I noticed that I'm usually one of the only people on VIPER these days that has any clue whatsoever regarding how to win at empiresmod. Even though most players that are active these days rarely visit the forums (let alone read my inspirational posts) I still think some people will appreciate it. So without further adeiu, FN TELLS YOU HOW TO WIN AT EMP 2.4 [TL;DR] Snare and destroy the enemy CV. Teamwork is Magic™ kill yourself [THE BIGGER PICTURE] Move out and establish a front line Build a turret farm next to the main base Acquire a sufficient amount of skirmishers to rush their CV End the game. Never let a game go on longer than it must. [BUILD ORDER] Build refineries and get your forward barracks down and then build a VEHICLE FACTORY. Get an APC on the field, then... If it's a choke map, steady advance with infantry in front of the vehicle/spawning out of it. If it's an open map, drive the apc around and spawn people all over the place/as close as possible to enemy locations without jeopardizing the apc If you're playing money, take the apc into their base and have your commander provide walls/barracks next to it Restrict vehicle creation and accumulate resources. Focus on maintaining map control and advancing your front lines. If you're the commander, assign targets like a madman. Take advantage of the fact that you can assign targets out of your team's line of sight. These are usually the enemies that will least expect someone to find them. For example, if there's an enemy engineer just chilling behind some rock formation totally out of your team's line of sight, assign him as a target. Once you have 600 resources, build a RADAR. Now un-restrict vehicle creation. Because research is free and only costs time, you want to be constantly researching. Never let more than 4 seconds pass in between one item and the next. [THE POINT OF RESEARCH] In empiresmod, you do not research weapons or armor in order to merely have better weapons or armor. You research weapons and armor in order to create a skirmisher. A skirmisher is a tank that can (when used in groups) kill other tanks better than any other tank. There are plenty feasible skirmisher loadouts. You may use a little bit of discretion when choosing which ones to use, but whether the map is wide open (like emp_duststorm) or narrow (like emp_slaughtered) should determine for you which ones to get. While it's mostly up to you whether to get mediums or not, it's much nicer to have the luxury of medium tanks on wide open maps than on narrow ones where they have less room to dodge fire. [RESEARCH PATHS] For BE Straight to Heavies. OPEN MAP SKIRMISHER: fission => reflective => ranged cannon/railgun => heavy tank (separate cannon bindings) NARROW MAP SKIRMISHER: bio diesel => regen/absorbant => HE cannon/plasma cannon => heavy tank (single cannon binding) Mediums and then Heavies OPEN MAP SKIRMISHER: fission => reflective => bio mg => ranged cannon => medium tank => heavy tank (separate cannon bindings) NARROW MAP SKIRMISHER: bio diesel => regen/absorbant => bio mg => HE cannon => medium tank => plasma cannon/heavy tank (single cannon binding)For NF Straight to Heavies. SKIRMISHER: 3 phase engine => reactive => UML => heavy tank (2 UML & 1 ML, single binding) Mediums and then Heavies SKIRMISHER: 3 phase engine => reactive/regen => bio mg => UML => medium tank => heavy tank (2 UML & 1 Bio MG, separate binding) Key: '/' means you can choose one or the other at your discretion. It does NOT mean that you should research both. '=>' denotes the order of research, from left to right 'single binding' means you bind all of the weapons to primary on the same number. 'separate binding' means you bind the cannons to group X and have one be primary and the other be secondary. With multiple weapon systems (ie. NF skirmisher), bind missiles to secondary and bio mg to primary. [BUILD YOUR TURRET FARM] After you have built your radar, focus on these two things at the same time acquiring more refineries building the defensive turret farm If you're on the field, focus on acquiring/rebuilding refs. If you're the commander, let's get started on that turret farm. Before you start though, you ought to acknowledge the purpose of the turret farm is not to defend the base, but to defend YOUR CV. If your CV is ever under attack, drive it around the turret farm until whatever is assailing you dies. If the farm doesn't seem like it'll defend you, call for help as urgently as possible. On the side that your enemy will most easily/likely attack you from, place 8-12 ML turrets and 2-3 MG turrets. Space each of them out so that the enemy cannot kill more than one with seismic grenade splash damage yet place them close to each other so that they can all fire on the same target at roughly the same time if one should pass into their range. [END THE GAME] Once you have enough skirmishers on the field, you can end the game. Locate the enemy commander, and coordinate a rush on him. Usually, it will take 5+ skirmishers to kill a CV. How to lead it is up to you, but here is some advice on CV killing. Order your squad/team to fire on whatever side you think is the weakest/easiest for most of the team to hit Snare the enemy CV. It is incredibly easier to damage an immoble target than a mobile target. Use stuns/walls/turrets&cams Once snaring the enemy CV, kill the driver as they exit and attempt to unensnare themself. NF comms get out on their left side. BE comms get out on their right side. [ADDENDUM I: COMMUNICATING OBJECTIVES] This is EXTREMELY important in empiresmod. If nobody on the team is using their microphone to relay the current objective to the team/how to go about accomplishing it, THEN YOU NEED TO STEP UP. If it doesn't seem like the team understands what they need to be doing (and even if it does seem like they know what they're doing) REMIND your team over mic what the current objective is. If the objective changes, inform your teammates. Constantly communicate and inform your team of where the enemy is weak, where the enemy is pushing, and what to do about it. If someone else on the team is leading part of the team, lead another part. Make sure communication is constant. Even if it seems like it might be getting to the point of being annoying, it keeps players engaged and informed. This is key.
