With the HA shield adjustments (possibly) on the horizon, I'd like to start a discussion on what weapon as a stalker infiltrator you have the most success with for killing HA's. If your tactics require combat aids like proxies, nades, medkits thats fine, please explain to everyone how you make your move. Essentially Id like to discuss options stalker infiltrators have when trying to take down HAs, using a wide variety of weapons, and dealing with the "spin and win" factor which does happen fairly consistently during ambushes. This thread is just going to assume that NO CHANGES happen in future regarding their shields, and things remain the same. Lets not complain lets just throw out some ideas and share what has been working for us. I'd really like to hear how you guys handle them using different loadouts and weapons choices. I will start out by sharing how I kill HA using the crossbow: #1) I found I had to beat the human reaction time so they just can't shield at all. A) Close enough to cuddle? I will try and creep slowly up and bolt knife them. I nearly always have to be right up on their *** though because even a tiny delay between the bolt and the knife (due to distance) will usually result in "spin and win." I have noticed that unless I can predict enemy movement, chasing after a sprinting HA will nearly always be a sloppy kill. This is where things feel RNG and most likely end in death. After self reflection I noticed mobile HA take downs were not working. In comparison, I was being rewarded with kills to other classes which cannot temporarily undo the gains made by your initial strike. In short, taking advantage of typical behavior of "stopping and facing the danger" in order to close the gap for a knife strike DOES NOT WORK and often results in a "spin and win." B) Knife Lunges: Usually 10-15 meters. Again risky but defiantly not as dicey as going after a moving target. I'v been modifying my tactics against HA. Example I try to decloak while jumping / sprinting towards them. It results in less reaction time, and a small decrease in probability for a reactionary shield when hearing the de-cloak sound. With other classes I often decloak and fire my bolt slightly sooner to ensure they "stop and face the danger - and eat a knife " C) Beyond 15 meters: This is where I try and use my EMP's when the target is out of my lunge distance, the only way I can be assured to make a clean kill is only needing 1 shot. Now I think with other weapons which have a better fire rate then the Xbow we might see some variation here. I'd be very interested in seeing if you guys feel it necessary to EMP at certain ranges using different guns. #2) Traps A) The proxy mine works nicely unless they are wearing flak, or run over it with their shield on. Which has actually happened a few times. B) Spotter Bait: may not always work with regards to HA. again I find I need to use my EMP in some situations. If I am not in a good position to take down a HA, with a lunge I will just remain cloaked and not react to him destroying my spotter. C) Ooo Piece of Candy... under AV turret. <3 #3) Shenanigans: A) Noticing the shield has been removed by another player and "helping." B) Attacking after the HA has used their shield to block another source of damage. I usually open with a headshot hoping for a single shot kill and crossing my fingers the target might be injured. C) Gravity assisted kills.Before or after the pancake has been made. D) Catching HAs in a reload, or when they have their rocket launcher out. E) Running away and waiting for the shield to wear off.
You're going to struggle against HA using a stalker cloak... But the best thing to do if you do intend to win is use a pistol such as the emperor, beamer/manticore, or magshot with a laser sight and ADAD spam like hell, crouch and basically make yourself as hard to hit as you possibly can, and just hipfire and go for headshots. If you do chain a few headshots you can bring a shielded HA down.
That was a pretty good summary of all the ways to do it. I've been using a silenced Desperado recently when I run stalker cloak because I'm not confident enough in my aiming and the crossbow is less forgiving than a rapid fire pistol in that regard. But the only times I successfully best a (good) HA is when he's already injured, his shield is down, and/or I'm able to get a number of head shots. I always go for the head on those guys in the first shots, because once they see the hit markers: up goes the shield and the erratic movement commences. And this is not just a problem with a sidearm. Even running my auto-scout rifle I've quit counting the number of times I've unloaded a full magazine, while he hits shield, spins around, and wrecks me. If I don't get consistent headshots the good players will do that every time, even when I get the jump, and it's extremely frustrating. (And almost makes me want to go back to the SMG where this wasn't as much of a problem...must...resist...)
