UPDATED 12/29/13 18 DHS, 9ML Alternate 17 DHS, 9ML, BAP (If your aim is good it might be worth it for you to drop a DHS for faster info gathering and not being jammed via ECM) Notes: Very risky to pilot without unlocking elite tier. Using target info gathering is, imho, essential! Piloting: This build takes a lot of heat discipline, the reward however is with good aiming you can strip away and enemy mechs armor in a matter of seconds. This build doesn't truly shine however until you reach "Elite" piloting skills. At that point you can maneuver around Heavies and Assaults like nothing. The best way to get the most bang out of your buck here is to focus on specific parts of a mech. If you just shoot randomly you're: 1) Going to spread your damage out and never get a kill and 2) Heat up to much you'll constantly be taking cover or just shutting down. Always take the extra 2 or 3 seconds to line up your shot or get behind the target/wait for it to turn around. Key notes: Aim for soft spots (already damaged areas). If there are none, don't waste your heat. Think of yourself as the clean-up guy. Let the heavies/assaults do the bruising. Heat = Ammo. Don't waste shots! Protect the hunch! Keep mountain/cover to your left if at all possible. This allows you to expose as little of yourself as possible while taking pop shots. Don't alpha though if your head and left arm are blocked! The ghost heat adds close to 15-25% more heat from just 2 lasers. Tactics: Never lead the charge with this build. I like to hang back with the assault mechs and pick off anyone stupid enough to get close. Use your assault buddies as cover if you need to. With "Elite" unlocked you should have zero trouble picking off lights which will crumple with a few well placed shots. I like to always aim for center torso because an alpha strike will melt armor no problem. Some mechs use XL engines exclusively however so focusing on Left OR Right may work out well. Weapon Range: 0 - 570 (Optimal ~270) If it's beyond 400 I don't even bother firing and risk building up heat. Don't get greedy with longer range shots because as soon as you do you'll wish you can keep firing at that Raven running circles around you. I usually group my weapons as follows: 1 - All 9 lasers 2 - Left and Right arms 3 - 6 lasers in the hunch 4 - Head laser I generally stay away from chain fire. It may sound crazy even on hot maps but by chain firing it usually means you over extend yourself and put yourself out for enemy fire for too long. Against other pin-point high damage meta builds this could mean a 2-hit death. Do your alpha or 6-laser hunch attack then back to cover. The only time I can think of using chain-fire is if I'm behind an enemy and it's focused on a teammate and I need to burn it down asap. Key notes: Bob and weave! This build is about the big alpha. Don't stay out longer than you need. Make your shot then take cover. Stick around your assault buddies and pick off the targets they soften. Armoring Since you need a lot of slots for DHS, use standard armor and endo-steel structure. I placed most of my DHS away from the hunch as possible. The one that's on the hunch won't make a difference if I get the hunch blown off. The important part is where you put your armor. The Rear part of the hunch is damn near microscopic. The hit box may not actually reflect this in game but I swear by it and haven't had my hunch blown off from behind yet. Stats w/ "Elite" Sustained DPS (w/o Overheating) 4.5 Dmg/s Max Possible DPS: 11.25 Dmg/s Heat Generation: 9 heat/s Cooling Eff.: 40% Heat Capacity: 73.44 Dissipation: 3.59 Heat/s Stats w/o Any Skills Sustained DPS (w/o Overheating) 3.9 Dmg/s Max Possible DPS: 11.25 Dmg/s Heat Generation: 9 heat/s Cooling Eff.: 35% Heat Capacity: 64.2 Dissipation: 3.12 Heat/s Recommended modules: Target Info Gathering Seismic Sensor (Skirmish or Assault) Cap Accelerator (Conquest)
I'm with Blagg on this one, BAP is a good idea on a knife fighter. Maybe it's time to dust off my ol' 4P.
