BF2S Forums Tips for effective chopper flying

GameOver wrote:

elite.mafia wrote:

I disagree with a lot of what you said...

No problem. You don’t have to agree with it, you don’t even have to use it. Moreover you don’t even have to fly with your chopper effectively. After all, you can die after every 3rd killed enemy. Or you can try to adapt something new/something different and die only after every 10th killed enemy. I don't care a bit. It's your game.

http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a245/ … /104-3.jpg
owned

elite.mafia wrote:

GameOver wrote:

elite.mafia wrote:

I disagree with a lot of what you said...

No problem. You don’t have to agree with it, you don’t even have to use it. Moreover you don’t even have to fly with your chopper effectively. After all, you can die after every 3rd killed enemy. Or you can try to adapt something new/something different and die only after every 10th killed enemy. I don't care a bit. It's your game.

http://i12.photobucket.com/albums/a245/ … /104-3.jpg
owned

dude, elite-mafia is the best chopper pilot ive ever flown with. ever. and ive flown with most of them.

ever.

*admires mafia*

Want my e-babies?

Last edited by =Karma-Kills= (2007-04-03 02:41:28)

GameOver wrote:

elite.mafia wrote:

I disagree with a lot of what you said...

No problem. You don’t have to agree with it, you don’t even have to use it. Moreover you don’t even have to fly with your chopper effectively. After all, you can die after every 3rd killed enemy. Or you can try to adapt something new/something different and die only after every 10th killed enemy. I don't care a bit. It's your game.

Wow, what a dick! He was just saying that your guide is your opinion and maybe you fly better using it but a lot of people disagree with your tactics. You had to be a fucking ass about it though. Maybe this is why nobody likes you.
It's hard to imagine how your big head fits into the chopper anyway.

GameOver wrote:

Hi everyone!

I know there are a lot of chopper guides alredy, but I think there are some important points, which aren’t mentioned in the existing guides. I don’t want to repeat these guides so this guide is not a complete one. Actually this is not even a guide, it’s just a collection of a few points which I think are essential for effective chopper flying.

1. Never fly with a gunner, except if you have a good, well-known gunner, with whom you can communicate orally. It’s all about communication: if you cannot communicate with your gunner, you (and your chopper) will be less effective, even if the gunner is a better one than you are.

How about learn to use your missiles?

GameOver wrote:

2. After taking off your first task should be to look for the enemy chopper and shoot it down first! Don’t shoot anything else, untill you shoot down the enemy chopper! Nothing else can shoot you down with a single shot except attacking choppers. So take them seriously!

On maps like wake and kubra, your first opposition will ALWAYS be the anti-airs. Take them out so you can GET to the chopper

GameOver wrote:

3. Flying high or flying low? Flying high! Definately flying high, it’s no question! There aren’t ’IF’-s, there aren’t ’WHEN’-s, there is no ’The other guy said that…’ He is wrong. Sure, if you fly low you can use buildings as cover. But that’s all, that is the only advantage of flying low over flying high. In fact if you fly high you will get rid of more potential threats than the number of threats you obtain by flying high.

The ONLY time I fly high is when I KNOW for a fact the enemy chopper is up high. If I'm flying high and my gunner gets a TV glitch on an AA, theres nothing I can do except bail out. If I'm low I can get him with my missiles, OR hide behind a hill/building or whatever is there to hide behind.

GameOver wrote:

4. Shoot mostly with the TV-missile! If you fly high you are hundreds of metres away from targets, thus usually you aren’t able to hit them with the hellfire rockets. Instead of flying closer to the targets use the TV-missiles. I think it’s just fine if your TV-misille kills/hellfire rocket kills ratio is at least 5.

Only use tv missiles on tanks/choppers/jets/cars. Use the gun for all infantry and AA. If I'm coming up over a hill I can keep my nose to the floor as i fly straight at an AA while you spam the gun, I find its much more effective than using missiles at that close of a range.

GameOver wrote:

5. Fly on the edge of the map! Especially if you have just joined the server, just taken off and started to look for the enemy chopper.

I fly down the middle and have no problems, you just have to take that extra step to take out the anti-airs if you do that. If you fly down the edges you probably won't see much opposition. Especially on wake and oman.

