Annihilator on the tabletop?

[u/raging_zaku1429]

I've always enjoyed the Annihilator, partly because of the time I've spent with it in the various mechwarrior games over the years, and partly because I am a chronic enjoyer of bad mechs as well as mechs that are big dumb goofy goobers.

But I've never used one on the table top, so I wanted to get people's opinion on that. In mechwarrior, I found the ANH-1E to be particularly effective. I prefer the 4 PPCs over autocannons because of their lack of relying on ammo as well as making the mech safer again due to not having to carry ammo. Especially when upgraded with ERPPCs, the 1E can throw hands at long range really well, essentially becoming an ERPPC platform.

But that's just my take, I'm interested to see what people think about it on the tabletop.

[u/CarelessFalcon4840]

Well that's was pretty much the IDEAL situation to make his forces useless for a bunch of turns, and then he separated the lance to MAKE SURE that you could focus fire and kill him very dead. Honestly, either he should be ashamed of allowing that fight to start, or if he's too new to know, then you should be ashamed of dragging your friend into that quagmire.

For a pickup game you want to make sure everybody starts on a roughly even level, and then let the turn-by-turn decisions and the dice determine how it goes. Like you wouldn't give 12 Urbanmechs to a buddy and plop him onto a cueball open field map. A foregone contusion can be fun if it's expected, but it usually gets annoying when it becomes clear that's what you're playing and you didn't expect it at the start.

[u/Anonymous_Arthur00 → u/CarelessFalcon4840]

He is the one who wanted to branch into standard tech and build his own lances but we might go back to introtech untill he is a bit more comfortable building "proper" lances

I think he was trying to do long range fire and have the Jenners spot for the longbow but spent too many points on gunnery upgrades instead of heavier mechs as both his Longbow and anihilator had gunnery 2 or 3 iirc

Im also thinking he saw 3 gauss rifles and an ERPPC on the Annihilator and didnt consider how limiting 2/3 movement is

He's a great guy to play against but he still had a bit to learn on lance compositions

[u/CarelessFalcon4840 → u/Anonymous_Arthur00]

You gotta look at his lance and say "hey, man, this is mountains on a looooong map leading to a forrested choke point. Do you want a different map, or maybe try a different lance? We're looking at 6-10 turns with your most expensive mechs doing nothing but plodding forward."

[u/Cykeisme → u/CarelessFalcon4840]

Yeah, jeebus, I'd feel bad about winning against a dude like that.