Steam Community :: Guide :: Tips and Tricks

Store Page

AirMech

All Discussions Screenshots Artwork Broadcasts Videos News Guides Reviews

AirMech > Guides > Rizael's Guides

285 ratings

Tips and Tricks

By Rizael

This a general Tips and Tricks guide to AirMech, please note: This is not a beginner's guide. This is more suited towards the mediocre player. The guide covers various topics like : Combat Tips, Teamwork Tips, CTF Tips, AirMech-Specific Tips, Map Tips and more.

Award

Created by

Rizael
Offline

Category: Gameplay Basics, Multiplayer

Posted

Updated

14 Dec, 2012 @ 7:22am

2 Feb, 2014 @ 2:33am

8,813	Unique Visitors
207	Current Favorites

Guide Index

Overview

General Tips

Combat Tips

Teamwork Tips

AirMech-Specific Tips

AirMech-Specific Tips (contd.)

Map Tips

Conclusion

Comments

General Tips

Shooting the corners of a Fortress does more damage than to any other side of it.
You can do decent damage to the enemy fort using just your mech shooting the aforementioned area. Doing this with Warthog is highly effective and has also earned the name HeroHogging.
You can use islands to store infantry.
Fortresses are damaged by Area of Effect attacks
Placing mines on creep paths that run near other expensive units is a good way to get rid of clumped units.
When you're mech hunting, carry seekers with you for backup.
When you're building units, don't wait for them to finish. Go out and harass and kill enemy tanks, creep, money makers, etc.). Basically, Never stay still.
If you invest money into abilities don't forget to use them.
Try to put your enemy in lose-lose situations. Put down tanks rolling from one side and start capping outposts from the other. This way they're gonna have to deal with both.
Watch the minimap as much as possible. The minimap is your friend. If you watch it, you will never be surprised by a tank column knocking down your front door or cheese.
Put HAATs and other cool stuff behind trees. When the opponent is going fast they can't see them all that well and will be caught off guard. Furthermore, if your team color is green, it will be very hard to spot units hidden behind trees.
Spread and hide arty to break defenses, don't mass it. As it will be easier for AOE to destroy it all at once.
Tanks, Berthas and Seekers take have their armor reduced by 40 when attacked from the rear.
When near your team's Fortress, don't waste time building soldiers, just take the creeps

Combat Tips

When you chase someone and they land, land near a ledge so you can quickly transform and chase them down without having the transform cooldown.
When you are being chased by someone, try to anticipate when they will land to attack you. A popular way is by seeing if your opponent is firing or not. Usually, AirMech Guns will pause for a split second before transforming. Use this time to transform and get away. Rinse and Repeat till you reach the vicinity of your outpost.
If you have Helix air missiles don't land to fight grounded mechs.
Jump in front of teammates that are low on health. The opponent will target you while your teammate gets away.
Storming in and capping a primary outpost (i.e. nearest outpost to enemy's main base), along with defending it, messes with the opponent's head and can change the flow of a match quickly.
Sometimes when sniping it's better to stand still so you only hit one unit at a time, so that only one unit ends up shooting you instead of the entire group.
No matter what the unit's normal attacking range is, if you're damaging it, it will fire back if it can.
When you get caught ferrying units in enemy territory and you can't make it back to your post back in time, drop the units and run to get speed. It's always better to lose the units than to lose both your mech and the units.
T99s cannot shoot missiles and attack units at the same time, use that to your advantage by placing units to attack T99s and doing Flyovers or even Bomb drops to get the attention of the T99.
T99 missiles follow different rules than most projectiles or missiles, they shoot up first, and then towards their target. They are not stopped by cliffs or objects, unlike seekers.
Units set to "attack" will attack only the fort once they're in range. So if your opponent rushes with dillos, feel free to stand as close as possible and melee them. They won't shoot back, unless your in the path of the tank shells.
You can block enemy units from attacking your fortress by placing units in front of them, this way they will attack the units and not your fortress shield.
Heal damaged units carrying them (space when over them) and healing them by hovering over an outpost (grey smoking units have lost half of their health, black smoking ones lost almost three-fourth of its health)
Try to capture as many outposts as possible. Don't just spam multiple tanks at one outpost, thinking that the enemy will continuously try to capture it, just leave 3 or 4 tanks there and go off to capture another outpost.
Try to make a small push, a drop or even solo-firing at the enemy fortress before Halftime. This way, you prevent your opponent from getting the Halftime credits bonus.
When an outpost is just captured, it will have 0 energy, during this time, if you can shoot your enemy, it means that they won't be healed by the outpost and will probably die.

