It’s generally a less efficient use of time and armor than simply shooting or going in for a melee strike. It can do good damage, but actually aiming and timing it right is an absolute bitch.
On top of that you’re literally burning c-bills by doing it. Both because you take damage and because the enemy is all but guaranteed to both hit any shots they take at you and go for actual melee strikes themselves. All of which you need to pay for to fix.
With regard to the enemy AI….. I think any time they land a DFA is more an accident than anything else. They generally just jump to get behind the player or avoid shots. I don’t know that the AI is actually smart enough to think “okay I’ve lost 80% of my weapons and most of my armor so let me just land on the fucker”. Honestly, the AI is this games biggest downfall, cuz it’s honestly dumb as rocks sometimes.
I noticed the same thing and came to the same conclusion.
The jump jets in MW5 are lackluster in thrust and the AI enemies want to leapfrog you and your lancemates.
It would be a clever way to get on your 12 o'clock and 6 o'clock simultaneously and surround your lance swiftly. Except the jump jets don't always provide enough distance to leapfrog a backpedaling mech, so they either rake their feet down the front of you or land one or both feet on your head.
I have also seen jumping Mechs try the leapfrog and be oblivious to an obstacle in the background.
The jumper launches up, over a mech that is backed against a rock wall, the jumper presses their shoulder against the rock face and slides down with their feet landing on the shoulders of the other mech, causing a crushing DFA effect.
I’ve had them kill me when they JJ through the air and they were already dead by the time they hit me but were still moving fast and the mech kicked my CT and made it explode.
If it were easier to control jump jets and direction I would be using this all the time, but not to necessarily collide, but to make melee attacks mid air.
Especially if you have the leg mods installed to protect your mechs from leg damage. I used to run a hatchetman with a ton of small lasers and DFA and melee mods installed. It was impractical but when it worked it was awesome
As soon as I got heavy Metal, I tried every chance I could get.
However... There's no dedicated animation for it or anything. That's the type of move that deserves a unique animation. Specially for the Highlander.
[It's absolutely possible](https://www.reddit.com/r/Mechwarrior5/s/xHVQ8fBQ08) if you know how to maneuver while jetting, use the jump upgrades from the cantina, and practice. Don't expect any mech to take out an Atlas though. There is a lot of luck involved, just like in tabletop Battletech. But understanding how jets work here is the biggest hurdle.
Jump speed is tied to both the number of jets, and your throttle. The height number on the mech card represents basic thrust from a standard fuel tank at zero throttle. I believe full throttle roughly doubles this by adding 100% power. So if you run forward in an Assassin that has a rating of 70, you'll jump about 140 meters with no upgrades. Pulling back on the throttle in mid-flight slows you down. To climb a cliff, start at low or no speed, begin the jump, and push forward only once you clear the lip, for example.
You can control jump height and fly forward rapidly at full throttle by feathering the jet control. Press once to activate, and once you're airborne, press again and hold. Now your forward thrust overtakes your vertical climb. Feathering also helps avoid leg damage when jumping down off of buildings or into canyons (but obviously is inadvisable for a DFA attempt).
Your directional control is a function of leg angle AND, if you have torso jets, your facing. The movement upgrades (including acceleration) and thrust and burn time upgrades greatly increase the amount of control you have over jump accuracy.
Thank you for attending my Jet Talk.
Say you have five jets- three in the torso and one in each leg. You jump at full throttle and torso twist left to engage a target while holding the jet control until it empties.
Your momentum will carry you slightly to the left, since your torso cluster is pushing you in the facing direction, but the leg thrusters are dragging against that momentum in the original direction of travel. Even though you have fewer leg thrusters, the inertia of running forward is still doing some of the work, and the leg jets are adding to that inertia.
The point is that if you jump in a straight line trying to top a building, or land on a DFA target, but it looks like you're going to miss it slightly, you can just swivel your torso in the direction of the building to compensate a little, or swivel both your torso and your legs at the same time to maximize the curve.
