Howdy everyone and welcome back to Mech Overview. This week we are finishing off the Striker Star with the biggest and meanest machine in the box, the almighty Goshawk! Also known as the Vapor Eagle if you want to use the clumsier name, the Goshawk is probably the second mech that comes to mind whenever you talk about non-omni Clan Medium mechs, after the Solahma death machine that is the Hunchback IIC. To spoil the article a bit, the Goshawk standard model is one of the best medium mechs in the entire game bar none, to the point that I have never bothered with any of its variants. I hope that I can be pleasantly surprised by some other quality machines hiding inside of the Goshawk’s skin. I also wasn’t aware that there was a sequel, the Goshawk II, not to be confused with the Goshawk 2. So, let’s get into it!
Chassis
The Goshawk is a 55 ton Clan medium mech, with a general identity centered around being a goddam threat to everything else on the table at all times. With most variants having high speed and good jump capacity, there are few things in its weight and BV range that can get away from it. It is also an insane threat to anything that can outrun it, discouraging light mechs and other little dorks from trying to close in. There could be variants that remix this but this core idea, being a jumpy, hard to hit bastard with high firepower and decent armor, is a winning recipe in BattleTech. The Goshawk isn’t an omni-mech, so in theory they could radically remix the internals for variants, but with how well set up the Goshawk is, I don’t know why they would bother.
Goshawk 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).
Vapor Eagle Standard
The Goshawk Standard is a goddamn threat to public health and safety and should not be allowed to roam the streets. The military has to be deployed every time one hits the table to recover what is left of the poor bastard that had to sit across from one of these.
For a hefty 2358 BV you get a 6/9/6 bastard with great armor, an XL engine, and a ton of very scary guns. The Goshawk Standard carries a large pulse laser, three medium pulse lasers, two streak SRM-2s, and four machine guns. In addition, it carries a targeting computer, giving it a -3 to hit bonus with its pulse lasers. The machine guns are whatever but an LPL and 3 MPLs with a targeting computer is an insanely threatening set of guns. I would bet on this thing winning a fight with most of the game’s superheavies unless the superheavy gets very, very lucky. The Goshawk Standard is a 1v1 machine because it just hits so much more often than whatever is across the table from it. 6/9/6 is decent movement for evasion, and the armor ensures that a single lucky gauss hit won’t pop a side torso, leg, or arm. It will just grind any enemies to death with sheer consistency and it will do it very quickly.
Pulse plus targeting computers is an insanely broken combo, and the only reason that I think it does anything in the game at all is that too many mechs mount both and would need to be changed if they tried to fix it. Putting pulse plus targeting computers on a tough, fast, jumpy 55 ton frame is blatantly unfair. There are a small handful of units that do jumpy pulse better, but they are all measured against the Goshawk for a damn good reason. Jump 8 hexes away from your enemy and cackle maniacally as you just hit on a better number than your opponent every turn forever.
RATING: A
Vapor Eagle 2
The Goshawk 2 (not the Goshawk II) is an interesting mech that is ultimately probably worse than the standard. For 1989 BV you get the same internals, movement, and armor, but trade one of the MPLs, both SRMs, and the LPL for a UAC/10. I am a big fan of -1 to hit UAC/10s, but this is a rough trade from a consistency standpoint. Going from a -3 to a -1 on your big gun is just miserable even if it has a 40% chance to do double damage. It isn’t completely terrible but it is a bit of a waste of the chassis and miniature compared to the Standard model. Adequate medium in its own right, but a bit expensive for what it is…and like, the Standard is right there, bodying an entire Fafnir on its own.
RATING: C-
Vapor Eagle 3
I hate this mech a little bit less than I was expecting to. For 2466 BV, you get the same structural components as the Standard, but trade the guns out for an ER PPC, 3 medium heavy lasers, an ATM-3, and a pair of regular SRM-2s. The Goshawk 3 is a very simple and straightforward trade, exchanging consistency for damage output. In my opinion this is a terrible trade to make in nearly all cases, and in my opinion the Goshawk 3 is substantially worse than the standard model. That said, as far as jumpy fast ER PPCs go, this is far from the worst one. You could have an entire Thunderhawk, with 3 gauss rifles, for this BV, but the mobility of this chassis lets it make great use of the one headchopper it has, while also letting it switch over to the high damage but short ranged heavy lasers whenever it gets the chance. I almost wish that this was a pure heavy laser mech though, dropping the ER PPC and the missiles to maybe add three or four more heavy mediums and some heat sinks. Not really that bad but also not that good, take something else. Or, if CGL ever nerfs pulse laser BV, reconsider this chassis. Clan LPLs should be 350 fucking BV dude, I hate how the pulse one is always cheaper and is also better, it sucks.
RATING: C-
Vapor Eagle 4
I am intrigued but probably not enough. For 2069 BV, you lose the jump jets but keep the rest of the structural components the same. For weapons, the Goshawk 4 carries two ATM-6s, four ER medium lasers, and three ER small lasers for some fucking reason. This isn’t a great choice because it also drops the targeting computer. It does actually have enough heat sinks for all that gun though, which is valuable, and ATMs are just as flexible and quality here as they are on every Clan mech that mounts them. The problem with this mech is, again, the Standard standing right behind it and making threats. Threats to you, personally. It is a good mech but it isn’t a standout quality mech like the Standard model. If you want fast ATMs, consider a Stormcrow E. It has more ATM tubes at the cost of some armor and two of the ER medium lasers, for only slightly more BV.
God I can’t wait to talk about the Stormcrow too. 6/9 Clan 55 tonners are fucking insanely good if built right.
