Lyramion

Even tho the minimap is small it should be your best friend. I often play by 70% minimap and only 30% my main window. The minimap decides over life and death. It should guide the next seconds of your action.


You can change the Zoom Level of your minimap in 3 steps using the N key on your keyboard.

Zoom Step 1: Big overview. Used for General Map overview and deciding where to head next and how the other Squads are doing. Also often used on large vehicle maps and to find far targets for tank fire.

Zoom Step 2: Medium Zoom. Often used for indirect fire. Used to aim Rockets and Grenades.

Zoom Step 3: Largest Zoom. This one is the Close Quarter Combat setting. This setting makes it the easiest to go for revives and see the directions the enemies are facing.


I love having my minimap rotating. It gives me a much faster overview on what is going on behind me and infront of me. With a static minimap you often have to look first in which way your soldier is facing. Newer players sometiems prefer the static minimap since they do not know the maps well enough and get confused by the rotating one. Your ultimate goal should be a rotating one tho. Your rotating minimap has the letters N E S W rotating with it.





- Q spot! Yes I am putting this first since it should always be used. After you Q spot something it will continue to blink on your minimap for 4-5 times while your whole team will see it.

You can Q-Spot out 3-4 enemies quickly before getting spamblocked. You can even Q-Spot for yourself. If an enemy is about to run away around a corner you can Q-Spot him and see where he is heading to on the minimap.

On a good team Q Spotting an enemy is already killing him halfway.


Q Spot Q Spot Q Spot! Repeat with me! I will Q Spot whenever I can !


- UAV the easiest way to see things on the minimap. It can be destroyed but people barely do this on nonvehicle maps. You are also dependant on the good will of your commander

- IDS small but deadly. One of the most overpowered unlocks. Keeping one up should always be the No1 priority of a Support guy. An IDS is your little sanctuary - a bubble of life. You will not have the fear of being flanked closeby and can concentrate on the things that are infront of you. An IDS will not spot vehicles so sometimes you will thing yuo are safe but there will be a buggy trying to mow you down waiting around the corner.

- PDS The PDS will detect Vehicles in a large Radius. it will also detect enemies on ladders, in Rorsches, in Pods and enemies parachuting. Because PDS blibs habe the same size as a common UAV it often gets misstaken as a UAV by newer players. The only way to find out is to use your brain and get a feeling for it. When your "UAV" on Berlin crossroad shows no enemy infantry... there could be something wrong with it and it could be a PDS

- Otus / Recon helm combo. This combo will have a large radius of scanning that easily beats out IDS range.

- Sentry Gun. If a Sentry Gun activates it will "Q-Spot" the enemy it is engaging.

- Pulsemeter / Recon helm combo. This combo is almost never used anymore there days. But a Pulsemeter is basically a 180° front arc Otus. It will produce diamonds with your Support helmet (it will NOT produce diamonds if you do not have the support helmet!!!) and dots on your minimap if you have a recon with his helmet in the Squad.

- Radar Grenade. A good unlock which stands in the shadow of too many other useful unlocks. Only to be used in special cases.


UAV IDS PDS RadarGrenade and QSpot will make the enemies visible to the whole team.

Otus and Pulsemeter combos will make them visible on your Squads Netbat only






- Dead people will always look streight NORTH on your minimap. This way you can notice dead people even if you are not a medic or if for some reason the medic symbol doesn´t show.


- Look at the friendlies and the direction they face. Are they covering your butt or just randomly staring around?





- The minimap can be your personal wallhack. You will know behind which cover enemies do hide. You will know which of your next steps will be safe and which is risky.

- Reload! An often underestimated fact is that you can see when you are clear to reload your main weapon. Maybe you can run away for cover and reload. Maybe not reload and pull out your sidearms or even get out your defib to revive fallen Squadmates that still have a full magazine.

- Indirect fire weapons! The biggest advantage the minimap can give you. You can aim Rockets, Grenades and Mortars at the dots on your minimap. Kill the enemy while your life is safe and you are easily reviveable.

- RDX. While this is an "indirect fire" weapon the possibilities are just too great. You can throw RDX down the stairs a Squad is rushing up without ever seeing them directly. You can trap corners with RDX and hide elsewhere.

- Let it dermit your next action. You can see if a revive is clear or if you are better off first suppressing the enemy looking at the wounded body. While this sounds small it is a VERY BIG factor in the success of a Squad. It is the difference between you and your SL being both dead on the floor or you both teabagging the enemy that killed your SL first.

- You can see which direction PAC Tanks face. Because they have no turrent they will only be able to shot in the direction their body faces.

- The sniper minimap feature will always be aligned north on your minimap. You cannot really see in which direction they face. The only times a Sniper symbol will be missaligned is when they are in a Rorsch, Parachute or Podding down.





- The Recon Ghost. It will erase your position from the minimap 60 meters around it and draw it to the ghosts position. A Ghost can really screw the mind of even the best players.

- Kill the darn UAV. You can destroy the enemy UAV easily with a SAWW. But even on an infantry map it can be killed by 1-2 Supports shooting at it.

- If you know the enemy can see you and you can see them use the minimap to your advantage. Turn your back to the corner the enemy will come around soon so they will think they just snuck up on you. Then turn around the last second and mow them down with their guard down.

- Snipe the Otus. While the Otus can be put back quickly many SLs will forget in the heat of the fight.






