“Quinlan, what do you have?” Seeker Enoch’ voice rang in my ears as I pushed Venom’s myomer, striding on ahead of the rest of the Star.

Seeker Enoch had been right, this was no mountain, nor a standard cache for that matter. The network of tunnels and support structure was gargantuan, spreading throughout the mountain’s hollowed bones like an ancient ant’s nest. Thankfully the frost and cloying cold had been held at bay by the lingering will of the fortification’s systems, keeping the tunnels clear, save for the remaining refuse that filled its many store rooms..

“Another munitions store, Seeker.” I responded finally, panning my floodlights across the pile of all but medieval, decaying munitions before slewing Venom around back the way we had come. “I am on my way ba-...” My voice trailed as the lights fell on a terminal embedded in the wall adjacent to the door’s control panel, the soft flicker of slumbering machinery playing across its display.

“Yeoman?” Enoch grumbled from the main pathway, a note of terse concern in his voice as I stared down at the display. “Yeoman do you copy?”

“A-Aff, Seeker.” I coughed up, reaching to set Venom to a resting state before continuing. “I think I may have found something of use. Dismounting to investigate.”

“Dismou- Yeoman what are y-” The Seeker’s voice fell away as I pulled my neurohelm off and pressed out of Venom’s cockpit, finding the biting cold of the mountain’s guts waiting for me. It was more than cold, the air was dead. Burning, cloying chemical tastes filled my mouth as I drew my first breath outside of Venom’s recycled life support, stinging my tongue and gnawing at my lungs as I coughed away the dust and stale air.

Great Father’s beard I hope he understands.

The machine hummed as I approached, a coughing spluttering hum of an aging and beleaguered system holding on by the last threads of its processors but a hum that told of possibility nonetheless. Seconds turned to minutes as I stared at the dust covered display, a stream of choppy numbers and broken UI flickering on the screen came to an abrupt halt as I reached out to wipe the grime away.

Deafening trumpets filled the room, startling me back a step as the machine burst to life, its interface lighting and flooding the room in stark white. Soon the sound settled, pairing down into a dull thrum that faded into silence as I took another tentative step forward and looked at the secret the interface had held.

“A Map…” My voice tumbled from my lips in a whisper, splashing on the screen before excitement took hold of my gut and drove me on at the realization. “A MAP!”

—

Seeker Enoch had been pleased at my finding, pleased enough to… Overlook my break in command to pursue it; for now at least. But we were moving again, and with a purpose to the movement that we had lacked a mere hour before.

“Eyes up, Yeoman.” The Seeker commanded, his Spartan taking the lead as we rounded the bend towards the space the map had identified as the main hold. “It has been a smooth path to this point, the road is bound to become rough somewhere.”

“Aff, Seeker.” Darius agreed, his Lancelot falling back to join me as the twins advanced, the shattering footfalls of their Kodiaks rattling the ground beneath Venom’s feet. “Quinlan, are there any defenses noted on this map of yo-”

A trio of heavy laser flashes ripped through the darkness, blowing fountains of molten armor from the legs of the man’s Lancelot as the tunnel turned to a fusillade of fire and noise around us. The twins soaked the fire as best as they could while Darius recovered, the roaring bark of their autocannons and howling missile flights searing my ears in the enclosed space.

“On your feet, Darius. stay back to cover the Harbinger and his accompaniment.” Seeker Enoch grunted, his Spartan hoisting the stricken Lancelot to its feet before swinging around to face me. “Quinlan, exploit on Carver and Pauleen’s work.”

“Aff, Seeker.” I nodded, pushing Venom’s engine to its limit as we broke into a sprint and hurtled after the wrecking ball that was the pair of Kodiaks.

The pair went past in a blur, a trail of molten armor and spent casings lit the tunnel behind them as they hammered apart the tide of turrets that had sprung their centuries old trap on us. Smoke roiled and flames clawed at myriad holes in the ceiling, the remnants of turrets hung from their shattered mountings twitched weakly as I screamed past to find my first target in the opening the pair had wrought.

Venom’s targeting computer sang as it found a firing solution, the aim track popping to life on her transpex guiding my hand to scythe a pair of heavy laser turrets from the ceiling in one fell swoop as Yeoman Darius and Seeker Enoch’s fire ripped another pair free. The hall went silent, the deluge of fire fading as the last turret clattered to the ground with an echoing crash at the foot of another set of titanic doors.