GameOver wrote:

6. If you are looking for the enemy chopper
    a) fly at least 200 m high and at least 100-150 m far from the ground.
    b) In chopper vs. chopper battles it’s very important who can spot the enemy chopper first, and who can shoot first. In order to be the first fly on the left/right edge of the map and use your mouse look to frequently look to the other direction(where the combat area is). In this way you only have to look to forwards and to the left/right(not to both sides). After shooting down the enemy chopper you can decrease your altitude a bit.

I just fly low, as soon as I see it I gain altitude. As far as I'm concerned if my gunner is shooting a missile straight up he knows he has to turn it more, which gives the gunner much more practice on guiding the missile. That's my philosophy. IF the enemy chopper is 400 feet or higher, than yeah, flying high would make sense, but that's VERY rare.

GameOver wrote:

7. After you have shot down the enemy chopper you have 30 seconds (for targeting other enemies) till it respawns(in practice that means two shots with the TV-missile). After the second shot, always prepare for the next chopper vs. chopper battle. What does it mean preparing for a battle against an enemy chopper?
    a) Increase your altitude!
    b) Fly towards the edge of the map: in this way you can minimize the number of  other enemies(mainly AA-turrets), which can reach you and disturb you while fighting against the enemy chopper.
    c) Fly towards the enemy helipad!
If the enemy chopper respawns on a capable base, destroy it before it takes off! Destroy it even if it's empty or try to steal it!

Never try to steal a chopper, if you lose it you'll probably never get it back again. On kubra if I'm usmc I'll just fly to the pad, kill the 2 guys (or more) and be on my way. No sense in camping them the whole game. And its more fun to let them get up anyways.

GameOver wrote:

8. Role of attacking choppers: many people say, that the role of a chopper is to support friendly ground troops and help them to cap flags. I say that this only a high-flown slogan. Sure, it sounds fine, but life is more complicate. There are a lot of threats out there, and if you don’t eliminate these threats, they will kill you, and if you die, you won’t support anything/anybody. So first: destroy vehicles, that can shoot you down(choppers, mobile-AA-s), THEN -if you have remaining time- support your ground troops and destroy vehicles that mean a threat only for your ground troops(tanks, APC-s). But remember: you only have 30 seconds for supporting ground troops/for destroying vehicles that cannot kill you, after that you have to pay attention to vehicles, that can kill you(choppers etc.).

IMHO the role of helicopters is to have as much fun as humanely possible.

GameOver wrote:

9. Don’t shoot at enemy infantry(or only very rarely)! If you fly high infantries cannot damage you, so they don’t mean a threat for you, therefore you don’t need to shoot at them. There are a lot of choppers, mobile-AA-s, AA-turrets out there. And these vehicles/guns can damage you. So shoot them instead of infantry! I prefer to destroy an empty vehicle rather than kill infantry. In the long run it’s a better choice: infantry cannot kill you, vehicles can.
(Of course, it’s depending on the map: e.g. on Sharqi you have only one mortal enemy(the enemy chopper) so you have more time to kill infantry, but on maps such as Kubra Dam, you cannot afford to waste your time shooting at infantry.)

I think that its fine to shoot at infantry. Circle flags as fast as possible without crashing, for short periods of time.

GameOver wrote:

10. Chopper vs. jets: the best maneuvers against jets are those, that minimize the time of the jet while it is able to shoot at you. Jets can shoot you down only if you are in front of them, so you have to fly towards the jet (and strafing to the left/right at the same time) to reduce its time. There are a lot of maneuvers: some of them are good, some aren’t. One thing is sure: never fly into the same direction as the jet!

Point chodda at the jet. lolz

GameOver wrote:

11. Chopper vs. chopper:
     a) Always look for the enemy chopper! Never let it happen that the enemy chopper can see you while you can’t see it.(See point 2!)
     b) Fly high!(See points 3 and 6!)
     c) Fly on the edge of the map!(See points 5, 6 and 7!)
     d) What to do if you spot an enemy heli: When you spot an enemy heli your first task should be to decide whether it can see you or not. The most important thing in heli vs. heli battle is to ask yourself the question: Can he see me or not?

Stay alert, look around the map. Thats all you need to do.

GameOver wrote:

12. Chopper vs. mobile-AA: The best thing you can do against mobile-AA-s is to destroy them before anybody gets in. They can shoot 4 missiles in quick succession, one of them will probably hit you. I advise you to drop flares before you switch seat to destroy them with a TV-missile.