Best thing to do is use a high damage pistol, get close enough to headshot, then immediately headshot + knife so they don't have time to activate the shield. Your only other real options are to wait until they're distracted with something and then start shooting. Or just be TR because the Repeater messes people up no matter what class. I <3 that pistol. Except when I'm not TR. I will say that firing a shot or two, seeing if they activate the shield, then running around a corner and hiding can be an effective way to make them waste it, although it does let them know you are around.
Just shoot them? I use mostly commie and silenced Cerberus as well as ADADAD jump crouch and I never have problems with heavies.
With the commissioner, I am just more patient for an opportune moment to strike. HS do wonders and using cover is also important!
The 1800 damage caused by two headshots with the commissioner within maximum damage range will kill anything. With Enhanced Targeting, you may be able to quickly gauge damage after an initial headshot and determine whether you can get away with a follow-up bodyshot against resist shield.
Well now, Stalker dealing with HA's. Can't say much more than CuteBeaver already did, however few pointers. Rough pointers, probably basic but maybe it'll help somebody. First of all Stalkers greatest friends are momentum and terrain. Sure, they're not very forgiving. Breaking line of sight, using uncommon routes in order to confuse enemy. Haven't been playin as a stalker for a while, although as far as I remember it did break down for me more or less this way. Weapons known so far ; Mag-Shot, LA8 Rebel, TX1 Repeater, Beamer, .44 Commissioner. Terms of use ; similiarly suicidal. Situation ; Bumping into surprise HA after walking through doors. Shields go automatically up due to both parties being surprised. Tactic : Force him out of his comfort zone. HA shield in my opinion might not neccessarily be as problematic as possibility of overriding "slow movement" while using it with pure mouse sensivity settings. Therefore before I got a hang on EMP nades I used to throw a panic frag behind such a HA. At times it forced them to move, and not just look around shooting. However it doesn't account for fixed at insane rate mouse sensivity. Then shoot them in the head. Preferably using a knife, damn I haven't used that in a while.. With EMP nades comes more confusion therefore factor of getting used to them as infil works in one's favor. Sometimes it did result in a "clean" kill. Not perfect, but I'm alive and he ain't. Momentum however is a different story : run past them right in front of them, flank them around when they spin back to shoot you. If that didn't result in kill and he spotted me. Oh well, momentum is still on my side ; sideways jumping around them and shootin while occasionally knifing. This usually worked for me since the confusion ; enemy usually doesn't expect jumping. Strafing, sure no problem. Crouch? You'll lose momentum and since majority HA from my experience tend to go for bodyshots if in doubt... Crouching is basically asking for an execution. Weapons although : MagShot - reliable, decent firerate damage output and firerate. Erratic jumping shots approved. LA8 Rebel - More damage, requires more precision equired. Erratic jumping only advised if you get familiar with bloom pattern. Good for more sniper-pistol approach if neccessary. Laser sights highly advised. TX1 Repeater - Well, basically pocket SMG. Predictable recoil pattern good for erratic jump shots. Beamer - If you are fast enough with decent momentum, and quick reflex in case of rather neccessary knife from point blank engagements. Rather funny if you manage to beat their reaction time and land headshots consecutively. Commissioner - Erratic confusion jumping in a suspicious pattern, don't recommend. Rather point blank shot and knife. Preferred tactics : Terrain - rapid floor switching for instance Snowshear Watchtower C point. Perfect for flanking and hunting down people going inside. Lure them slightly to your position, then just walk on the wall a bit, drop into ground level, flank. Get hackusations. Optionally ambushes using friendlies/common enemy routes. Preferrably when you're not in line of sight of their even after decloaking. Abuse their confidence - assuming