First off GDN, another excellent video. I have run clan mechs before and went back to IS. I had been playing for 4 or 5 years when FASA launched the clan invasion and had the dubious honor of surviving the role out at convention. It was a time of pain and hate. The novels don't do the hate of the clans we felt Justice and still kinda do honestly. It's a hate of the enemy not his equipment so don't twist it. The Timberwolves are huge targets in the battlefield for a damn good reason! It's murderous! Even a shit pilot will kill with one, an average IS pilot can clear a battlefield by himself with luck and the average or elite clan pilot... Death! It's got 6 tons less armor than an Atlas, 25% more lrm fire than a catapult, as much direct fire pew as a Marauder and moves faster than all of them! And that's just the prime. Is it any wonder a smart commander will single it out? When I'm playing in a timber wolf I prefer the prime or one with jump jets, but honestly configuration doesn't matter to me as much. I have never used a custom pod layout, I have never felt the need to min/max one. I have cleared heavy/assault class lances, head Hunter level II's and demolished open class Solaris battle royal play. Heat can be an issue but when you take a Dashi for an opponent in a trial and core him in 3 rounds without and random crit or head shot nonsense, just straight dakka and only take superficial armor damage that should tell you something. The timber wolf is a sarpurlative fire support mech, missile boat, skirmisher, in fighter and ammo sponge all at once. It can hang with the biggest adults all night and walk out of the bar in the morning. It can duel exceptionally well, it work in team exercises, and it can integrate into mixed units like few others can. I would classify it as a Swiss army knife that you trust more than a dedicated combat knife. In the RPG other than cost and maintaining resupply it has free flaws and can make allot of it's own logistics of in the right theater of battle or in the proper army. Sadly the jihad and war if reaving weren't nice to the Timberwolves. What isn't mentioned in Sarnia is that the ability to produce this icon of icons has been lost even to the clans. That's why the sea fox clan started making money hand over fist with the marcat MK II+ NO ONE in the current pay jihad era can make new Timberwolves! The morning II, III and IV are but shadows of the original imho, though great in their own right. Unless something Canon changes this wonder of war fighting ability is doomed to Extinction. I think personally FASA wrecked a great game and barely managed to save it when they introduced the clans back in the 90's simply by the shear OP of the tech the clans had, that's why I say it was a dubious honor to survive their arrival at convention. It took years and the comguard to stop them (plot reach) giving developers and the franchise a chance to figure out how to save their game. Play test people!!! In the end we have this wonderful design. Fearsome, fast and scary as duck! But it almost destroyed the game before the mechwarror video game every launched. It left is with over twenty years of people screaming for "SHOW ME CLAN MECHS!!" every time a new game drops. No lable has been able to go more than a year or two without flooding itself with clan hardware. How many of you MWO players run anything that's not clan based with any regularity once you have saved the C bills to get it? From the game side of me I won't turn down one of these for anything and might even give you one of my daughters for one. On the 25+ year fan side of me, being on the receiving end of class guns for many years before I could own my own and then quickly not being able to find ANYTHING else in the table top to fight it makes me sad. But in a happy note, I have gotten damn good at crushing clan machines with IS tech and have a very very tough time finding a local gamer willing to play me when I bring clan tech against theirs. If you can command innersphere units and win 25% of the time against clans, you will win 60% of the time clan to clan and 80%+ clan to innersphere. And this is why I believe that the way of reaving and jihad were run, to level the playing field by making the best clan machines either extinct or headed that way to be replaced with lesser designs. The timberwolf unbalanced the game even at a clan perspective, it's just too good in the right hands. Wonderful video GDN, I'm glad it wasn't the first class mech you showed, I would not have minded you clearing out more if the 3025 TRO before you hit the madcat though, it's hard to go back once you had cat!