“Quinlan?” Carver’s gold and red Kodiak paused a few short strides away, nudging the turret with the tip of the monster’s foot.

“Aff, Carver?”

“Study the map better next time.” He rumbled, a note of amusement in his voice as he ‘patted’ my shoulder with a massive bear claw. “Pauleen does not like surprises.”

“Enough chatter,” Enoch snapped, excitement plain in his voice as his Spartan stepped between the two Kodiaks and raised a hand to wipe the rust and dust from the door, “we have our prize.”

“For better or worse, Seeker.” Darius agreed, his Lancelot limping down the hall all but dragging the dead leg along with it.

“Indeed.” Enoch sighed, his Spartan taking a step back before looking to me. “Yeoman, if you would.”

“Aff, Seeker.” I whispered, flipping Venom’s set to transmit before beaming the codes into the mountain’s systems once more.

The weary groan of ancient metal meeting ancient metal for the first time in centuries reverberated down the hall around us as the doors cracked open, grinding into motion. Light filtered in, dancing and organic as if filtered through a sheet of ice high above. Seeker Enoch’s breath caught on the Commline, the sharp inhale of anticipation meeting with the release of success as we peered into the cavernous hangar that lay before us.

He had been right, the Spheroids had indeed not been here.

Row after row of grime covered tanks, aero assets, and ‘Mechs lined the dropship pads before us leading to a pair of towering Overlord class dropships waiting and ready to be loaded with their ramps down.

“Yeoman Quinlan…” Seeker Enoch’s voice trailed away, a bitter pain lacing the words as he found the rest of them, “what was the last entry on the terminal you had found?”

I stopped, prying my eyes from the trove of history to snap my attention to the Seeker’s question. There had been thousands of entries in the system’s databases. Each a new tidbit of lives gone past that I would certainly revel in reviewing once we were truly well and on our way back to the Scorpion’s embrace. But for now the latest would… do…

“May 18th, 2770. An error report for Carbonyl dichloride in the ventilation scrubbers?” I whispered, my eyes shooting back to the regiment of machines that had waited to embark their ships for the last three and a half centuries. Then I found them.

Bodies.

Thousands of men and women of the SLDF littered the concrete decking before us, what remained of their corpses languishing on the floor or draped over their machines. Thousands of men and women murdered in a mountain by a coward hiding on terra. Murdered by a writ of an order, not by the hand of a warrior.

Seeker Enoch’s voice coughed on the line, the tightness of tears strangling the words. “Great Father…”

— Yeoman Quinlan, Escorpión Imperio, Seeker Galaxy Battle Cobra Pilot, X Configuration. Kalidasa, Free World’s League, May 18th 3139.

—

Howdy ‘Mechwarriros and welcome back to another ‘Mech Overview! Unfortunately I continue to delve into the Omni-Mines, lest my Clan advisor decide to declare a trial of grievance for not ‘properly honoring Kerensky’, or whatever. It’s ok, the Force Marshal said she’d handle it if she did.

Anyhow, this week we’ve got a real idiot of an Omni-Mech that I actually am quite fond of! Behold: The Battle Cobra! A real weirdo of a 40 tonner that has quite the history in the Innersphere! Coming along with the invading Clans the Battle Cobra, called the BC from here on because I don’t wanna type it every time, was a cheap unit to push to the frontline to do whatever given job. While not the best of the invasion era Omni-Mechs it is still an Omni which has a worth all its own as the BC is built quite well to deliver BA and then support them once on target!

After the battle of Tukayyid, and the ComGuards absolutely pasting the fuck out of the Steel Vipers at Devil’s Bath after baiting them back in with one of the funniest bits of BT lore, ComStar elected to use their suddenly plentiful stocks of the BC as the starting point of their efforts to reverse engineer Omni-Mech technology! That’s right, here in the sphere we don’t have trials to get technology, we just beat each other to death and take what’s left over home to figure it out ourselves.

Like real ‘Mechwarriors.

Anyhow, they managed to do an alright job of tearing the things down and putting them back together, enough to make their own BC that ends up being… different which we’ll get to later on. But for now let’s take a look at the real OG!

