0
I'm playing with three of my buds in a 3 man lance, with a tag-a-long pug who fits right in. Other than that our team is a bunch of PUGs. We're playing against an 8 man group and pugs. The odds are against us. Thankfully it is Conquest and Tourmaline Desert and I have a plan. It is simple, instead of killing things and dying we'll outcap them. Yay. We've got a Jenner, Stormcrow, BJ, and our ECM Raven.
For reference here is our route:
Green Route = My Lance
Blue Route = Me
Orange Routes = Our other teammates lances
1. We head to epsilon to quickly cap, then move to gamma. Rest of our team begins engagement at Theta.
2. Team is not talking to us, we inform them we're headed to gamma to cap. Must be an intense brawl. I'm a little disappointed to see that both teams are destroying each other skirmish style at theta.
3. Dead guy on our team starts whinning about how far we are out and how we could have turned the tide at theta, blah blah. We're like...uh this is Conquest, not Skirmish. Thanks for not saying anything 5 minutes ago.
4. We encounter a lance of enemy mechs, mostly wounded. I break off from my lance and head for Kappa, telling my lance we don't need numbers to win this, just cap points. My lance gets distracted by a tasty almost dead Hunchback and kill a few mechs in the process, but all end up dead.
5. I begin capping Kappa and realize none of my lance mates got my hint. I decide to be more direct next time, subtlety is not my strong point. Team is whining about how we're going to lose because our lance should have joined the brawl at Theta. All your fault, etc...same dead guy as before is particularly whinny.
6. At this point Theta is partially capped by the enemy, but most of them are at Gamma capping. I decide to head to Theta.
7. After a few moments of capping I encounter lone Hunchback, he is legged, but fully armed. I'm careful so I decide to mostly ignore him and fire a few shots while fleeing. Much circly motion follows as his team tries to lrm me to death and keep missing since he can't keep a lock. Enemy team thinks I'm headed to theta. After swinging by a 2nd pass I try to finish Hunchie's leg, but miss cuz I'm in a hurry and don't really want to risk it. I make as if going for Sigma, but then break off and head for Epsilon pass and then onto Gamma.
When I make it to Gamma, we've gotten our 750 points, enemy team has barely capped anything, point wise it is a stomp, I'm relatively undamaged, but my entire team is dead.
Why do I tell this story? Cause I get to brag a bit, yeah, but mostly it is because I'm astounded at how stupid both teams were with Conquest. Mr. Whiner from my team, complained (paraphrasing) that "everybody knows you have a brawl in the center first and then split off and cap. Your idiocy is going to cost us the match."
What? When did Conquest become Assault? The point of Conquest is to cap the resource collector thingies, and then win with 750 points. This leaves you with a lot of strategic options as to which order to cap things in, but the bottom line I'd like to make is that, no you don't treat Conquest like a Skirmish. It means that a simple lone Jenner, can out cap your dead team after the main fight is over and you lose.
==
So let's review a few simple tactics to use when you select Conquest mode:
1. Always watch the cap. If the enemy cap is ahead, you are losing regardless of how many mechs your team is ahead. A difference of 40 points isn't much, but you should really start to worry if the enemy is 100 points ahead.
2. Leg mechs. Don't worry about finishing off enemy mechs, just leg them. A legged mech is a worthless piece of junk in Conquest. If it can't move, then it can't cap. Sure they can still spot and fire lrms, but they can't accomplish the primary objective of this mode half as well. The only types of mechs that you should probably finish off are slow molasses assault mechs that move just as slow legged as they do undamaged and LRM boats.
3. I'm legged, what do I do? You've got a couple of options at this point. If you are a lrm boat it doesn't really change anything; otherwise, what you probably want to do is head to the closest cap point that your team is struggling to hold and sit on it and defend. Defending doesn't require that you move around, only that you sit. If you are a legged mech, defending what you're teammates have died to keep, don't let some Spider steal it away.
4. Order of capping. The order that you cap things in matters very much. Here are some general tips:
- Lights should hit the closest cap point first and then allow mediums/heavies/assaults to finish capping it while they start moving on to the next cap point. Don't sit there, just start the cap, the rest of your team can finish it.
