MECHWARRIOR: LIVING LEGENDS

BUILD RULES CONCEPTS OVERVIEW

INTRODUCTION

This document is intended to provide an overview of the MechWarrior: Living Legends Build Rules concepts for

weapon spaces, weapon sizes, mutually exclusive mounting locations and the methods by which additional

equipment will be handled. This document should be considered a draft version and the concepts, values and

implementation may be subject to change as the needs of the MWLL project dictate.

HIGH-LEVEL CONCEPTS

The MWLL Build Rules are composed of two high-level concepts, both of which inherit some of their attributes

from prior MechWarrior video games and the Classic BattleTech ruleset. These two concepts are:

1. Total Vehicle Tonnage

2. Weapon & Equipment Spaces

As a brief overview, the Total Vehicle Tonnage concept assigns a tonnage value to each component that is used to

construct a player vehicle variant within the game. The base vehicle tonnage is determined by the vehicle

structure, referred to as “offset tonnage” for MWLL purposes, and the tonnage of the selected engine. Armour,

weapons and equipment are all assigned tonnage values that when added together with the base vehicle tonnage

cannot exceed the total vehicle tonnage rating of the selected asset. For example, an Inner Sphere Atlas ‘Mech

cannot exceed 100 tons of total vehicle tonnage.

This document will address the Weapon & Equipment Spaces branch of the build rules concept.

MECHWARRIOR: LIVING LEGENDS MODULAR WEAPON POD & SLOT CONCEPT REVIEW

The MWLL Modular Weapon Pod & Slot Concept was previously featured in a concept video. Vehicles within

MWLL are configured to mount weapons in either hard mount slots or modular pods, both of which are sized to

hold varying amounts of weapons based on the capabilities of the asset to which they will be attached. Weapon

slots, whether of the hard mount variety or a slot that is contained within a weapon pod come in five distinct sizes

based on the outside diameter of the weapon: SMALL (0.5m), MEDIUM (0.7m), LARGE (0.9m), ASSAULT (1.0m)

and SIEGE (1.2m). Missile weaponry follows a similar sizing concept but is not determined by a diameter measure,

but rather a qualitative sizing determination.

CONSIDERATIONS

The MWLL Build Rules account for a number of considerations, some of which were present in prior

MechWarrior/BattleTech games and some of which are unique to the MWLL project. I will discuss these in the

following section and reference them throughout this document within the concept examples.

Aesthetic Considerations

The MechWarrior: Living Legends team has always strived to maintain a high standard of visual fidelity both in the

quality of the art assets that it produces and in the construction of vehicle variants within the game. The 5 unique

weapon sizes used by MechWarrior: Living Legends dictate that certain weapons will not fit in some locations due

to being either too large or too small.

Our build rules have been constructed in such a way to disallow configurations that would be visually inconsistent

(ex. a LARGE weapon in a SMALL weapon slot) but still allow the player sufficient flexibility to create inventive and

unique loadouts.

Technical Considerations & How a ‘Mech Gets Assembled in MWLL

The placement of weapons and weapons pods on a vehicle is determined by the creation of “helpers” within the

vehicle geometry file. These helpers locate the weapons and weapon pods relative to the other geometry of the

vehicle and also govern the movement of weapons and weapons pods if the mounting location is subject to

rotation along any axis. Weapon helpers are placed based upon the supported pods and weapons for a given

platform. Helpers placed within the geometry all have a small but cumulative overhead in performance and also

add complexity to the vehicle geometry file for technical design. As such helpers are setup based upon the

expected weapons load out and supported pods for a given asset.

Weapon helpers for the Clan Black Lanner Medium ‘Mech (1,2,3 MEDIUM slots, 4 ASSAULT slot)

The MWLL build rules and the weapon pods that they use have been designed in such a way to optimise the usage

of existing vehicle weapon and pod placement helpers, add as little overhead as is possible but still allow players

reasonable flexibility of configuration.

