So me and my friends are having a LOT of trouble trying to keep good Covert Ops pilots of our backs. We are a group of 1 engineer (Syx) and two Guards (Anaconda-M) All armed with things like Propulsion inhibitors, Pulsars etc but it doesn’t matter. Either they activate their Plasma Arcs at the same time and destroy me in 1 second or they just move away, wait for the abilities to go on cooldown and move in for the kill.
That’s the part that frustrates me the most: you CANNOT hit them with normal weapons. Beams, Positron guns, Coil mortars it doesn’t matter, they are TOO fast for any weapon.
Please, we are pretty desperate to the point of quitting this game, even though I like it a lot. What can we do to at least stand a chance vs 3-4 good Covert Ops pilots ganking up on us?
Beams have infinite speed, so you’ll definitely be able to hit them, it’s just a matter of aiming skill.
Positrons are wonderful for hunting interceptors. Use speed ammo and acceleration coils. And try to keep a respectful distance, because the barrel slow effect makes it hard to hit interceptors less than about 1500m.
Coil mortars are pretty bad at hitting interceptors, since they have the projectile speed of a glacier. If you try to use these to hit an interceptor on top of you, know that you’re taking 125% base damage to their 75% damage.
Heavy blaster is okay at hitting interceptors. The spread helps, and the projectiles are a respectable speed.
Eclipse is bad at dealing damage, period, but I think you could probably hit an interceptor if you use speed ammo and acceleration coils. If they’re trying to dodge, though, good luck.
Cruise missiles are great at messing with any player’s head, since they’re slow and have huge range. But otherwise, they don’t really do much against anything but other frigates. Unless the enemy ship is literally right beneath you.
Octopus missiles are pretty good at hitting things at a medium-short distance. They fire with a certain amount of spread, and most interceptors will probably hit IR flares a bit too early to catch all of them, so typically, at least one hits. Unless they’re too far away, or close to cover.
EM torps are probably the best thing to use against covert ops, because they tend to give you a nice hug while attempting to plasma arc your face off. It has a large detonation radius and large explosion radius, so be prepared to take massive damage yourself, if you fire it while an enemy is close to you. They’re also good against camping enemies, for clearing beacons, and dumb LRFs, so they’re rather nifty.
Attack drones are okay against interceptors, but tend to die quickly, and don’t really do that much damage.
Anomaly generator will only catch a sleeping interceptor, or an after-bubble ECM. Maybe. It’s really good against frigates, and okay against non-fed fighters.
And, best for last, minefields make interceptors extremely wary. I usually don’t even dare attempt to take down an empire LRF with a minefield around it. Although typically those are the dumbest LRFs around, they still have some serious DPS, and the minefield means a harsh “NO” to the plasma arc.
Frigs aren’t the best things to take against covert ops, anyways. Interceptors and fighters do a better job. Tacklers are probably the best for a dedicated anti-interceptor build, with a four different slows - a weapon, a missile, and two modules. Gunships in overdrive basically become interceptors with better guns for a few seconds. Commands are a bit shaky on the anti-interceptor front, but can still equip gauss cannons like any other fighter. Another covert ops would make everything a bit more skill-based rather than “oh I knife you while you die”. Recons can prevent covert ops from sneaking up on you, or sneaking away, and have slowing missiles to annoy them. ECM is… Well, it’s more or less anti-everything, so there’s that.
And each frigate does have its own way of dealing with interceptors.
Engineers have their drones to alert them to a cloaked CO behind them, and to shoot at incoming interceptors, and also buffer shields if you read your enemy right.
Guards have their pulsar and mass propulsion inhibitors, as well as that aoe weapons inhibitor thing. If you’re squadding up, just bring an energy emitter engineer so they can use that easier.
Long ranges have EM scattering and IR pulsar, which make life harder for any enemy. They also have minefield and reverse thruster, just in case you didn’t want to die, ever. Like, ever.
Of course, if you see someone who’s really skilled at CO (names not mentioned here), you’re probably screwed anyways, because hella skills. But it’s mostly the same for any class. Someone really skilled in any one class can break the other team to pieces.
