16 replies to this topic

[Browno]

Hi! I play HEAT infiltrator and want some friendly advice on how to improve my game. You might see lots of things that i don't, and i want to take as much as possible into consideration to get better. Hawken is awfully fun!
I have read some posts where players were adviced to record their games and watch them to find ways to improve. So i did that today, and i do see some things i want to change. I need to step up somehow in the movement department and positioning and also watch my radar when i panic so i don't run into enemies.
Thats the most obvious things i notice about my gameplay.
Thanks in advance!

Updated with DM against humans.
I did jitter a bit with my aim in this vid, and i blame myself and my cough on that. I saw that i did put my crosshair over a couple of enemies in distance and not noticing when i played.

Edited by Browno, September 21 2014 - 09:50 AM.

[TwentyFirstPilot]

Try recording a game where you're against human opponents. Performance in bot TDM is a pretty useless measure of skill. This is because the bots suck, and they don't stop sucking until your MMR (matchmaker rating) is very high.

[Browno]

Ok i will try to record a game later then and upload here again

[spo0n]

@~1:36 you get tricked by a bots hologram... but I didn't watch the whole video.

Can you buy an air compressor_  I see how you are optimized to use orbs, but the extra movement ability will help to confuse humans and open up more options for what you can do at any moment.

Your cornering isn't too bad, you seem to know what you should be doing, but I'm not sure how many shots you hit vs how many missed.  It also seemed like you were firing blindly around a corner over and over and hoping a bot would just walk into your shots.  Not too sure how much you can learn from fighting bots besides aiming and kiting though.

[EliteShooter]

Heat tips:


- Use charged heat when you have the time and space to do it; when you're camping, stalking, sneaking waiting for enemy to chase you, hiding behind cover ... Weather you're in the air or on the ground. Remember, when you're rushed and fighting the enemy in an open area, shoot a lot uncharged shots as fast as possible.

- Don't overheat, space your shots because the heat generation is high. Charged the heat may help a bit, and allow you to fire continuously and for a longer duration.

- Hovering gives you some nice angles with the heat (and EOC too), so take advantage of that. Also having the Air compressor helps a lot. You hop, shoot in the air, and then dodge back to cover. But remember, your mech is PRETTY DAMN GOOD in the ground too, so don't let the air fight dominate your play with it.

- The heat is very accurate, but you don't have to be accurate actually IF you shoot at the ground and walls. The heat has a very good splash damage. Don't understand me wrong, I know direct hits are pretty important, but when playing heat infil, then you won't really need aiming perfections. So shoot close to where your enemy stands and it will make damage anyway.

- Here's the problem with getting used to shooting at the ground and walls; AIR MECHS! Those annoying guys will piss you off when you play heat; you now have to aim right in their faces, which might not be alwasy easy when you start relying on the heat's splash damage. So you should get yourself used to aiming well with the heat anyway.

- We already talked about the accuracy of the heat, but what you have to learn with it is how to time your shots and where to aim when you're trying to hit a distant target. Remember that the heat has a relatively slow travel speed compared to sustained weapons, but you can get used to it, ofc it's much faster when charged.

- When you're hugging the enemy, you'll get a lot of damage when you shoot him, or you shoot when you're hugging the wall, so watch out, it hurts. Therefore, spacing will help a lot, medium range is almost perfect for you.

- Dance and shoot, dance and shoot, like a heat scout.

- Playing against better players, you'll see them dodging automatically estimating that your heat is ready to fire, trick them and do some nice maneuver to get the off balance, and then hit them with your unexpected shot.

- Shoot when they can't see you, you don't need to see your enemy to deal dmg to him, Look at the radar and prefire at the ground and dodge right before the enemy shows up to get better angles and avoid his shots.

- One of the best things about the heat cannon is that you can dodge RIGHT after shooting, as unlike the rest of the weapons (EOC and AR), the heat fires ONE shot and so again RIGHT after firing you can dodge or do any move you like.

