What's the best BO for an air player?

[Eukanuba]

In general, not just Seton's, what order should I play to get air out as soon as possible in a general 4v4? Is it best to get a few T1 fighters out, or go straight for T3? If going for T3, what's the ratio of mex upgrades to pgens and what's the best way to do it?

[Mr-Smith]

there is no best bo
it all depends on the map -> reclaim
what your enemy does
how good your team plays and if the other team is turteling or not.
bo just work to the point where the fight starts.

[TA4Life]

The best way to play air is to play with aeon. Rush t2 get t2 power up quick, then tech for a while, until you have 4+ t2 pgens(depends on how much power you have to use toward air production), get both acu ras, switch to t3 air.

Everything else is completely dependent on number of mexes and reclaim.

[rootbeer23]

there are some general guidelines which are more often true than false:

1) unless you like being killed by gunships, make t1 intis
2) t1 intis are super cheap
2,5) swiftwinds are only better per mass than intis for chasing transports
3) 1 scout is worth 10 tanks. try to guess where your teammate needs to see the map
4) no t3 air without double ras
5) dont waste power. (if you have at least 1 t2 pgen) start RAS and keep one finger on the pause button
6) if you have 2 RAS, destroy ALL THE PGENS, upgrade ALL THE MEXES
7) make more engineers and t1 factories
8) keep spamming that you have RAS and that you are overflowing enough energy for teammate RAS
9) build t3 pgens so that the engis on the air factory can assist it without moving.
10) if you dont scout the (nuke launcher, GC, 8 minute t3 bomber rush) its your fault
11) if you have enough mass to make a GC, you really dont have enough engineers to make asf

[SC-Account]

Yeah, it is really map dependant.

On Seton's you usually go for T3 air with double ras, a general raw build plan would be ~6 mexes T2, T2 pgen, all mexes t2, RAS, start reclaim T2 pgens, ARAS, air spam.

On rush me more that won't do it since a 8-10 min strat bomber rush is very powerful, you will have to make T2/T3 air before ras.

On wonder mercies and drops are very powerful, so you have to prepare for that.. on other smaller non mass rich maps you will have to stick to T1 spam...

[Hawkei]

Okay. Some specific BO's.

Standard Air buildup: AF >> 2 Pgen >> 2 Mex >> 2 Pgen >> 2 Mex >> 3 Pgen >> AF (spam engineers on reclaim, hydro, and Mex capping) >> Build 5 T1 Pgen >> 3 LF spam engineers on reclaim >> 6 T1 Pgen >> 4 T1 Radar for area control and devote 1 air fac to T1 interceptors and scouts. You need to be immediately useful for your teammates, and you don't want any suprises

Supercharging your eco for T3 air spam: T2 engineering suite on ACU >> 4 T2 Pgen >> 4 Energy Storage >> Get ACU RAS >> Get ACU ARAS (Aeon and Sera). Reclaim the T1 power >> Get all those engineers assisting the air fac, and get it to T3... It is now 12 minutes into game. By this stage the reclaim should have got most of your mexes to T2 and you can surround them with storage.

First bomber start: Pgen >> AF (build bomber + scout) >> ACU assist first bomber >> Pgen >> 2 Mex >> 2 Pgen >> 2 Mex
First Jester start (Cybran): 2 Pgen >> AF (build jester+ engineers) >> ACU assist first jester >> Pgen >> 2 Mex >> 2 Pgen >> 2 Mex

1) One important thing to note is that air players often rush to T3 air too quickly. Which leaves their team vunerable to snipes and lower tech air. Consider using lower tech air units like T1 bombers, T2 fighter bombers, T2 gunships and Mercies. Remember that your job is to SUPPORT your ground team. So make sure you are proactively scouting and attacking. Sometimes your team would much rather have a few interceptors now, rather than those ASF in 5 minutes. You need to prioritise immediate lethiality. Find ways of being immediately useful to your team.

2) Another thing to remember is that there is a difference between "Air Dominance" and "Airspace Control". Air dominance means having more planes. But airspace control means actually putting them out there and controling the sky. It is no good having all your planes clustered at their home base if you allow your opponent to make bombing runs. You could have 50 ASF, but if they arrive 2 seconds after the Mercies hit your buddies ACU, they are USELESS!!!. The best way to achieve airspace control is to have a T1 or T2 air factory spamming interceptors, scouts and swiftwinds on patrol. Even when you are building ASF. Use the interceptors as an expendable patrol and keep the ASF in reserve.

3) Air units have different economic requirements. They need more power and less mass than land or naval units. T3 air is particularly power heavy and also needs a lot of build power. So this should be factored into your BO.

