Edit: I guess I'll go with Smurfy's fire power rating for the time being ^^ I was rearranging my Arrancar build during the medium mech challenge, see if I could make it a bit more "killy". This is what I run these days. It still has decent range with 2 AC5s, I kept the XL225 engine for a 100 kph max speed (inkl. Speed Tweak). It has more armor, vastly improved heat efficiency, also a pretty decent sustained DPS. I have yet to shut down due to heat. I did run out of ammo (me and my big mouth) after playing a bit of dodgeball against another medium mech that included rocks, other obstacles and lots of unfocused firing ^^. It's role is to flank and harrass in battle and to scout near the own team (no deep strikes, it's not fast enough for that). Against lights it works pretty well now, too, because you can pretty much fire away with everything you have with little danger of overheating. Since it's fast going backwards as well, it's sometimes a nice tactic against commandos and the like to just run backwards while plinking away at them - light mechs will usually try to establish their circle of death and they keep coming despite the fire, then try to maintain the circle although by going backwards you can keep the weapons far longer on them than if you try to break out going forward. You need a field clear of obstacles for that to work. Options: You can remove the AC5s, the MGs and the ammunition. This will allow you to install 2x UAC5s in their stead. I tried them, but I was not really happy - with basically the (U)ACs as the main armament, having them jam is a headscratcher. The UACs were my first choice, but after a few test runs I removed them and installed the AC5/MGs instead. If you want more speed you can add an XL255 engine. However in order to make it fit you must remove the (redundant) heatsink in the torso and the (non-redundant) MGs and MG ammo. In order to make up for the loss of the MG, and if you have too much cash burning a hole in your pocket you might in addition to the XL255 swap the armor for FF armor. This will save you another ton which you can use to either replace the MLAS with an MPLAS, or add another ton of ammo.
True. On the other hand I'm wondering: Although MG damage was doubled it went from next to nothing to not much - and making AC5s fire faster might up sustained DPS, but not Alpha (which I understand is Firepower). So hmmm - how come that Mechbay shows a 50% higher rating for firepower.
The firepower rating is alpha, not whatever you think it is. It's right. That .16 at the end of your firepower? That's your MG's. Look at DPS for damage per second.
Call me crazy, but I feel like it's the MLas that's out-of-sync in this build. I removed it and the DHS, then put in Ferro and upgraded the Engine to an XL255. This looks like a build that'll run just fine on SHS as well with a 71% heat efficiency. Not upgrading to DHS saves 1.5 mil, and making the XL purchase sting a bit less.
That's understood, what I'm wondering is why the build says 15.16 Firepower in Smurfy's and 23 when it's sitting in my Mech bay. Hmm. Loosing 1/3 of your firepower and relying solely on ammo fed weapons ? That's probably a playstyle decision. I wouldn't really be comfortable with it tho. With the large engine and the FF armor, I'd probably use a different weapon setup too, like this: Runs cool, has firepower, the long range gun lets you take advantage of the increased speed, you can move around, squeeze off some Gauss shots and get out again. Only the role and setup is now totally different from where we started, lol.
I had seen a loadout consisting of 1xERPPC and 1xAC/2. Don't know how they did it, but that's why I bought the CDA-3C. Couldn't get a good loadout done, so I came up with this. I had no idea of this site at the time and was screwing around in Smurfy trying to get something to work. It looks like I'm not alone. Tried to get twin LB's on it, but yea. That's a derp build and a half. The improvements to the AC/5's really packs a punch though if you maneuver smart enough. I find on chain fire, they recycle faster than the fire rate per cannon. The MLAS is supposed to be a bit of a deterrence for Lights if you manage to punch a hole through their outer armor. May not hit them with the AC, but ya got a back-up laser.
A good build, Slightly slow, but good, sustained fire power. The gauss build has too much ammo, if you use more that 4 tons of gauss ammo, you have either killed their entire team, or need to stop shooting walls, and even four is pushing it (but hey, this 12 v 12 might make me eat those words).
