The Mech Touch novel Chapter 3485

Chapter 3485: Strategic Shift

Although the support of the audience did not directly affect the battle strength of the combatants in any way, it still had a substantial influence on morale.

The Larkinson mech pilots became a lot more buoyed when they saw how extensively the fans and viewers around them rooted for their victory.

Even if many of the Larkinson mech pilots didn't fight for glory, right now they couldn't help but become caught up in the competitive fever!

As long as they won the next match, they would become famed and celebrated warriors in the Red Ocean! If nothing else, they could brag about reaching the finals of a big and important tournament whenever they entered a bar!

Of course, they still needed to win. All of their dreams and hopes would become dashed if they weren't able to beat the Urthinans.

As the countdown started, the mech pilots of both sides tuned out the massive live audience and only focused on what was important.

The arena battlefield turned into a highly unusual environment this time. The surface of the arena turned into a flat, arid terrain that offered no cover or obstacles of any kind.

A battlefield like this would have been completely boring if not for one complication.

A light sandstorm swept throughout the entire battlefield.

The sand particles that were largely blowing in a uniform direction were mixed with a light proportion of metal and exotic materials. This caused the sandstorm to generate a moderate amount of interference.

Although the sensor and communication systems of most mechs still remained effective in a range of a couple of kilometers around them, it was quite troublesome to reach any further without the use of mechs acting as relays.

Still, this was not that big of a deal. Neither the Larkinsons nor the Urthinans enjoyed a significant advantage this time. At most, they needed to roam around a bit more in order to locate each other's mechs.

What did bother them was the fact that the sand could sneak into all kinds of holes and crevices. While the blowing sand wasn't powerful enough to grind down solid mechs in a short amount of time, they could easily aggravate the injuries of any mechs!

As long as a mech suffered an armor breach and exposed its internals to the environment, all of that sand blowing into the interior compartments could easily interfere or wreak havoc on the functioning of the mechs!

The implications were clear to the Larkinsons.

"Avoid getting hit." Commander Casella instructed her men. "If you get struck by a lance, it likely won't matter as much, but if the enemy ranged mechs manage to breach your armor, try to orient your mechs so that the hole doesn't face the wind."

This would only slow down the deterioration process. The measures the mechs had to take to stall their end also impose considerable limits on their subsequent actions.

However, Commander Casella could work with this. In her judgement, the current battle environment provided a slight advantage to the Larkinson Battalion.

Whereas the Urthinan lancer mechs needed to pull off a successful charge in order to breach the armor of their targets, most of the Larkinson mechs didn't have to go through so much trouble!

Casella took one more look at her entire battalion. The mech roster for this battle was a significant departure from what the Larkinson Battalion had fielded before.

This time, the Larkinsons did not bring any Transcendent Punishers.

The Eye of Ylvaine wasn't happy with this strategic decision, but the Larkinson Battalion simply couldn't afford to bring so many burdens to the battlefield this time.

The Transcendent Punishers worked best against opponents that were slow and could not overwhelm the Larkinson lines. The aggressive, charge-oriented mech doctrine of the Glory of Urthina Battalion happened to be one of their worst nightmares!

No matter whether the Larkinsons brought 20, 50 or even 100 Transcendent Punishers, each of them would get demolished in the first five minutes when a torrent of lancer mechs swept across their positions!

Lancer mechs just loved to skewer their lances through big, fat immobile targets like heavy artillery mechs!

It was largely self-defeating to bring a large amount of knight mechs to protect the heavy artillery mechs.

The enemy lancer mechs would just wipe out the knight mechs first before moving on to demolish the heavy artillery mechs shortly afterwards!

This was also the reason why the Larkinsons did not bring any Eternal Redemptions this time. While Penitent Sister cannoneer mechs were more maneuverable than the Transcendent Punishers, they were still sitting ducks against their current opponents!

The Larkinsons made a bold but risky change in strategy for this match. Instead of fielding a rounded and balanced assault force, the Larkinson Battalion instead switched out all of their melee mechs and slower mechs!

The Bright Warriors in knight mech configuration and swordsman mech configuration were entirely absent this time. The Valkyrie Redeemers were still allowed to remain, but their numbers had been reduced from 120 mechs to 80 mechs.

The remaining 420 mechs of the Larkinson Battalion consisted entirely of Bright Warriors in rifleman mech configuration!

Many of the mech pilots who fought in the previous matches had been replaced by other mech pilots who specialized in ranged combat. The clan still had plenty of mech pilots that were readily available to participate in this competition.

The extreme shift in force composition meant that the Larkinson Battalion could no longer use the same fighting formulas as before. The Larkinsons needed to employ a radically different approach in order to win with so many mobile ranged mechs!

While the Valkyrie Redeemers could fight both at range and up close, they clearly weren't equipped to collide directly against the assault forces of the Glory of Urthina Battalion.

For now, their melee capabilities weren't important. Commander Casella had strictly instructed the Penitent Sisters to maintain their distance for the time being.

"Before we can go on attack, we need to blunt the enemy's assault." She reminded everybody. "Stick to the plan and force the Urthinan lancer mechs to waste their time chasing after our mechs."

As the Larkinson mechs all soared into the air and built up speed, the first Urthinan offensive mechs had already begun to appear from the sandstorm.

These mechs quickly relayed the news to the other Urthinan mechs. More and more powerful enemy lancer mechs, offensive knight mechs and light skirmishers emerged from the raging sands.

"Slay the infidels!"

"Run them down!"

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