- Lights should try to hit the enemy 'base' cap point 2nd. By base I refer to the cap point the enemy team starts out with. It is rarely guarded, and usually a quick steal for a lance of lights.
- Heavies and Assault mechs do best trying to hold the center where they don't need to cap much, but simply defend it. Heavies and Assault mechs have the most freedom in this mode, but they should mostly try to defend cap points rather than moving between them.
- Because you can expect the enemy to have read this post, expect them to follow the above points and plan for reverse tactics (eg: have a light killer waiting at your base cap for example).
6. How much should I cap? The main site claims, "HIGH COMMAND TIP: If you can, always make sure you fill your capture to 100% on your side. If enemies try to retake a control point, the extra effort you put in will buy you time to destroy/chase off the enemy Mech(s) that are trying to capture.". This is partially a lie. Sometimes all you want is a couple of points, you don't have time, especially as a light mech, to stand around on a cap and completely cap it. Doing so will earn you a giant ac20 to the face. Carefully learn to judge how far you should cap.
7. Watch the mech to mech ratio. Don't be that guy that is happily capping along and then realizes that huh, I'm the only one left? Keep hitting tab every now and again to check to see how many of your team is left.
8. Down a couple mechs? Your team down by a couple of mechs? Have no fear, you can still win this if you remember to cap. First thing: split up, don't stick together, make it hard to find each of you. Keep scouting, always know where the enemy force is mostly located at, this way you can avoid it and head to cap points that are far away from them. Feel free to step on a cap point for a few minutes and then leave, this can result in them all heading toward it even though you've long since left and double back past them.
9. Kill light mechs first. If it is a choice between shooting the Spider and the Timberwolf, go for the Spider. If you take out the enemies light mechs, their stagetic options become very very limited.
10. Have a plan. If no one on your team is giving directions it is time to come up with a plan and start getting your team to support it. Don't waste your precious pre-walk match time, chat it up like mad.
Finally a long time ignored piece of advice that the devs put up a long time ago:
"Try to get to one of the outlier resource collectors as fast as your team can. Once captured, try to hold both it and the one at your spawn location for the duration of the mission. Assault Mechs are prime candidates for protecting the defensive line between the two controlled points while the scouts/brawlers try to gain ground on the rest of the locations."
--
Advanced Tactics Tips for Light Mechs
-Depending on where the enemy is, the capture point you are trying to cap may not have a good place to just sit down and avoid line of sight fire. In this case, try circling the resource point at top speed. This makes you slightly harder to hit, at the cost of being slightly less situationally aware. 3rd person may also be helpful here.
-Hug the capture point resource collector machine thing if you are taking lrms to the face, you can use it to block the majority of the missiles.
-Capture Accelerator is overrated and probably not worth spending XP on unless you LOVE conquest and have lots of modules to spare. (It can become worth it if you launch with a lance that all have it equipped, makes for ridiculously quick cap times, but as a lone PUG it ain't really worth it.)
-Ignoring your teams pounding when they are being idiots can be hard, but if you keep on capping you may just pull out a lone win if you are smart.
-Stick together with a buddy, you can get a lot more done and cover each other's butts if a pair of Jenni come knocking.
-Get a LRM guy to help you out if other light mechs decide to challenge you for a cap spot, they'll soon flee if they're getting pounded by you and your friend's LRM.
-Keep moving, you shouldn't be defending cap points in almost any situation.
-In rare instances you might consider wandering to the edge of a map and shutting down, but this is only if you are about to win, the last one left, and are still making points off of previously captured points.
-Sometimes you can hide inside the dead bodies of enemy mechs who've died inside a capture point
-Resist taking shots at enemy mechs rear torso's who haven't noticed you capping. I know it is tempting, but it'll give away your position and possibly prevent you from being able to cap in peace.
Finally: Devs, please give teams more of a reward for winning with a 750 point capture. Too many people try to treat this game mode like skirmish simply because they get more xp and cbills for blowing components off of enemy mechs.
TLDR;
-Stop treating conquest like skirmish mode. The tactics are totally different.
Edited by Darth Futuza, 17 July 2014 - 07:02 PM.
