Post by snoggy on Jun 24, 2013 9:03:08 GMT -8
Someone last night asked for advice.. figured i'd lay it out.
Certs - My recommendations,
Acquisition timer: Bump it up a bit, not super required but nice to have if you have the certs, at least get it to the 150-200 level when you get a chance.
Utility Slot - Fire suppression. Just need 1 rank in this. Certing more than rank one only counts towards the timer, not towards the health regained.... basically, it brings you out of the OMG BURNING. Flares won't save you, you will get locked on by manpads all the time and they do diddly amount of damage... and just rank 1 is sufficient as I highly doubt you will live the further 25-30 seconds to use it again....
Defense Slot - Lots of arguments here... composite armor is not bad if you are new.... but with recent changes has become a little less effective. Most of the experienced people use nano-auto-repair armor... means you can auto-repair when out of combat. I have this maxed and it is all I use... basically you can pop in, kill a few things, back off and let yourself auto-repair.... saves you having to land and repair constantly. If you have the certs, I'd get both as comp armor is sometimes useful for the giant fights.
Airframe - Up to pilot preference.. I've tried them all and the precision bomber is my favorite. Lets me AWSD faster, makes lining up tankbuster shots easier.... high G is also useful but.. well it's all up to you.
Weapons and such:
Tank buster is the best main gun, no questions asked. Max out your ammo counts and magazine size... I recommend getting thermals so you can quickly scan for fleeing infantry, see below.
Secondary - Dalton is probably your best bet. Shredders are nice if you have an experienced gunner, but dalton should be your go-to gun. Very good damage vs tanks, decent against infantry, one shots esf's and 2 shot's libs.
Again, max your ammo count and reload speed. I personally prefer zoom, will depend on what your gunner likes... I have all the scopes so I can tailor to whomever.
Tertiary - Ugh, useless spot. Never ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever x100 use this spot unless you have a third crewmember. The AA gun is basically a gimped canadian BB gun. The bulldog is not too shabby but it requires the pilot to realize that his 3rd gun is facing backwards and must orient the plane so that he is essentially taking a poop on whatever he wants engaged.
I personally keep the bulldog in place unless I know I have a decent third person to run the AA gun and I know there are enemy aircraft. It's a boring slot to fill, and spinning to get your dalton in place is a far more effective AA weapon.
Flying- The bread and butter.
Right, few things to keep in mind. Render distance. You MUST know this.
Infantry render at 300-ish meters, tanks render at 700. This is above sea level, not above ground. The ground is often 100-200 meters above sea-level so your rendering distance will change.
You must be able to see your targets for your gunner to engage them. Not the other way around, often you will render to your enemy before you can see them, but they can still kill you.
As a pilot, you cannot see what is behind you or beneath you... it takes a shit load of practice but you will get a feel for things.
Q'ing targets, or spotting, them is THE MOST IMPORTANT THING EVER. Gunner and pilot together, the pilot needs to know when the gunner sees something so he can hover and slow down to allow the gunner to engange... the gunner needs to know when the pilot sees something so he can stop scanning and look up to finish off whatever it is the pilot spots.
Priority always goes to the pilot's target. Be it a tankbuster run on a sundy, enemy aircraft or libs... I personally say, "Belly." whenever I want caliver's attention, that I am going to be passing over something he needs to kill, he knows to look up and forward to finish off something that is a high priority.
Dogfighting. Since the pilot is generally blind and can only look forward... you rely a lot on sound. You can actually hear ESF's and such as they buzz about you. It takes a bit of practice but you can learn to orient yourself towards a target.
Hence why I am anal about keeping quiet on the comms, you can hear the ESF's when they are close and so you can spin to face them. Something not easy to do when everyone in TS is talking about the last patch, or DJ bot is playing his 80's junk.
So gunners, when the pilot starts freaking out and turning about.. it generally means there is an ESF behind us that needs dealing with.
AA Fire - Avoid it. You can soak it up for a bit, at least for 10-15 seconds to let your gunner finish a target.. but when you start getting to half health, gtfo.
Remember, breaking line of sight is the fastest way to dodge AA fire. Always keep in the back of your mind the layout of the land, know where all the mountains and hills are so you can duck behind them... I pretty much know where every nook and cranny is on any map/objective so I can know where to run.... so if you are in the shit.. get low.. low as you can... to get out of LOS. Even trees will help as they break the lock ons and make bursters ineffective.
