DUST Search - The Tactical Guide to Uplink Strategy

Terminus Dwyryd wrote:

I am new to uplink deployment but there is one thing which does really annoy me.

If one plans to lay an uplink which is more in a support or in a flanking position away from the front line and is in a spot of relative calm then please, please take a few seconds to look at the large map to see if there are other uplinks in the same spot.

It really riles me when I plan my next drop and I check my current uplinks (which I do every fre minutes) to find them in a pile of half a doxen uplinks. Not only does it make it hard to plan what to do next because in that mass of blurry blue light it's impossible to work out if my link has gone or not but it makes the shape of the battlefield warped. Having a pile of uplinks in the same corner means that there's only one entry in the battle area but the battle is brought to the links and there's no other way in and the things are camped.

Just don't run around a corner and think that this is a nice spot where ther's no firing going on so it would be good for an uplink please check that there aren't more five paces ahead. Clumpng uplinks brings the batte to you and it gives the opposition the ability to defend easier than if the uplinks were depoluyed in a manner which gives you the upper hand.

In short, look at the bloody map.

- Terminus


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John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 390	Posted - 2013.11.17 00:32:00 - [1] - Quote A Tactical Guide to Uplink Strategy (or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Being a Spam Artist) Note: this is a work in progress Foreword: My intent is not to create a "WP Farmer's almanac" (maybe I should have used that for the title, lol) for uplink spamming. This guide is designed as a sort of supplement to the excellent Logi code threadlink here, in order to encourage and facilitate the "working as intendedGäó"use of uplinks. Introduction Contrary to popular belief, there is strategy to be found in the correct use of this much-maligned piece of equipment. Just to get the defnitions straight, strategy refers to the overarching goal (or goals) of the military force in question. This is not to be confused with tactics, which are the means by which that goal is achieved. For example, the strategic goal of D-day was to establish a foothold in continental Europe in order to open a second, western front. The tactics employed (massively oversimplifying) were a combined airdrop and amphibious landing at multiple points to seal off a large section of coastline. So, back to uplink strategery. Rather than merely "reinforcing" as listed in the many R's of the logi code, I like to think of what I do as more of a "Tactical logistics" style of play. With the proper tactics, we can place uplinks in such a way as to shape the battlefield. Our strategy is to effectively make the battlefield as "small" as possible for our forces, allowing not only for reinforcement of the positions/battle lines we already have, but to create potential new ones to outflank the enemy as well. At some point dropships will presumably take on more and more of this role (soonGäó), but for now (1.6) they are still flying coffins if a good forge gunner is around, and uplinks are the most effective way to shrink the battlefield. Important! Before even starting out, you will need to spend some SP, as basically everything in this guide will be hard to do if you don't have the drop uplink deployment skill to at least level 3, and level 4 is where you really start to open up the possibilities. To keep this from being an insane wall of text, I'll break it up into a few parts. In part one we will start with the basics: - How uplinks work - What not to do with uplinks - What types of uplinks there are and how they differ - How many uplinks can I use at one time? - How do I keep track of them? Part two will briefly discuss some basic fitting suggestions, and part 3 will cover tactics (what this thread is actually about!), using the uplinks to their maximum potential. Templar'd for her pleasure Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 390	Posted - 2013.11.17 00:32:00 - [2] - Quote Part 2 Templar'd for her pleasure Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 390	Posted - 2013.11.17 00:33:00 - [3] - Quote Reserved Templar'd for her pleasure Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 390	Posted - 2013.11.17 00:34:00 - [4] - Quote Reserved Templar'd for her pleasure Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 390	Posted - 2013.11.17 00:34:00 - [5] - Quote Reserved Templar'd for her pleasure Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 390	Posted - 2013.11.17 00:41:00 - [6] - Quote Reserved Templar'd for her pleasure Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 391	Posted - 2013.11.17 04:41:00 - [7] - Quote Thanks for the suggestion. I often forget that functionality myself to be perfectly honest. I'll be sure to mention it in part 3. Templar'd for her pleasure Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 409	Posted - 2013.11.17 20:55:00 - [8] - Quote IceShifter Childhaspawn wrote: Think you should title this a Comprehensive guide as you delve beyond the links themselves and into fittings. LOL, I guess I could. Didn't plan on being this specific originally. But, as things I write often do, it got away from me a little bit and took on a life of its own. Some of part 3 should be ready by tomorrow, but I think the finished product may have to wait until my return flight... "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 424	Posted - 2013.11.20 03:15:00 - [9] - Quote Updated "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 441	Posted - 2013.11.23 05:05:00 - [10] - Quote IceShifter Childhaspawn wrote: Just a thought, but I generally consider the flux variants battle spawns and the quantum/ standard variants entry spawns. The flux are more useful in the heat of battle, granted placing them as such doesn't allow them to survive very long, but your team returns to the field faster. The quantum have a bonus to the number of spawns they may sustain, so I figured that they were designed with long term deployment in mind. Deploying these 120m or more (Not ridiculously so) from an area of interest allows the team to reform and approach tactfully. So theres my 0.02 isk flux are best deployed near an engagement, while the standard and quantum variants are best used as long distant reforming points. Yeah, I'm sure most of us do it that way. I'm putting it into part 3 eventually(soon-¥Gäó), but it makes sense to mention it earlier, so I made the change to part 1. Keep the good feedback coming! "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Amarr victor!

