Editing BattleMech (section)

=== Weaponry ===
* '''Lasers''': Basic directed energy weapon. They are fairly cheap, do fairly consistent damage and since they're powered by the mech's reactor they don't need ammo. That said while they do burn into your enemies' armor, they also generate waste heat. 
**'''Small Laser''': Low power and low range, often used on light mechs or as "we got half a ton to spare, what the hell?" add ons to heavier ones.
**'''Medium Laser''': Your basic laser gun. Main weapons for Light and Medium Mechs and useful secondaries for Heavy and Assault Mechs.
**'''Large Laser;''': Heavier, long range laser. Serious firepower for laser focused Big Boys.
**'''Pulse Laser''': Can be small, medium or large. As opposed to a single blast, Pulse Lasers fire several successive times in order to increase damage, though the heat they generate is much higher on average than the normal variants.
* '''Autocannons''': Abbreviated as ''AC''. An enormous machine gun/cannon that fires explosive shells in short bursts. Autocannons have variable ammo caliber sizes and are mostly grouped into categories of default damage numbers. While they don't generate much heat and are often times much better at taking armor off a Mech, they're also dependent on their hard ranges of minimum distance, requiring a lot of maneuvering to make work, and of course they can only carry a limited amount of ammunition.
** '''Autocannon/2''' - The sniper rifle of Autocannons. While it's next to useless in a close-range firefight, it's good at taking potshots from a distance that even LRMs can't reach. Almost anything that has one usually loads up on special munitions to offset the loss of damage.
** '''Autocannon/5''' - Arguably the first Autocannon ever made, it does respectable but not especially impressive damage at longer ranges, and can open just the right armor type in a pinch.
** '''Autocannon/10''' - The gold standard of Autocannons simply due to it's sheer utility; it can do some real damage, has a reasonable range, but critically it also has no minimum range that the MechWarrior has to consider when using it. Most 'Mechs that have an Autocannon will almost certainly default to this or any variant of it.
** '''Autocannon/20''' - The short-range, big damage variant. Can only shoot about a few hundred yards out, but anything dumb enough to be in it's range is pretty much scrap if the Autocannon lands more than one hit.
* '''Particle Projector Cannons''': The other standard Energy weapon (called ''PPC’s'' for short), but generally much spicier than any Laser. A massive Cannon that fires a concentrated stream of ions and protons at a target at such velocity and strength that the Mech it's attached to experiences a kickback from it. The Mech that gets hit can experience serious electrical damage from the volley, and as such they are prized parts of any Mech it's attached to; rivalling Autocannons in terms of overall usefulness. The Mech it's attached to has inhibitors to prevent the cannon from frying it's own circuits, but some mad lads play dangerously and pull that particular thing off in dire straits to see what happens when they let the PPC really cook. Comes in a similar range of sizes and utility similar their laser counterparts. Another new variant is the '''TSEMP''' ('''T'''ight '''S'''tream '''E'''lectro-'''M'''agnetic '''P'''ulse) cannon) developed by the Word of Blake and later Republic of the Sphere. It combines the principle technology and range of PPC’s with the disabling effects of the Mech Taser. However, the individual capacitors that charge each shot can blow up like the ones on Gauss rifles if they’re damaged.
* '''Missiles''': You know how these work; a big rocket full of boom comes straight down on your opponent's face. Most Mechs that have them have a dedicated platform designed to deliver the payload; from dedicated missile systems designed to be fired at short, medium, or long ranges aided by fire control systems, or simpler, fixed range missile launchers like the Arrow IV that are designed to even out the terrain of a particularly unlucky stretch of land. Very useful weapons, but they're expensive, and doubly so since they're susceptible to jamming. Special versions include Listen-Kill warheads aimed at electronic signatures or ARAD missiles tracking radiation emissions. Alternatively, the warheads can be swapped with special-purpose munitions. 
* '''Gauss Rifle''': A more technologically advanced alternative to the Autocannon among ballistic guns, a Gauss Cannon that has been standardized with powerful electromagnets to shoot a solid metal melon straight into and more often than not through opposing mechs. It generates almost no heat and is quite powerful, but is incredibly energy intensive and often enormous, requiring Mechs to almost be built around that weight limitation rather than the Rifle around the Mech's limitations. Also, if the individual capacitors used to power each shot are damaged, they risk blowing up the same way non-CASE’d autocannon ammo can.