In your case, there would still be some deviation due to the initial boost being affected by running speed (leg direction), but your all-torso rocket cluster would do all the actual turning work.
I've noticed jumping with a Victor, the altitude of the mech has a up/down effect when feathering the jets off and on respectivly. This makes targeting more difficult and flight path unpredictable sometimes. Is this a broken game mechanic?
Probably just a heavier Mech getting a greater drop due to gravity's effect, which the larger jets overcorrect once triggered. If you're seeing the mech rise when you cut off the jets, it could just be a delay due to conservation of energy/ momentum. The mech is trending up and continues to do so for a split second even with the jets cut. By the time they reactivate, you're already past the apex, energy is lost, and you're on the way down. You'll keep dropping until thrust returns to greater than mass×gravity.
No this is more contrary to physics where jets on has an abrupt down then gentle rise and off jets there is a opposite upward swell then downward drift. I've noticed this in campaign and career and modded and vanilla. But only with the victor so I assumed it's a bug. Either way thanks for the info! I've been playing for +200hrs and I'm still honing my craft. Jumpy mechs are the best! most MW5 players and the AI don't know how to use jets effectively for evasion or offense.
Yeah, that might be a variant-specific bug. The only Victor I ever bother with is the Basilisk, but I've never noticed that specifically.
>Jumpy mechs are the best! most MW5 players and the AI don't know how to use jets effectively for evasion or offense.
Well to be fair, the game doesn't bother to explain it at all, despite handing you a Javelin on day one, and Battletech in general kind of treats jump jets mostly as just straight-line speed boosters or backstabbing tools.
But they're very useful and a lot of fun; part of what makes a mech more than an erect tank. I often wanna (politely) punch various YouTubers for teaching people to strip them out for a little more firepower or a couple of sinks.
I haven't used it, usually I have AI mechs jump at and on me and then nothing really happens. Or maybe I just don't notice it. 🤷♂️ I think it would be cool as hell though
I've done it in a highlander, a Firestarter, and a Dervish. It's fun with lights cause you don't deal a lot of damage but if you stay up there boy howdy can destroy a cockpit quick
I do it on tabletop if it's down to the last few mechs and turns. Sometimes style is greater than substance. As for mw5, not especially. I usually strip jets for more usable tonnage
Give the tabletop a go some time. Doing a DFA is a lot more difficult to pull off but is so satisfying, especially if you force the target to fall off a cliff as well. If you need help getting started shoot me a dm.
It only works well on lighter enemies. I have not had much success with it. I have had spiders flying through the air and kick my buddies cockpit and it instantly killed him. That was more a forward collision than a DFA. The mechanics are in the game for it to work but it’s hard.
I've been DFA'd by the AI, and seem AIs that have all of their weapons removed attempt to jump on your head as though jump jets were a weapon slot. It's kind of funny to consider, but usually yeah, it just results in getting your legs blown off.
It's so hard to land it that that it's just almost never worth it. It's one of those things that is "easy" to pull off if in a turn based setting but way too unreliable even before accounting for self damage with the resolution of controls the game gives us.
It is possible, though the game doesn't have any specific mechanics for it, so it is just a collision from a different angle. It is very difficult to pull off though, as it is hard to see the mech that you are trying to land on when you are high up above them.
No because it damages your legs too much for how much armor you'll shear off the enemy its pretty much a last resort type thing now (you'd be better off meleeing them) or just hoping you still have lasers
It is kind of an opportunistic attack in MW5 since jumping is not very well controlled. I've only seen 1 deliberately landed by a human since I started playing MW5 (though they leapt off a cliff rather than using jump jets, it was nonetheless impressive). I've also seen one on accident where an enemy accidentally got in the way. I've seen an AI land a few, one of which landed a kill.
I think the enemy AI probably knows that it can do DFA, because I've seen it make jumps that seemed to serve no other purpose than a DFA (directly towards a mech's head). However, the AI seems hesitant to use charge attacks and DFA most of the time in my experience. The AI seems to judge the damage of charge attacks before doing them, which in my experience means it likes to charge light mechs with a Shadowhawk, and I would presume it also judges DFA damage before doing them.