When an aa locks onto you, the first thing you should do is either A.) point your gunner at it or B.) run. 90% of the time I run away, then turn around and give my gunner a line up. That's the best strategy I've found.

I think it's interesting to see the your point of view of flying helicopters, and writing a guide of it, instead of reading the same ¤"!¤%#!¤# different day. It's also an oppurtunity to get to learn your "possible-future-teammate / enemy"s tactics.

Thanks for the answer elite.mafia! That is what I was wonder about. Everybody can say that this is a lame guide, but it requires skill to be able to argue for your own tactics and against the other tactics. So I really appreciate you for writing your argument. By the way I would have some comments on it:

elite.mafia wrote:

How about learn to use your missiles?

For what? Actually I can't see the point of it. A) If you have a gunner, you don't need weapons, after all it's the duty of your gunner to eliminate everything. B) If you have no gunner, you can switch seat and use the TV-missiles instead of pilots rockets. It's a more effective killing instrument than the normal rockets. Personally I use the pilot rockets quite rarely. If I kill 50 enemy, only 9-10 kills are normal rocket kills, the rest of them are TV-missiles kills. So I use them only for the 20% of my kills. Of course if you are a skilled chopper pilot you can use them, but for beginners I would advise to practice shooting with the TV-missiles flying solo rather than practice using your pilots rockets. It's more efficient and you will need them more often. Not to mention that it requires too much time to become skilled at using them compared to how effective they are.

(By the way you can watch my Battlefield 2 Demo frag movie (link in my signature). I think it's a good evidence for that I can use my rockets quite well. However it was filmed in the demo (patch 1.0), where gameplay was much easier (14 rockets, useless AA etc.) Not to mention that I was an amateur at that time. I would die in the full game in a few moments after taking off, if I would fly just like in the video. Nowadays I play the game in a completely different style using mostly my TV-missiles flying much higher.)

elite.mafia wrote:

The ONLY time I fly high is when I KNOW for a fact the enemy chopper is up high. If I'm flying high and my gunner gets a TV glitch on an AA, theres nothing I can do except bail out. If I'm low I can get him with my missiles, OR hide behind a hill/building or whatever is there to hide behind.

I always fly high and not only against enemy chopper but against ground targets as well. If you fly high there are 2 kinds of ground targets:

1. Group 'A': those that cannot shoot you down while you are flying high: tanks, FAV-s, DPV-s, Humwee-s, APC-s, antitank soldiers. Actually they can't even damage you. Moreover they don't even shoot at you because they deal with targets that are in front of them, that are at the same altitude as they are. If you fly 100 metres above their head you are completly out of their sight. Of course they can see you, but often they don't deal with you. They know that they have no chance to shoot you down (because if you fly 100 metres above their head they have no chance) so most of the time they don't even waste their time shooting at you. Thanks to this I get damaged very rarely. So if you fly high you have the ability to kill them (with TV-missiles), but they don't have the ability to kill you. And this is an enormous advantage over them. To tell the truth, they are on the map only for being an easy frag for you. They cannot do anything against this - no matter how skilled they are. So if you fly high you can completely disregard them and you can spend more time to concentrate on Group 'B'.

2. Group 'B': those that can shoot you down while you are flying high: AA-turrets and mobile-AA-s.
Actually I don't consider AA-turrets a real threat, as they can hit you with both of their rockets in vain, you can still fly away without a death.

I agree with you on the point that it's not the best tactic to fly high against AA (against Group 'B') because there is no where to go and it takes time to find some cover by decreasing your altitude. Actually this is the only disadvantage of flying high compared to flying low: you can't use/find cover against ground-to-air missiles or only after a while (that's why I have written my 12th point to destroy mobile-AA-s before anybody gets in). But flying high is undoubtedly the best tactic against Group 'A'. (I have never been shot down by an enemy that belongs to the Group 'A' in my ranked career flying solo.)

And you can make a quick calculation: How many enemies do belong to the Group 'A'? And to the Group 'B'? There are much more enemy that belongs to the Group 'A'. So there are more enemy against which it's a good tactic to fly high, than the enemy against which it doesn't work well. That's why I have written in my guide that in fact if you fly high you will get rid of more potential threats than the number of threats you obtain by flying high.