Battle Cobra. Credit: Rockfish

Chassis

The Battle Cobra is, of course, an Omni-Mech. Which, also of course, means it’s always going to be the exact same frame across the whole series. SO, what is a Battle Cobra? Well, let’s take a look:

40 Tons.
6/9 movement profile.
10 double heat sinks, with all but one in the engine. (It’s in the foot for some fucking reason)
A 240 rated standard fusion engine.
Endo Steel structure.
91%(124 points) of Ferro-Fibrous Armor.
Armor: 11 Arm, 14 Side torso, 16 Center Torso, 17 leg, 9 head, and 5 on all rear torso locations.
14 tons of podspace
Entirely open Side torsos.

Oh yeah, that. The Battle Cobra, and a worrying amount of its cohort configurations, suffer from Crossbow disease and as such do not have anything in their side torsos meaning they can quite easily take CT crits.

That’s not great.

Otherwise though this seems like an alright base point for an omni-mech. Just really hope they don’t have ‘oops my side torsos’-itis!

Variants

These mechs have all been reviewed based on a standard F through S scale, which you can find described on our landing page here (along with all of our other ‘Mech reviews, the name of the box you can buy to get any of the mechs we have covered, and our general methodology).

Prime

Fuck, ‘oops my side torsos’-itis.

The Prime is incredibly straightforward. There is no funny business here. No odd things it is trying to do. No weird tricks up its sleeves. It’s a pair of LPLs and a pair of SPLs with no extra heat sinks. This means it’s movement heat firing off the two big guns or 4+ movement on an alpha.

This is manageable all things considered and gives you a good two-step heat pop firing pattern to go up to 4 over two rounds, drop an LPL and maybe pop the SPLs at something if its in range before getting the other LPL back. I like it but at 1,487 BV it could honestly just be a Cougar Prime and at least have the backup guns in the LRMs.

Those SPLs should be an extra heat sink each… not for the heat, mind you, just to pad the torsos. Would be straight up better, if a touch over sunk.

Liberty’s Rating: C+. The side torso problem really does knock this down a bit for me. If it had traded the SPLs and mounted the extra sinks in the side torsos it’d be like a B just on the back of being a cheap pair of 6/9 cLPLs.

A

Disco’s not dead, it just went on the exodus road wearing snake skin boots!

So someone heard me talking shit about the Prime and decided it’d be funny to not fix the primary issues and instead just do weird shit instead. The A has 4 MPLs and 6 SPLs. All in the arms.

But why?

For 1,466 BV I will admit that this is a nasty light hunter but it does still have the disease and as such is bound to explode in a terrible fusion plasma related fashion at some point. That said it does get to just fire off the MPLs at -4 + Movement every turn which is real cool. If you alpha you go up 8+Movement which is… I mean drop a pair of MPLs and pile on the SPLs if the moment calls for it I suppose?

This thing kills Fire Moths real good if it can get a hold of them I bet.

Liberty’s Rating: C. Put things in the Side Torsos. Stop having them be empty.

B

… Why’d you do this? I mean you can but why did you?

This is a prime but it has one to one swapped the LPLs for ERPPCs.

It still only sinks 20.

Firing both makes you go up 10+movement.

This is 1,892 BV.

Fuck off.

Liberty’s Rating: F. If I wanted to overheat like hell and pay too much BV for something that has a good chance of dying every time it got hit in a side torso I’d grab a 3R Marauder. Note that, despite my love of Marauders and the vast presence of them in the Reaches, I am not doing this.

C

Alright he gets a pass for being funny.

The C mounts up a rather useful ATM-9 with 3 tons of ammo in the left arm supported by a trio of MPLs and an SPL in the right arm. For 1,484 BV I honestly might start running this thing as, without the SPL, it’s heat neutral at a run.

Fragile or not I love cheap ATM caddies that wanna be carrying battle armor into a fight. This thing will come apart, and probably explode, but it’s gonna punch pretty well on the way out and I’m pretty alright with that!

Liberty’s Rating: C+. About as high as I’m comfortable giving something with flat open side torsos that doesn’t blow my socks off. Damn useful little idiot though!

Pirate Battle Cobra. Credit: Lynn B.

F

My god! Things in the torsos! I’m sa- why are you like this?

The F fixes a primary BC problem by filling the torsos, namely with 3 jump jets each giving it a full 6/9/6 movement profile. It then uses the remaining tonnage for a trio of ERMLs and a UAC/5 with one ton of ammo. And no extra sinks.

But why? Firing off everything leaves you at movement minus one. Which means a jumping strike is up 5, this is workable but nothing here wants to be jump firing which means it’s a positioning tool that, being 6/9 in the first place, I don’t think it super needs.

