Arithea

Leaving the African theater for a while, let's talk about Belgrade. Since our second server has been all Belgrade, all the time, it should be pretty fresh in our minds. Seeing as how this is a head-on map, we'll just have the one discussion thread.

So, what's your favorite strategy? Do you stick with the tried-and-true buggy rush to the furthest flag from your uncap? Or do you go directly for the action with a rush to Com Tower or Statue? How do you use the armor (and the Rorsches, for that matter) to best effect on this map? What are your favorite choke points to control--or are there any good ones?

Discuss!

Fine print: Anything you say can and will be used to educate n00bs via TacticalWiki.

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Icehawk217

My favorite strategy is:

For Both Sides....
-Buggy rush to Statue, to cap and get the walker
-Take the other buggy and go to either Com Tower or Playground, depending on opening team.


-As PAC, the tank goes to defend the main road, APC goes to Ruins, and infantry takes Pond.
-APC then goes up on main road so as to help destroy enemy armor
-APC then bombards infantry around the playground flag.

-As EU, the tank and APC should immediately go to the main road and help support Statue.
-The buggy rush to Playground should have a squad that goes to Com Tower, leaving one behind to cap Playground itself
-The APC will aid the advance to Com Tower by mortaring enemies
-A squad should also wait at Monorail if people are available given the chance of a PAC buggy rush there


At this point, it is just a matter of keeping a flag majority and making sure we keep statue to hold the walker. Armor moves as necessary to destroy enemy armor or stop infantry advances.

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"Give a man a match and he'll be warm for a minute. Light the man on fire, and he will be warm for the rest of his life"

Zhohar

To what end? To capture a walker and get the higher ground?

Both of those sound fine, walker being arguably one of the strongest pieces of armor in the game and highground being one of the most formidable tactical advantages a team can have, but how much of a difference do those two really make?

1. Statue offers little advantage to foot soldiers.
Between Statue and every other flag lies a wide road. It offers absolutely no cover for advancing infantry. This means that an infantry push can be easily stopped by the defenders at Comm Tower, Playground and Ruins.
Equally, that very road is also usually littered with armor, further reducing any advantage the Statue flag may have given to regular infantry.

2. The walker, when played offensively, provides very little advantage.
If the walker is outside the safety of the Statue walls, it usually falls within two minutes to Tanks, APCs, Rorsches, and unfriendly engineers.

I'm not aiming to be pessimistic, but Statue should not be as much of a focus as it is. It does offer a tactical advantage, I don't deny that, but it is not the key to winning the map.

Of course, the bottom line are the people playing. If two squads can be coordinated such that one fires rockets constantly on Ruins flags from Statue and the other moves in to capture the flag, the highground of Statue does pay off.
And equally, if the walker is piloted by a defensive driver, the main road can be completely clear of enemy armor.

My experience puts Statue Capture as the second strategy on the map. The first would be to capture Comm Tower and hold it.

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Specterr

I generally like to cap statue first just to ensure our team gets the walker...in the right hands it can be useful, and in the right enemy hands it can be a serious pain so I'd still prefer to deny it to the enemy over a quick Comm cap. I never try to hold statue though, once the walker is up it's not a priority flag for me.

I find Comm a lot easier to take than hold, so I don't mind putting off assaulting it until after Statue is secure.

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SithJedi

[quote=Zhohar;917812]To what end? To capture a walker and get the higher ground?


2. The walker, when played offensively, provides very little advantage.
If the walker is outside the safety of the Statue walls, it usually falls within two minutes to Tanks, APCs, Rorsches, and unfriendly engineers.

QUOTE]

Disagree, a Walker is very vunerbale in this environment espeiclaly from the forest at Comm Tower but grouping up with an Apc filled with engineers will help it surivive the ordeal.

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Proud Battlefield 2142 Player Since November 21st, 2006

MDFubar

Ok, many have played with me in this map and it comes as no suprise when I say that my first goal is Statue. I typically take a buggy and move to Statue, then SB the flag. If the enemy is already there, our job is to kick them out.
My Squad load out:
SL - Engy with MMBait and MM, Spanky and Pilum
Sm1 - Engy with MM and IDS
Sm2 and 3 - Assualt - rockets and Defib
SM4 and 5 - Support - weapon of choice and IDS with Emps

Roll into Statue and control one building(north or south depending on our approach), set MM, assess the situation and move in. Now, obviously if we don't get them off the flag right away we will be outnumbered by reinforcments spawning in.
Once we have the flag, we set up a defense with the Engy's laying mines on the approach closest to the enemy UCB. If we have the walker, it stays with us and provides cover fire for infantry to Ruins(we are defending so another squad will attack). From our position other squads can spawn in and attack in two directions. With the Engy's doing thier job, we can effectively neutralize the enemy armor. Many times I will either send myself or another SM to flank enemy armor approaching Statue. Two engy's and a wlaker engaging an APC ro Tank can be overwhelming.
If we are not heavily assaulted I will send a portion of my squad to assist at either Ruins or Comm. If We get attacked, I call them back or they spawn on me when they die.
The other Strat is to avoid armor and Hoof it to flags, I usually take a "cap and run" mentality. We cap the flag, clear it and move to another. If there is another squad on the flag with us, we just cap it and move. I usually leave the flag area and probe the next objective to inform the squad where to move.