John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 754	Posted - 2013.12.20 19:28:00 - [11] - Quote Shameless bump. I swear I'll have this done by Xmas, I was waiting to see if there were any notable changes in 1.7/1.8 but the answer is no/who knows when we'll find out (still hoping for an amarr scout in 1.8!) so I guess I'll just finish and make changes later. "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 1405	Posted - 2013.12.27 15:54:00 - [12] - Quote Fox Gaden wrote: John Demonsbane wrote: Shameless bump. I swear I'll have this done by Xmas, I was waiting to see if there were any notable changes in 1.7/1.8 but the answer is no/who knows when we'll find out (still hoping for an amarr scout in 1.8!) so I guess I'll just finish and make changes later. The more guides I write, the more work I have to do every time a new patch drops. Welcome to the AuthorGÇÖs club. Tell me about it. I like to write, gotta do something with that minor in literature, but man this is time consuming with the formatting and character limits and etc etc. Anyway, made some minor edits and reformats to make room for the rest of part 3. On track to finish it before 2014. "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 1453	Posted - 2013.12.31 18:58:00 - [13] - Quote Whew! Finally done for now. "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 1626	Posted - 2014.01.10 19:02:00 - [14] - Quote Thanks for the nomination. Time to practice my "I'm disappointed but Fox deserved to win" face and clap for the TV cameras! Also, made a few minor edits to the guide. Still waiting on 1.8 and how they plan to work the Amarr logi bonus. "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Amarr victor! Forum Warrior lv.1
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 1626	Posted - 2014.01.20 18:31:00 - [15] - Quote Bump. Still waiting on some info for 1.8 before updating again. "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Amarr victor! Forum Warrior lv.1
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 1764	Posted - 2014.01.29 16:42:00 - [16] - Quote Bump. Time to use that 3x SP for an Amarr logi suit if you want to use uplinks in 1.8. "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Forum Warrior lv.1 Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 1915	Posted - 2014.02.09 20:00:00 - [17] - Quote Bump. Will need to reformat extensively due to space limitations, might restart that prior to 1.8 depending on how long it takes for it to drop. "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Forum Warrior lv.1 Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 2112	Posted - 2014.02.24 15:21:00 - [18] - Quote Terminus Dwyryd wrote: I am new to uplink deployment but there is one thing which does really annoy me. If one plans to lay an uplink which is more in a support or in a flanking position away from the front line and is in a spot of relative calm then please, please take a few seconds to look at the large map to see if there are other uplinks in the same spot. It really riles me when I plan my next drop and I check my current uplinks (which I do every fre minutes) to find them in a pile of half a doxen uplinks. Not only does it make it hard to plan what to do next because in that mass of blurry blue light it's impossible to work out if my link has gone or not but it makes the shape of the battlefield warped. Having a pile of uplinks in the same corner means that there's only one entry in the battle area but the battle is brought to the links and there's no other way in and the things are camped. Just don't run around a corner and think that this is a nice spot where ther's no firing going on so it would be good for an uplink please check that there aren't more five paces ahead. Clumpng uplinks brings the batte to you and it gives the opposition the ability to defend easier than if the uplinks were depoluyed in a manner which gives you the upper hand. In short, look at the bloody map. - Terminus ~~Fire~~ spam bad! arrr.... "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Forum Warrior lv.2 Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 2253	Posted - 2014.03.09 19:36:00 - [19] - Quote Bump. That is all. "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Forum Warrior lv.2 Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 2510	Posted - 2014.03.26 13:39:00 - [20] - Quote Thrydwulf Khodan wrote: Currently (1 day after 1.8) the Amarr bonus does not appear to apply if you drop the link and swap out suits, or if you are dead and have to spawn back in. Interesting. I haven't been able to play yet, will have to do some testing and also see if I can get infos from CCP. Seems strange to me they would program it that way. "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Forum Warrior lv.2 Amarr victor!

