| Author |
Supplying Correctly |
Juxtapose
Grand Admiral
Sundered Weimeriners
Joined: May 11, 2002
Posts: 1308
From: Give me your bullets!
|  Posted: 2003-07-30 11:16
I was reading the =DSA= post on Advanced Supply Techniques, which can be found in this Forum. It has some good lessons in it, however there are some things that need clarifying. (this is written under the assumption that you know you have to be within 100gu of the target ship)
The Mission: Staying Alive
Disregard everything else you read that conflicts with this primary rule. Your main goal is to survive, above everything else. Dying gives prestige to the enemy and takes prestige from you. Don't get brow-beaten by some paranoid station or Dread into going down with them. When the death of a station or wounded dread is inevitiable, clear the blast zone and save yourself. (don't want to give that Station pilot Friendly Fire points do you? Really, think of it as doing them a favor)
2. Keep moving! If you jump to a wounded ship in deepspace, one that has just e-jumped from battle, keep moving. Even if it means driving in cirlces around it. There is a good chance that the enemy is going to find you. Supply ships aren't known for their acceleration prowness.
3. You are a combat ship. Fight. If you are going to sit in deep space and wait for the wounded to crawl to you then you are next to useless...get a scout.
Nothing I hate more than a supply ship that says Jump to me if you want Supply If I am desperate enough to distress, then chances are I am (a) in no condition/unable to jump or (b) busy. A supply ship has armor and guns so it can fight...extractors don't because they aren't meant to.
4. When jumping a wounded ship, don't just click on it and jump! Close jump it! A wounded ship that has just left battle probably has more pursuers then systems. Jumping 260gu away isn't going to help either of you. Why? Because if it gets jumped, the wounded ship is still going to have no systems when you finally get in range, so it isn't going to be able to defend you. Once it is dead, you are next.
5. FOR GODS SAKE DON'T BLINDLY PRESS FOLLOW 1. you jump near a wounded ship that is moving..and you press follow...you will take 3 times longer to get to it, especially if it starts moving towards you. Press follow once you get near enough to the ship and moving with it....and only if it continues moving (don't stop!). Blindly following a ship might land you in battle a long time before they arrive...will certainly increase your Planet Collision Stats...and will prevent you from helping others.
6. Supply Every ship you get near 100% Hull doesn't mean that there isn't prestige to be made. Fuel, ammo, systems. Just fly around targeting ships and supplying them...you will become more popular than a slaved-supply and will have more folks wanting to see you survive. Slaved Supply Ships are worthless to 99% of players...If you aren't going to help me, I probably won't be helping you.
obvious exceptions are bombing/supplyship pairs. And sometimes Station/Supply pairs...but, personally, if a station isn't carrying 20 elites, then it is more useless than a Supply Ship with no reloads
7. You are my #1 Target. Very important to remember. Lots of players, including me, will target you before any other ship. Why? Lots of reasons. . . the obvious strategic one is that you are repairing the ship that probably had been trying to kill me. You are easier to kill than that ship and more useful, so you must go before the other one. No point pounding away at a ship that is repairing at the same speed I am hurting it. The other reasons are: You are easy meat and good for my stats, it always seems to cause more whining than killing a normal ship, because most Supply Ship Captains don't know what they are doing and I hate them. . .which is why I wrote this post. . .
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I type with the tongues of my enemies, ascend from the backs of my friends, ignore the plight of innocents, and dance on the graves of my gods
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Azure.co.uk
Cadet
Joined: December 01, 2002
Posts: 355
| Posted: 2003-07-30 11:41
Jux is funny:) I hope ya'll SW remember to give him his daily medication.
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Demorian
Fleet Admiral
Galactic Navy
Joined: October 06, 2001
Posts: 3406
From: Charlotte, North Carolina
| Posted: 2003-07-30 12:01
Jux, you're forgetting one of the most important rules, an annoying one if your supply doesn't know how / refuses to do it...
Stay with your ship, don't make him stay with you
You have a duty to turn, accelerate, decelerate, etc, in order to meet the distressed ship in space and stay with him at all costs. A supply who doesn't do this, especially when you are trying to maneuver to meet him and expect him to do the same, is extraordinarily annoying and it costs you time and it can cost you prestige if you are on the run.