RATING: C-
Vapor Eagle 5
Okay now here is a variant that might have some teeth! For 2572 BV, a fuckton to be fair, you have the same structure and movement as the standard, as well as retaining the targeting computer. The 5 variant replaces the weapons with four MPLs, four machine guns, and an LRM-20 with Artemis IV and enough ammo to load some interesting alternative ammo types. I actually really like the look of this mech, you trade off 3 points of damage on one of your pulse lasers to get a substantially better missile weapon. This is a pretty good trade in my opinion, helped by the fact that with three tons of LRM ammo the Vapor Eagle 5 can afford to load a single ton of Thunder LRMs, letting it lay down minefields in various bits of cover, heavy wood hexes, and hiding places before your opponent can settle in to them. The Clan LRM-20 is also a fantastic brawling weapon with good long range capacity, which fits perfectly on a platform like the Vapor Eagle.
I actually think that in a lot of games the Vapor Eagle 5 is going to be straight up better than the Standard, and that is a big statement coming from me, the Goshawk Standard’s strongest soldier. The MPLs do most of the Goshawk’s damage so dropping the LPL doesn’t hurt too bad and an LRM-20 with Artemis IV is a comically better secondary weapon than two streak SRM-2s. You could go either way on this depending on how much you value a single 10 damage hit compared to just sandblasting the outside of a mech for tons of raw damage, but this is another extremely high grade from me.
RATING: A+
Vapor Eagle 6
Wow another bad one. For 1959 BV you can waste a perfectly good Goshawk chassis with the same internals and movement as the Standard model. The Goshawk 6 trades all guns out for two ultra AC/2s, three ER medium lasers, and four machine guns. UAC/2s are worthless weapons so this thing actually just downgrades the MPLs to ERMLs while gaining literally nothing and also removing the main gun. The Ultra 2 is a fucking travesty of a gun and I wouldn’t accept these weapons on a 1500 BV mech. This is a worse Clan version of the base model Blackjack.
RATING: D-
Vapor Eagle 7
Oh god someone let the infantry guy back in. Oh god oh fuck this is so bad, it’s so bad dude. For 2879 BV, more than a lot of 100 ton Clan assault mechs, you finally get some structural changes! The 7 carries slightly more armor and drops the jump jets. It then adds a supercharger and MASC to give it a move speed of 6/9(12)(15)/0, actually remarkably fast for any medium mech to move. For weaponry, it carries an ER PPC, a plasma cannon, and ten micro pulse lasers. This will completely pulverize any infantry that it comes across in seconds, capable of killing two or three platoons of infantry every time it shoots if it rolls well. Oh it also has a targeting computer so those little shivs are not missing.
The issue here is that like, is point blank backstabbing with micro pulses and killing infantry really what you want to be doing with a 2879 BV mech? A 594 BV Javelin will do nearly as well, as will an 841 BV Fire Moth P. The Fire Moth P is actually a very interesting point of comparison, as both mechs exist just to deliver micro pulse lasers into enemy back arcs. The Fire Moth is a lot more fragile, sure, but it can also run 25 hexes on it’s go turn, allowing it to hide nearly an entire map sheet away from its target. The Fire Moth P also carries two more micro pulses, and you can have three of the fucking things for less BV than the cost of a single Vapor Eagle 7. It does have that headchopping ER PPC, but at 2879 BV a single headchopper and literally nothing else once you are more than two or three hexes away from the enemy is completely fucking pathetic. The Plasma Cannon is also poorly used here, IMO the best thing to pair it with is UAC/10s. This is an overly expensive mess of a mech that wants to do the same job as a, 841 BV Fire Moth P but can’t even do that. Don’t use this one.
RATING: D-
Conclusion
Yeah I more or less had the right idea going in to this one. The Standard model is intensely, insanely strong, but I am pleasantly surprised that that quality was blinding me to a mech that is, in my opinion, very slightly better for my specific playstyle due to being able to lay mines! You genuinely can’t go wrong with a Standard or a 5, they can fit into any force and perform incredibly well. Some of the other variants aren’t completely without merit if you really like the sound of them, but like, two of the best medium mech variants in the entire fucking game, out of thousands of medium mech variants, are sitting right here with the same chassis and same miniature for only a couple hundred more BV. Genuinely a mech suffering from success, it was simply built different from the start and it is one of the only early BattleTech mechs that not only holds up but holds up as a goddamn mega-threat to everything else in the game.
If you find yourself facing down one of those two variants, I do have some suggestions on how to deal with them. For one, your own fast moving pulse losers, like Black Lanner variants and Gunsmiths, can chase them down and stick damage on them. The Black Lanner in particular is a pretty good matchup with the Goshawk, being faster in every config to the point where the Goshawk can’t run from it without very rough terrain to work with. A 14 hex run is hard to deal with. Another decent idea is to just put something like an Orion or a Banshee in front of it and get your opponent distracted trying to kill it. For all of its many strengths the Goshawk takes quite a long time to kill heavy and assault mechs on its own. Don’t get me wrong, it is going to win that fight, but hopefully you can win everywhere else while the Goshawk chews up a heavy mech that costs half as much as it.
Another viable anti-Jumpy Pulse tactic is to just herd up. Goshawks are at their best 1v1ing enemies, so if you have a bunch of heavy mechs with PPCs and Gauss Rifles, just literally stand next to each other for the entire game, horns guns pointed outwards and bristling towards the enemy. If the Goshawk/little bastard approaches your formation, light him the fuck up with every mech in the herd defensive formation and make them back off. I really should do an article about the Triceratops method of dealing with more mobile enemies at some point.
Mech good; use mech.
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