If you’re a big fan of the Stone Rhino in Mechwarrior Online, the latest update will have an almost funerary quality to it as the ‘Mech undergoes numerous explicit nerfs. That’s not editorializing, either, that’s what is in the patch notes along with an elaborate explanation of why. As the patch notes explain, the game has long had a rather cyclical nature of trying to make sure the new ‘Mechs introduced are not just playable but good, resulting in power creep, which requires later changes to make other ‘Mechs competitive, and so on and so forth.
It’s worth noting here that one of the big features of this patch is the addition of the Fire Moth. We’re not saying anything, we’re just saying.
So why is the Stone Rhino specifically targeted? While the team definitely thinks it’s overpowered, there’s also a desire to avoid taking it too far down so that it becomes outright unusable. So it’s another rolling series of small, targeted changes. You can check out the full list of nerfs in the patch notes, which also explain how Conquest is being disabled from Quick Play until March to allow for new very long Conquest matches to play out just through the next month.