Teamwork Tips

General

Don't wait till your teammate asks for help, analyze the situation and go ahead and help them unless they explicitly tell you not to.
If you see a shiny tag then it is a teammate asking for help, if you aren't doing anything important then go there,
To make one for yourself press Z, if you want to visual marker double press Z.
If a teammate asks you to build a unit is nice to do it.
Build just what you need, if a unit is not anymore useful recycle it (hold spacebar over an outpost/fortress) it's always nice having some power.
Try to avoid having similar unit in the loadout with your teammate especially socket units like Money Maker/Botspawner/Lunchbox , you can share your units.
Two people can easily capture an outpost, use that to your advantage.
Put ! before your message for it to be visible only to teammates.
Don't leave at the start of a match, you give your teammates a great disadvantage.
Don't leave when the game is going to end soon, you still get kudos and experience even when losing.
Try to cover your teammate from missiles cloud when he comes back to heal over outpost. Healing isn't instant when they come to the outpost, and even so, it might drain the outpost empty of energy.
Try to shoot down the missiles following your teammate, doing so can often save them.
When rushing, send two rushes this can increase your level of success. You can split with your teammate, him supporting the first rush and you supporting the second.
Pay attention to the radar, if you guess what your teammate is doing, you can work more efficiently, and help him as well.
Remember, its never YOUR unit, its the TEAM's unit.

CTF

Try to go for the core at the same time with a mate, the one who didn't get the core can be a meat shield for the other, this is very helpful.
It doesn't matter how many times you grab the core, you have to bring it to your base to score, so don't go alone, take it and get blown. If you are about to die, tag the place, drop the core and try to bring the enemy far from it hoping that your team will take it (once dead tell them to take it even on chat if it's still there)
Don't recharge over an outpost while holding the core, you heal less, instead, drop the core near the outpost then heal, after that make sure you pick it up before your opponent.

AirMech-Specific Tips

Striker

When you have the Sword and Shield up, you receive 30% less damage from the front.
Gundam (Striker Sword Ability) is amazing. It can shred infantry and clustered units with ease.
The Striker is generally good at anything. A good combination is the Gabe pilot, with it's Air Speed and Attack Power boosts, this makes it a viable AirMech Hunter.
Time the Striker rockets at the precise moments. Even if an opponent is low on health and has retreated to an outpost, fire your rocket. More than often it can kill them over their outpost with the massive spike damage.
Blaster guardians are a very nice addition to the striker as they add extra firepower and shoot while you use your sword melee skill.
Use Striker's afterburner ability to get to places, respond to harass and escape faster.
If you want to go support striker, make sure you max out the builder ability first.
Try to do a little bit of everything. Striker is amazing in that it can do a lot of things. Try harassing, destroying rushes with your sword and annoying your enemies with the rockets.

Chopper

Once you get missiles, don't land to shoot grounded mechs.
When trying to kill a grounded enemy, point your missiles at the enemy. Helix missiles do home, but they don't home much.
If you need to keep an outpost or fort from the enemy, nothing says GTFO like a load of missile spam.
When using chopper, place tanks in random spots to tempt an enemy into AM shooting it, then come in with your missiles blazing and go for the kill. Tank Trap.
Try to snipe your opponent's units from afar. Chopper's ground missiles have extensive range so you can destroy units from a fair distance.
If you want to go support helix, make sure to alternate between buying carry capacity and builder ability.
Use the high carry capacity of the Chopper to your advantage. By level 4, having just 1 point in carry capacity can let you carry 2 longhorns at a time. Use this to ferry your units faster across the map and micro more effectively.
When responding to harass, make sure you start firing your rockets a little earlier than before you reach your harasser. This means you do more damage to the harasser and also taking him by surprise.

Bomber

Bomber is a harass and anti-harass mech, play it as one.
A good strategy for destroying moderately defended outposts is by carrying the buildable Bombs unit and let it do the bulk of the damage and the use your Bomber's bomb ability to finish them off.
When Tanks are clumped to each other with less AA defense, transform to ground mode and melee the tanks from the hind, the Area of Effect attack along with the extra damage can destroy them quickly.
Try attacking Tanks and Seekers from the behind with the Bombs. You will need to adjust the position of your bombs to do more damage. When the tank glows red, it means you've hit the sweet spot. Continue to Bomb the tank in the same area to deal 2x damage.
If you chase an enemy Airmech and force it to transform into Ground Mode, do not try to juke it and transform into ground mode with it, because the Bomber has a melee attack in ground mode. Instead of transforming, use bombs to force them back into Air Mode and continue shooting.
Mantis Strike at level 3, when timed properly deals more DPS than normal melee. So unless you're up against a clump of units, Mantis Strike is more effective.
Mantis Strike can hit AirMechs in Plane Mode. So you can deal damage to those pesky chases.
Mantis Strike can pass through up to 3 targets.
While charging up mantis strike, you have extra armor, use this to get out of a sticky situation.
Your whirlwind ability does less than your melee ability but can hit units in all directions around your mech.

