Hwurmp fucked around with this message at 11:25 on Jul 14, 2019

Section Z fucked around with this message at 11:26 on Jul 14, 2019

• Autocannons/Miniguns: The most important weapon in your arsenal and the closest thing to a general purpose weapon you've got. Reloads almost instantly, shreds small bugs, drones, frogs, pretty much anything it can consistently hit. As a bonus, it'll put frogs into stagger lock so they can't shoot while being riddled. It's not uncommon for me to bring my current level autocannon and the previous level autocannon and just alternate firing them because they're that good.
• 150mm cannons: Pretty strong and spammable, think of this as kind of like a giant semi-auto sniper rifle. Really good for frogs and drones, a little slow for most bugs. Also decent for kaiju.
• Neutralize Cannons: Like a 150 but fires a shotgun spray of smaller bullets instead of one big bullet. Mostly crap except it has insane output against kaiju types like Erginus because they're so big all the bullets will hit.
• Spritefall: The best ticket-based call-in in the entire game. Goes exactly where you point it and basically murders everything in the AoE. It's good against everything in the game that it can hit; it wrecks anchors, frogs, bugs, drones who bumble into the radius, everything. It does huge rear end damage and also reloads super quickly. I bring a Spritefall to almost every single stage, and sometimes I even bring two.
• Bulge Laser: Kind of sucks in this game, honestly, but it's very precise so it can sometimes be useful, and it reloads on time instead of tickets which can be a major factor.
• Phobos/Kamui bombing runs: You get a lot of bombing runs, but Phobos/Kamui-related ones are unmatched and extremely useful. They can be placed very precisely and safely, do huge damage and splash, and kill giant hordes of bugs dead. I'll always bring one of these on maps that involve a concentrated zerg rush.
• Mortar barrages/Howitzers: These can be situationaly super good at clearing out bug piles, but they're very hard to aim and have a significant delay before the barrage starts so they require practice to get good with.
• Limpets: A weapon of last resort that you'll mostly use in caves. Most of them are utterly terrible, but it's pretty much your only direct fire option. Standouts are snipers with a decent reload speed(because only snipers will generally kill bugs quickly), the Limpet Chain Guns(actually fire enough small limpets to kill reliably), and the Limpet Detector(can fill an entire cave with bouncing shrapnel that actually shreds).
• Support Stuff: Life vendors/spout guns are situationally very useful and I bring them a lot in caves. Guide Beacon Guns can be very fun when paired with the right vehicle or allies with certain weapons. The buff posts are more difficult to give up a slot for in most cases.
• Turrets: Actually super good in this one, but I find they're most effective if you bring two packs of them and deploy them all at once. Really great in cave missions and my usual cave loadout is 2x turret and a limpet or a life post.

• Blacker series: Super reliable, cheap, no frills, and fast. These are a great "I don't know what to bring to this mission" choice and are also the premier way for you to get around the map at a decent rate for most of the game. Their guns tend to fall firmly in the "good enough, could be better" column. If you want your vehicle to kill a lot of stuff, Blackers aren't where you should look, but they do decently enough and are easy to use.
• Naegling series: How the mighty have fallen. These lads used to be one of the best vehicles in 4 and 4.1, but not starting with your vehicle loaded in 5 makes them super tricky to use because they need to be placed far, far away from the battle to not die immediately. That said, if you can get one deployed in a safe spot, they're great missile bombardment vehicles with fantastic range and good damage against small targets. If you can get a guide beacon stuck to something important the Naegling becomes a single target murder engine, as well.
• Depth Crawlers: Your only option for caves, but they're actually good vehicles in general in this one. Modest speed, has no issue with terrain, and generally has good firepower. Not a bad choice for general purpose use.
• Nyx series: The Nyx series is the most important in your arsenal because they generally are the best at combat. That said, there's several Nyx sub families that work entirely differently despite appearing similar, so some delineation is needed.
  • Gen-purpose Nyxes: Great if you don't know what the hell to bring because they're good against every target and generally have good mobility.
  • Nyx Grenadiers: Generally good for killing walls of bugs with tons of explosions at the cost of speed and range; not great against bigger targets. Probably the least useful Nyx.
  • Nyx Red series: The fastest Nyx and specialized for close quarters, usually carrying flamethrowers and canister shot(read: giant shotgun) cannons. These are really good for fighting bugs as well, and the canister shot is actually usually pretty good at murdering bigger stuff as well. A good general purpose pick.
  • Nyx Buster Arms series: Usually featuring revolver cannons in the arms and howitzers in the shoulders, this thing moves like a drugged snail and can't turn to save its life but in exchange has utterly unmatched firepower and range and is thus indispensible. Probably the highest DPS vehicle the Air Raider has and unmatched at killing big scary targets like frogs/queens, but requires careful positioning because of its terrible mobility. Very, very important but situational.
  • Nyx Missile Gun series: Revolver cannons in the arms, missile pods in the shoulders; this thing is the best anti-aircraft vehicle in your arsenal and is super good at killing many other targets as well. Another good gen purpose pick.
• Titan series: These have come a long, long way since their trash appearance in 4.1. Expensive to call in and slow as poo poo, but worth every penny. Titans have insane firepower in the form of a monstrously powerful Requiem Cannon in the main seat and side seats with guns generally on par with most other on-level vehicles. They also have a frankly ridiculous level of durability which means that they're largely immune to anything short of being swarmed by ants and spiders(which will kill you in almost any vehicle). The Titan is a great pick for almost any of the big setpiece open field battle missions.
• Proteus: Just bring a Titan.
• GIGANTIC UNLOADER BARGA: This game's giant punchy robot and much stronger than its venerable older brother the Balam. Absolutely massacres anything frog-size and up if it gets into range and has an almost bottomless pool of HP. The tradeoffs are that you are slow and you are helpless against flying enemies or being swarmed by bugs, but that's your friends' job. Important attacks are the uppercut(left, left, right) which knocks kaiju on their rear end, and the two charge up attacks which are really good at killing frogs/cosmos.