Picard maneuver

[Stateofpsychosis]

so I've been having some fun experimenting with using the lock to target plus the launch during combat to do something sort of like a picard maneuver...
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[Picard maneuver]

all you do is approach the enemy from a distance.. open your targeting panel (F1), then while keeping the enemy in front of you in the gyroscope watch the range for ship you're targeting on the bottom right hand side. when you get to under 1000 kms range, hit "set location".... immediately hit (F1 again) get some shots in, now hit your booster and get about 3-5000 km away from the targeted ship.... now if they're slow moving they'll be near enough to the target that you will be in the range when you jump... if they're too fast what you need to do is watch the gyroscope while getting them to chase you and get the yellow target in line with the red target....

after you have them lined up.... it's essential that you have them dead center in your crosshairs.. if it's even a little bit off your fire won't hit them midst the jump... you'll end up on their side...
because it's hard to get dead center.. i like to just aim a little downward and focus on getting them centered horizontally..
because it's more like the picard maneuver if you warp or jump to the underbelly of the ship you're firing on.

once you have them in your crosshairs, hit the jump button (F2), then immediately fire when they're close enough during the launch, and when you come out of the launch get them in your crosshairs again and fire away... it's preferable for them to be in your crosshairs when you come out of the launch but that requires luck.

anyways,
this trick isn't very useful half the time unfortunately
it is a way to do firing runs while taking on little fire yourself
but you give the enemy ship too much of a chance to build their shields up.

the only way it's really effective is when you both get them dead center in your crosshairs while jumping and firing while also jumping in close enough to continue doing damage to them.

....you can also just gun it as fast as you can getting them to follow you, then they'll be in a strait line sooner or later, then hit the set location button in your launch panel again, and you know the rest.. I don't like this one though because you usually launch in close enough. getting them in line isn't everything.

there are a few ways to do this anyways.

*you can use the "form with target" option in your launch panel to help you with yellow targets not red enemies though.


[Edited on 12-21-2013 by Stateofpsychosis]

[Stateofpsychosis]

there's something special about targeting manually like that. i don't know I suggest turning down your joystick sensitivity to medium as well by the way

[SeeJay]

Hi and welcome.

Sounds like a cool and effective move. Never tried that before but I'll give it a go and see how it works for me.

Normally I jump in the middle of the bad guy's and fight my way out LOL!:D

[Marvin]

Nice analysis. You should have a great time figuring out how to take on a capital ship ... or Vonari fighters (they move even faster).

[Stateofpsychosis]

yea jumping into a hoard like that is fun too I agree.

oh yea i'm nowhere near trying to take on a capital ship yet

going to need to do a lot of upgrades to try that

[Stateofpsychosis]

only chance i have on taking down a capital ship is if I blow up close enough to it

[Nigel_Strange]

In my old Captain Devious stories, I went into some of my tactics. I would pop in at a distance, let my shields/weapons recharge, and then pull the enemy fighters away from the group and kill them off one at a time.

As for capital ships, I used to be quite professional at taking them out in Legends, but now it is a little more difficult. It can be done, but it is not as easy as it was. The tactic is to target the weapon system, get in really close, and let loose with the missiles (I usually use Excals). When the weapon system is down (if I managed to hit it) then the rest is just whittling down the shields.

I would like to see this Picard maneuver. Perhaps you could make a video? The closest I have done involved Fulcrum Torpedoes and jumping out before the explosion. The problem is that I never actually confirm that it hit anything.

[Stateofpsychosis]

Nah sorry you're going to have to try it yourself.
I only have 2 gigs of ram

my computer wouldn't be able to handle having a video program running while playing it

I can't even land on earth like planets without the game crashing unfortunately
even trying modding the game textures down to 8 bit, turning off the water effects, etc
still crashes

so i wouldn't risk trying that

anyways, follow the instructions and you can pull it off as well

it takes a few tries to be lucky enough to have them slow down enough for it to work though

[Marvin]

When completing a "smuggler" contract, the target is never red until you start firing. After it turns red, the "formation" option should break lock,

[DaveK]

Hi Stateofpsychosis

This sounds like real fun. In combat I always get blown up looking like total twit - with this manouvre I can get blown up looking cool!

To tidy up this thread and avoid confusion you can delete your own redundant posts (EDIT and then tick the 'delete this post' box. You can also delete all the [Edited on . . . ] lines at the end of the post - a new one will be automatically created when you upload the changes.

I suggest you put the most recent instructions in the first post and delete the various versions of instruction lower down - then everyone knows where to find the latest version (just like with mod posts )

I'm going to try this out as soon as I can use a joystick again!

[Stateofpsychosis]

okay I think i cleaned it up enough

good point

did you break your joystick or something?

[Rubber Chicken]

.....The tactic is to target the weapon system, get in really close, and let loose with the missiles (I usually use Excals). When the weapon system is down (if I managed to hit it) then the rest is just whittling down the shields.

Getting a rage missile or two past the cap's point defense lasers works too. A high speed strafing run (faster than the flak and particle fire aiming) and a salvo at the closest you can get usually works.

[DaveK]

okay I think i cleaned it up enough

good point

did you break your joystick or something?

Yep - it's much clearer!

And nope - I damaged my arm sawing wood and then falling off a wall onto it! Got to be rested for a month or so

[Stateofpsychosis]

oh geez that sucks. If I were you i'd play point and click games or turn based rpgs for a month...

those don't require a lot of physical effort.

something along those lines anyways

[-splosives-]

I used this trick with fulcrum torpedoes a lot. set loc, wait for your target to be within 2000 meters, jump, fire torpedo, watch the fireworks from a distance. Not very useful with just guns though.

But that's from the past. Because my 2013 new year's resolution was to never use FT's ever again, and I haven't used them ever since.

[Stateofpsychosis]

yea their shields regenerate too fast for guns to be useful with this unless you're fighting an easy target or something.