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rage4order

While SL'ing for PAC everyone goes to statue so I prefer to go to Monorail. If you set up there correctly, you can deny EU their armor for the entire round. It is a battle, usually pretty nasty especially if somone has not taken playground and you are being assaulted from both flanks. I personally have found some of my best rounds to be defending Monorail as PAC.

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|TG-8th|RAGE

daithi1

I think probably the best way might be to send two squads to Comm and one to Statue. The walker can be a game-breaker so maybe it should be two to Statue and one to Comm. I disagree also with Zhohar that squads can't use Statue as a launch to go to Ruins and Playground. If the enemy hold Comm then there is usually no defense at Playground allowing a quick sprint across the round quick cap and then on to Monorail, while some of their defense is gone maybe the rest of your team can cap Comm.

In my eyes capping back flags on Belgrade with the possible exception of Monorail (and less so pond) are just diversions so the rest of your team may cap a different flag. I'm probably wrong.

When commanding I prefer to hold Statue rather than Comm, it's easier to defend and a lot of squads hate pushing on it. I'm repeating myself kind of now. It's easier to cap Comm holding statue then cap Statue holding Comm.

At the end of the day the team which holds bleed longer will probably win. Buggy rushes to pond or monorail work a lot more than people give them credit for. It's and underused strategy in my opinion. I have yet to see emp mines used anywhere on Belgrade except possibly Statue.

Another thing that works very well on Belgrade is asset destroyers. Destroy two assets. Hide, wait to see if CO will repair assets using boxes. If Co drops a box to repair and asset happy days CO gets no assets. This is why I think RDX and Ghost Recon would work better than RDX and Camo. Well this is based on Sat Track not picking up Ghost Reconers which I'm till not sure of (I'll regret saying this). CO gets distracted/loses assets and usually the destroyer will get away scot free. At best he might get an enemy squad chasing him around the UCB.

Thats me finished. Although I am deadly serious about the effects of asset destroyers.

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Sythos

I like grabbing the walker then walking it into comm tower, but other than that. As PAC I will wait for a few minutes then rush monorail and hold there for the rest of the game, and as EU I take statue then use the walker to move on ruins and pond.

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|TG-Irr|Sythos

Xbox Live= Latius

Lorax74

Statue is a good flag to hold if only for intel purposes alone. From statue, you have a good vantage point to see what's going on at Ruins and Playground and sometimes Comm tower. Statue also allows your team to a safe place to spawn as well as a spring board to quickly move on any of the three flags in close proximity.

In my opinion, the walker should be used only in defense of Statue and Ruins. The rail gun at Playground can be nasty.

That being said, my favorite flags to hold are - surprise, surprise - Pond and Monorail. I'm not a fan of Comm at all and I'm kinda burned out on Statue. Ruins can be fun, but it's tough to defend at times, especially if you don't have statue. Playground is another fun flag, but for some reason only seems to be a flag that both teams take when possible but never really defend.

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TG-9th Lorax74

ThaDoctah

I find playground far too wide open, so much so that it feels uncomfortable. Four buildings (two either side of the flag) have second floors perfect for snipers or assault rockets. The road is wide enough to land a jumbo jet in so a tank or APC should have no problems coming in to lay the smackdown. The area is utterly surrounded: Statue to the west, Monorail to the south and Comms to the north.

On the other hand it's a brilliant place to absolutely mess up any reinforcements that might come to put the hurt on some other flags. If you're battling the EU, they need to pass Playground to get anywhere else on the map (Monorail is obviously better at harrying armour back-up, but we're talking Playground here!), if you're battling the PAC, it's a good back-flag to dislodge interlopers at Monorail that are probably harrassing your back-up tanks and APC. Because of it's openness Playground makes for a great staging area for pushes to the surrounding flags (barring a hostile artillery strike, at which point it becomes a very bad staging area )

Next time I'm on Belgrade I think I'll give Playground a little more clout. It'll be interesting to see what's made of it.

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<Someone give me more training STAT!>

nhammen

Yes they do! However, I don't do these right off the bat because the enemy may still be capping them. My usual strategy is to buggy rush to statue, and then after that is done, take the buggy over to the flag closest to the enemy uncap. For some reason, the enemy always wants to throw all of their vehicles right at you, even if they do have the ability to go around. Additionally, having Pond+Statue means that Ruins is yours. I have never seen a team successfully defend against a well timed pincer there unless the defense greatly outnumbered the attackers.

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- Drake_Anra

Sgt. Vinck

Holding statue FTW. In most games the team that can take and hold statue throughout the match will win. Not onely do you get a walker but you can also strike any flag on the map from there.

machowner

I would say that most of the time the team with com tower/playground is the one that wins.

I hate the statue and prefer to not go there unless ordered to. With that in mind I will usually push for playground or com tower. After those are taken I like to have some fun at monorail.
From the other side I push for comm tower and wait for their apc to leave ruins. If all goes well I will usually head over to ruins.

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Razcsak

Statue is nice to take early on because it's very easy to defend and enemies throw themselves at it. It can become a permanent one-flag advantage with regards to bleed and creates a high-priority target that the enemy team will lose tickets assaulting. If I had to chose between Statue and Com, I'd prefer my team to have Statue. Com Tower can be a pain to defend, unless you're PAC. Then, grabbing the buildings between Playground and Com can give you an amazing ability to entrench and leech so many tickets.

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