Maps with chokepoint like astro crater are very popular.
It seems that getting Gun upgrade on the commander in those kind of maps is "vital".
Do you guys get gun upgrade first or factory lvl2? Or 1mex lvl 2 then gun? What are your toughts on the urgency on the gun?
I used to spam tech1 tank + arty or try to tech2 engi rush to build a base in the chokepoint but it seems that getting the gun its even better + energy storages for overcharging the point defence lvl 2 is much much better, toughts?
The fact this post in on astro kinda hurts.
But for what your talking about, gun and t2 is expensive.
If your enemy is not got much land spam gun can be useful to push whereas lots of enemy spam t2 pd is strong.
It entirely depends on the game.
You can go gun still on t1 tech just have t2 mexes and lots of e.
T2 you can go on t1 tech just same again has the resources behind you.
Ras Boi's save lives.
Normally T2 PD is a very easy counter to gun on extreme chokepoint maps. I guess there might exist some kind of "turtle meta", where one team devotes all their mass to eco and gets killed by an unscouted gun ACU, but that's very different from how the game is normally played.
If your allies would help you get gun and in position before the enemy com gets to t2 it could work, follow up with some t1 arty and lots of e storage
Potential counters to guncom on astro:
-Air snipe (lots of t1 bombers, or rush to t2 and get t2 bombers)
-T2 upgrade on com followed by 2 T2 pd (if against just 1 guncom); you need to rush the T2 upgrade and get the PD behind some of your mexes to give you enough time to get 2 T2 pd up before the guncom gets in range
-Aeon guncom (if they're not aeon) since it allows you to kite them
-If they're at mid upgrading with no T1 land or another com and aren't aeon, then if you're quick you could try sending 3 T1 arti to attack them while upgrading, meaning they either take some damage or are forced to cancel
-Guncom+teammate (if vs 1 guncom)
Guncom works best where you can get it early enough that they can't stop you with T2 pd, and if you're against just 1 enemy commander. However it costs significantly more power than T2, so your eco will suffer if you get it meaning you need to get a decent amount of kills for it to be worthwhile.
M27AI and M28AI developer; Devlogs and more general AI development guide:
https://forum.faforever.com/topic/2373/ai-development-guide-and-m27ai-v71-devlog
https://forum.faforever.com/topic/5331/m28ai-devlog-v130
In a 1v1, gun with supporting tanks tend to be far better, because T2 is kinda slow : you need to build the PD, and once it's up, it can't kill a gun ACU, and it quickly dies to overcharge/arty/tanks.
Once there are 2 pds and more, the gun acu can be repelled, bu if the opponent chooses to run in, you won't have time to build so many !
Now on astro, players can assist each other, and multiple ACU can go gun or t2. Usually, people don't like to charge in with multiple gun so it oftens end up in a PD base war. But if you spot only one ennemy ACU forward, you can make gun to force him back and take few mexes.
ACUs can "body block" to protect the PD (stand between friendly PD and the enemy gun comm). This can keep the PD alive longer and I think it can even block overcharges. If you have a brave team, you can get PD up and you can protect it which will force enemy gun comms back. You only need 1 ACU with T2 to make the PD, especially if there are engineers or other ACUs to assist them at the front.
Me and my friend both got the Gun upgrade both UEF and charged forward
We got in a 2v2 fight against 2 COMs, we had gun upgrade they didint
I overcharged the tech 2PDs they were building and we killed 1 commander
My Com was 50% hp, i sent 2 tech 2 engi forward and started building forward base taking all mexes in their part of the
map
After a while a SOLO seraphin ACU comes forward i had 1 tech2 shield 1 tech2 PD, some anti-air and some anti-missile
He killed all my base and both COMS while solo no suport
He ended up dying cause my friend T1 bombers had free shoots on him and it was share unit cap on death
On Astro the best strategy is to eco as hard as possible. Multiple gun ACUs might be able to get in but it will put you at a disadvantage if they don't do enough damage.
In my experience gun sucks on astro as in the end even if u get into the other base its almost certain there will be t2 pd there to counter it.
The main reason to get gun is to cause trouble at the front, get 1-2 extra mexes (or more on "rich" versions of Astro) and if you win a fight at the front, you can get some reclaim. A t2 fire base can have thousands of mass in reclaim. You're generally not going to walk your ACU all the way in to enemy base to get a kill or to destroy core mexes. You just mess around to get an economic lead and annoy the other team. They have to make more defenses so your team doesn't just walk artillery into their base. So you shift things into your favor by a few thousand mass.
Actually it's very viable if you can reclaim t2 pd or you can force enemy to run.
t2 pd + t2 com tech = 1200 mass, t2 pd reclaim = ~400 mass.
You need ~3 mins(180 secs) to run from mid to your base, so in that time team with gun can get your t2 pd reclaim(400mass) OR ~2 t1 extractors (4 mass/sec)=4*180=720 mass.
So overall team with 1 gun com(500-800) investment will pay for itself and get 500-1000 more mass than enemy.
