Matrix Games Forums

Exactly. Millenia is great for the CBT, especially now in WS that it went to 120%. It's also good for missile boats, the Tentakel being a good example.
Titanium is nice for when you have very few slots, especially arms and CTs with big engines.
Ok they're not the most used armor types, but competing with D and V is very tough.

Oopps! The Tentakel is T-based, not M. So is the Bombardier. M-based designs are the Ancient Mariner and the Black Death. The Devastator is a mixed M-T.

Yahoo! 2 titans out of about 200 use Millenium and Titanium armour.

Oh wait, that's just 1%

Hmm, I think that sends a pretty clear message. Those two armour types suck diddly uck!

I'll admit that the game is driven by heat, but even a 20% heat dissipation bonus isn't going to make me keen.

About the only types of titan that could use Millenium armour and not get turned into scrap within seconds would be gunboats and snipers, WELL out of the line of fire.

And what do all long range weapons have in common? They're **** HEAVY! With the honourable exception of the AC4.

OK, so maybe I could make a titan with a whole bunch of AC4s going Dak-dak and Millenial armour, but I don't like to design a Titan around armour unless it's intended to be shot at (like Bait).

I think the woeful protection that Millenia offers is enough, the fact that it weighs down your titan horribly dooms it to be about as useful as a screen door on a submarine.

Since you can't count, I'll help you. That's 5 out of 150, which is a little more than 1%.
But you're part right, they suck *compared* to the others. V rules in mediums and below cause of weight, D in heavies and assaults cause of thickness. There's no room for any other type except for maximizing a few locations.
The Ancient Mariner and the Black Death are not LR titans, and though I don't particularly like the BD, the AM rocks. It can kill you before you get past all that "tinfoil" armor.

Larkin is considering increasing the protection factor of those 2 types, but I don't think it'll tip the scales. Doing the "necessary" changes would require rebuilding the entire database.

Upping the protection factor would be nice...but I think it's weight that's the real issue.
(although the two are probably related, I don't know all the maths)

For instance, in Recon to Medium titans, heat can be a real issue, since there's not much space for Heat Sinks, and a lucky shot can take out a location much more easily...making you extremely vulnerable if you're using one of the bigger sinks.

But in titans of that size, weight is a real issue, and they just can't afford the extra weight those armour types have.

I do have another suggestion for improving Millenia, although it's admittedly a little esoteric. Perhaps Millenia could also be 'stealth armour' and increase the time for an enemy to make a target lock on your titan as well as the difficulty for them to actively scan you.

If you don't design a titan around armor, then why do you care if M and T are viable or not? V and D will give you everything you need, that is, low weight and thickness respectively. BTW, those are *the* factors considered when adding armor, bulk and heat dissipation (the only good characteristics of T and M respectively - V and D have *3* good characteristics *each*) are almost merely "cosmetic".
About LR weapons, not all are **** heavy like you say, only the big ones. Check out the small ones. Besides, the Devastator packs a truckload of LRMs and is armored in M and T. It is a beast nevertheless.
Still on the M and T count, those 5 I mentioned are those that are almost exclusively armored in M and/or T. A *lot* of other designs have a few bodyparts with either M or T or both. If I have the time I'll work on a statistic just for you
In the same line of argument, I'm surprised you didn't mention the fact that everyone only uses D for the head! It doesn't make sense the head is not affected by the bulk of armor types, but hey. (actually I used V in a couple of designs, recons I think)

About your stealth suggestion for M, although it sounds good, how would you implement it? How much M would you need in a titan to qualify for that ability? I'm sure it's not your intention to give it to a titan that has 10 M APs in the CBT and D everywhere else. Would you need the entire frame? That's like dooming the idea from the start. You could probably add a stealth variable to each titan, being a % of M in the frame - it would then modify lock time and active scan time according to its value. It would have to consider front and back profiles though, and depleted locations, and immersed locations, and whatever else. Larkin may be just a little too busy to go for it But then I heard that WS II will have research (ehehe, private joke).

I agree it would take a reduction in weight to make M a contender, I even think that it could be done without affecting the database (since you'd be reducing weight for some titans, no chance of overflow). But the database would have to be screened again to check for advantageous armor swaps. Not that it hasn't been done at least a couple of times now

M-armor is good when you have light armor, so it'll not be too heavy.Use light m-armor big guns, big heat-reg. Such ToS will be very dangerous(can fire big guns almost constantly),but make a mistake and may die very quickly. It's nice if like to solve a problem quickly.

Note the sig.

I absolutely never, ever ever use light armour. In fact, if a Titan has less than 30 points of external armour on all locations except the head, I don't deem it worth using.

