15 replies to this topic

[StubbornPuppet]

So, I would love to see a topic like this for every single mech... but let me start with the one I am having trouble figuring out.

The Brawler.

I'd love to see some suggestions on weapons, equipment, tuning and internals for this rig.
Getting some advice on effective tactics for the battlefield would be nice too.

Thanks

[v009]

Tuning: Full Armour, Boost Thruster, Hydraulics and rest on suspension.
Internals: Deflector, Extractor and Repair Kit.
Items: Emp, Shield and turret.

P.S. Saturnine shall enlighten you later when he sees this post with 2 page essay on how to improve your play and improve yourself with playing the Brawler.

Edited by v009, December 30 2013 - 01:00 PM.

[FakeName]

v009, on December 30 2013 - 01:00 PM, said:

P.S. Saturnine shall enlighten you later when he sees this post with 2 page essay on how to improve your play and improve yourself with playing the Brawler.

Brawler Commander: Saturnine

[Saturnine]

FakeName, on December 30 2013 - 01:07 PM, said:

Brawler Commander: Saturnine

Ahem, Brawler Herder.

v009, on December 30 2013 - 01:00 PM, said:

Tuning: Full Armour, Boost Thruster, Hydraulics and rest on suspension.
Internals: Deflector, Extractor and Repair Kit.
Items: Emp, Shield and turret.

P.S. Saturnine shall enlighten you later when he sees this post with 2 page essay on how to improve your play and improve yourself with playing the Brawler.

I dunno if it'll be that long... (Edit: I was wrong. I think it was longer.)

Well, first of all, watch the Mindgamer series by WolfyFTW, particularly episode 3: (Part 1: (click) Part 2: (click) ) and 4: (click)

The series as a whole is extremely well made and helpful, and should be invaluable for your play in any class, whether you are in a Brawler or an Infiltrator. However, while knowing how to move effectively and efficiently like that is useful for all classes, for the fat classes like the Brawler, it's invaluable. Being the fat classes, they can't get around the map very well, and a lot of players find that the smaller classes can run circles around them, or get out of the line of fire easily, leaving you, the fatty, with no recourse.

This need not be the case, in fact, get moving efficiently down, and you'll find that you can get around the map more quickly than your faster enemies at times. There have been multiple incidences where my enemies would incredulously caps lock at me in the chat, asking me "HOW THE FK DID YOU GET THERE SO FAST_" when I chased them down trying to run away, even in my Brawler. Basically, being in a faster class makes people complacent. They're fast, and they know it, so they just boost at top speed across the map, not caring where they're going as long as it's "away" or "somewhere else." They aren't paying attention to how they are moving or where they are going and how they are getting to that place. With enough play time, you get to knowing the maps very well. If you are fighting an enemy, and they decide it's time to run, pay attention to where they are running to. If you know the map well, you should be able to figure out where they will end up, and which direction you can go to cut them off, or even get to where they will end up faster than they get there.

Knowing the maps like the back of your hand is half the battle, and the other half is knowing how to move. Watching the Wolfy's Mindgamer series will help a lot with that, but he doesn't specifically talk about using those strategies to get around the map. You can use dodge moves like the ones he talks about to move quickly and efficiently, and with more speed than normal. Don't boost around corners, you preserve momentum and wind up moving in an arc - sometimes that's very useful, but a lot of the time you are just wasting fuel and moving more slowly than you would if you had stopped, dodged to the side, and turned to boost forward towards your destination. When you get this movement... philosophy, I guess, down, you'll find that big maps like Valkyrie aren't nearly as annoying as before, and you'll be much more able to get where you need to go much more easily.

However, that's not advice specific to the Brawler (though it will help you in Brawler more than any other class), and you're here for the Brawler stuff!

Brawler is the king of burst. It has the Flak/TOW combo, and if you can master that, you absolutely have the Brawler down. It also has the SA Hawkins and the Vulcan on it, though you don't see people with those as often, so first I'm going to tell you about why you might want to use those weapons. At first, the Hawkins and the Vulcan seem pretty antithetical to the typical Brawler meta, where you dance around behind cover, only popping out to smack people with your burst weaponry. However, these sustained weapons have the potential to be much more useful on the Brawler than you may expect. The Brawler has the most health in the game by far, and that doesn't seem likely to change. With that, you have the ability to withstand being out in the open longer than any other class, which is very important to sustained weapons, with which you need to keep a bead on your opponents for as long as possible to be most effective. If you're thinking what I'm thinking now, that's good, because then you are as crazy as I am.

What does that add up to_ Turret mode. Ohhh yeahhh, we're into the crazy stuff now. Bear with me though, because this makes more sense than you might think. A lot of people have trouble getting into the Hawkins with the Brawler because the SA Hawkins is a weapon that wants to be at mid/long range, and a lot of Brawler players are people who want to be up in peoples' faces, so they can't mix well with the Hawkins, and then forget about it to go back to flak. What I am here to tell you is that the Hawkins meshes extremely well with turret mode, and if you use it properly, you'll be shocked at how effective you are. So Brawler turret mode recently got a buff to move faster and have much better healing over time, and if you use that in conjunction with SA Hawkins at mid range, it's excellent. You're super slow in a Brawler to begin with, so don't fight it, and let your enemies try and keep range, that's where your Hawkins is strongest. At farther than close range, your opponents weapons are hitting less often, and with less power than when up close, which works very well with turret modes' damage reduction and heal over time. Set yourself up on top of an AA or in a nice position where people can't flank easily, while keeping a nice line of sight down the battlefield, and you can do some great things with the Hawkins in turret mode.

The same thing goes for the Vulcan - though it obviously has less range than the Hawkins, so keep that in mind. Also keep in mind that getting flanked in turret mode is a huge threat, as damage from behind does significantly more damage, so either keep your back to a wall, or keep an eye on the radar for anyone trying to get some opportunistic shots on you while you're preoccupied. The other thing with the Vulcan, though, is the dance that you wind up doing at close range in a Brawler plays havoc with the Vulcan, since you need to spin it up, and boosting forward resets the spin up, so while Vulcan makes a lot of sense up close, it may prove more worthwhile to stick a bit farther back with the Vulcan, as you can still do pretty solid damage, while keeping yourself safer from the combat, especially if you're in turret mode (and aren't imminently flanked).

