Category: Other Games

Before I forget what I did, I’m infodumping how I personally (eventually) got MechCommander Gold (MechCommander 1 + Desperate Measures expansion) singleplayer running nicely on my own Windows 10 system.

These instructions were written for me-and-friends with that level of detail in mind. No effort has been made in the instructions to support any other OS, including Windows 11, so I have no idea what happens if you try these steps elsewhere. This information largely duplicates / collates information that you can already find elsewhere and is minimally unique.

Continue reading “Getting MechCommander running on Windows 10 without crashes (for me)”

Desperate Measures, the expansion for MechCommander 1, introduced LB-X versions of Autocannons. Exactly how they work is a bit nebulous, but combining the in-game information, the official strategy guide, and player-created guides, it seems that each shot either connects or doesn’t (there aren’t separate hit chance calculations), and then if the shot does hit, damage is spread across areas adjacent to the hit — apparently even including to the firing mech if the target is close enough to it.

Combining this information with weapon stats, the expected outcome is a variant of ACs that does more raw DPS, but with less “punch” or penetration because the damage gets distributed across more areas of an enemy mech and so will tend to hit armor instead of managing to deal internal structure damage. That seems like a reasonable-enough tradeoff especially given that they have more generous ammo reserves than the non LB-X versions.

In reality, their DPS is actually atrocious, and I don’t know why.

Continue reading “Something seems horribly, horribly wrong with LB-X Autocannon damage in MechCommander”

With the years-long CBP Alpha 10 done I finally had some spare time/energy and so sat down to revisit MechCommander 1, something I haven’t played since I was a kid (and very, very bad at it). After first playing through much of the original campaign in my revisit, I noticed that even though all of the light mechs (except for the expansion-only Stiletto) claim to share the same 27 m/s movement speed, Ullers and Commandos always outrun Firestarters, Cougars, and Ravens – even if controlling for possible acceleration differences. I wanted answers, and every source I’ve been able to find parrots the same 27 m/s figure with no note about “btw the in-game value is wrong” or anything, so I tried (and spoiler: failed) to figure it out myself.

Continue reading “What’s up with the Commando and Uller (Kit Fox)’s movement speed in MechCommander?”

The issue

When playing Co-op in Mechwarrior 5: Mercenaries, if you get a mission that starts from a dropship (rather than just spawning directly onto the map), you sometimes lose mouse control when it’s time to exit the dropship. You can still fire, and the mouse will work on the game menu, but you can no longer aim using the mouse.

What worked for me

As an Nvidia GPU user, pull up the Ansel overlay using ALT+F2, then close it again. Mouse control returns.

Continue reading “MW5: Possible Fix for Mouse Bug in Co-op”

This is written for Wargame: AirLand Battle (ALB), and doesn’t factor in changes made in Wargame: Red Dragon.

 

The sentiment among some Wargame players seems to be that this class of units is useless, or at least pointless to actually use. The argument goes something like this:

• They’re outclassed against tanks by their dedicated anti-tank counterparts.
• They’re outclassed against infantry by stronger standard infantry or Special Forces.

While both of of these points are true, some experimentation has still found an excellent home for these jack-of-all-trade infantry squads in my decks.

Continue reading “Using Light Infantry in ALB (Light Riflemen, Mountaineers etc)”