Reminder that FN is a notorious troll and this is the only good guide to playing Empires. Actually, that's a really good point and I'm going to draw more attention to it.
So get regen when opposing FN. Got it. Do like Plasma though, rarely ballsy enough to research it though.
Don't forget that you can be forced into exiting the wrong side if the default exit side is walled/blocked/too close to an obstruction. I pretty much agree with FN's tank builds, but I'm not so sure about biomg on nf heavies. Unless the damage values have been altered, I always thought that biomg did relatively negligible damage, and I've found UML HE nf heavies to be the most efficient build, although it overheats constantly. Furthermore, if you're building a physics tank, you might as well get DUMG anyways. And though I personally abhor coolant, coolant engines on tight maps for nf tanks might actually be possible to pull off because uml can't be exploited with biodiesel anyways, although biodiesel would still obviously be the premier choice on BE tanks. Reactive armor is getting a huge buff in 2.41 though, if Trickster does what he says, so I'm curious to see how a straight heavy NF research rush would fare, using reactive lights to hold early and mid game. In this case, researching biomg might be feasible after getting uml heavies first, as the time saved on researching meds would just be diverted to getting biomg. Also, yeah, assign targets etc.
mid game? depending on the map a super light can be efficient to the end ... careful trickster, remember how 2.12 was either win with super lights or lose bc you were broke. income is higher now though ...
How to win emp of any version: team stack. Yesterday was practically unplayable with most vets joining nf and by the time a couple decent players joined be, it was too late. There is no future in this game because of dipshit stackers. Lol at paradick for saying "ok lets not stack this round" and proceeds to join nf anyways. GG empires.
team stacking occurs when more people on the team already know the stuff i just posted than on the other team. stacking isn't when one team is better than the other, it's when one team doesn't understand how to play/what they should be doing and when. Sometimes the commander may not exit the CV at all. I have yet to test what exactly causes this in open maps, bio mg is more easily used by new players to cause more damage. it only needs to hit once to do a larger amount of damage. HE may be nice on an NF heavy, but it is not necessary to acquire to create a sufficiently powerful skirmisher. my paths are the shortest ones to obtaining CV killers. DUMG presents a conflict of interest to tank drivers and does not do additional damage over time. While a player may damage other tanks with the bio mg and their cannons/missiles simultaneously, the DUMG user must alternate between the two and is not allowed the luxury of damage over time. DUMG will also take up valuable engine heat at the cost of the primary weapon. Coolant CAN work for NF on narrow maps, however, it is much nicer to be able to retreat quickly in the case of a ninja, or if suddenly ambused by multiple BE heavies. also speed is important in general. the point of getting the BIO MG before mediums, and before 2slot mls/cns is to allow the team to acquire BIOMG APCs which can damage vehicles while driving around the map spawning people all over. correct.
Heavy explosives work better than extended range cannon because of more damage and has splash damage. I would only get extended if I had bio missile to compensate a lack of splash damage. Or getting arty I usually do get extended range cannon for NF because their missile slots are used as a primary weapon and extended can snipe fleeing enemies.
... Ranged cannon: Costs 20% less than HE Does 20% less damage per shot than HE Projectile speed is 10% faster than HE Is 413% less affected by gravity compared to HE Generates 33% less heat than HE Fires 33% faster than HE Does 6% more DPS than HE Has 66% more ammo than HE Has 38% of the explosion radius of HE In short, I don't understand why people are so enamored by HE. I've never had a time where I've thought to myself (O.K., maybe once or twice on vehicle training in the past three years) "Wow! If only ranged had the same splash as HE cannon, I could've hit the wall behind that tank and killed him!". The only redeeming value of HE cannon is that it can be exploited on BE heavies with biodiesel. As an anti-tank weapon in any other situation, it is undoubtedly inferior to ranged cannon. And if you're using your heavy tank to mow down infantry in lieu of tanks, then you've either pretty much already won the game (because the enemy wouldn't be fielding tanks), or you could just memorize which side of the tank you jump out of, pull up to the infantry, and kill him. Or run him over. Edit: Also, I know that the scripts say that vehicle weapon spread is "only applicable to machine guns at the moment", but for some reason, ranged cannon just feels so much more accurate than HE.
I'll grant you that, but only because the average pubber can't aim for shit, and thinks that cannons should rape infantry for some stupid reason.
Well guys, I'm glad we all agree that HE and ranged cannons are good cannons. Railguns are great too, aren't they?
I refuse to admit that HE is a "good" cannon, except in one circumstance on one team in one type of map with one particular engine. Rails would be good if tanks could carry more than 25 (not sure about that) at a time.