Alright, now for the Flak. Brawler burst strategy, in a nutshell, boils down to a simple phrase: 'Reach out and hug someone'. You have the Flak Cannon, the quintessential close range primary, and used properly, you can dish out some very serious damage in no time at all.

The Flak Cannon is most effective when very close to your opponent. Some people think that that's a disadvantage, but you sure as hell don't have to worry about missing shots or dealing low damage when most of your screen is taken up by your enemy's soon-to-be scrap metal ass. If you get up close, you have taken control of the situation. You get to stop worrying, and they get to start worrying about the fight they started with the fatty that is right up in their face.

Your opponent sure as hell won't feel as calm as you will in that situation, no matter what their skill level is. At this point, your opponent will have a few options available to them when considering what to do next.

• They panic and run the hell away leaving themselves open to your flak and tow shots.
  
  
• They panic and try to run the hell away, but mess up and get stuck in a corner because 1100 health worth of angry is right there pulling off chunks of their armor with all the purpose of The Terminator pulling strips of metal off that car they thought they were safe in.
  
  
• They try and shoot you, but since you are the one who got control of the situation and initiated the wonderful romance that is a mech-on-mech hug, they can't keep track of you, and are panicking as you circle strafe them. You know what's going on, you know where you and the enemy are, and all they know is that there is fat ass somewhere near them that is tearing them a new one.
  
  
• They stand and fight, and are shooting their explosives at short range. Good. You have more health than they do, and you'll be damned if they don't regret that Pilot Error gun as they wind up causing themselves more trouble bouncing their TOWs off your glorious metal beast. Even if you're up against another C class, if you are the initiator of this hug, you have the control. You started this, and you're sure as hell gonna finish it. This means they're starting off disoriented, and you got the first hits off on them. This may be something of a problem if your opponent has Failsafes on, however. Though Failsafes are much less ridiculous than they were before, they can still make the difference. The solution here is that if you took control of the fight, you still have the advantage both in terms of health and psychologically. If they started the fight, you can still take control. Through smart use of cover and those excellent movement skills you've been practicing, that Failsafe of theirs won't mean much.

Internals: Normally, I don't like to give too much advice about things like internals, items, and tuning, since a lot of it is very personal-choicey. But I'll try to give some general advice. As we know, the Brawler has more health than anything else, and through that, we can take particular advantage of some internals.

The Armor Fusors work off a percentage of your max health, so if you max out your armor, you maximise your benefit from internals like this. Advanced Armor Fusor in particular is great because even at minimum health, you're getting 262 health per kill, though it was nerfed, so you get that 262 health over the course of the next 20 seconds. It's up to you to decide whether the wait is worth the health.

Another great internal is the Extractor, with which you can get all the health out of any repair orb much more quickly, which is wonderful for tanking through attacks, as well as getting back to max health more quickly so you can get back in the fight.

The Repair Kit is similarly useful because with it, you get more health for every repair charge, and you need it with all the health you need to recover.

Finally, Failsafe is an obvious choice, being the class that gets up close and personal with explosive weapons - though I personally don't use it. There are other internals that work well, though these are a good place to start.

Items: I'm normally not one to be too hard on suggestions for things like items, since they are so heavily personal choice, however, I'll make a few recommendations.

Hologram: not actually recommending this one; the hologram is not usually a good choice for Brawler, since you'll be moving around a ton in most cases, and people might not be fooled very long at all if they see a Brawler sitting still.

EMP: This is good with all classes, so with a Brawler it's just as great. Get those few seconds of free shots as your opponent scrambles for cover with nothing to do!

Shield: More health, more good! Shield is very useful whenever you need to defend a particular position, or when you need to give a teammate some extra protection. Just be careful, shields tend to have less health than you think, and they draw a ton of fire, so give some thought to whether that is worth the item slots.

Repair Charge: Reeeaalllly useful for Brawler, or anything really, considering how much health the Brawler needs to maintain, as well as it's use when trying to tank fire in bad situations. If you get this, definitely get the Repair Kit internal, and heavily consider the Extractor as well.

HE Charge: Hey, what can I say, I love it. :3 It takes a lot of practice, since it's a bouncy nade that you can't detonate at will, but it lets you do some really sexy stuff with ricochets, and it does a ton of damage.

Detonator: The HE Charge, but easy. Does less damage, but you can detonate it at will. Use this if you aren't hardcore enough for the HE.

Tuning: Like the other things, I don't like giving too much advice on this since it's so subject to change and personal opinion, but I'll give a bit of general advice.

Armor: More armor is always great, but remember you have limited points, so think about how you want to balance your health vs. your other stats. I personally put 5 points in it giving me 1100 health, at the moment.

Heatsinks: Doesn't always make a huge difference, but if you use weapon fire rate tuning, upping this as well is a great idea - higher fire rate means you generate heat a lot faster than you would expect, so using the two in combination can be useful.

Fire Rate: Firing more often is great, because you do more damage more often, and can sometimes hit shots that an enemy may have otherwise avoided. However, you generate more heat than you would anticipate with this, so think about using this tuning with Heatsinks. However, at that point, you may also want to think about just how many points you are putting into those stats.

Boost Thrusters: The Brawler is still the slowest mech in the game, but putting points here will make a difference when you need it. More speed is always useful.

Hydraulics: Same as above: More speed is always more good. Brawler has the biggest fuel tank by far, so you have the most potential for boosting a long time, but you'll still want to be walking a lot so you don't show up on the radar. With as painfully slow as walking is on Brawler, increasing this can be very helpful for chasing, getting around the map, and maintaining sanity. However, if you can embrace The Slow, you can use those points elsewhere, which may in the end prove useful.

Suspensions: Brawler has the slowest dodge cooldown of all mechs, however, each point reduces dodge cooldown by a set amount, not a percentage, so each point means less than it would for a class with a shorter base cooldown. However, with as slow as the dodge is on Brawler by default, you may want to maximise your potential here, as slow as that best potential still is.

