11 replies to this topic

[TheFlyingScotsman]

(Yes, this is a serious guide based on negative reinforcement.)

Nothing is more satisfying than leading your team to victory. Players are smarter than they seem, but generally lack leadership/the willingness to give directions necessary to get a win. So here is my guide to effectively steering the steers.

1. Affirming leadership:

Use plenty of profanity. This is the best way to get the attention of the group. If someone is offended by your language, remind them that anyone who is offended by language that anyone who thinks profanity is arbitrarily offensive is an ***** and can go **** themselves.

Profanity used to present an argument nonfactually, insult someone simply for the sake of making them angry, or swearing solely because you think it is funny is offensive because it is nonsensical, a waste of time, and proof of your ineptitude and lack of intelligence. Using it to convey meaning or accentuate a sentence accurately is not, and takes careful placement of the right word. Swearing exists to obtain people's attention, and HOW it is used is far more important than IF.

2. Conveying orders:

Repeat orders in new ways, instead of saying them once and expecting people to follow. The more people you can get to oblige, the more will follow those who do. The more coordination in a team, the better.

Communicating is very important, as many players will be preoccupied with combat. Many players will also not regularly check their map or their chatbox, so using caps to ACCENTUATE PARTS OF A SENTENCE but leaving the others unchanged will help to draw attention to important notices. IE: "WE ARE BEING FLANKED. Now turn the **** around before they blow your kindeys out the other end!"

3. Understanding which orders are a death sentence, and which are helpful.

There are many situations in game that require a shoutout and directions. Players and leaders should never assume that orders are necessary for every player to understand, as many simply do not feel their mechtype is suited for the role. For this reason, knowing your team composition is very important. Always start the game by looking at your team lineup, and memorize what you have at your disposal.

In example, when ordered back to base, only lights and fast mediums should turn and deal with it. If any larger mechs are to do so, the effect can cripple your defensive forward line. It is important to specify which mechs should take which action, or you will end up with heavies and assaults trying to head back, merely wasting time they should be using putting holes in things.

At the same time, it is important to understand how many pilots are necessary, as IE a base cap can mean a small light rush, or an actual lance push that requires heavier weaponry to deal with. If someone is wasting time by moving around unnecessarily, call them out first with neutral, factual statements. If they ignore them, call them an illiterate sheepfucker. It has roughly a 50% chance of working, and if it doesn't, they're too dumb or preoccupied for it to matter anyway.

4. Understanding roles.

Scouts are the most important tool in any game. They give LRMs a C3 computer lock from realtive safety, can cover ground very quickly, and offer bonuses to the group in a support role. BAP, AMS, ECM are more useful the more players are able to receive their benefit. If an ally is in the open taking LRMs, a light with ECM + AMS can literally be the difference between a losing game and a winning game.

Mediums are designed to support larger mechs in combat, or push in medium swarms. Regardless of how they do this (brawler, sniper, weapons platform) all mediums are support mechs, and cannot survive without support, just as larger mechs can be quickly overwhelmed without support from mediums.

Heavies are mobile firing platforms. Regardless of their role, most field a comparable armament to Assaults. The only difference between Assaults and Heavies is speed and armor. Thusly, Heavies should prefer a more cautious role to promote longer playtimes. The longer you live, the more damage you can do.

Assaults are just that. Their purpose is to Assault from the forefront, acting as a living wall for smaller mechs during a push, or at the front of the defensive line, holding ground. It is very important to understand that assault rarely have either more weapons or better heat dispersion than Heavies. If anything, players tend to overload Assaults with large weaponry, resulting in a useless mech that dies so often that they rescind themselves to a camping role. If you want to camp, play a Heavy. Assaults are just gigantic Heavies with enough armor to survive out in the open while being supported from behind.

ASSAULTS ARE NOT MEANT FOR CAMPING. IF YOU CAMP IN AN ASSAULT, YOU ARE WASTING THE ROLE BY DOING SOMETHING A HEAVY CAN DO EQUALLY WELL.

5. Knowing when to tell people to go **** themselves.

There are several types of player than need to be told to **** off. Unless damaging behavior is countered, the offending player will not learn. With that being said, BE NICE TO NEWBS, they do not deserve to be belittled or made fun of. If you accidently offend a player that doesn't deserve it, apologize for ***** sake!

Now, these are the players you should promtly send off to ****** themselves.

A: The contrarian.

The contrarian will insult, belittle, or otherwise try to upseat players who bother to coordinate the team, using no facts or logic. (See earlier paragraph on using profanity to replace logic and fact.) Regardless of why they do this, this behavior is detrimental to the entire team. It is important to promtly tell them to **** off, but more importantly, WHY they need to do so. If you can't make a logical argument against ignorane or arbitrary assholism, you have already failed.

B: Detrimental behavior.

That guy who keeps peeking and giving free damage to the other team. Start with factual/observational logic to get them to stop. If they continue, they can go **** themselves, and should be notified as such.

In the same way, appearing or firing weapons unnecessarily can give away the location of the whole team. This can result in getting swarmed and losing a game. Ask people who do this not to while explaining why. If they give you lip or keep doing it, they can go **** themselves.

C: Friendly Firing *******.

REMINDER: If the player apologizes, consider all forgiven/perfectly all right. If you can't let it go, go **** yourself, because it's you who is the problem. If they don't, see the following:

Fun fact: The acceptable amount of FF or accidental leg damage is NONE AT ******* ALL. It doesn't matter if it's an MG or .25 damage to a light's leg from a colission. There is no such thing as acceptable/forgivable FF. If someone is FFing, call them out on it. If they don't stop or try to argue that "it is nothing," they need to be chewed out. If they then shoot at you, put an AC20 shell in their face. It's the only way they will learn, and anyone who says self-defense isn't acceptable can also go **** themselves.

