The Thanatos

A battlemech that I first remember seeing in Vengeance, The Thanatos is today’s choice for review. The ‘Thanny’ comes in at 75tons making it top out the Heavy Class scale. The Inner Sphere’s answer to the Clan Thor? Almost.

Offering an excellent selection of electronics, The Thanatos comes standard with ECM and Jump Jets. LAMs and IFF Jammer round out the offering and are very good options for this battlemech.

Out of the factory, the ‘Thanny’ has 14tons of ferro armour almost full. It also has some 6 heat sinks that I am guessing is because of the Rocket launcher and medium pulse lasers packed on as stock weapons. If you strip away the heat sinks and weapons, add on the LAMs and IFF, you have 32 and ½ tons of weaponry you can pack on.

Weapons slots on the Thanatos are again what I consider an ‘older design’ having one arm mostly for ballistics and the other for missiles with a mix if energy and ballistic slots in the torsos. The ‘Thanny’ goes one better offering and additional 2-slot energy in the ballistic arm.

The missile slot is rarely used on this battlemech, often even having the armour stripped away to add in an extra ton or two of firepower. The ballistic arm has a 4-slot ballistic and a 2-slot energy. This is basically where the smack is located on this mech. This arm is capable of housing a Heavy Gauss or a HVAC20 as well as any other ballistic such as AC20, regular gauss, 2 lt gauss and so on.

One config that sees a lot of action is a HVAC20 and 2 large lasers, or replace the HVAC with a Heavy Gauss. The Thanny can take several different load outs including up to 3 lt gauss rifles making it a very good sniper mech with jump jets. The Thanatos lends itself well to being a RAC boat and this seems to be popular.

The Thanatos can fill many roles, from sniper to brawler. It can pack a good weapons load. It has reasonable speed and a great electronics package. There are a couple of things that I feel hold this mech back from being the answer to the Clan Thor. Obviously the main arm houses the majority of the smack. Once that arm is gone, the Thanatos is reduced significantly in firepower. Opponents know this and target ‘the arm’.

Another thing that bothers me is that the mech is built on an endo steel frame rather than a standard frame. Although this allows for greater speeds, ranging from 63kph to 99kph, and possibly allows you to pack on more weapons, it also transfers damage much more quickly once ‘the arm’ is blown off, or even if the missile arm is blown away (remember that many pilots will strip most the armour off the missile arm if they do not pack a missile to get extra free tonnage for more weaponry). The CT is relatively small and tough, but the body of the mech is wide so the side torsos take some abuse and once blown out transfer that damage quickly to the CT. Had this mech been built on a standard frame it would most certainly be a powerhouse.

One thing I do not like about the Thanatos is the animation given to this mech during movement. To me, it looks like it is prancing or prissing to the battle. Once you receive a blast from it, you soon forget how silly it looks coming towards you though.

The Thanatos has a 360 torso spin, another useful device adding to the strength of the mech. It climbs well, and of course, with jump jets, it can reach almost any spot on the map.

This mech is another of my favourites. I have well over 20 configs. I don’t use it much in the opens unless it is on weight-limited maps because of the fragility. IF you pack on spec armour, it makes a big difference in the longevity of the mech.

Vettie’s View? I like the Thanny but I think it falls short of being an answer to the Thor. The chassis being made of endo steel makes the battlemech somewhat more fragile than it presents itself as being. A pilot must protect ‘the arm’ to keep the firepower up. It can take many varied load outs and fills multiple roles. I rate the mech at 3 minutes, average to below average for its class.


Thanatos MP3

In Greek Mythology, Thanatos was ‘the personification of death’. In other words, the Thanatos is the bringer of death or will make the enemy ‘feel’ like they are dieing. While it is true that this battlemech can pack some devastation, when I see one coming after me or hunting me, I don’t feel like I am about to die.

Prior to MP3, the Thanatos was, in my opinion, a powerful battlemech that commanded attention on the battlefield. MP3 brought us so many new mechs with many being 80 tons or better that the Thanatos has faded from the ‘feared’ list.

Lets look at what MP3 did to the Thanny then we can examine why I believe it fell from grace. On the outside, the mech doesn’t appear to have changed much. Factory specs are 75Kph with ECM and Jump Jets, 14 tons of ferro armour makes it nearly full, and it packs a brawler config of weapons load with a LBX20, 3 medium pulse lasers and a MRM20 missile and it still has six heat sinks.

Stripping away the weapons and the heat sinks yields the pilot 35 tons to work with (assuming you don’t mess with the armour). LAMs and IFF Jammer are still options on this mech and should be taken in my opinion. The LAMs are optional depending on the battle you are about to enter, but Ol’ Vettie likes LAMs because he is not so good at avoiding missiles and every bit of protection helps.