@GrimDarkNarrator

5 жыл бұрын

Thanks once again, for taking the time to share your very knowledgeable opinion and experiences with these things :)

@snsm6730

3 жыл бұрын

Correct...I started playing when the first boxed Battletech came out...when the only Auto cannon you got was an AC5 8) I remember well my first convention game where clan tech was used, one star against almost a company and VERY unbalanced. Clearly someone at FASA did not understand why you play test ! You are also VERY correct about the aftermath...when you compare a Rakshasa to even the Timber Wolf Prime the unbalance is clear. The Timber Wolf is lethal because, as the commenter above notes, it's FLEXIBLE, it can touch you at range and keep touching as you close. Its armored where it counts and can handle the heat curve very well. It has good mobility even without jump jets. Lets hope for the Inner Spheres sake that the rumors of its production curtailment are indeed true....

Timberwolf pilot approval 👌

I so hope Mechwarrior 5 throws in a clan DLC. I would love to run a MadCat against everything, just messing up metal!

@ImranPangilinan

3 жыл бұрын

Rumor has it they will

@Sigmar_Heldenhammer

3 жыл бұрын

@@ImranPangilinan just got the game on console, really hoping they do.

@chrisgibson8863

3 жыл бұрын

I would use the timberwolf to crush the inner sphere.

@vinnydo314

2 жыл бұрын

I think they said no to clan dlc as they would rather make a new game with them

@bigwavesun

2 жыл бұрын

They might as well do it. The game's timeline continues past 3049 in-game.

My favorite Mech in this setting. The B-29 cockpit design.

@hemidas

5 жыл бұрын

Correction; it's a B-29 cockpit.

I love the MadCat. It feels good to core a mech when you rain down those LRMs on while they can't even see you in MWO. You need good scouts though.

Most iconic mech. Still love it after 30 years.

The greatest representation of the clans in a nut shell. Strong as all hell, versitile and advanced to boot. But held back by self imposed restrictions in production, and being too advanced for its own good and ballooning the price. It's a monster in just about anyone's hands but it was held by over specialized and underprepared fools no where near ready to take on the sheer size of the inner sphere. It might be a chain saw but eventually even it with get tangled up and break down

I love Mad Cat/Timber Wolf. Just iconic and cool. I have multiple miniatures. The metal ones from IWM are challenging to assemble. I have 2 painted in tiger stripes for Clan Wolf and another "Aiden Pryde" for the Jade Falcons Falcon Guard. The new plastic ones from Catalyst are superb. I have one painted for Stacy Church of Wolf's Dragoons, and 2 more I'm painting for Clan Wolf Beta Galaxy.

@GrimDarkNarrator

Жыл бұрын

Thanks for sharing.

Love the mech, hate the heat problems. Both the prime and H variants both suffer from chronic over heating. First experience playing it was way back in MechWarrior 2; where you can play as either Clan Wolf or Jade Falcon during the Refusal War. As for a quick description of what an Omni is; Inner sphere mech weapons and equipment are hardwired in. Clan mechs are modular; think of them as the ultimate plug and play.

@c182SkylaneRG

4 жыл бұрын

Just curious: how do you remember the H-configuration being configured? Because I feel like it changed somewhere between MW2 and MWO...

@gregdomenico1891

4 жыл бұрын

@@c182SkylaneRG sarna.net, the official Wiki. Any recognized cannon config is in there. The H variant runs two LRM 20's, and two Heavy Large laser's. The only time I've seen that version in a novel, was in a battle between I want to say Jade Falcon and Hell's Horses. They had to park the thing in a fountain, because the Heavies were over heating it.

@c182SkylaneRG

4 жыл бұрын

@@gregdomenico1891 Nice. Sounds about right. The first time I ran across the H config, It was described as being "just like the D variant, except the rear-mounted streaks are moved to the front". I feel like such a wordy description could only have come from Sarna, but I'm pretty sure I read it between 10 and 13 years ago, when I was originally playing MW2: GBL. My version wouldn't let me save custom variants, so I was having to learn about stock loadouts real quick.

