How best to use this mighty tank?

[Sir Grublar The Great]

How do people use the tank effecitvely? Personally, I don't see the point in using the cannon because the range just isn't far enough. I find kiting around the base slowly taking out the worms first and then the structures with red magazine. I havent got uranium bullets yet but im sure they will make it easier once I do. After, I use the flamethrower on the remaining critters.

I would let construction robots repair my tank after each fight but they get rinsed through, as they tend to get targetted first. So I have to manually repair the tank once it gets too low, which can get quite tedious if you are having to fight multiple bases.

Am I missing anything or is this the extent of using the tank?

[impetus_maximus]

yeah, best to take off your portable robo-port and save the construction bots if you use the tank.

i find myself skipping the tank and going for Mk II armor with 1 fusion, 1 Mk II battery, 3 exos, and a ton of shields. then just running an gunning.

*note i haven't played a playthrough for about a year now, since 0.16
don't know if the tank has gotten any buffs since 0.15.37

[Maelstrom]

Dive at the nests, you can kill them instantly by running them over (along with all the bugs short of behemoths). Use the machine gun to clear out the biters chasing you, or jump out and use the handheld flamethrower, or kite them back to a turret nest you built nearby (my favorite early in the game)

Later in the game when materials are plentiful I run 5 exos with no shields at all and I just nuke the crap out of everything. The few bugs that survive aren't anywhere close to being fast enough to catch me so I can kill or kite them pretty easily even without shields.

[Sir Grublar The Great]

Originally posted by Maelstrom:

Later in the game when materials are plentiful I run 5 exos with no shields at all and I just nuke the crap out of everything. The few bugs that survive aren't anywhere close to being fast enough to catch me so I can kill or kite them pretty easily even without shields.

I take it you used the rocket launcher for that? Does it have a further range? Ive thought about building a turret base but dismantling and rebuilding for maybe 20 alien bases also seems to take longer. I guess these tactics also falls down to personal preference

[Sir Grublar The Great]

Originally posted by impetus maximus:

yeah, best to take off your portable robo-port and save the construction bots if you use the tank.

i find myself skipping the tank and going for Mk II armor with 1 fusion, 1 Mk II battery, 3 exos, and a ton of shields. then just running an gunning.

*note i haven't played a playthrough for about a year now, since 0.16
don't know if the tank has gotten any buffs since 0.15.37

To be honest, I think the tank is actually pretty good; if there has been buffs or not. I find it fun to use but wasn't sure if anybody uses it any differently to me

[THE kilroy]

Expansion and permiter securring is mainly handled by laser turrets, but that can use up lots and lots of power, which can be an issue,.
tank is a good way at certain stages of the game to push back some of the more dense bases and spare your "yet to be developed" power grid.

[Horoai]

The tank requires some skill to use effectively but I don't see a better way of clearing out nests safe for artillery. Laser turret creep or running on foot just can't keep up if you know what you're doing, but they are easy to execute so naturally they are very popular.



First thing you have to realize about the tank is that it's cannon outranges even big worms and provides you with a massive tactical advantage. However, in oder to function properly you need to equip your tank with HE SHELLS (not the others, they aren't nearly as good) and max out cannon research first, especially rate of fire. The latter is mandatory.
Additionally, uranium ammo provides a massive damage boost for the tank's MG. There really is no way around it.

Next up is your power armor setup.
Do not use roboports. Your bots can't keep up and it's just annoying when they jump out of a moving tank, the repair isn't worth it. Legs and shields are useless inside as well.
Instead, you should cram your armor choke full of LASER DEFENSE and one or two batteries. Those can fire even while you're inside the tank and given full laser turret research they start dealing impressive damage in numbers.
They can easily reach a point where you do not have to pay attention at all to any biter getting close to your tank. Thus, you can calmly focus on firing your cannon/MG at long range.

Use flamethrower cut a path through dense forests. No better way to do it at full speed.

Finally, remember that while inside the tank you can still "throw" any utility items. In otherwords, there is no need to get lazy while firing the cannon / MG and entertaining your laser defenses. Use your free hand to throw CLUSTER GRENADES in order to clear out meat shields in high evolution levels or structures as you drive by shooting their defenders.
Likewise, if there is a really tough crowd ahead you can still use combat and decoy robots from inside the tank.

[Sir Grublar The Great]

Originally posted by Yggdrasil:

The tank requires some skill to use effectively but I don't see a better way of clearing out nests safe for artillery. Laser turret creep or running on foot just can't keep up if you know what you're doing, but they are easy to execute so naturally they are very popular.



First thing you have to realize about the tank is that it's cannon outranges even big worms and provides you with a massive tactical advantage. However, in oder to function properly you need to equip your tank with HE SHELLS (not the others, they aren't nearly as good) and max out cannon research first, especially rate of fire. The latter is mandatory.
Additionally, uranium ammo provides a massive damage boost for the tank's MG. There really is no way around it.

Next up is your power armor setup.
Do not use roboports. Your bots can't keep up and it's just annoying when they jump out of a moving tank, the repair isn't worth it. Legs and shields are useless inside as well.
Instead, you should cram your armor choke full of LASER DEFENSE and one or two batteries. Those can fire even while you're inside the tank and given full laser turret research they start dealing impressive damage in numbers.
They can easily reach a point where you do not have to pay attention at all to any biter getting close to your tank. Thus, you can calmly focus on firing your cannon/MG at long range.

Use flamethrower cut a path through dense forests. No better way to do it at full speed.

Finally, remember that while inside the tank you can still "throw" any utility items. In otherwords, there is no need to get lazy while firing the cannon / MG and entertaining your laser defenses. Use your free hand to throw CLUSTER GRENADES in order to clear out meat shields in high evolution levels or structures as you drive by shooting their defenders.
Likewise, if there is a really tough crowd ahead you can still use combat and decoy robots from inside the tank.

Great advice, thank you very much sir

[shiny_dirk]

im fairly new to the game and currently play my first map with the friends that brought me in. we literally found the "personal laser defense works in tanks" thing the last evening and because we found the results so funny, i recorded one of our diplomacy expeditions.

^ after all of this i can totally confirm what Yggdrasil said here, and provide a video for some footage if you want to see that rolling, hehe.

(disclaimer, thats 2 people sitting in this tank, overall some 28 or so lasers. it still does work decently enough when youre only one, though. but not at THAT level of absolute obliteration)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iu4Ym8m1O64

edit: at this time, evolution level was somewhere around the general 0.9'ish area, i think shortly before we started seeing the first behemoths. also, why not to use the roboport. rip bots.

[Lunacy]

Don't forget to have a bunch of personal laser defenses in your suit, they can still shoot from within the tank.
Mostly just ram it, exploding rockets to take out clumps of nests, flame/gun down groups of biters or let lasers finish them.
But I stopped using the tank when I had a good supply of destroyer robots that just evaporate everything around you.

[wurf]

Once you reaserch the nuke, the tank become useless.
Then again, It takes a long time to get the nuke.
I just plow right into the base and use the shell or bullets to kill off the spawners.
I then lead the bugs (biters and spitters) to a nearbay "nest" of lasers I put"
And repeat untill I kill all of them

[Horoai]

Originally posted by hot_tomato:

Once you reaserch the nuke, the tank become useless.
Then again, It takes a long time to get the nuke.
I just plow right into the base and use the shell or bullets to kill off the spawners.
I then lead the bugs (biters and spitters) to a nearbay "nest" of lasers I put"
And repeat untill I kill all of them

The nuke is such an incredible waste of resources it's not even funny anymore. Just use artiller instead.