How do people get so many kills?

[DartDaya]

Ive never got more than 5 kills a match

 

One time I got 25 assists in a 50 kill game

 

???????

Edited April 9, 2015 by DartDaya

[StrixHiraeth]

Most people who get high kills do so by focusing on weak targets first. If you look, you'll notice that they also tend to fly gunships or type 2 scouts.

 

For the purposes of requisition/xp/medals/whatever, there is no difference between kills and assists.

Edited April 9, 2015 by Ymris

[Verain]

Tom brought up that normally you switch to the closest target when trying for kills, only going out of your way if there's a solid reason (low health target, tactical target). So presumably "target weak players" isn't really the strategy. Other record holders might have different strats for that sort of thing, however.

[StrixHiraeth]

Tom brought up that normally you switch to the closest target when trying for kills, only going out of your way if there's a solid reason (low health target, tactical target). So presumably "target weak players" isn't really the strategy. Other record holders might have different strats for that sort of thing, however.

 

Not necessarily weak players; but weak targets. Ships that are at low health, ships that are distracted or in the middle of a fight, and so forth. Going for the closest target makes sense, too. If preferring 'weak targets' implies preferring 'targets which require least effort', then distance to travel would be a factor.

Edited April 10, 2015 by Ymris

[Ramalina]

Gear, practice, and the opposition play into it.

 

You want a solid build, one that can get where it needs to go fairly fast and put out lots of damage in short windows.

 

Part of it is upgrades. Ideally you want mastered components in your weapons, systems, and mobility components. Things like accuracy, shield piercing, and armor piercing can make a big difference.

 

Part of it is accuracy. In getting kills the ability to land 3-4 shots in a row is more important than total shots that hit, total damage, or overall accuracy. You want to do killing damage without being interrupted by things like LOS or shields that regenerate between your shots.

 

Part of it is general GSF piloting skill. Managing your energy so that you don't have to pause to regen very often makes a big difference. So does knowing how to get the most out of your cooldowns, far better to get three kills out of a TT or Wingman than just one.

 

In TDM a large chunk of it is knowing the power up locations. Damage overcharge is the best of course, but the engine and weapons power ones are also pretty potent. Depending on skill, being efficient at scooping up the power-ups can increase the rate of kills by 300-500%, or maybe even more.

 

Part of it is prioritizing kills as your goal. If you want the highest number of kills, then shooting down a turret is a waste of time unless you need to kill it to make your next ship kill. A really effective killer is often very useful to their team, but often they could be more helpful to the team effort if they had prioritized a bit differently.

 

Part of it is also just opponents that aren't doing a good job of defending themselves.

 

A really good pilot facing an unskilled team can pull it off in pretty much any ship at any upgrade level. Where you see it really consistently though is the exceptional pilots flying meta defining ships against poor or mediocre opposition.

[nyghtrunner]

Tom brought up that normally you switch to the closest target when trying for kills, only going out of your way if there's a solid reason (low health target, tactical target). So presumably "target weak players" isn't really the strategy. Other record holders might have different strats for that sort of thing, however.

I pretty much agree with him, especially on his preferred build (which matches his style). I think for Scouts, outside of going after gunners for tactical, it's almost always going to be correct to go at the closest person to you unless you can feel rails being charged and aimed at you from things further away.

 

You can do more "hunting" in a gunship in my brief experience.

 

I'll also note that in my experience, Tomm's style comes into play here as well. If he doesn't bag the kill on his first pass, he's already targeting the next person who is closest to him in his sights, and doesn't much mess with trying to seal the deal on more evasive people. Scrabs flew in a similar fashion. I tend to fly more defensively, and tend to chase after people until the deal is sealed, and as such, my damage and kill rates will never be as high as theirs. In terms of playing, Tomm's one of the most disciplined people I've ever flown with or against when it comes to scouts.

 

But to answer the OP, it's really kind of practice, along with gear to some degree. Although don't think for a moment maxing a ship will turn you into a 20 kill monster. Playing a T2 Scout is pretty much second nature to me any more, although I've got probably 1800 games in the cockpit of a T2 Scout alone, so I'm pretty well versed in what the ship is capable of.

 

The XP teaches you when you have a winning situation, when you've missed your window, when to let people go, how to prioritize targets in a cluster... And how to know when you need to cut and run before you go all explodey.

 

There's not really a simple answer to the question, other than "practice", unfortunately. Or maybe fortunately...

[Nemarus]

It's not about picking closest target or the one with the least skill. It's about picking the target that is vulnerable. Vulnerable targets are:

 

1) At or slightly beyond your optimum range (on my Blackbolt with MLC's and Pods, optimum range is 4500-5000m). If a target is much closer than this, it's going to be hard to keep them centered. The only weapon that breaks this trend is BLC's. Every other weapon is best fired at the middle or end of its range. Without BLC's, tryng to kill anyone closer than 3000m is usually going to be slow work, because of tracking penalty.

 

2) Targeting someone besides you. The easiest targets to kill are the ones who are distracted shooting at someone else. Trying to attack someone who is trying to attack you is always a waste of your time, unless you massively outmaneuver or outrange them. And if you decide to joust, then it becomes all about upgrade and cooldown usage. So make sure to only engage in jousts you can actually win. Don't joust a Scout in a Strike (Scouts have higher burst damage and better cooldowns). Don't joust a Gunship in a Scout--there's no need to do so since you can get behind him.

 

3) Strikes. It's sad but it's true. Once you get a Strike in your sights, it's easy to keep one there, even if you're a Bomber (especially if you engage them at the edge of your range). And unlike Bombers, Strikes do not have mines or drones to deter attackers. And honestly, a Strike (especially a Rycer, Star Guard, Quell or Pike) is a pretty reliable indicator that it's an inexperienced pilot, because experienced pilots know those ships are not competitive.

