Greetings
Starfighter Mechwarrior and welcome to the Mark 3 Mechwarrior Online OP, now with 175% more Dakka!
It has been reorganized and in some spots rewritten to provide more relevant, concise information for our growing roster of pilots.
If you have anything you would like to see added to the OP or notice any errors then please contact
@TOGSolid and I'll see what I can do.
Remember pilots, this is Battletech and around these parts, common sense is Lostech.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swBIL_LkAYI
What is Mechwarrior Online?
Mechwarrior Online is a free to play, PC based, online shooter produced by Piranha Games Interactive. MWO places you in the command seat of a heavily armed and armored walking battle machine that you pilot in team based matches against other Mechwarriors. Your mech is very customizable and able to field a huge assortment of energy weapons, ballistics, and missiles along with an array of modules and other utility items.
At the end of each match you earn C-Bills, the in game currency that is used to buy more items and mechs, and experience that is used to enhance your piloting abilities of your mech. Between matches, you can customize your mech with a variety of engines, weapons, subsystem modules, and chassis enancements until you have your chosen mech tailored to your liking.
There are two game modes currently; Assault and Conquest. In Assault, you and your team attempt to either capture the enemy team's base without losing your own base, or eliminate the enemy team. Conquest is a traditional domination mode where you and your team are attempting to reach the point total first or eliminate the enemy team. Later in the year, Community Warfare will be introduced that will pit player based Merc Corps and PGI operated houses against each other for control of entire planets.
Sounds good, where do I start!?
1.) Download the client at
http://www.mwomercs.com and install it.
2.) Before launching the game, click the "Visit Training Grounds" butting in the top right corner of the launcher. Watch those videos to get at least an initial grasp of what to expect. This game has a bit of a learning curve to it and while it's not super steep, it's definitely not just a jump in and click things until you win sort game. Be sure to watch the Weapon Grouping video as it'll do the most to help keep you alive. Chain fire is god.
2a.)
http://mwomercs.com/pennyarcade Penny Arcade also did some Pilot Safety Posters and while they're humorous, they do have some good information in them.
3.) When you start the game you will have access to four trial mechs that rotate out for new mechs every couple of weeks or so. These are non-customizable mechs with most of them being based on their stock tabletop loadout and others (known as Champion variants) being designed by the community. After twentyfive matches you will have earned an extra 8 million C-Bills on top of your winnings and will easily be able to afford a proper mech of your own.
4.) After each match you will earn some C-Bills, pilot xp, and general xp. C-Bills are the in game currency used to buy everything except cosmetic items. Pilot XP is specific to the mech you earned it on and is used to by piloting enhancements like faster torso rotation or faster turning. To unlock elite skills you will need to get all of the basic skills for at least three variants of a specific chassis. General XP can be used on any mech and is also used to unlock modules. Pilot XP can be converted into General XP by spending Mech Credits.
5.) Mech Credits (MC) are the in game currency that you purchase with real money in order to shortcut your way to a new mech. MC is also used to purchase premium account status and cosmetic items for your mech like new paint jobs and items to put in your cockpit like bobblehead dolls. MC CANNOT be converted into C-Bills or XP meaning everyone has to earn their arms and armor equally the same
A note about trial mechs
Do not get discouraged when driving a Trial Mech. These things are based on their original stock loadouts and for the most part just cannot keep up with a fully customized loadout. They also tend to have far less armor than the chassis is actually capable of and as such need to be driven very conservatively. If a Champion build is available (denoted by having (C) in the title, i.e. CPLT-A1(C)) then go straight for that mech. As a community designed mech it will have a much more solid punch and as much armor as possible. Playing with Oosiks will really help make this phase of getting into MWO go much more smoothly.
The trial mech system is slated to be reworked with the release of UI 2.0 so while it is honestly a bit of a grind to start with, it is on the docket to overhaul. We may even be able to gift mechs so those of us with more mechs than common sense may end up donating some of our old rides to the new guys!
The Origins of the Oosik Irregulars
The Oosik Irregulars formed when the 2nd Oosik Regulars, while deploying to protect a critical steelworks on Twycross, "mis-calculated" a set of jump coordinates and arrived instead in orbit of Talisker IV. Apparently not realizing the mistake, the Oosiks took up defensive positions--which would later prove fortunate, as the planet was subject to a surprise attack by a combined-arms force of 'mechs and infantry in an attempt to take control of its HPG uplink. In the ensuing battle, the HPG uplink was swiftly destroyed (allegedly due to friendly fire), but the Oosiks--now out of contact with their command structure--elected to remain on Talisker IV. They dug in around the capital city--incidentally home of the sector's only Class 3 brewery--and prepared to fight an extended siege. In the following weeks, the Oosiks earned a reputation as one of the most obdurate and immovable companies in the Inner Sphere. According to contemporary accounts, they could be dislodged neither by any quantity of enemy fire nor by the direct, angrily-shouted orders of their superiors.