* '''[[Flamer]]s''': They're in BattleTech too! You use them for almost the exact same purpose as you would in another wargame; melting infantry. This is much less useful in BattleTech however given that almost nobody uses full-on infantry anymore, but it can be helpful to raise the heat of a Mech to intolerable levels. The Capellans later invented a variant called Plasma (<s>no, not [[Plasma|that one]]</s>) which uses ionized & viscous foam bullets launched at infantry or light armor like modern white phosphorus or napalm.
* '''Machine Guns''': For killing squirrels. If you're in a mech primarily armed with these you're mostly just there to keep infantry or restless insurgents tied up, or, and I'm sorry to have to break it to you now, you're in the Mech that's expected to die. Machine guns can also be used in Anti Missile Systems like real life Active Protective Systems on modern tanks or Close In Weapon Systems on ships; blasting those pesky missiles out of the sky before they can mess up the paint job. They're also a component for Anti-Battle Armor modules to keep Clanner Elementals from tearing into your cockpit to shoot you in the face.
* '''Melee Weaponry''': While initially wildly impractical as an idea since a mech can carry giant guns and finish a fight against other Mechs without the use of a hand-to-hand weapon, the Succession Wars were such a resource drain that stuff like PPCs and even some variations of lasers couldn't be reliably manufactured and bolted to the giant robot, so mech-sized melee weapons found themselves making comebacks. As they do a point of damage per a certain amount of tonnage from the attacking mech and generate no heat, they can acquit themselves quite well if given to the right MechWarrior, but being in melee range for BattleMechs is generally not a good idea unless it was built/rebuilt from the ground up to brawl.  Jump jets in particular are practically mandatory equipment for melee mechs.  Certain types of melee weapons like fists and claws can also grapple opponents, reducing the chances of a successful breakaway from close combat.
** '''Punch''': Most Mechs in the game have some form of hand actuator, which means the most basic form of harm that a human can do is very much available to their giant metal toys. Games running Design Quirk rules can augment certain mechs with the "Battlefists" quirk, which gives further bonuses to hit on such an attack.
** '''Kick''': All Mechs have feet, however not all depictions of the game system allow for SERIOUS FOOTBALL (making Urbie lovers all the happier). Like with fists, games running Design Quirk rules can augment certain mechs with extra footie power, leading to the ability to literally remove another Mechs existence with well-placed toes.
** '''Push''': Again, a melee attack that's pretty much only in the tabletop versions. You have Mech? You have enemy Mech? Put your Mech against enemy Mech and move. Might cause enemy Mech to fall down. May have other effects.
** '''Charge''': A Push, done at speed. Warning: Running your Mech into another Mech, when the other Mech is bigger, is likely to cause your Mech as much damage (or more) than the enemy Mech takes. Extra points if the damage you take provokes an ammo rack explosion. Somewhat reflected in the computer games.
** '''Death From Above''': A Charge, as applied to Mechs with Jump Jets. Your Mech takes leg damage, enemy Mech takes upper torso damage. Can lead to extreme headaches for others. Can lead to extreme headaches for you too, if you flub your piloting check. Gravity is no one's bitch. Also, due to a Jump-Jet-equipped 90-ton monstrosity of an assault Mech called the Highlander, yes, "Highlander Burials" exist as canon in the game. You know you're having a bad day when your salvage-and-repair teams have to break out the shovels just to get to the light Mech so 'buried'. Absolutely is in the computer games.
** '''Hatchet''': A giant meat cleaver pioneered by the Lyrans. Does a point of damage per every 5 tons of Mech. Given that the average mech in the Lyran Commonwealth is probably 70 tons or more, this makes it a much more dangerous thing than it initially sounds.
** '''Sword''': A standardized sword created as an alternative to the Lyran Hatchet by the Combine. It does a point of damage plus one for every Ten tons of Mech, but thanks to their exceptionally engineered balance, they're easier to hit with than a Hatchet.
** '''Club''': A Hatchet with no blade, maybe just a tree you found, or possibly just an Urbie-onna-stick. Can also be the leg you just kicked off a Mech. Yes, this means you can literally beat another Mech to death with their own limb. Less accurate than a Hatchet RAW, however tends to do more damage since you don't have to mess around with balance or design considerations. *BONK*
** '''[[Solaris VII]] Weirdness''': The Arena is...weird. If you can make it look flashy and still do damage, some Mechjock has tried it. This includes: Buzzsaws, Chain Whips, Claws, Flails, Lances, Spikes, Talons (Claws for feet; Takes that DfA up to 11), Tasers (which is more like an Electro-Harpoon and a boon to salvagers everywhere), hand-held Shields, and Vibroblades. That said, a wide range of Solaris goofiness has ended up on the battlefield do to the fact that if it reliably works the arena, it usually will reliably work outside of it as well.