Effective Counters to Gunship Overwatch

[RabidFox]

Full disclosure, I find the masses of gunships to be unfun to play against--or with for that matter. As a pretty dedicated scout (blackbolt) pilot, fighting the masses of ion/rails makes me feel less light a pilot, and more like a British Army messenger running from trench to trench, dodging the interlocking killzones of german MG nests.

 

That stated, I'm not calling for gunships to be nerfed. Gunship pilots shouldn't have to alter their play style. I have to alter mine.

 

What I'm looking for are some basic things I can do to counter the effectiveness of multiple opposing gunships. Hopefully these will be steps I can implement by myself since I usually am unsuccessful in rallying the Jung Ma PUGs I typically fly with into any coordinated action beyond "hold A, B, or C". I've tried general harassment of as many GSes as I can get my crosshairs on. I've tied stalking and hunting down the top GSes in the match. I find that I often can't do enough damage before they boost away. If/when I give chase, I usually end up as target practice for the other GSes.

 

Ship-wise, my blackbolt is built for sustained speed and endurance for chasing and closing. If I need to be flying something else, that's something I can look at. If there's certain components that give me an advantage on these situations, please let me know.

 

Thanks.

[TrinityLyre]

You can't counter multiple gunships alone assuming equal skill (overwatch or not). Still, here's some stuff to read that may help you:

 

1) My S-12 Blackbolt build that I use to take down gunships. There's some helpful tips in there as well.

 

2) An entire thread on how to take down gunships as a scout.

 

I hope these resources help you out! I don't think there's really much to add.

Edited March 20, 2014 by TrinityLyre

[Davionix]

If you want to kill a really good one before they fly away and getting exposed while chasing them on your blackbolt / novadive :

 

Get EMP field with engine ability disable and secondary weapon as sabotage probe.

 

Sneak upon one of them and pop emp field to stop them from barrel rolling away and start locking sabotage probe.

If they use distortion field with missile lock break then still keep chasing because emp debuff still prevents them from barrel rolling so they will not be able to put up much distance between you and them.

 

With targeting telemetry and rocket pods build you can kill ones that are a bit slow to react but once they start fleeing you cant do much. It is good for harassing them since you deal loads of damage before they can react. Good when you can replenish rocked pods and your team mates are actually decent enough to finish them later on or capture objectives / kill other people while you are harassing them.

 

You can try harassing with a quell / pike with proton torpedoes and concussion missiles as well. Always approach a gunship from sides or back while not being in range of another one. Open up with proton torpedo from max range. If they start turning toward you boost towards them fast to get into blaster range while releasing proton as soon as its ready.If there are other gunships that can shoot you while you are in blaster range of initial gunship then after firing proton go on evasion mode and either boost out of railgun range or find an astreoid etc to break los.

 

If they do not start turning towards you hold on to firing proton torpedo since inexperienced ones may use their missile breaker before you actually fire the missile. If your target is still not using missile breakers release proton, switch to concussion missiles and start locking immediately ( you should be in range of concussion missiles by the time proton finishes locking ). Now your target either has to barrel roll and get displaced ( possibly in the direction they were shooting at ) or eats missiles that hurt a lot.

 

A displaced gunship becomes more vulnerable to counter-gunship fire from your side and being attacked by any nearby scouts / strikes.

Edited March 20, 2014 by Davionix

[Altheran]

If you want to kill a really good one before they fly away and getting exposed while chasing them on your blackbolt / novadive :

 

Get EMP field with engine ability disable and secondary weapon as sabotage probe.

 

That works well, but EMP's cooldown is a real pain. Once you've killed one, you become almost a free kill for the others.

(Slippery, yet uneffective offensively the remaining time)

[NotThatOne]

Gunship Overwatch can be a sticky tactic to counter, The best advice for a solo player taking on a gunship cluster is to be sneaky, and use LOS cover to close to firing range.

 

In my experience the Type 2 Striker (Pike/Quell) is the best non-gunship to do this, Althought I've seen very effective scout pilots in both current types do this very well.

 

Remember, you don't have to kill a gunship to take it out of the fight, simply force it to keep moving, in fact, keeping a gunship mobile may be the best possible use of a pilot with low to midgrade experience and skill.

 

Also: Never, Ever, fly straight at a gunship. If they're scoped, you're a stationary target that keeps getting bigger.

[Fractalsponge]

You won't kill them all solo unless you have damage overcharge and/or they're being dumb. That's no surprise, since there are lots more of them than there are of you. But you can disrupt them so that they're not instagibbing people with coordinated fire. Best way to break a gunship wall is to hit and run against it. As a blackbolt, this is what you're built for. Other gunships can also do it, but it requires better timing and awareness to achieve the same disruption, especially if the wall is alerted.

 

Go in with full engine pool, boost quickly if they don't see you, or barrel roll/use DField if they do, though really, you probably shouldn't charge them if they see you already. Select one target, preferably NOT an edge target, pop telemetry (which is what you should be using), and start your firing pass with your rocket trigger held down. Hopefully you can kill the first target quickly with your offensive cooldown up. If the gunship is at all good, it'll run if you can't burst it down immediately. Chase it a little bit and kill it if it's close to death, otherwise you should be weaving almost immediately, always boosting except for the initial firing passes. By this point pop DField or running interference, and run like hell for the nearest cover. You'll have to repeat this several times to keep their formation disrupted, and the gunships running as much as possible. If they're running, they're not shooting, which gives your team a chance to close.

 

Lot of this depends on your team really. If they aren't good enough to capitalize, you're not going to win the game.

[Kuciwalker]

I'm having reasonable success with EMP + sabo on my Novadive (and I'm not very upgraded yet, with several bad component choices). I also just don't have much trouble on my BLC + rockets Flashfire. I was able to take on a pair of gunships pretty handily with that the other day (one good, one OK, both supporting each other).