Cooldown Reduction: I personally try to put as many points as I can here. The overheat cooldown on Brawler takes aaagesss, and putting points here makes an absolutely enormous difference. Even if you're really good at managing heat, you'll probably still find points here worthwhile.


Always remember that you are the big fat metal bastard in the world of Hawken. If you are going to leverage that position you have as the fat mech, then you need to act the part. You are the biggest, scariest thing out there, and if you get up in your enemy's face and let them know who you are with the sweet, sweet caress of super heated metal raking across their windshield, you can bet they're going to remember it.

You are the hardass with nerves of steel, and they are the ones who are panicking and shooting wildly when they see you stomping down the battlefield at them. You are a Brawler. You take your throne at the top of the food chain and you show those baby mechs who the real badass is.

Edited by Saturnine, December 31 2013 - 11:08 AM.

[StubbornPuppet]

^Epic post and a helpful read ta'boot.

I had some good luck in TDM last night with the Brawler.  I was basically doing exactly what you suggest about throwing myself in their face and daring them to stay and fight.  I was trying to avoid turret mode, as it does seem to be a more frequent death trap for me than a help... but there were those times when it was just right (especially with a tech at my back).  If I can get a better grip on the flak (I keep thinking of it as a pump action shotgun) timing, I think that will be the turning point for me and success with the Brawler.

I had originally felt like the SA Hawkins was a really odd and useless choice for the Brawler, but I now feel compelled to try it out.

Thanks Saturnine, send me an FR if you like and I'll keep an eye out for you (though it will probably be on the other team and I'll regret it )

[1kingsman]

I haven't really found the "sweet spot" for my personal favorite mech, having only spent between 24-48 hrs in Hawken so far. However, I keep coming back to the Brawler. Early on, after reading the guide in these forums that was a crash course in various mechs. EDIT: it was our Saturnine's own guide at https://community.pl...to-the-classes/ I should have realized that before, considering it's in his signature. I realized that what bugged me most was the slowness. As a result, I have been putting as much points as possible in movement related talents. Hilarity ensues.

After I got practiced in aiming (using the CT-Recruit and Vulcan), I came into a TDM where my team was loosing. This silly reaper was trying to play SS with its Slug, and I flanked it and killed it. Second time, still was sniping from range, and easy pray for my Flak Cannon. He called me all sorts of names in chat, telling his team mates to "*** that 'kigsman'" (sic). This began to be a pattern whenever I take my Brawler into a match.

This culminated just now (literally) in a Siege match that lasted about 1.5 hrs. I would use my fast boosting to run into AA, picking off some class A mech that happened to be nearby. I then would use LOS to force them to come to me, and drop my Shield. The "wise" sharpshooters would always run into the shield, where my Flak Cannon was ready to give them a hug I had a lot of fun, although my team gave up by the end, and gave away the AA so the match would end. While I waited, I did something else Brawlers can be good at, at least against more inexperienced Pilots: bait. If you know the limits of your mech, and your opponents, you can boost into the AA and quickly go to the side out of sight. If you got hit at all, chances are 1-2 mechs will come to finish you off. Now, your teammates can take advantage of their numbers to take the objective.

To recap, Saturnine is right on on everything. All items, internals, and tunings are pretty much personal preference, but if you don't know where to start, use his suggestions as a starting ground. You can use your internals to change the mind-numbingly slow Brawler into a chasing and gap-closing powerhouse. If 3-4 mechs are at an objective, use LOS to encourage them to approach you, where you can use more LOS and/or your Shield item to force them to get in close. If you are facing another Heavy, use your massive Fuel tanks to keep them on edge. Boost and Dodge to the side of them, forcing them to turn while you chip at them with your Flak Cannon.

I prefer the Flak cannon overall, but all weapons have their place. the SA-Hawkens has great synergy with Turret Mode, and can really suppress the enemy over time. Just get used to predicting where to aim your TOW shots, and punish enemy snipers. The Vulcan is powerful and can really punish zerg tactics, but I dislike that Boosting resets the wind-up and can't get into it very well. I'm too fond of boost-dodging behind turtling Heavies and filling them with a Flak-TOW combo . As for the flak, there are a few things you can do. At the start of a match, aim at the force-field and fire a few shots. The spread is quite diverse, and takes a bit of getting used to. However, it is very reliable at tagging Predators from across the map, if you spot them, and can scare Infils as well. Don't even try fighting with the Flak beyond close range though, unless all you want is Assists. I usually try to use that and a TOW to finish off fleeing mechs, however.

I haven't really invested much into internals and items, although I know I have a shield on it, and the Repair-on-kill/assist one (hence my obsession with tagging enemy mechs). I'll think about it more soon, since I have about 70k experience on it and should be done with purchasing the mech unlocks.

Thanks for the tips Saturnine, and I have your post in my bookmarks now.

Hope this helps, StubbornPuppet.

Edited by 1kingsman, January 03 2014 - 02:48 AM.

[Aregon]

Saturnine, on December 31 2013 - 11:06 AM, said:

FakeName, on December 30 2013 - 01:07 PM, said:

Brawler Commander: Saturnine

Ahem, Brawler Herder.

v009, on December 30 2013 - 01:00 PM, said:

Tuning: Full Armour, Boost Thruster, Hydraulics and rest on suspension.
Internals: Deflector, Extractor and Repair Kit.
Items: Emp, Shield and turret.

P.S. Saturnine shall enlighten you later when he sees this post with 2 page essay on how to improve your play and improve yourself with playing the Brawler.

I dunno if it'll be that long... (Edit: I was wrong. I think it was longer.)

Well, first of all, watch the Mindgamer series by WolfyFTW, particularly episode 3: (Part 1: (click) Part 2: (click) ) and 4: (click)

The series as a whole is extremely well made and helpful, and should be invaluable for your play in any class, whether you are in a Brawler or an Infiltrator. However, while knowing how to move effectively and efficiently like that is useful for all classes, for the fat classes like the Brawler, it's invaluable. Being the fat classes, they can't get around the map very well, and a lot of players find that the smaller classes can run circles around them, or get out of the line of fire easily, leaving you, the fatty, with no recourse.

