[TMA] Positional Awareness

[duckduck]

I am a pretty mediocre PvPer. One of my main weaknesses is positional awareness - in the heat of battle I find it hard to keep a clear view of where everyone is. I have the basics right, proper overview settings and brackets, but I don't make enough use of the main display - I depend on the overview too much. At times, I could switch to map view (F10) and it wouldn't really make me much worse. (BTW I am talking about small to medium sized flghts where each pilot needs to think for themselves and when you don't have to turn everything off / down to avoid lag.)

I would like to hear people's advice about using the main display to gain positional awareness. For example, I often use the top down view, with the tactical overview on. This helps, but I am still struggling. Your tips would be appreciated.

[Daneel Trevize]

Zoom out?
Look at targets you need to know the orbit of (to evade or catch)? Know the shortcuts to do this as well as approach, etc.
Just how much of your screen is clear once you factor in local, dscan, cargo, drones, fleet, etc? I know some people merge many of these windows as you'll only need a few tabs at once.

[joe space]

Good question. Imo, it is what separates the good from the bad more than anything else.

Some random thoughts/tips:
* Overview. Icon/Distance/Speed/Ship/Name/Alliance/Corp/Transversal. I usually keep just the first 6 on my screen and slide out the corp and transversal if I need it. In larger gangs people like to have the name closer to the front, but for smaller gangs the distance, speed, and ship type are more important and will be how you distinguish targets. I like to leave fleet members on overview if we are five or less. I keep tabs for everything, pvp, and drones. On the pvp setting I have all ships, bubbles, gates, stations, probes, jump bridges, and webbing drones. I select ignore bubbles if I'm actually fighting around more than a couple of them - they are for dscan purposes, as are jump bridges.

* Shortcuts. The more of them you can get comfortable using the better. Unfortunately, they have historically been so shitty and buggy that I only use a few of them. The ones for locking, activating modules, overheating modules, approach, and orbit are probably the most important to get down (I still haven't got the hang of using most of these in more intense fights, when they'd actually be the most helpful.) Whether you are using approach and orbit via shortcuts or mouse clicks, they are extrememly important. It is very ship dependant how you use them, but always try to keep one as a kind of cruise control

* Tactical Overlay. One of the reasons I will probably never make a pvp video. I use it a lot. Overview cannot be trusted.

* When in doubt, be aggressive. If you feel like you're lost in the weeds err on the side of staying in the fight. Point something, shoot something, lock everything, and OVERHEAT! It's surprising how often this works out, and even when it doesn't you'll typically learn something.

* There's a lot more to be said. I may add more later if others don't cover it. Read the stickied nano thread.

[Xarthaginian]

I have often wondered about this too. Will check this thread closely for replies. My thoughts however tend to drift towards bigger engagements. Not 100 v 100 etc but the 20v20 that Rote often got when I was active.

Theoretical scenario: Rote in syatem A on Gate B. Enemy in system B on gate A. We get the order to jump in and burn to sun/station/celestial/moon/whatever while primaries are called. I invariably get the good fortune to decloak with the gate in my direct LOS to desired burn point.

So obviously, I disregard the dumb and burn in opposite direction. This creates 2 variables. 1: the enemy gang chases main gang - ignoring me so to speak. 2: I gain the choice - do I warp out and regroup or remain ongrid picking off tackle.

History and KB's will show that I tend to stay ongrid and nuke tackle. I am unsure of the soundness of warping out and back as gangmates burning to a celestial do not land you in favourable positions all the time. My question would be is this the correct choice? Obviously it is entirely situational but what would FHC do?

[Sudden]

Burning in opposite direction is good for survivability but tends to reduce the DPS available to the FC. If you find your self on the far hemisphere of the gate from the sun (dark side) try burning towards the sun at an oblique so you can dip in to apply dps or dip out to skirmish as needed.

I wish CCp would add an option to enable a permanent icon of your ship when you are zoomed out. There is the white square but IIRC it goes away if you click on anything else.

[Suleiman Shouaa]

Zoom out, rotate your camera angle whilst manual piloting so you have a better grasp of where everyone is relative to you. Zoom in when needed for the tricky parts (e.g. need to get "around" one guy to get to your gang without getting caught by his 6 buddies). The tactical overview helps a bit h, bereut I've never really gotten used to using it.

