Mechwarrior 5: Mercenaries is still receiving updates (new DLC is actually coming soon), despite it’s release back in December 2019.. And it’s companion title – Clans – has been out for a bit now as well (and again – is still receiving updates and DLC). That is some impressive longevity for a niche game, and I can’t thank Piranha Games enough for maintaining MW5: Mercs.
I’ve got over 300 hours in the game so far; I’ll play for a while, then step away, then come back and play more. Most of the time it’s just to start a new career mode playthrough and have some fun, or maybe try some new DLC content.
Right now, though I decided to ask the question: Can you enjoy Mechwarrior 5: Mercenaries while only piloting light mechs? Can a light mech lance handle the DLC campaign missions? What will I fucking name my light mech lance?
So far: Yes, We’ll find out in Part 2, and “The Anarchoholics”. Let’s get into the details.
The rules (and mods) I used for my light-mech-only playthrough
So, for a light mech only playthrough, the first rule is obvious: I – and my lancemates – can only pilot light mechs. That means 35 tons and under.
Anything bigger I get as part of a reward? I sell. It’s fine to acknowledge that heavier mechs exist, but the idea is that my lance and I are nimble balls of fury who can jump into a variety of roles. We can scout. We can assassinate. We can raid. We can blow shit up.. And we can fight in the arena, punching well above our weight class.
Additionally, I only allow myself to possess one incarnation of a hero mech: No running a lance of 4 Anansi spiders, folks.
With that in mind, I decided to do the house Kurita career start that gives you 4 light mechs: A Locust, a Jenner, a Panther and a Spider.
As far as mods go, I went with the staple YAML (Yet Another Mech Lab)/YAW/YAWC/YAEC setup to give me some variety and open up the mech customization options. I also run Simple Zoom (because I’m an old man now and want moar zooooms), vonBiomes, Lance Status Revamped, Purchase Salvage, and perhaps most important of them all: Mech Delivery (because I do not have the time to waste hopping around from system to system to hunt down my mechs and equipment).
Oh, and while it hasn’t become important yet early on in my career, I do have the mod that extends the window to start DLC campaigns to effectively forever.
With that out of the way, let’s talk about how it started running a light-mech-only career!
A slow (and rough) start
It has been a little bit since I last played, so I had to work to remember my controls and get used to the gameplay again.
This involved more than a few reloads from a previous save, but once I got into my groove?
Oh yeah, I got this.
I myself tended to stick to piloting my starter Locust. For my lancemates – when I used them – I mostly left the starter mechs alone (although I swapped out the PPC in the panther for some medium lasers and also gave it a faster engine so it could keep up).
We honestly ran like this for a while; It takes time to build up money to get better gear, especially when you’re relegated to light mechs.
For the most part I stuck to the lower-tier regions and simpler arena fights to save repair costs and reduce risks, but once I bought my first hero mech (the SDR-A “Anansi”)?
I found I could do a whole lot more.. Especially after kitting it out.
Clan Heavy Small Lasers & Light Rifles are 2 staples for a lot of my light mechs right now, but beyond weapons?
The Null Signature System is exceptionally useful, and is reasonably low priced enough that I can stick it on most mechs that have the space and heat-capacity to hold it.
This device essentially reduces the signature of your mech, making you much less visible to enemies as well as harder to hit.
Thanks to this thing, I can – so far – take on heavies and only recieve cursory armor damage.
As I progressed I picked up additional hero mechs; I should note that I’m keeping the mech availability in Mech Delivery to be lore-accurate in terms of the year, which means no clan mechs for quite a while.. And also means no Peanut Butter and are-you-Jelly Locust I referenced in my post about MW5 Mercs and accessibility for some time.
That’s OK, though; The fun is in the journey.
I did pick up a number of other hero mechs for my lancemates: A Jenner, Commando and Firestarter, all kitted out for speed and damage output.
The lancemates tend to be the weakpoint: They aren’t great at avoiding damage, and the Jenner in particular has a massive center torso that almost always ends up damaged to some degree (I ended up taking out the SRMs it came with and loaded it up with hot-loaded LRMs instead, alongside weight-reduction modules and the NSS).
Part of this is the pilots; Once I get them ranked up properly they should hopefully have a bit more survivability, but early on you’re really limited on pilots.
As I played, I began to develop a strategy, however, and also made some fun new discoveries in loadouts.
Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah! Stayin’ ALIVE (in light mechs)
Outside of equipment like the NSS, one important thing to keep in mind is picking the right missions.. And for the most part, I prefer to earn my income via the arena than actual missions themselves.. And employing good strategies to succeed in those missions.
For the arena, I have learned to love Free-for-all challenges (of literally ANY weight class).
Once you can equip the NSS and handle the heat (pro-tip: MASC helps immensely to get you out of the frying pan so you can cool down. Serpentine!) you’ll be unstoppable, but even without it there is one crucial tip I have:
Don’t rush out and engage in free-for-alls at the start.
Let the enemies whittle themselves down first. This is easier with an NSS, as it ensures you won’t be engaged by a nearby mech assuming you activate it immediately upon entering the cockpit.
Once they are down to a handful of mechs? Then you can engage.
There’s usually one or two other enemy mechs playing the same game as me, so I go after them first.
Before I built my Backstabber Locust (I’ll share that one shortly) I’d MASC in and start hammering at the legs while circling them. The key thing to do is make use of MASC to keep them guessing while you circle them (especially when your weapons are recharging), and avoid getting caught up on the terrain or buildings, as speed = survivability. I’d rather miss a few shots – which I do frequently since I’m not using a mouse to aim and am instead using my HOSAS setup – than slow down and lose a critical component.
Avoid running directly towards or away from your foes: A laterally-moving target is harder to hit, especially when you’re fast as fucking fuck.
Of course, once you start exploring other mech loadouts you begin to develop other more.. unique strategies.
Enter my new favorite Locust build: The Backstabber.
I picked up the LCT-1VB – a lore-accurate variant available thanks to YAML – and thought.. What happens if I build this out with a crap-ton of Clan Heavy Small Lasers and an NSS?
As it turns out, you get something more worthy of the name “Assassin” than the actual Assassin mech.
Here’s why:
Since I was approaching from behind and had my NSS active, this heavy Crusader had no idea I was there.. And I proceeded to unload an alpha strike right into it’s rear center torso.
This was enough to cause it to immediately explode.
It’s not a guarantee of course: You have to get lucky and hit the right part to one-shot heavier mechs, but it is possible.. And if it doesn’t happen? Then I just do my circle strategy and whittle them down (relatively) slowly.
What’s next for the Anarchoholics?
Well, I’m about 1 year away from being able to purchase the Pirate’s Bane Locust, so I’ll be grabbing that and a couple more mechs + pilots so I can field 2 full lances of light mechs..
And then we start to tackle the DLC campaigns.