Hello All,
I wanted to write this down somewhere that everyone has access to, and can possibly respond.
I've noticed that the support lance needs to be a bit more diverse in our builds and tonnage depending on which lance we are paired with. I wanted to go over some of my observations and see what everyone else thinks.
This diversity is necessary based on the types of tactics needed to help support different types of Lances. We cannot expect the Skirmish or Scout lances to play meat shield for us, and we cannot assume that the Match Maker is going to give us an equal amount of tonnage. At the same time, we need to have the weight freed up to support the Assault Lance.
Based on these requirements this is what I've come up with.
Supporting Assault Lance:
We need to have medium or low end heavy 'mechs with a significant amount of indirect fire. We need to have the agility to keep the Assault Lance between us and the enemy while still being able to bring the fire-power down on the enemy, hence the indirect fire. We should not be using direct fire weapons when supporting the Assault Lance because we will be singled out.
Additionally I would argue that we need some backup weaponry to deal with the light harassers. Streaks or small lasers can be incredibly effective, although dumb-fire SRM2s might be more beneficial if we keep getting signal locked. It may be prudent to take at least one ECM capable mech to counter the signal locks. All of these considerations mean that we won't have as much long range firepower as a boat, but we won't be completely helpless when the lights harass us.
Supporting Skirmish Lance:
We can expect the Skirmish Lance to sow chaos in the enemy ranks, and we can expect that they would be able to help us with any light harassers. We cannot expect them to be able to hold off a superior enemy force, nor should we expect them to be able to hold locks while bobbing and weaving through enemy fire.
Based on these facts; I believe the Support Lance should be taking heavier 'mechs with direct fire capability. We want to take advantage of the enemy revealing their rear armor to us when the Skirmish Lance gets to work, we want to have pin-point damage to take out as much of the enemy firepower as possible. We also need to have the mass and the armor to deal with a push from the enemy heavies and assaults, which is just not possible with a bunch of medium LRM 'mechs.
I also have some mixed tactic builds that incorporate things like 2xLRM15s + AC10 + 2ML Orion that may be viable but IMO not as optimal as say a 2xGauss Night Gyr.
Supporting Light/Scout Lance:
This is where the tactics get a bit dicey for us. If we drop in PuG drops with the Scout Lance we should probably take mobile LRM builds as the Scout lance is going to be able to maintain locks and keep Narc on enemy combatants. We can use the typical murder-ball and NASCAR gameplay to our advantage by keeping our team between us and the enemy while focusing on high priority targets as called out by the Scout Lance.
If we are doing 2 v 2 Lance brawls with the other TAW Lances then we won't have the rest of the team to use as a buffer. However, if we use direct fire builds we are denying the Scout Lance their primary function and capabilities. At this point I don't see many alternatives other than the Scout Lance assuming the role of Skirmishers while we pour on the pin-point firepower and bring heavier armor to the mix.
Conclusion:
The Support Lance needs to evolve past the original mandate of having only Medium builds if we are going to effectively support the rest of the unit. I think the other lances have very specific tasks and focuses, and we cannot ask them to modify their tactics too much to fit us. Our range and options for platforms give us more opportunities than other lances get, i.e.; you can't run a Light as an assault mech, you can't run an Assault as a scout mech.
I think all the lances should have flexibility on their builds. The brawlers can use mediums - assault, skirmishers can go from light - heavies, as long as we are supporting each other it'll work.
My thought on it is that the lances can discuss what they would like to bring and then compromise from there. If the support lance are running mediums then the skirmish can take fast heavies if they take assaults/heavies the skirmish can use brawler mediums. Even the scouts can move up to things like Vipers or Cicadas for example.
For the support lance even if two of the mechs are "boats" and they fall back and use the other two to shield. I've used an inverted "V" with four missile mechs, when the lights come in the two furthest away fall back towards 5 & 7 o'clock position and focus the light. That tactic has been good for killing the lights that come in, even to the point that the mech being attacked was still shooting the front line threats and ignoring those at its feet.
I agree that the lances should be flexible, and you make some very valid points for how they can be!
Do you think we could work in some anti-light tactics into the training? Sometimes it's a real problem for the Support Lance, especially when we get signal locked or people attacking us from behind.