John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 2529	Posted - 2014.03.28 20:22:00 - [21] - Quote Phantom Gibson wrote: Thrydwulf Khodan wrote: John Demonsbane wrote: Thrydwulf Khodan wrote: Currently (1 day after 1.8) the Amarr bonus does not appear to apply if you drop the link and swap out suits, or if you are dead and have to spawn back in. Interesting. I haven't been able to play yet, will have to do some testing and also see if I can get infos from CCP. Seems strange to me they would program it that way. The response seems to be "intermittent" one death I'm working at 3-5 second spawn times... The next 10-15. I believe that it may be related to calculating the bonuses incorrectly. I had the same experience when I played one day after the 1.8 release. There hasn't been much talk about this in other threads, but there was a rumor that the Amarr bonus would disappear if you changed suits after dropping uplinks. I hope that rumor is false because it would limit the available tactics for anyone who wanted to use uplinks as their primary role. BTW, this guide has been one of the best I've read on the forums and one of the most influential on my play style. Thanks for putting it together! You are quite welcome. You can't really separate the use of uplinks from battlefield tactics, they go hand in hand. That's what makes it interesting to me. lee corwood wrote: I am not getting the same experience. What level amarr logi do you guys have? I have maxed and even when I start out a match in my fresh dragonfly scout suit, all my uplinks are 3 seconds, no matter how many deaths. As for the Amarr logi bonus, I spent like 2 hours last night spending the dropsuit skill tree refund and am not even halfway through rebuilding my list of fittings! Boy is it ever tedious. Hopefully before the weekend is over I can get in some playtime and real testing. I have the Amarr logi maxed as well. If the bonus really does only apply when actually using the suit, that complicates things but leads to some interesting scenarios: Could you run in with a scout suit and drop some links at the beginning of a match and then switch to the amarr logi suit for the actual fighting, thus retroactively applying the spawn bonus? I might actually like that functionality better, tbh.... "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Forum Warrior lv.2 Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 2533	Posted - 2014.03.29 04:54:00 - [22] - Quote Did some testing myself tonight, can't make heads or tails of how the bonus works or doesn't work. They all show the same exact timers to me too. Looks like I'm going to have to go begging to the devs to give us an explanation of how it's supposed to work and if it currently is. "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Forum Warrior lv.2 Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 2608	Posted - 2014.04.06 13:50:00 - [23] - Quote Stefan Stahl wrote: Nice guide. Thanks for writing it up. Here's one of my hints: When a battle goes awry and the blueberries need somewhere to drop I tend to set up two uplinks with ~50 meter distance between them, at equal distance to the nearest objective. The idea is to make the blueberries spawn at both locations symmetrically so that each half will give the other covering fire when the enemy team comes by for the inevitable stomping. This also avoids granting the enemy team 500 WP from a single warbarge strike. Another one that's close to my heart: Please don't drop tons of uplinks all over the map. Yes, you get many WPs for it, but no, your team of randoms won't perform any better when each blueberry decides to drop at a different location. Good one. I actually try to do that on two sides of the map (the new scouts make this so much easier than before) to minimize the chances of spawn camping or that single devastating orbital. One related thing I have definitely learned to avoid is placing an uplink on a high tower in those type of battles. It sounds great in theory as a place that is virtually immune to spawn camping, but it seems to only encourage them to just fall back and snipe. Same thing, gets you some WP but doesn't exactly get people to push objectives. As for "spam", personally I try to not let the blueberries dictate what I do; I operate under the default assumption that I have better quality uplinks (esp post 1.8 with my Amarr logi) and will place them with more care. As such, it's still in the best interest of the team for me to do my thing. I'm not going to drop an uplink on top of someone else's obviously, but otherwise if an area needs a link, it's gonna get one! "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Forum Warrior lv.2 Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 2668	Posted - 2014.04.18 19:55:00 - [24] - Quote Updated for 1.8 with a new title as well! "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Forum Warrior lv.2 Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 2732	Posted - 2014.04.28 14:49:00 - [25] - Quote More minor tweaks. Here's a video from Moody on uplinks. Not as entertaining as a lot of his videos are but it is on the same topic so... "The line between disorder and order lies in logistics" -Sun Tzu Forum Warrior lv.2 Amarr victor!
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 2959	Posted - 2014.05.03 14:56:00 - [26] - Quote Thanks for reading the guide. Like my characters, it has been archived on a sleeper ship and will be reactivated if we ever reach the PS4. o7 o7 I'm out. See you on the other side. psn: bobswerski
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 3540	Posted - 2014.06.22 00:40:00 - [27] - Quote Cross Atu wrote: Quick info bump, Mr. Demonsbane may be in stasis for the time being but his work is valuable regardless. Cheers, Cross Thx for the bump. I've brought it back, Rattati seems to be doing a decent enough job to give him the benefit of the doubt. (The godfather of tactical logistics) Quitting cold turkey was impossible. The forum patch is helping me kick the habit
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 3542	Posted - 2014.06.22 16:11:00 - [28] - Quote Lorhak Gannarsein wrote: ILY for putting it back :) I was considering going to dust search to track it down :) I subconsciously must have known you wanted to read it. No problem. But, I'm curious, what use does a veteran (and a tanker at that) like yourself have for my guide? (The godfather of tactical logistics)
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 3557	Posted - 2014.06.25 22:02:00 - [29] - Quote True Adamance wrote: OOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH JOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHHHHNNNNNNNNNNNN! https://forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=166404 Holy **** ********* ** ** (The godfather of tactical logistics)
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 3557	Posted - 2014.06.25 22:32:00 - [30] - Quote True Adamance wrote: John Demonsbane wrote: True Adamance wrote: OOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH JOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHHHHNNNNNNNNNNNN! https://forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=166404 Holy **** ********* ** ** You won't beat me or Aero though...... however you will be a tough man to beat..... but I DO THIS 4 LUFF this is not about renaming a weapon. No way I'm winning, sadly. Even if I was that good to be #1 in kills (and all the Amarr decided to go ScR) I won't be able to play enough to do it. I'm working one of the weekends and speaking at a conference out of town for another. RL gets me every time, lol. (The godfather of tactical logistics)

