Author: LocutusXavier
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I know that most of you veterans will think this is obvious stuff, and I apologize if I'm wasting anyone's time, but for me it's a good exercise, and I think we have enough new recruits here that might find this helps clear up the global strategy issues. Note that I'm not taking the caves into account here, but I'll save that for another guide. My intent is that this would make a good primer for an outfit leader.
Goals. We must start with the end in mind. The goal that we all share in playing Planetside is to have fun. I propose that it's more fun to fight a well matched battle and win than it is to fight a well matched battle and lose. In addition, when we win, we get BEP and CEP, both of which ultimately provide us with more toys, especially the ultra-fun orbital strike ability.
If two empires fight on a continent, and both empires lock the continent, then essentially we have equal sized forces. The only difference is skill level and lattice/empire/module benefits. Lattice benefits are determined by the battle itself, and I want to ignore caves and modules for a moment, so that leaves us with empire benefits that are gained by holding each of the 4 neutral continents. All other things being equal, holding empire benefits should translate into capturing more territory on any given continent. Currently, the VS usually hold most of the 4 neutral continents, and they also tend to capture and defend territory better than we do. I submit that as evidence supporting my claim.
Therefore, I am claiming that capturing and holding the empire benefits (specifically the shield and repair benefits) are the first steps toward having more fun. What follows is my reasoning on this issue.
Let's start with the image of the lattice that the Dev's provided us:
Global lattice picture provided by Devs
Well, that's pretty and all, but I'm a visual guy, and that map just doesn't give you a good feel for where the battle lines are drawn. Here's the real deal that I came up with:
Blue is us, the good guys. Red is the evil TR, and pink is for... well, you get the idea. I think this is as simple as you can get. Looking at that, it all looks nice and balanced, doesn't it? Well, it's not.
I'm going to refer to the actual continent maps and their bases quite a bit, so I suggest you go here to follow along:
New lattice maps from Planetside Idea Lab
Now, let's talk about home continents. They form a ring around the battlefield. As far as I'm concerned, their only strategic purpose is to provide links to the 4 neutral continents. Holding both of an opposing empire's home continents will give you access to their vehicles, but I don't think there's any value in that. I know how to drive and gun a vanguard, but if I go and pull a magrider, I wouldn't know what to do with it. Novelty is one thing, but I don't see a use for it. If we win the war, I'll pull a magrider and go for a joy ride. On the other hand, attacking Amerish (VS) or Ceryshen (TR) threatens their link to the neutral continents, and might be a good diversionary tactic in some cases, but most times we're just going to help the third empire. Note that if we take both Amerish and Ceryshen, then we hold all of the links to Searhus, so we would get that by default, but that's nothing more than an interesting footnote..
Notice that Esamir and Forseral are the furthest continents away from us (3 hops from the sanctuary). These 2 continents are where the VS and TR fight each other, and when they are occupied with each other, they're not bothering us. If we ever go to Esamir or Forseral, we're always going to become the cream filling in the oreo cookie, and that's always a bad thing. I don't see any decent reason to go there unless we have every other continent locked. I can't stress this enough. Every time I see us fighting on Esamir or Forseral, I cringe, because that means we're probably losing more valuable ground elsewhere. I know Forseral is pretty, and all, but we need to stop going there.
Our (NC) home continents are the easiest to invade of all others, because Ghanon on Hossin and Seth on Solsar are both tech plants one link in from the warp gate. Amerish, Esamir and Forseral do not have 1 link tech plants. Ceryshen does. That means we can attack Ceryshen easier than we can attack Amerish, but who cares, because we shouldn't do that. Let the TR feel safe on their home continent, and they won't bother us. If they don't fight us there, then there's a greater than 50% chance they'll attack the VS.
The fact that we need our home continents, and the other empires need their home continents, but we don't get much by invading theirs leads me to this declaration of strategy #1:
Defend Hossin and Solsar. Don't bother with Amerish or Ceryshen.
