Reading & Ranting: The Panther | Battletech Battlemechs
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- Опубліковано 6 вер 2024
- Listen along, as I read About, and give my opinion on, the Unusual but effective Kuritan Light Mech, the PNT-9R Panther!
Music Used: ironsmith.band...
Reading Source: www.sarna.net/...
Image by me, that's my Panther
Patreon, for those who want to support: www.patreon.co...
Music site, for those who want to check out more of my music: ironsmith.band...
A Panter and Jenner in the same lance had two consequences for me:
1) (many Years ago) As a new player, I started working more with light mechs...
2) Many of my mechs are now painted in Sword of Light red!
A Panter is not a small Griffin... the Griffin can survive staying still for a round in a good position to get a better shot and take some damage if its on a nice hilltop... and go in close to use the fists. the Panter must always move and get hot if its use is jumpjets, using some rounds to jump in cover and hide to cool down.
@christophk.3085 Amazing, and yeah the Panther was a great lesson for me on Light 'Mech versatility.
As for the Panther and Griffin, oh I know, but creating the "MINIGRIF" Panther variant was more of a fun little experiment than anything else. It definitely can't 1:1 replicate the Griffin's role, but is is fun!
I play companies of Panther, and refer to Panthers as “the littlest Heavies”. They are designed to be used as heavy mechs with 2-4 working as team versus one larger opponent, while maintaining the ability to destroy lighter opponents 1:1.
My favorite upgrade to the stock Panther is swapping the HS for DHS, the PPC for an ERPPC, and the SRM4 for an LRM5, but not to mini a Griffin. I do this because I also run Dragons with PPCs and the LRM10 swapped out for 3x LRM5’s.
@jeffersonian000 Very fair. And yeah, running them as if they were Long Range Heavies really does tend to match their unique design pretty well!
I use panthers frequently. It is better in large numbers. The advantage is sheer number of ppc shots at a single target. Once a panther gets damaged I let it fall back behind the rest of the line.
1 panther is meh. 4 panthers..... people flip out when you start regularly hitting 2 or 3 ppc hits on a single target. They get even more mad when you fall back the damaged panther but it still fires and it cant be easily reached without exposing your mech even more to the remaining panthers. 769 bv for a stock basic panther is a dream when pushed into a numbers game. 4k bv battle? Your opponent take 3 or possibly 4 mechs. You take 5 or you take 4 and 2 of them are significantly better pilots.
If you want to spice it up a bit more have 1 panther drop the srm4 and pick up a command console. Small change for big improvement to your numbers advantage.
@@goodbodha Huh... a Panther Gun line. What a terrifying and fascinating idea!
@@thevoiceofiron it works well. Jump 3 hexes plus ppc shot you are heat stable. Jump 4 heat goes up 1. 3-4 ppcs shooting at a single target even rolling on 10s will usually get results after a few turns.
first panther that gets hit just falls back a bit and keeps shooting at the edge of the medium/long range bracket line. If they want to go for him they have to close on the others which can always opt to dump srms into a target.
I’ve been running companies of Panthers since the 90’s, their are intending to be used in large numbers specifically to be used as a gun line exactly as described above; out number your opponent, stay at range, group snipe one target at a time, move damage Panthers back while still keeping them in combat. I treat them as mini-Warhammers rather than mini-Griffins.
The only way to meaningfully improve the Panther, in my opinion, is to bump it up to a 5/8/5. Thankfully, it's a relatively inexpensive machine to upgrade. The 13 standard heat sinks can be traded out for 10 doubles, almost immediately freeing up all the weight you need for improvement. Sadly, Wakazashi didn't have the support they needed to get DHS in good numbers.
Swapping the PPC for a Snub-Nose is a very good upgrade, as is swapping out the SRM-4 for an MML-3 or 5, depending on your other weight saving measures. I even made one with two Light PPCs, one with a capacitor, and an MML-5. It's a ridiculously good set-up, as long as you're comfortable with an XL.
I was playing a game with my son, who loves panthers in any form, so I gave him a Kuritan lance including both a Panther and Jenner, and he did some serious work with them. Makes me very proud.
@WolfHreda That's awesome! Always great to see the game being shared with new generations, very heartwarming!
Also, 5/8/5 panther would be beautifully terrifying. Just snipe, reposition and snipe again!
@@thevoiceofiron I think I also tried to make one with a partial wing, but those things are a pain in the ass on lighter 'mechs.
It's a fun light fire support sniper, although with my preferred play style especially in later era's it's not that good of a fit for my preferred forces (full blitz/super heavy fire distraction).
It still pairs well with just about any force composition you can imagine especially as a filler unit.
@@spacewolfblackmane19 Oh yeah, definitely a mobile but overall backline support gunner for sure. Not a great blitzer itself, but pair this thing with a few Jenners? Horrifying!