Why? Simply because when the AI plays against me all it's pilots are taken striaght from anime series like 'Nadesico' and 'Vandread' where a totally inexperienced pilot can jump striaght into a complex experimental prototype and singlehandedly save the universe!

Simple: When the AI fires on me, they WILL hit, and they WILL force a piloting check, and I WILL fail that piloting check.

Don't quote the odds, that's just the game's elaborate way of making me seem like I'm not being screwed. I have fun whipping out my TI-83 and calculating the probabilty of some of the events happening.

I once had a series of misses that had approximately a 1 in 16 billion chance of happening! I absolutely kid you not!

So yes, I guess for mad scientists of pessimistic ToS design, there really is only 2 types of armour worth bothering with.

For the record. Oh yes, I will not use anything but Durallium for the head, thank you very much!

The manual says there's a 5% chance of hitting a titan in the head? Not for me there ain't. The AI consistently hits my titans in the head approximately 20% of the time, meaning that it's very rare that I ever have a pilot finishing a battle with full HP.

Seriously, if you ever want a titan design that will survive ANYTHING, then I am the man to ask.

We are twealing the armor values for WS.

Millenia will be 20% less heavy and Titanium 10%
as well as giving a new heat distribution :

M : 120 %
T : 100 %
v : 90%
D : 80%

This is not fixed yet.

2 Korgmeister: 1st - ALWAYS RUN, you'll be much harder to hit, when reloading/cooling/etc DODGE(firing when dodging is hard).

And fire 1st and keep firing as fast as possible.That's why you need light armor - all crits/tannge is used by weapons, heat regulator, engine, computer.

Its that simple. A big missile boat with LRMS is advised
to take Millenia with v1.4. Hope to get not hit but
launch multiple racks with little heat problems.


Of couse only as a team titan with others to take the
heat of battle.

Korgmiester: Alright if your a tos design genious then i need a titan with good scanners to provide indirect missle fire for my 2 long range artillery (artillary?) titans, i can't use a hevy or assualt (too slow my artillary is faster than that seriously) while still having armor and being able to defend itself at least a little at medium/short range and i need a tough medium meelee/short ranged tos that has good cooling systems if ya got anything id be glad to take the tos on a crash course and see if it gets fragged within 400 seconds like my last one was

The tough Melle Titan is already made. See the design specs for the Bait MkIV. It is admittedly a little weak at MR, being designed mainly for CC operation.

If you find it inadequate in the SR weaponry department, I'll see about making a few modifcations, although that could cause the armour to be reduced a bit, since laser weaponry is alot heavier than machine guns.

I'll see what I can do about the missile titan, but no guarantee. I've got almost no experience with missile titans, as I normally use CC titans with snipers...hence I don't know much about what does, and does not work in practise rather than theory.

Still, I'll see what I can come up with

It'll prolly be a medium rather than light design. Lights are too **** small to mount half-decent missiles and equip.

Ok, Whitefirefox. I have created a design for your missile support titan.


Titan Name: <Fuscia> (Medium Defense Titan)
Chassis: Krios K-M4
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Weight: 100.0t (100t maximum) Height : 13 [meter]
Bmt : 24 (50 kph) Reduce Heat: -2.4C/sec.
Jmt : 14 (85 kph) for 60 secs Cost : 215220 ($)


Equipment:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Component/Type/Location

Engine :CyberSys [Engine 3] [CT ]
Heatreg.:Delinit H4 [Heat 4]
D.C.S. :Repakoff [D.C.S.1] [LT ]
LifeSup.:Phillippi [Life 2] [Head]
Scanner :CyberSys L [Scan 3] [CBT ]
Computer:Mark BC-X [Comp. 6] [RT ]
E.C.M :Lios [E.C.M. 2] [RT ]
JumpPort:Morola MJ [Jump 4]


Weapons:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Location/Weapon/Ammunition/SL

[Head] MEDIUM LASER
[LT ] N.M. 7 RACK (014) [1]
[RA ] L.R.M. 9 RACK (015) [1]
[LA ] L.R.M. 9 RACK (015) [1]


Armor:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Loc/Internal/Armor/Points/mm

[Head] (11) Dullaroy 021 [031mm]
[RT ] (21) Vicenium 039 [065mm]
[CT ] (23) Vicenium 039 [065mm]
[CBT ] (15) Vicenium 035 [059mm]
[LT ] (21) Vicenium 039 [065mm]
[RA ] (23) Vicenium 035 [059mm]
[LA ] (23) Vicenium 035 [059mm]
[LowT] (13) Vicenium 035 [059mm]
[RL ] (19) Vicenium 035 [059mm]
[LL ] (19) Vicenium 035 [059mm]

Armorindex: 5.36 [Total APts/T]
Internal: 188 [APts]
External: 348 [APts] Max:[083mm]
Total Armor: 536 [APts]


JOCK requirements:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Piloting: skill on Medium Titan incl. Jump
Weapons : N.G.M Energy
Warfare : Scanner Warfare(ECM)
Skills : D.C.S Medical Recon Ind.Fire

Admittedly This is just V1.0 of the design and will probably benefit from some feedback from you and combat testing.