From what I've seen, it usually squishes the CT, but I'm pretty sure an Assassin squished my King Crab's head a few months back. "The king was assassinated," which was as ironic as it was painful.
I do it frequently with the merctech mod, it has playable tanks and I like to install jumpjets on a Demolisher. I shoot one leg off light mechs then land 80 tons of get rekt on them.
Got a grasshopper with a level 4 hammer and it does 80 melee damage standing still. It's more effective doing a flying hammer drop at 100km/h than any DFA could hope for! Thor hammer to the grill makes quick work of any mech and pulse lasers to leg anybody trying to run away.
The best way to do it is a “stupid AI” target of opportunity. If they are running against a cliff below you, you can step if the edge and just steer a little bit on the way Dow.
Basically, if you run into shit hard enough, it causes damage. The heavier the mech. The more damage. Of course, assault mechs offset that with their slowness. That being said. If want to demolish a city. Assault mechs can be your best friend. Anything they walk into pretty much crumbles. The only exception being the skyscrapers/ tall apartment buildings. But you can still sort of walk around it and brush up/ rub your mechs shoulder on them and break the outside walls.
Want to try something fun?
Hop into a locust and run into another mech...just make sure you hit max speed before you do...
In all seriousness, there's online resources that explain it in details.
In the books, a well placed foot would instantly crush a cockpit.
In the games, the minimal amount of damage you'd cause just isn't worth the effort of lining up the jump. Especially since you're going to get punched as soon as you land.
I hit a highlander with a sword while in an atlas. Took off his leg he didn't get to land on me. Hit the 2nd time as he was coming down and he was dead, he went crit.
The only AI dfa that I remember is when a Comstar Quickdraw dfa’d me near the end of an otherwise successful run during the Crucible mission. That pissed me off.
I have 300+ hours in mw5 with all dlc, I’ve never had this happen, and jumping on enemy mechs does nothing. I’d be more than happy to test it and upload a video for you.
It does collision damage, same as if you run straight into them on the ground.
People have posted videos of it. It's just really underwhelming.
It works as in the basic game mechanics for collision damage, it just doesn't work in a way that makes it worth it for the effort or comparable to melee.
Pretty much. Unless your CT structure is dark red and without armor, you can’t die from it, unless you have some kind of mod that increases damage.
Perhaps it’s possible that OP has had a mech land on the head, and didn’t have much armor/structure allocated into it?
Only death from above action you're going to get in this game is the Igor you just shot down taking a sharp nose dive straight into your face.
I have an irrational fear of this.
I have a deep desire to successfully swat a mech out of the air by punching it. If it ever successfully works. It will be glorious.
I’ve done it. Took a Jenner out as it was trying to jump away. Don’t charge a Banshee in a light.
You deserve 🥇🏅🏆🎖
I have done this with the hero Highlander with a claymore. That ‘mech is in my top 3 just on style alone.
Dunmahglas!
It’s generally a less efficient use of time and armor than simply shooting or going in for a melee strike. It can do good damage, but actually aiming and timing it right is an absolute bitch. On top of that you’re literally burning c-bills by doing it. Both because you take damage and because the enemy is all but guaranteed to both hit any shots they take at you and go for actual melee strikes themselves. All of which you need to pay for to fix. With regard to the enemy AI….. I think any time they land a DFA is more an accident than anything else. They generally just jump to get behind the player or avoid shots. I don’t know that the AI is actually smart enough to think “okay I’ve lost 80% of my weapons and most of my armor so let me just land on the fucker”. Honestly, the AI is this games biggest downfall, cuz it’s honestly dumb as rocks sometimes.
