Good Job Guys

Good job tonight guys. We had good progress with vehicles and working the vehicles. Widowmaker is incredible in that shrike. No doubt about it, he was born to fly. Griznak is a good bomber and pilot and his crew did very good working together on bomb runs. Jackle is excellent at bombing and all who flew tailgunner picked it up quickly and were very effective.

The transport attacks are very promising, I'm looking forward to establishing a team who's sole mission on vehicle maps is to assault as we practiced tonight.

Pixelsponge and Palooka teamed up well to work cap runs and routes...This is vital to success, teamwork and timing.

Hats off to those who played Defense on Slapdash...Widowmaker, Abaddon,Sunnyjim<=RD=> Dr. K and SolarWolf. Very, Very Impressive teamwork. Lots of hustling and keeping equipment up. Great Job.

Jackle, Beast, Squidly worked well and provided a lot of input throughout Slapdash as to better our attacks.

Special thanks to Leonidas for joining our practice and putting up with my brainlock on how to say his name. Well done!

Wednesday night practice same time, same place. Maps: Sanctury (briefly), Slapdash and Katabatic

I'll have a short list of teams for the practice. I'm hoping we can slip into gear a tad quickly with some prearranged teams.

Thanks again guys,

[AK]NeverRetreat

Sorry I missed a lot last night. http://www.augustknights.com/ubb/frown.gif I should have the most of the problems with my system worked out by tonight or tomorrow as I will be indtalling ME tonight. Hope its better than my version of 98 2nd edition.

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[AK]Slaughter
slaughter@augustknights.com
'The slaughter fest has begun, punk.'

Slautganken - Lvl 10 Human Paladin
Slaughterin - Lvl 5 Barbarian Warrior
Slaughtarol - Lvl 7 Iskar Monk
Shokwaive - Lvl 2 Human Magician
Ozumar - Lvl 2 Wood Elf Druid
Moonika - Lvl 2 High Elf Enchanter

Your truely missed when you can't be there...good luck with upgrade.

[AK]NeverRetreat

It was an interesting practice for me, since I really didn't know what was going on. RW was "zotsing" out on me. I'd get some of the stuff, but seemed to be missing the vast majority of it.

I doubt my firewall is the issue, since I have had RW working both ways in the past.

Frustrating...

My only observation is that you really need to cook those bombers through the target zone quickly - at the expense of accuracy.
Slow bomb runs result in all the tailgunner's flares being expended - and that makes for short bomber life.

It's a balancing thing on the bomber, Squid. As bombardier, I thought the bomber was moving a little too fast on Sanctuary. As the bomber moves faster, the bombs fall at more of an angle, so they tend to hit walls rather than inside the courtyard.

I suspect that the bomber is best used against the vehicle pad. The bomb blast radius is not enough to reliably take out spiders and spikes. Killing defenders is fun, but they respawn, rearm, and are back on the job pretty fast. But blow up the enemy's vehicle pad, and his offense is stalled for several seconds while he locates the problem, gets the repair pack out there, and fixes it.

But I'm not sure that the bomber is going to prove to be a good general purpose unit. The vehicle pad repairs very quickly, and most teams will keep an inv near the pad, which means that they won't have to wait while someone carries out a repair pack. Giving up three men to blow it up and stall their offense for a few seconds doesn't seem like a good trade when you think of what those men could have done as a pilot and two heavies in a Havoc.

Bomber can not takeout vehicle pad nor can most armor unless a heavy can just sit there throwing mortars (4) in a row...

You need to take the gens down first before you can destroy the pad. ForceRecon and I tried all the weapons on the pad last weekend and thats what we came up with.

[AK]NeverRetreat

Sorry I missed out. My connection has been giving me fits. All weekend it would work for 30 -50 min then nothing for about 2-3 hours. The connection just seems to get droped for no apparent reason. I am going to check on my trouble ticket today to see if anything has been found out.

-Goob

I think I've seen a bomber take out a live vehicle pad. It usually doesn't happen because the bomber is moving and spreads its bombs out. The trick is to get a precise painting, then get the bomber way up high out of sight and out of missile range. The pilot puts his nose through the ring and stops. The bombardier can't see the ground, but once the bomber has stopped he cuts loose with the bombs dropping straight down. Six or eight of those things will take out the pad. A live pad isn't impossible to kill, it's just heavily shielded.