you're on equal ping they shouldn't react fast enough to you running at them from sidelines. Especially after landing shots on both sides. Why care if you have 5% health if nanites will revive you indefinetly. HA's want to live forever, therefore their shield. Usually they're not used to idea of underdog with less basic health to charge them. Yes I'm suicidal at times, at times it actually works. Frustration - get them to be so annoyed by you to try dumbfire you, dodge it, kill them. Bait - Maybe there is something wrong with me, but apart of using motion spotters/terminals as baits I used to expose my position for fraction of a second, break line of sight, therefore forcing them to usually switch to their sidearm with flashlight. Curiously without nearly infinite bullets at times they get so confused at reload that they forget about their shield. From my observations it seems like as cloaked stalker you can see flashlight on you while they're 15 meters away from you, while they can see you shown only roughly when they're 10 meters away from you. Not certain, just a personal feel from encountering flashlights of doom. Bonus - recently discovered Terrain fun fact. Included video link for conducted test in ping/fps friendly environment. Thanks to courtesy of my friend who provided video hence my ancient hardware can barely run ps2 not to mention recording it. Secret is doublejump, similiar use of momentum as in hillclimbin. Don't judge a voice of a tired person, and ignore that mistake regarding health at end. Personally since continent locking massive fights I have issues repeating this bonus terrain tactic, so can't say it's gonna work in terms of actually killing them, many factors are to be accounted for. However I can guarantee that what you see in video is possible even if a bit...Tricky, yeah. Tricky. Maxes tend to work as well just in case there are SMG infils wanting to annoy them. Anyways here's the link for the video, and sorry for chaos in this specific post. Exhaustion does the trick, also my stalker experience has been neglected lately therefore it's been a bit demanding to recover everything in order.
OMG that is totally awesome! I have noticed this when trying to do air assassinations with the bolt knife sometimes I would land on the enemies heads for tiny moment. However I never considered actually using it to land the second shot, or even open. That is absolutely hilarious. My only concern would be a moving HA, but then again... we are infiltrators, sometimes we do tend to sneak up people standing still. Regardless this is totally on my bucket list <3 thanks for sharing. This is perfect for trolling. This is why I love these class forums. We have a problem, and we get the most amazing out of the box answers imaginable. I don't know what inspired you that fine day to piggyback attack, but bravo, bravo.
HA/CM here. I have to say the crazy jump-dodge-lambada routine is what gives me the most trouble when a cloaker manages to get the drop on me. If I'm running with MSW-R, or a shottie he is toast, anything else, however, and things might go shaky for me (since I run the Foregrip on the majority of my loadouts). Forcing the HA to ADS in CQC while jumping all around the place is a solid tactic (even if it looks quite ********). Nice thread. As you were.
Has discovered resist shield HA's are weaklings against stalker infils. Just EMP + knife them and laugh. Both Nanoweave and Resist Shield do absolutely nothing with regards to mitigating knife damage. Overshield cannot block any EMP shield damage so in the case of resist If you happen to follow up with a knife its over for them in the blink of an eye. While the HA's Resist Oversheild remains visibly "active" your bypassing all of its effects. NMG and Adren is a different story all together and doesn't work like this. + 700 HP is only going to come down with damage or beating human reaction time. The hard part for me is figuring out which NC shield is Resist and Which is NMG / Adren. They look identical to me. The TR is slightly less awful and I tend to notice the magma / lava / electrical pattern for the resist shield. VS has a purple one for (Resist) the other is Teal for NMG. I am finding NMG and Adren to be the most challenging to overcome. I can kill a Resist HA in 2 actions, it takes 4 to kill a NMG.