It's a very precarious thing to consider... Do I go in high and plink armor? Or is the AA fire so much that I have to come in a bit low and make a quick pass?
This is more of an experience thing, and you can tell a lot by reading the map.... listening to comms and seeing what is going on... also consider what is around you.
Flying is one of those finicky things, you have to look at the entire map as a whole, not just one objective. Want to hit a tech plant? Great. Want to hit a tech plant with 48+ on both sides, and the surrounding territory is enemy? Yeah, you gonna get raped.
If you look at the map, the friendly territories are areas that you generally are safe in... so if the platoon is off on some objective in the middle of nowhere, there is just no way you can get to them. It's a bit of a failing in how the Commanders run things, just remember the outfit leaders aren't pilots, and don't really know how things work... so you have to adjust and do your best to help out but still keep yourself alive. Deep thrusts into enemy territory are great for infantry and armor... but air? Not so much... I prefer to hover over friendly territory or areas that have lots of areas to quickly retreat to. Cowardly? Sure, but this thing costs 350 resources to pull and when you are on esamir with 35 resources coming in every 5 minutes.... it's not something you can throw away like a prowler.
Ground pounder reports must be taken with a grain of salt. "No AA here, you are clear to come in." Great, and I am sure the AA batteries aren't shooting at you because you are on the ground... derp. Always approach new objectives with a mind to gtfo if you need to. Hovering is bad, especially over spawn points.. drop pods will get you.. they always do.
Top tip. Fly with the same gunner/pilot. After awhile you do start to get a little more in sync and you get into a rhythm. You know how your pilot reacts and does things.... and you know what your gunner can do.
Again, this all takes a shit load of practice, and you WILL die, often. Liberators are often viewed as a cert pinata, everyone and their uncle will shoot at you.. especially if you are like Caliver and I and are well known as flying death.
My best advice is to cert as posted above... cert to the max... at least for the requisites like dalton reload speed and airframes and armor.... then just fly.. a lot... that's how I learned. We have a ton of gunners and people willing to gun, "Anyone need a lib gunner?" is always heard, "Anyone wanna gun for a lib?" not so much, we need pilots!
Anyways, if you have questions or want to learn a bit more i'm always happy to teach new people if i'm about.. and if i'm online I am always up for flying a lib, so long as I have the resources.
Certs - My recommendations,
Acquisition timer: Bump it up a bit, not super required but nice to have if you have the certs, at least get it to the 150-200 level when you get a chance.
Utility Slot - Fire suppression. Just need 1 rank in this. Certing more than rank one only counts towards the timer, not towards the health regained.... basically, it brings you out of the OMG BURNING. Flares won't save you, you will get locked on by manpads all the time and they do diddly amount of damage... and just rank 1 is sufficient as I highly doubt you will live the further 25-30 seconds to use it again....
Defense Slot - Lots of arguments here... composite armor is not bad if you are new.... but with recent changes has become a little less effective. Most of the experienced people use nano-auto-repair armor... means you can auto-repair when out of combat. I have this maxed and it is all I use... basically you can pop in, kill a few things, back off and let yourself auto-repair.... saves you having to land and repair constantly. If you have the certs, I'd get both as comp armor is sometimes useful for the giant fights.
Airframe - Up to pilot preference.. I've tried them all and the precision bomber is my favorite. Lets me AWSD faster, makes lining up tankbuster shots easier.... high G is also useful but.. well it's all up to you.
Weapons and such:
Tank buster is the best main gun, no questions asked. Max out your ammo counts and magazine size... I recommend getting thermals so you can quickly scan for fleeing infantry, see below.
Secondary - Dalton is probably your best bet. Shredders are nice if you have an experienced gunner, but dalton should be your go-to gun. Very good damage vs tanks, decent against infantry, one shots esf's and 2 shot's libs.
Again, max your ammo count and reload speed. I personally prefer zoom, will depend on what your gunner likes... I have all the scopes so I can tailor to whomever.
Tertiary - Ugh, useless spot. Never ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever x100 use this spot unless you have a third crewmember. The AA gun is basically a gimped canadian BB gun. The bulldog is not too shabby but it requires the pilot to realize that his 3rd gun is facing backwards and must orient the plane so that he is essentially taking a poop on whatever he wants engaged.
I personally keep the bulldog in place unless I know I have a decent third person to run the AA gun and I know there are enemy aircraft. It's a boring slot to fill, and spinning to get your dalton in place is a far more effective AA weapon.
