs can't exist without technologies that hadn't been introduced yet. PoptartsNinja fucked around with this message at 12:26 on Aug 19, 2022 |
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Aug 19, 2022 12:24
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I'm in a similarish spot of not knowing what to do bc I just finished the base campaign. Is it just 5 skill missions from here until the end of time? How do I access the DLC content I installed?
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Aug 19, 2022 14:53
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Post-campaign, go ahead and start a new career. The DLC content will activatevon that, so you can discover the joys of urban maps and electrical transformrrs. As for Linux + modding, I don't do it myself, but RogueTech can be made to work, at least according to their wiki, and discussions I've seen in the Discord snd on Reddit. Other big modpacks like BTA and BEX also seem to work as well, from a quick search. As for BattleTexas Red and the Big Iron, yeah, that's an issue across the board; lights *can* go against late-game beasts successfully, but it takes some serious kitting-out and tactics specific to their advantages. (In Roger Tech, people have been known to take the Legendary 40-ton Spider "Anansi", and solo the entire Solaris Heavy Championship season - I need to find some video of that, just to get a grasp of how it's done.)
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Aug 19, 2022 15:28
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Marx Headroom posted:I'm in a similarish spot of not knowing what to do bc I just finished the base campaign. Is it just 5 skill missions from here until the end of time? How do I access the DLC content I installed? When I finished my campaign, I just started going after flashpoints, and when I didn't see any, I just stayed in the most recent area looking for interesting missions. The flashpoints are usually pretty unique and cool. Speaking of Flashpoints, since they have a set number of days before going away, can they come back after waiting long enough, or if you miss them are they gone for good? Since I am using BEX, some flashpoints can be on opposite sides of the Galaxy, and it takes 100 days to reach 'em, meaning I just can't do them all as they randomly appear.
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Aug 19, 2022 15:51
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Crazy Joe Wilson posted:When I finished my campaign, I just started going after flashpoints, and when I didn't see any, I just stayed in the most recent area looking for interesting missions. The flashpoints are usually pretty unique and cool. They loop forever until you do them, so if you miss it or aren't strong enough to handle it, you can wait for the next time around. Don't forget that there's a unique FP for each Great House if you ally with them!
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Aug 19, 2022 15:56
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PoptartsNinja posted:I don't have any advice on modding, but don't sleep on light 'Mechs.
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Aug 19, 2022 16:31
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My usual endgame lance is a Firestarter, a royal Phoenix Hawk (if I can get one), a Marauder, and then whatever else I feel like bringing because the other three don't really need the help.
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Aug 19, 2022 16:40
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Serephina posted:Hello Thread! I'm currently using BTA 3062 as my mod of choice. It has all the cool ClanTech and advanced IS tech as well as the whole Inner Sphere map, but doesn't go quite as insane as RogueTech with putting every drat thing they can think of in. From a Light Mech perspective, BTA doesn't degrade Evasion, so if you get to 8 pips of evasion for a turn you stay there no matter how many people shoot at you. That GREATLY increases the utility of Light Mechs (and fast Mediums for that matter). Throw in some of the advanced tech like ECM, Stealth Armor, MASC, and so on and you can make some disgustingly hard to hit Lights. And with the increased power of the advanced weapons, especially Clan weapons, and Lights can be incredibly effective. Also, BTA has BOTH drop weight AND drop slots as limiting factors, so Lights are useful to fill out a drop to max tonnage. Above and beyond that, Artillery is in the game with BTA so building a super fast super sensory artillery spotter 'mech is totally viable once you get some big guns of your own. So yeah, I'd recommend BTA for your light mech needs. As far as running it in Linux? No clue, but if it can be done, I'm sure the guys on the BTA Discord can tell you how: https://discord.gg/fsWzbFwF
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Aug 19, 2022 18:40
