Howdy and welcome back to Mech Overview! Continuing our coverage of the Merc box, we are looking at one of the most mediocre of heavy mechs, the Quickdraw! The Quickdraw is a personal favorite of mine, the bane of my younger self’s existence due to its proliferation on RATs and mediocre at best quality. The Quickdraw is the pinnacle of the “Take what you have and make it work” style of list construction that can be so much fun in BattleTech. It is a junky dorkus of a heavy mech that consistently underwhelms you, but never to the extent that you are actively upset about it, you are just happy that it tried its best.
This is a profoundly silly looking mech and I love them. It is kind of adorable in a weird way, and its proud status as the leader of the 3025 trash patrol of mediocre and underwhelming junk is very well conveyed by the miniature. This, the Clint, the Vulcan, and the Rifleman rapidly become the bane of your fucking existence if you play early periods and use a RAT, or Random Allocation Table, to determine forces. Getting a decently rare heavy mech roll and having it turn out to be a Quickdraw is both profoundly disappointing but also induces incredibly high levels of “Fuck it we ball.” If you have never played the game by generating a force off of a Random Allocation Table, you should try it, it is a lot of fun. You will get given Quickdraws though, because God hates us.
Chassis
The Quickdraw is a 60 ton heavy mech with a generalist identity. Most variants are fast for their time and carry mediocre weapons, with a lot of them pointed the wrong way around. I have been shit talking the hell out of this mech but this comes from a place of genuine love. Possibly Stockholm Syndrome. I have been badly scarred by using the 3025 variants of this thing to fight 3D Marauders and K2 Catapults. As a non-Omni with it’s origins in TRO 3025, variants can make significant changes. That said, the Quickdraw lacks variants compared to most of the other TRO 3025 heavy mechs, lacking the sex appeal of mechs like the Warhammer or Griffin.
Variants
These mechs have all been reviewed based on a standard F through S scale, which you can find described on our landing page here (along with all of our other ‘mech reviews, the name of the box you can buy to get any of the mechs we have covered, and our general methodology).
QKD-4G
The OG, the 4G comes in at 1192 BV and is a profound disappointment. It moves 5/8/5 and has thin as shit armor, like, Panther grade armor. For a mech that weighs nearly twice as much as a Panther, that sucks. Weaponry is similarly anemic, with an LRM-10, SRM-4, and 4 medium lasers, two of which point backwards. This would be an immensely better with those lasers pointing forwards, and for 1200 this is straight up a pathetic heavy mech with very few redeeming qualities. It blows up, dies, and has guns pointing the wrong way. A+, one of the finest examples of 3025 trash in the game, I love this piece of shit. I hate thinking about the poor motherfucker that has to drive a Quickdraw in a world that has the Dragon in it.
RATING: D-
Also please god use this thing, it is such a rat mech and every time it kills something it will be a fucking all time moment for your BattleTech playing career.
QKD-4H
The Monkey’s Paw curls. The 4H is more or less exactly the same as the 4G for 1242 BV, it just swaps the rear firing medium lasers to shoot forwards! But, because we can’t have a 3025 Quickdraw being good, the SRM-4 now fires backwards. I mean it’s better but it still isn’t great.
RATING: D
QKD-5A
The 5A is an interesting variation, and a semi-decent 3025 Quickdraw. At 1196 BV, it swaps the LRMs out for 2 extra medium lasers and some heat sinks. While this mech now has cripplingly short range, it also has a pretty good amount of short range firepower for the era on a pretty fast body for the era. Time isn’t kind to this mech and it ends up in a similar boat to an Urbanmech, best used in broken terrain and typically getting shot to death on it’s way in.
RATING: D+
QKD-5K
The 5K is a very simple upgrade, being exactly a 5A with marginally thicker armor and double heat sinks. At 1265 BV this is a reasonable upgrade but the mech still isn’t great. It is also hilariously oversinked, generating a max of 20 heat firing all front facing guns and jumping but sinking a full 34 fucking points of heat, making it immune to inferno missiles as long as you don’t jump, which is fucking hysterical but also incredibly bad. Bit of a waste of advanced technology and it would be infinitely better with more armor and less heat sink.
RATING: D+
QKD-5K2
I am being fucked with. Like: I am actively being fucked with. For 1312 BV the 5K2 is exactly the same as the 5K, but its rear firing lasers are swapped to fire forwards! However, because reasons, the SRM-4 is now firing backwards, and it fixed literally none of the issues with the 5K. Hilarious fucking machine and I hate it so much. Piece of shit.
RATING: D+
QKD-5M
Why is every Quickdraw a piece of shit? The 5M is exactly the same as the 4G, with marginally thicker armor and the SRM downgraded to be one shot for some fucking reason. It is 1237 BV and it sucks, moving on.