Now, let's talk more about Searhus. First of all, I question the usefulness of the benefit (faster respawn). Does it really turn the tide of a battle? Do we want to rely on zerg tactics? However, both we and the TR have a strategic advantage when invading Searhus - we're both 2 links away from a tech plant (Tara), but the VS are 3 links away (Kanhi). If we ever did take Ceryshen, then Searhus becomes only a 2 way battle and we have a distinct advantage.
On Ishundar, every empire has a tech plant as their first link, so it's easy to break into, compared to Searhus. The empire benefit for Ishundar is vehicle shields - very useful in both an offensive and defensive role. This continent is worth capturing. After it's captured though, we don't need to hold it. If we hold it, we're the cream in the oreo again, but have a look at the map. We can fall all the way back to just holding Baal, Dagon, and Akkan, and that gives us a very defensible position (remember we have vehicle shields because we were the last to lock Ishundar). We would have tech, fast respawn, shields, and repair. Plus, both the VS and TR will start fighting over Enkidu, and they might just leave us alone (remember they're still fighting on Esamir-Forseral too). Therefore, I declare this strategy #2:
Take Ishundar, then fall back and hold at Akkan and Dagon. Attack the stronger empire to keep them stalemated.
How about Oshur? Look, the NC is the only empire whose first link to Oshur is a tech plant! Great! NOT! Those tech plants on Desolation do nothing for us, because we can't pull Vanguards or Reavers. The only thing we have going for us is that all three bases on Desolation are LLU runs (excluding the first one, of course, because we have nowhere to run it to, so it's a hack and hold). That means an organized force can take all of Desolation in about 20 minutes. Still, the NC is at a disadvantage on Oshur. The benefit is vehicle repair (dropship benefit). Repair and shields are the two most important benefits, so Oshur is worth attacking.That's strategy #3:
Take Oshur.
Once we have the Ishundar and Oshur benefits, only then does it make sense to push forward elsewhere. So, let's get a mental picture of where we are... we hold Hossin, Solsar, we have the empire benefits from Ishundar and Oshur, but we don't keep those locked. To the other 2 empires, at this point we should look non-threatening (after all, we're on the run, and the TR and VS are presumably fighting on every other continent).
I thought it would then make sense to hit both Searhus and Ceryshen simultaneously. I say Ceryshen because it's easy to get a foothold, and hitting Ceryshen helps to take the pressure off of Searhus. We already have the advantage over the VS on Searhus, so if we deflect the TR, we should get Searhus. The problem is, that's going to tick off the TR, and that's where it all falls apart. The TR will turn their attention to us, the VS will then only have us to deal with on Ishundar and Oshur, and we'll have to give something up. Therefore, I suggest the only valid next step is strategy #4:
Take Cyssor.
Cyssor is like Ishundar - each empire has a tech plant as their first link. But, we and the VS have a hard time pushing past that first base, because both empires have to travel across bridge choke points to do it. If Aja is well defended, it's nearly impossible for armor to push from Wele to Aja. Therefore, any NC assault on Cyssor needs to be co-ordinated. Two forces need to attack at the same time; one needs to take Wele, and the other needs to occupy Bomazi until the Wele hack goes through. Bomazi is an LLU run, and can be taken quickly, and then our forces can pull armor from Bomazi and swarm Aja from the rear. Think of this strategy as a blitzkreig. Note that having Wele-Aja-Bomazi is also a defensible position. If we take Cyssor, we can still fall back to this position, let the TR and VS fight at Gunuku, and we still hold the empire benefit. In this case, the benefit is +5% armor, which isn't really that important, but it's easier to attack Cyssor than Searhus. After you've taken Cyssor:
Take Searhus.
That's it, nothing fancy. Nobody else wants Searhus bad enough to bother with it when Ishundar and Oshur are up for grabs. Those two continents have juicy benefits. Attacking Searhus shouldn't upset the balance between the VS and TR, but it might draw their attention, and if someone attacks us on Searhus, that's not a bad thing. We can afford to lose that. If they don't attack, then we get faster respawn.
To recap, here it is in order of priority:
1. Home (Hossin/Solsar).
2. Ishundar (for shields).
3. Oshur (for repair).
4. Cyssor (for +5% armor).
5. Searhus (for faster respawn).
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