MechWarrior: Living Legends places weapons on ‘Mechs and vehicles using two methods: a single weapon hard

mount slot of a given size or a weapon pod which may contain one or more weapon slots of varying sizes. The

following is a list of possible pods within MechWarrior: Living Legends and their related weapon slot sizes:

Pod Name Weapon Slots

Small Basic Pod x1 SMALL

Small Bi-Pod x2 SMALL

Medium Basic Pod x1 MEDIUM

Medium Bi-Pod x2 MEDIUM

Small Tri-Pod x3 SMALL

Large Basic Pod x1 LARGE

Crusader Pod x1 LARGE, x1 MEDIUM

Medium Tri-Pod x3 MEDIUM

Small Quadri-Pod x4 SMALL

Assault Pod x1 ASSAULT

Assault Armored Pod x1 ASSAULT

Barrage Pod x1 ASSAULT, x1 SMALL

Medium Quadri-Pod x4 MEDIUM

Large Bi-Pod x2 LARGE

Small Penta-Pod x5 SMALL

Destroyer Pod x1 ASSAULT, x1 MEDIUM

Large Tri-Pod x3 LARGE

Siege Basic Pod 1x SIEGE

Hellfire Pod x2 LARGE, x3 MEDIUM

Devastator Pod 2x ASSAULT

The pods listed above are used for the majority of vehicle configuration purposes within MWLL. There are some

additional platform-specific pods that have been created to maintain the visual presentation of certain vehicles

and ‘Mechs (as example, the arm pods on the Blood Asp and Fafnir assault ‘Mechs).

Balance & Gameplay Design Considerations

CBT has had a long tradition of allowing nearly unlimited placement options for weaponry on ‘Mechs due to the

lack of a visual fidelity requirement. MWLL exists on the other end of that spectrum with very well defined

constraints on what can fit where on a vehicle. In addition to this there is an underlying desire to enforce some

aspect of canonical role to each vehicle for those vehicles that are remembered primarily for being implemented in

a certain way. For example, we want to encourage players to configure canonically energy-based ‘Mechs like the

Novacat or Awesome to be energy platforms and as such they have features like fixed heatsink equipment and a

lack of missile mount points.

The Spaces Build Rules defined within this document will work in tandem with the Tonnage Build Rules and an

aesthetic ruleset to create the framework for an eventual ‘MechLab concept within MechWarrior: Living Legends.

THE RULE OF SPACES

Similar to the system of “critical spaces” that was used by Classic BattleTech to determine the available equipment

and weaponry loadout for a vehicle, the MechWarrior: Living Legends build rules concept uses a spaces concept in

combination with the visual size attribute. MWLL separates spaces into two major categories: weapon spaces and

equipment spaces. Within the equipment category there are three types of equipment spaces: general, electronic

and mobility.

Weapon Spaces

Weapon spaces are determined at the pod mount or hard mount slot location. If a pod mount is defined to have 6

weapon spaces then the weapon slots within the pod cannot have spaces totaling more than the weapon spaces of

the mount itself. If a pod mount can utilise a Large Tripod then each of the weapon slots within the pod will be

allocated 2 weapon spaces apiece.

Given the need to restrict weaponry selections on certain platforms for balance reasons, missile weaponry uses a

separate but parallel weapon space system that may differ in value for a given mount location. The Catapult

External Mount and Shiva Hard Mount examples below will give further insight into this design decision.

Each weapon mount capable of mounting weapons pods and/or missiles will have a list of allowed weapons pods,

the weapon spaces for the mount and the weapon spaces for each weapon slot. Additionally, any mutual

exclusivity between a Weapon Pod and a Missile Pod would be defined via an MU attribute.

By defining the list of allowed pods for a platform we can ensure that the pods work aesthetically with the vehicle

(mounting in the correct locations, no clipping, etc.) and handle the circumstance when a pod mounting location

would look incorrect if too small a pod was affixed (ex. a Small Basic Pod attached to the right arm of a Mk2 would

look ridiculous).

The ability to define a specific pod set for each mounting location of a vehicle can be used as a balancing tool to

restrict or allow access to certain pods. This also gives us the flexibility to define more pods at a later time if we do

not currently have a pod and the related helpers defined for a vehicle.