@gregdomenico1891

4 жыл бұрын

@@c182SkylaneRG If I remember right, all of the Common configurations for MW2 came straight out of the old FASA tech readouts. Game wise, the first (and only time), that I've seen the Heavy Laser's was in Mech Commander 3. I think they have added them into Rogue tech. I don't play MWO anymore, it got too arcade like for me. I stick with Battletech/RougeTech.

@c182SkylaneRG

4 жыл бұрын

@@gregdomenico1891 I'm gonna have to dust off my old Win XP laptop and play MW2 again, to try and refresh my memory. I know in GBL there was a variant of the Mad Cat that had jump jets, but seemed like it still had LRMs and ERLL, rather than the -S variant that we have in the record sheets, today, which is all short ranged. I also know that FASA and Catalyst keep changing things around after the fact, which renders old media inconsistent or obsolete. (The cover of one of the Twilight of the Clans books shows a DWF-B from before they moved the UAC/2's off the shoulder and split them between the side torsos, for example. And even more recently, MWO added the Gargoyle C with 1.5 tons of extra armor to make up for the 3 A-Pods they couldn't add to the legs, and added a fixed Ferro slot to each arm, while the record sheets I have moved those fixed ferro slots to each leg and replaced one of the A-pods with a CT ERSL).

my first time introduced to battletech/mechwarrior 19ish years ago was a 2 meter heavily detailed mode of the timberwolf in a glass case at the entrance to the MW vs pods in the local arcade

@GrimDarkNarrator

5 жыл бұрын

Must've been a cool prop.

@dhellfox

5 жыл бұрын

@@GrimDarkNarrator funny thing i never knew what the mech was called until a year ago. didnt really play mechwarrior till the digital battletech game came out.

I captured two of these from wolf, played around with the load outs and found that I liked having two LRM 15s, Two ER PPCs, Two ER medium lasers, and an SRM plus Jump Jets. One was destroyed the other got shelved around the time my mercenary unit made its treaty with Ghost Bear which shifted us more towards manufacturing and testing new mech designs. Including our prized Arctodus platform which is a modified Kodiak. I think last I did anything with it was tearing parts off of it to put on other mechs.

yes I remember from 20 yrs ago it was called mad cat. battletech was so awesome

❤ My favorite Heavy Mech next to the Maddog. Though Medium Mechs like the Shadowcats are my go to for Medium Striker.

@GrimDarkNarrator

7 ай бұрын

Good choice!

I like the MadCat as much as anyone who played the Super Nintendo game growing up...but looking at it now it just seems so fragile. The joint at the shoulder, elbows, hips, and reverse knees are all so very exposed.

@glytchd

2 жыл бұрын

SATCHLE Charges! :D Infantry, ftw!

The mad cat/timber wolf. Im not a huge battletech fan (a flaw i am working to fix) but this was the one that introduced me to the setting as a child and is still the one i think of the most when i think of a symbol for the setting.

@kinggoten

5 жыл бұрын

I'm a huge fan of the video game series and a few of the novels I can understand why people dislike the Clans but any video game that does not feature the Timber Wolf will be a mistake because for the casual(or even many hardcore fans) it is the symbol of the setting as you say it was on the cover of like 5 differen't video games and said video games are also why a lot of people became fans you can't just ignore that and expect to get by on name along, which is why I am not sure how well MW5 will do, sure pertty much everyone who plays MWO probably pre-ordered but what about the casual who sees an add on steam or youtube they might be like meh big robot game but if they seen the timber wolf it might trigger some chidlhood memories etc..

@GrimDarkNarrator

5 жыл бұрын

@@kinggoten Too bad they could't get it in the newer Battletech game.

Im a big fan of the Timber Wolf back in Mercenaries 4. A good variant that dealt with heat build pretty well was two er medium lasers, a guass rifle in each arm or torso, and srms. Cause the guass rifles didnt really build heat, you could use them to get close and punch holes before unloading a full compliment of missiles at close range. Good video, Id love to see the Daishi or bushwacker at some point too.

This is the mech that made me like giant stompy robots!

