Robocraft: Rosefall's Ravager
With the advent of aeroflak, my beloved plasma bomber is no longer my prime choice. For a while, I favoured my SMG mechs and then LML came along, which not only put further back the viability of fliers but also put to question of which ground SMG is best suited for current meta.
If you want fast ground bots that can quickly take cover from missiles, then SMG cruiser or hover are the best. However, the former loses control too easily, especially on ice, and the latter is susceptible to flak (as stated previously). SMG mech is great at tanking and also jumping to avoid plasma shot but jumping makes it vulnerable to flak too.
Tesseract is still the best flying bot around but only if you're able to control it well. Sadly, I'm not.
So I usually just cycled through the current bots I have, playing many TDMs. I bought a few bots to try out, including a tesla plasma of which I was so bad at piloting it :) I did consider getting a walker copter rail bot but decided to wait until the next major patch which will introduce 2 modules - blink and shield - that surely will shift the meta again.
After playing gazillion number of TDM games (TDM earns many times more RP than BA, given the same period of time), I started to crave for BA games. I played maybe 3 BA games each day and I concluded that the best bot in my inventory for current meta, at least in BA, is Rosefall's Ravager.
Sorry for the bland colour. There are only 4 non-premium colours to choose from: sky blue, orange, white or grey. You can use a mixture of colours, of course, but I think a monotone grey gives the best camouflage to the bot for all maps. Yes, there are better monocolours tailored for each map but since I don't know which map I'll get, grey is the best.
This is a walker copter flak bot but it's used mainly as a walker i.e. find a good spot to perch on and snipe from there. The rotor blades merely improve its mobility.
Its back has the tendency to want to lift up. Too much uplift by the rotor blades? Also, if it knocks onto something while in the air, it wants to flip on its back @@. Its gun, being top mounted, has problem shooting directly below. Perching is the key. Of course you can also shoot when you're at ground-level with the enemy but that's not advisable (the bot is not a tank!) unless the enemy is nearly dead.
Other than that, it's a great bot to use but as with any bots, how you play it matters a lot. As stated above, need to find a good spot to perch and also to hide from enemy's fire. I commonly encountered many shots from rails, LML and flaks, and the occasional plasma shot from fliers.
Although some may think a flak bot is easy to use, it is not as a youtuber (either Lathland or Aavak) discovered. You have to learn to lead the enemies i.e. predict where they would go. It probably has the hardest time shooting ground bots than any other weapons. Took me a while to learn this.
My primary targets are fliers of course. Then it's whatever the situation demands. Enemy rail harassing team mates? Give him a few shots to make him retreat. Enemy LML? Degun him. Flak cannon has much more health than LML and I often outduel enemy LML. Enemy SMG/plasma is battering team's medic? Flak him.
At all times, be aware of the situation. Look around. Look at mini-map. Make sure there's suitable cover to use and use it frequently
One serious drawback of a flak bot is that it is a hard counter to fliers and hence if there are no fliers, then you'll have difficult time to shine, unless enemy's hover and mech bots oblige you by hovering high and jumping, respectively. This happened to me in one BA. Our team lost and I didn't do well in my team. Fortunately, it appears that copter LMLs are popular and there's also usually one plasma bomber and/or copter rail and so I continue to use Ravager for BA.
My best performance to date using Ravager:
Usually I'll be in the top 5 of the scoreboard, without the victory bonus.
Well, things will change drastically once the 2 modules come in. I'll probably take a short break shortly after they are introduced and monitor the game via youtubers. Almost surely a game changer.
If you want fast ground bots that can quickly take cover from missiles, then SMG cruiser or hover are the best. However, the former loses control too easily, especially on ice, and the latter is susceptible to flak (as stated previously). SMG mech is great at tanking and also jumping to avoid plasma shot but jumping makes it vulnerable to flak too.
Tesseract is still the best flying bot around but only if you're able to control it well. Sadly, I'm not.
So I usually just cycled through the current bots I have, playing many TDMs. I bought a few bots to try out, including a tesla plasma of which I was so bad at piloting it :) I did consider getting a walker copter rail bot but decided to wait until the next major patch which will introduce 2 modules - blink and shield - that surely will shift the meta again.
After playing gazillion number of TDM games (TDM earns many times more RP than BA, given the same period of time), I started to crave for BA games. I played maybe 3 BA games each day and I concluded that the best bot in my inventory for current meta, at least in BA, is Rosefall's Ravager.
Sorry for the bland colour. There are only 4 non-premium colours to choose from: sky blue, orange, white or grey. You can use a mixture of colours, of course, but I think a monotone grey gives the best camouflage to the bot for all maps. Yes, there are better monocolours tailored for each map but since I don't know which map I'll get, grey is the best.
This is a walker copter flak bot but it's used mainly as a walker i.e. find a good spot to perch on and snipe from there. The rotor blades merely improve its mobility.
Its back has the tendency to want to lift up. Too much uplift by the rotor blades? Also, if it knocks onto something while in the air, it wants to flip on its back @@. Its gun, being top mounted, has problem shooting directly below. Perching is the key. Of course you can also shoot when you're at ground-level with the enemy but that's not advisable (the bot is not a tank!) unless the enemy is nearly dead.
Other than that, it's a great bot to use but as with any bots, how you play it matters a lot. As stated above, need to find a good spot to perch and also to hide from enemy's fire. I commonly encountered many shots from rails, LML and flaks, and the occasional plasma shot from fliers.
Although some may think a flak bot is easy to use, it is not as a youtuber (either Lathland or Aavak) discovered. You have to learn to lead the enemies i.e. predict where they would go. It probably has the hardest time shooting ground bots than any other weapons. Took me a while to learn this.
My primary targets are fliers of course. Then it's whatever the situation demands. Enemy rail harassing team mates? Give him a few shots to make him retreat. Enemy LML? Degun him. Flak cannon has much more health than LML and I often outduel enemy LML. Enemy SMG/plasma is battering team's medic? Flak him.
At all times, be aware of the situation. Look around. Look at mini-map. Make sure there's suitable cover to use and use it frequently
One serious drawback of a flak bot is that it is a hard counter to fliers and hence if there are no fliers, then you'll have difficult time to shine, unless enemy's hover and mech bots oblige you by hovering high and jumping, respectively. This happened to me in one BA. Our team lost and I didn't do well in my team. Fortunately, it appears that copter LMLs are popular and there's also usually one plasma bomber and/or copter rail and so I continue to use Ravager for BA.
My best performance to date using Ravager:
Usually I'll be in the top 5 of the scoreboard, without the victory bonus.
Well, things will change drastically once the 2 modules come in. I'll probably take a short break shortly after they are introduced and monitor the game via youtubers. Almost surely a game changer.
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