How do I kill these blasted statues?

[Loweko]

Returning player here. I was elated to discover the 1.3 patch and eagerly nabbed it and reinstalled...only to find my beloved IA/MPI maps covered in these weird laser-firing statues that kill everything I send against them.

I am utterly infuriated by these things. I have been trying for days and cannot kill a single one.

In the meantime they're spamming out wave after wave of Ambushers to kill my extractors. Even worse, none of the AI units can target that damned "Sentinal" (nice spelling there) and it wipes out entire armies on its own.

Mortar bikes or tanks? Eaten for breakfast. Assault tanks? The statues outrange them and kill them rapidly. Comet cruise missiles? The ambushers explode on them and shoot them down. I can never tech to a bomber bay to try that because the (entirely free-ranging) AI is knocking on my doorstep by then with 8 untouchable pools' worth of Maulers.

The only tactic that has met even basic success is five APCs, which got a mini-statue down to half health before they all died.

Okay, I get it, they're there to prevent rushes. Fine. But how do I KILL these things? It's gotten to the point where I no longer play maps with statues in them because I can't get anywhere!

Help? What can I do to kill these things and play the damn maps?

[Zero Angel]

Not a big fan of statues either.

Anyways what I do is circle around them to draw their attention (phantom VIR helps) while you have a spam of light units take em out (APCs, bikes, SP-Stab sabres). One of the maps has both rocket and slug powerups. The slug powerup can outrange the mega statues (which have an engagerange of 300m) but only just barely. If you want to plink away at a statue from range with those what I do is, as a pilot, jetpack and plant a nav on the base of the mega so I know what its range is then plink away at it being careful not to aggro the statue.

Mini statues arent hard either. Just circle them to draw their aggro and send a spam of units to finish it off.

[General BlackDragon]

Ahh....the GreenHeart maps....

Those statue's arn't really scary. The new one that GH made, Umber Statue, which I created the weapons for, is Scary. It hasn't been released though

Normal Statues: The ones from the ice planet SP mission debris: Sit on a hill and mortar them to death.

The Mega Statues, the tall big ones that shoot out Ambusher Drones and are ontop of pools: I use the GH recy variant, Heavy Sabre II, with dual SP Stab. Myself in one, and 5 AI ones. I send the AI ones in to attack it, while it's busy killing them I sweep in right behind them, get right next to the statue, and circle/strafe firing dual SP at it until it's dead.

[Red Spot]

First of all, only GH-maps have these statues on them, at least in 6.2 (did it change in 6.3?). And iirc only 2 GH-maps have the mega-statues on them.

Alternate strat:

Build a hand full of Atank, position next to each other just out of range of the statue and send them in together. Even nicer results if you send a walker first and hide behind it untill the statue has it targeted.

Do expect to lose most, if not all, of your units though

With a team of skilled humans, and a bit of luck, you can actually take them down without losses

[MrTwosheds]

1 human, scout or mbike, circling, mega cant hit em as long as they keep moving, send in squad of AI sp tanks to destroy it, works most of the time.

[Red Devil]

i'll put in a fix for that.

[MrTwosheds]

Please don't, its not quite as easy to pull off as I make it sound and making the player get out of their duel SP Sabre to beat them is a nice bit of counter intuitive strategy.

[General BlackDragon]

Twosheds, I believe he was telling a joke.

[yeah]

Well several tactics have been suggested already, just to add how i usually do it.

1.) far range mortar, that is you need mdm, a service truck or service pods, if you just stay just out of thetriggering range of moste of these statues you still can mortar them with mdm by letting the mdm mortar bounce rather that hitting it directly. However the ammunition of one tank is not enough, that's why you need pods or the service trick to refill you (if you go back to the base the statue will heal quickly). Btw you can go by foot closer to the statue without triggering it and yuo can use that to mark or target it.

2.) you can kill them completely remotely by sending 2 large teams of mortar bikes in parallel from different directions

3.) On some maps you can shoot at them from behind a cover (like an enemy extractor), that can allow you to kill them before them before the swarming drones kill you.

4.) As an experienced pilot you can kill the tower by cycling it and avoiding it fire most of the time. You may need additional units (tanks, bikes) or other players to hit it while it is targetting you primarily.

Of course you can also combine any of the approaches above, but note that only 1.) avoids the triggering of drones.

5.) I haven't tried that myself but potentially several large groups of APCS (from different directions in parallel might do it too). The APCs are too slow, but if you have enough from different direction the still may launch enough soldiers to kill it.

6.) further variations

One common feature of all these approaches (aside from 1.) is that you need to attack in parallel from several sides, so that while the statue is targetting some ships or players others use the distraction to pound it hard and quickly.


Hope that helps

[Nielk1]

I have to point out that no map that did not have statues had them added. Thus, none of your old favorite IA/MPI maps would have this change. The statues are generally only on GH maps unless another map maker feels the need to include them. The ambush statue only appears on one specific map, the sort of "hard mode" map, granted it really isn't that hard once you get a method.

[Red Spot]

2 Maps N1, as I pointed out before. Thats assuming we talk about the same statue.
-DropZone
-Surprise

[DarkCobra262]

They aren't that hard if you play MPI ^.^ (and if you play Instant, you can always cheat to kill them)

[ssuser]

I am curious as to what comes after the Uber Statue.

How about a Mega Uber Statue of Death? Give it Da Bomb, and if you get within 400 meters of it, it triggers and everything on the map dies.

[Red Devil]

Timevirus, RIP, used a form of it in ZTV about 10 years ago, but used a damagefield weapon on a mountain to prevent your bomber(s) from reaching the AI base; very effective

[Ded10c]

Just throwing my tuppence in here, but I really dislike the idea of statues. Sure, they increase the difficulty and prevent rushes, but they don't make sense and they invariably never fit the map they're placed in.