 

One useful thing to do against gunships is take the "Running Interference" copilot ability; it really helps.

[Armonddd]

The Blackbolt and Sting can both load up ranged bursty builds, which are good at smacking gunships around even as they try to flee:

 

-Quad laser cannons for the Sting, or just regular Laser Cannons for the Blackbolt: I like to think of these as "medium lasers". Their DPS isn't spectacular, and their firing arc is a little small for my (admittedly biased) taste, but they have good rate of fire and accuracy, and the tracking penalty is about what you'd expect.

-Rocket pods: Yo dawg, we heard you like shooting, so here's some shooting to go with your shooting so you can shoot while you shoot.

-Targeting Telemetry or Blaster Overcharge: BO compresses a lot of damage into a small time frame; you have to get very unlucky with accuracy rolls or fight an exceptionally alert gunship pilot to not get the kill. TT is better at negating enemy accuracy and is better when you can quickly switch from target to target, but its damage increase comes from winning the crits lottery.

-Damage capacitor: Range capacitor lets your lasers nearly match the range of your pods, which is good for sneaking and chasing and is a viable alternative. Don't take frequency capacitor, though -- it's a DPS increase, but only after about three or four seconds. Things shouldn't be alive that long.

-Barrel Roll and Regen Thrusters: Without Booster Recharge, you're going to need massive amounts of mobility to chase a running gunship.

-Distortion Field with t3 right: Nothing can ruin your day quite like being forced to choose between barrel rolling past the guy you're chasing or eating a torp. Plus, it's probably the best counter scouts currently have to railguns.

[-Streven-]

That works well, but EMP's cooldown is a real pain. Once you've killed one, you become almost a free kill for the others.

(Slippery, yet uneffective offensively the remaining time)

 

EMP is difficult enough to use it REALLY needs a shorter cooldown.

[Verain]

I would like there to be TWO EMP blasts. One should be the existing blue one at that radius. The other should be like a 6k radius, a red pulse, and JUST be for mines and drones (no effect on ships). Not only would this look wicked cool, it would let you detonate mines with it.

[Altheran]

EMP is difficult enough to use it REALLY needs a shorter cooldown.

 

Definitely.

 

I see several reasons for that :

1. Most of Scouts' Systems have a CD that don't exceed twice the duration except EMP
   
2. Relative duration is less valuable since it's a debuff, and not a buff. If the target dies, it doesn't last. Yet the CD is still there.
   
3. Who hadn't used EMP to see the target not recieve the debuff ?
   
4. It's a Bomber counter style of play. If the counter can not be used as frequently as the initial play, it's not countering effictevly... Mines' CD : 20s EMP's CD : 45s... really ? (I wouldn't mind Drones' CD reduced in compensation)
   

 

Ideally, I'd see the effect duration reduced to 10s and a 20s CD (upgraded from 30s)

Edited March 21, 2014 by Altheran

[mattycutts]

firstly,

 

with the changes recently to the map, target them, and you can see which direction they facing, take a run at them from behind, if not killed on 1st run hit with sab probe. Thats one gone b4 majority gunships react.

 

Multiple gunships, if they are of equal skill to you and working together you will struggle, but key to a gunship, is keep moving, fast, change angles of attack, random directions corrections, alot of average gunships if they miss 1st shot start to panic a bit and they toast at that point.

 

First piece of advice if you not already done so is fully upgrade a gunship leanr its strengths and weakness. see how many fully charged shots they can do b4 no weapon power left, how long their speed boost lasts for b4 their a sitting duck etc.

[Pilgrim_Grey]

No matter what, EMP for scouts needs a bigger blast radius. If you're going to cover a decent sized area on a satellite, you often have to get inside a mine's detection range (if you're going to hit other stuff). Even if that's not an issue, the radius is so small you have to hug a satellite with the bomber(s) on it and you'll still only cover about a 3rd of the area. Oh, and the bombers will probably throw out more mines just a few seconds after you use it. :/

 

I don't really see why its CD is so high, either. If it were a base of 45 seconds, that's still a long time for it to recharge, and most bombers are going to get their stuff back up well before your CD comes back. The most innoportune for them is if you used it RIGHT after they dropped a mine, but they'll still get those mines back before EMP comes back.

 

I dunno. I've been getting more mileage out of it as I use it more, but that CD and radius are still annoying. EMP missiles are a pretty long lock for what they do, but they at least can be used out of range of most of the stuff you're trying to take out.

[Verain]

I don't really see why its CD is so high, either. If it were a base of 45 seconds, that's still a long time for it to recharge, and most bombers are going to get their stuff back up well before your CD comes back.

 

It could have a shorter cooldown if the engine lockdown were reduced on a second by second slip.

[Davionix]

Definitely.

 

I see several reasons for that :

1. 
    
   
2. Who hadn't used EMP to see the target not recieve the debuff ?
    
   

 

That is a common bug with buffs / debuffs sometimes not showing up on target. If you are in 3,000 range they always get hit by it.

 

On other ideas, I agree that emp field needs something more to make up for the risk the scout takes by getting into mine explosion range (unlike relative safety of emp missile ).

 

As mentioned before a reduction in cooldown would be OP if engine lockdown debuff remains the same so if any changes were to happen to cooldown shield / engine lockdown debuff durations has to be altered as well.

[Altheran]

That is a common bug with buffs / debuffs sometimes not showing up on target. If you are in 3,000 range they always get hit by it.

 

It was not that bug. I thought about it and followed my strategy as if it were this bug. My EMP disables Engines abilities and I use this aspect to easily place a Sabotage Probe. I locked it, he barrelroll'ed.

Only possible reason : he hadn't been hit.

Edited March 21, 2014 by Altheran