Here in this glorious subforum of sneakiness, we all share a love for the glass cannon class that is the Infiltrator. With our cloak and some brains we can find our way into superior flanking positions, or disrupt an enemy advance from behind. We have the ability to OHK targets out to render range, as well as being able to hack terminals/turrets to further disrupt and distract our foe. We pay for this by having the least health, highly limited weapon choice, complete inability to harm armour and loud audio cues. This makes a well played Infiltrator a valuable asset in certain areas, but sorely lacking in many others. Which makes our usefulness in squad play somewhat erratic, leading to the Infil being neglected in "serious" objective based gameplay. On the other hand, it makes for a superb lone wolf class able to act far away from any support and be effective. All of this is fine, if you prefer the aforementioned "lone wolf" playstyle. But what of those infiltrators yearning for teamplay? Are we to simply pull a Medic or Engi whenever we want to play with a group? Currently, it seems as though this is a fact that will not change in the near future. Looking at this from a relatively new players perspective, the Infil has one or two roles it can fulfill in a squad. All of which are highly situational. Those roles are: - Providing recon via Motion Detector and Sensor Dart - Hacking terminals As you can see, our viability in serious squad play is exiguous at best when compared to our disadvantages. It's hardly surprising then that the competitive outfits ask for certs in Medic/Engineer/Heavy Assault/MAX. Our cries of "but I'm a far better Infil than I am HA!" will, again understandably, fall on deaf ears. This is where you, the Infiltrator community come in. Help show that we can be an asset to outfit play, and change the stigma against this class. How can we go about this? What are your thoughts on usefulness as an Infil?
Recon is one of the most useful tools for any infantry squad and is nowhere near situational. A good squad always has radar up, knowing when and where your enemies are coming from is half the battle. If you are in a squad that refuses to run an infil and you're not going up solely against vehicles. Leave. That squad leader has no idea what they're doing. Alternatively if you aren't constantly keeping radar up for your squad you are being a bad squad member. If you don't have radar up you're just asking to be surprised by a sudden push of enemy infantry. Ontop of that Infils are second to none when it comes to long range infantry combat. A sniper rifle in a squad provides a quick and easy way to counter a lot of ranged threats, from AI mana turrets to other snipers. If that sniper is good those skills also easily translate into close quarters when they can take down engies repairing maxes and other high priority targets. Unfortunately infils do reach capacity really quickly. You really only need one infil with a maxed motion spotter or darts to effectively keep radar up. Sometimes two infils is useful, but once you start getting more than that you run into issues in other areas. That one infil though is pretty much a requirement for any serious squad.
There are two main roles for the Infiltrator as I see it. 1st there is the long range role when a force is approaching a base. The Infiltrator is invaluable as the player that is taking down high-threat targets. Especially high-threat AV enemies, HAs, Mana AV turrets and other snipers. Vehicles are pretty much like cardboard now and last seconds against even a modest enemy force. Then as the attack moves into mid ranges the sensor net becomes invaluable. I managed to keep a Sunderer up for about 20 minutes using recon darts (until the enemy got angry and used a VS alt to destroy it) and a Bulldog on the Sunderer. You can spot LAs all day but people won't do anything until he's C4d the bus and pretty much ended the assault. I think Inf is very useful as part of the combined force.
I think my views are too extremes, but I just posted my PoV there : https://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/index.php?threads/light-assault-and-infiltrator.205467/
The importance of being able to see where all of your enemies are can not be overstated. Whether you do this with a motion spotter or dart spam, this is the single most useful ability we have in regards to the 'team'. I run Stalker 90% of the time (I'm not into sniping or SMG run n' gunning, though they have their moments of usefulness) and when the team is facing an entrenched enemy I put on the grenade bandolier and feed them EMP blasts at a steady pace. The EMP's remove any mines near the doorways and knock out all of their deployables while also dropping their shields. If your team takes advantage of this and rushes in after the EMP goes off, sometimes it can help break up the stalemate. Also, suicide prox mine runs are super effective in taking out rooms full of entrenched enemies. When it comes to fighting in the open with a team, what I like to do is to be the ultimate opportunist and act as wingman. Hover at the periphery of the action and keep an eye on your teammates. You can see when a teammate is about to engage an enemy, either you can physically see the two about to meet, or you can see it coming via the mini-map. Right when they start to fire at each other I uncloak and attack the enemy from the side or from an angle he isn't suspecting. This helps your teammate win the fight, stay alive, and keep moving forward toward the goal. The same goes for when you are using a Wraith cloaked Fury Flash. Taking on a Lightning alone is not the smartest thing to do, but if you hit the rear of an enemy tank while it is being engaged by one of your own, they go down quick and you help your teammates stay alive. Also, there is base prepping. Send in a competent, or better yet a team of competent Stalkers to prepare a base for invasion. Numerous times I've taken my trusty Flash to a forward enemy base that has no one in it, hack the vehicle terminal, spawn a Sundie, deploy it, plant mines on the major routes out of their spawn, overload any generators that may be there, motion spot or dart the area in between their spawn and the capzone, and then start the cap. The enemies won't come there until it shows up on the map that someone is trying to take the hex, so you do all that prepping first, then cap last. By that time people are spawning from your Sundie and surrounding their spawn, other friendly vehicles show up or are spawned there (since you hacked the terminal) etc. When playing Stalker, I like to think of and use myself as a 'compliment' to what the team is doing at the moment. Always keep an eye on the bigger picture and constantly think of how you can use your abilities to turn the tide. During a battle for a tower, sneak inside and hack an AV turret and shoot that deployed enemy Sundie that is spewing out baddies but it's at an angle your team can't hit, etc. You never know, a simple action at just the right time by your friendly neighborhood Stalker can change the tide of battle in your favor.
