Empire at War

If you have a useful tip or small tactic that you feel is of importance, post it here and it will be featured on the main Empire At War Portal! Whether it ranges from which units are the best in certain situations or the best time to attack or take use of the ecomonic structures around the map.



This post has been edited by Apollo`: Nov 23 2006, 22:58 PM

Got one. It works for me at least.

When you get a ship with torps/conc. missles or mass drivers send it through a nebula, or around the back. If you send it through a nebula and distract the other guy, insta-win. Works well with vengence frigates mostly, but MC-30s and other small ships work well.

Thanks, keep a look out, it might appear on the portal soon

Meh. It's a tip, but it's kinda common sense don't you think?

not for people like me...
I'm tryin to learn space and only played a few games so I need to know stuff like that

Meh. You just have to be careful and make sure that the ship doesn't get seen. Cloaking rules!

And another one is that in replays I've seen, some people sat back and built up while the other 2 were going at it. So in a 3 way game, sit back and defend. Then go at it when one person loses.

I'v got one for the Zann Consortiums destroyer droids, I don't know if people allready know this but it comes in handy. When the droids move they become very vunerable to enemy fire since they're sheilds are dropped, this is bad if you are targeting an enemy slightly out of its range so the droid drops its sheilds and moves closer towards it. Instead just move slightly forwards, the droid moves but DOESN'T drop it's shields, you can keep doing this for as far as you want because it works 100% of the time if you don' tell them to move to far ahead. Click about 2-3 cm ahead of them to make them move with there sheilds still online, this makes them last way longer when under enemy fire since they don't drop there sheilds and move towards the enemy. They move towards the enemy with their sheilds this way.

Here is one for those not used to the empire's space forces. Do not activate power to weapons unless one of two things happens:

1) You need to do significant damage and losses are not important.
2) You shields are down when this happens activate the power right then because you have a very small window before your first hardpoint goes down.

Also against the A.I they always target the frontal hardpoint (from my experience) so with the acclamator it will be the proton torpedo launcher (I believe) and with the victory it will be the Ion Cannon.

Hmm interesting, a good tip there.

Teching

In Empire at War, time is important, how you use this time is very important. Unlike some other RTS games, you can only make one unit at a time. Bigger ships and smaller ships alike can only be made one at a time. Time wise, is it better to build smaller of larger ships one at a time? Because of this advantage in technology, upgrading your station in space is of the utmost importance if you want to win. When to upgrade and why is what I shall discuss.

If your enemy has decided to rush your mines, you need to take an opposite stance and tech fast. Let them attempt to cripple you. When you finally pump out your capitals, you will be able to retake the mines, destroy their smaller fleet and cripple them back. They will have lost precious time trying to take your mines by building their small fleets and using their credits. Do not counter their rush with small ships too, they are already in yout territory meaning they will get the advantage to tech if they feel they have you under pressure.

When deciding when to tech, tech comes before mines. No amount of money can buy you enough X-Wings to win Remember that while you are teching, you cant make ships, forcing you to buy upgrades and capture mines during this period. By capping and upgrading while teching, you will be prepared to defend those mines with new ships. Mines lost early would have been a loss to you. While you are teching dont hesitate to exhaust your current fleet of smaller ships to try and defend your mines, go out with a bang. By the time they are depleted, you will probably have your bigger fish (Sorry Ackbar!) ready to move in.

key points
-Teching is important, bigger ships eat smaller ships (bombers eat bigger ships but thats another week in which ill try and discuss)
-Tech while capping mines and upgrading, they are the 2 things you can do while teching at the same time, be efficient and dont waste precious time doing it after you tech
-Sacrifice your small ships if they can help avoid the destruction of your mines. in fact, they will open up unit slots later on.
-Keep your money just enough to keep you building and try to have ships coming. Pressure is key in a game like this when only one unit can be made at once. There should not be the word "spike" in this games vocabulary. This allows you to save time when you do want to tech again. You can survive off no ships while teching (early game), but its still better if you have those reinforcements at your disposal.

All of this leads to steady game play, and ultimately victory.

This post has been edited by Hyprodimus Prime: Jul 12 2007, 05:48 AM

Nice, going to make it a ToTW

Or a ToTM by now

Sigh sorry but I've really been lax in my duties. My clan (BSL) kind of took off so I put most of my effort there (40 members woot)

This post has been edited by Thawn: Jul 28 2007, 23:18 PM

B-Wings

The Blade Wing Starfighter combines firepower with relative speed and armor make this fighter valuable in almost any fleet. B-Wings come in flights of 3s and are relatively cheap for their power.

B-Wings are used to dispatch of enemy Capital ships in three ways.
1) Ion Cannons: These quickly drain shields without actually doing damage to the vessel itself, the benifit is that friendly capitals can now deal damage to the hard points.
2) Lasers: Deals small amounts of damage.
3) Proton Torpedoes: Deals massive damage right through the shields of foes.

Each torpedo can deal about 40 damage depending on enemy armor upgrades and your firepower buffs. Each B-Wing will fire 2 torpedoes. Each squadron of B-Wings consists of 3 fighters. 40x2x3=240 damage. Each enemy hard point has about 200-500 hit points depending on the class. As you can see, a few squadrons of B-Wings can eliminate a capital ship within a few passes.

