....than anything else.

With pinks advice they really are a joke. Of course maybe I just haven't run into the people who are OMFG good at it. :p

what's pinks advice?

I've had a couple of people try it against me. They both lost really fast. An early radar, a few tanks, and a point defense or two built by my ACU ruined their bold plan easily.

IIRC, the basic idea is this. First of all, don't build research stations, they are a waste of mass. Most of my games my opponents have roughly 2x as many RP than I do total, but that doesn't matter for squat if there are 20+ tanks shooting your com.

Build the basic four mexes to start off, a couple energy, and a couple factories. Build an intel on a factory, and send your first troop off to see what is going on. Depending on map size, you'll see the com before your first troop runs off on radar or your troop will run into the guy.

At this rate you have to build the shields on your factory, and build a PD behind the factory. Hide troops and engies under said shield, and poof, ACU is rather helpless to run over your factory. He can run around the factory or try and cap the PD, but unless he really hauls *** over he can't really help anything. Even with some health and what-not, a commander, PD, and anywhere from 3-6 tanks are too much to handle at that point. I've even had guys retreat and repair, and repair the com while attacking, all to no avail.

I always build an air fac first and build a fighter to scout, so I usually also have an air fac. Then I just research gunships with the handfull of points you start with (rather hard now with the gunships being 5 RP) and you can force him to run away or just kill him even faster.

So yeah, thanks for that supcom sunday vid pink, very helpful.

Of course I still have no idea how to stop a faceroll by 2+ coms. Unless you get immediate and plentiful ally support, you seem to get rather boned. But thats why I play 1v1.

Thanks for the help. I'll have to give that a shot.

It really is just like FA, except replace walls around your PD with factory shields. PD are good for chasing off commanders.

Well it is good they can do that at least, they are rather useless for everything else! (Except Aeon PD, they have the super duper range ).

Unless you're playing against an idiot who sends his ten tanks into a few PD, you'll get eaten by 2~4 mmls and then it is over for whatever position you were trying to hold, assuming a competent land spam opponent.

Even so, I just lost a game to gunship spam. Even with the five factory AA and 30 mobile AA around my commander, they ate straight through his health almost immediately. Sad day. I guess a delay of ground forces by arbitrary choke points = death against gunship spammers.

Well once they fix the air factory bug hopefully gunship spammers will stop

There is an air factory bug? Do tell.

Sort of. It's pretty much like strat bomber spam in FA in that respect, except they come out earlier. You can counter fairly easily with:

-Hiding underwater
-Carting yourself to/from map corners with a space temple (Aeon)
-Hiding in a randomass corner of the map (UEF radar jammer)
-Free Research Station/Mex AA. TAKE NOTE (UEF)
-Bomb Bouncer rape (Cybran)
-F/B spam
-Factory/regular/commander shield layering, com HP upgrades, Hunker
-Pre-emptive nukes
-UEF tanks
-[Possibly] Pulinsmash spam, GL with that though
-[Possibly] Cybran structure detonate. I'm not sure how big the AoE is. Maybe on a really tall building..?


I'd actually go so far as to say it's a good deal more counterable than air spam in FA. People just need to stop the knee-jerk ZOMG SPAM MOAR BASIC AA!!1!1!!1one!11

http://forums.gaspowered.com/viewtopic.php?t=44093

Good points. I'll keep the early game options in mind, especially the water one. Unfortunately for this map it was rather difficult to do this. I forget the name, but it is the plus-shaped one where there are only skinny walkways connecting all the players, and chasms everywhere else. I had all of my research into land and no research stations, and less than optimal research points from combat because the map really stonewalled me (well, the player was smart with his artillery placement and F/B use too).

The thing is, I was 2 RP away from UEF tank AA gun. That might have saved me, but he flew the gunships up from the bottom chasm, so it might not have mattered. The commander was under 2 shields, and they went down pretty quickly. I'd say there were at least 20 gunships though.

Although I have to admit, if my first two land assaults hadn't failed, he would never have gotten that many. I let the game go too long, and secured my own fate that way. Plus I had a few micro screw ups. He had two fortified artillery, and my scout plane died before seeing the row of PD behind his factory meatshield. I think this was more a case where I just got outplayed.

And my fear was that if I didn't supe up my land forces enough to completely facerole in the third assault, I wouldn't have a chance to win. Best part was that when my com died, his com was surrounded by 30+ land units and was at half health. So I was just an instant behind really.

But many of the options you listed are rather expensive/lategame/research heavy. You won't see many of those in a 1v1 on a smaller map. Am I doing it wrong by focusing research into one area? I figure splitting it between structure and land to go for shield and strong landspam would be a disaster, I usually count on my land armies being substantially more powerful with double-barrel and a training or two.

I think it's generally a bad choice to take training when it's possible you'll desperately need a unit unlock later on. If he only has 20 gunships, you should be able to counter pretty easily with some proper shielding/hunkering and mobile AA. Really, gunships as sniping devices only become an issue when there's many more of them- at which point many of the options I outlined above are usually relatively affordable.

It's really difficult to give blanket advice that applies to every game, matchup, map, and playstyle. Do what works.

Ah. I usually leave training for the extra research points I have after the necessary land items have been researched. I'll try a few game diversifying later RP instead of blowing seven of them for two trainings.

Thanks for the advice.

Power-Detonate on jumpjetting loyalists?

Upon further inspection of the replay, he had 61 gunships.

Also, I noticed that I would have won had I not stopped to destroy some point defense on the way to his commander, his commander was at half health and retreating when my commander hadn't even been touched by the gunships yet.


Then again, this is an ACU rush thread, so I'll stop now.

Also do keep in mind that the air factory veterancy bug is probably the source of many or most of the gunship issues at the moment.

its greyed out when they're mid jump IIRC.

Yeah you cant activate either detonate or mega armor while jumping.

The best counter to ACU rush is to scout and/or save your RP until you need it. A transport will almost always counter an ACU rush, but you have to be ready to leave your base behind. If you do have to leave your base behind, self-destruct it and try to reclaim the mass. Each structure is basically 1 RP for the enemy.

What happens if they get the TML upgrade for their ACU, allowing it to 2-shot your factories? I guess with the shield it would actually be 4 shots, so you do have a bit more time to crank out units. But still, their TML outranges your PD.

This hasn't been a problem yet. Maybe I haven't fought skilled enough rushers, but with the factory TML too they can't sit still at least, and a handful of tanks to kill healing engies and whatnot makes the acu quake. In the mean time I have a few gunships built from my airfac which I build first anyways, and an engie or two is headed towards his base to cap those research stations.

Haven't had an acu rusher get the arty upgrade on me yet, the usually die first. Maybe the acu rushers I've run into are just not as good as they should be?

Just a quick side note- is there anyway to access these vids Pink does now? Or was it a live streaming thing?


Edit: I found some. Google is a wonder

My signature's a clickable link, brah

Tried a speed aeon acu upgrade on markon bridge, going straight to their base via the water? I've not tried it much vs good players but it seems to be working on the random noobs I've been finding.