Interesting...I would not say our role in squad play is exiguous at all. It comes down to two factors, the competency of your squad / platoon leader, and the ability of the infiltrator in question being used correctly. We have three infiltrators in 3GIS at the moment. Its a small 36 member outfit based solely on team cohesion. Point holds are the outfits strongest feature we can hold out at times against 70+ % overpop, so you might ask why on earth do you have 3 infiltrators if your holy trinity is based on medic max engineer play? I function as a pseudo light assault, using primarily the stalker cloak and the crossbow. I have 4 EMP's on hand which allow me to venture outside and take down enemy beacons. My proxy mines paired with an EMP can gut a MAX crash support from behind. I generally try and watch the rear to prevent backrage. Bolt + knife is great for that. Before the base caps I tend to Turbo Scythe ahead to establish connections while the rest of the squad is loading up in the galaxy. Rak is our dedicated sniper. He will also sometimes fly ahead and give leadership intel on which points are in contention before the galaxy arrives. Depending on location (leadership picks) he can do an incredible amount of damage from the exterior. If he dies in his perch, a quick spawn beacon and hes right back with us holding down the building with his ghost. Rak is also incredibly flexible and well certed in other support classes, allowing him to drop down as pretty much anything we need at the time. Interdiction is Raks strongest point, and he really shines when we are stemming enemy access to the point hold building. Coop is a new addition, with strong stalker skills, but instead of crossbow + knife, he prefers using a pistol, hes good at killing / and assisting against moving targets, and we like him for his awareness, adorable personality, and his motivation for keeping squad members safe. He can switch between SMG or stalker play as the situation demands. He is incredibly flexible and has excellent instincts. It boggles my mind hes been playing PS2 for less then a year. None of us take away from the team atmosphere, but infiltrators are a different breed. We don't fall into preset molds. Everyone has their own strengths. Ours is more of a mental game. A leader in a public squad is not going to know how to use THAT specific infiltrator. They don't know them well enough to go beyond asking for simplistic things like hacking and placing motion. When you start running with the same people daily you get a handle on where each person excels. Edit: I'd also like to add depending on what your outfit or squad is doing also dictates on what you can do to complement them. If your group allows it, prep bases like REZ suggested. Its really awesome to sabotage enemy vehicle pads. If your group is mobile orbit them and prevent enemy flanks ect. Also don't be afraid to think for yourself. As long as your following what the leader wants to accomplish take the advantageous position. You don't need his permission to be effective.
Most of outfits I joined had as Golden rule "no more than 1 infiltrator per squad". This class is for lone wolves or for dedicated teams (i.e. infiltrators only).
The uber fast respawn rate of the game pretty much renders snipers worthless from a hardcore competitive cap bases point of view. A sniper just can't output the sheer volume of rapid fire kills required to actually make progress against minions respawning in mere seconds. If head shots blocked medic revives and caused a longer respawn time or a complete revamp of the spawn system that takes it away from centralized spawns for facility and towards dynamic spawns based on where friendly forces are.. then a sniper might actually contribute something in the grande scheme of things. But as it is now, they are the single least 'effective' fighter any side fields. Basically it takes an extremely talented sniper to even come close to matching a mediocre HA, LA or Medic in useful output (kills/revives). The super fast respawns and redeploying also renders intel rather worthless since in mere seconds hundreds of players can show up from who knows where at whim. Basically its just a fun class to play that doesn't really help your faction/outfit at all. I don't really care myself. I play whats fun, the base capping I find to be too shallow to really care about anyways. I just like shooting sniper rifles and hearing the ping of head shots. If you must play infiltrator and want to be 'helpful' to your faction and/or outfit then you pretty much are forced to SMG cheese or abuse the broken OP cloaked flash. Only then do you really output kills fast enough to make a 'difference'.
