Sideshow
13th November 2006, 16:53
BF2142: Recon and You
or: How to make the most use out of the camper without pissing him off.
This article is aimed, not at the Recon player, but instead at the other guys in his team/squad. It covers most aspects of the Recon class, and stems mostly from all the fucked up, retarded things people do in games online. It's written about the Recon class in BF2142, but a fair chunk of it can be applied to the Sniper and Spec Ops classes in BF2.
First, let's look at how the Recon player fits into the squad, and what you can expect from him. The Recon class is a support class in 2142 (as are all classes bar Assault, IMHO): you really don't need more than one in the squad. He can provide supplementary fire support, but he will rarely win in CQB versus Assault of Support. Check the armament: He will either have a semi-automatic sniper rifle, only accurate while scoped, or he'll be using the Carbine. With the rifle he'll be useful in mid-range firefights, and devastating at anything longer. Close up, he's better reverting to pistol, which isn't exactly going to compete with an H-AR. If he's trying to support the squad close-up, to give them more immediate firepower (during a run on the Titan for example) he'll have the Lambert Carbine, which will let him out-shoot Engineers and Snipers at anything less than mid-range, but he'll still lose against Assault and Support. It aint a G36C (bah). He'll get owned by enemy Snipers at mid-long range too. Squad Leaders and squadmates should bear this in mind if they find themselves depending on the Recon to hold their own in these situations - he's not a lot better in an up-tempo firefight than an Engineer. Equipped with either weapon, the Recon player is very very good at killing enemies who do not know he is there, and a lot less good at killing the ones he doesn't have the drop on.
Equipped with the Carbine, the Recon soldier can still be an effective up-close member of the squad, but his strength will not be by trying to out-shoot the opposition.
With C4 he can very effectively take out enemy vehicles, but only if the squad works together. Both Engineers and Support have access to EMP weaponry, which can provide an ample window of opportunity for the Recon to insta-kill enemy vehicles. Yes, the Engineer, in AT mode, can take out vehicles on his own: combining with the Recon and his C4 can take them out far quicker. Alternatively, if the enemy are advancing on you with a lot of vehicles, you can garner an extra AT by combining the Support and Recon troops. While the Engineer can be shooting one tank with his rocket launcher, the Support and Recon can take out another. Finally, the Battle Walkers are devastatingly powerful in BF2142: the surest way to kill one is combining all the squads efforts. Demo packs are the way to do it.
APM (anti-personnel mines) are not just used to guard the top of the ladder that the Recon climbed up before setting up his tent. In rolling firefights they are a very effective way for the Recon to cover the squad's back, a task he'll be much better suited to than spear-heading the charge. Don't get in the way of the mines, and don't punish if you do. Mines are also good for defending flags (covering entrances into the flag for instance), or just as booby-traps once the squad has taken one flag and is moving on to another. If you see the little skull-and-crossbones, be careful! It is not the witches chasing you!
The other way the Recon plays is more appropriate to the name: providing reconnaisance (and coincidentally shooting peoples heads with the sniper rifle). Do not be upset if the Recon guy is not anywhere near your squad. Most maps in 2142 have some good vantage points from which a player can see a good portion of the map. From here the Recon troop can do two things. (a) He can provide fire-support with his sniper rifle. Being far away is helpful in this instance: his angle of attack will likely be vastly different from the rest of the squads, so enemy units taking cover from the squad will hopefully be open to him. If he's good he can kill them with one shot, which makes them a lot less likely to spot where the attack is coming from. If they do notice they may try to run for other cover, exposing themselves to the rest of the squad. (b) He can give spots. Good spots. Lots and lots of spots. With the HUD upgrade his spots last a long time, and can include hit-point information. This is like having your own private UAV for the squad, and is probably more useful to the squad as a whole than all the head-shots in the world. In BF2142, first strike is very important. If you can shoot at them before they know you're there you're gonna win, 9 times out of 10.
What can screw this up? Do NOT follow the Recon guy. Do NOT lie down next to him and open up with your AR, or your Support weaponry: you fire tracers! Enemy can see you! The last thing you want to do is call attention to where he has hidden himself. If he wants to go off by himself, don't think that he's doing it for easy cheap kills and try and get in on his action. Just leave him alone. Assault: Do NOT *helpfully* leave him a healing station. It shows up on everyone's HUD, and acts like a giant finger of God pointing to his location for the enemy. For the same reason, Support shouldn't leave him any ammo. Commanders: don't drop a supply crate for him unless he specifically asks for it.