The damaged ship may have no drive functionality and may be cruising uncontrollably at 20 gu/s and it may be listing one or two clicks to starboard. These ships aren't going to come to you, or wait for you to catch up, or otherwise maneuver to meet you. Learn to judge where the ship you're about to supply is going, and stay with him/her. Trying to force the ship to follow your path is imposing and rude, and an indication of lack of practice and ability.
-Dem
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``We are the GTN. You will be resupplied. Resistance is optional.``
[ This Message was edited by: Demorian on 2003-07-30 12:05 ]
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Juxtapose
Grand Admiral
Sundered Weimeriners
Joined: May 11, 2002
Posts: 1308
From: Give me your bullets!
| Posted: 2003-07-30 12:17
A Good point and another reason to target a supply ship. Perhaps when folks start getting the hang of supplying I will refocus my attention on combat vessels.
Or atleast Engineers.
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I type with the tongues of my enemies, ascend from the backs of my friends, ignore the plight of innocents, and dance on the graves of my gods
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Grimith
Grand Admiral
Templar Knights
Joined: August 09, 2003
Posts: 836
From: Your local future farm.
| Posted: 2003-08-20 15:35
~I definitely agree here, especially in terms of supply ships going all the way out to supply one slow ship like a dreadnought or a supply station. Unless that huge ship somehow escaped the battle and is now out of sensor range of all the enemy or there's a lot of allies around in a massive battle, there's a very good chance that any other supply ship moving to the big ship is going in for suicide---if not because of the ally you were trying to save exploding and killing you with splash damage, then because the enemies that were attacking the weak ship you wanted to repair decided to paint you with lasers. People just can't expect supply ships to charge ahead straight into the thicket of a battle where there's only that one ship or an ally against many, many more. And supply ship pilots can't just crazily dance in to try and do some heroic maneuver. I've tried it before when I first got my supply ship about a week and a half ago (yes, I'm still newbish). It didn't work. I died almost as fast as the ship I was trying to save did.
~I'll add two more here, too, though I think they're both pretty much common sense, and it applies to everything in Darkspace.
PAY ATTENTION TO WHAT'S HAPPENING ON YOUR SCREEN
~Blindly putting follow on and then turning to watch the T.V. could easily kill you, for instance. Not realizing that the ship that you're trying to repair can't stop and it eventually gets hundreds of gus away from you is another prime example. If you're next to a planet in a system with known enemy sightings and said planet has no interdictor base, you very well could get jumped and swamped before you can say, "How much was that doggie in the window?" That's happened to me, too. And watching that new episode of (insert T.V. show here) is a bad idea when you're in the middle of a very dangerous system and people need serious repairs. Not only will your allies be frustrated by a "dead rock" for a teammate, but you'll definitely be easy prey.
DON'T GO PLAYING OUT IN THE STARS BY YOURSELF
~Jux was on the nose when he mentioned that Supply Ships are very big targets. For instance, the Heavy Supply Ship can hold two drone bays... but it can mod it so that it contains a reload and a build. That means that it can serve a repairing job and a building job, which inherently increases the threat that the ship brings you. Furthermore, the Supply Ship is one of the slowest things there is. Oh, sure, you can pack it with an AME Drive, but there's only one. The acceleration is so slow that you could dance around for maybe two minutes before the Heavy reached maximum acceleration.
~Can anyone figure out how painful it would be if a few scouts crept around a Heavy Supply?
~Oh, sure, the Supply Ship's pretty tough, and it can handle a small bit of combat (I'm only speaking from the ICC Faction--I'm assuming the UGTO's Heavy Supply is pretty much the same), but it isn't necessarily able to detect cloaked units, and bays couldn't repair it fast enough to restore system damage. Even when at max acceleration versus slower units, the enemy can just P-Jump you... and it takes an insane long amount of time for a Supply Ship to slow down before it can jump (though, with the way it's looking these days, current velocity won't matter when you want to jump).