Infiltrators have 2 primary roles :: Close in :: spotting so your allies can know the location of enemies that they can't see, deploying scouting devices (so your teammates can see enemies on the mini-map), for hacking terminals, hacking turrets (both occupies and unoccupied), hacking generators, deploying vehicles from hacked terminals inside of enemy locations (want a spawn point inside those vehicle shields, this is the way to do it), catching enemies where they think they are safe, and locking cap points by staying out of sight but close enough to a cap point to keep it form being captured by the enemy. Far distance :: spotting so your allies can know the location of enemies, sniping defensively to defend squad members, Spotting is KEY. When you are in a squad that is solo in an area, don't under estimate the advantage of leapfrogging ahead as an infiltrator to disrupt and resupply from the enemy's own base of operation. This is especially useful when you are in an area of operation with low numbers of players involved. Back capping is done quite often by infiltrators and this can gain your squad the ability to stop an advancing enemy force from taking your squads current location - thus giving them a foot-hold to move up to your current location. Deploying a Sunder from the enemy's side of the fight. Hopefully, wasting enemy time and manpower by disrupting their logistics and weakening the forward location for when your squad advances. And, of course, you can spot from any location and you can do it verbally as well as actually using the spot function. Letting yoru squad mates know that a column of tanks is moving up the road toward their location give them time to try to prepare a defense.
It may not be a popular way of playing give the emphasis on kills, but you'd be surprised how effective you can be in squad play as an infiltrator that cripples rather than kills. You can completely break the momentum of an enemy rush by setting yourself up to wound many rather than kill a few. If my squad is holding down a cap point for example, I grab my semi-auto sniper, and set myself up with an angle on the enemy approach and go down the line landing one-and-done shots. Enemies I hit will then either take cover, try to engage me from well beyond their weapon's effective range, or they continue to the point with significantly less survivability. Any of these outcomes is favorable to your squad, either the enemy flow gets thinned out or you provide your squaddies with some targets that can be mowed down with just a few bullets. Doing this I've actually gained experience faster from critical assist XP than I would were I using a BASR and going for kills. And just as a side-bar, I've been AMAZED at how long it takes for someone out of their way to deal with me when I'm not actually the face grinning at them from their death screen. From this role you can also build on your recon role by calling out MAXes over the voice chat. Darts, sensors, and spotting are nice but sometimes your squaddies aren't looking at their minimap, or don't know which unit that random blip might be. It's been my experience here that, so long as your squaddies don't mind the callouts, doing this can mean the difference between a rushing max taking out half your squad and being met with a barrage of explosive ordinance the second they round the corner like something out of a cartoon. Obviously, you won't get an awesome stats since you're mostly getting assists and sometimes your squad might not even realize you're doing it. But those that do recognize what you're doing seem to like it, to the point where I once had a squad lead ask my to stop being a medic and go back to sniping... which is a really weird request to hear.
Showing everyone where the enemies are, then watching them get rekt despite superior intel and initiative. EMP for wiping out enemy deployables, creating openings for crashes, stackable with the other nades via allies. Trapping key locations with AP mines. Reclaiming turrets from enemy infils.