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RBA Starblade posted:They loop forever until you do them, so if you miss it or aren't strong enough to handle it, you can wait for the next time around. Don't forget that there's a unique FP for each Great House if you ally with them! Never tried those, I hear they really stack the deck against you. Speaking of which, UGH, if you install the extra dropship mod with BEX, there's a part of it that also gives the AI a chance at an extra support lance. Problem is, the AI has that chance from the very beginning of the game, whereas you have to pay through the nose before you can get a full extra lance. I did a mission just now where I was against 2 medium lances to my mix of mediums and heavies, decided to try to withdraw because it was not going in my favor, but I FORGOT when you withdraw you still have to get to an LZ, and there was no way I could get through the line of mechs arrayed against me. Why couldn't they make the withdraw option a "Hey we're not getting paid enough for this, how about we just withdraw and pay you some 'sorry' money?" VVV Good to know it has to do with tonnage + skulls VVV Crazy Joe Wilson fucked around with this message at 00:14 on Aug 20, 2022 |
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Aug 19, 2022 22:58
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Crazy Joe Wilson posted:Never tried those, I hear they really stack the deck against you. The logic for it makes it more likely the more your tonnage is over the recommended for the mission (and its own difficulty rating), so if you do nothing but two lances of assaults by the end of the game on a 5 skull mission then gently caress you, get two extra lances
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Aug 19, 2022 23:07
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Serephina posted:Hello Thread! Modding on Linux: 1. The game has built-in mod support -- they incorporated parts of the community ModTek so it's mostly compatible and many mods will run without further tinkering. Check ~/My Games/Battletech/mods and read the pdf. So if you are picking individual bits from the Collective rather than looking at huge mega-mods, or want to tweak stuff yourself* to roll your own perfect vision, you may not need more. *modding the combat rules and mechs is super easy, it's all json files that are highly readable and friendly to edits. The reason that BT has such a good scene is that it's a very good game to learn modding in. 2. For mods that require the community ModTek (because it kept getting updates and new features after HBS was done with the game), you can run the windows modtek injector through wine. The injector only needs to be run once, it patches dll files and is done. Following the install instructions for macOS, with edits due to different folder layout, worked for me. So: mono ModTekInjector.exe /m ~/.local/share/Steam/steamapps/common/BATTLETECH/BattleTech_Data/Managed/ was all I needed to do. (ModTek mods go in ~/.local/share/Steam/steamapps/common/BATTLETECH/Mods) 3. Various mega-mods like RogueTech or BTA: as far as I've seen the install instructions for these all involve running the installer via wine and seem rather fiddly. If you have done option #2 successfully, you can also just extract the contents of their installers to "manually" install the mod. Whether this is easier or harder than the wine method, I don't know. Klyith fucked around with this message at 15:45 on Aug 20, 2022 |
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Aug 20, 2022 15:32
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RBA Starblade posted:The logic for it makes it more likely the more your tonnage is over the recommended for the mission (and its own difficulty rating), so if you do nothing but two lances of assaults by the end of the game on a 5 skull mission then gently caress you, get two extra lances That... makes more sense, thanks. Also, I learned a few days ago there is an achievement for watching all of the credits. Cool.
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Aug 21, 2022 11:06
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Updated to the latest BTA patch, new campaign, Kurita start... Immediately head "north" to Clan space. Started grinding half-skull missions and gathering Clan salvage, had a star of Clan lights by day 100. W00t!
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Aug 22, 2022 18:04
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PhotoKirk posted:Updated to the latest BTA patch, new campaign, Kurita start... I did a Clan Space start, which they call a hard start, but the speed at which you pull in ClanTech made it the easiest BTA run I've ever had!
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Aug 23, 2022 04:24
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i was listening to a podcast ep on tanks and it made me want a tank game. i've been told they're all horrible MMOs so i think this game is probably my best bet. i played the campaign (without the DLC) awhile ago and enjoyed it, thinking about starting the career mode soon. i have the DLC now, should i just go vanilla or try mods? are there recommended mods?