Why that? Maybe I can use the 25% faster information gathering, but on a build like this one I wont trade a heat sink for such a small boost. On Bambino's build I'd remove the CASE to fill full armor. Variant without the AMS, but one more DHS:
I'd equip BAP because it counters ECM, which is great if you're playing a support role, staying close to your assaults. They draw fire while you get the chance to perfectly aim your 45 point alphas. The ECM lights will come at you like flies and with BAP you have to best tool to make sure your team turns them into scrap instead of chasing them into infinity (talking from a pub game standpoint here)
It's sort of brokesauce, but BAP and Seismic basically make you immune to backstabbing right now. A smart pilot will back off as soon as he sees his ECM go haywire.
There was some recent confusion on what build Lost One used to achieve the score below; at first we thought it was 2x LLas and 6x MLas build but it turns out it was the build you see above. I even tracked him down on MWO O-Forums to ask what it was. There you have it!
I really like this build. Played a few games with it last night. It can be difficult to pick your spots, but it's a new challenge for me that I've been enjoying. Thanks for sharing.
Mastered the Hunchies and yes, the knifeback was one of the configurations that I used. I did have a x6 SLAS in the Hunch with x2 MPLAS in the arms. So long as I got close, it would wreck things. However; I then switched to the full x9 MLAS even after the alpha-change (nerf?) as I just wanted to pack just a little more punch. Heat discipline needs to be high but one can slice off arms and legs with ease in this config. 5/5 for me.
I'm kinda new to MWO, and have mostly been rocking AC5 mechs, or SRM brawlers - Decided to give this bad boy a go, and I gotta say.... is this really viable...? I know its hard to judge prior to getting elite and specifically the heat unlocks, but it seems that one volley and I've literally can't fire another for a scarily long amount of time, so i'm kind of left either running away, or trying to dodge like a mad man while I get hammered. Do the elite unlocks make this less of a heat nightmare, or is it really just "fire, then run away and hide!"?
You never encountered a HBK-4P with 9 MLas right? The first time I did was with an Assault and I died desperately though i had much heavier Weapons. From then i wanted my own HBK-4P, and i can say - if it was not the big Hunch, which you could lose quickly, I would say it's a perfect Beginners.Mech! You just stay next to your bigger mates, aim, Alphabeam and take cover (behind your mates) for Cooling Down. Whenever you have to deal with Single Opponents in a 1v1 Fight, just encircle the enemy to avoid hits. If you want to avoid the Heat Penalty, just put your Lasers in two Weapongroups - 1.Hunch & 2.Rest. If you have enough Heatsinks you will cool down fast enough to fire continuosly. Here is a recent Match (for which i reloaded this Weaponsetup back from the safer "Mobilaser" Build) and it was on the hottest map! I used the STD275 from my Kintaros and 18 DHS: Try it out, you won't regret it! [hr] If you like to stay at safer distance you could try the "Mobilaser" build.
How do you get these speeds on your mechs? I got a STD260 in my Hunchie and I only get 64 kph...How can you do 79 with a STD245? Is it some elite unlock?
If you're going 64kph in a 50-ton 'mech, you have a 200 installed. Perhaps the save didn't go through properly.
I would move the DHS in the left arm to the right arm since you'll be protecting your right side. Otherwise, that's ideal for the max dps MLas 4P. Concerning ghost heat, one could argue that the 7th torso+head MLas is of diminished value, and leave it off in favor of an engine upgrade, or put the weight towards AMS (though you'll have to drop a DHS as well as the 7th torso MLas to make slot room). I'd take the 7th torso MLas for max DPS even if I can't always put it to use over a mere 1.8 KPH, and get slots/weight for AMS from engine and DHS. You can only nuke an overheated light once.
Revisited the HBK-4P. It's been awhile since I've played around with it. Surprisingly, it does well even with ghost heat. Definitely my favorite mech still! Thanks for all the feedback everyone =) Updated the OP with some thoughts and feedback I've gotten from everyone.
Only change is that I am using std275, and 17HS. This mech absolutely fries that armor. And at the end of the match, I was missing both torsos, but still had the head medlas for that final damage!