 

4) Gunships that are charging their railguns A Gunship that is charging is obviously distracted and less likely to notice you. New Gunship pilots sometimes don't even realize when they are being shot. You are going to be able to do some measure of damage before they use Barrel Roll or Power Dive. After that, you can either chase them or choose a more optimal target. If a T3 Gunships uses Retro, just wait for them to finish and then resume shooting.

 

5) Bombers out of cover. In Domination especially, if you can press forward toward enemy spawns, you can catch Bombers out in the open and kill them.

 

As for Scouts, killing a competently flown one with conventional lasers and missiles takes a long time, unless you have him outnumbered or catch him flying straight as he focuses someone else. Otherwise, it's best to leave Scout-killing up to Gunships and Bombers. They are far more efficient at it than Strikes or Scouts themselves.

 

When you take all these rules, you can see why a fully optimal super serious GSF match, at the highest level, usually contains no Strikes at all, and is instead made up of a heavy mix of Bombers, Gunships, and BLC Scouts (Sting or Flashfire).

Edited April 10, 2015 by Nemarus

[Mintas]

Getting a lot of kills depends on just about everything already posted. Ram's quote of "A really effective killer is often very useful to their team, but often they could be more helpful to the team effort if they had prioritized a bit differently." is spot on.

 

I have seen "uber/elite/ace" pilots get a ton of kills and still lose the game because they lose focus on the match. IMO situation awareness and managing the dynamics of a match are the most important factors in winning. Sometimes that involves challenging their "Ace" , keeping them from farming and sometimes it is you farming kills.

 

In the end, it is a give and take.

[tunewalker]

[RickDagles]

Getting a lot of kills depends on just about everything already posted. Ram's quote of "A really effective killer is often very useful to their team, but often they could be more helpful to the team effort if they had prioritized a bit differently." is spot on.

 

I have seen "uber/elite/ace" pilots get a ton of kills and still lose the game because they lose focus on the match. IMO situation awareness and managing the dynamics of a match are the most important factors in winning. Sometimes that involves challenging their "Ace" , keeping them from farming and sometimes it is you farming kills.

 

In the end, it is a give and take.

 

Very true. This is the reason BLC scouts are better than quad/pod scouts in Dom. There are only three ships that can hold nodes. BLC scouts, t1 bomber, and t2 bomber. Quad/pod scouts have to go 5000m off the node to be effective, and that can often cause a loss. BLC scouts are the best solo carry ship because they can hold nodes, quickly travel between nodes, kill turrets/cp easily, and perform in the absence of pod refills

 

Deathmatch is a different story entirely and I think laser/pods can be the best carry build unless there is a solid GS-bomber ball team working together. Definitely some matches can be decided by which team had the easier farm players.

Edited April 11, 2015 by RickDagles

[TheGreatSatan]

Aim for the butt. Gets'em every time.

[BlackflameSeven]

The 20+ kill matches I have had and see others get require certain fairly unusual circumstances.

 

1) Inexperienced opposition. If a team sees a player getting kill after kill, then they really should pay attention to them more. I've been on the receiving end of Scrab's scout a few times, early on he massacred teams, but the last time I saw him, probably a couple of months ago, I was in a guild group, and we made sure to chase him around. He got plenty of kills, but nowhere near 20, he didn't wipe the map with us, and he wasn't enough to swing the match alone, as he had been in the past. Still the best in the match, just not the deciding factor.

 

2) Inexperienced team mates. The opportunity to score 20+ kills either means a long drawn out domination match because neither side is controlling things, or a deathmatch where no-one else is getting the kills. My last 25 kill match was a deathmatch, and surprisingly enough, it worked both ways as a pilot on the other side got 23 kills. Very few other pilots did much, but the other team got enough to take the win, and every time I tried to shoot down the enemy pilot getting the kills, he ran, and I had to go back to killing his teammates. His scout was just faster than mine, and they did eventually start paying attention to me, making me fight more defensively.

 

3) Powerups. In the game mentioned above, I picked up five damage overcharges. Being able to nail two or three people in a single fly through and comparatively few shots makes a stupid difference to racking up your kill total.

 

4) As mentioned by Mintas above, NOT being a team player. You might find you kill steal just because the quickest thing to see and shoot at has almost no hull left and dies to a single hit, but as has also been mentioned, in terms of reward, assists and kills are equal.

 

So while I might jokingly yell at a guildie on Teamspeak for nicking my kills, in a tight match, I'd rather someone managed to finish my target now than perhaps my shot missing and them escaping to continue contributing. Some may view that as being a poor team player, but not me, the final shot is nice, but the opponent exploding is all that matters.

 

The time that poor team play becomes a problem is usually in a domination match. After a tight loss in a wargame last week, one of the better pilots on Red Eclipse who had been on the winning team commented in the /Gsf channel that two players had cost us the match, trying to snipe him on their gunships while he parked his damaged scout under a satellite and captured it. If they had just flown into the sat, and parked on top, we'd have kept control, and won.

 

Last night, I saw one of the same pair rack up 20 kills in a domination match, and twice I had to race back to the satellite he was sniping at, watching it go from green to white to red as he didn't move an inch, leaving me to kill the ships hiding under it, and take it back. At the end, he had 2 defensive points and no offensive at all, I had over 300 defensive and 4 offensive. As an example of team play, it could have been costly, but was great for his kill/death ratio and making himself unpopular with his teammates. We still won, but it was a lot closer than it needed to be.

 

So don't worry about big kill scores, contribute to the win and the rest will come in time.

 

Sableflame/blaze, Unrelenting, Red Eclipse