Fans of theBattleTechfranchise can once again suit up inMechWarrior 5: Mercenaries, and this time it’s to make a name for themselves as a rookie MechWarrior mercenary. Set in the turbulent final decade of the Third Succession War, players in Year 3015 need to slowly rebuild their mercenary unit. Armed with MechWarriors of various types, players can take contracts and build relationships with many factions in the area.
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And just like any management game,MechWarrior 5: Mercenariesstill need players to hold down the fort. Essentially, players need to balance whacking other MechWarriors and finding ways to maintain upkeep in their mercenary unit. Thankfully, the game does offer quick and efficient ways to earn sweet money throughout any playthrough.
Managing Faction Relationships
Of course, a huge part of profits inMechWarrior 5: Mercenariescomes from conducting operations, missions, and various jobs across the star system. And given the breadth of these regions, it’s notable for specific factions to dominate parts of the starmap. Interestingly, players can maximize their profitability options when carefully navigating their relationships across these many factions.
Judge The Zone By Its Cover
Before players get into a new zone or star system, they need to at least ensure whether it’s worth it getting there anyway. For instance, if a star system has only one contract, attempt to avoid getting to that star system as the overall fuel and repair costs might not be worth the mission.
Instead, a more reasonable course of action is to head to a star system with at least two missions. That way, players can maximize their stay and reap more earnings that could recoup their travel costs.
Favor A Faction In Conflict Zones
Conflict Zones exist in various quadrants of the map. As the name implies, thesezones highlight a conflictbetween that territory’s owner and the faction closest to them. Interestingly, missions in these Conflict Zones will favor one cap over the other. In turn, as a mercenary unit, it’s really just choosing the faction that offers the best buck, right?
As it turns out, favoritism works. Essentially, players can get more benefits when choosing missions that favor one faction in a certain part of the starmap. Moreover, this strategy works more efficiently in Conflict Zones. In return, these favorite factions will often have the best relationship with the player - as reflected by very favorable prices and flexible negotiations.
In The End, It’s All Business
Granted, as a free company, players can choose jobs and prioritize certain factions as they wish. However, they can actually maximize profitability when taking client relationships into consideration. As mentioned, favoring one faction will greatly boost their “relationship” with the player. Likewise, the opposite happens to the conflicting faction.
Players need to remember that favoring one faction will likely result in another faction “hating” them. Thankfully, this negative relationship won’t impact the story. In fact, players can still conduct missions for that faction. However, players do have to remember that dealing with that negative faction will likely lead to bad prices and less favorable negotiations.
Managing Contracts, Jobs
At first glance, doing work for factions should become extremely straightforward. Players get the job description, they follow it to the letter, they get a nice payout and some parts. Neat, right? Thing is, with the right understanding of contracts, players can actually maximize the kind of profits - and bonuses! - they earn when conducting missions.
Capitalize On Negotiating Power
When players get a job offer from any faction, they’d discover that they can actually haggle and negotiate their contracts in a variety of means. At its core, players dealing with factions that have great relationships with them will likely help them get contracts in great favor to them. However, before players go willy-nilly in their counter-offers, here are the three most integral aspects of contracts to remember:
Consider Salvage Shares When Collecting Parts
Players who get a knack for whacking MechWarriors during missions can score some of their weapons and armor parts throughout the playthrough. However, it’s Salvage Shares that dictate whether players can keep these said parts or not. Remember, keeping parts of larger, more powerful mechs will likely cost more Salvage Shares.
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However, players who have built good relationships with other factions will want to try prioritizing Salvage Shares. Sometimes, a good mech torso can score thousands (sometimes, millions) of C-Bills when sold to friendly factions. Here are good considerations when it comes to managing Salvage Shares:
Get Careful With Damage Insurance
As the name implies, Damage Insurance guarantees that the employer (in this case, the faction) will pay for all damages the player’s mechs have incurred throughout the mission. This is a sweet deal, right? Thing is, players need to remember that despite how high Damage Insurance is, it will only pay only the damage suffered by the player.
For instance, scoring 300,000 C-Bills in insurance might be great. However, if players only need 100,000 C-Bills in repairs, that’s the only money the faction will cover. The 200,000 C-Bill leftover won’t get released anywhere else. In turn, it might be a good idea to invest in Damage Insurance in Story Missions or missions players know might deal a ton of damage to their mechs.
Opt For The Most Reasonable Calculations
Given the above elements, it’s important for players to have the most reasonable approach when it comes to their negotiations. At its core, it may help to divide their negotiation points in certain categories to maximize the profits they can obtain there. Here’s a suggested layout:
Managing Internal Spending
Granted,MechWarrior 5: Mercenariesputs playersin charge of their own mercenary unit. And mercenaries take odd jobs from various factions - so the game has got this element covered. Thing is, in the spirit of realism, players also need to manage the internal affairs of their own mercenary company. These include paying pilot salaries, maintaining mechs, and even paying for travel around the starmap.
Conflict Affects Repairs, Work
Thanks to the wonders of space travel, players can do repairs and order work for their mercenary unit from almost any part of the starmap. However, they need to consider external factors when trying to do their interstellar shopping. Essentially, there are penalties involved when doing repairs or order work inside conflict zones.
To avoid these issues, players might want to jump out of these areas first before ordering stuff and doing repairs. Likewise, it’s also practical to get into a friendly zone first before doing these things, just to maximize the perks.
Consider Cold Storage Savings
Sometimes, players just love collecting mechs they’ll never use. In these situations, the Cold Storage serves as a great place for players to just admire their current collection of massive robots. However, the Cold Storage is more than just a giant action figure cabinet. In fact, players who want to save money will likely want to maximize their Cold Storage savings.
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Remember, mechs inside the Cold Storage will be counted as inactive mechs. In turn, they won’t be a part of the maintenance bills that the mercenary unit incurs throughout their journey. As good practice, players should place their “extra” mechs in Cold Storage if they know they have a core quartet of favorite mechs for their missions.
Travel Still Stinks In Space
Travel costs money in terms of fuel and mileage - and this stays the same in outer space. Whileinterstellar travel does support jumps across star systems, they do cost money. And while players might not notice the costs of jumping from one system to the next, they may soon rake up in the millions when players could’ve had made more practical choices.
Essentially, players should consider making smaller and more meaningful jumps to maximize their jump costs. If possible, players should always jump towards friendly territories to maximize the cost of things they want to avail there.
No Hesitation For Compromises
Granted, not all “money-saving” hacks for internal affairs would work all the time, especially when it comes to the commute and the repairs. On the off-chance that players are in a conflict zone and the nearest friendly industrial hub is too far, they can simply just accept that repairs in their area might be a bit higher than anticipated. This is better compared to forcing themselves into incurring more costs just to get to that industrial zone.
Likewise, while conflict zones indeed incur higher costs for repairs, players can choose to only actively avoid repairing inside them if costs rake up to a 300-percent increase.