Once, I managed to take out a live pad in a Shrike, but it's very hard. You have to move the mouse to compensate for the Shrike's auto-leveling to keep the nose still at a down angle.

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Organize Aggressively
Leonidas

If you a bomber or a shrike have that much time to sit over vehicle pad, then the other team is all on offense.

[AK]NeverRetreat

Each map has it's own personality. Slapdash was the one that proved to be the biggest problem last night... Lots of defenders, lots of missles, never enough flares. It just makes a slow run a poor option. Quick, relatively low altitude runs right up the flag valley seem like the best solution for that map. Disrupt the defense before the transport comes in with the heavies, followed by the cappers.

On a map like Sanctuary - a slower, high altitude run makes more sense. Sure, you may not drop more than 2 bombs "in the barrel" but you're still disrupting the guys standing on the roof defending or the turret-field outside the front door. That's really what the bomber is all about... keeping your opponent from organizing a coherent defense. Just when they start to settle in, they have to fix/redo/respawn and that gives the second and third wave an opening.

Hey NR have you ever thought about useing a Shrike for defence?
I say this because it is very difficult to bring down a bomber if they have a tailgunner that has even a small idea what hes doing, the flares just totaly rule out missels. A shrike in the right hands is very usefull for takeing out bombers.

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Member of GanG Green
[GanG]Drewski

[This message has been edited by Drewski (edited 05-21-2001).]

I personally think the bomber's best use is to cause as much confusion for the other team as possible. With the proper timing, something like 2 bomber passes, and the crew jumps out just as the cappers come though would pretty unstoppable. That of course would require a lot of communication, and a whole lot of practice http://www.augustknights.com/ubb/smile.gif



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http://www.augustknights.com/signatures/pixelsponge.jpg

I think a real defense will shred a bomber no matter what. Between AA turrets, defensive Shrikes, and defender chainguns, any low altitude bomber isn't going to have the energy to do anything but try to stay alive. Our bomber on Slapdash wouldn't have lasted as long as it did if the turrets had all been swapped out with AA.

With high altitude bombing you are out of range of turrets, missiles, and chainguns. On low visibility maps they can't even see you. The only thing that can take out a high altitude bomber is a Shrike. The bomber sinks pretty fast, though, so it takes a good pilot to maintain altitude while hovering, and a good bombardier to leave the pilot enough energy to maintain altitude.

I'm not saying that high altitude bombing is a cure-all. It isn't good for anything unless you've made an accurate low altitude painting pass - and survived. And once you go through the trouble to set it all up, all you've accomplished is taking down a single target.

I'm pretty skeptical on the general usefulness of the bomber. The only time I see it being a decisive factor would be if you manage to catch the enemy with no Shrikes in the air. Then a good bomber crew could effectively camp the vehicle pad while maintaining high altitude, sitting out of reach of any ground based anti-air weapons. On a vehicle-mandatory map like Dessicator or Recalescence, that could win the game.

We're getting there Pix.

Drewski...you should see Widowmaker in a Shrike defending our air space. He has a gift.

Squidly...bomb runs should be effective. Fast or Slow, doesn't matter as long as they are effective.

[AK]NeverRetreat

Quote:

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Originally posted by [AK]NeverRetreat:

Squidly...bomb runs should be effective. Fast or Slow, doesn't matter as long as they are effective.

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Well sure... http://www.augustknights.com/ubb/smile.gif

I just think that on some maps fast is "more effective" than slow, high is "more effective" than low, etc. And on other maps - vice-versa.

It doesn't seem to me to be a one size fits all proposition.

I think you're right, Squid. The maps are all different. On Slapdash you've got high visibility and several turrets, so you better keep that bomber moving or it's toast. On Dessicator you've got no turrets and low visibility, so you can slow down a bit and get denser and more accurate bomb coverage.

Well I'm still waiting to install Win ME, but I did fix my internet connection (great news). As soon as I install ME the rest of my problems should go away.. prolly defrag again after I install.

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[AK]Slaughter
slaughter@augustknights.com
'The slaughter fest has begun, punk.'