B-Wings have many advantages over their Imperial and ZC brethren. B-Wings have the ability to increase speed and agility thus allowing them to get around faster and stay alive longer by dodging attacks. Skiprays rely on upgrades for speed and TIE Defenders rely on upgrades for damage. Each does have its own advantages fully upgraded, but B-Wings are built to bomb. (built by the cooperation of insects and squid!) B-Wings are much cheaper than MC30-s, which in my opinion is a horrible ship (too frail and too expensive).

B-Wings may be used for the following.
1) Fleet to fleet engagements. Be sure to back them up with your own capitals to eliminate fighter threats, and bring a few of your own anti fighter ships, although B-Wings can take a beating, a full Imperial fleet with full fighter garrisons will be overwhelming to your B-Wings.
2) Scouting and Mine Capturing. B-Wings are faster than capital ships and provide enough firepower to retake mines and destroy defensive installations. When faced against Laser based defenses, micro is key. Keep your fighters zig-zagging to avoid fire. Run from missile launchers.
3) Base Attacks. Send a fleet of B-Wings to your enemy space station to inflict damage or distract them enough to retake a sensor node, mines and other key points.

B-Wing Weaknesses. Although B-Wings are great at many things, they are fighters and all fighters have some common weaknesses.
1) Diamond Boron missiles via Broadsides, Marauders or ZC platforms. To counter, bring Laser based capital ships.
2) Projectile diverters. eg. Jamming stations like the ZC satellite and Interdictor. Crusaders can also neutralize projectiles. To counter, bring Laser based capital ships.
3) Space superiority fighters. like Star Vipers, A-wings and TIE Defenders. To counter, bring your own anti fighter craft.
4) Corvette class ships. eg. Correllian Corvette, Tartans, Crusaders. To counter, bring Laser based capital ships.
5) Concussion missiles from missile platforms, Acclamators and Gunboats. To counter, bring your own anti fighter craft.
6) Mass drivers. The ZC ships carry these nasty buggers. They chip away at your fighters and are impossible to dodge. Destroy the launchers first. Mass drivers are the bane of B-Wings, it might be better to not even think about using them against the ZC and they have so many counters.

Watch for these counters, run away from the diamond boron missiles (and Boba Fett) and make sure you send your B-Wings in waves rather than clumped. Good bomber micro can destroy an enemy base while their fleet is engaging your main somewhere else. After all, destroying the enemy space station wins you the match in skirmish.

The number of B-Wings you choose to send out will depend on the situation. In a balanced fleet, a good ratio is 2 B-Wings for every Capital or about 1/4 of your fleet. (Remember against the ZC you might not want B-Wings) In a station raid, you might want 8 with a few in supply to hyperspace in an emergency.

Designed by Akbar and built by Verpine, this all Rebel ship humbly describes itself on guides as "being able to retain a stationary cockpit while the ship rotates in flight." (Like does that matter in space?! o.0)

This post has been edited by Hyprodimus Prime: Aug 14 2007, 06:12 AM

Very nice

Thank you very much

I'll see if it's going to be another totw

I dont know if its censored on your screen, but on mine it is. The censored word should be cockpit.

It's not censored on my screen. Weird.

Cockpit

Can you see it?

I edited it succesfully, Ive had the problem before on a wiki site. Its ok now.

Ok your tip should be posted soon

Thanks a lot for it

Hot keying and the Gunboat

Hot keying your structures and fleets makes it easier to control and move. Placement is key to any unit game. Placement allows you to control if you attack or if you get attacked. Chess, Starcraft and Counter Strike all require you to be in a more advantageous position than your enemy. You might be sneaking up from behind with a surprise attack, you might be flanking or you might be needing to escape. Placement is only available if you can micro your ships. This is done through hot keying. Bombers are the most important ships to hot key.

Before I go into details, just to make sure everyone knows what hot keying is, it is clicking a structure or unit or bunch of units and holding down ctrl and then pressing a number. Now every time you press that number, you will select everything that under it. Everyone should by convention set their Station to 1. Unlike Starcraft, this is still limited as you cannot hot key other commands like upgrades or attacks.

Now for bombers and gunboats. You should get a feel as to how many gunboats or bombers it takes to take down a hard point. I find that 3 bombers gets the job done in one strafe, but depending on the ship and enemy upgrades, it might take more. Hot key that amount of bombers into "squadrons" so that you can just click, 2 and attack the enemy shield generator, then click 3 and use that squadron to take out the Turbolasers. Hot keying is very useful in a retreat situation. Say that Boba come up and is about to set a charge, you can send each squadron in a different direction to reduce losses.

I find the gunboat is most effective against the ZC. They are strong enough to take a beating from mass drivers and they can go straight through shields. Gunboats are expensive though. To keep them alive, build repair stations. Then when they take enough damage, boost engine power and move them to the station. Your fleet should be in a constant relay race healing, and attacking, healing and attacking. You should upgrade too as to make the most of your ships. Hot keying your gunboats is harder to do as you have no control over which one is going to get damaged. Its then hard to remember the number you set that gunboat too. Instead just use hot keying to keep your gunboats in constant motion in the battle. Missiles can track their targets so it doesnt matter if the gunboat is moving or not.