Re: It's a trap! (strategy brainstorming)

[Lytyr]

In light of news that we can't bring in reinforcements during a battle, I've been attempting to think up new ways of trapping the enemy in a situation which he doesn't expect. This may prove more or less difficult, depending on the quality and frequency of Intelligence reports available to both Imperial and Alliance forces, as well as the enemy's cunning - however, there are sure to be some basic strategies that can be built upon or modified depending on the situation.

 

What I want to do here is start a discussion on ways to capture or deceive the enemy into an unfavourable situation - pertaining primarily to the Imperial side, since the Rebels are made to sneak around in the first place, while the Empire can't exactly hide 5 Imperial Star Destroyers behind an asteroid field. So we need to find out ways to trick them, either to make them loose equipement, or to let us gain ground.

 

Here are a few things I've come up with; let me know what you think, and post any other ideas that come to mind. Also, note that you can also deceive your opponent into thinking you are doing any of these as well - if he doesn't know what you're doing, all the better for you. In addition, none of these are foolproof; the best player would react properely to any and all of these. I'm also making some assumptions about gameplay and Intelligence - since we don't know everything, some of these may or may not work.

 

This might be a little long, but in the end this is essentially a tactical diary, so it will get longer. Feel free to correct me if I've made mistaken assumptions about something. These are also tailored for humans, as well, as the AI's capacities are as of the moment unknown to us.

 

 

Double-feint: this seems, to me at least, as a fairly simple tactic, but at the same time rather long to execute, and not necessarily easy to predict. You pull together a bunch of ships, such as Tartans and Acclamators, and you jump into an ill-defended system near the border, and wreck the local fleet, if there is one. Then you run away. The enemy might move some forces to the area; jump in again, with maybe a Victory thrown in, and repeat the process. Do it a third time, but with a worthless little fleet like three Tartans.

 

Then hit a far-away system with a group of Victories and a few Imperials. The enemy will realise the other attacks were feints, and they were. Take the system if you can, but don't commit too much of a force to it. The enemy will come stamping back, and may or may not take the planet. Repeat the initla feints with similar group make-ups, but on a different system. A mediocre enemy will expect an attack far away from the feints, and will mobilise forces to anticipate the actual attack. Surprise hmi by pulling a half-dozen Imperials and several Victories into the feinted system and taking it from under their noses. If the enemy reacts poorly, in the surprise you might be able to take another system or two, as well.

 

 

Encirclement: certainly a basic strategy, but I'll put it here all the same. Through combat with your enemy, try to get an idea of his favourite units and how be outfits them. Then look around the planets you own, and see if any of them gives a significant bonus that the enemy would really like. Make sure it's not on the border, but not too deep either. Preferably, have it be one system from your enemy's territory. The pefect border planet would also have a trade route running through it.

 

Remove your space forces from the area - leave it open for him to take. On the bait-world, leave a large ground force, to make it a pain to take. Put in turbolaser batteries and ion cannons, just for fun. If he does want that planet, and isn't any Thrawn, he'll pounce. Wait for him to get to the bait planet, and then jump one force into the border system he took to get there. Take it back, then hold it. Assuming that he's taken the space over the bait-world, but not the ground, you can safely launch a strike force - not from the border, but somewhere else - onto him; prioritise destroying weapon systems. Forget about engines and armor - he's got nowhere to run. If he beats that back, he'll have had quite a few losses, as well as disabled weapons - just mop him up with the border force, if that's the case. At worst, you've lost one strike force, while he's lost a lot more - hopefully a nasty lot of ground forces, and ships to Ion and Turbolaser batteries. Here's where one can hope that there's more to individual battles then "Go here, AI takes over, hope to win". Not to mention, he'll be distracted... so you can always "sneak" another force in somewhere else.