I imagine you are going to ask me why I chose the scanner system I did - There's a good reason. It has very long range. Other scanner systems don't have such a long range, which is very important when you are dealing with weapon systems like LRMs.

Short and Medium range defense is provided by the Napalm Missiles and Medium Laser. Hopefully the heat generated by Nape missile strikes will discourage enemy pilots from needless agression against your person

In Long Range titans, an ECM is essential, or else you will be vulnerable to Guided Missile Fire.

Het regs only provide sufficient cooling for firing both LRM racks, or the Napalm Missiles & Medium Laser combo. Firing all weapons at once is a bad idea(tm).

Anyway, I have a few possible bugbears about the design I'd like to see tested in training:
- Possible risk of overheat, especially if moving alot.
- Possible ammo shortages, especially in large team matches.
- Possibly underarmed, may need more weapons.

It may be possible to sacrifice some of the armour, and perhaps the jump ports in order to make room for more weaponry, but I will leave that for you to decide when you've tested the design in combat and given me feedback.

As it is, I've designed this titan to be rugged and mobile, to provide long range suppression fire for your artillery Titans and is capable of going in and taking on Light Titans or damaged Medium Titans in Short Range combat.

I'm not sure if your pilot has a good enough Damage Control skill to use the DCS very well, but I find in missile titans, a DCS is a damned useful thing to have! In fact, you will thank God I included it if you ever find yourself facing up to a Gambler.

For the record, I called it the Fuscia, because that is the colour of the shirt I am currently wearing. It's late, and creativity beyond making big, explosiony things is beyond me at this time of night. Enjoy.

well we'll just have to see how it fares eh? deploy all titans!

also where can i find the specs for the bait mk IV?

Ok, ill try and put together a titan that uses ONLY M-armor. Ill think of a use later, probably ill use BRGs, cuz i like their pilot skill-check chance increase.

Korgmiester: Pretty good although the pilot i had in it (one of my better ones) wasn't exactly configured to its weapons (energy and melee.........) but all in all it nearly doubled the effective range on my guideds although it could use more ammo and the napalm racks weren't too effective at their job but all in all its pretty decent ill have to get a pilot for it though but awesome job you really are a tos mad scientist

Back due to popular demand, is the specs for the BaitMkIV.

I really should see about posting it up on my website. This is easily my best design to date, and can often reliably face up to Medium titans, provided it closes quickly enough (which is usually does, thanks to it's long legs)


Titan Name: <BaitMkIV> (Light Close Combat Titan)
Chassis: Morola L4
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Weight: 70.0t (70t maximum) Height : 10 [meter]
Bmt : 19 (63 kph) Reduce Heat: -2.3C/sec.
No Jump-Ports Cost : 159496 ($)


Equipment:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Component/Type/Location

Engine :Morola M1 [Engine 1] [CBT ]
Heatreg.:Delinit H4 [Heat 4]
D.C.S. :Surko [D.C.S.3] [CT ]
LifeSup.:Phillippi [Life 2] [Head]
Scanner :CyberSys L [Scan 3] [LT ]
Computer:CyberSys [Comp. 2] [RT ]


Weapons:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Location/Weapon/Ammunition/SL

[RA ] POWER AXE
[LA ] POWER AXE
[RA ] MACHINE GUN (040) [1]
[RT ] MACHINE GUN (040) [1]
[LT ] MACHINE GUN (040) [1]
[LA ] MACHINE GUN (040) [1]


Armor:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Loc/Internal/Armor/Points/mm

[Head] (11) Dullaroy 018 [027mm]
[RT ] (19) Vicenium 041 [069mm]
[CT ] (19) Dullaroy 041 [059mm]
[CBT ] (13) Dullaroy 041 [059mm]
[LT ] (19) Vicenium 041 [069mm]
[RA ] (19) Vicenium 040 [068mm]
[LA ] (19) Vicenium 040 [068mm]
[LowT] (13) Vicenium 042 [070mm]
[RL ] (17) Vicenium 041 [069mm]
[LL ] (17) Vicenium 041 [069mm]

Armorindex: 7.89 [Total APts/T]
Internal: 166 [APts]
External: 386 [APts] Max:[071mm]
Total Armor: 552 [APts]


JOCK requirements:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Piloting: skill on Light Titan
Weapons : Cannon C.C.
Warfare : Scanner
Skills : D.C.S Medical

Keep in mind that this titan was primarily designed to be shot at, and aborb fire away from lightly armed support titans like the Pentrator. As a result it IS decidedly under-armed. That's deliberate, the weapons systems there are basic and designed mainly to annoy other ToS pilots enough to consider it worth targeting.