- The sfx is awful, when you charge it the enemy can easily hear it, and when charged it still makes a loud noise, so a good player or actually a good listener will know that you're around. Just bare that in mind.

- Raise the sensitivity a bit when using the heat, and start spamming shots on the enemy's right and left leaving almost no chance for him to dodge them all.

[Browno]

spo0n, on September 20 2014 - 09:24 PM, said:

@~1:36 you get tricked by a bots hologram... but I didn't watch the whole video.

Can you buy an air compressor_  I see how you are optimized to use orbs, but the extra movement ability will help to confuse humans and open up more options for what you can do at any moment.

Your cornering isn't too bad, you seem to know what you should be doing, but I'm not sure how many shots you hit vs how many missed.  It also seemed like you were firing blindly around a corner over and over and hoping a bot would just walk into your shots.  Not too sure how much you can learn from fighting bots besides aiming and kiting though.

At 1:36 that was when i was in panic mode. I have noticed that i take potshots when i panic against enemies i run by, so thats one thing i have to get rid of.
I will get the AC again then
My current acc is 47% with grenade and 44% with HEAT

Edited by Browno, September 20 2014 - 09:47 PM.

[ThirdEyE]

Here's another recent thread with lots of good advice and a classic video at the bottom of the first post

https://community.pl...-how-to-hawken/

[Browno]

Thanks for the guidance ThirdEyE!

Updated with new vid now against humans

[DM30]

Elite's HEAT cannon advice was all really good. I was especially going to mention the self-damage that he brought up, since it looks like you spent a lot of time at facehugging range which is risky when running dual explosive weapons. I'd say try not to get caught so close, or if you really like playing in-your-face combat a failsafe might not be a bad idea (I still advocate avoiding self damage entirely, though).

Only other thing I would really mention is that your dodging patterns looked a bit predictable when you were fighting in open ground, either dodging left-right constantly or just spamming it after every HEAT shot (which is a habit I've also formed, I admit). This will make it easier for enemies to predict your movement if they're paying attention, so be careful of that.

[Browno]

Thanks for the heads up DM30!
I will take that into consideration and try to be more unpredictable

[BurnsHot]

After watching both videos:

Your aim with the heat cannon looks pretty good.

1.If you get the drop on someone then unload both primary and secondary shots.  Always keep the right mouse button ready to pre-detonate the Nade even if you lose line of sight.  It's one of the best feeling in the game to throw a Nade, dash behind cover and get that positive sound prompt that you just made a kill.

2. You need MORE practice with your Pre-detonation of your Nades.  I saw way too many explode way in front of the enemy without causing any damage.

3. A lot of shots looked rushed and panicked.  Take your time.  Set up your shots by firing either your Primary or secondary shot only. Then wait for them to dodge to send the second shot.  I think i noticed you lobbing both Primary and Secondary shots at the same time more often then you should be.

4.  In Deathmatch, take advantage of other players. When you walked in to the fight of that infiltrator against the heavy you zoned on on the Infiltrator first.  You should have quickly seized up the fight and targeted the Heavy Mech first.  You ended up dividing your attention between both and missed two easy kills.

5. Not playing aggressive enough.  In the above listed fight, after the infiltrator got away from the heavy and you ran from the heavy you picked the infiltrator up again.  You stayed behind cover hoping to hit him when coming after you.  You had your cloak ability and this would have been the perfect time to use it.  You could have gone around the right side or over the top of the wall for the surprise hit.

Don't know if you give this much thought but it boils down to an Health Point game.  If you have a certain amount of HP more than the enemy then you can afford to take more risk and charge right in.  Learn to recognize when you have this advantage and you will start charging in with confidence.

Do that a couple of times to the same player and you will notice that some players instead of fighting just try to avoid you altogether.  You've already won the psychological battle.  All that's left to do is chase him down and take him out.


6. Like you have already admitted to, your movement/dash/dodge needs more practice.  Minor note, if you have a full tank then just boost straight out of the fight until you run out of fuel or you feel safe enough to walk and disappear from radar.  I saw couple of times fleeing and trying to use the side boost and it didn't look smooth at all.

