Game Mechanics

This page is a work in progress.

The following is a list of tips and articles relating to game mechanics.

Accuracy

Range

Range matters. Pay attention to the range brackets of your weapons. Shooting at anything further than short range incurs an accuracy penalty: -2/-4/-6 to hit for medium, long and maximum range respectively. Further to that, trying to shoot something within a weapon's minimum range incurs a whopping -8 to hit.

Elevation

Elevation accuracy bonuses/penalties are a scaling effect based on the height difference between the attacked and defender.

For every 20m an attacking unit is above its target it gains +1 to accuracy. For every 20m an attacking unit is below its target it suffers -1 to accuracy.

There is no maximum limit to this mechanic so the higher above a target you can get the better.

Size Delta

The size delta is a scaling penalty or bonus to attacks based on the difference in size between the attacker and defender.

For every 15 tons difference between them, the delta gains +1/-1. If the attacker weighs more than the defender, the attacker gets a penalty. If the attacker weighs less than the defender, the attacker gets a bonus.

Example 1: An Atlas is shooting at a Commando. The Atlas is 100 tons, the Commando is 25, meaning there is a 75 ton difference between them. The Atlas suffers a +5 size delta penalty (75/15 is 5) to hit the Commando. In return, the Commando has a +5 size delta bonus to hit the Atlas because of the 75 ton difference.

Example 2: A Grasshopper is shooting a Hunchback. The 'hopper is 70 tons, the Hunchback is 50, meaning there is a 20 ton difference between them. The Grasshopper suffers a +1 size delta penalty (20/15 is 1.333 and the delta rounds down) to hit the Hunchback and the Hunchback's return fire has a similar +1 size delta bonus to hit the Grasshopper.

Movement

• When attacking, you suffer a -1 penalty to accuracy if you walked, -2 if you sprinted, and -3 if you jumped.
• Sprinting does not end your turn.
• Evasion is not removed from 'Mechs when they are attacked.
• Sprinting and jumping with damaged leg actuators can cause a 'Mech to fall over.

Leg Actuator Damage

If a 'Mech has leg actuator damage a threshold percentile check is made at the end of a sprint or jump made by that 'Mech (if the pilot rolls 30 or lower on a d100 check it fails) to see if it falls over.

Evasion

Soft limit: 6

Hard limit: 12

Evasion has a soft and hard limit. The soft limit is reachable by any mech/pilot but you need specific quirks, gear and piloting skills in order to go over it. 12 is the absolute maximum you can get.

Each chevron of evasion gives +2 defence against being hit up to 6 chevrons. Chevrons 7-12 only give +1 defence against being hit.

Heat

Overheating in BTA has been completely overhauled and no longer deals structural damage as it did in vanilla HBT BT. Instead, you can be forced to shutdown, experience ammo explosions, pilot injuries, or critical hits, and experience significant movement and attacking penalties. For more info and the full heat scale effects table click the link below:

Heat Scale Effects

Biomes

Biomes affect the effectiveness of heat sinking, with hot or airless environments significantly reducing the amount of heat a 'Mech can dissipate. Conversely, wet or cold environments increase the amount of heat a 'Mech dissipates, allowing you to fire more often or run hotter builds. Heat banks and laser heat sinks provide heat sinking that ignores biome modifiers.

Biome	Heat Effect
Lunar	+35%
Martian	+25%
Badlands	+15%
Desert	+15%
Highlands	0%
Lowlands	0%
Jungle	-10%
Tundra	-15%
Polar	-20%

Initiative

BTA uses the Expanded Initiative mod which doubles the initiative phases from 5 to 10. For more information click the link below:

Initiative Phases

Resolve

Resolve is a per-pilot statistic in BTA, not a pooled resource. What this means is that pilots track their resolve independently of one another. They still benefit from base resolve gain and from resolve-increasing effects such as mech equipment or quirks, but when they spend resolve they draw from their individual pools, meaning your pilots can have wildly different resolve values at any given moment, depending on your usage. This can be quite potent if you manage it well: for example every pilot being able to use Precision Strike in the same round is incredibly powerful.

• The Resolve bar now runs from 0 to 60, not 0 to 100. The Argo morale meter provides less per-turn resolve than it used to, with each slot on the morale scale giving 0/5/10/15/20 resolve (so the max morale on the Argo gives you 20 resolve a turn in-mission, etc). Notably, buying morale on the Argo is now more expensive than it used to be.
• The Tactics skill is more important now, increasing resolve generated by 2% per point up to a maximum of 20%.
• Pilots will gain resolve normally every turn from the Argo morale values, they can also gain or lose resolve due to in-combat actions.