Slautganken - Lvl 10 Human Paladin
Slaughterin - Lvl 5 Barbarian Warrior
Slaughtarol - Lvl 7 Iskar Monk
Shokwaive - Lvl 2 Human Magician
Ozumar - Lvl 2 Wood Elf Druid
Moonika - Lvl 2 High Elf Enchanter

Good info all around guys. The sharing of ideas and taking the time to study such things as sensor range, etc. Improve all of our understanding of the game. I'm hoping to establish a viewable format shortly with these different suggestions and techniques given for different maps.

One of the areas I managed when running the Offense for aYg last year was a map strategy area. In this area I would list the maps, list of positions both defensive and offensive and and their responsibilities. This allowed for non-starters to review their role for any given map and determine quickly what they were to be attempting to do before entering a game.

I see our ideas and suggestions being molded into this format very soon. I also provided demo's of the maps for routes to enemy base as capper or HO. Turret setups were also demo'd. I can't wait to have these tools available again for us to utilize.

[AK]NeverRetreat

Good info all around guys. The sharing of ideas and taking the time to study such things as sensor range, etc. Improve all of our understanding of the game. I'm hoping to establish a viewable format shortly with these different suggestions and techniques given for different maps.

One of the areas I managed when running the Offense for aYg last year was a map strategy area. In this area I would list the maps, list of positions both defensive and offensive and and their responsibilities. This allowed for non-starters to review their role for any given map and determine quickly what they were attempting to do before entering a game.

I see our ideas and suggestions being molded into this format very soon. I also provided demo's of the maps for routes to enemy base as capper or HO. Turret setups were also demo'd. I can't wait to have these tools available again for us to utilize.

[AK]NeverRetreat

Drewski,

I was mentioning to Goob last night that you have a awesome cap routine for Archipelago. Shrike in the water waiting, that is so fun to watch.

I watched a couple of aYg's last night doing shrike caps on this map that is very impressive. Pixelsponge and I have been working on these techniques on several maps. Capper flies the shrike across cap route (higher then flag stand), jumps out in flight, grabs flag from stand, jets up to were his shrike has flown to. The shrike is still a tad higer than flag stand, but has traveled a little ways pass the flag area. Capper jumps in and is gone.

Now if for some reason he can't make it, a second shrike is behind him watching for any sign of trouble. He can easily fly in and grab the flag if capper dies or exit the shrike for capper to continue home.

Cappers...I believe you need to spend the majority of your time practice these techniques and less time in pubs...

[AK]NeverRetreat

Squidly...sorry, didn't answer this earlier.

Bomber crew respawn question, I would like to see crew who bails out or is drop attacking enemy base get after the enemy base until last death. Then reorganize for another run.

But their goal isn't base ownage like say a transport attack. Get gens down, get v pad down thats about all the time you'll have.

Announce "Enemy Generators Destroyed" very important to do so, so any other Offensive player can target sensors and turrets and take them out very quickly.

[AK]NeverRetreat

Ok, I'll attack the base if I get shot down - but I won't camp there. http://www.augustknights.com/ubb/smile.gif

Connection Problems = Gone
Computer Problems = Gone http://www.augustknights.com/ubb/biggrin.gif
I'm good to go guys http://www.augustknights.com/ubb/tongue.gif

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[AK]Slaughter
slaughter@augustknights.com
'The slaughter fest has begun, punk.'

Slautganken - Lvl 10 Human Paladin
Slaughterin - Lvl 5 Barbarian Warrior
Slaughtarol - Lvl 7 Iskar Monk
Shokwaive - Lvl 2 Human Magician
Ozumar - Lvl 2 Wood Elf Druid
Moonika - Lvl 2 High Elf Enchanter

This Kinda reminds me of the tactical battle plans I had been working on for tribes, which I got sidetracked on and never really finished (well I finished about 3 of them, Snowblind, Ice Ridge, and Scarabrae) until my computer decided to go nose first to hell, and everything got trashed. Anyways they consisted of attack routes, sniper points, APC Routes, Sensor nets, and Turret Set ups.

There was also more than 1 plan for each map, there were about 3 set plans for high offense, moderate defensive, and high defense. I also had a few Demolition (Destroying turrets, sensors, etc...) runs in, which effectively took their sensor net, and turret fire of the opposing teams out from either the outside in, or the inside out.

Included were suggested loadouts for each person going on what type of run, in what armor, whether it be a heavy on defense, or offense, a medium on defense or offense, or a Light on Offense or Defense. This also included many roles, as fire suppression, sniper, cover fire, base annihilation, and more.