Pryde should have stuck with his summoner.

@jasonames145

4 жыл бұрын

@James G True. Loved that character :)

This is my favourite clan mech

Favorite clan machine❤️

The Timber Wolf was my favorite clan mech, when I started with battletech. I wanted to order a mini of it, but it was unavailable at the time and I took a summoner instead. I got one some time later, but it stayed part of my rpg character to have been unlucky and not being receiving a Timberwolf and having to pilot a summoner instead...

@GrimDarkNarrator

3 жыл бұрын

Thanks for sharing :)

@bombomos

3 жыл бұрын

Hahah that's a great backstory

Gdn I just wanted to say thank you I remember playing mechwarriors in the 90s on the computer I enjoy the lure about all the mechs I have listened to your five book series you did on the grey skulls and enjoyed it I enjoy your narration very very much. And I look forward to more of your books thank you for all the lore and all the time and effort you put into it thanks again and please keep it up

@GrimDarkNarrator

5 жыл бұрын

Thanks.

I think it’s great from a visual design perspective. It’s got that animal appearance with the reverse-jointed legs and low “head,” but then those arms make it look so alien and weird like the ED-209 you can’t help but love it. Having only ever played Mechwarrior games, though, I prefer some of the other heavy mechs. I don’t mind trading speed for the additional firepower or protection. I guess I’m a Lyran at heart.

@GrimDarkNarrator

5 жыл бұрын

Respect :)

I play as clan ghost bear in the battletech the timberwolf is alway my go to heavy mech it punches way above its weight

Omnimechs: Legos with guns.

@6msrct

2 жыл бұрын

Tex talk

I do love Clan mechs. They are pretty handy once you clean the trash out of the cockpit.

@richardvaldes3959

5 жыл бұрын

Lol always aim for cockpits

@GrimDarkNarrator

5 жыл бұрын

Cleanup on Clan Aisle 7

After almost 30 years, still the best Heavy 'Mech in the game IMO. A perfect blend of speed, pod space and armor. It's pretty telling that the Inner Sphere's attempt to duplicate it, the Rakshasa, fall very short, but still ended up making a pretty good Heavy (with some heat issues). Do its Medium counterpart, the Stormcrow (Ryoken). Or my favorite, the Summoner (Thor).

@gregdomenico1891

5 жыл бұрын

I'd like to see him do it's big brother, the Dire Wolf( Daishi) when he gets to assaults. Summoners are nice, but just not enough pod space for me. Personal preference for me is the Warhawk; 4 er ppcs tied into a clan targeting computer can really ruin someone's day!

@GrimDarkNarrator

5 жыл бұрын

@@gregdomenico1891 The Daishi is a favourite of mine. too.

@Mugdorna

5 жыл бұрын

Loved the WarHawk since reading the Black Thorns book. Used it a lot while playing MechCommander back in the day. PPCs were so OP in MechCommander.

@gregdomenico1891

5 жыл бұрын

@@Mugdorna yeah, when that Warhawk blew away the Stinger in the first novel, all I could say was ouch! Bad way to go; at least it was quick. That mission to get the J model in MC was a royal pain.

@PerpetualGM

5 жыл бұрын

@@gregdomenico1891 I probably love the Summoner because I Am Jade Falcon. I'm probably Too Much Jade Falcon. I still field the Hellbringer and Kit Fox for Kerensky's sake!

Oh and I would totally go into war in a timberwolf / mad cat thank you

The MWO timber wolf with the gauss cannon looks like the one i think i requested from an artist, maybe bishop steiner? Like 5 or 6 years ago. Clan wolf alpha galaxy paint job, 2 lrm 10, a gauss and 4 er medium lasers (and jump jets) . Might be...

I would like to see the Berzerker.

@GrimDarkNarrator

5 жыл бұрын

I'll add it to a roster soon, then.

@paulhuston9991

5 жыл бұрын

Waited fifteen years to get mine, just did last month!!! Hehehe happy dance!!!! I want to see it too!

