Cadet II/Dogfighting

General dog fighting

Well if you've come this far in Allegiance, you should understand the fundamentals of flying and more importantly, the basics of combative flying. I'm going to help you expand on that understanding and hopefully bring you to a more competent and competitive standing in the game.

Evasion

This isn't a turn-based game, combat is real time, so you're going to have to learn how to combine perfect offense and perfect defense. This is the most important aspect of dogfighting. You can have the sharpest, most precise aim possible for a human being but still have the majority of your engagements end in losses if you have poor evasion. Learning how to efficiently evade fire is how you defeat people with greater kill bonuses and perhaps even superior technology.

First thing first, it's important that you have your thrusters mapped to a convenient location. Here's an example of mine:

Keyboard		Joystick
W	Thrust up	HAT	Look around
S	Thrust down	X-Axis	Roll
A	Thrust left	Y-Axis	Pitch
D	Thrust right	Z-Axis	Yaw
Q	Roll left
E	Roll right
Z	Thrust forward
C	Thrust backward

Secondly, keep your forward/backward mapped to something easily reached. While holding on one of the side strafe keys 100% of your engine power is put into that direction (which is often far less efficient than your main thrusters). If you hold on forward at the same time only 50% ^Verify is put into the side thruster which allows you to keep your forward speed high and prevent you turning into a sitting duck.

It is also useful for counterbalancing the shaking effects of boosting, flying in formation, slowing down at alephs, and many other situations.

Watch and evade

This part is fairly simple, all you do is pay attention to incoming fire. Most players make the fatal mistake of only strafing one direction while they hold on to their own trigger. Might as well be flying straight at your target IMO, since mediocre pilots will have no problem re-adjusting to train their aim on you. If you're hit, change directions, if you see particles getting closer to you, change directions. Keep them guessing and make them have to constantly re-adjust. Watch the particles coming towards you to guage which new direction you should be taking.

Playing at max range

Gat has a range of 600, gat 3 660, and all miniguns have a range of 400m. The only exceptions are TF and Rix. Learn the ranges well. Use your backthrust while strafing to back away from combat, and play defensively. It's much harder to hit someone at max range then it is at 150m. If you can out range someone, chances are they'll boost in to try and resume the engagement, this is your chance to "joust" with your opponent. You can use their forward momentum to boost over/under/around them while you score a few minor hits while passing. At this point you have two options, continue to play them at max range (This is how a fighter stands a chance vs an interceptor, you must joust or you will die once you're in mini gun range) or simply keep boosting forward to gain a headstart and break the engagement. Learning how to manipulate the ranges of the craft you're facing and knowing the limitations of the one you're in is an invaluable aspect of combat awareness.

Control your range

Everyone has a particlar range where they are most comfortable in. Learn your range. It's the point where no matter what, you are going to hit their ship and not miss, a point where you are most capable of precise aim. Now take what I told you about Forward and Backthrusting. Remember when you're strafing, you're not moving forward or backward. Chances are your opponent isn't either. Use Forward thrust to shorten the gap into a range you are most comfortable in, or backthrust to extend it. Learning how to keep the range *you* want in a fight is like maintaining the high ground in a sword fight. If you are facing a lesser or equal skill opponent, they will be forced to give up ground to try and get you to surrender your advantage. Be warned though. Don't recklessly go for the high ground in an engagement, you will probably lose. Manipulate your thrusters carefully and cleverly.

The reticule is a merely a guide

The reticule is somewhat accurate. Watching how your particles travel in this fictional space is much more accurate. I would suggest just using the reticule as a guage to where you should start aiming, then adjusting your aim as you need to to start landing shots. Becareful though, you don't want to be firing for no reason, so once you have a general idea of the target's position, let loose a few tracers to see if you're on the mark. If you are, let loose, if not, adjust. My suggestion is get rid of the stock allegiance reticule. Get a small dot, small cross, or if you want to play like me, nothing at all. It's imperative to have good hand eye co-ordination for this, if you're lacking in that, stick to missiles. Actually if you have a poor hand-eye relationship, you're going to find dogfighting very hard. You want to have an eye for the white puffs of smoke that appear once you land a shot on your target. Once you attain that, aim accordingly to keep that up.

Rotate your craft

Sometimes people will come in at a funny angle. Sometimes they will be oriented towards you in a way you don't like at all. Sometimes your guns will not line up with the hitbox of their craft. There are many reasons to need to roll your craft, the most important one is not forgetting to do so. If you are positioned in such a way that 2 out of 3 streams of fire is hitting the enemy craft, then you are only fulfilling 66% of your damage capability and wasting 33% of it along with the ammo to sustain fire for that wasted gun. Correct it ASAP. With the exception of 3, (GT, Belts and Dregh) All Interceptors are wide and flat. You don't need to be perpendicular to them. Parallel is best since you line up all of your guns with them. Fighters are a different story, considering some of them are boxier. Consider your opponents orientation and your gun mounts, and decide if all may hit or if 1 or 2 may miss.