Flight Vehcles:
Moskito (Mossie): This is your best friend if you like to go solo, its small, doesnt show up on enemy radar unless spotted or interlink, automated turrets wont shoot at it (However miniturrets (spitfires) will!). These are great for picking off infantry and large aircraft, and harrassing ground vehcles, however, you only have an automatic 12mm gun, so you will take a long time on larger/heavy armoured vehcles. They have virtually 0 wingspan, so feel free to fly between trees, but watch out as vets will know most of the forrests better then you do!
Wasp: This is a varient of the Mossie that has less armour but exchanges it for a larger afterburner and lock on air to air missiles. It can fire 2 at a time, and to keep them locked on you must keep the crosshair on the target at all times!
Reaver: This is the gunship of the airfleet, it can fire either twin 20mm guns (alternateing on each side of vehcle) or anti-tank rockets (also firing alternatley). Ignore infantry for the most part as they can be troublesome to get, and rockets are usually more effective due to splash as its hard to hit with the 20mm. Aim for tanks, and if possible, find some AMSes! You can try using the rockets mid-air on larger craft, but they go in a striaght line and only travel so far before dieing. These have a wide wingspan so be careful when flying low!
Liberator (Lib): This is the bombcraft, the gunner is given a 25mm cannon on the front that can rip most stuff to pieces, however the bullets travel slowly, so make sure you lead your target accordingly! You have no afterburner, but you get a big bonus instead. A bomber seat! Get you mate into this seat and he can drop either anti-tank or anti-personel bombs, these can kill infantry more or less instantly, and will maim most vehcles. You also get a slot for a rear gunner with a 20mm cannon to keep off the above craft that will no doubt think you easy prey!
Tactics for a Lib are either low level or high level bombing. Low level, use terrain to get as close as possible before breaking cover, then go full speed hoping your bomber can catch many infantry unaware, and vehcles all parked up ready to die. The bomber can lead his bombs a good distance, so that they can all land on the same spot if he slowly moves the target back during flight. The high level bomb is flying at ceiling height (I think this is 400 meters) and dropping bombs without having to worry about most AA as its out of range, use radar and zoom to pick targets (especially watch out for AMSes on the radar, these are usually under one of the 4 bridges in a base, or behind the vehcle pad.)
Vulture: This is a Liberator varient that allows you an afterburner, and special antitank bombs that have a small radius rather then being single hit only. You get no anti-infantry bombs however! The main aim of this plane is to do dive bombing on faster targets, using your afterburner to get away after doing a steep dive, that the bomber can unleash all 10 bombs into your chosen prey!
Phantasm: I'm afraid this arrived after I stopped playing, but basicly, its a 5 man transport with a single pilot. The bonus it gets is that it can go totally invisable. If the pilot is in a stealth suit, he can activate it and the rest of the ship will cloak too, giving you a surprise drop of 5/6 men!
Loadstar (Loady): This is a repair/support ship, single pilot although you can carry a single vehcle in the back of it, allowing you to move tanks over rivers, or drop an AMS deep into enemy territory! When landed any vehcle (including air) that approaches the sides of the ship will repair, and have access to refill the weapons ammunition. However beware, as these tend to become targets for Orbital Strikes (OSes) and bombing runs from the other team, as often crippled or immobile vehcles will be parked up as easy kills. (Lib pilots on our side should look out for them!)
Galaxy (Gal): The workhorse of all sides, the Galaxy is a transport plane that has 1 pilot, 2 wing gunners, 1 tail gunner, 6 passenger slots, 2 MAX passenger slots, and one small vehcle bay (ANTs, Buggies, quadbikes, etc). THese are often used to drop a full squad of men onto the roof of a tower to attack from both the top and bottom, or to drop into a base to try and disrupt those inside enough to allow a break in elsewhere. Its also the quickest way for a group of people to get around.
Tactics:Low gal drops means the enemy has no time to prepare a mine field or get to where you are landing, however the gal will take a huge pounding as more or less everything in the base will try and shoot you. High gal drops will give the gal no trouble, but the men may land only to be OSed, or shot to hell by one of the giant robots roaming about!! Lower is better, but its pointless to get shot down before you get near the base! When dropping from a gal its good to have someone that is COmmand Rank 3 or above, as they have an EMP which will disable all turrets and blow all mines around you, just before you land. However all soldiers can do this with Jammer grenades. Make sure you all know who is opening the door when you land also, no point 5 of you trying to open at once, but likewise, for everyone to arrive without being able to open the door is suicide!
Anti Air: What to do if you get locked on! Well, it helps to know where from, and what from as always! But it if you don't know then ask the first question of if its NC or VS.
In the case of NC, its a lock on missile that will follow you till it hits you or something else, or hits max range. With this in mind, flying behind something isnt enough, you need to put something physical inbetween you and the missiles (They'll be on the radar) and travel as much distance as possible, even if its orbating a mountain! They'll eventually get bored and blow up, and then you can go get repairs or fly back.
In the case of the VS, they have the oh-so-wonderful StarFire MAX, it will be hell to you! As long as they have their crosshair on you, the missiles will follow you, so you need to get out of sight, and very, very fast. Just getting behind a tree isnt that great, as some are a bit dodgey and can still be locked through, however get behind a hill or a tower and you're good! They'll just fly off harmlessly.
Skyguards, these pesky little guys are an AA buggy, fast and agile, they'll dodge a reaver or lib with ease, so you need to sneak up on them, or get ground troops to take care of them, they have flakletts so best way to dodge them is to suddenly turn in other directions, as they will have to be leading you quite a bit depending on how high up you are.
My final point is about us winning this contest... its abuot getting kills, and deaths, not included, if you have lost an air duel, or are going to die to AA, it may seem dishonourable, but bail out!! Then you have a bit more of a chance to survive, try get back to your mates as quickly as possible, if it isnt possible, then commit suicide, it will jsut be another death, its no biggy. It denies the other team kills and XP, and will piss them off to the point they might stop playing for a while! While this is generally bad manners, in this competition everyhting gives you an edge!
Air vehcles in a nutshell, my next post when I get around to it will be about the NC, their prefered tactics, weapons and vehcles, and how to kill the corner humping barstewards!