Another excellent presentation! My only "problem" with the Timberwolf is that it is a Clan Mech, not Inner Sphere. Otherwise, it's an amazing and awesome Mech! Thank you for sharing this Lore with us, and have an Awesome (AWS-8T variant) day!

@GrimDarkNarrator

5 жыл бұрын

You have one as well :)

I would like to compare the Timberwolf / Mad Cat to the Dessert Eagle pistol. It is big, loud, powerful and iconic. Butbis also ostentacious and very unwieldy for those with little or no experience. You can use both to make a point and scare the majority, but do not expect the highest standards of practicallity nor hope to win wars by themselves.

@GrimDarkNarrator

Жыл бұрын

I would think that kinda applies to all assaults.

I loved My 4D. Hmmm, Fuzzy thoughts.

Oh yeah! Mah favourite mech in Mechwarrior!

thanks for another great video hop you do more clan mech videos

@GrimDarkNarrator

5 жыл бұрын

I try to do what the people vote on :)

Cant wait to get my hands on this mech in battletech....

@Shadow-Kalbo1

5 жыл бұрын

there is a mod out that gives you the timber wolf work of advice throw a heat bank on the central torso

My favorite mech!

@GrimDarkNarrator

3 жыл бұрын

Definitely an iconic one.

Personally, while I think the Timber Wolf is a great 'mech, I also think it is too expensive for what it is. In a combat scenario where you are only comparing unit numbers or tonnage it is one of the best heavies around. (Example: Mechwarrior Online, or essentially Haribrained's Battletech) If you compare credit cost or battle value, however, and it shows just how expensive it is. You could get two Atlas Assault Mechs, with change, for the cost of a single Timber Wolf.

@GrimDarkNarrator

5 жыл бұрын

Never looked at it that way. If so, it is ridiculously expensive since an Atlas can take more punishment.

Let me fix your intro. "I am not biased between Clan and non-Clan mechs. That being said, the MadCat is a dirty, dirty Clanner mech."

@GrimDarkNarrator

5 жыл бұрын

Lol

The Miffed Kitty...

I think the term you were looking for was MODULAR not customizable as all mechs can be customized however you damn well please, this is the issue when you're primary experience with the Battletech universe is through MWO, however only Omnimechs are able to use Equipment Pods to speed up the repair/replacement and alteration of it's loadout by installing several systems at once. Though to be frank Battlemechs can also do this to a degree by replacing entire sections at once, it's just significantly less combat effective to have two mechs, one operational and the other in parts, when you can have two operational mechs instead. Pods in comparison are effectively only the components, rather than components, internal structure, and armor. Bit of a tangent though still somewhat related to Omnimech technology, Hand Held Weapons, these are weapons that as the name entails are weapons held in the hand actuators of mechs with them, as opposed to weapons installed in the arms and designed to appear to be hand held, and are fairly rare despite the age of the idea given there are only four variants of mechs noted for their use, two experimental and two production variants of the Quickdraw and Axeman. I bring this technology up as in the Inner Sphere it is often referred to as the "poor man's omnimech" because it allows the mech in question to near instantaneously alter it's loadout even in combat, however unfortunately it is only possible to use Handheld Weapons with two full Hand/Arm Actuators, and each Hand/Arm Actuator can only lift 5% of the mech's weight, twice as much with TSM, thus limiting the loadout of said weapon system to a max of 10% of it's max tonnage or 20% with TSM, assuming one can keep their TSM warm. However it's also worth noting that Handheld Weapons also don't take up any of the mech's tonnage themselves nor do they slow the mech as cargo strapped to it's hull might, almost as if hand actuator's were designed to carry cargo or something. Additionally don't ask me how all mechs can use Energy based Handheld Weapons when the weapons themselves do not mount a power source. Possibly all mech hands are designed with universal power plugs? Wouldn't surprise me given how much knowledge and technology regressed during the Succession Wars, wouldn't explain it for the Clanners though. Tradition maybe?