This need not be the case, in fact, get moving efficiently down, and you'll find that you can get around the map more quickly than your faster enemies at times. There have been multiple incidences where my enemies would incredulously caps lock at me in the chat, asking me "HOW THE FK DID YOU GET THERE SO FAST_" when I chased them down trying to run away, even in my Brawler. Basically, being in a faster class makes people complacent. They're fast, and they know it, so they just boost at top speed across the map, not caring where they're going as long as it's "away" or "somewhere else." They aren't paying attention to how they are moving or where they are going and how they are getting to that place. With enough play time, you get to knowing the maps very well. If you are fighting an enemy, and they decide it's time to run, pay attention to where they are running to. If you know the map well, you should be able to figure out where they will end up, and which direction you can go to cut them off, or even get to where they will end up faster than they get there.

Knowing the maps like the back of your hand is half the battle, and the other half is knowing how to move. Watching the Wolfy's Mindgamer series will help a lot with that, but he doesn't specifically talk about using those strategies to get around the map. You can use dodge moves like the ones he talks about to move quickly and efficiently, and with more speed than normal. Don't boost around corners, you preserve momentum and wind up moving in an arc - sometimes that's very useful, but a lot of the time you are just wasting fuel and moving more slowly than you would if you had stopped, dodged to the side, and turned to boost forward towards your destination. When you get this movement... philosophy, I guess, down, you'll find that big maps like Valkyrie aren't nearly as annoying as before, and you'll be much more able to get where you need to go much more easily.

However, that's not advice specific to the Brawler (though it will help you in Brawler more than any other class), and you're here for the Brawler stuff!

Brawler is the king of burst. It has the Flak/TOW combo, and if you can master that, you absolutely have the Brawler down. It also has the SA Hawkins and the Vulcan on it, though you don't see people with those as often, so first I'm going to tell you about why you might want to use those weapons. At first, the Hawkins and the Vulcan seem pretty antithetical to the typical Brawler meta, where you dance around behind cover, only popping out to smack people with your burst weaponry. However, these sustained weapons have the potential to be much more useful on the Brawler than you may expect. The Brawler has the most health in the game by far, and that doesn't seem likely to change. With that, you have the ability to withstand being out in the open longer than any other class, which is very important to sustained weapons, with which you need to keep a bead on your opponents for as long as possible to be most effective. If you're thinking what I'm thinking now, that's good, because then you are as crazy as I am.

What does that add up to_ Turret mode. Ohhh yeahhh, we're into the crazy stuff now. Bear with me though, because this makes more sense than you might think. A lot of people have trouble getting into the Hawkins with the Brawler because the SA Hawkins is a weapon that wants to be at mid/long range, and a lot of Brawler players are people who want to be up in peoples' faces, so they can't mix well with the Hawkins, and then forget about it to go back to flak. What I am here to tell you is that the Hawkins meshes extremely well with turret mode, and if you use it properly, you'll be shocked at how effective you are. So Brawler turret mode recently got a buff to move faster and have much better healing over time, and if you use that in conjunction with SA Hawkins at mid range, it's excellent. You're super slow in a Brawler to begin with, so don't fight it, and let your enemies try and keep range, that's where your Hawkins is strongest. At farther than close range, your opponents weapons are hitting less often, and with less power than when up close, which works very well with turret modes' damage reduction and heal over time. Set yourself up on top of an AA or in a nice position where people can't flank easily, while keeping a nice line of sight down the battlefield, and you can do some great things with the Hawkins in turret mode.

The same thing goes for the Vulcan - though it obviously has less range than the Hawkins, so keep that in mind. Also keep in mind that getting flanked in turret mode is a huge threat, as damage from behind does significantly more damage, so either keep your back to a wall, or keep an eye on the radar for anyone trying to get some opportunistic shots on you while you're preoccupied. The other thing with the Vulcan, though, is the dance that you wind up doing at close range in a Brawler plays havoc with the Vulcan, since you need to spin it up, and boosting forward resets the spin up, so while Vulcan makes a lot of sense up close, it may prove more worthwhile to stick a bit farther back with the Vulcan, as you can still do pretty solid damage, while keeping yourself safer from the combat, especially if you're in turret mode (and aren't imminently flanked).

Alright, now for the Flak. Brawler burst strategy, in a nutshell, boils down to a simple phrase: 'Reach out and hug someone'. You have the Flak Cannon, the quintessential close range primary, and used properly, you can dish out some very serious damage in no time at all.

The Flak Cannon is most effective when very close to your opponent. Some people think that that's a disadvantage, but you sure as hell don't have to worry about missing shots or dealing low damage when most of your screen is taken up by your enemy's soon-to-be scrap metal ass. If you get up close, you have taken control of the situation. You get to stop worrying, and they get to start worrying about the fight they started with the fatty that is right up in their face.

Your opponent sure as hell won't feel as calm as you will in that situation, no matter what their skill level is. At this point, your opponent will have a few options available to them when considering what to do next.

• They panic and run the hell away leaving themselves open to your flak and tow shots.
  
  
• They panic and try to run the hell away, but mess up and get stuck in a corner because 1100 health worth of angry is right there pulling off chunks of their armor with all the purpose of The Terminator pulling strips of metal off that car they thought they were safe in.
  
  
• They try and shoot you, but since you are the one who got control of the situation and initiated the wonderful romance that is a mech-on-mech hug, they can't keep track of you, and are panicking as you circle strafe them. You know what's going on, you know where you and the enemy are, and all they know is that there is fat ass somewhere near them that is tearing them a new one.
  
  
• They stand and fight, and are shooting their explosives at short range. Good. You have more health than they do, and you'll be damned if they don't regret that Pilot Error gun as they wind up causing themselves more trouble bouncing their TOWs off your glorious metal beast. Even if you're up against another C class, if you are the initiator of this hug, you have the control. You started this, and you're sure as hell gonna finish it. This means they're starting off disoriented, and you got the first hits off on them. This may be something of a problem if your opponent has Failsafes on, however. Though Failsafes are much less ridiculous than they were before, they can still make the difference. The solution here is that if you took control of the fight, you still have the advantage both in terms of health and psychologically. If they started the fight, you can still take control. Through smart use of cover and those excellent movement skills you've been practicing, that Failsafe of theirs won't mean much.