Flying- The bread and butter.
Right, few things to keep in mind. Render distance. You MUST know this.
Infantry render at 300-ish meters, tanks render at 700. This is above sea level, not above ground. The ground is often 100-200 meters above sea-level so your rendering distance will change.
You must be able to see your targets for your gunner to engage them. Not the other way around, often you will render to your enemy before you can see them, but they can still kill you.
As a pilot, you cannot see what is behind you or beneath you... it takes a shit load of practice but you will get a feel for things.
Q'ing targets, or spotting, them is THE MOST IMPORTANT THING EVER. Gunner and pilot together, the pilot needs to know when the gunner sees something so he can hover and slow down to allow the gunner to engange... the gunner needs to know when the pilot sees something so he can stop scanning and look up to finish off whatever it is the pilot spots.
Priority always goes to the pilot's target. Be it a tankbuster run on a sundy, enemy aircraft or libs... I personally say, "Belly." whenever I want caliver's attention, that I am going to be passing over something he needs to kill, he knows to look up and forward to finish off something that is a high priority.
Dogfighting. Since the pilot is generally blind and can only look forward... you rely a lot on sound. You can actually hear ESF's and such as they buzz about you. It takes a bit of practice but you can learn to orient yourself towards a target.
Hence why I am anal about keeping quiet on the comms, you can hear the ESF's when they are close and so you can spin to face them. Something not easy to do when everyone in TS is talking about the last patch, or DJ bot is playing his 80's junk.
So gunners, when the pilot starts freaking out and turning about.. it generally means there is an ESF behind us that needs dealing with.
AA Fire - Avoid it. You can soak it up for a bit, at least for 10-15 seconds to let your gunner finish a target.. but when you start getting to half health, gtfo.
Remember, breaking line of sight is the fastest way to dodge AA fire. Always keep in the back of your mind the layout of the land, know where all the mountains and hills are so you can duck behind them... I pretty much know where every nook and cranny is on any map/objective so I can know where to run.... so if you are in the shit.. get low.. low as you can... to get out of LOS. Even trees will help as they break the lock ons and make bursters ineffective.
It's a very precarious thing to consider... Do I go in high and plink armor? Or is the AA fire so much that I have to come in a bit low and make a quick pass?
This is more of an experience thing, and you can tell a lot by reading the map.... listening to comms and seeing what is going on... also consider what is around you.
Flying is one of those finicky things, you have to look at the entire map as a whole, not just one objective. Want to hit a tech plant? Great. Want to hit a tech plant with 48+ on both sides, and the surrounding territory is enemy? Yeah, you gonna get raped.
If you look at the map, the friendly territories are areas that you generally are safe in... so if the platoon is off on some objective in the middle of nowhere, there is just no way you can get to them. It's a bit of a failing in how the Commanders run things, just remember the outfit leaders aren't pilots, and don't really know how things work... so you have to adjust and do your best to help out but still keep yourself alive. Deep thrusts into enemy territory are great for infantry and armor... but air? Not so much... I prefer to hover over friendly territory or areas that have lots of areas to quickly retreat to. Cowardly? Sure, but this thing costs 350 resources to pull and when you are on esamir with 35 resources coming in every 5 minutes.... it's not something you can throw away like a prowler.
Ground pounder reports must be taken with a grain of salt. "No AA here, you are clear to come in." Great, and I am sure the AA batteries aren't shooting at you because you are on the ground... derp. Always approach new objectives with a mind to gtfo if you need to. Hovering is bad, especially over spawn points.. drop pods will get you.. they always do.
Top tip. Fly with the same gunner/pilot. After awhile you do start to get a little more in sync and you get into a rhythm. You know how your pilot reacts and does things.... and you know what your gunner can do.
Again, this all takes a shit load of practice, and you WILL die, often. Liberators are often viewed as a cert pinata, everyone and their uncle will shoot at you.. especially if you are like Caliver and I and are well known as flying death.
My best advice is to cert as posted above... cert to the max... at least for the requisites like dalton reload speed and airframes and armor.... then just fly.. a lot... that's how I learned. We have a ton of gunners and people willing to gun, "Anyone need a lib gunner?" is always heard, "Anyone wanna gun for a lib?" not so much, we need pilots!
Anyways, if you have questions or want to learn a bit more i'm always happy to teach new people if i'm about.. and if i'm online I am always up for flying a lib, so long as I have the resources.