But don't be fooled, it is still deadly by virtue of it's stubborn inability to die, no matter what you throw at it. About the only thing that will reliably kill it is headshots.

OK, I've seen about revising the design and modifing the weapons suite somewhat. I would have been nice if you could have told me what weapons your pilot is skilled with, but I've assumed that your pilot is skilled with cannons rather than energy weapons.

I really hope you don't want me to design an LRM missile titan with CC weapons, because that would be seriously loony.

So here it is, the Fuscia MkII:


Titan Name: <FusciaMkII> (Medium Allround Titan)
Chassis: Krios K-M4
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Weight: 100.0t (100t maximum) Height : 13 [meter]
Bmt : 24 (50 kph) Reduce Heat: -2.4C/sec.
Jmt : 14 (85 kph) for 60 secs Cost : 210841 ($)


Equipment:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Component/Type/Location

Engine :CyberSys [Engine 3] [CT ]
Heatreg.:Delinit H4 [Heat 4]
D.C.S. :Repakoff [D.C.S.1] [RT ]
LifeSup.:Phillippi [Life 2] [Head]
Scanner :CyberSys L [Scan 3] [Head]
Computer:Mark BC-X [Comp. 6] [CBT ]
E.C.M :Lios [E.C.M. 2] [LT ]
JumpPort:Morola MJ [Jump 4]


Weapons:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Location/Weapon/Ammunition/SL

[RA ] L.R.M. 9 RACK (030) [2]
[LA ] L.R.M. 9 RACK (030) [2]
[LT ] LIGHT MESON GUN (026) [2]
[RT ] LIGHT MESON GUN (013) [1]


Armor:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Loc/Internal/Armor/Points/mm

[Head] (11) Dullaroy 021 [031mm]
[RT ] (21) Vicenium 034 [057mm]
[CT ] (23) Vicenium 034 [057mm]
[CBT ] (15) Vicenium 033 [055mm]
[LT ] (21) Vicenium 034 [057mm]
[RA ] (23) Dullaroy 032 [047mm]
[LA ] (23) Dullaroy 032 [047mm]
[LowT] (13) Vicenium 034 [058mm]
[RL ] (19) Vicenium 034 [057mm]
[LL ] (19) Vicenium 033 [056mm]

Armorindex: 5.09 [Total APts/T]
Internal: 188 [APts]
External: 321 [APts] Max:[083mm]
Total Armor: 509 [APts]


JOCK requirements:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Piloting: skill on Medium Titan incl. Jump
Weapons : N.G.M Cannon
Warfare : Scanner Warfare(ECM)
Skills : D.C.S Medical Recon Ind.Fire


OK, so what's the difference?
Firstly, the weapon suite has been changed. Energy weapons have been ditched in favour of Light Meson Guns.
I would have liked to have put in something heftier, but it just wouldn't be possible. Ideally, energy weapons are best for short range defense. Cannons just don't cut it, IMO.

However, the Light Meson Guns have fairly good range, and with some luck they will frustrate your opponents by screwing up their systems and weapons. They're light, compact and generate very little heat, so you can fire these things and still move. As with the Fuscia MkI, Fire either the LRMs or Meson Guns, not both, that will overheat your titan.

Armour has been reduced by about 20%. Now you know I absolutely hate reducing armour. But the reality is, this is a LR titan, and probably isn't going to get shot at very much...also, the Fuscia MkI was chronically underarmed. In support Titans, it's probably worth sacrificing a little armour for the sake of more weaponry.

Speaking of weaponry, ammunition for the LRM racks has been doubled. But it comes at a price! You will notice the arms are rather fragile now, with a mere 32 points of armour. Titanium armour would have been nice, but it was too heavy, I had to settle for Duralloy. I don't feel that good about doing it, but it was better than running out of ammo in the heat of battle.

Anyway, please let me know wether the Fuscia MkII is an inprovement. Advise me on anything else which you think could be imroved, the more specific the better. If I believe it's possible to implement without too many design compromises, then I'll try making a Fuscia MkIII.

Aaah, the wonders of iterative development!