Internals: Normally, I don't like to give too much advice about things like internals, items, and tuning, since a lot of it is very personal-choicey. But I'll try to give some general advice. As we know, the Brawler has more health than anything else, and through that, we can take particular advantage of some internals.

The Armor Fusors work off a percentage of your max health, so if you max out your armor, you maximise your benefit from internals like this. Advanced Armor Fusor in particular is great because even at minimum health, you're getting 262 health per kill, though it was nerfed, so you get that 262 health over the course of the next 20 seconds. It's up to you to decide whether the wait is worth the health.

Another great internal is the Extractor, with which you can get all the health out of any repair orb much more quickly, which is wonderful for tanking through attacks, as well as getting back to max health more quickly so you can get back in the fight.

The Repair Kit is similarly useful because with it, you get more health for every repair charge, and you need it with all the health you need to recover.

Finally, Failsafe is an obvious choice, being the class that gets up close and personal with explosive weapons - though I personally don't use it. There are other internals that work well, though these are a good place to start.

Items: I'm normally not one to be too hard on suggestions for things like items, since they are so heavily personal choice, however, I'll make a few recommendations.

Hologram: not actually recommending this one; the hologram is not usually a good choice for Brawler, since you'll be moving around a ton in most cases, and people might not be fooled very long at all if they see a Brawler sitting still.

EMP: This is good with all classes, so with a Brawler it's just as great. Get those few seconds of free shots as your opponent scrambles for cover with nothing to do!

Shield: More health, more good! Shield is very useful whenever you need to defend a particular position, or when you need to give a teammate some extra protection. Just be careful, shields tend to have less health than you think, and they draw a ton of fire, so give some thought to whether that is worth the item slots.

Repair Charge: Reeeaalllly useful for Brawler, or anything really, considering how much health the Brawler needs to maintain, as well as it's use when trying to tank fire in bad situations. If you get this, definitely get the Repair Kit internal, and heavily consider the Extractor as well.

HE Charge: Hey, what can I say, I love it. :3 It takes a lot of practice, since it's a bouncy nade that you can't detonate at will, but it lets you do some really sexy stuff with ricochets, and it does a ton of damage.

Detonator: The HE Charge, but easy. Does less damage, but you can detonate it at will. Use this if you aren't hardcore enough for the HE.

Tuning: Like the other things, I don't like giving too much advice on this since it's so subject to change and personal opinion, but I'll give a bit of general advice.

Armor: More armor is always great, but remember you have limited points, so think about how you want to balance your health vs. your other stats. I personally put 5 points in it giving me 1100 health, at the moment.

Heatsinks: Doesn't always make a huge difference, but if you use weapon fire rate tuning, upping this as well is a great idea - higher fire rate means you generate heat a lot faster than you would expect, so using the two in combination can be useful.

Fire Rate: Firing more often is great, because you do more damage more often, and can sometimes hit shots that an enemy may have otherwise avoided. However, you generate more heat than you would anticipate with this, so think about using this tuning with Heatsinks. However, at that point, you may also want to think about just how many points you are putting into those stats.

Boost Thrusters: The Brawler is still the slowest mech in the game, but putting points here will make a difference when you need it. More speed is always useful.

Hydraulics: Same as above: More speed is always more good. Brawler has the biggest fuel tank by far, so you have the most potential for boosting a long time, but you'll still want to be walking a lot so you don't show up on the radar. With as painfully slow as walking is on Brawler, increasing this can be very helpful for chasing, getting around the map, and maintaining sanity. However, if you can embrace The Slow, you can use those points elsewhere, which may in the end prove useful.

Suspensions: Brawler has the slowest dodge cooldown of all mechs, however, each point reduces dodge cooldown by a set amount, not a percentage, so each point means less than it would for a class with a shorter base cooldown. However, with as slow as the dodge is on Brawler by default, you may want to maximise your potential here, as slow as that best potential still is.

Cooldown Reduction: I personally try to put as many points as I can here. The overheat cooldown on Brawler takes aaagesss, and putting points here makes an absolutely enormous difference. Even if you're really good at managing heat, you'll probably still find points here worthwhile.


Always remember that you are the big fat metal bastard in the world of Hawken. If you are going to leverage that position you have as the fat mech, then you need to act the part. You are the biggest, scariest thing out there, and if you get up in your enemy's face and let them know who you are with the sweet, sweet caress of super heated metal raking across their windshield, you can bet they're going to remember it.

You are the hardass with nerves of steel, and they are the ones who are panicking and shooting wildly when they see you stomping down the battlefield at them. You are a Brawler. You take your throne at the top of the food chain and you show those baby mechs who the real badass is.

I believe I find it out myself, with my legendary skills which can only be competed with Xacius, Houruck it will be easy.

DISCLAIMER: WHAT IS STATED IN THIS POST CAN BE DIFFERENT IN OTHER PEOPLE`S OPINION. IF YOU FIND THIS WRONG PLEASE TELL US VIA A PRIVATE MESSAGE.

[FakeName]

Saturnine, on December 31 2013 - 11:06 AM, said:

FakeName, on December 30 2013 - 01:07 PM, said:

Brawler Commander: Saturnine

Ahem, Brawler Herder.

v009, on December 30 2013 - 01:00 PM, said:

Tuning: Full Armour, Boost Thruster, Hydraulics and rest on suspension.
Internals: Deflector, Extractor and Repair Kit.
Items: Emp, Shield and turret.

P.S. Saturnine shall enlighten you later when he sees this post with 2 page essay on how to improve your play and improve yourself with playing the Brawler.

I dunno if it'll be that long... (Edit: I was wrong. I think it was longer.)

Well, first of all, watch the Mindgamer series by WolfyFTW, particularly episode 3: (Part 1: (click) Part 2: (click) ) and 4: (click)

The series as a whole is extremely well made and helpful, and should be invaluable for your play in any class, whether you are in a Brawler or an Infiltrator. However, while knowing how to move effectively and efficiently like that is useful for all classes, for the fat classes like the Brawler, it's invaluable. Being the fat classes, they can't get around the map very well, and a lot of players find that the smaller classes can run circles around them, or get out of the line of fire easily, leaving you, the fatty, with no recourse.