The following example illustrates how this would be managed in an Excel spreadsheet format:

LOCATION POD SLOT SIZE SPACES

Right Arm Pod 1

Assault Basic Pod Assault 6

Crusader Pod Large 4

Medium 2

Large Basic Pod Large 6

Medium Basic Pod Medium 6

Medium Bipod Medium 3

Medium 3

Medium Tripod

Medium 2

Medium 2

Medium 2

Small Quadripod

Small 2

Small 2

Small 1

Small 1

Small Tripod

Small 2

Small 2

Small 2

Small Bipod Small 3

Small 3

Small Basic Pod Small 6

And in an XML data structure inherent to the vehicle script file:

<Mount id="idComponentRightArmP1" weaponspaces="6" name="right-arm-P1" mu="right-arm-M1"> <Pods> <Pod name="Assault Basic Pod" weaponslots="1" geometry="Objects/objects_mwll/Weapons/Modular_Weapons/Pods/Assault_Basic_Pod.cgf"> <Slot name="assault1" spaces="6" size="Assault" helper="idGunMountL_F1"> </Pod> <Pod name="Crusader Pod" weaponslots="2" geometry="Objects/objects_mwll/Weapons/Modular_Weapons/Pods/Crusader_Pod.cgf"> <Slot name="large1" spaces="4" size="Large" helper="idGunMountL_F1"> <Slot name="small1" spaces="2" size="Small" helper="idGunMountS_F2"> </Pod> <Pod name="Large Basic Pod" weaponslots="1" geometry="Objects/objects_mwll/Weapons/Modular_Weapons/Pods/Large_Basic_Pod.cgf"> <Slot name="large1" spaces="6" size="Large" helper="idGunMountL_F1"> </Pod> <Pod name="Medium Basic Pod" weaponslots="1" geometry="Objects/objects_mwll/Weapons/Modular_Weapons/Pods/Medium_Basic_Pod.cgf"> <Slot name="medium1" spaces="6" size="Medium" helper="idGunMountM_F1"> </Pod> <Pod name="Medium BiPod" weaponslots="2" geometry="Objects/objects_mwll/Weapons/Modular_Weapons/Pods/Medium_BiPod.cgf"> <Slot name="medium1" spaces="3" size="Medium" helper="idGunMountM_F1"> <Slot name="medium2" spaces="3" size="Medium" helper="idGunMountM_F2"> </Pod> <Pod name="Medium TriPod" weaponslots="3" geometry="Objects/objects_mwll/Weapons/Modular_Weapons/Pods/Medium_TriPod.cgf"> <Slot name="medium1" spaces="2" size="Medium" helper="idGunMountM_F1"> <Slot name="medium2" spaces="2" size="Medium" helper="idGunMountM_F2"> <Slot name="medium3" spaces="2" size="Medium" helper="idGunMountM_F3"> </Pod> <Pod name="Small QuadriPod" weaponslots="4" geometry="Objects/objects_mwll/Weapons/Modular_Weapons/Pods/Small_QuadriPod.cgf"> <Slot name="small1" spaces="2" size="Small" helper="idGunMountS_F1"> <Slot name="small2" spaces="2" size="Small" helper="idGunMountS_F2"> <Slot name="small3" spaces="1" size="Small" helper="idGunMountS_F3"> <Slot name="small4" spaces="1" size="Small" helper="idGunMountS_F4"> </Pod> <Pod name="Small TriPod" weaponslots="3" geometry="Objects/objects_mwll/Weapons/Modular_Weapons/Pods/Small_TriPod.cgf"> <Slot name="small1" spaces="2" size="Small" helper="idGunMountS_F1"> <Slot name="small2" spaces="2" size="Small" helper="idGunMountS_F2"> <Slot name="small3" spaces="2" size="Small" helper="idGunMountS_F3">

</Pod> <Pod name="Small BiPod" weaponslots="2" geometry="Objects/objects_mwll/Weapons/Modular_Weapons/Pods/Small_BiPod.cgf"> <Slot name="small1" spaces="3" size="Small" helper="idGunMountS_F1"> <Slot name="small2" spaces="3" size="Small" helper="idGunMountS_F2"> </Pod> <Pod name="Small Basic Pod" weaponslots="1" geometry="Objects/objects_mwll/Weapons/Modular_Weapons/Pods/Small_Basic_Pod.cgf"> <Slot name="small1" spaces="6" size="Small" helper="idGunMountS_F1"> </Pod> </Pods> </Mount>

In summary, the determination of weapon placement for a given pod is a combination of:

The mount point weapon spaces

The number of weapon slots in the pod

The weapon spaces allocated to each slot

The visual size of the weapon slots within the pod

Put as a written example, assuming the player chose to fix an Assault Basic Pod on the Right Arm of the vehicle

example above it would allow this ‘Mech to mount a single ASSAULT sized weapon of up to 6 weapon spaces. This

would allow the Right Arm to hold a Clan Gauss Rifle (ASSAULT, 6 spaces), a Clan ERPPC (ASSAULT, 2 spaces) but

NOT allow for the Clan LBX20 (ASSAULT, 9 spaces) or the Clan UAC20 (ASSAULT, 8 spaces).

