Is it a good or bad idea to use tomcat missles?

Discussion in 'PlanetSide 2 Gameplay Discussion' started by Kimble, Oct 24, 2015.

  1. Kimble

    Purely from an objective viewpoint regardless of you personal feelings about them..I know a lot of time they get hate.

    Are they generally weak or strong?

    Particularly if you are a solo flyer.
  2. Thardus

    Well, you need to be a good enough flyer to keep your cross-hairs over your target for the entire flight time. The upside, is you don't need to keep your missiles equipped, so at closer range, you can keep firing with your nose-gun, since you don't have to worry about leading too much.
  3. JojoTheSlayer

    You wont win a one on one reverse engine fight with TomCats, but if you fly secondary support (solo, but not alone in the air) with extended range on the TomCats. It gets the job done for those that are not that good at dog fights. For people that are generally good in the air though. Its more waste than gain. They will have more success via bringing other more versatile secondary weapons.

    The TomCats have a range extensions that increases the lock on range with 50m. Making it easier to keep lock, but also... IF your first missile hits the target AFTER reload is complete you can fire again on the same lock.
    You then and only then do not need to reLock the target.
  4. CorporationUSA

    It depends on who is using them, and what's their ultimate goal.

    If they just want to fly and kill some aircrafts, but don't want to put in the hundreds of hours it takes to get decent at hoverdueling, tomcats may help to do that. If they are dedicated to flying and want to get better, it's going to take longer if using tomcats because they are a crutch to fall back on. And the user will be gimped in a hover duel, due to not having fuel pods.

    There are a few other concerns as well. Tomcat users to tend get priority from experienced air, and they also tend to get rammed more because people don't like them. Not having fuel pods means A2A libs will have an easier time killing them, and they are more susceptible to AA because it's harder to get away from without the extra afterburner.

    Where tomcats do well is in the hands of experienced pilots, and when the user is able to hide behind friendly AA and snipe. They are also really hard to fight in numbers. But they aren't really a great option for inexperienced solo pilots to go out and hunt air.
  5. SteelMantis

    They are good for new players who are not going to hit anything otherwise, good for a wing-man who is going to hang back and support a more aggressive pilot and also good anytime you find yourself in an air zerg where there is a good chance of crashing into friendlies while chasing down enemies.

    For solo play nothing beats afterburners. A lot of times people flying solo will find themselves outnumbered in the air and afterburners increase the chance of being able to disengage.
  6. Taemien

    Its not a close range dueling weapon. But as hardly anyone runs flares anymore due to FS being so good, they can work well. Just have to know what you're fighting.

    ESFs and Libs, engage from above or behind. Chances are they'll bug out.

    Galaxies you want to attack from below if manned, but juke around if they begin firing bulldogs.

    Where they really shine is in groups. 2-3 ESFs with them can literally gib another ESF from a decent range. And they won't likely get away without flares. Same thing with Libs and Gals.
  7. Vurvu

    Well, they're mounting animals on quadcopters, so the relevancy of good and bad probably ends at explosive yield.
  8. Obstruction

    if you're not already good at ESF, they won't make you better. if you're just starting out it's better to get a friend and use the afterburner tanks to learn hoverfighting and leading targets with the nose. after you can successfully duel, you can then start to duel with less fuel - this is when a tomcats secondary used during the nose reload can be very strong, or simply used to kill targets that flee in an efficient manner.

    if you want to be cancer, follow around behind an actually good pilot and use your tomcat to steal his kills until he changes faction to **** you repeatedly. anytime someone actually engages you just run away, and if they chase you and start doing damage you can either jump out as light assault, or take ejection seat and go infiltrator because you're already trash so who cares what anyone thinks?

    look at DonAfraido, doing exactly this has made him famous. go to Connery VS and see the dead server, learn from the best.
  9. Crayv

    Power wise, they are the weakest of the secondary weapons. They are inferior to a HA's G2A launcher in nearly every way (while a HA wishes he could carry rocketpods).