Raid Party: Thoughts on Tactics

[Phienyx]

The following are some ideas I thought may help us out and give us some things to think about as we begin to engage in combat more often.
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As we gain combat skill we will and have began engaging in offensive operations against enemy forces more often.  As such, it is important for us to know that preparation and organization is just as important, if not more important than raw weapon and combat skill.  Combine skill, preparation, organization and combat effectiveness increases exponentially.

The first thing that is very important is to select ONE raid party leader.  This is the person who will be making the decisions during the raid.  The reason for this is that without a defined raid party leader, everyone and their mom will think they can and should be giving orders and when things get exciting chaos and confusion will ensue and if anything good comes of that, it will be due purely to luck.  Stowe your egos at the door.  Once you decide on the raid leader follow his/her guidance and keep in mind that the battlefield is not the place to dispute that guidance unless the raid leader asks for alternative suggestions.  If you think the raid leader has over looked something or that there may be a better option to a plan than the options currently presented, ask if you may suggest something.  If your suggestion is not taken, drop it and discuss later if you wish to take the issue further.

Equipment/Armor:

When selecting armor and weapons, keep in mind that the sun’s/moon’s reflection from your equipment could possibly give your position away even from a distance.  If possible, choose equipment that has low reflective qualities.

Do your best to bring a good mix of melee and ranged weapons and fighters.  You never know what situation you may find yourself facing, deep within enemy territory.  Don’t “over pack” because if you do die, you don’t want to loose more than is necessary.  

Tactics:

The first stage of assault should include discussing Intel.  What is known about your area of operation?  Consult with party members who may know the area or where the best target zones are.  It doesn’t have to be a detailed discussion, but some basic knowledge of what you’re getting yourselves into will be useful.

When moving through enemy territory with a raid party sized force, stealth and staying low key is important in order to make it to your objective area.  Spread out and use the terrain to mask your numbers.  One or two players moving around do not catch the eye’s attention as quickly as many players grouped together.  You do not want to sound the alarm before you even get to where you’re planning on striking.  Do not fire off or swing any weapons unless you are attacking or being attacked.  These sounds can be heard from a long way off and will give your party away as someone who hears will almost always come to investigate.

If a hostile is spotted, don’t just go charging in for the kill.  Inform the rest of the party and let your raid leader decide if it is more prudent to evade in favor of reaching your area of operation or move in for the kill.  Whether or not your party has been spotted will play a role in this decision.  In most cases it is probably best to evade detection so that the mission isn’t compromised before it begins. However, it will be a judgment call based on your current objective.

If your raid party is attacked, there will be two choices:  engage or evade.  If the you are attacked by an overwhelming force or multiple assailants on mounts, its probably a good idea to escape and evade.  (Players on mounts can pretty much be counted as two players because you’ll have to take down the mount before being able to do significant damage to the player who is much faster while on a mount.)  One of the most effective methods of escaping and evading is for the raid party to scatter.  This gives your party a few extra moments as the attackers decide on whom and if to pursue.  If they do pursue, it spits them up and thins their numbers in the case that you need fight them off.  Most of the time, this will give at least a few of your party members a chance to escape and live.  Do not underestimate the value of terrain as cover.  If you can break line of site, duck into a bush, behind a rock, up a tree, change direction completely or double back.  Misdirection and deception are your friend.  The goal of escaping and evading is for your party to survive and regroup once the threat is no longer immediate.

If attacked and the raid leader makes the decision to fight, fight as a team.  This doesn’t necessarily mean everyone attack the same target.  We’ve seen how this can end up.  You can end up helping the attackers by injuring and killing each other.   Do not let the attackers separate you from the main group.  Keep the comm. Comm. Channel clear and keep your ears open for direction from your raid leader and tactical information from party members.  Keep the channel clear of all extraneous chatter like:  “get my gear” …blah, blah, blah or anything else not pertinent to the immediate combat situation.  And NO ONE is to be looting any of the fallen until the threat is neutralized.  Once again the goal is for as many of your own raid party to survive as possible. 1 or 2 people stopping to loot will jeopardize the lives of those still fighting.  The priority is the survival of a majority of your raid party if not all of them.