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Aug 23, 2022 04:33
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Finally started a new Roger Tech career, post-savebreak. Wanted to be sn obnoxious prat, so I took a Veteran start for the random Bushwhacker. And LAMs, so the Bushy isn't getting too much work.  Low-skills pilots are still doing good at difficulty 4 (2 green skulls) because stupid levels of evasion and constant backstabbing are a wonderful combination.Once my commander recovers from a nasty wound (49 days - Argo needs upgrading badly), I'll probably get everyone massacred, because the Test Drive flashpoint popped. Quads for everyone! Whaddya mean, they barely know how to walk? I do have a bunch of complete groundpounders ready to assemble, because max salvage right from the beginning, but my Mechtech rating is pitiful and I'd be lucky to recover the ashtrays from the Apollo... Need Reliques (Screamer LAM) and Derelict (unlocks Air Shows) to pop so I can upgrade my LAMs. The two PHawks are still near-stock but OK, it's the 2x Wasps and 1x Stinger that are made of paper.
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Aug 23, 2022 08:32
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crepeface posted:i played the campaign (without the DLC) awhile ago and enjoyed it, thinking about starting the career mode soon. i have the DLC now, should i just go vanilla or try mods? are there recommended mods? There are many recommended mods, depending on what you like & want. There are the big 3 mega-mods, BEX BTA and RogueTech, which in that order have increasing amounts of stuff & increasing deviation from vanilla gameplay. Or you can roll your own and stick with mostly-vanilla with some QOL & balance mods. Some that I highly recommend: BetterAI - enemies are more aggressive & can reserve BTML Color LOS Mod - make targeting lines give more information BTRandomMechComponentUpgrader - enemies can get + weapons BT Simple Mech Assembly - Yang can glue mech parts from variants together Headshot Weapon Limit - Nerf called headshots by limiting how many weapons can shoot MechMaintenanceByCost - a Locust costs less for upkeep than an Atlas PPC 30 Heat (a super-basic sample mod) A mod I made: SLDF Incoming - SLDF mechs can show up in battles in the hands of ace pilots I should really put that on github or something. I use a bunch more mods than that, but they start getting into my own personal take on "what is best / balanced" and a lot of personal customization & modding. But I think the vanilla game is pretty dang good, so my entire set of custom mods is still pretty vanilla-like. Personally I've never felt the need for mods than add more mechs -- the game has plenty IMO, and the big problem with megamods that add 100s of mechs is they make loading even more painful. OTOH I wasn't a Battletech fan before this game so I don't have a huge attachment to mechs that aren't in the game. Klyith fucked around with this message at 15:06 on Aug 23, 2022 |
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Aug 23, 2022 13:36
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crepeface posted:i was listening to a podcast ep on tanks and it made me want a tank game. i've been told they're all horrible MMOs so i think this game is probably my best bet. I like BTA. The DLC is fun but heavy metal in particular is way overpowered. Once you have a marauder and kit it out properly, you’ve pretty much won the game. The called shot bonus on that thing means you delete a mech pretty much every round you are in combat. BTA kinda unfuck a the quirk that allows you to do that which is less fun if you are looking for a power fantasy, but more if you actually a fight.
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Aug 24, 2022 17:45
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I tried BTA in order to mix things up, but I only got 2 contracts done before I completely lost interest. Stuff on either side dies so slow that the missions took ~45 mins, where I was used to being able to do one in 10-15 mins.
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Aug 24, 2022 18:07
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Do Roguetech turns still take ten times as long as normal turns ?