OTOH, if you, as the Commander, receive a call for supplies from a Recon player who's in the enemy base BLOODY WELL GIVE HIM A CRATE. He's going to spend the next ten minutes running around blowing up all the assets the enemy have. The enemy will try and fix them: as long as Recon has a steady supply of C4 he's just gonna keep doing it. If he's playing nice he won't be spawn-raping the enemy, but he will be killing any repairers / guy's trying to root him out AND the enemy commander whenever he can. The disruption to the enemy commander alone is worth it (lack of assets, dying now and again), but the Recon effectively neutralises every enemy player who stays behind in the base to repair or try and kill him. Think about that in a resource advantage mindset: as commander you are using 1 player and a supply crate. If he's playing well, you are making the enemy lose (roughly): His assets, the commander, a repairer and maybe another soldier too. That's a huge gain SO GIVE HIM THE SUPPLY CRATE.
Finally, Titan mode. There is no quicker way to take down the enemy Titan than with a good squad. The consoles take an age to shoot out, so what's the solution? Well, obviously, it's a Recon and a Support. Recon C4 takes out Consoles and the Core faster than anything else. Running from one to the next, C4ing it and then resupplying on the move can let you take a Titan down inside a couple of minutes. So while Recon is planting charges what should the rest of the squad be doing? (1) NOT standing near the console. You'd think that would be obvious right? (2) NOT shooting the console. Your guns aren't gonna make it blow up any faster. You should be concentrating all your efforts on the corridor access points, giving the Recon guy the time he needs to plant and detonate. The same goes in the Core: The Recon player will dance around the core planting all his C4. Don't be standing near it shooting it. The enemy can come in large numbers from both direction in the Core area: keep all your attention on killing them. After each volley of charges the Recon will need to re-arm from the Support guy, but he can do that just by dropping the Ammo on the ground. Just make sure the Recon guy lives and/or gets resussed. It only takes 3 sets of charges to kill the Titan, at which point you WIN THE GAME. It's not hard.
or: How to make the most use out of the camper without pissing him off.
This article is aimed, not at the Recon player, but instead at the other guys in his team/squad. It covers most aspects of the Recon class, and stems mostly from all the fucked up, retarded things people do in games online. It's written about the Recon class in BF2142, but a fair chunk of it can be applied to the Sniper and Spec Ops classes in BF2.
First, let's look at how the Recon player fits into the squad, and what you can expect from him. The Recon class is a support class in 2142 (as are all classes bar Assault, IMHO): you really don't need more than one in the squad. He can provide supplementary fire support, but he will rarely win in CQB versus Assault of Support. Check the armament: He will either have a semi-automatic sniper rifle, only accurate while scoped, or he'll be using the Carbine. With the rifle he'll be useful in mid-range firefights, and devastating at anything longer. Close up, he's better reverting to pistol, which isn't exactly going to compete with an H-AR. If he's trying to support the squad close-up, to give them more immediate firepower (during a run on the Titan for example) he'll have the Lambert Carbine, which will let him out-shoot Engineers and Snipers at anything less than mid-range, but he'll still lose against Assault and Support. It aint a G36C (bah). He'll get owned by enemy Snipers at mid-long range too. Squad Leaders and squadmates should bear this in mind if they find themselves depending on the Recon to hold their own in these situations - he's not a lot better in an up-tempo firefight than an Engineer. Equipped with either weapon, the Recon player is very very good at killing enemies who do not know he is there, and a lot less good at killing the ones he doesn't have the drop on.
Equipped with the Carbine, the Recon soldier can still be an effective up-close member of the squad, but his strength will not be by trying to out-shoot the opposition.
With C4 he can very effectively take out enemy vehicles, but only if the squad works together. Both Engineers and Support have access to EMP weaponry, which can provide an ample window of opportunity for the Recon to insta-kill enemy vehicles. Yes, the Engineer, in AT mode, can take out vehicles on his own: combining with the Recon and his C4 can take them out far quicker. Alternatively, if the enemy are advancing on you with a lot of vehicles, you can garner an extra AT by combining the Support and Recon troops. While the Engineer can be shooting one tank with his rocket launcher, the Support and Recon can take out another. Finally, the Battle Walkers are devastatingly powerful in BF2142: the surest way to kill one is combining all the squads efforts. Demo packs are the way to do it.
