The 3025 setting laid out in Battletech 2nd edition was so colorful and evocative:
It's really too bad that it was abandoned just 2 years later.
I wouldn't really think of it as a Mad Max style setting since there were functioning governments and other strong entities like the bandit kings and Comstar. It felt more like early feudal Europe with petty kingdoms and the Catholic Church, and with Mechwarriors as the knights. There was always a possiblity that someone could rebuild what had been lost, but it was supposed to be hard.
It is called "Mad Max in space" on official BT forums as a joke, not as a literal comparison. Effectively it was post-apocalyptic scifi.
And yes, i know what 2nd Ed had, have a Finnish translation of those rules actually. But a lot of things were thrown away in the earliest books expanding the setting. Closely enough to "right after the game was made", i think.
Medium Lasers are the most mathematically superior Inner Sphere weapon, but it was originally balanced by its heat cost. A 'Mech with 12 heatsinks can dissipate the heat from 4 MLs, but one with 12 double-heatsinks can handle {i]8[/i]. And it gets only worse as you add more heat sinks. My point was that with double-heatsinks, it's a lot easier to build optimized 'Mechs that have the best weapons and that single-heatsinks encourage using more varied designs.
Single-heat sinks encourage slow gameplay. Or difficult gameplay, try firing weapons at starting at 8+ heat, after moving etc... Having played enough games with IntroTech, i'm inclined to think DHS are not necessarily a problem.
Intro level rules themselves are problematic, for there is little equipment, little variety. Hence, "Medium Lasers all the way".
With IntroTech, one third of available weapons are practically worthless from optimization stand-point. And even with experimental equipment (Blazer, prototype TSM, EW Equipment), the choices are very limited. Doesn't really allow for varied builds, especially when considering the superiority of the Medium Laser, with occasional Large Laser and PPC providing long-range firepower.
Eras with DHS also have weight-saving equipment, thus making ballistic (and missile) weapons more viable (not to mention having greater variety of them), and via that,
more varied builds more viable. Sure, some of them still suck (eg Ultra-AC2) and/or are niche weapons but at least now you can pair them with respectable energy weapons array, with IntroTech you may well be limited to either/or, or have to sacrifice speed or armor or both.
But in either case, optimal mechs are possible. What does it matter if DHS allow even better optimal mechs if the game's limited to SHS?
Ultimately it is the ability to customize a mech that leads to optimization more so than any individual piece of equipment.
Indeed, i may be a one of a kind player in that i advocate a Mechwarrior/Battletech game without customization and choose mechs available in a game very carefully to avoid optimal and worthless choices.
Of course, that would be out of place in a RPG-like game. A very good reason to set a game during the Jihad or so. If you have customization, let me have a lot of options, won't deter those who optimize their mechs one bit.
