Newbies at high noon

[Trixantreat]

I thought I’d write this while still a noob. It strikes me that after a while we might forget what it’s like to climb the steep Allegiance learning curve. Certainly I was at a total loss in my first few games, so maybe this will help you. Check for the vets comments in this thread. I may be totally wrong.

Firstly, don’t stress too much about all the “what not to do”, and “how not to get laughed at” stuff you read in the Cadet 1 info pack. Take it to heart, yes, but don’t let that stop you joining games. It put me off going anywhere near a game for a week. But I was wrong.
Secondly: Do the training. Don’t stress if you can’t kill anything – I couldn’t. Yet in-game, I found that there’s lots of other newbies to kill – they were just as bad as me.

In your first few games, as a noob, you can be useful, and gather some points to advance you up the learning curve.

So select a game and a team, and wait to be picked. It usually happens. The frightening thing is... then what?

You find yourself in a base, wondering when someone is going to tell you what to do. The average commander doesn’t have time, and rightly so.
So choose a Scout. As the blurb says, scouts are needed: They can ...um, scout, probe, nan and pickup pods, so you’re useful already.

Equip yourself with a nanite gun obviously. I ditch the ammo and replace these slots in equal parts with probes and missiles. I can’t hit a thing with my guns yet, so if I have the chance to down anything, I use a missile. But probes are the most important thing for your first and second loads.

Then launch.

The Cadet 1 info makes much of the minimap. As a noob, I didn’t realise just how powerful a tool this is. Learn your minimap icons – they tell you what’s been seen in which sector.

The second thing I didn’t realise, in learning to fly, fight, and generally poddle about space, is that the minimap is the key to your early game. Sectors are like playing fields – you switch between them like a prostitute changes underwear (we hope).

Once in space, switch immediately to F3 mode – the radar view. Check where all the scouts are rushing to, and rush to another aleph yourself. (Left-click on the aleph on the minimap or right click on the aleph symbol on the F3 map). You’ll go into autopilot and head off faster than you could manually fly there. As I said, choose an aleph that isn’t being targeted by other scouts.

Once on the other side of the aleph, still in F3 mode, right click somewhere in empty space, where nothing seems to be happening. That’s usually where other alephs can be found. Once underway, drop a probe (Press D). When you get through that aleph do it all again. Your first job as a newbie is to find alephs and in the process find sorts of other stuff for the commander.

Within five or so minutes, your minimap will show red rings – there’s trouble in these sectors. Hover your mouse over the sector looking for ejector pod symbols (your team’s not the others).

You can now make yourself useful getting to those sectors, targeting the friendly pod (right click it in F3), and performing pickups.
If that’s all you do for the first few (10 or so games) you’ll be popular with your commanders and start racking up points.

Later in the game, there doesn’t seem to be much to do as a scout. That’s where nanning and pod pickups come into play. You can also nuke a few enemy miners with your missiles to get some kills in. Don’t try to go head to head with fighters and such, they have been playing longer than you. Occasionally you might be able to add a few missiles to the attack of one of your fighters or interceptors, but don’t bother going one-to-one.

Finally – remember the “R” key – that ripcords you to somewhere safe if you come under attack. Also the “B” followed by the “P” keys target your nearest base, and autopilots you there.

When in a base, check to see if any new scout types are available, and use them. People have died so that they can be used by you.
Personally, I stay off the chat. I don’t think I have anything to say that real players haven’t heard. Also I respond to any command (esp. pickup) if it’s directed at my call-sign.

That’s all for now.

Now over the next few weeks, I’m gonna try work out where everyone else is during the game. How I can help bombers. And oh, yes, how the game is won. After a few months I imagine I’ll have a look at commanding.

[ogorass]

FYI: Helpline forum is strictly limited to asking and solving technical issues with the game. This thread has nothing to do with any technicalities.
The above are the reasons, why this was moved to Gameplay.

[RHINO_Mk_II]

QUOTE (Trixantreat @ Feb 6 2009, 09:29 PM) Once on the other side of the aleph, still in F3 mode, right click somewhere in empty space, where nothing seems to be happening. That’s usually where other alephs can be found.

Also good to know is that the alephs tend to be arranged more or less in a radially symmetrical pattern (regular polygon) around some point near the center of the sector grid. In my experience this is true at least 98% of the time.

EDIT: Left a word out, and forgot to wish Trixantreat good luck in Allegiance.

[sambasti]

Another importnat thing to note is that clicking on the minimap lets you autopilot to that sector, so instead of hitting the R key, I usually just click on the minimap to get the the exact sector I want to go to. (Unless it's really urgent and I just want to get away)

[FreeBeer]

Nice summary, Trix. Welcome to the game!

[One-Man-Bucket]

Wall of text! stop sucking!

cheers its friday!

[Archangelus]

If 50% of the newbies read this and follow those simple tasks, I believe gameplay would really go a bit better.(despite those random uneyed bbr run and htt´s being eyed)

Nicely done Trix.

Just a small tip: When picking up pods, go with no shields and missiles (this way you have less signature, wich means less chance of being found). and dont click on the pods. Stop the ship somewhere you have less chance to get eyed(generally above/below grid), and get the pods(u can order them to you, or use a VC).

[Psychosis]

Trix, please sign up for the cadet program and go through it, we cover alot of this stuff, and I would be interested to see your digestion of the material which we have.

also, the cadet-II program materiel is not available to everyone and covers many of the advanced topics that you need to move on from the basics

Welcome to allegiance, I see you've already made a good start

[zecro]

Probing: try not to drop them in straight lines between alephs because they will be found and destroyed. Drop them off-plane (hold right click and drag up/down on f3 mode) or a little to the sides. Anyone can drop probes, but dropping probes well takes some skill (also you will understand it more when you learn to de-probe).

Enemy miners: fighters and (especially) interceptors are blind and can't see the enemy miner(s). One scout is all it takes. Destroying drones (miners/constructors) is a very important action, but you can't destroy what you can't see. So, probe enemy sectors and look for their miners/cons. Hopefully your team will have enough clued-in pilots to `am (attack miners) or `ac (attack constructor). If you spot either of those, use the respective voicechat to give an audio clue to people. Unless your team is gearing up for a major push or is defending heavily, it is always appropriate.

edit: also, Trix, welcome to Allegiance. I see you will probably fit in well.

[badpazzword]

A couple more precious points to learn by now:

Any (friendly) ship can pickup pods. This is very important, especially when you need to get rescued yourself. Scouts, however, are usually the fast and quiet way of rescuing them.Don't use just any missile; use dumbfires. A lot more damage for slightly less aiming aid, and you don't have to wait for them to lock. Aim your dumbs a bit behind your target.If you have the time, drop the probe behind the aleph (1000 meters at most). This makes the probe harder to spot.Don't be afraid of the chat. If you have questions, ask away! You will not get essays in return, but there is a lot of precious information to be learned this way. PM good, friendly pilots or anybody with a '?' in their nick, if they aren't busy they will be glad to help you out.Always get on Command wing. You can read the orders the comm gives to drones. For example, if a comm gives a build order, it probably is a constructor that needs some defense.Don't be afraid of learning how to aim. When I was a newbie I didn't learn, and three years into the game I still can't get myself to learn how to properly lead those targets.

As a fun bonus: begin playing with the prox. It works like this: get the enemy to fly through it after it has activated (5 secs) and the baddy will take damage. The faster he goes, the harder it goes down. The more people you kill with your prox, the deadlier your proxes become (until you are killed yourself).