In reality these could’ve been a UAC/10 and some sinks for padding and i'd've been happy.

At 1507 there are worse things, like most Shadow Hawks, but there are also kinda just better Battle Cobras instead

Disappointing.

Liberty’s Rating: D+. It’d be a fine run about machine but as a medium costing 1500 BV with 1 big gun, 3 energy weapons and jumping 6 you’re competing with the Marshal 6FR, and losing. Shoo, vile bucket.

G

Ya know, G for ‘Ginfantry can Go Fuck themselves.’

We’ve found him, lads and lasses. Infantry man has been here. How can we tell?

Two plasma cannons and two flamers backed by a a pair of ERMLS. This thing wipes infantry clean off the face of the board and then tries to fuck around with heat math for a while until someone seems not to annoying to live any more.

An extra heat sink has been added to deal with the extra loading which would be good and cool if not for the fact that it’s in the fucking left leg for some reason. Of course infantry guy couldn’t do that right, he was too afraid of getting leg attacked and pulled into the teeming masses ‘neath his feet.

The extra sink means you have some alright firing runs but no good ‘fuck it’ button to push when the going gets rough that won’t spike your heat. An alpha gives you 8+ movement while just the plasmas and the Lasers will give you 2+ movement. Workable enough and comes with the cool off pattern of either both plasmas and a laser for -1 on the run or both lasers and a plasma for -3 on the run.

Not much damage but for 1593 BV I honestly might start poking this for my next ‘ok but what if I break people’s brains in heat math’ experiment!

Liberty’s Rating: C. I must conduct further mad science for the gram… do kids still say that? Am I old now?

H

BY GOD, USEFUL SIDE TORSO PADDING! THE HEAVY BELLS RING UPON THE HILL FOR A REAL ‘MECH IS BORN!!!

The H is, as per usual, the heavy laser variant. Though in this instance the heavies aren’t taking center stage and are just along for the ride. We’ve got a pair of ERLLs and a pair of normal HMLs out in the arms supported by 14 total heat sinks. These sinks have been added in:

The left leg
The right arm (???)
The right torso
The left torso

Why they didn’t drop all four of them in the torsos for those gigantic air intakes to use I will genuinely never know. That said with 28 heat sinking we’ve got a machine with 2 distinct firing patterns! Both ERLLs will set you at -2 heat on a run while both MHLs and an ERLL will give you heat neutral on a run! Anything beyond that and you’re taking a run up the heat scale to the tune of either +5 or +12 which… Not Great.

For 1,592 BV I quite like this, I don’t know that I’d run it much more than other configs but I can certainly see the use cases for it!

Liberty’s Rating: C+. A real little guy! He does stuff and doesn’t explode when his torsos get breached! Yipee!

I

I is for Incoming!

Two LRM 15s with Artemis V and 2 tons of ammo a piece. The torsos are empty again and it has at most -8 heat.

This is 1,385 BV… Honestly that kinda fucks, might be using this thing.

Liberty’s Rating: B-. Look man Artemis V is fucking sick and something that moves them around like this is very cool.

J

BEHOLD THE CLATTERING WHINE OF THE LITTLE WORLD ENGINE. COWER BEFORE ITS HAILSTORM AS IT BRINGS ABOUT THE END OF THIS, YOUR PRISTINE PAINT JOB!!!

Yea uh… It’s a RAC/2 with two tons of ammo and a pair of ERMPLs. I mean It’s heat neutral at a run with the RAC set to full tilt? I dunno this doesn’t get my goat as much as it would if that was a RAC/5. For 1,272 though I can see it making an alright support piece to some other big backline sniper to try and plink at open holes with?

Genuinely the alternate universe version of this that has a RAC/5 with 2 tons of ammo and a pair of ERMLs is probably just better… if nearly 320 BV more expensive. What? No I definitely didn’t go immediately make that so I could use it. Stop talking, you sound crazy.

Liberty’s Rating: D+. I mean it’s alright enough but man there’s only so much going on here, even for the price.

Jade Falcon Battle Cobra. Credit: Jack Hunter

T

Got computers up in that torso, just doin’ shit.

2 ERLLs, 2 ERSLs, 13 double heat sinks stuck in the arms and legs for some fucking reason, and a TComp in the right torso.

For 1,666 BV I can see some play with this just for being a heat neutral pair of ERLLs with a TC that can, against most targets, control the engagement space to take advantage of that damned good short range.

