43 replies to this topic

[Spleenslitta]

This guide i made has a lot of ways to avoid detection by other lights and i do it with a KFX nowadays.
Non Meta Light Mech Tactics Guide.

There are some limitations of course such as lower damage per minute than more aggressive tactics.

But if it's done right you have a decently high chance to live to the end of a match with a lot of spare armor.
This allows you to help drag home the victory if your team is losing. Especially if the enemy only has slower mechs left on their team.
You can kill a lot by just going by the motto: Shoot but do not get shot in return.

Edited by Spleenslitta, 20 September 2015 - 12:56 AM.

[Weeny Machine]

Flanking is great in light mechs or fast meds. Even if you cannot apply too much damage because you cause a massive reaction, you draw away some firepower from your buddies.

However, I was flamed by a genius yesterday for "not wanting to teamplay and go for afkers". Ummm...yeah.

[waterfowl]

OP, you tried flanking in a KIT FOX. There's your mistake. Faster mechs have the legs to get out when they do mess up, and can reposition faster. A Kit Fox isn't mobile enough to flank unless you are sure the area is clear, otherwise it's a death sentence. Kit Foxes are support mechs first, everything else second. If you must flank, then be sure to use S legs for the jump jets. That's how I do it. Jump jet to weird spot, then use the high mounted AC to plink.

Edited by waterfowl, 20 September 2015 - 01:36 AM.

[Vlad Ward]

MischiefSC, on 19 September 2015 - 05:52 PM, said:

To flank you need 1 of 2 things -

enough speed to quickly disengage and get away from anything you encounter when it goes wrong

OR

enough firepower to make your flank go 1 way, right through all the enemies.

Otherwise all you've done is split your team up to be slaughtered.

As a given rule flanking is a bad idea on average.

^

Flank with UAC Dire Wolf. Take out entire lance from behind. Even if you die a minute later, you probably did at least 700 damage so there's your 300 match score.

Edited by Vlad Ward, 20 September 2015 - 01:34 AM.

[waterfowl]

Vlad Ward, on 20 September 2015 - 01:33 AM, said:

^

Flank with UAC Dire Wolf. Take out entire lance from behind. Even if you die a minute later, you probably did at least 700 damage so there's your 300 match score.

the fun part is getting that fatty into position

[Yosharian]

Dakota1000, on 19 September 2015 - 04:37 PM, said:

kitfox

Lmao

[Spleenslitta]

waterfowl, on 20 September 2015 - 01:32 AM, said:

OP, you tried flanking in a KIT FOX. There's your mistake. Faster mechs have the legs to get out when they do mess up, and can reposition faster. A Kit Fox isn't mobile enough to flank unless you are sure the area is clear, otherwise it's a death sentence. Kit Foxes are support mechs first, everything else second. If you must flank, then be sure to use S legs for the jump jets. That's how I do it. Jump jet to weird spot, then use the high mounted AC to plink.

It has it's clear limitations yes. But that ECM makes the enemy responsetime longer in many cases.
Furthermore the KFX has a lot of firepower for it's size because of that smaller engine so you need to pop out of cover less times to kill your targets.
But yeah.....when the Cheetah is out for C-bills i think i will do better in that. The lacking speed hurts the KFX when you go flanking but it's far from a mistake to go flanking with it.
I know when to admit to myself that i'm to blame rather than blaming my mech or my teammates.

[Mudhutwarrior]

You can't flank a radar hack. Just do a google search. After finding out how the top teams were using and alt to direct the others it pretty much makes flanking pointless.

When your well hidden in a gauss boat and surrounded by your team and the light comes from behind and alphas you before anyone else its a good hint. Especially when no one else doritoed him beforehand.

All that weirdness happens a lot and the exploiters will come here and tell you your dreaming. Of course.

[Sjorpha]

Wait until the fight has started and only flank enemy mechs that are already engaged, the success depends on the degree of split attention between you and the main fight.

If you "flank" before the main engagement has started there is no split attention involved and you will functionally BE the main target the moment you fire.

Getting attention as a flanker is not a failure, because it means your teammates can get free trades in against that mech. But getting attention also means your job is completed for the time being and you need to do something else such as reposition and flank again or jump into the main fight or whatever.

Flanking or backstabbing unengaged enemies is another type of mission, better described as assassination or harassment. It's a harder thing to get away with alive, though very fun.

[Pjwned]

El Bandito, on 20 September 2015 - 12:11 AM, said:

ER Smalls + SRMs are too short ranged to be an effective flanking weapon, IMO. At that distance, the enemy can return fire very easily and you are in danger of being detected on Seismic.

Being within seismic distance hasn't prevented me from getting behind people a number of times lately while proceeding to melt their rear armor and then some. I imagine an enemy's seismic sensor has tipped somebody off when I'm nearby so that they turned around or ran off, but I've been able to get behind people and have a pretty damn good surprise advantage surprisingly often.

I will say that seismic has saved my ass more than a few times though, so either it's not a very common module or people suck at using it properly or both or something else.

Mudhutwarrior, on 20 September 2015 - 03:08 AM, said:

You can't flank a radar hack. Just do a google search. After finding out how the top teams were using and alt to direct the others it pretty much makes flanking pointless.

When your well hidden in a gauss boat and surrounded by your team and the light comes from behind and alphas you before anyone else its a good hint. Especially when no one else doritoed him beforehand.

All that weirdness happens a lot and the exploiters will come here and tell you your dreaming. Of course.