The “One Step Down” Size Rule

For reasons of performance and visual fidelity, weapons pods and slots within MWLL generally allow a “size minus

1” rule for placement of weapons within a Weapon Gun Slot. By this I mean that an ASSAULT sized slot may

contain either ASSAULT sized weapons or LARGE sized weapons (assuming that the Weapon Spaces allow for them

to be affixed in the given location). The placement of the helper for an ASSAULT sized weapon within a Weapon

Pod or Fixed Gun Slot will allow a LARGE sized weapon to be placed there without overt aesthetic detriment (aka

“looks ok”). If a MEDIUM or SMALL weapon were affixed to the helper for an ASSAULT gun slot then the weapon

geometry would not be placed appropriately and result in problems like the weapon not protruding sufficiently

from the vehicle or pod geometry (see visual examples below).

Here the left arm of a Mk2 “B” contains an ASSAULT sized weapon, the CUAC20 within the Barrage Pod.

Assault weapon in ASSAULT helper location

Replacing this weapon with a Large Beam Laser yields an acceptable visual result still using the ASSAULT helper

within the Assault Basic Pod.

Large Weapon in ASSAULT helper location

However, if we place a Small Beam Laser using the ASSAULT weapon helper the weapon geometry no longer

sufficiently protrudes from the pod geometry and visual fidelity is lowered.

Small Weapon in ASSAULT helper location

In summary for this facet of the rules:

A SIEGE slot can hold SIEGE and ASSAULT sized weapons

An ASSAULT slot can hold ASSAULT and LARGE sized weapons

A LARGE slot can hold LARGE and MEDIUM sized weapons

A MEDIUM slot can hold MEDIUM and SMALL sized weapons

A SMALL slot can hold SMALL weapons only

There may be specific overrides on the hard mount slots of certain platforms that allow for a “Two Step Down”

allowance; a good example of this is the 4x Light Gauss Fafnir which mounts Light Gauss Rifles (LARGE weapon) in

the left and right torso hard mount slots (SIEGE sized slots).

Equipment Spaces

Equipment spaces are assigned to the vehicle as a whole and not specific to physical location or vehicle

component, as such they are tracked logically within the implementation of the vehicle. When equipped some

optional equipment does have a physical presence (ex. LAMS) represented by additional geometry affixed to the

base vehicle geometry. The rules governing the placement and display of these items will be defined in a later

document and are not relevant for the core build rules implementation.

Some equipment types cannot be fitted on certain platforms (ex. Jumpjets unavailable on certain ‘Mechs), or only

a certain number of an equipment entities or entity classes can be fitted (ex. Maximum of two AMS unit on a

Morrigu tank). These will be governed by XML allow or quantity attributes as in the following example:

<JumpJet Allow=”1”> <AMSEquipment AllowQuantity=”2”> <CoolantPod AllowQuantity=”3”>

A vehicle is defined with a total number of equipment spaces. Each equipment space is assigned a type of general,

electronic or mobility.

The following table defines the values for Equipment Type, Spaces and EquipmentClass:

Item Equipment Spaces Type EquipmentClass

(C3) C3 Master Computer 2 electronic

(C3S) C3 Slave Unit 1 electronic

(GECM) Guardian ECM 2 electronic

(AECM) Angel ECM 2 electronic

(BAP) Beagle Active Probe 2 electronic

(BHP) Bloodhound Probe 3 electronic

(CPOD) Coolant Pod 2 regular coolantpod

(HCPOD) Heavy Coolant Pod 3 regular coolantpod

(AMS 1) Laser Anti-Missile System, Tier 1 1 regular ams

(AMS 2) Laser Anti-Missile System, Tier 2 2 regular ams

(AMS 3) Ballistic Anti-Missile System, Tier 3 2 regular ams

Enhanced Optics (5x Zoom) 1 regular

(HS) Heat Sink 1 regular hs

(DHS) Double Heat Sink 2 regular hs

Additional Ammo Ton 1 regular ammo

CASE Ammo Ton 2 regular ammo

Jump Jets - Light 2 mobility jumpjet

Jump Jets - Medium 3 mobility jumpjet

Jump Jets - Heavy 4 mobility jumpjet

Jump Jets - Assault 5 mobility jumpjet

MASC - Light 2 mobility

MASC - Medium 3 mobility

MASC - Heavy 4 mobility

MASC - Assault 5 mobility

The following is an example vehicle allocation of Equipment Spaces for a random Light ‘Mech:

Space Type

1 General

2 General

3 General

4 General

5 General

6 General

7 Electronic

8 Electronic

9 Electronic

10 Electronic

11 Mobility

12 Mobility

Placement of equipment within the slots is governed by the following rules:

Electronic Equipment can only be fitted into Electronic Equipment Spaces

Mobility Equipment can only be fitted into Mobility Equipment Spaces

General Equipment may be fitted into any Equipment Spaces

Some equipment is considered FIXED and cannot be removed or changed to a different space on the

vehicle.

Knowing the above, this example Light ‘Mech might configure their Prime variant equipment as follows:

Space Type Usage

1 General HS

2 General HS

3 General HS

4 General HS

5 General HS

6 General

7 Electronic BAP (1 of 2 spaces)

8 Electronic BAP (2 of 2 spaces)

9 Electronic HS

10 Electronic HS

11 Mobility MASC (1 of 2 spaces)

12 Mobility MASC (2 of 2 spaces)

The fixed equipment spaces are used to help enforce canonical vehicle roles by forcing the placement of things like

heatsinks for platforms like the Novacat, Morrigu and Awesome or ammo storage locations for platforms like the

Demolisher and Mauler.

CONCEPT OVERVIEW & EXAMPLES

The following examples will illustrate implementations of the MechWarrior: Living Legends Weapon Spaces

Concept and their application towards balance and design goals of the MWLL project.

Example 1 – Uller Clan Light ‘Mech Arm

In this example, we will show the mutual exclusivity feature of the build rules as it applies to placing either a

Weapon Pod or a Missile Pod on the right “arm” mounting point of an Uller ‘Mech.

LOCATION TYPE MAX POD SIZE

MAX WEAPON SIZE

WEAPON SPACES

MAX MISSILE SIZE

MISSILE SPACES MU DESCRIPTION

RA P1 POD ASSAULT ASSAULT 6 n/a n/a RA M1 Right Arm Pod Mount

RA M1 MISSILE n/a n/a n/a LARGE 3 RA P1 Right Arm Missile Mount

Here we are showing that the Right Arm mounting location is actually described by two mutually exclusive

locations noted as “RA P1” and “RA M1” which are marked as mutually exclusive to one another in the “MU”

column. Note that the weapon spaces vary based on the selection of Weapon Pod versus Missile Pod which will be

used as a balancing mechanism to further influence canonical roles of vehicles. In the case that a vehicle simply

should not mount a Missile Pod in a Weapon Pod location no missile mount parameters will be defined, the

reverse may also be true.

Example 2 – Catapult External/Arm Pods

In this example we will show the difference in allocation of weapon spaces when fitting a weapon pod versus a

missile pod.

LOCATION TYPE MAX POD SIZE

MAX WEAPON SIZE

WEAPON SPACES

MAX MISSILE SIZE

MISSILE SPACES MU DESCRIPTION

RA P1 POD ASSAULT ASSAULT 6 n/a n/a RA M1 Right Arm Pod Mount

RA M1 MISSILE n/a n/a n/a SIEGE 15 RA P1 Right Arm Missile Mount

The Catapult highlighted one of major concerns in designing the spaces build rules concept and led to the

development of separate treatment of missiles from all other weapon types. If the Catapult External/Arm pods

had been allocated 15 weapon spaces but no differentiation was made between “regular” weapons and missile

weaponry then the Catapult would have been capable of mounting an Improved Heavy Gauss (13 spaces) since it

requires 15 spaces to be capable of mounting the Arrow IV missile system. By logically separating the missile

weapon spaces into their own category and assigning different values based on missile versus weapon pod this

concern has been allayed.