Something that works for me if I meet a HA right around a corner and he pops his shield is to sprint around him. My general purpose stalker build uses Adrenaline Pump you'd be surprised how hard it is to track someone sprinting around you faster than a normal person usually does especially if you have shield slowage. Now obviously you can't maintain this forever so what I do is knife them to death as I'm sprinting around them. The way to keep momentum while doing this is to Jump --- Slight Turn (let go of sprint button) --- Knife (press sprint before you hit the ground) Accomplish this correctly and you will not lose sprint momentum at any time. You can test this by trying the combo while moving in a straight line. You will notice that jumping allows you to maintain forward momentum speed and during your jump time you can shoot and knife without speed loss. Then before you land re-engage your sprint key to continue your sprint speed momentum. This combo paired with adrenaline pump is the only way I have ever successfully chased someone down enough to shot knife them with the QCX while they were also sprinting. (I was really surprised when I learned in beta that my Infil ran at the same speed as a HA since in PS1 the heavier your armor the slower you moved. Thought that was the trade off for less health but I guess I was wrong ) It's difficult at first but once you get the combo down it becomes second nature. Using this I chase down HA's all the time that are attempting to flank armor by themselves. This combo is not limited to just the crossbow either just know your shot to knife ratio and your good for instance 3 Mag-shot or Rebel + Knife or 2 Desperado + Knife (never really tried this with the Revolvers as I used the commie to execute from range and the UB I just went for headshots anyway) -SideWinder
As mentioned by DHT#, TR are blessed with the Repeater. I started using the X-Bow with Stalker cloak but as I'd typically open up for the shot+knife combo, I found the Repeater much more flexible when the target moves around/ is jet packing above you/ running away/engaged with another target. The added bonus is that HA can be dropped reliably, assuming you can get close (which, unless some jedi is covering their backs, should be the case). Three clicks aimed at the head + knife while walking forwards and through the character model followed by immediate 180 while inside the model followed by the last few clicks (or knife if close enough) finished them off. Of course, anything other than point blank range is generally messy - thought unlike with the X-bow, this can be done to moving targets, whether they be moving away/towards etc. Tbh, if you can catch them on a blind corner and have them run into you, all the better. Still not sure about utility slot tho. I'd hope for Ammo Belt, tho Nanoweave might be better for this brawler/messier (at least compared to the finesse of the x-bow) style of play. However, I also enjoy having 4 EMPS (and always run regeneration II for sustain. Sharpe, who I believe is number 4 in world (or was) on Lynx kills, (with Snowfake no.3? Been a while) has a technique of play that would work very well with Stalker cloaks. Having had the good fortune to sharing a curry with Sharpe IRL and watched him play, I don't think he'll mind me sharing a key to his technique: Always running *holding* a medi kit. If he takes fire en route to a target, he'll pop it, dive for cover, flank and engage (or if forced, pop and fire). Likewise he's got the timing down to a T of when to open fire, break, pop medi, engage. Granted he's blessed with a Lynx and a jump-jet and yet, I reckon the style of play could be adapted for a Stalker + Repeater (or more likely, an SMG/Hunter Cloak). One of the things I've been practicing of late is the beautiful art of Stalker re-cloaking and minimum distances required to travel to crouch and have it kick in, allowing us to pounce back on the target when they look for us. Even a Dark Light can provide us with a second or so to get the jump on the target. Hmm.. while the LA has the advantage of cover, perhaps we can use this to pop a medi-kit before heading out again. Of course, the trick is to keep the pressure on. I see a fair amount of videos where Stalker play can be described as sedentary - which is fine, of course (to each their own). However, giving time to a target, especially a HA, is generally a good way to lose our only real edge.
There is only one tactic for it, kill him before he shields....... if you dont 90% of the time you will loose. I would like to point out this doesnt make the HA shiled OP, it simply means that we have to take more care when engaging a HA. Appart from sniper i feel the Stalker is the best Infil setup for dealing with HAs, it gives you the one hit then knife option which is the most effective way of killing them before they have time to shield.
