Just to clear something up:
Newb = New and inexperienced.
Noob = Idiot unwilling to improve.
We were all newbs at one time. We do not want to be noobs.
Space
- Make sure you use the same damage type on all your energy weapons. Then make sure all your tactical consoles improve that damage type. For example, if you use Antiproton weapons, make sure your tactical consoles are Antiproton Mag Regulators. Tactical consoles stack properly.
- "Rainbow warriors" cannot do as much damage as someone boosting a single damage type with all their tactical consoles.
- Try to have a Covariant shield on your ship. These have more shield hitpoints, so you have longer to react and hit your heals.
- Unless you're manually sending off timed torpedos or specialty burst shots, put all your weapons on autofire. Then you can spend more time hitting your other abilities.
- Distribute your shields as often as possible. Put this on your ability tray where you can have easy access to it. Once you get experienced, you'll probably add it to most of your other keybinds.
- Positron deflectors benefit your shields. Use these unless a different type would benefit the majority of your setup.
- Use combat engines. They give more speed when your power levels are low.
- Change your power levels. If you are not doing as much damage as you'd expect, make sure you have weapon power maxed. Generally use 100/50/25/25 or 100/25/25/50.
- Auxiliary power benefits shield heals.
- Science consoles should include at least one Field Generator. This increases the capacity of your shields. They also stack properly.
- Engineering consoles tend to be the place to dump universal consoles. It is also a good idea to have some armor. Armor stacks with diminished returns.
- Do not command a lolcruiser. If you claim you can tank, you'd better make certain you can!
- Consider taking an away team consisting entirely of Engineers with turret and mine abilities, and split-beam rifles. Take along a science bridge officer as well, but only if you need some heals. There is no need to bring along a tactical bridge officer--you already go through the enemy like a hot knife through butter.
- Use a pulsewave for close-range DPS, and a sniper rifle for when the enemy is far away.
- Never use Shooter Mode. You will not do as much damage, nor will you be able to shoot and kill as many of the enemy as a player using RPG Mode. RPG Mode locks on a target so you can focus more on your other abilities. In order to avoid accidentally activating Shooter Mode, you can rebind the key use for that to something less likely to mess you up in the middle of battle, like Walk.
- Aim [x] and Crouch [c] are your friends. Use them to increase your damage and defense. Advanced players might consider binding both to the same key.
- /bind c "+crouch $$ +aim"
- /bind x "+crouch $$ +aim"
- Carry lots of Large Hypos. These should completely heal you, and can save your life long enough to turn the tide of battle.
- Hit [Backspace] to reply to a /tell.
- You can access emotes via the dropdown list available by clicking the little icon to the right of your chat bar, or you can start typing /emote <emote>. After the first letter or two of the <emote>, you should get a list of options to quickly finish what you're typing.
- You can turn off the profanity filter in your chat options.
- Turning off Zone chat in your chat options is usually a good idea. That way you don't have to listen to politics, religion, profanity, or Gorn jokes.
- If you use custom chat channels like TPD, you can change the color so the channel stands out from your other chat.
- Build your ships in ways that are not selfish. You want to be able to share heals with your teammates. Crosshealing in teams is often the only way to survive. The top four non-selfish abilities that every player should have at least three of include:
- Tactical Team or Science Team (Engineering Team works on teammates too, but it's not recommended).
- Hazard Emitters (Hull Heal you should use instead of Engineering Team).
- Transfer Shield Strength (Shield Heal).
- Share heals liberally. Even escorts can share heals.
- Never turn off team chat no matter how much that one guy pisses you off. You'll probably forget to turn it back on for the next mission, and you'll seem the noob who cannot work with the team.
- Know your role on the team. This is largely determined by the ship type you command, and the Captain abilities you have. Pick the ones that fit your captain and ship:
- Engineers: Heal
- Science Officers: Debuff
- Tactical Officers: Damage
- Cruisers: Heal
- Escorts: Damage
- Science Vessels: Crowd Control
- As an additional note for Engineers and captains commanding cruisers, there is no "tank" in PvP. In PvE, you can "tank" only if you can command the aggro and have the heals to keep yourself alive.
- Do not command a "lolcruiser". If you claim you can tank, you'd better make certain you can! Do not leave it up to the escort on the team to tank while doing all the damage AND keeping you healed. I've been that escort, and it isn't fun