Keep a close eye on your overview in order to find out how everyone else is moving (I don't use relative velocity or whatever it's called, though I probably should) as well as mousing over other people to get a more accurate feel in high speed chases (it updates much more frequently than the overview).

Use look at on enemy ships to see in which direction they're flying towards, whether they have active modules running like Invulns, as well as gun types.

Keep very close attention to what is actually doing damage to you and work on reducing that DPS, either by getting out of range or destroying it. Keeping your combat log open is very useful for this purpose if you're doing 1 vs 10+ in particular as drone damage can often blind your notification.

When you have a spare moment between doing the above, check d-scan to see if more hostiles are inbound. Also, if you narrow down the cone you can see if they're trying to get a warpin on you if you missed them warping off to the celestial you're aligning to. Changing your align point whenever anyone warps off is generally a good idea.

Always try to have a vague idea of what your plan is going to be for the next few minutes at least e.g. "I'll pull range on those Hurricanes with an overheated MWD, get those tacklers desperate to attack me so I can drop them on the approach, then will keep at range and start popping their drones, once there's only 5-6 left which are not ecm drones I'll turn around and start smashing their BCs"

As for burning away, it depends on what ship you're in and what you're engaging. For example, most BCs should be able to deal with a tackler or two, but things like Arty Canes need help from either their enemies being dumb or from friendies in order to drop them. I'm generally pretty confident in BCs so I'll stick around and drop tacklers (record is dropping 6 in a minute and a half with the rest of my gang off the field) as they generally get very eager and just smash approach, just remember to overheat your MWD!

Oh and remember to decloak a few seconds AFTER the rest of the enemy gang has so they move towards them. Also, if you're warping back in, ask for a suitable person to warp to from the celestial you came in at "I need a warpin from Planet X" "Warp to Y at 50".

[Daneel Trevize]

What about the merit of burning ~70km away from the sun while your corpmates do the same towards it (or all just scatter from the gate), then warp to them at 0? Granted we're talking about ~45-60seconds to regroup but you're able to shoot rather than going off-grid. I'm thinking mainly if you're in a cane or HM drake/something with similar speed and damage projection.

[Suleiman Shouaa]

By the time you land, you'll be about 10km away from the rest of the fleet (assuming they're all tightly packed together) and at 0 speed. It'll take you ~10 seconds or so to get to the same speed as the rest of your fleet, so you'll be trailing by about 20km and that could be deadly depending on enemy tacklers etc.

EDIT: Really depends on the situation - if they're being chased like mad by the enemy gang then warp off then back at range. If they've pulled clear, then you can warp to them np.

[Daneel Trevize]

Whenever I come out of warp from off-grid I've still got speed (75%?), never noticed if this is different with on-grid warps.
E.g. go up/down the perfectly in line Sisi CA beacons in a BS, can hop along far faster than starting from 0m/s at 0km.

[Suleiman Shouaa]

You are correct, my bad. :(

Still, it takes time to land and then to catch up with your gangmates so if they're moving fast and tacklers are behind them, you should probably not warp to them. What you can do instead is get someone in a faster ship who is still with the pack (Interceptor etc.) to burn ahead of them and warp to him at range instead.

[Sudden]

Don't forget that a bublle in your warp path (on a gate most likely) will prevent this so you will still have to burn at an angle

[ROX Genghis]

* Tactical Overlay. One of the reasons I will probably never make a pvp video. I use it a lot. Overview cannot be trusted.
This!!! I know very few people who use the tactical overlay, and god knows why they don't. Sometimes I hear "because it's ugly," but I generally play to win, not for graphics.

[Tyrus Tenebros]

* When in doubt, be aggressive. If you feel like you're lost in the weeds err on the side of staying in the fight. Point something, shoot something, lock everything, and OVERHEAT! It's surprising how often this works out, and even when it doesn't you'll typically learn something.

I'll come back to this thread after I finish destroying the remaind of my liver tonight, but this is worth noting since I've seen many fights lost from people assuming they're losing and deagressing/leaving the field without a specific command to do so. It's quite frustrating.

[SAI Peregrinus]

Warp to your bookmark 100km/200km from the gate in the direction nearest the burn direction, then back into the gang.

