I'm always fiddling with my Blackjacks trying out different builds and seeing what works well on it. I've been running some pretty hot builds on this chassis for a while, and have decided to try to cool it down a bit. The easiest way to do that without going all medium lasers, is just to not utilize all of the hard points on the mech. That's fine as long as your play style is good at keeping the pressure on and putting out the DPS (which mine is definitely geared towards). I was running with the dual PPC build last night and it was working all right, but definitely was toasty, so I decided to cool it down and do a direct swap of PPCs for LPLas. This has worked very well for me and I was putting up 500+ damage like clockwork in this mech and doing a great job at destroying components. I originally had this build with 4xSLas, but I see no reason to take those compared to dual MLas. This build is cool enough to really benefit from the add-on damage from those medium lasers as long as you keep your eye on your heat scale. It does help that the dual medium lasers are actually cooler than the quad small lasers as well. I definitely have a newfound respect for these large pulses! Who knew!
Oh yeah. I've been loving the LPLs since the last buff. I actually ran a quad LPL Orion for a bit to HILARIOUS ends! I like that you didn't feel the need to fill every hardpoint with this build. I often try to fill every available option and end up wasting tonnage and winding up with an inefficient build. You wind up fitting very nice heat efficiency into this build and still leave all weapons in semi-actuated arms. I love it. I may just have to throw this together this week. Cheers!
Thanks for the comments! I have always been trying to use all of the hard points in the BJ-3 to justify its space in my collection. I mean, if I'm not using all the points why not just put in a BJ-1? I'm not sure if the arm (stub?) mounted medium lasers are enough to suggest picking up this mech over the BJ-1 if somebody doesn't own it, but it's a great build if you already have it. Like going asymmetric with the BJ-1 I am trying to get over my bad self and not feel the need to use all the hard points for this chassis. The initial results are definitely positive! Now I'm trying to wonder if picking up the LPLas range module would be worth it for this mech and LPLas in general. I get a ton of use from my MLas module and being able to shoot out +13.2 (+26.4) meters for a bit more heat is worth it.
A lot of my Merc Corps mates swear by the LPL module. However, I don't use them in comp. drops, so, I haven't spent the GXP. I do hear good things, though.