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Aug 25, 2022 01:58
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thanks guys, i'll look into BEX BTA and RogueTech
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Aug 25, 2022 07:05
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Floppychop posted:I tried BTA in order to mix things up, but I only got 2 contracts done before I completely lost interest. Stuff on either side dies so slow that the missions took ~45 mins, where I was used to being able to do one in 10-15 mins. I found that it requires a different play style to vanilla. Get used to physically hitting and kicking things to make them unsteady before following up with weapons, until you get your pilots trained. In the early game I also embraced weapons with accuracy bonuses alongside the 'punch them in the face' tactic. Further into the game this becomes less and less necessary. BTA was a big improvement for me and extended the game for many, many hours. Don't let the change of play put you off. It is all about maximising you hit chances rather than just firing enough lead and laser down field.
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Aug 25, 2022 14:22
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Kicking mechs works great until you miss and realize that you just doomed your light mech (Dekker survived anyway lol)
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Aug 25, 2022 15:08
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Devolving the game to melee kinda sucks IMO. Diverse builds? Positioning & flanking? Evasion vs cover? Nah, just run at them and play rock-em-sock-em robots. Also unless BTA has done overhauls to the AI that change this, the AI has always had a big gently caress you w/r/t melee combat: it knows how far every mech can move and tries to stay 1 hex out of punch range. So if you really want to punch someone, you generally have to give them the opportunity to punch you first. Conversely the player doesn't have that information for opponent mechs so you can't pull the same trick on them.
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Aug 25, 2022 16:39
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It's been a bit since I did a full playthrough, but I find melee has pretty varried effect depending on the phase of your campaign. It can help out a lot early when your pilots are pretty crap, but falls off as you get XP/better gear and don't need to rely on it for evasion stripping. Then when you get to late game and can afford to build a dedicated melee monster like a berserker with mods/tsm/etc it becomes very useful to include again. I really think the requirement for melee in BTA is overstated in general though. You can easily afford to have more sensor locks/active probes/other lance accuracy buffs if you prefer, thanks to the expanded lance capacity. In vanilla with a hard limit of 4 units you can't really afford a dedicated scout with sensor lock/active probes/ etc.
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Aug 25, 2022 16:52
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Klyith posted:Devolving the game to melee kinda sucks IMO. Diverse builds? Positioning & flanking? Evasion vs cover? Nah, just run at them and play rock-em-sock-em robots. BTA let’s you sprint/charge and melee. Sprinting just makes you less accurate not useless like in the base game.
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Aug 25, 2022 21:57
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I just installed the new BTA update for C3 improvements (neat!). It says to delete the ".modtek" folder (specifically with the dot). I don't actually have one. Am I good to go then or am I screwed? I'm not in the mod's discord to ask lol
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Aug 26, 2022 03:20
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RBA Starblade posted:I just installed the new BTA update for C3 improvements (neat!). It says to delete the ".modtek" folder (specifically with the dot). I don't actually have one. Am I good to go then or am I screwed? I'm not in the mod's discord to ask lol .modtek is where modtek keeps a cache of all the modded json files. If this is a fresh or previously unmodded install, you don't have it yet & you're good to go. Otherwise, make sure you're showing hidden folders. (especially if you're playing on a steamdeck or other linux system, because .something is how you make a hidden folder on linux)
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Aug 26, 2022 03:57
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Def not fresh but it's definitely not there Guess we'll see!
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Aug 26, 2022 04:04
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Good God, there are so many CAB Mechs I wanna play around with in BEX but can't because they just look like poo poo in the Mech Bay. Like, can't we have an actual model for the Flashman and Pillager without having to reuse the model of the Imp and Kodiak respectively? And why does the Thunder Hawk look like a tiny Transformer?
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Aug 26, 2022 11:32
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anakha posted:Good God, there are so many CAB Mechs I wanna play around with in BEX but can't because they just look like poo poo in the Mech Bay. It's called CAB for a reason. Community Asset Bundle. These are all fan made, and if people don't make the model for a 'Mech, devs for mods like BTA and RT are stuck either using an existing model for a stand-in or forgoing a design because it has no in game assets. And before you ask, no the devs can't make their own. They're too busy trying to build the engine that the mods need to run.