[joe space]

I have often wondered about this too. Will check this thread closely for replies. My thoughts however tend to drift towards bigger engagements. Not 100 v 100 etc but the 20v20 that Rote often got when I was active.

Theoretical scenario: Rote in syatem A on Gate B. Enemy in system B on gate A. We get the order to jump in and burn to sun/station/celestial/moon/whatever while primaries are called. I invariably get the good fortune to decloak with the gate in my direct LOS to desired burn point.

So obviously, I disregard the dumb and burn in opposite direction. This creates 2 variables. 1: the enemy gang chases main gang - ignoring me so to speak. 2: I gain the choice - do I warp out and regroup or remain ongrid picking off tackle.

History and KB's will show that I tend to stay ongrid and nuke tackle. I am unsure of the soundness of warping out and back as gangmates burning to a celestial do not land you in favourable positions all the time. My question would be is this the correct choice? Obviously it is entirely situational but what would FHC do?

fly in smaller gangs more often and you will know exactly what to do in these situations. while this particular situation depends on the circumstances, it is pretty easy to figure out what to do and a small gang pvp'er/solo'er will likely have the right answer 9 times out of 10.

[Sudden]

Only vaguely related but in lowsec many peeps forget that sentry guns make great on grid warps.

[Liptonez]

I'd call zooming out the most important thing of all here. Zoomed out that far that you have awareness of the whole field, but also remain able to see movement of individual hostile ships (say finding out whether that Dramiel is coming for you or someone else). Unless you have a very good reason for it (and I don't know many while kiting a hostile gang), you'll be a useless pilot either a) being out of damage range or b) about to get webbed and die. This is just so terribly important especially in turret ships.

I personally don't use the tactical overlay simply because it completely occludes the screen with useless gray and an overlay that only gives me 2d information in a 3d game isn't too useful to me. Not saying that the overlay is not useful, but for me it simply is not useful because it lacks reliable height information.

The overview is only an auxiliary tool to find out how far I have zoomed out so I can estimate how many cm on my screen equal about how many km. The overview just isn't reliable at all. It only updates what once every second. It lacks speed information even if you have the speed bracket turned on (which you should), simply because the speed doesn't update fast enough and it also doesn't tell you where that ship is actually heading. So I basically only use it for targeting and finding out what ships are harmful to me.

Whenever you do kiting fleets, you can easily tell who is zoomed in just by seeing where they are on the field. It's hilarious.

Also since op mentioned top down view: Top down is 2d and will give you unreliable information. You have a camera that you can easily rotate in all directions, so use it. Normally you'll be burning to a celestial, so you can find a sweet spot and stay in that position until you have to go somewhere else or find out about a new ship bracket that is flying a weird way. If my interwebs connection allowed me to I'd post videos of how I fly, but unfortunately that would blow up my monthly volume.

[Yankunytjatjara]

Heh, the tac display. If only they implemented my proposal... (check sig)

[slight]

Yeah I posted that in that recent 'small' requests thread. Also, tac overlay plane /not/ having a grey disc, you only need the circles for a sense of scale.

[joe space]

some of the many things liptonez is wrong about:

* when kiting you should be zooming and and zooming out, not staying zoomed out.

* tactical overlay is the best way of see'ing how far you are zoomed in or out, not overview.

* overview can tell you how fast things are burning toward or away from you. but now that i've said that forget about it, just use speed, distance, and watching space to figure this out.


i like the velocity vectors idea. although i wouldn't ask for more than just a way of amplifying engine trails so you can see them when zoomed out. i thought the addition of engine trails would do the same thing, but they really don't because you can't see them unless you're zoomed in on the ship.

[Sudden]

Yeah I posted that in that recent 'small' requests thread. Also, tac overlay plane /not/ having a grey disc, you only need the circles for a sense of scale.

Oh god this, that grey circle is pointless and obscures your view when there are ton of ships and effects in space.

[Zavior]

This thread inspired me to watch Nanofiber Internal Structure again \o/

[RoemySchneider]

Heh, the tac display. If only they implemented my proposal... (check sig)

well... they once teased us with a screeny of a new overlay/overview a couple of years ago - which pmuch translates into "never going to actually happen"

[Azure]

Agreed on the tactical overlay.

