[_54th_ElephantNest]

Mike Sliszowski on Desert Combat
An online guide from gaming's most grizzled embedded journalist.
By Dave "Fargo" Kosak | December 19, 2003

[Welcome to another special guest lecture on PlanetFargo, this week featuring our favorite returning speaker. Mike Sliszowski's Guide to Care and Feeding of Medal of Honor Smacktards was banned in Haiti, and his Battlefield 1942 Domination Guide was like a strategic enema. This week he returns to tackle modern warfare in Desert Combat, the most-downloaded modification for BF1942.]


Sliszowski: Salaam, putzpacker! Today I will talk about Desert Combat mastery, because there's so damn little of it out there. You play online, you know what I'm talking about. You can't look up without seeing the sky fulla jets piloted by buttlips trying desperately to figure out where the horizon is while flying with one hand down their pants.

Desert Combat more than any other game proves my golden rule, the central philosophy that defined my Medal of Honor and Battlefield 1942 strategies: 75% of People Who Play Games Online are Smacktards. But never before has it been so dangerous, because in Desert Combat the Smacktards have heavy modern weapons at every spawn point. It's like giving dynamite to preschoolers (I speak from experience here). In fact, short of the North Koreans, these are pound for pound the most dangerous Smacktards on the planet.

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Desert Combat is so hopped up on ass-wailing that it's almost impossible to write a strategy guide. Take, for instance, the little tactic I call Mike Sliszowski's Tank Driving Doctrine of Unrepentant Manslaughter. The idea here is that first, you sit in an M1A1 Abrams Tank. Second, you point the tank at distant dots on the horizon that don't have your teammates' names over them. Lastly, you fire until the little dots disappear into puffs of smoke and blood. This technique is so simple it's not worth writing a strategy guide over. It is also, coincidentally, how I hunt deer.


All aboard the pain train.

But Desert Combat does contain one Ultimate Weapon -- actually, several, with more on the way thanks to the patch. I'm talking about helicopters, son. Choppers. Whirlybirds. Egg beaters. Chump-chewers. Pirouetting Punk-Pummelers! You master these, and nothing on that server with two legs will have either one for long.

Of course, flying a helicopter is a lot like shaving your privates with a straight-edge. It takes a delicate hand, and you got it all hanging on the line. So I've put together some tips to get you maggots started. You'll find them on the next page, along with several large advertisements for unrelated products.

First, let's talk about what you can do with a helicopter, provided you have enough skillz to keep the sky toward the top half of your monitor. You can rush to an outpost at the start of a map, capturing it yourself, then you can hover high above it scouting and defending. You can circle-strafe, sliding sideways while pivoting to hit a Smacktard from every angle without giving him a stationary target. Because they can hover, helicopters can actually capture territory on the ground. Jets can't: jets keep Smacktards off the ground, uselessly circling around the map, firing rockets at their teammates while watching Dr. Phil over their shoulder. But Helicopters Win Wars.

They're also damn hard to fly. That's why the Smacktards can't use 'em. Getting into a chopper with a Smacktard is little better than blowing your brains out with your rifle. It's a funeral with a built-in cremation at the end. Fortunately for you, it's impossible to get into a helicopter with a Smacktard because the toilet-slurping cheek flossers never wait for a gunner to get inside. They're premature chopper ejaculators. They take off like it's a rodeo and start doing barrel rolls the moment they're off the ground. Staying airborne for more than 10 seconds is like getting to third base for these guys; It's exciting to think about, but it's never gonna happen.

Basic Flying

Sword of ManaPLAY STOP MUTEL O A D I N G 100 [00:46]
But you, YOU'RE going to be a good pilot. Because you have Uncle Mike to show you the way. First of all, the key is to practice offline with a quick respawn time, because your first few flights are gonna be like a circus midget funeral: short and sad. Use either a keyboard or a joystick that can twist -- I prefer the keyboard. Your forward and back keys (W and S by default) will control the power of the main rotors, making you fly higher or lower. The strafe keys (A and D by default) will rotate your chopper. The up and down arrow keys will tilt the nose forward or back, and the left and right arrow keys will roll you left or right, which I don't recommend until you figure out the basics of hovering.

The thing is, you gotta be easy. EASY! Treat her gentle, like she's got a big brother you don't want to piss off. Press the keys and then release. If you hold 'em down you'll never be able to recover, like Netscape. And remember, much like I get wood every time I see a McRib commercial, every action has a reaction. If you roll left, you're going to need to roll right eventually (or turn right and pitch forward) or else you'll be drifting all over and it'll get ugly. Plus, your monitor will be covered in vomit.

Your chopper will always move in the direction it's leaning: tilt forward to go forward, tilt right to slide right, etc. Just remember that anytime you're not level with the ground you're almost definitely going to be dropping in altitude, and if you lean too much you'll go down faster than [Editor's note: Don't go there].

Doing some Damage

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Now let's rip Basra a new one. First off, flying alone is like solo sex. It's just not as satisfying. Wait for gunners to jump in! Then you will be a roving angel of death. Piloting a fully loaded 'copter with soldiers at every gun is like flying a giant boot around a world fulla asses, kicking at will. It makes you tingly. It feels so good you keep thinking it must be wrong, like watching anime with no pants. But it's not; unless you're in one of them nicer theaters.

Beyond that, you just need to focus on staying alive so you can deliver your ordinance. If you're traveling across the map, fly WAY high to avoid AA fire and other aircraft. Otherwise, stay low so AA guns can't aim at you. Keep moving, so you're hard to hit. Use cover -- pop up from behind a building near the enemy, rake the place like a zen garden, then drop out of sight. Practice circling an enemy while keeping your nose pointed at him. Try to fly behind other choppers from your team, giving you the opportunity to double your firepower and mock their skillz. If you're lucky enough to be on a server with other non-Smacktards, you can ferry soldiers from point to point.

The skies are yours, soldier.

Now don't get them all crusty like your pillow. •


~Nest