Saucer

Blink is amazing. It will let you get away from most sticky situations you find yourself in.
Blink makes you the fastest AirMech by far.
Do not overestimate Blink. Even though you are moving extremely fast, you are doing so one blink at a time. You are not immune to AirMech Fire.
If you drop bombs while blinking, they will go much farther than just dropping them normally. Makes aiming hell of a lot harder though.
Abduct units even if they're cheap. You can always recycle them for their full value.
You can't abduct units that you can't normally build. For example, you can't abduct an enemy goliath if you don't have 2 techpods.
On large maps, use the Saucer's superior speed to abduct random units. This will distract the opponent and also make them curse you :)
Death ray damage scales up the longer its used.
Only use the blast wave ability when there's a unit engagement, since the blast wave has a relatively long cooldown time, its best to save it for when you really need it.
Did I mention Blink is awesome ?

Neo

Neo has the highest base Air speed and a fast turning speed. Use it to gain advantage in dogfights.
Doing Boomer drops along with a stasis burst can highly increase the chance of all boomers exploding. This is because, the stasis burst slows down units' firing speed by 50%.
Use Cloak to make sneaky escapes and ninja drops.
Neo is very good at strafing because of its high Ground Speed. A Neo can constantly strafe to avoid getting shot by tanks.
At level 15, a Neo can carry two Longhorns. Doing that along with Cloak can catch the opponent off-guard.
Neo's stasis blast can slow down units and lock mechs down into ground form. Use the former to buy time and the latter to finish off escaping mechs.
When you are cloaked, avoid getting into areas with AirMech Fire. You lose fuel very fast when your AirMech receives fire. Try to move via secluded areas.
While trying to kill a mech on low health, pretend as though you've given up by going away, cloak, and then when the enemy transforms in the air to escape, finish it off.
If you don't have Jammers, you can make your push go unnoticed by using the Radar Disrupt ability.

Osprey

Osprey is a support mech. Don't try to take on lots of units with it.
Don't bother with the Osprey's ground guns. They're horrible.
Constantly heal your units. Press and hold Right Click throughout the game to keep your units alive.
You can disarm mines with the Osprey. While not very useful, its a neat perk.
Use a pilot that provides a heal or unit bonus as Units are the power of the Osprey. Examples are Kira, Jesus or Samson.
Osprey's Air Guns are on par with the Neo. Don't underestimate them.
When you're getting ganked or when there is a lot of Anti-Air in the area, transform to Ground mode and heal your units. Ground Mode Heal also takes up less energy than Air Mode Heal and also heals more.
You can heal a unit with your heal beam as well as carry units and heal them, do this to maximize your healing capacity.
If you have a lot of units with black smoke, its a good time to activate the Heal nova ability.

AirMech-Specific Tips (contd.)

Since Steam Guides has a stupid character restriction, I had to make a second section to continue.

Warthog

Warthog is a tank AirMech. Don't be afraid to take on units.
Continually pressing the fire button can make the Warthog significantly faster while firing. This is commonly known as Tap Firing.
Don't overestimate the Warthog. There is a limit to how much damage the Warthog can tank.
Make your aiming precise as the Warthog does massive amounts of damage in the Air.
Do not snipe with the Warthog. The Warthog is meant to tank damage and get fairly close. In accordance, Warthog guns are designed to fall off at long distances, dealing significantly less damage.
The damage increase ability and the piercing increase ability make you an absolute beast versus tanks

Paladin

This mech is a great for supporting units.
When taking fire from a unit, make sure you face your shield towards it, this reduces the damage taken by 50%.
The Paladin's high carrying capacity and amazing supporting abilities makes it great for PvE games, though it's aura abilities are also quite helpful in PvP (especially for players who enjoy playing mainly as an army commander).
The Paladin's hammer throw ability can be useful to get a little damage off on enemy units while in a stalemate situation and can also be useful against enemy pushes.
Speed Aura is when you're pushing.
Defense Aura is when your push has arrived at an enemy outpost and is taking fire.
Attack Aura is when you're defending against a push (since your units will most likely live due to defender's advantage, it is better for them to destroy as much of the push as possible)

Angel

The Angel is a hit and run mech. It hits hard with the snipe ability and has a wonderful escape mechanism in the form of the loop ability.
Sniper ability is best used from behind enemy tanks to do extra damage.
Use the afterburner to move faster while carrying heavy units such as Goliath and Brutes.
Use the glide ability to chase enemy mechs on ground mode and move over chasms.
Use the afterburner to outrun enemy missles when loop is still recharging
Use Energy Guardians with Angel to maximize Sniping abilty and Quick shot for faster (and more) shots.
Angel is quite fragile, so if you see a Helix nearby while sniping, its time to run.