John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 3560	Posted - 2014.06.26 16:04:00 - [31] - Quote I read the event again, I guess playing only 1 weekend is still viable... Which of course still assumes I am anywhere near as skilled as the rest of the people on murderer's row here. Maybe I need to try to get an uplink named after me instead.... (The godfather of tactical logistics)
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 3620	Posted - 2014.07.06 05:12:00 - [32] - Quote Yeah so Tibs pretty much equaled my lifetime kills in a single week for this event. Not that I was serious about it, but I pretty much stopped trying right there when I saw that sh!t. (The godfather of tactical logistics)
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 3755	Posted - 2014.07.13 03:59:00 - [33] - Quote To quote Cat Merc.... le sigh. Let's hope we logis don't have to go through yet another nerf cycle. Go here and tell Rattati he's barking (meowing? I am channeling Cat Merc here, I guess) up the wrong tree! (The godfather of tactical logistics)
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 3845	Posted - 2014.07.13 19:24:00 - [34] - Quote RedBleach LeSanglant wrote: WELL DONE Sir! Good guide - educational and useful - and to be honest I was not clear on the details of remaining in the Logi suit to make the bonus work. Just proves you can always learn something - thanks! Praise from Caesar. o7. Yeah, it's a little bugged, even still, imo. I fail to understand why the bonus disappears why you are trying to spawn in, but I guess it may be an inevitable side-effect of the way it's coded. Who knows. (The godfather of tactical logistics)
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics League of Infamy 3845	Posted - 2014.08.04 03:36:00 - [35] - Quote Amarr logi suit barely missed losing it's sidearm (killed link, thread has been closed), let's hope we can get it fixed in hotfix delta. (The godfather of tactical logistics)
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics 3861	Posted - 2014.08.18 19:44:00 - [36] - Quote Now that you have finished reading this excellent guide, consider taking a moment to go over to this thread, and contribute to the ongoing discussion about improving logi suits for Hotfix Delta! (The godfather of tactical logistics)
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics 4075	Posted - 2014.09.17 02:54:00 - [37] - Quote I'm glad I could expand your horizons, lol. It's ather fun, really, trying to keep tactical control of the map. A nice little intellectual exercise. I would have become bored of the game much sooner otherwise. (The godfather of tactical logistics)
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics 4228	Posted - 2014.10.21 20:15:00 - [38] - Quote Why hello there, you need to move forward a bit, little thread. (The godfather of tactical logistics)
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics 4571	Posted - 2014.11.18 16:22:00 - [39] - Quote Bump (The godfather of tactical logistics)
John Demonsbane Unorganized Ninja Infantry Tactics 4767	Posted - 2014.12.01 20:21:00 - [40] - Quote Not sure how I'm going to wedge in a discussion of EQ bandwidth once it's implemented. Space is already so tight. sigh Maybe a GM can help me with an extra post stuck in somewhere or something.... Also, bump to keep the thread locking gremlins away. (The godfather of tactical logistics)