I dunno, after playing MW5 and Battletech I can agree with some of the OPs points. However I think there are a few that I believe are a very serious.
1) Ai.. or more importantly the lack of i (intelligence). Seriously, you can tell its definately in a MW title when the AI in 5th game is every bit as stupid as it was in 4 and 3. Seriously, even same tactics and NPC fitting styles work. Grab the tankiest brawler mech and give that to your NPCs because the "Geniuses" will get horribly violated in just about anything that isn't meant to be shot in the face by a whole platoon. Weapon loadouts? Hah! I sure hope you weren't expecting NPC to use that LRM20 on the archer, cause he will..... first 2 times before he gets into point blank range of a jenner/spyder/cicada and gets circled to death. Leaving you to LeBron James the whole mission by your lonely self, because a couple of lights or worse..... tanks... managed to kill the lance because you didn't manage to kill 98% of what spawned on you (more on that later) just 95%. I am starting to think that the title of the game should of been "Mech Warrior 5: Slackers". Because it feels like Ai NPCs just do things to make it look like they are helping by focusing on your target, only to miss a stationary Banshee with their volleys standing 400-500 meters away..... seriously....
That really kills the fun since you can't really have diversity in your lance because anything that is not a brawler mech will either be misused or get savagely violated to a point that you'll be forced to sell it in shame. Enemy NPCs aren't any better either, with heavy LRM tanks rushing you to almost point blank or with helicopters for some odd reason deciding that they need to hover 10ft above you in order to slowly shoot you. Seriously, if the game allowed you could probably have the mechwarrior step out of the cockpit for a sec and RPG the stupid things out of the sky since they either present you with their bellies at a hello or just hover stupidly at close range. THATS NOT HOW HELIS FIGHT!
2) NPC Spawns, I love a challenge of hectic fire-fights. But nothing feels like more annoying than 20-30 NPCs spawning right on top of you. I've noticed that in some missions vast majority of enemies you'll fight will show up at the first location of the map. The rest of the way you'll get a trickle here and there. (01/07/2020 so its after the latest patch) Can't tell you enough of how often it happens when I get a mission that I adequately gear for; all optimized only for the targets being 2 turrnets 2 light tanks at location A. Then in a span of about a min it become 7 turrets (I am starting to think that it Battletech universe they mount turrets everywhere even on outhouses too.) 4 Helis which jetfly toward you when they spawn (you can actually see that happening when you see them spawn). 1 V-tol (oddly enough only NPC I can't complain) and like 7 light tanks 3 LRM tanks 4 Heavy tanks (A/C), 3 light mechs and 1 medium mech. I feel that the entire spawnlist for the mission got dropped on me when I reached that objective, because once I survive that fight, there are hardly any enemies left.
3) Mech gearing, this I agree with you to some extent. While I am not a huge fan of being able to 100% mount anything you want on them, I do think that weapons should at least be segregated to "Launchers" and "Guns" slots. And thats it; nothing is more annoying than me seeing a mech with 2 large gun slots that fits Laser cannons and get irritated that I can't put 2 A/Cs in it, until I find a variant of that mech on sale somewhere through sheer luck. Now with size they can restrict it as they do now, but at least let me put different gun types on mechs.
4) Targeting, I don't know what is up with this game but targeting is very odd. Targets appear and then disappear (you can see this alot with V-tols and Helis when they are flying right at you) making things even more annoying. At first I thought that it is squad-sight of some sort whereas if one of my Lance has eyes on target then maybe I get the coordinates too. (You know to facilitate the use of Support mechs we have in this game) But no, some enemy NPCs just disappear making some other tactics like pop-tarting useless since you can't alway spot them w/out radar signatures. That and when you shoot them they bonzai charge you anyway discouraging those tactics.
5) This is just a personal preference but I'd love to see more mechs, I know there were still a few models that they could've easily added. I know that the battletech universe has a very large list of diverse mechs, I would really love to see them add more mechs to the game outside of the ones that already have been in there since MW1. Especially since both MW and Battletech decided to set their games before the Clan invasion where majority of "Cool" mechs start to appear. ( I miss my madcat and Dire Worlf)
6)What was the point of the ship? I mean it is cool when you spawn into the hangar and you see your mechs towering over you, but other than that..... there is nothing happening. Hell all terminals are the same too, no need to walk anywhere, unless its for that 2-3 min exposition monologue by either your liason or the mechanic. There needs to be something going on with the ship. Does not have to be crazy indeph like Star Citizen levels of crazy, but at least some communication from the crew so that they don't stand there nearly motionless.... staring at you all creepy....
7) Would also be cool if you can see system difficulty and ownership change based on your actions. Help 1 side of the conflict and watch the other escalate things by increasing the mission difficulties, where if you win you see the system change onwership.
8) Auto-replace/spare components. Nothing is more annoying when you get components lost that you have in your inventory but can't keep track of. Should just include "Restock" or something to have the system pull those out and replace what was lost.
9) Have "Some" form of melee. Not cart-Blanche like Battletech, where you can whack a mech with your gun barrel and have it not jam. But there are alot of mechs in the game that have arms that can't equip weapons, but look like they were made to punch things....
10) Balance the salvage vs payout system. Yea, that needs to happen. As of right now, unless you have a very high standing with a faction you are almost 90% better off maxing out payout and using salvage for components that you'll inevitably lose I.E. Med Lasers and heatsinks. Seriously investing into mech salvaging is almost pointless since its not guaranteed (I've had many missions where I took mechs down with very little fatal residual damage, only for them to not show up.) And to get anything even remotely good you need to have insanely large amount of salvage points (20+). Thus normally for optimal play you would invest your negotiations into Payout and repair, and just taking basic salvage.
All said I love MW 5, and glad that it happened. I just feel if they addressed the above points it would be the perfect MW game.
Maybe the modders can get something like this out.
