Here's a tip I haven't seen from my quick glance through this topic.

Be aware of the ship you're opponent is flying and it's strengths and weaknesses. Use this against them. If you're in equally matched ships, then you just have to be a better pilot.

If you're in a prom, don't hang back against a light fighter. You need to get them in range or they'll peck you to bits from outside you're effective range.

If you're in a light fighter don't go point blank with a GT equipped ship (unless you're stupidly talented).

Another tip, which has been mentioned but which I'll reiterate:

Expect to die, but don't fight with that attitude. When you fight you should fight to win.

Shameless Plug: http://www.vo-wiki.com/wiki/index.php?title=Player_VS._Player

Tossing a bit of info in here as well- while I notice everyone harping on defensive combat binds, I've yet to see anyone say a thing about offensive ones.

Offensive combat binds generally control how your weapons are fired- to make which damage dealer they spawn from more random and less predictable, or to cover every possible escape route of your enemy.

Personally, I fly sunflares with a nifty offensive combat bind that cycles through and fires each tube on its own. This presents a sort of sunflare wall headed towards the enemy when set off in a certain way- making it very difficult to dodge and opening up the enemy pilot to a full salvo as they try to back up.

Now, that isn't to say that I couldn't chain my sunflares myself, but binds/aliases are tools to make things easier. It's very helpful to know how to create binds and aliases whenever the need arises. I suggest viewing this page here for information on all the /commands you can manipulate in the lexor.

{EDIT: And yes, people using "combat binds" as a term for preprogrammed dodge patterns annoys me. There's much more to combat that you can bind than dodge patterns.}

{EDIT2: If you're looking for a completely up to date list of all the /commands in the game, enter in "/print 0" and check your errors.log [May not work though- haven't tried it in a while.]}

Anyone who uses chainfire binds has no right to bitch about swarms and other setups that are dealy, ie standard Prom. They're all "valid tactics in combat" right? Just my 2 cents.

A bit off topic- but if that was directed at me, I'm confused as to why. Otherwise, carry on.

Well, I DON'T use chainfire binds... but a chainfire bind is still worthless without the aim behind it. Not so with swarms...

but then, I don't bitch about swarms either, use em as much as you like, your funeral.

The standard prom is a crutch. But its not really in the same realm as a chainfire bind, its a completely different kind of flying. AKA its a packaged win. Requires very little skill at all.

I think Scuba's bind is really nice. I mean, so what if he has a stream of flares, He'll be using them faster than he normally would anyhow. and He still has to net them properly. It has weaknesses as well as strengths.

Not at you Steve. Just in general. Many like to bitch and be hypocrites. I tend to forget their names for my sanity.

And no offense Shape, but what you're saying basically is saying someone needs to know how to do this:

Nose of Ship ) ======>> (Enemy Ship)

I know it's more complex, using flares all the time myself, but a patient chainfire user (or someone matched against a poor dodger) only needs one net to kill an opponent. Maybe I'm rambling because I'm a disgruntled not so good dodger. Some lessons so I shut up? :P

here is my advice, fight and you will learn. fight alot and you will learn alot.

there give me my mentor point huh

/me gives Noresman some mentor points

I fight with a rag...the only player I know of who consistently fights with em'..and wins.

The thing is, right now a rag is at a huge disadvantage, People who back up can control the fight Example? vults. they can go backwards at 60, whilst go forward at 50, making it really hard for me to even get close. This is why I avoid fights with corvus vults, and people who backroll. I usually can beat most people and ships, people who give me a hard time (usually due to being good with light ships) ; Niki, shape (funnily enough, he's not as good at dodging flares then niki...last I check, anyway) firsm, mecha...and the list goes on...

Proms are tough, simply due to the fact that they have more armor then a ship with missles can hit them with, if they are good at dodging, you're screwed, due to the fact that you can't stick around as long as they can, they can fire forever when you're stuck without any ammo.

Personally, I feel backing up needs to be at 50% speed (for fairness and realisticness) and that the rag should get a higher thrust (it needs it)

Cheers!

Changed combat binds section of the wiki to dodge binds just for steve =)

Huzzah and jubilations Ghost!

And yes, netting someone with flares does require a bit of practice- but flares aren't the only weapons that benefit from the standard chainfire bind. Offsetting energy weapons works well to keep your enemy off balance as well as providing a better platform for spray-and-pray tactics.

{EDIT: Of course, it's probably not worth the effort to try and fire your energy weapons with a chainfire bind. The only way I've come across to make it work is with one press == one shot type thing. Once the Lua is opened up I'll work on a function to handle chaining while the key is down and post it somewhere. }

As far as chainfiring energy is concerned on two gun ships, binds are definately not the way to go. Reason:

Having the ability to fire just one of your guns at a time is an advantage when trying to utilize your battery to its full effectiveness.

It is much more desired to simply have your left and right guns mapped to different keys (ie. left and right mouse button)

Or, if you want to do it with much less clicking, bind both weapons to left click, and one weapon to right click. Then tap right and hold left, perfect chainfire every time.