This need not be the case, in fact, get moving efficiently down, and you'll find that you can get around the map more quickly than your faster enemies at times. There have been multiple incidences where my enemies would incredulously caps lock at me in the chat, asking me "HOW THE FK DID YOU GET THERE SO FAST_" when I chased them down trying to run away, even in my Brawler. Basically, being in a faster class makes people complacent. They're fast, and they know it, so they just boost at top speed across the map, not caring where they're going as long as it's "away" or "somewhere else." They aren't paying attention to how they are moving or where they are going and how they are getting to that place. With enough play time, you get to knowing the maps very well. If you are fighting an enemy, and they decide it's time to run, pay attention to where they are running to. If you know the map well, you should be able to figure out where they will end up, and which direction you can go to cut them off, or even get to where they will end up faster than they get there.

Knowing the maps like the back of your hand is half the battle, and the other half is knowing how to move. Watching the Wolfy's Mindgamer series will help a lot with that, but he doesn't specifically talk about using those strategies to get around the map. You can use dodge moves like the ones he talks about to move quickly and efficiently, and with more speed than normal. Don't boost around corners, you preserve momentum and wind up moving in an arc - sometimes that's very useful, but a lot of the time you are just wasting fuel and moving more slowly than you would if you had stopped, dodged to the side, and turned to boost forward towards your destination. When you get this movement... philosophy, I guess, down, you'll find that big maps like Valkyrie aren't nearly as annoying as before, and you'll be much more able to get where you need to go much more easily.

However, that's not advice specific to the Brawler (though it will help you in Brawler more than any other class), and you're here for the Brawler stuff!

Brawler is the king of burst. It has the Flak/TOW combo, and if you can master that, you absolutely have the Brawler down. It also has the SA Hawkins and the Vulcan on it, though you don't see people with those as often, so first I'm going to tell you about why you might want to use those weapons. At first, the Hawkins and the Vulcan seem pretty antithetical to the typical Brawler meta, where you dance around behind cover, only popping out to smack people with your burst weaponry. However, these sustained weapons have the potential to be much more useful on the Brawler than you may expect. The Brawler has the most health in the game by far, and that doesn't seem likely to change. With that, you have the ability to withstand being out in the open longer than any other class, which is very important to sustained weapons, with which you need to keep a bead on your opponents for as long as possible to be most effective. If you're thinking what I'm thinking now, that's good, because then you are as crazy as I am.

What does that add up to_ Turret mode. Ohhh yeahhh, we're into the crazy stuff now. Bear with me though, because this makes more sense than you might think. A lot of people have trouble getting into the Hawkins with the Brawler because the SA Hawkins is a weapon that wants to be at mid/long range, and a lot of Brawler players are people who want to be up in peoples' faces, so they can't mix well with the Hawkins, and then forget about it to go back to flak. What I am here to tell you is that the Hawkins meshes extremely well with turret mode, and if you use it properly, you'll be shocked at how effective you are. So Brawler turret mode recently got a buff to move faster and have much better healing over time, and if you use that in conjunction with SA Hawkins at mid range, it's excellent. You're super slow in a Brawler to begin with, so don't fight it, and let your enemies try and keep range, that's where your Hawkins is strongest. At farther than close range, your opponents weapons are hitting less often, and with less power than when up close, which works very well with turret modes' damage reduction and heal over time. Set yourself up on top of an AA or in a nice position where people can't flank easily, while keeping a nice line of sight down the battlefield, and you can do some great things with the Hawkins in turret mode.

The same thing goes for the Vulcan - though it obviously has less range than the Hawkins, so keep that in mind. Also keep in mind that getting flanked in turret mode is a huge threat, as damage from behind does significantly more damage, so either keep your back to a wall, or keep an eye on the radar for anyone trying to get some opportunistic shots on you while you're preoccupied. The other thing with the Vulcan, though, is the dance that you wind up doing at close range in a Brawler plays havoc with the Vulcan, since you need to spin it up, and boosting forward resets the spin up, so while Vulcan makes a lot of sense up close, it may prove more worthwhile to stick a bit farther back with the Vulcan, as you can still do pretty solid damage, while keeping yourself safer from the combat, especially if you're in turret mode (and aren't imminently flanked).

Alright, now for the Flak. Brawler burst strategy, in a nutshell, boils down to a simple phrase: 'Reach out and hug someone'. You have the Flak Cannon, the quintessential close range primary, and used properly, you can dish out some very serious damage in no time at all.

The Flak Cannon is most effective when very close to your opponent. Some people think that that's a disadvantage, but you sure as hell don't have to worry about missing shots or dealing low damage when most of your screen is taken up by your enemy's soon-to-be scrap metal ass. If you get up close, you have taken control of the situation. You get to stop worrying, and they get to start worrying about the fight they started with the fatty that is right up in their face.

Your opponent sure as hell won't feel as calm as you will in that situation, no matter what their skill level is. At this point, your opponent will have a few options available to them when considering what to do next.

• They panic and run the hell away leaving themselves open to your flak and tow shots.
  
  
• They panic and try to run the hell away, but mess up and get stuck in a corner because 1100 health worth of angry is right there pulling off chunks of their armor with all the purpose of The Terminator pulling strips of metal off that car they thought they were safe in.
  
  
• They try and shoot you, but since you are the one who got control of the situation and initiated the wonderful romance that is a mech-on-mech hug, they can't keep track of you, and are panicking as you circle strafe them. You know what's going on, you know where you and the enemy are, and all they know is that there is fat ass somewhere near them that is tearing them a new one.
  
  
• They stand and fight, and are shooting their explosives at short range. Good. You have more health than they do, and you'll be damned if they don't regret that Pilot Error gun as they wind up causing themselves more trouble bouncing their TOWs off your glorious metal beast. Even if you're up against another C class, if you are the initiator of this hug, you have the control. You started this, and you're sure as hell gonna finish it. This means they're starting off disoriented, and you got the first hits off on them. This may be something of a problem if your opponent has Failsafes on, however. Though Failsafes are much less ridiculous than they were before, they can still make the difference. The solution here is that if you took control of the fight, you still have the advantage both in terms of health and psychologically. If they started the fight, you can still take control. Through smart use of cover and those excellent movement skills you've been practicing, that Failsafe of theirs won't mean much.