Example 3 – Shiva Hard Mounts

LOCATION TYPE MAX POD MAX WEAPON WEAPON MAX MISSILE MU DESCRIPTION

SIZE SIZE SPACES MISSILE SIZE

SPACES

W P1 POD SIEGE SIEGE 11 n/a n/a W M1 Right Wing Pod Mount 1

W M1 MISSILE n/a n/a n/a ASSAULT 8 W P1 Right Wing Missile Mount 1

Although using a single weapon space system would have disallowed the Shiva from mounting the Arrow IV missile

system we wanted to still allocate sufficient weapon spaces to allow the aerospace platform to be able to mount

the canonical 2x Heavy Gauss Rifle configuration if the player so desired.

Example 4 – Blood Asp and Fafnir Arms - Multiple Helper Configuration Profile

The Clan Blood Asp Assault ‘Mech uses a custom arm pod that allows for two mutually exclusive weapon slot

configurations (profiles) within a single instance of the weapon pod geometry. This yields a performance savings in

only needing to load the geometry and textures for a single pod.

The Blood Asp arm profiles are as follows:

1x LARGE slot, 2x SMALL slots

1x LARGE slot, 1x MEDIUM slot

Blood Asp Arm Pod Profiles

The Fafnir takes this concept of single pod geometry using multiple profiles one step further by having three

possible configurations:

1x ASSAULT slot

2x MEDIUM slots

4x SMALL slots

EXAMPLE VEHICLE CONFIGURATION PROFILE

The following is an example vehicle configuration showing the definition of Weapon Spaces, Equipment Spaces and

allowed pods for an Inner Sphere Uziel Medium ‘Mech.

Pod and Slot Definition Table:

LOCATION TYPE

MAX POD SIZE

MAX POD SLOTS

MAX WEAPON SIZE

WEAPON SPACES

MAX MISSILE SIZE

MISSILE SPACES MU DESCRIPTION

RA P1 POD LARGE 2 LARGE 5 n/a n/a RA M1 Right Arm Pod Mount

LA P1 POD LARGE 2 LARGE 5 n/a n/a LA M1 Left Arm Pod Mount

RA M1 MISSILE n/a n/a n/a MEDIUM 3 RA P1 Right Arm Missile Mount

LA M1 MISSILE n/a n/a n/a MEDIUM 3 LA P1 Left Arm Missile Mount

RT S1 SLOT SMALL 1 SMALL 1 n/a n/a Right Torso Small Hard Slot

LT S1 SLOT SMALL 1 SMALL 1 n/a n/a Left Torso Small Hard Slot

CT S1 SLOT ASSAULT ASSAULT 7 n/a n/a CT M1

CT M1 MISSILE n/a 1 n/a n/a LARGE CT S1

Right & Left Arm Pod Definition:

LOCATION POD SLOT SIZE SPACES

RA P1

Large Basic Pod Large 5

Medium Basic Pod Medium 5

Medium Bipod Medium 3

Medium 2

Medium Tripod

Medium 2

Medium 2

Medium 1

Small Tripod

Small 2

Small 2

Small 1

Small Bipod Small 3

Small 2

Small Basic Pod Small 5

LA P1

Large Basic Pod Large 5

Medium Basic Pod Medium 5

Medium Bipod Medium 3

Medium 2

Medium Tripod

Medium 2

Medium 2

Medium 1

Small Tripod

Small 2

Small 2

Small 1

Small Bipod Small 3

Small 2

Small Basic Pod Small 5

Equipment Slot Definition & Example Values:

Space # Type Prime A B C D E

1 Regular HS AMMO AMMO HS AMMO

2 Regular HS AMMO AMMO HS AMMO

3 Regular HS

4 Regular

5 Regular

6 Electronic BAP BAP BAP GECM

7 Electronic BAP BAP BAP GECM

8 Mobility JJ JJ JJ JJ JJ

9 Mobility JJ JJ JJ JJ JJ

10 Mobility JJ JJ JJ JJ JJ

11 Mobility MASC

12 Mobility MASC

13 Mobility MASC

CONCLUSION

We hope that you have enjoyed this look into the Spaces Concept of the MechWarrior: Living Legends Build Rules

Draft and have a better understanding of our intended design and the implications it has for gameplay and

planned features such as ‘MechLab.