[Enigmatic Entity]

My Channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/JamikKim27?feature=mhee

So now you can see my devious and sometimes cowardly tactics... 
I'm stuck on that Slaying Ravana mission at the moment, keep dying in stupid ways.

Any tips to improve my flying? Especially to avoid chasing Loki's across the whole field of engagement 

[Cobra]

Tell your wingmen to attack the beam and flak cannons.

As for your Loki problem... Harpoons help.

[Enigmatic Entity]

"GTF Myrmidon is unable to carry GTM Harpoon weaponry."

Rock-eyes in a Myrm in the first 3 mission aren't very effective against Lokis.

Later on I will toast those Loki's though

And yes, I do need to get on to my wingmen instead of letting them flounder around!

[General Battuta]

Tempests Tempests Tempests

[Snail]

Tempests are awesome

[Sushi]

Tempests Tempests Tempests

Also, Tempests. They work.

Slaying Ravana is one of the worst-designed missions ever. Your best bet is probably to cheat by flying over to the Sobek on the far side and parking there while it takes out the Ravana with beams.

[Rodo]

Tempest

[Marcov]

You will find yourself being able to mow down those Insane Lokis with impunity after you've beaten Quantum Delta at least 50% of the time.

[X3N0-Life-Form]

First thought when I saw the topic's title : "s/he is gonna have problems on Slaying Ravana"

Do what Sushi said, that mission isn't worth it.

Harpoons are almost ineffective on Insane, Tempest are not. You might have to imporve your aim skills though.

You might want to try to go into "turret-mode" (= dead stop) to kill fast, small annoying fighter like the loki, uly, astaroth or dragon.

[QuantumDelta]

You might want to try to go into "turret-mode" (= dead stop) to kill fast, small annoying fighter like the loki, uly, astaroth or dragon.

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

[Kolgena]

Keep in mind that it is (iirc) impossible for AI to miss the lead indicator. If you're sitting still, any AI shooting you will have 100% accuracy.

If you have trouble chasing down fleeing fast fighters like lokis and manticores, ignore it and let it come back towards you. The more you chase it, the more it runs.

Also, tempests. They never become obsolete. Recall that tempests have a higher DPS than the Cyclops as long as the ship doesn't have a huge flag (Corvette or larger)

One thing I do to survive in dogfights where I'm heavily outnumbered (like 1v6) is to try and juggle the fighters. Enemies will break off and run for a little while if you harass them. If you're not sure you can kill them that instant, instead of using that window to chase them down, target the next fighter shooting you and repeat. This way you can keep bouncing fighters off you while slowly distributing damage to everyone. I find I receive much less fire this way.

[X3N0-Life-Form]

big No

EDIT - whatever, but you could suggest him more effective tactics

If there is a lot of them -> what Kolgena said

[Sushi]

Keep in mind that it is (iirc) impossible for AI to miss the lead indicator. If you're sitting still, any AI shooting you will have 100% accuracy.

That said, default AI will usually just fly circles around you if you stop, without ever drawing a bead. Assuming you only have one of them shooting at you, sit&spin is very effective against the default AI...

[QuantumDelta]

big No

EDIT - whatever, but you could suggest him more effective tactics

If there is a lot of them -> what Kolgena said

I've posted over 200 videos with 'advice' most of which, are actually on insane, vs harder ai than the default campaign has.
I've posted an entire dogfight guide that can be applied vs AI even more effectively than against people.
What more do you want? :I

[X3N0-Life-Form]

links or suggestion to look for your videos
nobody pointed Enigmatic Entity to your videos or your posts so far.

I can suggest him to dig your youtube account, or your forum account and the topics you've created though; I didn't thought about it at the time. All I'm saying is that you could have said is:
"don't listen to X3N0, it's bad advice and there are more effective tactics; I posted several videos with advice that might help you. You can check them out by looking at my forum profile -> show posts -> topics" instead of just a big no.

[Enigmatic Entity]

  ... Anyway, I love to use Tempests, I always have at least one bank where practical, the other is usually Harpoons if available. I do slow down a bit when trying to face AI, but try not to stay still for too long...

Also, I added QD as a friend on YouTube yesterday, except I've only watched a few WoD LP's. I need to look through the 100's of videos to find the ones I think will help (and others to watch for fun).

btw, how do you change the cross-hair shape?

[Destiny]

For me, I sit still against AI fighters. Turret mode is sadly one of my favored tactics, especially when I have Trebs and Harpoons.




...in a Ares.

Generally I try to avoid jousts unless I'm in an Ares, and once in a dogfight I stop and turret mode if the opponent is annoying.

Occasionally match their speed.

[QuantumDelta]

btw, how do you change the cross-hair shape?

It's the FS1 crosshair, you need to extract it (the file is called reticle_1 I think?) from FSPort's media vps and throw it into FS2's data\hud folder, 2_reticle1.ani and reticle1.ani, I'm not entirely sure where they are in the FSPort VPs though they're probably in the same folder in there.

For people professing love for turreting, do you actually play on insane?
You turn faster into someone's pursuit curve while braking in this game because of a weird quirk in the physics than you do at zero speed, while zero speed means that the enemy will never face you without you facing them first, they can out manoeuvre you forever if they want, while I admit the AI doesn't it's just a bad practise to learn and depend on, especially if you end up having no fall back when you're fighting multiple opponents.

More later maybeh

[Destiny]

I've completed the FS2 campaign many times on insane. So I decided to try it again, so here I am playing on insane, turreting with a GTF Perseus against NTF Hercules fighters after avoiding their joust. As the topic is about the campaign and AI, so I won't compare it to multiplayer because I am vehement against shooting player-flown ships. The reason I turret is because I'm flying too fast and can't see my target, or they're too maneuverable or annoying.

I do boost and set engines to maximum occasionally if someone else is shooting me, but usually I blow up when that happens. In an Ares...not so much. Usually when one (hopefully) charges towards me, I ETS max shields and press the button to send power to the front shields, tank and tank until they get into hexa-Kayser range.

In other fighters I don't do that because they're made for running around.

[X3N0-Life-Form]

Apart from missions like Slaying Ravana, I don't turn the difficulty down. As I said, turreting is very situational and works only against a small number of retail AI fighters. I learned from experience the limits of this tactic, and as my flying and aiming skills improved, I used it less and less. However, it is still something that can be done in retail fs2 main campaign, even on insane. Eck, I do it almost every time against Apocalypse's dragons.