I dig it.

Liberty’s Rating: B-. I’m a sucker for cERLLs and Snubs and this boyos doing damned good work with them cERLLs. Now if only I could get a clan version with some mixed tech.

X

THE DOCTOR IS IN AND HE’S PUTTING ON A CLINIC ON WEIRD SHIT. DO YOU WANT EXPLODING LASERS ON A MACHINE THAT DOESN’T COST WHAT IT SHOULD AND IS JUST HITTING YOU AND HITTING YOU AND HITTING YOU A-

The X is my favorite Battle Cobra. If I put a Battle Cobra to a table it is probably an X. This is because only building 1 Heat at a run to spear 5 god damned medium heavy lasers into someone’s back is hilarious.

And doing it for a mere 1,492 BV is even funnier.

18 double heat sinks, of which SOMEHOW none ended up in the right torso support 5 iHMLs and a targeting computer to make 35/36 heat. Throw a run on there and you’ve got a recipe for 4 turns of being an asshole before, oh deary me, you have to drop a laser. In most cases this thing, or its target, is fucking dead by then.

This machine fucks. It Fucks hard. The amount of times I’ve sent one behind a big heavy and just chokeslammed it into the core of earth borders on a crime. If you want a fun and idiotic Battle Cobra this here is your man.

Liberty’s Rating: A. I don’t even care about the empty side torso here if I’m honest. That is 50 accurate, heat manageable damage that can just scream into position with a reliable 3 TMM for fucking budget prices. Thing’s awesome.

Battle Cobra BTL-C-2O

Remember how I was talking about ComStar just stealing a shitload of these off the Steel Vipers? Yea… this is what they did with them.

Using entirely IS tech they rebuilt the Battle Cobra from the ground up to make a real weird dude. Coming in as another 40 tonner there are some key differences here:

15 Tons of Pod space, up 1 on the perfidious clanners
A hard mounted double heat sink in each side torso
A fully used left torso that is consuming most of the IS Endo and Ferro slots
Only 3 slots left in the right torso
A 5/8 movement profile by using a smaller IS 200 rated SFE
91%(125 points) of Ferro-Fibrous Armor. This extra armor is making the CT 17 now.
Hard mounted C3i in the CT

So, what strange configs did the telephone company, and their terroristic spinoff, come up with?

-2O

Second verse just about the same as the first?

This is, essentially, just the old Prime but IS grade and with an extra heat sink/C3i. A pair of IS LPLs fills out the arms and uh… that’s it. As a C3i spotter I think a heat neutral on the run pair of LPLs probably does a damned good job.

Especially when it only costs 944 BV and has things to crit in the side torsos.

Oh yea, that’s a whole thing about these, they’re fucking capital C Cheap.

Liberty’s Rating: B. I like him, cheap, effective, dumb. Probably pretty good in a non C3i force as a blocking or reactive light screen.

-2OA

EWAR is the best War!

1,113 BV can buy you a lot of friends, a lot of real weird friends that make strange noises and bad negi vibes.

A TAG in the right arm
3 Medium Lasers in the right arm
An ECM Suite in the right arm
3 MPLs in the left arm
An SPL in the left arm
A Beagle Active Probe in the left arm.

That’s the lot of them.

Also the C3i is, obviously, still here which makes this a self protecting C3i spotter with some pretty alright short range weapons! An alpha on the run builds 3 heat so drop the SPL and only go up one. Not bad for the price if you need something to make some noise and spot some targets!

Liberty’s Rating: C+. Good EWAR mech usually doesn’t necessarily make for a great ‘Mech but that many medium and medium pulse lasers buys a little good will on my end.

Lynn's Rating: B in a C3i network. This thing is as slow and flimsy as all the other Spheroid Battle Cobras, but the expanded EWAR package is very useful in a C3i net, at least if you're playing with ECCM rules so the ECM can help protect the network, and the OA has a great set of guns to get a boost from more mobile (or simply opportunistically-positioned) members of its Level II: IS MPLs are a lot less laughable when their party zone can extend to six hexes.

-2OB

Look he’s trying his best…

For 895 BV you too could be the proud user of… 4 MRM 10s? WITH 3 WHOLE TONS OF AMMO???

Damn, the guard was out here planning to be in some long term campaigns with this one. I think as a cheap chip in asset this could make a good friend to any number of other weirdo C3i ‘Mechs but more importantly we’re shaping up the real beauty of the ComStar Battle Cobra:

The fact that they make a C3i Level II all their own.

