But that sounds like what passes for "rational thinking", ugh! That said, finally getting into the game and my ship's halls look like an old Space Marines flagship when it comes to the prevalence of memorial walls to ordinary walls aboard the ship. And that also means that my merc company is an equal opportunity recruiter - if there's one thing that can be promised it's that no potential recruit is passed away, ever! Also great advancement opportunities!
Yes, lots of 'retirement' opportunities. I suck as a tactician and this game is really all about getting to know your units, their strengths and understanding the weaknesses of the opponents. Essentially all the things that I like to avoid Fun game, really is. Also I felt it would feel silly to play without the mechs getting blown up from CT destruction.
I see it now. The point is not to try to challenge a Fatlass with my three Commandos and be excited that one of them survived the onslaught but to rather try to roflstomp the enemy without having all my mechs and pilots blown apart. Force preservation, what an alien concept!
Yeah, I highly recommend maxing the armor on all your mechs, default is too light. Also focus on engaging opponents in a way where you can focus fire on something without them being able to focus fire back, so use terrain to block sightlines or long distance weapons to soften stuff up before rolling into direct combat. If you just roll straight into a firefight you'll often come out on the losing end in a long fight. Picking your shots to hit shoulders or arms where their big guns are is also very effective in reducing enemy firepower without having to full take them out.
Not that they can't be found, but I wish there were more missions that rewarded finishing them quickly or some other incentive for taking faster mechs. Especially in the late game. All too often I ran into 5 star missions where bringing anything less than an assault lance is near suicide.
I just can't figure out how a light lance differs from an assault lance. - Steiner officer Yea, it's the 4 mech drop limit really that produces this. For late game with heavy mechs the battlefield itself needed to expand so that there would be physical room for more than 4 mechs and for the light elements to perform an actual picket and skirmish duty. Thus the game is sort of a sim of a meta-lance and being the lance commander as far as I can figure it out.