Internals: Normally, I don't like to give too much advice about things like internals, items, and tuning, since a lot of it is very personal-choicey. But I'll try to give some general advice. As we know, the Brawler has more health than anything else, and through that, we can take particular advantage of some internals.

The Armor Fusors work off a percentage of your max health, so if you max out your armor, you maximise your benefit from internals like this. Advanced Armor Fusor in particular is great because even at minimum health, you're getting 262 health per kill, though it was nerfed, so you get that 262 health over the course of the next 20 seconds. It's up to you to decide whether the wait is worth the health.

Another great internal is the Extractor, with which you can get all the health out of any repair orb much more quickly, which is wonderful for tanking through attacks, as well as getting back to max health more quickly so you can get back in the fight.

The Repair Kit is similarly useful because with it, you get more health for every repair charge, and you need it with all the health you need to recover.

Finally, Failsafe is an obvious choice, being the class that gets up close and personal with explosive weapons - though I personally don't use it. There are other internals that work well, though these are a good place to start.

Items: I'm normally not one to be too hard on suggestions for things like items, since they are so heavily personal choice, however, I'll make a few recommendations.

Hologram: not actually recommending this one; the hologram is not usually a good choice for Brawler, since you'll be moving around a ton in most cases, and people might not be fooled very long at all if they see a Brawler sitting still.

EMP: This is good with all classes, so with a Brawler it's just as great. Get those few seconds of free shots as your opponent scrambles for cover with nothing to do!

Shield: More health, more good! Shield is very useful whenever you need to defend a particular position, or when you need to give a teammate some extra protection. Just be careful, shields tend to have less health than you think, and they draw a ton of fire, so give some thought to whether that is worth the item slots.

Repair Charge: Reeeaalllly useful for Brawler, or anything really, considering how much health the Brawler needs to maintain, as well as it's use when trying to tank fire in bad situations. If you get this, definitely get the Repair Kit internal, and heavily consider the Extractor as well.

HE Charge: Hey, what can I say, I love it. :3 It takes a lot of practice, since it's a bouncy nade that you can't detonate at will, but it lets you do some really sexy stuff with ricochets, and it does a ton of damage.

Detonator: The HE Charge, but easy. Does less damage, but you can detonate it at will. Use this if you aren't hardcore enough for the HE.

Tuning: Like the other things, I don't like giving too much advice on this since it's so subject to change and personal opinion, but I'll give a bit of general advice.

Armor: More armor is always great, but remember you have limited points, so think about how you want to balance your health vs. your other stats. I personally put 5 points in it giving me 1100 health, at the moment.

Heatsinks: Doesn't always make a huge difference, but if you use weapon fire rate tuning, upping this as well is a great idea - higher fire rate means you generate heat a lot faster than you would expect, so using the two in combination can be useful.

Fire Rate: Firing more often is great, because you do more damage more often, and can sometimes hit shots that an enemy may have otherwise avoided. However, you generate more heat than you would anticipate with this, so think about using this tuning with Heatsinks. However, at that point, you may also want to think about just how many points you are putting into those stats.

Boost Thrusters: The Brawler is still the slowest mech in the game, but putting points here will make a difference when you need it. More speed is always useful.

Hydraulics: Same as above: More speed is always more good. Brawler has the biggest fuel tank by far, so you have the most potential for boosting a long time, but you'll still want to be walking a lot so you don't show up on the radar. With as painfully slow as walking is on Brawler, increasing this can be very helpful for chasing, getting around the map, and maintaining sanity. However, if you can embrace The Slow, you can use those points elsewhere, which may in the end prove useful.

Suspensions: Brawler has the slowest dodge cooldown of all mechs, however, each point reduces dodge cooldown by a set amount, not a percentage, so each point means less than it would for a class with a shorter base cooldown. However, with as slow as the dodge is on Brawler by default, you may want to maximise your potential here, as slow as that best potential still is.

Cooldown Reduction: I personally try to put as many points as I can here. The overheat cooldown on Brawler takes aaagesss, and putting points here makes an absolutely enormous difference. Even if you're really good at managing heat, you'll probably still find points here worthwhile.


Always remember that you are the big fat metal bastard in the world of Hawken. If you are going to leverage that position you have as the fat mech, then you need to act the part. You are the biggest, scariest thing out there, and if you get up in your enemy's face and let them know who you are with the sweet, sweet caress of super heated metal raking across their windshield, you can bet they're going to remember it.

You are the hardass with nerves of steel, and they are the ones who are panicking and shooting wildly when they see you stomping down the battlefield at them. You are a Brawler. You take your throne at the top of the food chain and you show those baby mechs who the real badass is.

DAT TEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEXTLENGHT!

Aregon, on January 03 2014 - 06:02 AM, said:

I believe I find it out myself, with my legendary skills which can only be competed with Xacius, Houruck it will be easy.

DISCLAIMER: WHAT IS STATED IN THIS POST CAN BE DIFFERENT IN OTHER PEOPLE`S OPINION. IF YOU FIND THIS WRONG PLEASE TELL US VIA A PRIVATE MESSAGE.

owned you -

[StubbornPuppet]

Ha, I wondered if I was the only player who often decided to use myself as bait to lure the enemy out of an objective for the team.  Glad, at least, that somebody else does it.

It's actually amazing how well it works (and not just with Brawler or C class).  ie: When the AA is overwhelmed and my more cowardly teammates are struggling to figure out how to get in without dying, I run right into the middle of the enemy pack, lay down a little distracting fire, if I have time, and then keep on boosting as far away from the AA as I can.  It always ticks off at least 2 or 3 enemy players and they come out after me.  That's almost always enough to let the rest of my team move on in to the AA.

Anyhow, I'm getting better with the Brawler, but I know I'm still "doing it wrong" because I always end up acting like a suicide bomber - going right into the enemy lines, getting in their faces, taking out 2 or 3... but ultimately dying quickly.  Eh, that's always my role in online shooter games - so I'm used to being cannon fodder.

[1kingsman]

StubbornPuppet, on January 03 2014 - 06:55 AM, said:

Ha, I wondered if I was the only player who often decided to use myself as bait to lure the enemy out of an objective for the team.  Glad, at least, that somebody else does it.

