Wanzer Construction

Building your wanzer is a complex art that is vital to your success in Front Mission 4. Since all combat in the game takes place in your wanzer, having a powerful, yet practical wanzer for all battle situations is extremely important. This part of the guide is supposed to act as a sort of beginners' guide in what to look for when building and upgrading your wanzer to best fit what you're looking for.

Stick To Default
In otherwords, if a wanzer comes in as a shotgun/machinegun toting wanzer, then keep it that way. It's obviously best for the particular character the wanzer is catered towards, and the default abilities will always be for the way the wanzer is initially equipped. Unless you want to buy from the computer shop and get your abilities that way (which is always an option, just not always the best one monetarily), work with what you have. Machinegun abilities will go towards those who are initially equipped with a machinegun; same with missiles, grenades, and all of the like.

Weight vs. Power
Weight and Power are two stats inherent to wanzers and what you equip on them, and you must understand how they work within wanzer construction, or you'll find yourself having a lot of difficulty when building the perfect wanzer for your character.

Weight is how much each item weighs that you can put on your wanzer. All arms, legs, weapons and even the bodies themselves have weight. The difference between the body and the rest of the wanzer is that it also carries "power," which is how much weight the entire wanzer can hold. Hence, if a wanzer's power is 500, for instance, it all comes from the body. The body also has weight, so lets say the body weighs 200, you have 300 power left to "spend." You cannot go over your weight limit, so if something doesn't fit on your wanzer, you have to sacrifice other things to make it fit. It's rare where you can have the absolute best of everything on a single wanzer.

The primary reason behind weight restrictions is to make sure players don't go all out on their wanzer equipment. What's stopping you, afterall, from equipping a long-range rifle, missile and grenade launchers, and a melee weapon on each wanzer? Nothing at all… except for weight restrictions. That's why choosing and sticking to whether your wanzer will be a gunner, long-range wanzer, missile user, et cetera, is very important to decide prior to upgrading each wanzer.

Evasion
Evasion is a stat that should be considered closely, primarily for machinegun/shotgun using wanzers, and melee wanzers especially. Evasion is simply the chance your wanzer has of avoiding enemy attacks. This is, of course, not considering enemy skills they could have, such as Aim and the like, which will nullify your evasion.

Going into negative evasion percentages (such as -10%) really doesn't matter; it's the same as zero (0%), you have no chance of avoiding any enemy attack. For missile/grenade users, long range rifle users, bazooka users, and the like, evasion doesn't matter. So their armor having poor evasion matters little as opposed to the aim and sturdiness. On the other hand, more fast-moving wanzers that use melee weapons and close-range guns will need good evasion, because their fast movement will sacrifice some armor protection, hence making their ability to avoid enemy attacks vital. Keep that in mind when creating and upgrading wanzers.

Hit Points Are Not the End-All
Hit points for particular parts of your wanzer are important, sure, but not the end all. If a melee wanzer, for instance, will lose 50% of his or her wanzer's evasion to gain 100 hit points, it's not worth it. For a missile user, on the other hand, you should consider that move, since hit points are more important for distance fighters anyway, evasion being nullified completely. Make sure to carefully balance what stats you gain or lose in conjunction with gaining or losing hit points - it's not always about hit points, afterall.

Hit% Is A Good Thing
Hit% (Hit Percentage) should always be kept in mind when equipping arms on your wanzers. The higher the hit percentage, the better, always… except with shoulder-fired weapon users. Machinegun/shotgun using wanzers, and long-range gun users should always keep Hit% at the pinnacle of what is considered when equipping arms. It helps to determine whether or not you're going to hit your enemies, afterall.

Movement is Vital
Being able to move around more is always a good thing. While not as vital with long-distance attackers, the ability to move (by acquiring good legs) is always nice, and should be considered. Make sure to check out the "move" stat when buying legs… if it's not giving you anything or taking away how much you can move, always try for an alternative that allows you to move more.

Stay Away From Buying "Full Sets"
Full Sets for your wanzer include arms, legs, and the body itself. While it keeps you nice and "organized" by mostly keeping "types" together as far as brand name and the like, it limits you to a certain attribute that armor setting brings with it, and then you have to go and buy or sell to get what you want. It's easier, cheaper, and more practical to buy your wanzer gear piece by piece. Trust me.

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