u/_Thorshammer_

I just picked up the H3 [175mm] and I' 3-4 games in on it.

Thoughts:

AP pen seems sus. I bounce shots I have no business bouncing with a 175mm.

Accuracy also seems off, particularly with HE rounds.

Alpha seems fine when I do pen.

Questions:

Should I be primarily running HE?

Any recommended builds?

Any advice or thoughts?

#What mech would - in your "humble" opinion - have been made better with one(ish) simple change?

For me, it's the OG Hatchetman - all short range and melee aggression without enough speed to catch anything and no way to force them to get close and lots of reasons to stay away.

Simply swapping the AC/10 for an AC/5 frees up enough weight to get to 5/8/5 plus some more armor. If you really wanted to get crazy you could drop one ton of autocannon ammo and add even more armor or another heat sink.

That gives you a mech with enough speed to close on some stuff and enough range / minimum range to give your opponents a reason to get close to the hatchet.

What's your take?

tl;dr - A perfectly serviceable casemate TD that plays like a super-StuG… at Tier 7.

A peek behind the curtain - I’m writing these reviews based on each tank's position on my tracking spreadsheet. 

My first review was roughly my “best” tank and I just worked down the list from there. 

I also only write reviews on tanks I have at least 100 games in. I’ve written reviews on 25 or 30 tanks below the T25 AT on my list because it didn’t have 100 games…. until this week. That’s a measure of how well I perform in it - higher on the list than tanks I have 130 - 140 games in. 

The WW2 Tier 7 American tank destroyer T25 AT occupies an odd spot in its tech tree - so odd it makes the tech tree feel incomplete, or badly laid out. 

The two tanks prior to this are relatively mobile, acceptably armored (for a TD), good DPM turreted TDs - the Wolverine and the Jackson. The three tanks after this are slow, massively armored, low ROF beasts - true casemate assault guns; the T28, the T95, and the T110E3. 

The T25 AT is a relatively mobile, middling armored, casemate TD. It’s not fast enough or turreted enough to be a Hellcat sibling, and it’s not armored enough or gunned enough to be a T28 sibling. 

Whatever it is, it seems to work well. The top gun is a 105mm with acceptable ROF, acceptable accuracy, and a solid punch. It hits hard enough that I only carry 5 premium rounds and I rarely use them.  

Its armor isn’t up to Doom Turtle standards, but it’s okay(ish), particularly for a support sniper. The armor is very much Claymore - “front towards enemy” - so try not to get flanked. 

Like its immediate predecessors its speed is nothing to write home about - it’s fast enough to get to a good early position and keep up on an advance - but if you get flanked it’s not fast enough or spinny enough to protect its vulnerable sides and rear so choose a good position and watch your map. 

Its camo / view split is pretty good and gets better with a build, and that’s a nice plus for a born sniper. 

I understand that this review makes the tank sound mediocre, but that’s not my intention - it hits hard and accurately and generally rewards good play. 

I like this tank, but it’s never my “go-to” when I want to just mindlessly pull the trigger and I think that’s because (as mentioned) this is a thinking man's tank and I’m not much of a thinker.

If you like mid-tier German casemate TDs, you’ll probably like this. If you prefer your TD with some speed, a turret, or two feet of armor, probably not.  

Current equipment / build: Full camo, three equipment (gun rammer / coated optics / improved concealment), three consumables (enhanced repair kit / enhanced rations / enhanced med kit). 

As I write this I have career stats (on this account) of 30,742 battles, a 48.35% winrate, and a WN8 score of 1417. 

As I write this I have T25 AT stats of 102 battles, a 53.92% winrate, and a WN8 score of 1920. I have a single mark on this tank.      

Disclaimers:
I am bad at this game and you should probably not take my advice.

Unless otherwise noted, assume all tanks are fully upgraded/outfitted and the review assumes that level of equipment.

This is my opinion. I suck at the game and better players might have different opinions. You might have different opinions. That’s ok.

This game is my hobby and I have a good job so I spend money on it. If you are an aggressively free-to-play kind of guy we may not vibe.

All stats taken from https://www.wotstars.com/xbox/1093328947, player AmbshPrdator on Xbox.

Here's the idea:

You're an engineer in the BattleTech universe and you get a few seconds with the CEO of the industrial conglomerate you work for.

You've been working on the elevator pitch for a mech design you've been working on in your spare time and now is your chance to deliver it!

What is your elevator pitch?

The rules:

Your pitch can not be longer than three short(ish) sentences. No thesis dissertations disguised as a run on sentence, please. The idea is to sell the CEO in a few seconds - you're not giving a board presentation.

Your pitch can be about a "real" in-game mech or some homebrew monstrosity you put on the table at your FLGS.

Your pitch must name the mech, describe it's basic load out and purpose, and explain why billions of c-bills should be spent to produce it.

For fun, you can have 2-3 extra sentences to describe the company you work for - "Tharkad Dough Mixer MFG., now mixing up mechs!!", for example

Your pitch can be serious or silly - this is for fun, and nothing else.

Them's the rules.... now what have you got?!?!

In order to give credit where credit is due, this post was inspired by the thread linked below.

https://www.reddit.com/r/battletech/comments/1uliks5/whats_the_elevator_pitch_for_the_mercury_sentinel/

https://preview.redd.it/no1eavly7uah1.png?width=554&format=png&auto=webp&s=937663589c8ed591d6d0df84a8e316a5b957d8b3

The M60T and it's variants from Turkey.

It starts life as an M60A1.

The next generation is the M60T. It gets the Israeli Sabra upgrade, which is an upgraded Magach 7C - IMI 120mm smoothbore, applique armor, more powerful engine, better tracks, some other tweaks.

Then it gets the Sabra Mk II upgrade which is the same as above plus some composite and reactive armor.

The M60T1 is the M60T with upgraded FCS and some more applique / additional armor.

The M60TM takes the M60T1 and upgrades the FCS and active protection (which the game doesn't model. Yet.) and a spall liner.

It's not a full line, but it would make an interesting stub branch off the CW Independent tree.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M60T_tank

https://preview.redd.it/5e6p4sq63mah1.png?width=500&format=png&auto=webp&s=f990d74b26e41085451fd1476b382f3cda0f7ac9

As per the title - I have a bunch of thoughts about the specific industry I'm in and I want to get them down "on paper" somewhere.

Is there a sub for that?

Kind of like the various writing subs where people can post short stories, or a series of linked short stories?

Think about it like this:

If, at the dawn of the telecommunications age, we received unaimed transmissions from an alien race and the majority of those communications were descriptions of incredible violence - personal, national, corporate.... all of it - we'd be concerned.

When we realized that some of the violence was real - the holocaust for example - and then realized that this species entertained itself with media that depicted them KILLING AND EATING EACH OTHER we would be absolutely terrified and almost certainly choose to avoid them as long as possible.

Edit: This scenario assumes that we are roughly similar to, or slightly ahead, of other species.

In a scenario where an alien race is billion years ahead of us they're either ignoring us the way we ignore dung beetles or we're in the Zoo Hypothesis.

Think about it like this:

If, at the dawn of the telecommunications age, we received unaimed transmissions from an alien race and the majority of those communications were descriptions of incredible violence - personal, national, corporate.... all of it - we'd be concerned.

When we realized that some of the violence was real - the holocaust for example - and then realized that this species entertained itself with media that depicted them KILLING AND EATING EACH OTHER we would be absolutely terrified and almost certainly choose to avoid them as long as possible.