Map Tips

Simple

Use the various height advantages to maximize your artillery's range.
You can send pushes from the top and bottom lane to distract your enemy, while you can mess around with their units.
Since Simple is a small map, movement speed is not very important.

Duel

Duel is a pretty linear map. As always watch for cheese on your forward and close outposts.
Every 5 minutes, a lockbox spawns in the middle left and the middle right area along with Gorgons and extra Golaiths. Get the lockboxes and make sure your opponent doesn't.
Recycling the lockboxes can give you a huge 40k credits which can help fund a push or help you recover from an assault.

Chasm

SO MANY PADS, make sure you populate them with stuff, preferably Money Makers, Levelers or Generators.
Be careful about the outposts on the sides, make sure you fortify them or at least keep an eye on them via the minimap.
It is crucial to not allow your enemy to capture the outpost on your side in the beginning of the game, or else they will use that base as a foothold on your side and then attack from there.
Use the height advantage and artillery to rein terror on your opponent if they capture the middle outpost.
Place a tank on your fortress' bottom right corner so that the jackal at the start doesn't damage your fortress.

Thar

There are small pieces of land on the top right left and bottom mid parts of the map, at the edges of the map. These look like prefect arty positions, if the enemy is turtling at those posts.
It is generally advisable to go for the south neutral island as it is relatively less defended by neutrals
Send a small push for the neutral outpost at the sides. That outpost is defended by Jackals and Seekers so one tank can take out almost all of the neutrals.
Set your units on Y Command (Attack) during the pregame so they head towards the middle. After that, set them on C Command (Hold) so they stop and attack the units. This is because if you set units on T command during the pregame, they head towards the side neutral outpost, which is of relatively low priority.

TwinPeaks

You can make a choice between the top outpost which is more closer to the opponent's closest outpost or you can go for the bottom outposts, which gives you more resources if you manage to snag both of them.
Once in a good position with both top and bottom outposts, sneak in some tanks and AA. Once you have enough in position, rush them in. Best done with an Osprey/Chopper.
Set up artillery in different strategic locations at the bottom or top so you can take out the opponent's units.

Sandrim

You can sneak in infantry to the small islands near the middle outpost during pre-game. Keep a bunch of infantry there instead of running back to your fortress to get more infantry.
The middle outpost holds strategic value as it gives you tons of choices for your next outpost capture.
Keep an eye on the minimap for any mech that tries to go for the neutral outpost next to your fortress. Last thing you want is your opponent getting your closest outpost.
If you fail to capture the middle, go for the opponent's outposts, they will be relatively undefended because they will be indulged in holding and fortifying mid.

Nesthorn

The middle outpost has quite some neutrals so its a fight between which player clear them and capture the outpost first. Make sure you don't let your units die to the neutrals.
If you use moneymakers, make sure you guard the farm of 3 pads by an Anti Air unit.
In the event that you fail to get mid, go for the opponent's closest outpost, this will distract them and give your teammates an opening to siege middle.

Vale

It's a big map. Make sure your team splits up into the different lanes to get a tactical advantage.
If you use a Saucer, make sure you abduct your opponent's units at random. Getting around Vale is a hassle and takes time if you're not a Saucer, so they will likely not have time to respond to your abduct harass.

Crater

You can take out the neutral turrets with artillery to get to lots of XP.
Try to avoid flying over the turrets for obvious reasons.
Try sending a push through the topmost lane as it only has Mines which can be deactivated easily.
If you have mid, you have the opportunity to confuse your opponent by attacking various outposts at once. Send bluff pushes to the three outposts, but increase your forces at the outpost which is relatively less defended.

Salt

Salt is like an expanded version of Simple. Most of your Simple strategies can apply to Salt with a little bit of modification.
The middle top outpost is guarded moderately, make sure you have a medium force before trying to siege that outpost.
Every 5 minutes, a lockbox spawns in the middle-bottom area. Make sure you get it and your opponent doesn't.

Conclusion

Thanks for reading this guide! Don't forget to rate this guide and if anything is out of date or if you have any tips to share, please comment below!

72 Comments

< >