However because I didn't get around to releasing the actual documents I had made, we never really got around to trying it. I had practiced some of these with a few friends, and know that they can work with practice.

(5 hours of total domination because of 5 guys doing what they should on 3 different 30 player servers is proof enough for me that they work).

Anyways what I'm proposing is you guys should come up with some set battle strategies to work off of, and manipulate when needed.

For example, on a Flag run, you should have one guy providing an escort, to the flag carrier, and it would probably be ideal to have a sniper follow you itowards your destination, so they an provide cover fire at a distance. Now if people as a weary as they were in Tribes 1, about snipers in T2, The sniper, if found, would not only take out some foes attacking/pursuing the flag carrier, they would also attract a fair bit of attention if they were found, or seen (this may be an idea for deliberate firing of the laser rifle on low power if needed), there by taking some if not, a lot of the threat away from the Flag carrier.

Another idea is, if you can, Have some Heavies Start Bombarding the Base. Only one or two is nessesary. For fear of many of the bases turrets/censors/occupants being torn apart, they would have their attention divided by the heavy, as well as the escort for the flag carrier.

Something for the Escort IMO that would be very effective, is an ELF, supposing the person is well versed in the use of the weapon/tool. This way when a pursuer takes to the flag carrier/runner, the Escort can simply ELF him, to stop him from following him, or simply long enough to make the flag runner/carrier to be out of the effective range of the Pursuer. Another bonus to the situation would be supposing the Pursuer was not destroyed. By the time he got to the base, the flag would be captured, and he would have the bases defense ontop of him, if the escort gives sufficient warning (which he should). So this is almost a win/win situation providing the right circumstances.

Well I've posted enough, for now, I think http://www.augustknights.com/ubb/biggrin.gif

-HM

I also had many plans that were very precise, and because of being so precise failed a lot, due to failure in the precision of the execution of the plans. Hehe. http://www.augustknights.com/ubb/biggrin.gif

I like the way you think, Hitman. If we can work up detailed battle plans and implement them well, we can beat most teams, and have a lot of fun doing it. We will probably have a lot of discussion on them, because there are so many ways to approach any given map.

Implementation can be tricky, though. As the plans get longer, its hard to get everyone to read the whole thing, and usually unnecessary. I suggest that the plans be organized around position-by-position instructions, even if those instructions are a little repetitive. The idea is that everyone doesn't have read the whole plan. They just have a hard copy of the entire plan before the battle, they get their assignment in the pre-battle meeting, and they read their specific role.

That shrike thing is interesting... seems some of us have come up with the some idea independantly... I was beating some team like a drum on a pub the other day by dropping my shrike, beaconing it, and capping like mad on Archepelego...

[AK]Zorro

Chief Operations Officer
<a href="http://www.augustknights.com" target="_blank">AugustKnights.com</a> WizOp

A Very useful script, IMO (even though I don't have T2, I've heard how it works, etc...) would be a script that allows you to change control methods when you pilot a vehicle, etc...

For example, when you get into a Bomber as the pilot, you controls would be transferred to your joystick, which controls the pitch/yaw, as well as maybe the throttle (supposing the vehicles use a throttle, which I'm supposing they don't, since they didn't in T1) Then have the trigger on button one. This IMO would make the vehicles MUCH easier to fly (as I've found, using the mouse to control the vehicles in T1 is very annoying. That's why I went and double binded my fire button to ctrl as well as the left mouse button, and had movement buttons on my number pad. *use the mouse for moving around outside a vehicle, and use the keypad for vehicles, and the ctrl button if I'm using a scout*).

The gunners I'd think should stay the same, but pilots should be able to switch to a joystick if need be.

Also if there is a script out for this, letting me know would be good, so I don't have to go bugging people when I get my new comp/T2.

And if there isn't, there's a project for any of you script-wizards in here http://www.augustknights.com/ubb/smile.gif.

-HM

Hey NR,
On the note of the shrike in the water, there is actually 2 ways I do this, the 1st way is to dive in head 1st with the shrike, beacon it and then go for the flag and ride back.
The other is a littel harder, I've noticed that if you nose the shrike up and jump out, it will fall backwards into the water, this works well if you can master it. It's alot faster then the 1st way but, you have to rember to look back so you can get an idea where the shrike is.

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Member of GanG Green
[GanG]Drewski