4) Just because your the air player doesn't mean you have to confine yourself to air units. Some targets are best taken out with ground forces. Tech up one of your land factories and build a small number of high tech ground units Like T3 Bots, SCU's or Obsidians. Load them into transports and use them as a kind of "SAS unit". With aerial support, those land units can do wonderful things Air to ground capability isn't just about bombers and gunships, it is also about transports. So don't ignore them.

5) Another thing to consider is using Ground AA as a way to re-aquire air dominance. Build SAM's to keep ASF out of your base. Load mobile flak into transports and drop them into combat areas to defeat gunship swarms (esp. Restorers). Sometimes just building more ASF isn't the answer.

6) After a major battle. Get a transport with some engineers and drop them on a reclaim mission.

[SC-Account]

Supercharging your eco for T3 air spam: T2 engineering suite on ACU >> 4 T2 Pgen >> 4 Energy Storage >> Get ACU RAS >> Get ACU ARAS (Aeon and Sera). Reclaim the T1 power >> Get all those engineers assisting the air fac, and get it to T3... It is now 12 minutes into game. By this stage the reclaim should have got most of your mexes to T2 and you can surround them with storage.

T2 engineering suite on ACU is not efficient, especially since you need T2 air factory in any case, getting storages after all T2 pgens are done also not really. Reclaim T1 power to make more T2 power, rather than keeping them for RAS, reclaim T2 power while making ARAS and rather make T3 power if you need more.

Everything else is too situational, I agree on your bomber first build, though

[RoLa]

T2 engineering suite on ACU is not efficient, especially since you need T2 air factory in any case, getting storages after all T2 pgens are done also not really. Reclaim T1 power to make more T2 power, rather than keeping them for RAS, reclaim T2 power while making ARAS and rather make T3 power if you need more.

But it helps making ras faster while engies can further reclaim. And you get build power with higher radius than t1 engies, so less path finding issues.

[Hawkei]

T2 engineering suite on ACU is not efficient, especially since you need T2 air factory in any case, getting storages after all T2 pgens are done also not really. Reclaim T1 power to make more T2 power, rather than keeping them for RAS, reclaim T2 power while making ARAS and rather make T3 power if you need more.

Certainly, T2 engineers is an alternative to the engineering suite on ACU. But call me sentimental, I just can't bring myself to reclaim T2 Pgens. Especially when my team are still scratching together lines of T1 Pgens to meet demand. I would have thought that getting that extra 1080 reclaim mass would not warrant the loss of 500+ power. Which would likely spill over to my allies, who may not even have a single T2 pgen. Usually my bottleneck is power anyway, not mass. So I'm behoved to reclaim any of it before ARAS. I will do some testing.

As for E storages. The economics depend on where you put them. An E storage with double adjacency with T2 Pgens gives a bonus which is even more effective (per unit mass) than building T3 power or RAS. Before even considering the advantages which the storage unit alone provides.

As for T2 Air Fac vs T2 engineering suite. The upgrade costs 720m + 18000e. Compare this with the cost of a factory upgrade and 3 T2 engineers (which is the equivalent in build power) and you get 1110m + 14220e. Even if you only produced 1 engineer it would still be more mass. The factory path costs more mass but less energy. I take you point that the T2 factory upgrade would have happened anyway, but, the timing is crucial. I will do some testing. But, I would have thought that the best economic growth rate is achieved when non-economic mass expenditure occurs as late as possible.

Everything else is too situational,

Yea. A lot of my pointers were intended to illustrate the breadth of strategy within the air game. Everything always is siduational.

...I agree on your bomber first build, though

Well at least we agree on something.

[FireMessiah]

for setons, watch TA4Life's guides, theres like 6 related to that map, and 3 for Air spot.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtwTaBkJ ... 9C&index=8

this helped me a lot to learn the general BO. at first I copied it like for like, now ive tweaked it to suit my play style.
and yeah, good time to get some extra airfacs down is when the mass income from mid starts, minute 2/3, at least 2 airfac anyway. use one to go t2, the other just to put a few t1 out around mid and naval. ofc 2/3 early scouts over the enemy are a huge help. once you main airfac goes to t3, you could pause/upgrade/reclaim any other airfacs you made.

if you've got the power for it, that mass reclaim during min 2-5 is awesome for throwing down extra facs.
by the time you have double ras and t3 air (min 11-12), all mex should be t2, and readying the first t3 mex + t3 power.

also, I wouldn't bother with ACU t2 until hes sitting there with double ras and doing nothing. its a waste of mass considering youll be upgrading your airfac to t2 only minutes later.