Commanding on Karkand

DrunkenSoul · 01-20-2006, 05:16 PM

64 player Karkand includes bleed, so it is usually to your advantage to cap 5 flags.
The majority of the time, this map turns into a river stalemate where one team holds the east side (usually MEC) and the other team holds the west side (usually USMC)

** This is just a general guideline, assuming squads are with 5+ people and you dont have many squads with few members**
*Feel free to give some suggestions. I am not the best commander, I just decided to give some insight to commanders on things that they should watch out for when playing this map*

What should be done when you start out in the beginning
As MEC
1.)Leave a squad to defend eastern side using ALL Armor. The best way would be to an apc at bridge, tank at land bridge and APC in water southeast of land bridge to watch for swimmers and apcs in water.
2.)Have 2 squads spawn at Suburb and defend it. Might have one stay at flag and the other defending south of the suburb (near the ramp)
3.)2 squads defend the hotel. One east of the hotel to see if any Get ohumvees/apcs/tanks drive by and have one defending the flag.
4.)Use last squad as a defensive barrier at the square watching roads leading to it from hotel and make sure tanks dont get buy using the ramp to train accident.
5.)Also you might have a squad spawn with AT's and Spec Ops to pick off apcs if they try to use the east hills straight to the water.
6.)Once you lose the flag, have 2 squads at Suburb, 2 at train accident, 1 defending east, and one covering land bridge on west side of river.
7.)IMO the suburb and train accident are the easiest to defend and using 2 squads at each, you should be able to hold it for a long time.
8.)All this is done to hold a ticket bleed and increase your ticket lead as long as possible.
9.)Usually you will end up losing the Suburb, so in this case have 3 squads defending the east side and have the other 3 defending the train accident using 1 armor on the bridge for support.

As USMC
1.)Try to use your APCS to get over to east ASAP. Probably have 2 different squads one in each and have one in the water while the other using the shoreline and goes north of the bridge
2.)If that fails, try to use APC's to get at least the Train accident and hold that.
3.)Use 2 squads to try and take suburbs.
4.)2 most important flags for USMC are suburbs and train accident (on western side). If you dont get square or hotel at first, its ok because those arent too hard to get if you have other flags on the west side.
5.) Try to get 4 flags as soon as possible to stop bleed.
6.) If you have 3 western flags and cannot get the train accident for instance, have 2 squads make a hard push for land bridge to eastern side to divert the enemies attention and have more squads help out there, and then have the remaining squads hit the train accident from all sides.

Some tips once this river battle begins:
1.) Make sure to have squads covering both the bridge and land bridge
2.) Tell a squad to destory the bridge if you don't see yourself sending a squad to the other side in the near future.
3.) Spread out ur armor. Each side has 2 APC's and a Tank make sure you tell ur squads where to place them so all 3 are not bunched up. Have at least Bridge and land bridge covered.
4.) Watch for APCs using the water. Either south of the land bridge or north of the regular bridge
5.) Remind squads to have a least one medic and revive as many people as possible even if they are not in your squad
6.) Have a timer (refer to game time, your arty time) to see when the other commanders arty is charged and tell squads to spread out from each other once the enemies arty is replenished.

Many times you are down in tickets (100 or more) and you need to get across to the other side.

Best ways to break the river battle
1.) Have 2 squads attack while the others mantain positions
2.) Either attack through the bridge or land bridge. Have one squad use the APC(s) and use the water while the other squad puts pressure using the bridge or land bridge with the tank or other APC. If you plan to use the bridge, have the APC go into water north of bridge and push across once your other squad maintains a steady assaulting from at least the middle part of the bridge. This squad on the bridge should use a tank or an apc. If attacking through land bridge to the same thing except go south of the land bridge with apc and have another squad push through on the land bridge.
3.) Probably the best way to pull this off is to have arty hit the enemy stronghold whereever you want to attack and the instance your arty starts hitting them tell your squads to go. The enemy forces should either be dead or concerned about running from arty. The objective of the squad on the bridge/land bridge is to distract the majority of thier forces and armor while the apcs try to get on land as fast as possible.
4.)If the water apcs take most of the attention, have the other squad push in with the tank/humvee/whatever they have.
5.) Best flags to hit: Factory as USMC. Suburb as MEC.