Moving to the weapons slots, everything is the same with one exception. The right torso used to be a 2-slot ballistic rack, but now it is a ‘blue’ direct fire hardpoint meaning that you can put ballistics or lasers there. You have the 4-slot ballistic, 2-slot energy in the left arm, a 3 slot missile rack in the right arm and in the left torso you have a 2-slot energy rack.

As mentioned above, the Thanatos comes with 14 tons of ferro armour and except for a shaving of the legs, it is completely full. Again this is mounted on an endo steel frame. Stripping away all the external armour, the engine upgrades and the electronics (ECM and JJs) reveals to us that the Thanny has 18.9 tons of internals spread throughout the mech. The fact that the internals are endo steel means that damage will spread from destroyed panel to the core more quickly than mechs made on standard frames.

One of the weak points of the Thanatos is very obvious if you look at the armour allocation vs the weapons slots. The left arm potentially holds most of the fire power of the mech but yet it holds only 1.4 tons of armour (ferro). This yields a 42pt damage allocation before this section is destroyed. 42pts is not very much. Two gauss rifles and an ER Large Laser shot from a Thor will strip that arm. A Canis or Victor or larger mechs will put a serious hurting on the Thanny, destroying the arm and taking out some of the internals in one alpha.

Another weal point of the Thanatos is the actual shape of the mech. If you are facing your opponent straight on, the Thanny has a very wide, broad torso area. Lots of mass for enemies to hit, even if the CT is relatively small, the side torsos are very large. This mech does have a 360 torso twist and that is a good thing. Use it to spread the incoming damage.

The addition of Artemis system for missiles will bring back the use of the Thanny’s other arm. You can pack an ALRM2o in there and do some real damage to some one from along distance. The Heavy Rocket Launcher can also be installed as well as the non Artemis Arrow systems. As I said in my original review, many pilots would not use the missile arm and instead would strip armour to put other weapons else where or add heat sinks or other electronics or whatever. Some of you may want to re-think some of your older configs when considering the use of a Thanatos.

The change of slots in the right torso allows greater flexibility from the pilot. You can add energy weapons, say 3 large lasers, or a crop load of mediums and not worry about ‘the arm’ taking out the majority of your alpha strength. Too bad the IS doesn’t have a Lt PPC, it would be perfect in this mech. Who knows, maybe MP4 will yield one for us puretech fanatics.

One of my favourite configs for the Thanatos is an ‘old school’ design. Three RAC2s and a Large X-Pulse laser with all the electronic toys and 81Kph speed will put a hurting on enemy mechs. For hotter maps, exchange the X-Pulse for a standard Large Laser.

I still say this mech is better used as long range mech, or even a sniper. Use mini gauss or HVAC2s and 5s, or Lt Gauss or RAC2s. Using ECM, IFF and JJs, this mech can get to places and hide itself, then snipe away. It can also be used to dislodge an enemy that is sniping. The Thanny is agile and climbs well, although I think the accel rate could use a boost, it seems sluggish or almost slow to start moving. This makes it tough to hill hump.

As a brawler, the Thanny can pack a punch with the capability of housing 3 lbx10s or a lbx20 and a lbx10. AC10 and 20s are my favourites because you get the full damage value at range, but an lbx20 is just a nice brawling weapon. Try a Thanatos with 3 AC10s and watch folks gripe about it.

Then Thanny also fits the mid range support mech role to a tee. A HVAC20 or Heavy Gauss with some large lasers and it will hurt you in the 400 to 600 meter range.

All in all this mech can fill most roles if needed but I think the mid range to long range role is where it will shine.

I rated this mech at 3 minutes in my first review. MekTek and the community must have had similar feeling because they created the Thanatos XT taking away the missile arm and adding another mostly ballistic arm. I will review the XT version another time, but I think the Artemis Missiles have brought the right arm back to the Thanatos. Put a Smoke AGL in the left arm and pack on some TLRMs or Arrows, a Lt Gauss or two or maybe even some mini gauss and fire away at enemies that can’t see you and if using your IFF won’t get a reticule on you unless they are inside of 400 meters.

My rating will only change by about a half a minute. I think 3 to 3 ½ minutes is a fair rating of the Thanatos. I like the mech and I wish it were tougher, but in today’s Sunder, it just won’t last against the assault mechs like the Cyclops, the Canis and the Behemoth II’s that are out there. It is just a bit to fragile. Stealth and patience play a big part in its survival on the battlefield.