This thing just kinda keeps shooting MRM10s at you until you make it stop. With 16 heat from guns, ammo for 18 full salvos, and 20 sinking it tapes down the firing button and waits until the bins go dry or it comes apart!

Liberty’s Rating: C. I mean honestly for the price I can’t hate him.

Lynn: I'd like the OB better if the OE wasn't there singing siren songs of potential, but it'll definitely have more of a place when/if the new core book MRM buffs go through.

Wolf's Dragoons Battle Cobra. Credit: Jack Hunter

-2OC

NARCing you and NARCing you and NARCing you and NARCing you a-

It’s 2 iNARCs with 5 tons of ammo and that’s it.

This is 726 BV. I dunno man go be a dick with the weird ammo types and bully people to death about it. This has the chance to be simultaneously hilarious and also idiotically useless depending on the present lists..

Liberty’s Rating: Superposition between D and B. If you take it build around it and give it a bunch of weirdo asshole ammo types to bully your opponent with because once that first NARC hits you probably won’t need the rest of them.

Lynn: If you haven't played with Haywire Pods, they are among the most annoying things you can do to your opponent in the game of BattleTech, and they're good against literally any opposition that isn't running a pure melee strat. ECM pods can also situationally be an amazing debuff, Nemesis pods are hilarious (not good, but hilarious), and hey, worst case scenario if this mech flings Explosive pods it can do 12 damage, which is better than some 700 BV mechs! Don't run this mech in any situation where you can only bring regular iNarc pods, but if the special pods are on the table you can definitely have a fun time.

-2OD

BEHOLD MY DELUGE OF LIGHTNING. I AM MIN-TRO ZEUS, THE KING OF THE LITTLE SPARK!!!

Yea so this is 4 Light PPCs and a targeting computer. It builds movement heat and is incredibly funny. Would make for a very good plink truck as a back actor in a C3i force. At 1,221 BV it’s not a terribly noticeable dent in your BV and should be some consistent chip damage to whittle away at things while the rest of your force distracts them!

Liberty’s Rating: B-. I’m a sucker for Light PPCs and Targeting computers. Sue me.

-2OE

Would you like… missiles?

Two MML9s and 3 tons of ammo. That’s it, that’s the loadout. It’s 840 BV.

And it scares me.

I like this, I like this a lot more than I should and I will be running it. It’s down 8 heat on a running alpha and has the extra ton to give you play choice for throwing in oddball ammo if you want to.

Shit’s cash.

Liberty’s Rating: B+. Cheap. Useful. MMLs. I can’t ask for much more in life and I’m surprised I haven’t used this little shit yet.

Lynn: God I love this thing. B+ is right. It dies quick, but if it gets to SRM range for at least one turn of firing before it dies it can easily make its paltry BV back. It's also one of the most efficient machines in the game for cooking Battle Armor squads as long as they aren't fire-resistant.

-2OF

I WIELD THE FIRE OF THE GODS! PROMETHEUS IS MY NAME AND SLINGING PLASMA IS MY GAME!

Two Plasma Rifles and 3 tons of ammo that build movement heat for 1300 BV is honestly pretty sick. I like it, I like it alot.

Liberty’s Rating: B-. I will be running this and annoying people with it… if only this thing showed up in more places once ComStar and the WoB fell apart.

BTL-C-2O… II?

OK, SO. From here on we’ve got a change that’s been made: There is no C3i anymore. The Kell Hounds decided they quite liked the ComStar Battle Cobra and restarted production without the warcrime box in it and started selling them on the open market!

So, what does that lack of a C3i get us? Well… its 2.5 tons… fuck else’d you expect?

---

Lynn: Actually, the Battle Cobra isn't merely two mechs in a trench coat, it's three mechs in a trench coat! That hard-mounted C3i naturally became a liability for the IS Battle Cobra after the whole Word of Blake... unpleasantness, but, as hard-mounted equipment on an OmniMech, it couldn't technically be removed without a full rebuild. Arc-Royal MechWorks, who had partnered with the non-Blakist elements of ComStar to keep the BTL-C-2O in production after the Blakists leveled its original factory, chose to make this modification, and an altered version of the chassis entered service with the Kell Hounds, though, confusingly, its alphanumeric designation didn't change. Configurations G-J all describe the "new" version of the BTL-C-2O rather than the ComStar original, and technically aren't interchangeable with the O-F configurations.