~So, if someone dances a Supply Ship around in a dangerous system with no backup, there's a good chance that it could become a major target. And once a Supply Ship has been made into a target, the odds of it escaping are very, very bad (I've tested this out the painful way and an EAD owned my Heavy Supply in about 10 seconds at the most. Massive pain.).
~There. That's my contribution.
~Excellent job, by the way, Jux. You definitely made great points.
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[ This Message was edited by: Grimith J. Reaper on 2003-08-20 15:40 ]
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Fornax
Marshal
Raven Warriors
Joined: April 30, 2002
Posts: 906
From: Jacksonville, FL
| Posted: 2003-10-19 18:19
Jux wrote a good article but I'd like to emphasize what it means to combat-supply and the link in to #2/#3/#4/#6
First thing you should remember is, mod your ship. Armor may hurt your turning a bit, but it helps your power situation for an ICC.
Second, keep moving, always. And look for people that need help and figure out if it's even possible for you to get there.
Third, how you get there. Supply ship jump recharge isn't too bad. Consider using strategic e-jumps (hard to master but worth it) to jump towards an allly in need. One way to do this is hit 'follow' to line up on the target then turn it off and use e-jump. Then just exit the jump as well as you can/ as close as you can to your target. This works well also for retreating (without turning off the e-jump) as you can always fix your drive.
Always repair everyone. More combats are decided by a little bit of system damage than anything else. Ships left on their own only slowly repair one system at a time -- your repair drones repair all systems and provided desperately needed ammunition. Frequently it's a good idea to follow one ship but never just stay there. Others need your help and there's lots of prestige to earn.
Doing combat-supply is risky, but the rewards are great. More importantly, if you can save a ship that otherwise might have died, or allowed a few ships to survive long enough to wipe out the defenders...well, that's when the supply captain really gets the pats on the back. And that's when you find people willing to risk their own necks to save yours the next time.
Nax
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SmellyTerror
Cadet
Joined: September 24, 2003
Posts: 52
From: Canberra
| Posted: 2003-10-23 16:26
Couple of newby queations (and observations):
1. What was that about 20 elites on a station? Is that to stop boarding actions or can they be made to repair you, or what?
2. Speaking of boarding actions - why don't people seem to do it? I've been picking up my small (3-4) troop compliments if there are a lot of inf about, and throwing them on board an enemy seems to, at least, distract them for a minute. Does it do bugger-all damage? Why don't people do it more? Or are people just not wanting to waste their troops on my usually pretty crappy ships?
3. What's a P jump?
4. I've asked this in another thread, so apologies if it gets answered twice, but is it true that docking a supply to someone makes you repair them faster? If not, what's docking for? (Obviously you'd only do it if there're no baddies about).
5. Combat supply actually seems pretty easy to me. As soon as you start taking damage you know it's time to bug out, and you can shift-J (E jump?) out then go back to fringe-supply. If some goose of a combat pilot jumps out after you, especially in a big battle, then hey - you just removed the mug for at least a jump-drive recharge time, so it's all good. Yes? Not to mention possible suicide damage.
6. Strap a AM mine to a K'Luth supply, and make stupidly big mine-fields. Why don't people ever seem to do that? In fact, minefields in general don't seem to get used much. Why not?
7. People in DS seem unusually unfriendly to newby mistakes. We're talking derision and cap-yelling when people do things wrong. For a very complex game with such minimal documentation and buggy tutorials, this seems a bit harsh. Is this an ongoing issue or just a rough period?
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Hitman23
Grand Admiral
Joined: March 22, 2002
Posts: 585
From: WoW
| Posted: 2003-10-23 16:41
A station uses the 20 troops it carries mainly for planet captures.
Boarding has been removed from the game due to a balance issue I believe. Might see it return one day but unsure when.
Minefields tend to create too much lag so a lot of players now try to place them infront of a moving ship. Large minefields are still used though, just not as common. Also, each server has a mine limit now (last time I checked anyways), so once you hit the limit, new mines will cause the old mines to blow up.
As for your rough experience with other players, they seem to forget that they were once new just like you. When I started playing I was yelled at all the time but I slowly learned the game and found a few players that were willing to help me out. There are a ton of really nice people here, this game has the best community out of any other game I have played. Please do not let a few children turn you away from here.