If you lose a back flag. Dont panic:
1.) Dont send all squads back to capture the flag you lost. If you do, a smart squad/commander from the other team will start capturing the flags/areas u leave.
2.) IMO i think it is best to send 2~3 squads to contain the forces and retake the flag. Make sure to bring some armor to help.
3.) Leave 3 squads defending the river. Since you have no armor support for them, make sure to tell them to load up on AT's and mines.
4.)If too many of them spawn at the flag you lost, go ahead a send a squad to the other side of the map and try to capture some flags.

If you manage to take the subub/factory and have bleed, keep a few squads on the flag to defend. Dont send too many guys to defend or else you are vunerable on your side of the river. If the enemy sends massive amounts of troops to retake that flag, go ahead and send some squads to take other flags from thier side. For example, if the MEC capture the Suburb and 3 USMC squads attack the flag, leaving the land bridge wide open, send a squad or 2 to take the Square or another flag, but make sure to defend your side of the river at all times.

I will include some ATC pictures and diagrams later tonight. Also will include some tips on what each side should do before the river battle actually begins

TheRooster1 · 01-20-2006, 05:35 PM

We had a very bloody standoff a few nights ago on Karkand. It was just as DrunkenSoul described. We were MEC on the east side. I had a squad with 4 AT, I was support and MedicRus was, well, medic.

It was damn fun. We had the lead, so we were content to try and hold on for the 20 remaining minutes. We were protecting the land bridge. The US would try to run across with Humvees, APCs, etc. MY squad would open up with three AT rockets right off the bat. . .BOOM. Very very fun. Eventually the standoff broke and we won the war.

Drunken makes a great point. . .whenever we lost a back flag, we stayed at the land bridge. we had no CO, so I would watch the map and make sure at least one squad was heading to re-cap. we just hung tight.

DrunkenSoul · 01-21-2006, 04:05 AM

edited with things that commanders could try before a river battle occurs. Maps to come next. Feel free to give suggestions

-=[dMw]=-DuVeL · 01-21-2006, 05:28 AM

I gave some tips on our own forums but I'm willing to share tactics. I do have to say that my tactics are more for publicservers but they work great.

One of the most played maps is Karkand. What happens everytime is that the US side are doing a runner for the backflags and want to take out the main MECbase as soon as possible to take down the Arty/UAV. The MEC's allways spawn on the Hotel for the easy frags (and a few try and take the tank from the base where the Arty/UAV is).
I allways try and be the MECcommander on this map since it's an easy map but by being the commander you can make an easy defence for your Arty/UAV.

So you got the Commanderrole. First start off as SpecOps and spawn at the trainaccident. Take the Vodnik there, pass the first bridge towards your Arty/UAV and blow up the bridge behind you (usually someone wants to pass with the tank first).
Place a supplydrop on the docks near the little hut where people can drive a Jeep/Tank/APC through the water (rivercrossing). Get your new C4 from the supplydrop and place it just behind the ramp/on the docks. There's a little ledge so if you drop it behind the ledge a Jeep/Tank/APC wont see it. Run back to the hut and resupply on C4. Switch to detonate and just wait for the USside to roll in.
They will keep on trying to get over and you just keep resuplying yourself with C4 since you are the commander (and can give yourself all the supplydrops you need). I got a lot of kills that way because the USside hardly use Engineers on this map so they can't repair the bridge. Most of them start as SpecOps so they can blow up the Arty/UAV and get points that way.

The USside allways tryes and take Suburbs first and then Trainaccident or your mainbase. On every ranked server I've played it happend the same way.
The US overruns the MECside because the MECside is guarding the Hotel and no other flags (some try and defend but this happends not that often). The MEC Arty/UAV gets blown up and they loose their mainbase, loosing the tank (which is an important vehicle on this map). But you as the commander have stopped the USside from overtaking the MainMECbase and gave the MECside atleast 1 spawnpoint to keep on fighting from. Usually Squadleaders will see that you've defended the MainMECbase and will and try and help out.
If you've lost all the other bases as the MECcommander, put the UAVoverflight exactly between the bridge and the rivercrossing so you can see if they are trying to move over. Most MECcommanders place the UAVoverflight only on the Trainaccident and don't guard the rivercrossing.