Sadly(?), when the Jade Falcons took Arc Royal they reconfigured the production line to produce the original ClanSpec Battle Cobra rather than the IS BC, so while this mech is still in circulation, it's on a path to slow extinction. The Clan version is "better" in some regards, but I'll miss the incredibly cheap BV cost, more being-an-annoying-shit-centric loadouts, and side torso heat sinks of the IS chassis.

Maybe we can get some funny MixTech configs of the original from the Kell Hounds at some point, though?

Clan Jade Falcon Gamma Galaxy Battle Cobra. Credit: Valk.

-2OG

Oh hell yea, now we’re speaking my language.

11 Double Heat sinks, a snub nose PPC, a Plasma rifle with two tons of ammo, and a pair of machine guns, all out in the arms. Also a CASE II’d half ton of ammo in the Right Torso.

Heat neutral firing both off at a run is pretty good on a pair of my favorite weapons with a pair of MGs for activities when things get in close is pretty alright by me! For a stomachable 1,217 BV I think this guy could be right at home in plenty of IS merc commands!

Liberty’s Rating: C+. I dig it, I will be using it.

-2OH

Heavy Lase- oh no wait… Thunderbolt?

So, a Thunderbolt 15 in the right arm with 3 tons of ammo in a CASE protected bay in the right torso. Backed by a trio of IS ERMLs and the standard 10 DHS. An alpha strike, as odd as it may be, with this puts you to 2+ Movement which is manageable enough. I quite like the thing and usually end up tossing it out as a funny ‘am I gonna get your head’ machine that never fails to at least be funny in how it stops existing. If the ammo cooks off it just becomes a trio of ERMLs which is fine enough as a degraded state for the 1,305 BV you pay for it.

Liberty’s Rating: C. Relying on the Thunderbolt as your primary isn’t usually the best bet but for the price this weirdo budget head capper is quite entertaining!

-2OI

… Yea bud?

Ok, so this is a bunch of weirdos, one sec:

An iNARC with 3 tons of ammo spread across the right arm and right torso.
A 2 pack of SRM 4s in the left arm, with its ammo in the right torso’s CASE II bay.
A pair of left arm mounted Medium Lasers.
A Laser AMS in the CT.

This is only +1 heat on the run if the LAMS gets activated so otherwise it’s down on heat a considerable amount. For 1,019 BV if you want an iNARC carrier that can do more than just sling iNARCs I suppose this is a pretty alright choice!

Liberty’s Rating: C, also known as the midpoint between D and B!

Lynn: There are only ten canon units that mount iNARC launchers after the Jihad (one of them a Unique Solaris mech), and this is the cheapest mech in that number. That alone gives the OI a place to shine!

-2OJ

Sargent… I think the new laser is giving me cancer again…

Alright, time to get weird with it. The J here has a whole lot of fun toys and odd choices that culminate in a 5/8(10) movement profile packing a whole pile of oddball guns, namely:

A Large Re-engineered laser
A Medium Re-engineered laser
A normal ERML
2 M-PODs
A Targeting computer

This builds movement heat firing everything off… Shit I might have to use this. I adore M-pods for the one off pop of crit seeking they represent and I think they might be an under utilized asset in mech design personally. Being able to get right up on someone and pop a free LB-15 off at them is very funny and something I wish to do more of. Pair that with the -2 to hit on the RE Lasers and the -1 on the ERML and you’ve got a very interested Liberty. Every now and again you drop the Medium RE laser to dump your heat back out but largely this thing is all gas and no brakes until someone puts them to you!

At 1,269 BV this pile of odd balls looks awfully appetizing.

Liberty’s Rating: B. I like him… gonna have to play with him a little to see if he works as well as I think he would as a Hammer Head hunter.

Final Thoughts

I quite like Battle Cobras! New and old they've got plenty of odd fun and weird configs to play around with! I don’t really have anything I think is missing beyond a mixed tech variant for both chassis. Give me one of those and we’re golden.

Lynn: The thing about Battle Cobras is that they're all here for a good time rather than a long time, but they come in BV-cheap enough - especially in the Spheroid flavor - that it really doesn't matter that they'll pop sooner or later. For as long as you can keep them alive, they can offer remarkably cost-effective firepower!

Until next time! Fair weather, good seas, and happy taking-the-god-damned-bait-ing!

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