Lucky Strongarm, on 21 July 2014 - 06:56 AM, said:
It has been my experience so far that the new group mechanics are making for more challenging drops. What I mean by that is that I lose more often.
Realizing my question is a bit open-ended, I'll ask it nonetheless: Assuming that a group is made up of players who know each other, have the ability to coordinate the mechs they drop in, and actively use comms, what is the foundation for effective tactics in the current mechwarrior setting?
What are you having success with? Staying together as a group? Calling targets and focusing fire? Using the battlegrid command controls to direct your group? Practice practice practice?
I'm interested to hear the thoughts of pilots better than me (queue most of the community).
I'm not sure I understand what you're asking, so correct me if I am wrong.
I am assuming you're asking what brings me better success when dropping with friends on comms. In that case, we use a combination of what you mentioned. The most important and best advantage we get is that we can have one person be the drop caller. That person will direct the movement of our units, and where they should go, and how they set up.
When I used to lead 12 mans I spent a good deal of the early game hidden and looking over the battle grid setting up where everyone should be.
After the drop caller the next advantage is the knowledge of what loadouts exist, meaning I won't bring a support mech and run into the problem of not having an LRM boat on the team, or vice versa. Thus I always know what my team has, and who to run to when chased by certain mechs (I prefer piloting lights).
Third advantage and the one that has the most impact when we clash with the enemy team is the ability to focus fire. In HHoD I drop with people I regularly know, and we have drilled good response and reflex, so when I hear Alpha, it takes me at most 3 seconds to spot it, and open fire on it.
At the same time, since we have a drop caller who's in a somewhat relaxed position, they can also declare which targets are secondary and tertiary.
Basically here's one scenario that happened during my last group drop.
We had 6 mechs in our premade. Our drop leader used my scouting information to see which enemies were barreling down on us, and called the enemy T-Wolf with Gauss ERPPC as primary, the CTF-3D as secondary, and the JM6-DD with 6MGs as tertiary. When we got to open fire on those three (they were ahead of the enemy formation), we killed the T-Wolf first, and those that didn't get there in time didn't need to waste time trying to see where Alpha is, as soon as we called Alpha down, they didn't need more communication, they switched to hit Delta (the CTF with the LBXs), and as soon as they heard Delta down, they were hitting Golf (the JM6-DD).
By the time we churned through those three, our drop caller already had 3 more targets prioritized for us, and we just went through the enemy team like a combine harvester on roid-rage.
Also, when we say at the beginning of chat that we are a premade, the PuGs usually follow us around, and I always make sure to keep them in the loop using chat. A luxury afforded to me since I am in a light going at 140Kph, with ECM, and I can hide wherever I want. Sometimes our drop caller (if they are the type to sit back and coordinate, like me, instead of lead from the front) will be the ones using chat.
Here's another scenario where we achieved a great victory simply because we kept the PuGs in the loop:
Terra Therma, we dropped with 3 DWFs (this was back when the clan packs had just been released), and we were made up of 4 mechs only. We told the PuGs to follow our lead, and they did. We got to the caldera and waited outside one of the exits for the enemy team to come out.
I kept having to type in chat "stay close" and "no, come back, don't leave the group or we lose" things like that to keep the natural "I wanna charge and punch things" mentality in check. We had our DWFs and JM6s and other mechs lined up in a concave firing line, and watched as the enemy team came out 2, 3 mechs at a time, and got chewed up. Once we had a 5 mech advantage, we let the PuGs go wild, and it was like the scene from 300 when they let the Arkadians in on the slaughter.
The brawl was glorious, and we had a clear win. Comms can be a game changer because you can use them while piloting and attacking. Meaning you don't need to worry about players not reading chat, or not having the time to type in chat. A second or 2 can be important if you are in a brawl. If you are sitting behind a rock and waiting for things to happen, use chat.
JigglyMoobs, on 23 July 2014 - 01:46 AM, said:
The basic difference is that the optimal pug play style is defense oriented, with each player using the other players and the terrain as defensive screens to get in damage and kills over time.
On the other hand, large groups need to use their superior communication to be much much much much more aggressive. They are using shock, mass, speed, maneuver and focused firepower to win.
Good 6-12 man groups are constantly on the attack. They get everywhere much faster than opponents expect and attack much more aggressively, often committing their entire force into an attack.
Target calling and foccus firing is actually secondary. The primary thing is to get everyone in position to commit to an attack under favorable circumstances, and recognizing or creating those circumstances really fast. That accounts for 90 percent of the roflstomps.
The other 10 percent of games where 2 teams that have the basics down are facing each other is where More advanced skills are coming in play.
Its indeed completely different.
I use my JJ mechs to charge behind my teammates and fire over them as they are bum-rushing the enemy lines.
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