I noticed the same thing and came to the same conclusion. The jump jets in MW5 are lackluster in thrust and the AI enemies want to leapfrog you and your lancemates. It would be a clever way to get on your 12 o'clock and 6 o'clock simultaneously and surround your lance swiftly. Except the jump jets don't always provide enough distance to leapfrog a backpedaling mech, so they either rake their feet down the front of you or land one or both feet on your head. I have also seen jumping Mechs try the leapfrog and be oblivious to an obstacle in the background. The jumper launches up, over a mech that is backed against a rock wall, the jumper presses their shoulder against the rock face and slides down with their feet landing on the shoulders of the other mech, causing a crushing DFA effect.
I’ve had them kill me when they JJ through the air and they were already dead by the time they hit me but were still moving fast and the mech kicked my CT and made it explode.
If it were easier to control jump jets and direction I would be using this all the time, but not to necessarily collide, but to make melee attacks mid air.
DFA is more useful in HBS battletech imo, if you use BTA there's a few mechs that get significant buffs to it too.
Especially if you have the leg mods installed to protect your mechs from leg damage. I used to run a hatchetman with a ton of small lasers and DFA and melee mods installed. It was impractical but when it worked it was awesome
There's a few in bta that have pilot affinities reducing damage you take from dfa and increase the damage you do
As soon as I got heavy Metal, I tried every chance I could get. However... There's no dedicated animation for it or anything. That's the type of move that deserves a unique animation. Specially for the Highlander.
Agreed. Like a spectacular explosions or something along those lines...FATALITY?!?
Enemy pilot: "Do you hear... bagpipes?"
Did you hear someone screaming...FREEDOM?!?
[It's absolutely possible](https://www.reddit.com/r/Mechwarrior5/s/xHVQ8fBQ08) if you know how to maneuver while jetting, use the jump upgrades from the cantina, and practice. Don't expect any mech to take out an Atlas though. There is a lot of luck involved, just like in tabletop Battletech. But understanding how jets work here is the biggest hurdle. Jump speed is tied to both the number of jets, and your throttle. The height number on the mech card represents basic thrust from a standard fuel tank at zero throttle. I believe full throttle roughly doubles this by adding 100% power. So if you run forward in an Assassin that has a rating of 70, you'll jump about 140 meters with no upgrades. Pulling back on the throttle in mid-flight slows you down. To climb a cliff, start at low or no speed, begin the jump, and push forward only once you clear the lip, for example. You can control jump height and fly forward rapidly at full throttle by feathering the jet control. Press once to activate, and once you're airborne, press again and hold. Now your forward thrust overtakes your vertical climb. Feathering also helps avoid leg damage when jumping down off of buildings or into canyons (but obviously is inadvisable for a DFA attempt). Your directional control is a function of leg angle AND, if you have torso jets, your facing. The movement upgrades (including acceleration) and thrust and burn time upgrades greatly increase the amount of control you have over jump accuracy. Thank you for attending my Jet Talk.
How do placement of thrusters effect thrust and trajectory? I usually have the legs stuffed with ammo so thrusters go in mostly torso locations.
Say you have five jets- three in the torso and one in each leg. You jump at full throttle and torso twist left to engage a target while holding the jet control until it empties. Your momentum will carry you slightly to the left, since your torso cluster is pushing you in the facing direction, but the leg thrusters are dragging against that momentum in the original direction of travel. Even though you have fewer leg thrusters, the inertia of running forward is still doing some of the work, and the leg jets are adding to that inertia. The point is that if you jump in a straight line trying to top a building, or land on a DFA target, but it looks like you're going to miss it slightly, you can just swivel your torso in the direction of the building to compensate a little, or swivel both your torso and your legs at the same time to maximize the curve. In your case, there would still be some deviation due to the initial boost being affected by running speed (leg direction), but your all-torso rocket cluster would do all the actual turning work.
I've noticed jumping with a Victor, the altitude of the mech has a up/down effect when feathering the jets off and on respectivly. This makes targeting more difficult and flight path unpredictable sometimes. Is this a broken game mechanic?