I hope I have helped you, don't hesitate to look me up, I will try and answer any other questions you have.
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Bobamelius
Grand Admiral
Galactic Navy
Joined: October 08, 2002
Posts: 2074
From: Ohio
| Posted: 2003-10-23 16:59
Quote:
| Couple of newby queations (and observations):
1. What was that about 20 elites on a station? Is that to stop boarding actions or can they be made to repair you, or what? |
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Stations can carry enough infantry to capture a fully defended planet. All by themselves. Without inf they are just giant targets of minimal usefullness.
Quote:
| 2. Speaking of boarding actions - why don't people seem to do it? I've been picking up my small (3-4) troop compliments if there are a lot of inf about, and throwing them on board an enemy seems to, at least, distract them for a minute. Does it do bugger-all damage? Why don't people do it more? Or are people just not wanting to waste their troops on my usually pretty crappy ships? |
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You can't capture ships. It's been disabled. And boarding does nothing at all in the MV, but it does system damage in scenario servers (the reasons for the disabling is that boarding is horrifyingly unbalanced and will have to be addressed in a later update)
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| 3. What's a P jump? |
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Precision Jump. It's when someone jumps right on top of you and blares away with all their guns, generally vaporizing you very rapidly, and in a single barrage if you're just a supply ship.
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| 4. I've asked this in another thread, so apologies if it gets answered twice, but is it true that docking a supply to someone makes you repair them faster? If not, what's docking for? (Obviously you'd only do it if there're no baddies about). |
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Docking does pretty much nothing. I don't know why it's here, probably will be better utilized in the future.
Quote:
| 5. Combat supply actually seems pretty easy to me. As soon as you start taking damage you know it's time to bug out, and you can shift-J (E jump?) out then go back to fringe-supply. If some goose of a combat pilot jumps out after you, especially in a big battle, then hey - you just removed the mug for at least a jump-drive recharge time, so it's all good. Yes? Not to mention possible suicide damage. |
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I usually try and stick with my buddy for as long as possible, resupping anyone within my reach and plug away at nearby enemies. If you do have to jump out I repair myself and immeadiately go back into the fray to help my allies, assuming they're still alive. Don't jump into a giant swarm of enemy ships to help one guy who's almost dead. Know when and when not to take risks.
Quote:
| 6. Strap a AM mine to a K'Luth supply, and make stupidly big mine-fields. Why don't people ever seem to do that? In fact, minefields in general don't seem to get used much. Why not? |
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You must not have played much in the MV 
Quote:
| 7. People in DS seem unusually unfriendly to newby mistakes. We're talking derision and cap-yelling when people do things wrong. For a very complex game with such minimal documentation and buggy tutorials, this seems a bit harsh. Is this an ongoing issue or just a rough period? |
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Depends on the people, what you're driving and where you're playing.
In scenario servers it's pretty much a free-for-all anyway, rarely is there any organized effort so you can pretty much do your own thing, people generally won't chew noobs out too bad here, but in the MV, you're expected to know what you're doing, especially if you're playing a pivotal role like a supply ship.
Hope that helps.
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[ This Message was edited by: Bobamelius on 2003-10-23 17:04 ]
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SmellyTerror
Cadet
Joined: September 24, 2003
Posts: 52
From: Canberra
| Posted: 2003-10-23 17:32
Damn! Good and fast answers - thanks.
Yeah, there have been a lot of damn good folk who helped me out, just an unusual number of psychos as well.
I kinda gathered the MV was for experienced players - so far I've just been sight-seeing and fighting the occasional one-man-reguard-action to delay planet captures. I'm almost ready to actually jump in and join a fleet, I think. Almost.
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Hitman23
Grand Admiral
Joined: March 22, 2002
Posts: 585
From: WoW
| Posted: 2003-10-23 17:39
I don't think that you are expected to know what you are doing in the MV, I see people screw up all the time. I would much rather have a bunch of new players in the MV than not have anyone.
I learned how to play in the MV and pres farmed in the FA server til my rank was high enough to get a Command Dread, then I became an MV only player. I can be found in the FA server from time to time but I hate it.
The MV is all about teamwork, if you can help your teammates then you are needed in the MV!!!
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