In the aftermath of the conflict, the Oosik Irregulars became a mercenary unit, claiming Talisker IV as their base of operations henceforth.
Who are the Oosik Irregulars?
We are a very loosely organized (and by loosely I mean not at all) merc corp that is open to anyone who wants to join. The Penny Arcade community frequently makes loose groups for new games just to make it easier to find people to play with and while this started out as just another one of those, it has grown into so much more. We formed under the banner of The Oosik Irregulars as a way to honor the great forumer
@A Flock Of Walrus who brought us closed beta footage at the expense of his access to the game and have since then become a tightly knit group of very active players.
We don't care about player skill levels or general MWO experience. Our primary goal is to have fun and help each other out, this includes brand new players. If this is your first time launching the game then we'll still be glad to have you come play with us. We have a lot of experienced community members more than willing to help you out and I can't think of a single person that would refuse to let you roll in a lance with them. If you're an experienced pilot already then you'll also find players looking to push themselves as hard as possible in this game and are constantly working to improve themselves. There is something for everyone in the Oosiks Irregulars!
How do I join the Oosik Irregulars?
The good news is you already have! There is no application, no interview, no skill level check, or anything else involved. Just show up and start playing and don't be shy in the thread. We
mostly don't bite.
Do you guys stream matches at all?
We do at
http://www.twitch.tv/theoosiks and while there is no set schedule for streaming, we will announce when we're going live via Twitter so be sure to follow us there.
Where can I get a sig from!?
PM
@TOGSolid or
@Kashaar
Outreach Broadcast News is an offshoot of the Oosik Irregulars. Run by a dedicated group of Penny Arcaders it is pushing to become the premier fansite for Mechwarrior Online. Complete with its own Mechlab with features no other website has, a soon to be implemented forum, constant reporting on the goings on of MWO, articles about the game, and much more! We also have some very big thingss in store for when Community Warfare goes live that will be sure to excite everyone.
One of the best parts about OBN is that it's open to the community to work on! If you have an idea for an article or wish to contribute in a different fashion you are absolutely welcome to! Just contact
@Mvrck @Kusmeroglu or
@TOGSolid
OBN also has a huge amount of resources available so if you'd like to know how the heat scaling works, we have graphs for that! Want to see how your build will perform heat wise with constant firing? We have a simulator for that! Want to know the cooldown rate for a Large Pulse Laser? We have charts and stats for that! Want to know the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow? Then you're a smartass! (though I'm sure Petra will end up graphing that as well)
The OBN staff is very open to new ideas for the site and constructive criticism. This is a site for the fans by the fans and we want it to be the best it can be so don't be shy to speak up.
We also have a live Podcast that airs on Sundays at 5PM PST at
http://www.twitch.tv/theoosiks. We discuss the state of the game, recent news, and take any questions you may ask in the twitch stream. Archives are available on our twitch site. We will be moving to our own dedicated OBN Twitch channel soon and the OP will be updated when it happens.
1.) Flanking is god.
If there is a primary battle line and you're not in a mech that needs to be holding that line then circle around and pounce the stragglers/high value targets like LRM boats. Jumping the LRM boats is an especially game changing thing to do because once those LRMs stop flying PUGs get really emboldened and ballsy. Even if you die you will still be the big god damn hero. During Operation Lead Poisoning the pack I was in was doing this a lot and we were constantly wrecking house. Learning the maps is a huge part of this. With that same OLP group we were able to use the terrain to our advantage to successfully jump and annihilate packs of targets.
2.) Learn your range bands and proper positioning.
If you are a brawler then that doesn't necessarily mean you need to get in ASAP. Allow the fight to evolve a bit and wait for targets of opportunity. Go off to the sides and see if you have open lines to approach on to catch your enemies unaware. Conversely, if you are sniper and can still freely shoot things then why move in if you don't have to? Obviously, if you need to reposition to take advantage of the changing battle lines then do so but moving in just to move in? Nah, don't do this. This also kinda applies to brawlers since this is how you end up with a giant clusterfuck of people all at 10 meters trying to get hits in.
3.) Learn your mech.
Trying to get into a hill humping contest with a Stalker while you're in an Atlas? Bad idea. Your guns are low slung and you have to expose yourself a lot to use them. Doing it in a Jager? Brilliant. That mech's hardpoints are tailor made for this sort of thing. This also means using these hardpoints to your advantage and putting appropriate weapony in them. For instance, don't put your big guns in the lowest slung points on your mech. Keep em high and you'll be able to take advantage of any hills. Of course, this depends on your mech but this goes back to playing your chosen variant correctly. Don't use the 4X as a hill humper because all the big guns are super low slung. DO use it to keep people suppressed when you can and as a heavy fire support mech. Similarly, don't try to use a Victor as a frontline mech. You hit hard but don't have Atlas grade armor to absorb hits with. DO use an Atlas for that because it's a purpose built party crasher.