Aye, steve is right. Combat binds do not = dodge binds. When flying a valk with dual neuts and one flare, I use a chainfire bind to stagger my neuts. This allows me to have control of all my weapons with only 2 buttons and still be able to stagger them. But when using only 2 weapon ships, I switch back to one weapon on each button.

No, zamzx zik. Directional speed does not need to be modified and neither does the Rag (yet). What we need are real Rag weapons now that we have more than a shadow of real Rag targets (capships); we can also Change Throttle and Turbo to make marginal increases in forward velocity easier to acheive than tapping the Tab key a lot. The Rag is a heavy assault ship/bomber; it should almost never win a duel-like fight against a light or medium ship.

My tactic :

Point mouse.

Press Fire.

Move Left.

Move Right.

*waves*

Bind autoaim to your mousewheel or similar place where its always at your fingertip.

Toggle it on off repeatedly in combat, make sure that when you're botting you do the same, bots are dumb targets with little movement on their own, but being able to take them on without the mouse aim, helps.

Disable the hud and the autoaim. Learn to hit your opponents. Start with Orun collectors and roids, work your way up. Especially useful with the old Marauder and rockets, helps to get your angling just right. ( I had a few nice fights with RelayeR like this back in the day. Wonderful aiming practice. )

Rockets, Turn them towards moving targets, angle them in a net fashion or the classic sunfan. one above, one below, two pipes and you can usually make a Vulture cry.

Don't underestimate the boost, roll your ship slightly, angle the side of a vulture or the front against your enemy, boost yourway outside his range when he's backstrafing. He'll have to turn, toggle your FA off and roll around your axis, spread fire a few rockets and watch him attempt to recover as you nail him with energy.

Use energy to guide them into slow moving rockets, turn the fight, backwards, launch a flare and guide him with a spread pattern of fire, the energy will be faster than the rocket, and forces him to dodge it (or get hit;) while the rocket will be near stationary. Learning this can help guide unsuspecting opponents straight into their own deathbed.

Rockets have speed. Boost a rocket and they can actually pass by eachother (or could back in the day. not sure about current acceleration and engines) causing your opponent to have to adjust to the speed of your weapon as well as the angle makes it harder for him.

Cool suggestions Spider, but where the hell have you been?!

I especially like the one about turning off the HUD and autoaim, although I think you could get a bit of a better learning experience using the new HUD features.

For instance, without the indicator telling you where the nose of your ship really is, you won't really know how fast your ship is turning, unless you don't use mouse look. Also, I think without the HUD you won't learn energy management, nor speed control. So I would suggest, turn everything off except the power bars and the nose direction thingy.

Also, in regards to rockets. One of the biggest weaknesses that is exploited by light energy fighters when fighting rocketsleds, is their tendency to over correct in attempting to hit a ship that is trying to turbo out of rocket range once it finds itself in a disadvantageous situation.

I'm not going to presume to offer advice on how to counter attack this because I am no rocketeer, but I will provide the technique used by light fighters for the benefit of all perhaps:

If you find yourself in relatively close (<300m or so, basically within rocket range) to a rocketeer, with him or her aiming slightly off of your direction, turn away from where they are headed and hit turbo. This will lead the rocketeer to think they've got an easy hit if they can aim it right, expecting that you are about to try and turbo out to safe range to regroup. This will also send the targetting recticle off if they are using it as a guide. As soon as they begin their turn (pretty much right away), flick FA on (if you had it off) and whip back around and go in tight. Chances are they will have commited to the turbo vector, and will be stuck in an overcorrection situation. Land as many shots as you can while in close, land as many shots as you can while they are attempting to get back into position.

Now there are some issues with this tactic. It doesn't work all that well against proms or hogs with agt. It can work if you are very conservative and patient, ie. FA on, go in, land a shot, FA off slide away fast. This also illustrates one of the defensive maneuvers used by rocketeers (especially proms). Once they find themselves in this situation, many will simply turn FA off (allowing them to dodge better), and slide away from you while correcting their position.

And it can backfire something fierce if the rocketeer doesn't fall for it or you change your trajectory so drastically that you are essentially sitting still while your turbo compensates, albiet quickly, for the change in course.

I'm in no way qualified to give pvp advice, my pvp is pretty poor. but I will add that I've mapped FA to my mouse wheel click, and that has helped my flying quite a bit. I turn it off and on all the time, and it doesn't require me to use my left hand at all, leaving it free for strafing.

Often people will mention that use of FA or Physics mode is a very good way of getting an edge for different situations. I've found the frustrating part is getting to know when to switch, and then how to do it quickly and gracefully.

I'm a full-time physics moder. I've learned to get a feel for the handling of the craft so that I can maneuver as if I'm in FA when I need do, but by staying in physics mode I don't remove my ability to reverse and use other advanced maneuvers.

Practice emulating physics mode by countersteering, counter-strafing and pre-strafing into a turn. Using every form of strafe in the same way (up down left right) is key to controlling the craft seamlessly.

gotta go to work. maybe I'll write more later.