 

Running interference: this is one that involves you knowing well how your enemy plays. If he likes to send spies everywhere to figure out where you're going, then it would be best to try and trick him, to confuse him. Use his studiousness against him. Simply put, create chaos all around. Move your ships to and fro accross the border and trade routes. Lash out randomly with Victory SDs and TIE complements. If you've got a Death Star and that victory condition is off, loose it one some useless planet that gives him low income, a small base and no decent bonuses or heros. Send Darth Vader on a suicide mission into some deep-space Nebula. Make him thing you've gone insane, basically - but make sure you've always got lots of ships, and I mean lots. If you're lucky, he might think you've got some master plan going on and go paranoid. If he can't predict what you're doing, he'll either scramble his forces about and lose track of everything, or he'll decide to stampede into your stronghold and take over. Hopefully though, he'll have difficulty choosing a target, if you are patroling everything evenly. When you can see a large force amassing, however, you know it's time to focus: pull everything somewhere and hit a planet that the enemy considers important. You just have to hope that he doesn't just ignore everything and run over to take some planet YOU hold dear - then again, many players don't take loosing their holdings easily.

[Garbageben]

My tactic for trapping an enemy as the Empire would be an Interdictor (obviously), but since I will be playing rebels most of the time I will have to come up with some of my own ideas.

[Phantom_pff]

A good trap would (if it is possible) Spit you forces in the system before the battle, only works if you know the enemy is going to attack that planet, and have one half hide behind/on the far side of the planet. then once the battle commence, bring that half around into the enemy's flank.

[RogueCommander]

Actually I think you can't go around planets only that part of space you see in the videos/screenshots. Although it would be cool most likely it is just the background.

[Mcas1937]

The Double Faint I think would work well for the Rebels, as they need all the tactical adavage they can get.

[Guest]

"It's a trap!" yup that's ackbar, master of stating the obvious

[Bel_Iblis]

General Garm Bel Iblis reporting for duty.

 

Aight men let me introduce you to a special trap I learned while fighting over the planet Tangrene.

Seeing as skilled Y-Wing pilots have considerable ability to take down Nearly any Ship larger than a patrol vessel, This stategy works well agianst an enemy that is Star Destroyer crazy. Frigates, tho deadly in forces, do not put up a good enough fight alone for the empire to fear them, so of course they are actually willing to attack them when they are alone. Heres how it works. Make yourself 3 Frigates and Put them solo guarding border areas, but in the planet very near to them, preferable behind them, Store up your Y-Wings and X-Wings. Do not, however leave a mear frigate guarding a planet, few Imperials trust a rebel fleet that doesn't have a good X-Wing or Z-95 squadron. On the surface of the bait planet make an Ion cannon to help hold of the ISDs while the Cavalry Arrives. Be watchign careful and use the bothans well, If you notice enemy ships headed to said planet quickly send in the Y-Wings and X-Wings. Due to their increased speed they can easly beat the Large ISDs and arrrive in time to help defend the planet. As soon as you mop up the pathetic imperial fleet, procide with yoru frigate and Y-wings , leave most of  the X-Wings to guard the planet, and attack the planet the Fleet was launched from.

 

(I have used this tactic in the Demo and it works perfectly because so long as your fleet is enroute beofre the battle starts the ycan be called in as reinforcements.)

[CTrooper1]

/qRemove your space forces from the area - leave it open for him to take.  On the bait-world, leave a large ground force, to make it a pain to take.  Put in turbolaser batteries and ion cannons, just for fun.  If he does want that planet, and isn't any Thrawn, he'll pounce.  Wait for him to get to the bait planet, and then jump one force into the border system he took to get there.  Take it back, then hold it.  Assuming that he's taken the space over the bait-world, but not the ground, you can safely launch a strike force - not from the border, but somewhere else - onto him; prioritise destroying weapon systems.  Forget about engines and armor - he's got nowhere to run.  If he beats that back, he'll have had quite a few losses, as well as disabled weapons - just mop him up with the border force, if that's the case.  At worst, you've lost one strike force, while he's lost a lot more - hopefully a nasty lot of ground forces, and ships to Ion and Turbolaser batteries.  Here's where one can hope that there's more to individual battles then "Go here, AI takes over, hope to win".  Not to mention, he'll be distracted... so you can always "sneak" another force in somewhere else./q

 

 

A different way would, as you said leave the space of the planet alone but what i would do along with the ion cannons and so forth if i would station dozons of detachment ships on the planet surface, split them into groups and every so offten attack the transports and ships in space to lower my ground casualties.