Regarding indirect LRM fire to cause stability (via tactics-sensor lock).
Does the instability counter clear-reduce once the mech moves?
Point being is it that useful if one cannot get enough stability hits against the mech before it moves, which seems likely if indirect.
Also how do you guys feel about replayability interest and trying other mech configuration-options and different character skills.
Thanks
Gelanin covered most of the points regarding how stability gets removed.
Some points to add, however.
If you have higher initiative, by abusing reserve, you can get up to 8 attacks on an enemy mech in a round (if all 4 of your mechs have higher initiative than the enemy mech). Alternatively, you can put your highest initiative mech + pilot in your stability damage mech. Using reserve, you can use this pilot to always get 2 attacks versus an enemy mech before it can move.
Early game, I made sure my LRM boat was always the highest mech in the initiative order. Use Shadowhawk (high innate initiative) for the LRM boat (3 missle hardpoints, but one of them is only 1 slot) with only enough armor to withstand one shot 
. Some of the other medium mechs can more easily field high missle loadouts, but they come at the expense of speed and initiative order. Then I always reserved him in case I needed him to attack an enemy mech twice before it could act again or to use him after getting sensor lock with another pilot.
I usually use knockdown for mech salvage. It's the safest way to get full mech parts salvage on heavy and assault mechs as long as you use low damage/high stab. weapons. Depending on the order of initiative, you can knock down a mech twice in one round and then once each round after that. Depending on the guts of the pilot that can take between 2-4 rounds (enemy pilots with 5 wound points is pretty rare, but 4 wound points become fairly common later in game).
For quick mech takedowns, I either core the torso with called shot if I can do it in one shot or take out the legs for more salvage if it's going to take 2 shots or more to destroy the torso.
Alternative for quick/safe takedowns if you don't have the damage to take down mechs quickly (early to mid game depending on mission difficulty) is to target the side torsos. They generally have less armor and are relatively easy to hit with called shots. Ammo is also generally located there and you'll take out the attached arm. This will generally greatly reduce the damage potential of that mech and as a bonus destroying a torso results in a pilot injury. The drawback is that you'll lose a lot of salvage potential by doing this. Weapons get destroyed, less mech parts salvage, etc. But it's safe and allows you to take on more difficult missions early to mid game. Can be done relatively reliably with just Called Shot Bonus (relatively cheap to get).
Combine that with takedowns and you'll often quickly take out a mech by incapacitating the pilot if you don't destroy the mech first.
As to replayability, it all depends on how much you like the core gameplay loop (customization, experimentation, collection, field combat, etc.). I'm still playing in the same campaign despite finishing the story missions a few days ago. I want a Stalker and the random mech assignments in missions hasn't given me the opportunity to get one yet. AAAAUUUGGGHHHH!
I'm also thinking about restarting the campaign at some point and seeing how far I can get using only light mechs or only maximum medium mechs. I really like the idea of the Locust M variant using LRMs, but by the time I got one, I wasn't using light mechs anymore.
Regards,
SB