It's actually amazing how well it works (and not just with Brawler or C class).  ie: When the AA is overwhelmed and my more cowardly teammates are struggling to figure out how to get in without dying, I run right into the middle of the enemy pack, lay down a little distracting fire, if I have time, and then keep on boosting as far away from the AA as I can.  It always ticks off at least 2 or 3 enemy players and they come out after me.  That's almost always enough to let the rest of my team move on in to the AA.

Anyhow, I'm getting better with the Brawler, but I know I'm still "doing it wrong" because I always end up acting like a suicide bomber - going right into the enemy lines, getting in their faces, taking out 2 or 3... but ultimately dying quickly.  Eh, that's always my role in online shooter games - so I'm used to being cannon fodder.

.... I will admit, I only did this in one game, and I was playing with/against significantly less skilled players, in their defense. Now, to help you survive....

Say, 2-3 are in AA on Wreckage. Purposefully head towards the AA, fire a few shots, and boost towards one of the large pillar things around the AA. Hide near one of them, and play LOS games with them. Drop your shield, and force them to come close.

Hit some ranged mech with your flak cannon, and hide behind a wall. Pop out again, this time firing both TOW and Flak. Play enough Peekaboo until you have lost ~30% HP, then move to the side as if to repair, but don't hide completely out of sight. If they hit you as you repair, that's when you move behind cover and repair. But first, drop your shield . They usually can't resist the idea of killing a vulnerable, wounded mech, and come boosting over. As soon as the first shots hit your shield (or as soon as you see them round the corner, if you aren't using one), cancel the repair with a side dodge and lay into them. Usually, this catches them by surprise and results in a brief period where you can land several flak shots before they start really dodging.

Focus on winning your 1v1s. Find and isolate some ranged mech that's harassing your team, and return the favor. Get in close, and start taking advantage of your massive fuel tanks, dodging and boosting like crazy inbetween Flak shots (make sure to land them though ). Use LOS like crazy, making them have to come closer then they prefer to finish the fight, then boost towards/behind them, in order to disorient them.

In more outnumbered fights, try to get ahead of your team mates, and then use the same LOS/harassing tactics to make them move in. If you can get them to move out of that bunkered position, it's much easier to isolate them and take them out one by one. In addition, you continue in that role of distraction, allowing your team mates to approach (mostly) unnoticed.

Against average players, this seems to allow me to do top 4-5 in each match, easily top 1 against people who aren't ready for these tactics. OFC, this varies greatly when more experienced players fight me, or I get team mates who have no clue what is going on (broken in-match balancing and Voice Chat, anyone_)

Hope this helps you a bit!

OH, and Saturnine, mind if I add you as a friend as well_ I would love to be able to pick stuff up from matches with you.

[Saturnine]

1kingsman, on January 04 2014 - 12:22 AM, said:

OH, and Saturnine, mind if I add you as a friend as well_ I would love to be able to pick stuff up from matches with you.

Yeah, absolutely! Anyone and everyone is more than welcome to friend me if they care to. I only hope that you still have stuff to pick up from me with all the tips you're slinging!

[ThirdEyE]

Disregard Saturnine, play Vanguard instead.

Here's my current Brawler setup, which I find to be quite effective but could still use some finer tuning (maybe invest in Weapons Loader)

http://imgur.com/TXIlwtc (not sure why this isn't embedding properly T_T)

[Daronicus]

So bear in mind that this advice really only applies if your team is semi-together, but being really slow, it's sometimes the brawler's job to stay and do as much damage as possible before the inevitable death. In those situations, you've just gotta hope your team can clean up.

Also, with the massive health pool, the brawler is one of the best mechs for holding off flanks and pushes. If you see someone peeling off, try to head them off if you aren't otherwise engaged. With the right positioning, you're almost guaranteed to at least make a loner turn back, and you can usually delay larger pushes long enough for your team to regroup.

Confidence in your health pool combined with awareness are really important. Sometimes, you just need to commit, so you have to be comfortable going in without necessarily having an escape route. Knowing where your enemies and friends are coupled with the aforementioned confidence helps a lot.

[Bazookagofer]

Wait a second. I will put on my game for the first time in a month or two and see what I ran when I still played and almost mastered 3/4 C classes,(Jking I didn't really master them...)

Dang it not working... gosh dust got into the files...

Sorry I will try from memory:

Flak+TOW

DEFLECTORS, FUEL CONVERTER and er something else...

Top Level Shield, Blockade

I Full armor, boosters, and er some other stuff...

I kind of just made my brawler into a gigantic fortress.

Edited by Bazookagofer, January 05 2014 - 12:07 AM.

[redslion]

Ok, but what about scouts_ They are prepared to get up close and personal, and eve if not with a dodge they can't get out of your FoV and make sure you won't get your aim again.

You might try to stay farther during the fight: dodges will be more trackable and less effective, so armor will count more. But at the same time, Flaks have big spread, and Brawler's hitbox is still much bigger than the scout's one.

Other than that, fighting A-classes I find myself shooting them point blank, crosshair on them and dealing 0 damage. How is that possible_
(I have a ping at around 100 usually)

[Muffintrumpet]

redslion, on January 07 2014 - 04:06 PM, said:

Other than that, fighting A-classes I find myself shooting them point blank, crosshair on them and dealing 0 damage. How is that possible_
(I have a ping at around 100 usually)

small, fast-moving objects benefit the most from ping protection
with 100ms ping you need to lead a Scout boosting laterally by nearly one mech width, and at medium range that movement is still just within the hit cone of a Flak, ergo, without any Kentucky-ping windage you often still land at least some damage
however, when that Scout is in your face one mech width is much larger than the Flak hit cone, ergo, without any Kentucky-ping windage you often land no damage at all even tho from your POV you were dead on

this game has no ping compensation that I can see and as a direct result low ping players will always have a significant advantage over their high ping victims
Red Orchestra 2 was released with no ping compensation and it suffered as Hawkin is now, but once TWI added ping compensation the level of competition in that game rocketted
(a few low ping players lost dominance over their high ping punchbags and complained about it but turkeys don't vote for christmas)