D: The bottlenecker.

Everyone knows who the bottlenecker is. That chump in the stalker that doesn't want his pretty paint scratched and starts to back up into their own group. Halting a necessary push in any way can lose games. Always ALWAYS call this behavior out, most especially if they are in an Assault.

ASSAULT PLAYERS: You are a frontline mech. End of story, no arguements, zero reasons to say otherwise. I don't care how many LRM's your ***** *** throw onto the highlander, because once you cease to perform the role required of your weightclass, you are a severe detriment to your team.

Once again, if you want to camp and snipe, USE A HEAVY. It has just as much firepower to HE ratio, but is faster and has less armor. The ONLY reason to take as assault over a heavy is for the armor, and that armor exists to soak up damage your teammates cannot.

I hope players find this guide useful in their endevors. Remember, always lead up to insults with patience and kindness. Once that is rejected, tear them a new *******.

-love and regards, TheFlyingScots(wo)man

[-Muta-]

As a light pilot I could suggest to go for the legs first... after a light mech is legged is done.

[DEMAX51]

****ing excellent, TheFlyingScotsman. ****ing excellent.

[BOWMANGR]

This is awesome!

I totally agree about the Assaults that do NOT assault. If I see assault pilots cowering during the opening stages of the map I already know that we are doomed...

I strongly believe that PGI needs to make a Role Warfare tutorial in order to teach newbies the very basics of each weight class. It's really frustrating to see Mediums holding the frontline because the assault doesn't want to get scratched.

Edited by BOWMANGR, 12 September 2013 - 12:45 AM.

[mailin]

I was really glad to see the comments about the role of lights and how "scouts are the most important tool in any game." Thanks for that, but honestly, it really is a matter of teamwork, every mech is the most important, as long as each pilot knows their respective roles. Also, one thing that the OP touched on, but that I would like to elaborate about lights and lrms. If a light driver with ECM notices that a friendly is being fired upon by lrms, he should, if he can, try to get close to his friendly and break the lrm lock. The friendly mech WILL thank you. Also, this is a great way to assist someone who has gotten themselves isolated from your group and pinned down by lrm fire. Lead him back to the group, and then race off again to harass, tag, or cap (briefly).

A good light pilot will make the enemy convinced that there are more lights than there really are, simply by moving all over the map and firing at targets of opportunity.

[Linkin]

Just want to say- damn straight! Brilliant post flyingscots(wo)man!

I know I'm guilty of not always pipping up when I see something wrong... of course, I've also had a few unfortunate incidents when I do say something, involving forgetting to set my throttle to full speed preset, causing a lack of life giving momentum and the subsequent coring of my halted Jenner as I type. Lesson learned, type responsibly (or play more with voice comms)!

[John Buford]

Little over the top in places but I like it. Especialy the part about Assualts and doing their job which is taking fire. Friend of mine plays and Atlas and it drives him crazy when you see that Atlas trying to snipe with a Gauss and LRMS. Can hear him yelling MOVE as I type this. Oh and not to worry he is that type of player that loves to lead the charge just need get him to learn there are times you need to hold back a bit and wait for the right time.

[B1zmark]

Good post. i apply this to all games - generally i will ask people for things or inform them of my intentions (Example DOTA: I am coming to gank your lane). If they fail to act upon this then they deserve to be shouted at as they contribute nothing to the team.

"I'm just on to have fun". That's great for you. But this is a 12 v 12 game, I suggest Hawken or Armoured Core in that case. Team vs Team games are purely competitive and as such should be taken seriously. Expect to be ridiculed if you are bad and refuse to team-play. Even bad players team-playing change battles.

BTW Mailin, your signature i hope is a troll. Abusing bad spider netcode isn't skill, it's borderline cheating. Sick of hitting them with AC20 shells and doing no damage.

[mailin]

B1zmark, I am looking forward to PGI having the hitboxes fixed on Spiders, but there are a lot of people who still won't be able to hit them.

[Satan n stuff]

Assaults with LRMs are not useless, assaults with LRMs that refuse to do any actual assaulting might be, depending on their loadout. If you're an LRM assault with no decent backup weapons, you'd better be able to hit the enemy with your missiles, because an LRM boat sitting behind the front line throwing missiles at random blips is worse than useless, regardless of weight class. Bring TAG if you can or a spotter if not, use the target decay module if you have it and always use Artemis and preferably BAP or ECM. Having LRMs on your assault mech is actually a huge advantage if you know what you're doing because of how slow your mech is as it lets you damage mechs in a much larger area, making your lack of speed less of a problem especially on the more open maps. However LRMs are one of the hardest weapons to use properly, and assault is the hardest weight class to use properly, so if you can't pull it off don't do it. A low top speed combined with a minimum range means you need to have other weapons and/or nearby teammates to protect you at close range. Even if you have no backup weapons whatsoever you still need to stay near teammates because the closer you are to the enemy ( who are likely to be near your teammates ) the more likely your missiles are to hit, and you're much more vulnerable on your own.

[Caswallon]

Having played under your leadership TFS I would like to publicly vouch for its success!

you're a **$@^^ Diamond Jock! Keep up the @%!!! Good Work! Made me laugh all the way through the match..

[Vassago Rain]

The best scout is an atlas with full electronics.

The worst scout is a light pretending he can get away without losing half his mech.