The infiltrator is a rather unique class, with different players each finding their own unique play style that makes use of the unique tool set of the infiltrator. For example. I personally can't stand the nanoarmor and stalker cloaks, but I know someone that only ever plays stalker infiltrator. I obviously won't mention every single possible upside of having an infiltrator per squad/platoon as I have my own unique play style with its own strengths and weakness. That being said: -Recon Darts: I give my squad and platoon extremely advanced notice of enemy troop movement. We can focus all of our attention on the enemy's main spawn until people start showing up on the recon dart on the enemy teleporter room. -Motion Spotter: I give my squad and platoon extremely detailed information as to how many enemies are attacking through every entrance of a point, and even the direction they are looking, which can be extremely helpful for counter attacks. -Spotting: Because of my infiltrator cloak, I can peek places none of my teammates can because it is extremely hard to shoot at me while cloaked. While I am cloaked, I can then q spot enemy troop movements. -Immunity to vehicles: Infiltrators are mostly invisible to vehicles and can easily sneak past vehicles locking down a spawn area to place a beacon on point -The ability to play areas no one else can: because of my invisibility cloak, I can play areas such as the point in construction site, keeping the point flipped in our favor without putting myself in nearly much danger as any other class would. -EMP Grenades: These wipe all enemy equipment, including shield regeneration fields, motion sensors, recon darts, and spawn beacons, even through walls, not to mention that they eliminate enemy shields and make it more difficult for hostiles to aim. -Anti-infiltrator equipment: Recon Darts and Motion Spotters will both give you the location of infiltrators, and EMP Grenades will wipe the cloak energy of any infiltrators hit by it. -Long Range Suppression: Infiltrators have access to a kit of weapons that allow them to harass enemies at much farther range than the rest of their squadmates. -Anti-MANA Turret: Any and every semi automatic weapon in the infiltrators arsenal can be used to quickly and effectively eliminate engineers on mana turrets. -Anti-Vehicle Engineer: If the rest of my teammates are pounding away at an armor column, I can kill hostile engineers as they attempt to repair their vehicles. -Terminal/Turret Hacking: Infiltrators have the ability to hack infantry and vehicle terminals, allowing my squad and me to pull sunderers and maxes as needed to assist in a base capture -Vehicle Terminal Denial: If anyone tries to pull a vehicle from a terminal, I very often have the ability to camp it and completely deny enemy usage to the terminal. -Beacon Escapes: If the rest of my squad wipes while on a point, using my invisibility cloak, I have the best chance of being able to put a squad beacon down so that the rest of my squadmates can reenter the fight. -Hostile Squad Beacon clearing: If my squad spots an enemy squad beacon, I can either EMP the beacon, or work my way into a position where I can wipe the beacon and then return to point. -Back Rage: If there is a big push about to enter from a known doorway, I can go invisible next to the door and get lots of free kills and assists on everyone walking through it -Suicide Runs: I can infiltrate into the middle of an enemy group and assassinate enemy medics and engineers in order to weaken an enemy attack or defense. -Harassment and Aggro: even if I don't kill anyone, I can harass a group of enemies almost indefinitely, and keep them focused either on me or keep their shields and health low. -CQC Sniper Utility: CQC sniping is an art, and I still have a long way to go before I become even come close to mastering it. That being said, the ability to use your faction's CQC sniper rifle is an amazing utility. I can harass and eliminate targets at much longer ranges than the rest of my squad, while maintaining viability in close range combat. This also means I can thin out the number of enemies my squadmates will be needing to face once the enemy enters into combat range. As I am generally running a 4x scope, I maintain much of my ability to counter snipe just about any other sniper that can pose a threat to my teammates. I am ridiculously strong at wiping hostile MANA turrets, both AV and AI, by either flanking or baiting the turret to look straight at me so I can get a head shot in. If an enemy attempts to peek a door, I can kill them before they ever have the chance to move away from their position.
What always baffles me is that in every thread with this particular topic, is that every time people claim infils are useless against tanks. Wraith Flash is part of the infiltrator repertoire, guys! Whenever my squad decides it's time to set up an AV nest with lancers and AV turrets, I'll be pulling a flash. Not only can I spot vehicles from the ground, but I can also finish off vehicles that pull back behind cover to repair. I can deal with enemy AV nests, I can deal with sniper nests threatening our own AV nest. I may not be able to outright destroy enemy tanks from full health(unless I've got a decimator heavy riding shotgun), but I can make damn sure they're not interested in shooting at my mates anymore. When my team is defending, I'll be circling around our base looking for sunderers, picking off snipers and other stragglers and firing the odd recon dart at the base. There are many options available to us infiltrators, and more so if we think a little bit outside the box. (Might be easier to do once there's proof of thinking going on -inside- the box, too.=)
Just as an aside as this seemed to indicate comradery among players that tend to play only infiltrators. I'm a Jack-of-All-Trades. I just threw my two-cents in on the Infiltrators based on what little experience I have. I don't just play one class, and I certainly won't claim to be a master of any one of them.
In Planetside 1, only Infiltrators could cap objectives, and would need to be defended. They'd use a hack tool to do so.