The other thing, and it's pretty fundamental, is "More Haste. Less Speed" The one thing that really used to screw me up in the early days was trying to achieve too much at the same time. I'll stick my neck out here and say when a lot of people say they're terrible at situational awareness it's more to do with how they process (or not) the information they do have.

Develop a routine and practice it so the routine itself becomes quick. Repeat: Practice a routine to quickness. Don't try to do the routine quickly. You'll get flustered, make mistakes (like losing situational awareness) and end up getting pwned, in a useless position or being forced to bug out because you don't know what the hell to do.

FWIW I was never a great PvPer when i still played but i got far more comfortable with PvP when i learned to actually process what the UI was telling me before making decisions.

Hope that helps. ;)

Edit: Typo

[James john]

Positional Awareness provide us a best direction in life so be conscious and always be ready for
best role in life so we will get a best role in life.

[Liptonez]

some of the many things liptonez is wrong about:

* when kiting you should be zooming and and zooming out, not staying zoomed out.

* tactical overlay is the best way of see'ing how far you are zoomed in or out, not overview.

I just don't zoom in and out but stay zoomed out simply because I keep turning my camera around like mad. Maybe some people don't have that much of a sense for 3d views doing that, but turning the camera around for a second tells me where and how fast any little bracket on the field is going (as long as you have locked targets this is very very easy, without locket targets or overview a little less. And doing this will actually give you vectors in your head). Because of this I don't fraps very often, if I speed that up two times you can literally see nothing of the fight any more. Oh and obviously I don't zoom out that far that I can't see anything any more, I focus my sight over the important part of the field (read: me and 30-100km, depending of what we're up against). I barely ever run into scram/web/neut ranges or out of damage range, which is the important part I guess. I can't recall myself having died from kiting in half a year now, and we've done a lot of that.

Tactical overlay is surely the easiest and best way to do it, I can't deny that. But like I said, to me it occludes too much with useless gray, I can get the same information from turning around my camera and locking targets/hovering over people.

Everyone their own ways really. Watching videos from a few well regarded PVPers, I know that I'm not alone with my way of awareness. :D

[Smuggo]

I always find I can keep track of most ships on grid fine and keep to my desired range (occasional derping aside). However, one thing I frequently lose track of is where the rest of the solar system is in relation to me, especially when not aligning off an object from the start of an engagement.

I did it last night, enemy blobbed up while we were in pretty close so just start burning away but then realised as I start moving that I'm not even vaguely aligned to anything, which meant I had to burn off for much longer than I'd like to as, even once out of point range you then need to allow some time for alignment to something warpable. With tengus and drakes pounding you with missiles at long ranges this can become a bit of an issue (last night my nanocane start dipping into armour for example.

[Gix Tyrionn]

Develop a routine and practice it so the routine itself becomes quick. Repeat: Practice a routine to quickness. Don't try to do the routine quickly. You'll get flustered, make mistakes (like losing situational awareness) and end up getting pwned, in a useless position or being forced to bug out because you don't know what the hell to do.


That's actually along the lines of what most military and law enforcement groups teach. Don't freeze just follow the training.

If you make a simple list for burning away:
1. Is there anything in front of the direction I'm burning
2. What's closest to me
3. What's moving the fastest

make a simple list for life
1. where am I going?
2. what am I shooting?
3. where are they moving
4. what are they shooting

[joe space]

I just don't zoom in and out but stay zoomed out simply because I keep turning my camera around like mad. Maybe some people don't have that much of a sense for 3d views doing that, but turning the camera around for a second tells me where and how fast any little bracket on the field is going (as long as you have locked targets this is very very easy, without locket targets or overview a little less. And doing this will actually give you vectors in your head). Because of this I don't fraps very often, if I speed that up two times you can literally see nothing of the fight any more. Oh and obviously I don't zoom out that far that I can't see anything any more, I focus my sight over the important part of the field (read: me and 30-100km, depending of what we're up against). I barely ever run into scram/web/neut ranges or out of damage range, which is the important part I guess. I can't recall myself having died from kiting in half a year now, and we've done a lot of that.

Tactical overlay is surely the easiest and best way to do it, I can't deny that. But like I said, to me it occludes too much with useless gray, I can get the same information from turning around my camera and locking targets/hovering over people.

Everyone their own ways really. Watching videos from a few well regarded PVPers, I know that I'm not alone with my way of awareness. :D

you don't know what you are talking about though.