4.) Play medium mechs a lot.
Yes, really. When I went back to goofing off in my Hunchbacks after playing heavies and my brief stint with assaults in the Victor, I had realized just how hard my skills had truly slipped due to getting comfortable with the higher armor and firepower acting as a replacement for good situational awareness and positioning. Pick one with a specific role to flesh out your skills in that area. I.e. if you want to be a better brawler then run a HBK-4G. You will die a lot, you will get your ass kicked, and it will make you a better pilot.
5.) Patience can help a lot.
There are just as many times when hanging back and waiting for an ideal moment to jump in is just as advantageous as crashing the gates and going nuts. Especially in the current meta where a lot of stuff is out there that can vaporize you if you get too ballsy.
That said, there is a time and a place for coordinated, balls out gate crashing. Going in with your buddies all at once can do amazing things to break the enemy's lines but it has to be done carefully and at the right time which goes back to that whole fickle patience thing.
6.) Let the pubbies go first.
They tend to follow anyone that looks even remotely competent. Seeing as how we tend to love flanking maneuvers and speed we end up with a tendency to have the pubbies follow us when we're counting on them to blob to their usual locations. Wait a little bit at the start of the match before you strike out to do horrible things to the enemy's butts.
7.) Want some great fundamentals training? Don't be shy about taking your mech onto the training grounds and just cruising around checking the map out to learn it.
While you're doing that keep moving at high speeds while you shoot up the dummy mechs to learn to move and shoot fluidly. Circle around them while keeping your crosshair on the target via torso twisting until you don't have to think about it. Practice popping up behind a hill, acquiring your target, firing, and hiding as fast as possible until it becomes second nature. The more skills you commit to muscle memory, the better of a pilot you'll be. Remember, you fight like you train so train like you fight.
8.) Want some great aim training?
Pick up a copy of Unreal Tournament 2004 and setup a bot deathmatch with lightning guns only and the game speed mutator set to 150% speed. From here, practice getting headshots on the move in the training grounds. It's a hard target to hit in most mechs and it will help you fine tune your aim with MWO's weapons.
9.) Call your targets to aid in focus firing and for Kerensky's sake, press R to lock on to your targets!
With 12 vs 12 being the hot new thing, we have four more phonetic alphabet letters to learn to aid in target calling! For your reference here's the full list:
1.) A lot of times when emailing support they will have you run the official MWO repair tool located here:
http://mwomercs.com/forums/topic/115147-mwo-repair-tool-public-release/ Try this before going any more in depth with trying to fix things!
2.) A reinstall can do wonders if you're having problems with the bootstrap launcher (the patcher thing that pops up before you get the login window). Sometimes the uninstall goes wrong (because of course), so go here if it won't reinstall.
3.) Try manually deleting the shader cache (MWO should do this automatically, but sometimes fails and it gets corrupted). The post in the link also gives steps to set up a batch script to force the deletion each time MWO loads.
4.) This is a weird fix, but some people found that moving the install directory to another physical drive solves crashes. Literally cut/paste the directory and update shortcuts manually. Not sure if moving to another partition on the same drive helps.
5.) Force your video card to stop power-save throttling and disable ambient occlusion.
6.) Force multi-threading, in case the game isn't using all available cores.
Tips from
@Cabezone!
7.) I recommend people run the repair tool even with a new installation. I've had crashing after a fresh install fixed by the tool.
8.) Setting my PC to high performance also fixed an issue I was having where Mechwarrior was set to some low powered mode and the video card wasn't able to run full out.
This is totally a placeholder while I get something else made up.
Odds and Ends!
Posts
Unreal Engine 4 Developers Community.
I'm working on a cute little video game! Here's a link for you.
Re-asking my question from the old thread:
Have PGI given us any insight into what the Command Console is actually supposed to do?
Yes, and the paraphrased answer is "fuck if we know." I'm really not joking either.
So basically business as usual for PGI. Got it. It's amazing how hot and cold this company is for producing content.
What it does is serve as the excuse for making the Atlas D-DC a bullshit Stealth Battleship of Goddamn Assfucking for the past year.
I need to find some place to use this.
The Phonetic Alphabet has been posted in the OP!
Games: Ad Astra Per Phalla | Choose Your Own Phalla
Charlie Foxtrot
and Tango Uniform
Anything else gets tuned into background noise =P
There have been some suggestions of the Command Module increasing the effectiveness of any equipped modules, or sharing some portion of any equipped modules. But I'm sure that's pretty low on their priority list.