Well, I hope I gave you enough to think about.

Keep us updated on how well you've improved.

[Browno]

Thank you BurnsHot! You made many good points that i will practise on and what kind of mindset i need. Got some days of practise ahead before i post next update.

Question to all of you, do you prefer to have 2 vids side by side here, keeping the old vid and the latest one for crossrefernce to be able to compare them and see if there is any improvement going on_

Or just have the newest vid up_

[EliteShooter]

It's always easy to keep them all there. You can embed the newest one as usual, and put the others in spoilers, just to make it easier to navigate the thread.

[bad_wolf2013]

I know I'm not as good of an infil pilot as the other guys here, but I just need to point out one thing, at 5:45 you got really lucky that the g2 pilot had bad aim. You were dangerously close and in the air, if he had hit you with the MIRV your infil would have slowly fallen to the ground while he kept on hitting you. It has happened to me countless times in when a raider sneaks up behind me while I'm fighting someone else, it's not fun, even air compressor won't help you move. Try to engage a g2 raider from a distance.

[BurnsHot]

Browno, on September 21 2014 - 09:27 PM, said:

Thank you BurnsHot! You made many good points that i will practise on and what kind of mindset i need. Got some days of practise ahead before i post next update.

Question to all of you, do you prefer to have 2 vids side by side here, keeping the old vid and the latest one for crossrefernce to be able to compare them and see if there is any improvement going on_

Or just have the newest vid up_

Your welcome!

You can update your OP and stack the videos one after the other with a notation on the date they were uploaded, or you can simply leave the OP alone and the next time you post just add the new video to your new post.  If you do it the last way I just said then its real easy to follow the conversation and all the comments make sense.

Updating your original OP can sometimes lead to confusing conversations where the reader has to search for what the person was talking about.  I was just lucky that I saw your first video before you changed it and then was able to see the second one.

Either way its your choice how you want to update us because its your Post.

Edited by BurnsHot, September 22 2014 - 06:04 AM.

[Browno]

Ok, so i have had 2 days, or 3-4 hours to practice things, so it might not be that good, but i have started to think different then before and remembering what you have told me. I did practice some with the grenades when to detonate them, and i seem to be better at that now, and i do not shoot grenade and heat simultanously as much either, which have proven to help me out more in 1 vs 1 duels.

In this game that i uploaded i got some tunnelvision and were trapped a few times into enemy lines which is bad.
I also seemed to get some lucky moves in and got some nice kills by doing that. (A shame i can't do it all time )
My mindset is a bit more confident in my skills 1 vs 1 so i do not panic as much as before at least.

[BurnsHot]

It will take some time to learn how to be a great Pilot.

Your first fight with that reaper, you let him sneak up behind you.  You had the HP advantage on him and that's the only thing that saved you.  It only took one direct hit with a Nade to finish him off but you had a hard time landing it.  Wait for him to dodge and aim for where you predict he will be at the end of his dodge.  I know its hard to do while someone is shooting at you but try to stay calm and not jerk your mouse.

After that fight, you encountered the Zerker.  Did you notice that the Zerker took to the Air and stayed up there_  You were back peddling and couldn't get a good angle on him while he was able to rain down on you.  Next time that happens, Just boost right under him then then do a side dash to point yourself in their direction.  When done right you set yourself up with the better firing position and he is the one scrambling to turn his mech at you.

I do want to go back and say that your first volley should be the Primary and Secondary.  Once you lose the surprise then settle in to the rhythm of spamming primary to set up your secondary shot.  If you get the drop on someone then unload everything you got (Alpha strike with Primary, Secondary and Item like detonator or heat charge)

Other things to think about.  What is your FOV (Field of Vision)  Max right now is 110 and i think most of the higher level players have theirs at max.

Might want to change your kill cam to First Person prospective.  I find it better to view the kill-cam  from the shooter's cockpit instead of over their shoulder.

If you find yourself out numbered and there is no easy kill in front of you then definitely cloak and run.