Well I suppose I should log in to respond more often. Thanks for kind bravo CuteBeaver, as it is for inspiration.. Basically I got annoyed few times after being killed by HA bumping into me while I was cloaked minding my own business, obviously that ended with erratic shooting half of the mag by HA which resulted in my death, so I figured if they can use collision against me, there has to be a way for me to use it against them as well. Also I gotta say thanks for your videos CuteBeaver. Because of them I decided to "befriend" crossbow which seemed odd at first look beforehand didn't even consider buying it. After obtaining it, oh let's just say it's potatopc with barely bearable latency viable. To the point however, few more things that seem to work. I did some extensive testing in regards of "combat jumping" let's call it or "I don't care if you're HA, I'll just walk over you". In fact most of them HA's do not even suspect this move, however small minority is aware enough to react quickly. However as it is for a facts ; HA Serial Code T-NMG [Fluffy red magma coat as I'd describe visual effect of it] Bolts from Xbow taken while using NMG - 1[Body shot if I recall correctly] EMP's used - 0 Combat jumps performed on him - 0.5[You need actually two extremely quick jumps to get on their head, first one gets you on their shoulders therefore 0.5 CJ's 1CJ would be on the head.] Knives taken to the face by said HA, while having overshield - 3 Confusion level - "Wait...what? Where the hell is that stalker...*death screen showing up*" Damage taken by said stalker - ~50% shields down while using Nanoweave Tier 5, encountered HA after shooting at me while I ran at him got confused to oblivion when I got on his shoulders, not a single shot fired afterwards. Motivation : I don't have enough damn time to rechamber xbow bolt, bastard spotted me. HA Serial Code T-NMG [FRMC] Bolts taken - 0 CJ's performed - 0 EJ[erratic jumps around him] - Approx 2 circles EMP's used - 0 [I need to get that grenade bandoleer at some point, one simply ain't enough] Knives taken on every square centimeter/inch of HA -7 Damage taken by stalker -5% shields off. Final thought : "Just die already you inhumane monster...wait are they all blind? I knifed one of their heavies in middle of them and nobody tried to help him? Sheesh poor bastard" Motivation : Same as in previous case, minus accuracy HA Serial Code V-R [Teal Glowing Spandex] Bolts taken - 0 Knives taken - 0 EMP's taken - 0 EJ - 0 CJ - 1.5 [jumping on his head and over him] Mines deployed on his head - 2 Confirmed Kill Damage taken by stalker - What stalker? [-100% shield+health, I may have unhealthy relationship with minefields, somehow I still like it though.] Conclusion to encountering HAV-R : "I might be playing on a potato, and I might have less health. However I don't like HA so, I'll kill you even with 10 fps minefielding you into oblivion with myself included if necessary" Note : It also works wonders with pretty much all HA, especially if you see them camping in some corner, just throw 2 mines at their head. Although you might want to put few bullets/bolt in case of Flak armor T5/Nanoweave T5 HA Serial Code RS [Randomized faction Shotgunner] Kill them with any method listed above in various posts. Just a word of advice what works for me ; dodge their bullets until they end their mag, kill them while they reload. Assuming they won't get drop on you/they'll fail at first shot. 1 CJ also works on those, they tend to spam shells in 360 degrees flat field of view, almost never look up, if they do it's too late. Hmm well I suppose that's it for now. Kaeyz
Another few days of repeater + stalker (+ammo belt) and I have to say, assuming you get the jump, heavies are a piece of cake, shields be damned! My little infi is eagerly awaiting the new TR faction pistol tho. Probably gonna be a trade for opportunistic efficiency versus reliability up close. Though saying that, repeater is really getting the job done - moving/flying/shielding/cloaking - it kills them all (with thanks to a trusty knife). At the moment, the real enemy is my little infi's own faction and team mates, though it's to be expected if he insists on humping the legs of the enemy when there's itchy trigger fingers around. EDIT: It should be noted that, while it can be fun hunting down solo targets, we don't always get the luxury (typically when the PL is sending us into another grinder and calls my infi back in from walkabout). It's those frantic firefights where the repeater really shines. Shines before shortly getting snuffed out with extreme prejudice.
MAKE THEM FEAR YOU pop a few bullets into him with a silent weapon he comes looking pop 2 into him again. eventualy when they hide in the corner you can just leave them there or get a clean double/triple tap to the head. the rebel pistol for NC works great with this