MWO: Adamski
[VTR-9B]: 2xMPLS, 2xSRM6, AMS, 2xMG, Gauss, 360XL, DHS, Endo
If you want something that absolutely vaporizes the universe this is a really good pick.
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
First match up, we have a stack of lights on Tourmaline Conquest versus a heavy-ass team with a lousy two lights. Naturally, the rest of the team gets splattered in the stand-up fight, and the remaining idiot lights splatter themselves against a couple of lights instead of capping for a sure win. Not once, but twice, both times against well-armed healthy assaults that completely kicked their asses despite repeatedly being told to run away instead of being stupid and trying to fight.
Second match up is Alpine Assault from the high base. Whole team is moving behind the mountain, grouping together nicely, and the two teams are pretty evenly matched in weight. Too bad the other team know the fatal weakness of TOTAL MORONS and began capping our base with a couple of lights. Our lights call that they have it, move to engage... and our entire fucking force of mediums, heavies, and assaults turns around to go back to base. Then get butchered from behind for being total idiots for a complete and total roll.
Third match up, the team is fairly competent except a lone idiot who rushes the high base on Forest Colony Assault with a Cataphract. Versus the entire enemy team. Was actually an even match, pilot-wise; too bad one of our three assaults was a 2xLRM20 + 2xLRM10 Stalker with one ERLL who did jack shit, and the other team had 3 Atlases and two Highlanders. You can figure what happened there.
Final match is Tourmaline Conquest again. Team sticks together, supports one another, withdraws from bad positions to get reinforcements, doesn't have idiots running off in assaults to cap points instead of fight, and we end up rolling over the other team so bad that only two of them break 100 damage, and none of us go down despite only a single Atlas remaining on their side. I appreciated the 5000+ XP from the fight, but damn, PGI has the damndest time realizing that some matchmaker balance is the beating heart of of keeping people playing a game like this. Not a single balanced match in any possible way, just 4 straight matches of people getting rolled.
They really ought to make the Atlas-K the ECM variant. Lord knows that chassis needs help. With ECM and double AMs, it would actually make a great anchor against LRM-heavy teams
You know, sending the entire force back isn't a terrible idea on Assault mode in the larger maps, as long as you haven't pushed too far out and the main enemy force is still some distance away. You get to maximize firepower on the capping force, possibly destroying a few of them, and ensure your lights don't just get their asses kicked. Your force will stay relatively together, and with luck, the enemy might screw up their advance and conga-line into your forces.
This will only work against pubs, though.
Lights only, they said.
Don't bother sending any more people, they said.
I'm pretty sure that DDC stands for Dick Drilling Cocksucker. I will be fucking ecstatic when they remove ECM from it.
http://steamcommunity.com/id/pablocampy
Looking forward to the patch...especially if we get the phoenix colors, kinda want to get some mechs the colors. Finding time to play might be a bit hard, got Saint's Row IV and have two new novels to read. One of which is the latest English Witcher novel.
Ah time, you are a precarious bitch goddess.
I got my 2x XP for my CN9-A in 2 matches, but it's been about 5 games and I've yet to get my win in my AL, a mech I've been putting hours into virtually exclusively since Closed Beta
le sighe
Don't stress the dry patches. Just the other day I spent a dozen games into a losing streak before I even got my first first win of the day bonus. I could practically hear my Elo dropping. Could also have been something to do with 4 days worth of hangover catching up with me...
http://steamcommunity.com/id/pablocampy
Will you help make my dream a reality? 8pm tomorrow night, I need 23 of my Oosik pals to meet up in vent for Operation This is Ridiculous
http://steamcommunity.com/id/pablocampy
"Oh what a day, what a LOVELY DAY!"
We did it with 16 people. What's 8 more, right?
Unreal Engine 4 Developers Community.
I'm working on a cute little video game! Here's a link for you.
Well if we have two 12 man teams we'll be about 40% of the 12man population so I think the hard part will be prying people away from Crime Time
Hey VIK TAH, hey OSS KAH, get a load of ROW ME OH over here.
That's just the way we roll, in the Navy at least. (standing EO for a decade means I correct comms all the damn time).
Anyone got any word on a patch today? Or are we in an off week?
The last patch was on August 6th, so we should get one today. I wonder what's in it.
Unreal Engine 4 Developers Community.
I'm working on a cute little video game! Here's a link for you.
Kintaro for CBills, isn't it?
6MG DD reporting for duty sir. I only wish I could replace my two LPLs with machine guns.
Ohohohoho. Even I didn't have the courage to sacrifice so much to fit 6 AC2s.
But I should do it...
It's "The Triple Nipple(tm)".
(But I'm just glad to have produced a 'mech build thats different, effective, and mega fun)