A few newbie questions...

[BadAsh]

I'm a brand new player to the game. I love it so far and bought the game and expansion after playing the 7 day free demo last week. I have a few beginner questions.

What is the best way to recruit players into your squad? The stand next to someone and press �G� and then do a menu select method is just not practical in most cases and neither is typing �/invite player name� one at a time. This is especially true when there is activity in the area. Is there a more efficient way to invite people into your squad? If not would a brief local recruiting message be appropriate etiquette or would that be hated spam?

Once I have my squad going how do you identify players as squad leaders so you know who to invite to form up a new platoon?

Finally, does anyone know of a good resource for brand new players? I�m curious about several other things such as game play guides and advice on gaining battle and command experience points and what are good certification and or implant combinations.

Any advice or help would be appreciated! Thanks in advance for your time!

BadAsh
Johari Terran Republic BR 6

[Eldanesh]

How to invite people? Well, the only real ways to do it are the G key -> invite and the /invite functions. I no longer do the whole LFSM as I pull most squaddies from my outfit, but usually in sanctuary you can do a "/b \#c LFSM to (continent) please send tell " and during peak times you can usually find people. Another option is that while at a base if you are sitting on a capture is to look for all people with "Looking for Squad" over their heads. If they are soloing they will usually say no, however there is always a chance. Also, you can tell your squad to let you know if they see anyone LFS and you can invite them from there.

If you want to platoon up, you can also do a broadcast that your squad is LFP.

Oh and also, the reason for the please send /tell is that after they send you a tell that they are LFS, you can just hit your backspace key and it types the /tell<playername> for you and you can replace the tell with invite.

[Dharkbayne]

Good info on that stuff is on this site, welcome to PSU!

[NNY]

join an outfit that is all ready set up it your want to squad up.

here is a tip most ppl dont like a noob as Squadleader

[Kikinchikin]

Originally Posted by NNY

here is a tip most ppl dont like a noob as Squadleader

I would not play with these people. I know that when i did pickup squads (when i was looking for an outfit in between SGE and 7th legion) when i didnt join squads i would join up with someone who looked competent. I remember once having a squad ofall grey uniforms cept for me. Didn't bother me one bit since the guy was doing a decent job on commanding.

but yeah ur gonna run into people who are jerks and people who are good squadmates

[NNY]

when i was a CR 0 and starting a squad at scanc alot of ppl left my squad at soon as they learnd i could not set Way Points. i could not hold a squad untill i joined a good outfit. now every thing is ok i comman a squad half the time im on.

[Jagd]

As for good cert/implant combinations...

Surge (implant), Agile Armor (free!) and the Sweeper Shotgun (medium assault) go together like pimps and hos. And uhh, feathered hats I guess.

Special assault is the most versatile of all weapon certs you can get, and combos very nicely with Reinforced Exosuit and Medium Assault (which you need to have to get Special Assault anyways).

Although it's about as fun to drive as a 1978 Ford cargo van, the AMS is by far the best bang for your buck as a first vehicle. If you're finding yourself irritated at running out of health/ammo all the time, and don't have the points to burn on advanced hacking, medical or engineering, an AMS will make your day and help your squad out huge. Combine an AMS with Combat Engineering and you are a dangerous soloist.

For vehicle combos, though you're probably a little too low level to be worried about these yet, always have one "light" vehicle that can be attained at any base, as well as an "advanced" vehicle that requires a tech plant. This way you'll never be left running across country because some damn cloaker is taking out all the tech plant generators behind the front lines. Example: Lightning first, then Prowler/Van/Mag. Mosquito first, then Reaver or Liberator. Deliver, then Sunderer, etc. Trust me on this one, get the light version before the advanced. Once you've mastered the baby you will own with the daddy, and you won't have to experience the frustration of those deadlocked battles trying to gain a toehold on a continent without access to any transportation for hours at a time.

And here are some other general thoughts about certs--

Unless you've got a good reason to take ATV (ie: you're a cloaker and need the wraith) go for a Harasser instead. They're both 2 points, but the harasser lets you pick up LLU carriers and stray squadmates and they are both available at any friendly (or hacked!) vehicle pad.

Advanced hacking is the most all-around useful skill to have, combat engineering can be a blast if you have some patience but you'll need an AMS or an advanced hacker nearby to use it to full effect, and advanced medical is pretty much a waste of time.

If you find yourself wishing there was a Galaxy pilot/medic/deliverer around more often that's your clue to buy the cert yourself. Too many players horde their certs around heavy assault, special assault, sniping, etc instead of spending a measly 2 or 3 certs on a teamplay cert like the troop carriers. Don't be one of them, and you'll be surprised how much more often your squad pulls off the big base hacks.

Anyways, that's my $.50 on Planetside Certs for Dummies, er sorry Newbies. I'm sure not everyone will agree with all of my points, but please don't flame me just post your own thoughts for this newcomer. Maybe we can consolidate the views of the forum and have Hamma put up a page on PSU with a beginner's guide or something.

[TeraHertz]

I have a newbie question too.
In nearly every FPS I play I go as Combat Engineer or equivilant. I was wondering, is there something like this in Planetside, and if so, what can he do and what would be his common weapons and attributes.

eg. In BattleField 1942, I'm armed with a non-scoped sniper rifle, mines, explosive packs, a thing for fixing vehicles, and a pistol.

[NNY]

you will like Combat eng then you get
1) boomers = is like an explosive pack
2) mines
3) spitfire turrets = is shoots ppl
4)motion sencers

and for normel ENG you get
to fix Vehicles and ppl armor

[TeraHertz]

Can I carry a sniper rifle (or some other long range accurate and powerful weapon against infantry) with that setup?

I like weapons that hit hard, and are accurate. I tend to dislike rapid fire weapons. Even in close combat I usualy take a pot shot with my rifle, then finish people with my pistol of BF.


What would you recommend?

[Eldanesh]

A CE (combat engineer) is 5 certs to get, 3 for engineering,+2 for combat. engineering gives you 2 tools to use in pistol/rifle slots, the rifle slot fixes vehicles and equipment, the pistol fixes infantry and maxes.

CE gets you the ability to use an ACE (takes up a pistol slot) you can deploy the ace to lay mines outdoors, spitfire turrets (light defence turrets) outdoors in neutral or friendly SOI, motion sensors (again, neutral/friendly areas only) and boomers, or heavy explosives. (deployable anywhere you can think of, but can still get a lil green light to show. )

So at Br 6 you can get CE, medium assault, and AMS/ harasser.

EDIT:: Doh! curse my slow hands, but yeah, you can still carry sniper rifle. sniping is another 3 certs however. Me, I use sweeper 90% of the time. love that gun!

[Jagd]

edit: Woops, beat me to it and said almost exactly what I did.

Medium assault / sweeper shotgun is the best choice, as is AMS for your vehicle. Sniping is kind of weak, especially compared to BF1942. My Konreid character was built on Medium Assault, AMS, then Engineer, then Combat Engineer. Now he is also an infiltrator with an Anti-Air MAX and damn can he ever solo well.

Oh yeah, and instead of a Wrench, in Planetside it's called a Glue Gun.

[TeraHertz]

Christ, sounds like It'll take ages to anywhere up to an effective level.

[Jagd]

No, by BR6 you can have a pretty decent set of certs under your belt, and it doesn't take long to get there if you've got twitch skillz and/or a good squad to play with. Remember that getting to BR3 is "free" cause you can go to VR training to level up at first, and the next few levels zoom by in like 3 or 4 base captures.

[gonnagetyou]

Jump into the fight and you'll pick up BEP pretty quick. For me BR 16 was when it started feeling like the next BR would take forever.