MechWarrior 5: Mercenaries announced

[endfire79]

Hi all,

This looks interesting now that it's on Steam at least.

Question on the side. What's the best way to get a bit into the lore of the MechWarrior/BattleTech universe?  I haven't been playing since MechWarrior III/IV.  I was a fan of the old 90's cartoon (if anyone can remember that), and got the gist of the Star League, Inner Sphere & Clan story lines. That's as far as my knowledge goes (never got into the table top RPG long time ago).  I'm catching up via www.sarna.net for now.

[Destraex]

Endfire I really enjoy the battletech novels.
Specifically the robert thurston ones. Yes I am starting a out 100 novels behind the latest one! Nonspoilers!

Mechwarrior 5 has a tonne of lore incorporated by the way. There is a timeline that generally has massive amounts of lore to read as your campaign moves through the timeline. I mean the timeline lore is like the six o'clock news each night.

Another way is to watch battletech lore on youtube. The 90s cartoon is on youtube and was remastered. I think on renegade hpgs channel?

Also there are battletech podcasts discussing lore. These dona good job of explaining the dark ages etc. But for mw5 you really only need very old inner sphere lite st the moment and you may as well play through the gsme to get that.

[endfire79]

Really appreciate the feedback Destraex!  I'm looking at picking this title up and catching up on that universe, this helps.  I thought I'd get called out for talking about the old cartoon, but I'm glad people still remember.  FASA did some good work but I just missed that boat in the 80's.

[Destraex]

It's actually under news not timeline sorry... here are some examples.. so you get an idea of the kind of "news" you get throughout the campaign. I have 10 pages of the stuff to read currently.

[Skoop]

How do you guys like it ?  I noticed this on steam finally and am just waiting for a sale to pull the trigger.  I don't know much about the lore either, but big mechs battling seems cool.

[MiniHexer]

I cant see it being batter than VOX MACHINAE in VR, does MW5 have VR? If you have never been in VR you will think its great! but after VR 2D games are yesterdays newspaper. VR will split the calander soon BVR and AVR. I know how it goes you think your happy with your PC its running your fav stuff and you have lots of games, but after you try a VR game NOT any games some are crap, you will find yourself in another dimention where its like being in someones elses head, the feeling of dread you get just as you approach the top of a rollercoaster before it decends is like VR , you think just sight and sound cant effect you, but its balance too, there are all sorts of feelings like this as you enter different situations EG horror the half life Alyx scares you with creaping sounds and visuals its great!

[GDS_Starfury]

somewhere in a box, I have the Kerensky graphic novel that covers this.

[Destraex]

Here is the official battletech PDF primer to the lore

https://bg.battletech.com/download/BattleTech%20Primer.pdf?x64300

[endfire79]

Here is the official battletech PDF primer to the lore

https://bg.battletech.com/download/BattleTech%20Primer.pdf?x64300

Thanks, that's exactly what I was looking for and very handy!

[GDS_Starfury]

enjoy the rabbit hole.  :bd:

[Destraex]

I cant see it being batter than VOX MACHINAE in VR, does MW5 have VR? If you have never been in VR you will think its great! but after VR 2D games are yesterdays newspaper. VR will split the calander soon BVR and AVR. I know how it goes you think your happy with your PC its running your fav stuff and you have lots of games, but after you try a VR game NOT any games some are crap, you will find yourself in another dimention where its like being in someones elses head, the feeling of dread you get just as you approach the top of a rollercoaster before it decends is like VR , you think just sight and sound cant effect you, but its balance too, there are all sorts of feelings like this as you enter different situations EG horror the half life Alyx scares you with creaping sounds and visuals its great!

I think MW5 has some sort of experimental ray tracing.

As for VR, no idea what is going on in that regard, but as of July 2021 make of this what you will;

https://mw5mercs.com/news/2021/07/60-mw5-july-7th-patch-notes-updated
"The VR Plugins have been reenabled in the Editor. This should allow Mod Builders to continue creating VR-related mods and will enable users to explicitly enable VR support when desired, rather than the game auto-launching any installed VR software."