I do this frequently. It is bad for your k/d (if you care), but you can distract many MBTs with 1 little wraith. Pop them a few times in the azz and run. The Fury makes a distinct sound, so they will know what is happening. This can be to your advantage. They will stop shooting downrange and start chasing you looking to kill the annoying atv. In the meantime, you have looped around and are already harassing a new target. You can break up a whole firing line very nicely. Sometimes they whip around and 1 shot you while you are cloaked and juking sideways. Oh well; the flash cost 50 nanites. I love to use LA drifters to C4 tanks. But damn does that run through resources fast! You can have a much more economical impact on the fight with a fury wraith.
Even comments from people who rarely (if ever) play Infil are welcomed. I doubt anyone who frequents this forum only ever plays Infil. Doing so is missing out on a large portion of the game, imho. I have ~80% playtime as Infil, because I find myself more effective there. But if the flow of battle calls for a different class (usually heavy for AV, MAX for AA or Medic for Bio Lab assaults) I wont shy away from it. It's worth nothing that SPM shoots through the roof doing this. Cute Beaver raises valid points. In a small, tightly knit outfit one can more readily assess the skillset of each individual and use that to their advantage. But this is reliant on playing with the same people regularly, as mentioned. In public squads/large outfits, this doesn't happen. The squad/platoon lead will, understandably, prefer their underlings to be the more "effective" combat classes. To the point I've been kicked from squads for not changing to Medic, as someone was using detect bolts for their Crossbow. Which brings me to the main reason for this thread. The Crossbow can perform the same job as our Sensor Darts, with far greater frequency and more importantly it's available to all classes. As an example, an Engy could keep a motion field up while repairing a MAX, more efficiently than an Infil ever could due to unlimited ammo. We need to be considerate with our darts/motion sensor, the Engy can spam their XBow as much as they want. This can be seen in some of Yamiks' videos. Though he plays Infil in those videos, it seems his role could be easily filled by a more direct combat ready class.
I see the infiltrator roles as basically a support function: Harassment behind the lines - keeping a squad or more detained to prevent them from being on the front lines. Mess with the base behind the front. Snipe, CQC anyone coming out of the spawn room, set up motion sensors use darts to distract enemy faction chasing ghosts. Advanced recon aka preparing a base for capture - hack the turrets first, hack the terminals, hack the shields (timed to do this at the same time causes the most enemy confusion). Jump in hacked turrets to destroy any enemy vehicles leaving for the front lines. Locking down terminals, not just hacking them - ensure they aren't used for reenforcement to the front lines. Spot the enemy - Q spot enemies - this can change the course of a battle. Motion sense the enemy (use tunnels in bases to set sensors), reload at terminal to dart outlying areas for any incoming enemies Own the capture point [A] [C]. Own it... keep enemy infiltrators from doing the same. Non support functions are perfect for solo players but not especially helpful to teams in my view. Fight the enemy, 2 proximity mines at key locations, CQC, stab em, shoot em Flash fight in wraith mode to run over enemies near sunderers, Fury blast enemies repairing vehicles and their vehicles. As a game, don't lock yourself into one class. If a medic is needed grab a medic if an engineer is needed grab an engineer, et.. If you play solo, infiltrator is a great class, just don't expect as much action teamed up with others when a group is going to need medics and engineers... Combined arms and all. You can't heal or revive other members, you can't give them ammo or repair their vehicles, it comes down to that.
Infiltrators role is to run in first before their squad and clear the area of all non-MAXes, preferably with scoutrifle and a EMP to start things off. Another role is to suppress a high traffic enemy route to buy your empire time, throw EMPs from cover onto the path then go up and wreak havoc. Also dont fear going toe to toe with HAs, just practice getting good with scout rifles and they dont stand a chance. Our cloak was rendered next to useless, this became my new way of playing infiltrator... Hack tool was available to everyone. But required inventory space and investments to be used faster and against vehicles.
Unless things have changed since I last looked at it, an Engy with a Xbow has to practically constantly fire the sensor bolts to keep the field up. They would never be able to repair a max AND keep a sensor field up at the same time. Both require too much time and effort. Even if you stopped and switched to fire a bolt every few seconds, you'd have gaps in coverage, and I'm sure the MAX wouldn't be too happy about the breaks in his repair time. Also, if you are repairing the max while it is in combat, that time stopping will be deadly to the MAX. If an engineer is repairing a max, chances are the best thing he could do as much as possible is repair the max and make sure he doesn't run out of ammo. Don't stop and shoot, don't do sensor darts, just keep the max alive. A Engy (any other class needs an ammo pack to be remotely viable) with sensor bolts, in my opinion, is only a band-aid solution to not having the superior Infiltrator Motion Spotter And/Or Darts. The xbow bolts cover a MUCH smaller area, last for a fraction of the time, and they ping their detection field less often.