APM (anti-personnel mines) are not just used to guard the top of the ladder that the Recon climbed up before setting up his tent. In rolling firefights they are a very effective way for the Recon to cover the squad's back, a task he'll be much better suited to than spear-heading the charge. Don't get in the way of the mines, and don't punish if you do. Mines are also good for defending flags (covering entrances into the flag for instance), or just as booby-traps once the squad has taken one flag and is moving on to another. If you see the little skull-and-crossbones, be careful! It is not the witches chasing you!
The other way the Recon plays is more appropriate to the name: providing reconnaisance (and coincidentally shooting peoples heads with the sniper rifle). Do not be upset if the Recon guy is not anywhere near your squad. Most maps in 2142 have some good vantage points from which a player can see a good portion of the map. From here the Recon troop can do two things. (a) He can provide fire-support with his sniper rifle. Being far away is helpful in this instance: his angle of attack will likely be vastly different from the rest of the squads, so enemy units taking cover from the squad will hopefully be open to him. If he's good he can kill them with one shot, which makes them a lot less likely to spot where the attack is coming from. If they do notice they may try to run for other cover, exposing themselves to the rest of the squad. (b) He can give spots. Good spots. Lots and lots of spots. With the HUD upgrade his spots last a long time, and can include hit-point information. This is like having your own private UAV for the squad, and is probably more useful to the squad as a whole than all the head-shots in the world. In BF2142, first strike is very important. If you can shoot at them before they know you're there you're gonna win, 9 times out of 10.
What can screw this up? Do NOT follow the Recon guy. Do NOT lie down next to him and open up with your AR, or your Support weaponry: you fire tracers! Enemy can see you! The last thing you want to do is call attention to where he has hidden himself. If he wants to go off by himself, don't think that he's doing it for easy cheap kills and try and get in on his action. Just leave him alone. Assault: Do NOT *helpfully* leave him a healing station. It shows up on everyone's HUD, and acts like a giant finger of God pointing to his location for the enemy. For the same reason, Support shouldn't leave him any ammo. Commanders: don't drop a supply crate for him unless he specifically asks for it.
OTOH, if you, as the Commander, receive a call for supplies from a Recon player who's in the enemy base BLOODY WELL GIVE HIM A CRATE. He's going to spend the next ten minutes running around blowing up all the assets the enemy have. The enemy will try and fix them: as long as Recon has a steady supply of C4 he's just gonna keep doing it. If he's playing nice he won't be spawn-raping the enemy, but he will be killing any repairers / guy's trying to root him out AND the enemy commander whenever he can. The disruption to the enemy commander alone is worth it (lack of assets, dying now and again), but the Recon effectively neutralises every enemy player who stays behind in the base to repair or try and kill him. Think about that in a resource advantage mindset: as commander you are using 1 player and a supply crate. If he's playing well, you are making the enemy lose (roughly): His assets, the commander, a repairer and maybe another soldier too. That's a huge gain SO GIVE HIM THE SUPPLY CRATE.
Finally, Titan mode. There is no quicker way to take down the enemy Titan than with a good squad. The consoles take an age to shoot out, so what's the solution? Well, obviously, it's a Recon and a Support. Recon C4 takes out Consoles and the Core faster than anything else. Running from one to the next, C4ing it and then resupplying on the move can let you take a Titan down inside a couple of minutes. So while Recon is planting charges what should the rest of the squad be doing? (1) NOT standing near the console. You'd think that would be obvious right? (2) NOT shooting the console. Your guns aren't gonna make it blow up any faster. You should be concentrating all your efforts on the corridor access points, giving the Recon guy the time he needs to plant and detonate. The same goes in the Core: The Recon player will dance around the core planting all his C4. Don't be standing near it shooting it. The enemy can come in large numbers from both direction in the Core area: keep all your attention on killing them. After each volley of charges the Recon will need to re-arm from the Support guy, but he can do that just by dropping the Ammo on the ground. Just make sure the Recon guy lives and/or gets resussed. It only takes 3 sets of charges to kill the Titan, at which point you WIN THE GAME. It's not hard.