You've mentioned before how there'd be a case for welding armour boxes onto mechs for infantry to shelter behind for use as instant close support for fighting in urban areas/ city areas ....
Respecting the 'rule of cool' - apart from jump infantry riding in, maybe hanging on to improvised grab handles (inner sphere pre-clan invasion) I suspect that the experience would be one of squishy meat pulp being quick fried on the mechs armour plate...
(Plus weapon heat, engine heat, missile exhaust plumes, jump jet heat.... seriously infantry lighting in helmet, flak jacket, helmet and underwear.... while on the swaying mech)
Anything armoured (vehicles or mechs) would draw anti armour weapons fire.... the pink squishy infantry would act as low grade sandbag armour...
Using fast light mechs would allow jump infantry a fast infantry drop off with way better mobility than ankle speed....
The pirate states, outer sphere and those backwaters planets that have an ICE powered mech would benefit from Mad Max infantry platforms welded on where needed....
It'd be a great dispossessed story, where the dispossessed pilot is now 'Riding Infantry'.....
It is an issue, most of what might hit a 'mech would be absolutely lethal to an infantry type perched atop it. The feasible scenario, I feel, is less one of tank desant and more like a ball-turret gunner- some specially engineered gunner's cockpit atop the 'mech, independent of the main control systems but allowing for moderate armor (enough for glancing shots, at the very least) for the person in there operating an extra laser or AC or rocket pod. More firepower than just a PBI sitting up there, such that the risk at least has some reward.
To get more ambitious with it, we can posit the notion of combining this with OmniPod technology, such that a 'mech so equipped would be able to detach this auxiliary turret and simply drop it down somewhere useful. You walk into battle, unhitch your autocannon aux-gunner, the newly-created gun emplacement holds down one angle while your 'mech can march off in the other. Very handy if troops need heavy support but the MechWarrior can't stick around.