RATING: D-
QKD-5Mr
Mr. Quickdraw here is still bad. For 1471 BV it is exactly the same as the 5M, but it upgrades the front lasers to ER lasers and adds a targeting computer and Artemis IV to the missile racks. Still bad, poorly armored, and upsetting for the price.
RATING: D-
QKD-8K
Thank god for House Kurita. We have a decent one. Not great, just decent. For 1583 BV it carries mediocre armor, better than the actively bad armor that most Quickdraws so far have had, and some decent weapons. It mounts 4 ER medium lasers, all front facing, and an MRM-30. With the way this mech is set up, heat wise, you want to fire the ER mediums on most shots, being heat neutral while doing so, and swap 2 of them out for the MRM-30 whenever you have an easy shot. You want to prefer the lasers due to the accuracy penalty of the MRM-30. If you have an easy shot, a 6+ or better, you would probably benefit from swapping to the MRM. MRMs do a fuckton of damage if used correctly and 5/8/5 is fast enough to do MRM things without a ton of issues. I have a bias towards MRMs because they are just massively cheap for the damage potential that they carry, and this is a mediocre but not actively bad chassis for one. Sad that that is as good as it gets for Quickdraws though, at least so far.
RATING: C-
QKD-8P
At 1598 BV, the 8P is a deeply funky mech. First off, it drops the jump jets and has a torso cockpit, freeing up the head for other stuff. It has significantly better armor than the Quickdraw standard, and significantly better weapons with a head mounted PPC, 2 medium lasers, and a streak SRM-4. It also has a TAG and ECM if that matters in your game. It only has single heat sinks, which kinda sucks, but it bracket fires well, being heat neutral with either the short range guns or the long range guns. It also has TSM to take advantage of heat, and boosting up to 6/9/0 is pretty nice in this kind of mech. The firepower is anemic for the cost though, and overall despite being a weird little guy I just don’t think that this is a particularly good mech. It is durable but very low damage and overall just meh.
RATING: C-
QKD-8X
At 1612 BV the QKD 8X is a funky mech, designed to use handheld weapons. I got a few facts wrong last time we featured a mech designed with these in mind. For one, you cannot shoot any torso or arm mounted guns while using them, unfortunately. Fortunately though, the 8X is fucking incredibly built and is designed to be a fucking menace with those handheld weapons. It has TSM to boost it to 6/9/0, and that is a secret tool that will help us later. For weapons, it has a head mounted PPC, 2 rear facing medium lasers, and a head mounted TAG. The PPC is also in a turret, which is funny. It has stealth armor, 12 single heat sinks, and thick armor. It is built to, turn one, walk and fire the PPC with stealth active, and then after that just run and fire the handheld weapons constantly, as they build no heat. Now, the most interesting parts of this mech are the lift hoist mounted in the rear, and the TSM.
The Lift Hoist lets it carry half of its weight on its back, amounting to 30 tons, enough for an entire light mech, and the TSM lets it carry 12 tons in it’s hands, 6 tons when it isn’t active. It has 2 classes of handheld weapons, 12 ton heavy weapons, and 6 ton light weapons. Near as I am interpreting the rules, it can “Draw” a weapon from the lift hoist into it’s hands with a couple of PSRs, to drop and pick up the weapon. It can carry 2 12 ton weapons on it’s back, along with one 6 ton weapon on the back and 1 in the hands. It can then swap them on the fly to adapt to changing battlefield conditions, and I don’t care if that is suboptimal that is the coolest shit ever!!!! This thing has a fucking 4 weapon inventory like a goddam FPS protagonist and I love him so much you have no idea!
For handheld weapons, you have the following set.
- 12 ton weapon: LRM-20 with 1 ton of ammo, 236 BV
- 12 ton weapon: LBX-10 with a half ton of ammo, 174 BV
- 12 ton weapon: 3 Streak SRM-4s with 1 ton of ammo, 248 BV
- 12 ton weapon: RAC/5 with a ton and a half of ammo, 310 BV
- 12 ton weapon: Thunderbolt 10 with 3 tons of ammo, 239 BV
- 6 ton weapon: Light AC/5 with a half ton of ammo, 82 BV
- 6 ton weapon: 5 machine guns and 1 vehicle flamer, with half a ton of machine gun ammo and 1 ton of flamer ammo, 64 BV
- 6 ton weapon: 1 medium laser, 110 BV
So the thing that fucking rocks with this is that you get to build loadouts, not just pick one, and all weapons mounted on this thing are just there for support. My recommended loadout is to start with the LAC/5 weapon in your hands loaded with precision ammo, with a RAC/5, Thunderbolt 10, and anti-infantry weapon on your back. The thing is that I could also see an LRM and SRM loadout, or any number of other ones. I don’t even care if I am misreading the rules, this is such a fucking rad mech. The idea of a mech that can adapt to changing battlefield conditions on the fly and carry on without having to stop and refit is just fucking awesome, and being able to do it in game is even cooler.