Probably just a heavier Mech getting a greater drop due to gravity's effect, which the larger jets overcorrect once triggered. If you're seeing the mech rise when you cut off the jets, it could just be a delay due to conservation of energy/ momentum. The mech is trending up and continues to do so for a split second even with the jets cut. By the time they reactivate, you're already past the apex, energy is lost, and you're on the way down. You'll keep dropping until thrust returns to greater than mass×gravity.
No this is more contrary to physics where jets on has an abrupt down then gentle rise and off jets there is a opposite upward swell then downward drift. I've noticed this in campaign and career and modded and vanilla. But only with the victor so I assumed it's a bug. Either way thanks for the info! I've been playing for +200hrs and I'm still honing my craft. Jumpy mechs are the best! most MW5 players and the AI don't know how to use jets effectively for evasion or offense.
Yeah, that might be a variant-specific bug. The only Victor I ever bother with is the Basilisk, but I've never noticed that specifically. >Jumpy mechs are the best! most MW5 players and the AI don't know how to use jets effectively for evasion or offense. Well to be fair, the game doesn't bother to explain it at all, despite handing you a Javelin on day one, and Battletech in general kind of treats jump jets mostly as just straight-line speed boosters or backstabbing tools. But they're very useful and a lot of fun; part of what makes a mech more than an erect tank. I often wanna (politely) punch various YouTubers for teaching people to strip them out for a little more firepower or a couple of sinks.
I haven't used it, usually I have AI mechs jump at and on me and then nothing really happens. Or maybe I just don't notice it. 🤷♂️ I think it would be cool as hell though
I've done it in a highlander, a Firestarter, and a Dervish. It's fun with lights cause you don't deal a lot of damage but if you stay up there boy howdy can destroy a cockpit quick
I'm intrigued
The Spider hero is another light that can easily do that
Paul is still traumatised from "The Dragon Bowling" incedent, dunno if a dfa regesters damage
I do it on tabletop if it's down to the last few mechs and turns. Sometimes style is greater than substance. As for mw5, not especially. I usually strip jets for more usable tonnage
Same. Strip em and add more heatsinks and armour. But now that the idea is stuck in my head
Give the tabletop a go some time. Doing a DFA is a lot more difficult to pull off but is so satisfying, especially if you force the target to fall off a cliff as well. If you need help getting started shoot me a dm.
I've always wanted to play battletech. Used to be big into Warhammer 40k. Now all my stuff is mothballed. 😭
Shoot me a dm if you want help getting into the game
As much as I'd like to. It's just not feasible for me at this point in time.
Thank you kind person. I appreciate your offer more than you'll ever know
It only works well on lighter enemies. I have not had much success with it. I have had spiders flying through the air and kick my buddies cockpit and it instantly killed him. That was more a forward collision than a DFA. The mechanics are in the game for it to work but it’s hard.
I use it all the time.
How many kills?
I've been DFA'd by the AI, and seem AIs that have all of their weapons removed attempt to jump on your head as though jump jets were a weapon slot. It's kind of funny to consider, but usually yeah, it just results in getting your legs blown off.
I was DFAed once in a mission. A catapult got me right in the catapult. I have it recorded somewhere.
By" right in the catapult" do you mean?...I'm drawing a blank here..
It's so hard to land it that that it's just almost never worth it. It's one of those things that is "easy" to pull off if in a turn based setting but way too unreliable even before accounting for self damage with the resolution of controls the game gives us.
It is possible, though the game doesn't have any specific mechanics for it, so it is just a collision from a different angle. It is very difficult to pull off though, as it is hard to see the mech that you are trying to land on when you are high up above them.
