Hello all! I'm new here to the message board although I have been reading the posts for quite some time.
The discussion I want to start is something everyone talks about anyway in other posts. Tactics. The tactics in Wing Commander games seem to change from game to game. In WC1, the enemy fighters seemed to want to do nothing but joust with you head on, while cap ships just seemed to spin and die quickly, causing no real threat. WC2 seemed to make the fighter's AI a little more advanced, but the introduuction of the live action 3D games saw the AI grow into a really bad-@#*$ opponent. Everything from the fighters learning to attack in numbers (even the little Darkets were problems if they threw enough of them at you), to the capships learning to defend themselves (damn that cannon on the back of the corvettes!)
To deal with this growing intelligence of your opponent (whether it be the cats, Border Worlds, or the Nephilim) I'm sure alot of you developed some great tactics for dealing with every challenge that arose, from taking out a Cap ship to keeping your wingman alive (a real problem in some of the games). I'd like to share some of mine and hear some of yours.
(I'm going to concentrate on the games after WC2 since I thought WC1 and WC2 were pretty straight forward. Even heavy Jalthi Fighters could easily be taken out with lasers and cap ships in WC2 where no prob as long as you held onto a torp or two)
Fighters-I enjoyed a tactic for fighters that worked even on the highest levels of play. The kilrathi loved afterburners, they never seemed to run out! As soon as a ship targeted me, I could run at him (not bothering to fire because I wanted to save the gun energy) waiting for him to fire his salvo, dip down about 15 to 20 degrees, (this way I could still see his approach and dodge the fire) wait till he was almost on top of me, and turn till I was directly behind him, immediately punching the after burners staying less than 1000 kloicks behind him. (I would assume this would be pretty hard without a joystick! ) This allowed me to do one of two things. If it was a light or medium fighter I could chew him up from behind with guns or if he was a heavy fighter I could fire away till his aft shields were gone and dump even the easily evaded heat seeker up his pipe at close range. Just typing this makes me want to boot up WC3 and light up some Voktaths! This tactic worked even on the Nephilim, though you had to strip some of their extremely thick armor away before letting the missle go.
Wingmen- If I could I'd love to fly without a wingman, though instead of 3 fighters ganging up on me I would have 5 or 6! My favorite strategy on this was to send my wingman off on his own quest, down 2 of the baddies that were after me, then break off to help him/her even if I had one on my tail (I usually make sure I leave the light fighter so I can take a few shots to my shields before I get into trouble.) Fighters were usually so busy with my wingman, they wouldn't pay attention to me until I put down at least 2 of them. I would then turn my attention back to the fighters on my tail, helping out my partner any time I could.
By the way, my favorite wingmen are Flash and Vagabond. Vagabond was a very competent pilot, alot like Stilletto, fighting both fighters and cap ships. Flash, for all his arrogance, was one hell of a pilot ( I always had to accept his challenge to get him on my roster). He was murder against fighters but was fodder for cap ships.
Cap Ships- Cap ships are both hard and easy depending on your tactics. Prophecy caps never gave me any trouble (though they seemed to play hell with my wingmen). Kilrathi cap ships had some tough armament, but after that was neutralized (one way or the other), they were cake. Almost all the Cats Cap ships had blind spots at their rears. If you could sneak in there, you could pound away at them until they finally targeted you. The "yellow bolt" guns (have no clue what they are)on the heavier caps were murder, even if they did fire slow, and that cannon on the rear of the Corvette just had to go.
Anyway, I'd love to hear some of your tactics on any of the games. I'm off, I've talked so much about ways to kill ships I've go to go do it now.
The discussion I want to start is something everyone talks about anyway in other posts. Tactics. The tactics in Wing Commander games seem to change from game to game. In WC1, the enemy fighters seemed to want to do nothing but joust with you head on, while cap ships just seemed to spin and die quickly, causing no real threat. WC2 seemed to make the fighter's AI a little more advanced, but the introduuction of the live action 3D games saw the AI grow into a really bad-@#*$ opponent. Everything from the fighters learning to attack in numbers (even the little Darkets were problems if they threw enough of them at you), to the capships learning to defend themselves (damn that cannon on the back of the corvettes!)
To deal with this growing intelligence of your opponent (whether it be the cats, Border Worlds, or the Nephilim) I'm sure alot of you developed some great tactics for dealing with every challenge that arose, from taking out a Cap ship to keeping your wingman alive (a real problem in some of the games). I'd like to share some of mine and hear some of yours.
(I'm going to concentrate on the games after WC2 since I thought WC1 and WC2 were pretty straight forward. Even heavy Jalthi Fighters could easily be taken out with lasers and cap ships in WC2 where no prob as long as you held onto a torp or two)
Fighters-I enjoyed a tactic for fighters that worked even on the highest levels of play. The kilrathi loved afterburners, they never seemed to run out! As soon as a ship targeted me, I could run at him (not bothering to fire because I wanted to save the gun energy) waiting for him to fire his salvo, dip down about 15 to 20 degrees, (this way I could still see his approach and dodge the fire) wait till he was almost on top of me, and turn till I was directly behind him, immediately punching the after burners staying less than 1000 kloicks behind him. (I would assume this would be pretty hard without a joystick! ) This allowed me to do one of two things. If it was a light or medium fighter I could chew him up from behind with guns or if he was a heavy fighter I could fire away till his aft shields were gone and dump even the easily evaded heat seeker up his pipe at close range. Just typing this makes me want to boot up WC3 and light up some Voktaths! This tactic worked even on the Nephilim, though you had to strip some of their extremely thick armor away before letting the missle go.
Wingmen- If I could I'd love to fly without a wingman, though instead of 3 fighters ganging up on me I would have 5 or 6! My favorite strategy on this was to send my wingman off on his own quest, down 2 of the baddies that were after me, then break off to help him/her even if I had one on my tail (I usually make sure I leave the light fighter so I can take a few shots to my shields before I get into trouble.) Fighters were usually so busy with my wingman, they wouldn't pay attention to me until I put down at least 2 of them. I would then turn my attention back to the fighters on my tail, helping out my partner any time I could.
By the way, my favorite wingmen are Flash and Vagabond. Vagabond was a very competent pilot, alot like Stilletto, fighting both fighters and cap ships. Flash, for all his arrogance, was one hell of a pilot ( I always had to accept his challenge to get him on my roster). He was murder against fighters but was fodder for cap ships.
Cap Ships- Cap ships are both hard and easy depending on your tactics. Prophecy caps never gave me any trouble (though they seemed to play hell with my wingmen). Kilrathi cap ships had some tough armament, but after that was neutralized (one way or the other), they were cake. Almost all the Cats Cap ships had blind spots at their rears. If you could sneak in there, you could pound away at them until they finally targeted you. The "yellow bolt" guns (have no clue what they are)on the heavier caps were murder, even if they did fire slow, and that cannon on the rear of the Corvette just had to go.
Anyway, I'd love to hear some of your tactics on any of the games. I'm off, I've talked so much about ways to kill ships I've go to go do it now.