**** off, we're talking about tactics here and not scrub whining tinfoil hat garbage.

[Ultimax]

Dakota1000, on 19 September 2015 - 09:20 PM, said:

To be honest, I guess I just get bored of the same thing over and over even if I'm winning. I always come up with side challenges for myself that usually make things harder.

That tends to be the thing that gets players killed prematurely.


Have enough players on the team doing this, and you are likely to lose - probably in a stomp.


It's a team game.

[Vlad Ward]

Pjwned, on 20 September 2015 - 04:47 AM, said:

I will say that seismic has saved my ass more than a few times though, so either it's not a very common module or people suck at using it properly or both or something else.

Doesn't work while moving. People like to rock/waddle while trading, so it's not picking things up most of the time. I make a habit of full stopping to check it once in a while in my Dire, but staying still too long isn't great either.

[Weeny Machine]

Pjwned, on 20 September 2015 - 04:47 AM, said:

Being within seismic distance hasn't prevented me from getting behind people a number of times lately while proceeding to melt their rear armor and then some. I imagine an enemy's seismic sensor has tipped somebody off when I'm nearby so that they turned around or ran off, but I've been able to get behind people and have a pretty damn good surprise advantage surprisingly often.

I will say that seismic has saved my ass more than a few times though, so either it's not a very common module or people suck at using it properly or both or something else.



**** off, we're talking about tactics here and not scrub whining tinfoil hat garbage.

How can you use seismic wrong?

Anyway, that module has saved me so often. In my opinion it is actually too good. On the other hand in the Age of ECM-Covers-Us-All the module is great to pierce the veil

[xMintaka]

Mudhutwarrior, on 20 September 2015 - 03:08 AM, said:

You can't flank a radar hack. Just do a google search. After finding out how the top teams were using and alt to direct the others it pretty much makes flanking pointless.

When your well hidden in a gauss boat and surrounded by your team and the light comes from behind and alphas you before anyone else its a good hint. Especially when no one else doritoed him beforehand.

All that weirdness happens a lot and the exploiters will come here and tell you your dreaming. Of course.

Here. You need this more than I do.

[Escef]

A solo-flank can work, but usually only in the solo queue. A lot of folks in the solo queue don't equip seismic modules, there's little team communication if someone catches a glimpse of you, etc.

For example, in this clip if the Timber Wolf had seismic he would have "seen" me coming. My UAC20 jammed, otherwise I probably would have ended him with that backstab attack. It turned into a nasty duel that I barely won. But either he didn't call for help or was ignored. The KGC didn't see me at all (and obviously lacked seismic), and was fool enough to think that something that hit him that hard wasn't going to pop him again. The Orion was mostly luck, he had an open side torso rear and an XL engine, poor dude went down like a sack of bricks.


Long story short, if you intend to be hanging back for fire support DO NOT hang too far back from help and equip a seismic module.

[Mudhutwarrior]

Lunatech, on 20 September 2015 - 05:13 AM, said:

Here. You need this more than I do.

Yeah, great comeback. I am sure you think your money in the bank is safe too.

[Lykaon]

Fleeb the Mad, on 19 September 2015 - 04:49 PM, said:

Doing that in a Kit Fox is tough, though ECM covers many faults.

Normally you need to wait until the enemy is fully engaged and distracted. It sounds like the reason you got demolished is because there was a full enemy lance that was puttering around with nothing to do and nothing to shoot at them if they turned to engage you.

If you try to flank in the early game you're probably in for a lot of trouble because there's too many people looking for someone to engage in the standoff cover fire stage. Try waiting for the teams to move closer together and you'll be able to find a bunch of people with target fixation that you can exploit.

This here is some very sound advice.

Timing is 90% of the success of flanking.To soon and you get swamped to late and you don't contribute enough.

I frequently pilot my Huggin (4 MGs 2 SRM4 with full SRM4 module upgrades) I use this mech as an ambush predator.I swing out wide early on moving to the enemy formation rear trying not to be seen.Wait for the enemy to get comfortable with the hidey pokey game.They get very target focused at this point and almost never cover their backsides.

[Lyoto Machida]

Mudhutwarrior, on 20 September 2015 - 03:08 AM, said:

You can't flank a radar hack. Just do a google search. After finding out how the top teams were using and alt to direct the others it pretty much makes flanking pointless.

When your well hidden in a gauss boat and surrounded by your team and the light comes from behind and alphas you before anyone else its a good hint. Especially when no one else doritoed him beforehand.

All that weirdness happens a lot and the exploiters will come here and tell you your dreaming. Of course.

This guy still plays the game? Shouldn't you be on a boat somewhere with no access to this forum?

[Mudhutwarrior]

Lyoto Machida, on 20 September 2015 - 10:51 AM, said:

This guy still plays the game? Shouldn't you be on a boat somewhere with no access to this forum?

Can't leave. Dissidents in this country can't get a passport anymore and are more than ever on the no fly list.

Of course that's a conspiracy theory if you have never stood for anything. Just be a good consumer and everything will be fine.

for a while.

[Lyoto Machida]

Mudhutwarrior, on 20 September 2015 - 10:57 AM, said:

Can't leave. Dissidents in this country can't get a passport anymore and are more than ever on the no fly list.

Of course that's a conspiracy theory if you have never stood for anything. Just be a good consumer and everything will be fine.

for a while.

I'm sure you'll find a way out someday. Many people seem to have no problem getting into this country illicitly.

$1000 if by land...$2000 if by sea.