Cael
Arcane
- Joined
- Nov 1, 2017
- Messages
- 22,063
Loss of targeting systems.Or shooting at no more than 225 meters with our long range missiles or whatever comically short range it wasIf BTech was about realism, we won't be using 'mechs...Actually, Knockdown being overpowered seems realistic, and would pinpoint why we don't use giant 2 legged vertical tanks IRL, so it could be considered self-derision (same as AT-ST losing to a bunch of Barbarian teddybears because they have stability issues).
I had a good laugh at the mech commander manual even back in the day as a clueless youngster.
They did have some silly explanation for it, I think. I'm sure you remember better than I. Guidance technology limitations due to losing technology or some such?
Basically, you aim everything by hand. From the cockpit of a giant robot. With weapons that could be anywhere on the robot. At targets moving up to 130kph. While you were bouncing around because your robot is running around at 130kph. And for lasers, you had to hold the laser on target for a period of time long enough to actually start melting the armour and/or doing damage to the enemy 'mech.
There is no such thing as "lock-on" for any weapon in the original BTech. You basically spray and pray with missiles (hence the Number of Missile Hit table), even LRMs (yeah, the missile launchers are basically missile based shotguns).
If anything, I thought the 630m range limit for LRMs were pretty darned long for something that could be sited a meter back and to the side and you aiming using a dot on the cockpit canopy.