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Aug 26, 2022 13:46
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Rorahusky posted:It's called CAB for a reason. Community Asset Bundle. These are Like, there are original models that didn't come from MWO in the CABs, but they're pretty meh. Also, even the mechs that are ripped directly from MWO have to be rigged to a skeleton & animations from existing stock-game mechs -- I don't know if that's a question of modders not being able to create original rigs & animations through mods, or just the substantial time & skill barrier. (Plus there are plenty of MWO mechs that have weird issues, particularly with cockpit glass textures, just because the 2 games have different engines and texture mechanics and the modders are like 'eh good enough, it can have a green glass cockpit now' rather than actually hand-fix all that stuff.) Like I'm not discounting that the community has done a lot of work to make all the new mechs, even the MWO imports. But if the battletech mod scene in general has a quantity-vs-quality dial, it's twisted to "quantity" so hard that the knob's snapped off.
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Aug 26, 2022 14:45
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Rorahusky posted:It's called CAB for a reason. Community Asset Bundle. These are all fan made, and if people don't make the model for a 'Mech, devs for mods like BTA and RT are stuck either using an existing model for a stand-in or forgoing a design because it has no in game assets. And before you ask, no the devs can't make their own. They're too busy trying to build the engine that the mods need to run. There are good to great CAB models that I'm completely happy to play with. The 3050 Clan Mechs all generally look great, and the Marauder II looks menacing as hell. But they are the minority. Playing post-3052 starts veering into the 'unfun' territory when the new Mechs that start showing up in TRO 3055 onwards mostly look like overly shiny crap. If I could have the option to view the models then be able to pick and choose what Mechs would be available in-game based on that, I'd even be willing to pay for that mod. Basically, what I've learned is: Klyith posted:But if the battletech mod scene in general has a quantity-vs-quality dial, it's twisted to "quantity" so hard that the knob's snapped off.
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Aug 26, 2022 15:21
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Seems like all the 3025 custom mechs in BEX look pretty great. I honestly want to run a Gladiator, seems like a fun mech to use, like a leaner Centurion with Jump Jets. Having more fun on this new campaign at Simulator+ difficulty. Haven't lost a pilot yet, and having dropcosts per mission means I really have to make my profits off of salvage rights rather than pay rights. Crazy Joe Wilson fucked around with this message at 18:37 on Aug 26, 2022 |
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Aug 26, 2022 16:46
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Getting back into this after several years to try out BTA3062. Any pro tips you all have to share? It already seems pretty unforgiving, which I like.
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Aug 30, 2022 14:08
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DrPop posted:Getting back into this after several years to try out BTA3062. Any pro tips you all have to share? It already seems pretty unforgiving, which I like. Kick light mechs to knock them off balance and lose evasion Vehicles are extremely good at certain roles Abuse your beacons they're invaluable. If you lucked out and started with the strafing one start from behind the enemy and drag forward - it's almost always going to attack on that vector and shoot their backs.
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Aug 30, 2022 14:27
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Maybe that's the core of why I got turned off of BTA. It seems to want you to run a combined arms approach with vehicles and mechs. I mainly just want to run mechs.
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Aug 30, 2022 14:33
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| # ? Jun 9, 2024 11:35 |
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Floppychop posted:Maybe that's the core of why I got turned off of BTA. It seems to want you to run a combined arms approach with vehicles and mechs. I mainly just want to run mechs. You don't have to, but you'll want to rely more on melee and TAG early on either way. The drop beacons can also call in bonus mechs instead if you have those. LRM carriers are busted as gently caress (and very rare now), my lovely vtol rules, and BA is fun to mess with for a while (but quickly stops mattering in my experience). TBH it seems like by the end it's either certain super vehicles and assaults (with a handful of lights or LAMs) or just the mechs anyway. The private slots for vehicles are mostly just a bonus you can ignore if you don't want them.
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Aug 30, 2022 14:43
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