Assuming your raid party has been competent and successful enough to reach your planned area of operation; it becomes even more important to use stealth to avoid being detected.   The terrain is your friend as is the use of crouch.  Low and slow is the word and be patient.  If you think you’ve been spotted, often just freezing in place is enough to make an observer doubt if they’ve actually seen what they thought they’ve seen.  Keep in mind what most animals do first if they think they are in danger.  They will first freeze in place because the eye is attracted to movement.  

When a target(s) are spotted, inform the team and let the team leader make the decision when and how to attack.  Avoid the Leroy Jenkins syndrome chicken or no chicken.  All balls and no brains is a quick way to end a raid.  

The closer you can get to a target without him/her noticing the more successful your strike is likely to be and the less likely they will be able to escape.  So approach low and slow and use your available cover.

Even though a lot of the above information might seem like common sense to many of us, you’d be surprised how many of the above points are not taken into consideration on even on the few raids we’ve participated in.  It’s easy to let the adrenaline and excitement take over instead of keeping a cool head and making good tactical decisions.

We as FA have yet to establish ourselves and make a name for ourselves within Darkfall and it isn’t going to come to us on a silver platter.  This means we must strive to be the best by showing them how organized and effective we are, because just telling them won’t mean jack.  We had our 15 minutes of fame in MxO, but that is merely a drop in the bucket when compared to other guilds/clans who have extensive experience in multiple MMOs, some starting with the first MMORPGs.  I do not mean that with any disrespect toward FA in the slightest.  I am merely saying that in order for the name FA to mean something outside of MxO, our actions need to stand out in Darkfall and I think that by putting some of the above tactics into use is a good building block on top of the foundation we’ve already begun to build.  We might be small in number in comparison to some of the guilds out there, but only us few good Angels are required to set an example for the rest.  Just keep in mind that no matter what you're doing regardless of how significant or insignificant, you are representing and helping to build the reputation of FA within the Darkfall world.

[Erathaol]

Honestly, from what I've seen from the majority of raid/siege videos of even major clans that claim to be well-organized and coordinated, it's really just a giant dustcloud-style melee.  I've seen nearly zero separation of roles, as in everyone is trying to do everything (melee/magic/range) all at once, and there are absolutely zero battle-lines, formations, or even groups moving and working in unison.

That being said, I'm convinced (until I see it tried and utterly defeated in-game) that with the proper coordination and teamwork, we will be able to decimate groups of much larger sizes.  Since we are so few in number, this is crucial to our survival!

I think (really, it's common sense) that we should spend a certain amount of time each week (or whenever, really) conducting various wargames and scenarios to get our PvP skills up to snuff and, more importantly, get us accustomed to working together.  A major thing we should focus on is fighting while outnumbered, since we will be vastly outnumbered pretty much at all times.

There is definitely some merit in simply going into the field and PvPing the reds we encounter or rival guilds we meet, but I think a more focused approach will yield greater results.  There's a reason real-world military/sports teams/teams of any kind utilize specific drills and ways of practicing rather than learning by pure experience.


Though I must say that I am not in-game yet (hopefully this next week!) so I don't know what we are actually doing in-game to develop our PvP skills; y'all may very well already be doing this or have decided that it's worthless.  I'm just adding my opinion; I'll leave it up to the leaders to decide what we are to do.

[Jarimus]

Heals are #1 most important I think.

If just 1 person stands back and heals a melee fighter, that fighter will be unstoppable. And large groups is such a CLUSTER-F anyway, the other side probably won't even be able to spot the healer.


Does anyone know where all the heals spells are at? Which groups - which heals are the best? What regs do they use?

[ArchNemesis]

Are all the other magic skills working?

I know it sounds off topic but it's in regards to the heal post, cause Setun bought Lay on Hands which is a heal target spell, it uses the mana and reg but i don't see a difference in health regen nor does it even say anything in the status window.