Not to mention that one part of the Group 'B', the AA-turrets are fixed AA-guns and cannot move. So you only have to know the map and you know from which direction they are shooting at you. While every enemy that belongs to Group 'A' do can move, so first of all you have to figure out from where they are shooting at you.

elite.mafia wrote:

Only use tv missiles on tanks/choppers/jets/cars. Use the gun for all infantry and AA.

Of course, I agree with you on that point. I didn't even suggest to shoot with TV-missiles at infantry. But since I suggested not to shoot at infantry that means practically you can shoot at everything with the TV-missiles if you follow my tips.

elite.mafia wrote:

I just fly low, as soon as I see it I gain altitude.

I found that it's too late... I think it's a big disadvantage to begin a chopper vs. chopper combat at a lower altitude than the enemy chopper.

elite.mafia wrote:

Never try to steal a chopper, if you lose it you'll probably never get it back again.

I disagree with you on that point. Often it's the best tactic to steal the most useful vehicles of the enemy (choppers, jets, tanks - depending on the map (but choppers are very useful on every map)) for winning the round. Of course you have to look after your stolen chopper. You have to fly more carefully if you use a stolen chopper (or jet or whatever). Even if you kill only a few enemy it's much better if you use it instead of the enemy.

elite.mafia wrote:

IMHO the role of helicopters is to have as much fun as humanely possible.

Well, I don't think so. I have played a lot of rounds, where noobs were using the chopper of our team. They seemed to have fun, but they were completely useless for our team. They took off and crashed it/died or just were flying in a completely useless way. They haven't eliminated the enemy chopper or other deadly enemies so our whole team were no more just a bunch of frags. So if a chopper doesn't fulfill its role/its duty then it spoils everyones fun who is on their side. If a driver of a FAV/Humwee is having fun and doesn't fulfill its duty it's not a problem because cars are most of the time quite useles, but a helicopter is a too useful vehicle for only having fun. It has a very important duty: kill, kill, kill.

elite.mafia wrote:

I think that its fine to shoot at infantry. Circle flags as fast as possible without crashing, for short periods of time.

I think that all of my teammates can kill infantry: tanks, APC-s, cars, infantry... everybody. But there are some kinds of enemies that cannot be killed by all of my teammates(choppers, tanks etc.), or the chopper is the most suitable device for the job. So I think that a) you are wasting the speciality of your chopper by shooting at infantry (I repeat: all of your teammates can kill them, so you don't need to do that), b) you are risking your life unnecessarily by concentrating on infantry instead of concentrating on bigger threats.

Of course, if you have free time to shoot at infantry, then do it! Personally, I found myself very rarely in a situation, when I had free time to shoot at infantry.

elite.mafia wrote:

Stay alert, look around the map. Thats all you need to do.

I think this is insufficient. Looking around the map is one thing but it's not enough. You do have to spot the enemy chopper before it spots you otherwise you are dead. I think that you have to treat the enemy chopper as a much bigger threat than 'Oh, I will shoot it down whenever I spot it accidentally.' This is not enough. I think that you always have to LOOK FOR the enemy chopper and you must not shoot at anything else before you shoot it down.

Last edited by GameOver (2007-04-05 09:33:55)

chodda u pubbzor

edit: are you still on any cal teams

Last edited by =NHB=Shadow (2007-04-06 14:16:30)

makes sense to me.

the choppers piss off to 400 feet and go at it queensberry style and leave the real fighting to the infantry. personally i hope to see gameover in Iron Gator, im getting tired of being spawnraped on the viewing deck.

elite.mafia wrote:

You know what, since you don't believe me, I made a photobucket of all the pub ownage I've done recently. Enjoy.
http://s151.photobucket.com/albums/s133/mafiapubownage/

No CLU ownage?

=NHB=Shadow wrote:

chodda u pubbzor

edit: are you still on any cal teams

I've been on Msq. for quite a long time. They don't really play anymore besides helping out STO in Open. I think some of the guys want to compete in Desert Conflict but I tried it out and I just lag too bad... in regular BF2 I everage 40fps... if that... lol DCon is just something to mess around with untill Quake Wars.

Ajax_the_Great1 wrote:

No CLU ownage?

CLU is bad kthx. They just banned someone last night for black skys. Bunch of fahgots who cry way too much, I've overheard them in TeamSpeak a few times...

Last edited by Chodda (2007-04-12 07:36:01)

NooBesT[FiN] wrote:

Wait, what? Never fly with gunner?

I'm not reading more.

that's the best and most true part of what he wrote