This is truth. You will get hit by Grenades, Rockets, be flanked and destroyed from within by another Squad utilising the Minimaptools. Only a very steep difference in general skill can outweight this.

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Anospa

Thank you! This might be one of your best posts yet!!

I keep on taking my knowledge of this stuff for granted and not sharing it, especially the north-revive.

Lyra speaks the truth, the mini-map is where you live. I actually have the squad screen set as my middle mouse button and live there instead, as I can select squads individual players to highlight which squads they are in.

Some things to add:

Watch for empty buggies; if an empty buggy appears somewhere on the map, chances are an enemy just abandoned it, so be wary of incoming threats.

Watch enemy armor (especially on armor/Titan maps); you can alert the rest of your squad when the APC is incoming on Berlin by seeing it disappear off the minimap indicating someone just occupied it. Same goes for gunships and transports in Titan.

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DrakenViator

I use this all the time to protect against the FAV rush on Tunis as well on Belgrade.

The MINI map is your friend USE IT!!! I look at the mini map almost half of the time trying to read movements and see where I need to be.

I would +rep you Lyra but I can't... Must Spread Rep...


~ Draken

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|TG-55| Infantry Division

Reaperassault

the ponypower has guided lyra well and it will guide you well, straight to your minimap

the lyra speaks the truth learn from him.

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Aumen1

Q-SPOT !

Check out this link --
http://forums.bf2s.com/viewtopic.php?id=45491&p=1

It shows you how to bind the q-spot in bf2 so there is no menu involved. Does anyone know if we could do this in 2142 and would it be allowed?

Cheers,
A

Bomber

for the reload part, when you run out of ammo and revive, isnt there a glitch where you come up with a full clip again? Not sure how it works anymore, but i'm sure you know

Housekeeper

Wow, enemies on ladders? I didn't know this one, as well as parachutes... That's pretty cool.
You certainly do speak the truth, when I took a few months off 2142 to play too much TF2 / etc, coming back to this game the minimap use took a while to re-train myself. How else can you mow down entire squads with a shotty if you don't know how many are waiting around the corner!?! Great post.

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2142: |TG|Housekeeper007
TF2: House.Keeper

*Squad waits patiently for House to spawn in on an infantry only mini-verdun as the seconds tick away...*
Zho - "House you going to spawn in or what?"
House, after completely spacing out -"Oh... uhhh I was just practicing for when BF2:BC comes out, lets spawn on frozen!"

pred011586

I've always thought that everyone used the minimap that much o,o. Guess I was in the minority!

Knowing that PDS working on people on ladders clears up alot of what I thought were bugs (maybe they still are) in the system. Though it does kind of make sense, seeing as, if I remember right, a death on a ladder is unrevivable just like a death in any other vehicle. Interesting way to implement ladders, DICE. Makes me wonder if death in a vehicle is defined simply as death while not on foot, and the fact that ladders take you off your feet is just an oversight... Or maybe it was intended like this. Either way it's the way the game's been for years now, no need to change it!

Nice write up!

Starting a petition to link this thread in the "TG Guide Index" sticky! Countless times people have asked what exactly the Otus, Pulsemeter, and the Ghost all interact with the helmets in a squad. This thread pretty much sums up all the answers to all those questions in one very organized post. Having it readily accessible will give alot of answers in an easy to access form while avoiding the search feature. Plus it'll be easier to pull up to link to it for those that don't check that sticky.

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PennyFlame

Don't know where to ask this so I'll ask here. Is there any advantage to using the pulse meter over IDS in the support kit? It's one of those unlocks I never use.

Anospa

Also, the IDS will show info for your whole team, while the scanner will only provide intel for people in your squad.

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pred011586

So looking at it... Having a Sniper (don't kill me yet) SL isn't that much of a bad idea. In situations like Crossroads in FoB, on EU, the Recon SL can pop an otus and basically have a mobile UAV for his squad. Plus as a Sniper he'll be forced to stay behind the action, so now if someone breaks through he'll be able to respond quicker.

Sure Sniping is fairly useless with all the defibs about, in a full TGvsTG round I'd recommend switching to a Lambert, but in a general TG server game, there's enough pubbies out there that you'll be able to pick off one or two that are trying to make a break for it. Plus if you're following behind an enemy SL, nothing's more accurate at long range than a sniper rifle.

This all, of course, is based entirely on the assumption that Recon Helmet + Otus, has a fast enough refresh rate on the minimap to make an IDS fairly useless. I never actually looked, how fast IS the refresh rate of the Otus?

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Reaperassault

very quick, its no pulse from an IDS but its fast enough to keep the info up to date

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Lyramion

Radiactivepony is not pleased with your reading skills!

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Lyramion

Sniper SL is a very interesting style of play. Silver often uses it. Ghost and Cloak can not only used to break Stalemate spots but also to run circles like a dog chasing his own tail to deplay Squad Members all aruond the area.

Also a Sniper SL will barely have the thought of throwing his body into a Close Quarter Fight and die with enemies surrounding him.

Some of the best SLs I know use the Recon SL tactic. The Otus scan radius IS that much bigger than an IDS. It´s such a powerful tool when defending.

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ionpig-A

+rep is not enough, this calls for ^rep, that's right, "rep to the power of rep".

Great posts Lyra!

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