Also, I don’t see anything in the rules that would keep you from handing one of the weapons off to a friendly mech, assuming they can carry it. This mech is not only the man of many guns, but also an arms dealer and possibly, without exaggeration, the coolest mech in the game if it works anything close to the way I think it works. I don’t care how much it sucks or doesn’t, I am going to use this in every game, probably with a high skill pilot.
Assuming you can hand out the weapons, this thing could just carry 5 LAC/5s on it’s back and give them out to any other 60 tonners, or 30 tonners with TSM, to go commit crimes with. Having access to a few shots of precision ammo on every mech if you need it is potentially fucking hilarious, though not a ton of mechs are super happy to trade off their actual mounted guns for it.
Relatedly, I am going to go build a whole bunch of mechs designed around handheld weapons to use in casual play. Customs are fun for dumb shit like this.
RATING: Probably a B, but an S+ in my heart. Stupid fun.
EDIT: Future Peri here, having reread the book and been informed of the fact that the rules for using this stupid thing are split between two books (Total Warfare and Tac Ops) and 3 sections of those books (Including the scenario design section of Total Warfare for some fucking reason), it more or less works the way I thought but with a few exceptions, so let’s run through it.
First, yes, friendly and enemy units can make use of the handheld weapons that the Quickdraw can carry. It is fully allowed to be an arms dealer and that is funny as hell. Any TSM 30+ ton mech with hands can use any of the 6 ton weapons. Mechs can carry 10% of their weight in their hands, doubled with TSM, so 30 ton with TSM or 60 ton without TSM are the breakpoints.
Second, the sequence for swapping weapons is a bit more convoluted and long than I got from my initial reading. There are no PSRs involved, instead you have to unload the cargo from your back and drop the handheld weapon at the end of the movement phase of a turn, which will prevent you from shooting that turn. Next turn you can pick up the weapon you just unloaded, which prevents shooting for another turn. You trade 2 turns of shooting to swap weapons, and your TMM probably won’t be great. It is very risky to do in the field, but you also do still gain that tactical flexibility. The best use might be to start with the LRM/Thunderbolt weapon, shoot out all of the ammo, then duck behind a wall and draw one of the short ranged guns and dive in to finish things off that have been softened up by your LRM barrage.
Another fun note is that the guns designed for this thing could hypothetically be carried by an Industrial Mech like a Buster, which could carry like 9 of the 6 ton weapons, including one in it’s hands, if I am reading the rules right. This would let the Buster act as a caddy for handheld weapons for an entire force, which is hilarious and possibly one of the only conceivable uses for an Industrial Mech in a regular BattleTech force.
It is a bit less on the fly adjustable but all the other fun stuff is still very doable with this mech.
QKD-9G
Back to normalcy, the 9G is 2224 BV, has fine armor, uses MASC and a Supercharger to move 5/8[10][13]/5, a wild movement speed, and carries 2 streak SRM-4s, a Clan grade streak SRM-6, 2 front facing ER medium lasers, and 2 back facing regular medium lasers. It also has a targeting computer. This is overall a perfectly fine cavalry mech, even with the bad TMM breakpoints that it is hitting with MASC and Supercharger. I am not super excited about it but there isn’t anything glaringly wrong that I can notice. Mech fine.
RATING: C+
QKD-9M
This is a different sort of mech. For 1690 BV, you get decent armor, 5/8/5 movement, 2 large lasers, an LRM-15, and a targeting computer. Heat management is ok but not great, and overall it is certainly one of the XL engined IS heavies of all time. Not exceptional but sorta kinda ok if you squint a bit.
RATING: C
QKD-C
This is a 5K that trades one rear medium laser for a C3 slave. Mech sorta mid, not fantastic, mediocre in a C3 lance and no better anywhere else. It is cheaper at 1225 though. Still oversinked to high hell.
RATING: D+
Conclusion
The Quickdraw is a complete trashbot, a mediocre at best mech without anything that makes it stand out in any way. It is of low to middling quality for the most part. I love them because they suck so hard, and they are insanely fun trashbots to run at people because they don’t really do much but they are pretty big at least. The 8X is easily my pick for best out of the bunch though, insanely fun mech with a cool gimmick and a meaningfully different playstyle compared to every other mech in the game, swapping weapons based on what it needs. It is also allowed to pistol whip people with its guns, making a club attack with them and breaking them, but it can just draw another one and keep blasting.
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