[Destraex]

Here is the official battletech PDF primer to the lore

https://bg.battletech.com/download/BattleTech%20Primer.pdf?x64300

Thanks, that's exactly what I was looking for and very handy!

No problem. A friend and I were looking through the website last night because he loves to gawk at things he cannot afford and plan his "never going to happen" purchases. I came across this very basic overview for the uninitiated. I learnt a few things I did not know myself, but I am no expert, fairly well versed though. I love that the lore is so deep as a backdrop. Not many franchises have literally hundreds of novels and technical readouts etc to draw from. If they do they are usually pretty average. Not so for Battletech. I have always been a lot more impressed with Battletech novels than I have with 40k novels. They are great fun and very easy to digest. Nothing complicated about them but real page turners. A little like reading a Bernard Cornwell novel. Then others are slow and political, not complicated political, just more deep lore which I can get into the mood for sometimes.

What gets me the most though about Battletech is the tech they use for the Mechs. A helmet that transmits movements and (I think) feeling straight to the brain and myomer fibre muscles of the mechs that make them move. The flexing of those leg muscles and that mechwarrior helmet would be amazing and tech that would not seem to be that far off  now. A lot of other franchises have copied this system (If the Japanese did not describe this system before Battletech anyways).

Without the helmet and muscles you still have the tanks in the universe which I believe are crewed by many souls like modern tanks. The crew would be needed because the Mech tech is not incorporated in them I assume and the fact that without feeling you have to have a driver watching exactly where the tank is heading all the time. Which will come out on top? The lower silhouette of the lower tech tank. Or the mech that can run to cover or across rough terrain and jump over behind the tank. 

Another thing that fascinates me is the treaty against Naval Space Warfare because of the loss of tech that this caused through massive amounts of orbital bombardment of factories etc when society broke down originally. Hyperspace jump capable ships are still protected throughout the inner sphere. Even in full blown wars they cannot be touched. Warships seem to exist but are few in number and not used due to treaty. This all enable the mech to be the star of the show. Because the aim of the game after society broke down is to preserve what is left and therefore not attack from orbit or destroy things with aircraft. BTW they have aircraft that are basically giant mechs in the sky. Not sure how these compare to Mech tek though.

The clans have not turned up yet and I am really hoping they will in a huge DLC or expansion.

COOP is great fun in MW5, I play with a mate who owns it on EPIC while I got it on Steam. Shame it does not have PVP because I cannot play Mechwarrior Online since in that game I get headaches for some reason now. Played it for years without problems and then a patch one day killed it for me.

This is the novel series I am reading. I read these three 20yrs ago and did not realise their were three more. On the 5th one now, still great fun to read.  :bd:

[MiniHexer]

I cant see it being batter than VOX MACHINAE in VR, does MW5 have VR? If you have never been in VR you will think its great! but after VR 2D games are yesterdays newspaper. VR will split the calander soon BVR and AVR. I know how it goes you think your happy with your PC its running your fav stuff and you have lots of games, but after you try a VR game NOT any games some are crap, you will find yourself in another dimention where its like being in someones elses head, the feeling of dread you get just as you approach the top of a rollercoaster before it decends is like VR , you think just sight and sound cant effect you, but its balance too, there are all sorts of feelings like this as you enter different situations EG horror the half life Alyx scares you with creaping sounds and visuals its great!

I think MW5 has some sort of experimental ray tracing.



As for VR, no idea what is going on in that regard, but as of July 2021 make of this what you will;

https://mw5mercs.com/news/2021/07/60-mw5-july-7th-patch-notes-updated
"The VR Plugins have been reenabled in the Editor. This should allow Mod Builders to continue creating VR-related mods and will enable users to explicitly enable VR support when desired, rather than the game auto-launching any installed VR software."

ok thx,seems interersting

[GDS_Starfury]

Ive kind of felt like the whole franchise went down with the whole clan arc.

[Destraex]

Ive kind of felt like the whole franchise went down with the whole clan arc.

I've only really known the series since Mechwarrior2 and the whole wolf\jade falcon clan arc. Love that arc and in fact without it I think the Franchise would not be nearly as interesting.