@starsiegeplayer

5 жыл бұрын

He said "a lot more customizable" which I interpreted as "more easily customizable due to the modular nature."

@gregdomenico1891

5 жыл бұрын

Clan proto mechs also use handhelds.

@GrimDarkNarrator

5 жыл бұрын

Thanks for all the info. I'll definitely do an omnimechs video at some point.

@Mugdorna

5 жыл бұрын

The modular element of Omnimechs are rarely evident in Battletech games. Lorewise they were easier to repair and get back to the fight. Also lorewise the Omni could be changed from day to day depending on the mission or even the personalities of the mechwarrior themselves. MW4 had the ability of Omnis to mount any weapon in their slots (IS mechs had fixed ballistic/energy/missile slots) MechCommander just had lighter/smaller Clan weapons, Battletech has followed suit.

Also known as "We are fracked!" if you are not smart about how you should play the game, "I got this" if your me and are piloting an Atlas, Highlander or WarHammer, the last one if your really skilled at it, or "those inner sphere dogs took out our main production facility for our super-powerful battle mech that makes other mechs inferior, very dishonourable", if you a Clanners,

Come on, Mechwarrior 6!

OMNIMECH the Battletech version of the Barbie Doll. You can dress it up for any occasion.

with all its faults its still my favorite heavy........take it over any Atlas or Fafnir (i may die but it will be a glorious death worthy of remembering) great memories from the old mechwarrior games back when computers ran on dial up and lots of prayers and pixels were pixels and men were very greasy men

@bombomos

3 жыл бұрын

See I think we were in the Good timeline back then. Now in days it feels we are on the Bad timeline

@glytchd

2 жыл бұрын

@@bombomos u are more than correct. We fully slipped into the 'Dark Age of Information' a decade ago.

I remember even in the old xbox games MechAssault 1 and 2, this was one of the best Mechs.

@Mugdorna

5 жыл бұрын

Afro Chef It was one of the best mechs waaay before that young game. Try MW2 and the RPG in the 1990s. I think even MechCommander is older than MechAssault.

Oh yes! The inner spheres favorite punching bag!

THE MECH YOU'VE ALL BEEN WAITING FOR!

@GrimDarkNarrator

5 жыл бұрын

I thought that was the Atlas.

Clanner scum got the shiniest toys. Makes for the best salvage.

@digitalis2977

5 жыл бұрын

If you can kill one with your Stravag toys, sure.

@Nordicscholar

5 жыл бұрын

@@digitalis2977 I won't be the one killing you. That'll be the numerically and tactically superior forces you decided to invade.

@digitalis2977

5 жыл бұрын

@@Nordicscholar Isn't it time to pay your Space AT&T bill?

@Nordicscholar

5 жыл бұрын

@@digitalis2977 Isn't it time for you to fight over some dead dude's sperm, because you forgot the birds and the bees?

NOT the Marauder. But my little brother loves it. But AVOID overheating it. "Know your mech," he warns.

Moar Mechs!

@GrimDarkNarrator

5 жыл бұрын

They're coming at a steady rate.

This affront to mechdom is not the Marauder. It's a fuck truck.😁

I cannot help but notice a lot of overlap in wording with the video from Tex talks Battletech which sometimes feels like direct quotes.

@GrimDarkNarrator

4 жыл бұрын

Probably because we both used Sarna material.

So where did the name "Timber Wolf" comes from if it was officially called Mad Cat?

@GrimDarkNarrator

4 жыл бұрын

Timber Wolf was the clan name. Mad Cat was how the Inner Sphere mechwarriors named them. Pretty much all the Clan mechs had their original names and a nickname given to them by the Inners.

@alvinderama3196

4 жыл бұрын

@@GrimDarkNarrator Ah Thank you for making it clear for me!

Its. Mad Cat, get mad CLANERS you lost to space AT&T

Always will be a clan player. I can't stand the IS. Mad Cat rigged with twin guass rifles, er lasers and 120's for maximum fuck you at any range with limited heat issues.