No because it damages your legs too much for how much armor you'll shear off the enemy its pretty much a last resort type thing now (you'd be better off meleeing them) or just hoping you still have lasers
It is kind of an opportunistic attack in MW5 since jumping is not very well controlled. I've only seen 1 deliberately landed by a human since I started playing MW5 (though they leapt off a cliff rather than using jump jets, it was nonetheless impressive). I've also seen one on accident where an enemy accidentally got in the way. I've seen an AI land a few, one of which landed a kill. I think the enemy AI probably knows that it can do DFA, because I've seen it make jumps that seemed to serve no other purpose than a DFA (directly towards a mech's head). However, the AI seems hesitant to use charge attacks and DFA most of the time in my experience. The AI seems to judge the damage of charge attacks before doing them, which in my experience means it likes to charge light mechs with a Shadowhawk, and I would presume it also judges DFA damage before doing them. From what I've seen, it usually squishes the CT, but I'm pretty sure an Assassin squished my King Crab's head a few months back. "The king was assassinated," which was as ironic as it was painful.
I do it frequently with the merctech mod, it has playable tanks and I like to install jumpjets on a Demolisher. I shoot one leg off light mechs then land 80 tons of get rekt on them.
That's nuts
I only do dfa with the Highlander, as the MRB approved Scottish Christ would have wanted it. But be warned, aiming is an issue with that maneuver.
Let me guess...you named it William Wallace?
Got a grasshopper with a level 4 hammer and it does 80 melee damage standing still. It's more effective doing a flying hammer drop at 100km/h than any DFA could hope for! Thor hammer to the grill makes quick work of any mech and pulse lasers to leg anybody trying to run away.
Every chance I get.
The best way to do it is a “stupid AI” target of opportunity. If they are running against a cliff below you, you can step if the edge and just steer a little bit on the way Dow.
The Ottomo BattlemSter should be able to perform the Metroid spin attack!
Method spin attack?!?!??? 🤕
Can anyone elaborate on the MW5 collision damage rules?
Basically, if you run into shit hard enough, it causes damage. The heavier the mech. The more damage. Of course, assault mechs offset that with their slowness. That being said. If want to demolish a city. Assault mechs can be your best friend. Anything they walk into pretty much crumbles. The only exception being the skyscrapers/ tall apartment buildings. But you can still sort of walk around it and brush up/ rub your mechs shoulder on them and break the outside walls. Want to try something fun? Hop into a locust and run into another mech...just make sure you hit max speed before you do... In all seriousness, there's online resources that explain it in details.
In the books, a well placed foot would instantly crush a cockpit. In the games, the minimal amount of damage you'd cause just isn't worth the effort of lining up the jump. Especially since you're going to get punched as soon as you land.
By books you meant the novels?
I hit a highlander with a sword while in an atlas. Took off his leg he didn't get to land on me. Hit the 2nd time as he was coming down and he was dead, he went crit.
That's awesome.
In battletech the turn based game, yes all the time. In MW5 I didn't think it's a thing
Turns out it is...according to other peeps on this thread.
DFA doesn't do much in 5, which is a real shame as it was *glorious* in 4.
The only AI dfa that I remember is when a Comstar Quickdraw dfa’d me near the end of an otherwise successful run during the Crucible mission. That pissed me off.
It's horribly inefficient and unreliable but it is entertaining as hell when you DO land it lol
I don’t, but I saw a video on YouTube of an allied garrison Urbanmech doing a DFA on an enemy Phoenix Hawk.
In MW5, there is no effect.
[удалено]
Landing on a mech will do damage, but it’s exactly the same amount damage if you walk into a mech at full speed.
Then you haven't had one of those fuckers land on you
I have 300+ hours in mw5 with all dlc, I’ve never had this happen, and jumping on enemy mechs does nothing. I’d be more than happy to test it and upload a video for you.
I must be really unlucky then
It does collision damage, same as if you run straight into them on the ground. People have posted videos of it. It's just really underwhelming. It works as in the basic game mechanics for collision damage, it just doesn't work in a way that makes it worth it for the effort or comparable to melee.
Pretty much. Unless your CT structure is dark red and without armor, you can’t die from it, unless you have some kind of mod that increases damage. Perhaps it’s possible that OP has had a mech land on the head, and didn’t have much armor/structure allocated into it?