Thundersword Bomber Guide!
Now there is nothing better like a thsword bomber diving for a bombing run manned with a crew knows its job - and there is nothing worse than a bomber crew who don't.
So I take the courage now, for the shake of newbies who just dont know the how-to for using this most powerful weapon of tribes 2 - the Thundersword bomber!
(its a very good idea to have the pilotmodII script, its very useful, get it from here: http://www.astrolorf.com/t2scripts.htm)
Pilot
First of all, use your command hud, set a waypoint at the enemy vehicle station in order not to miss it. For the most successful bombing run, pilot should achieve a good positional advantage.
Its like this: you should fly at high altitude, attack from behind the base and keep the Thsword's energy at maximum when time comes to bombing, for the vehicle is most vulnerable when above the enemy base, and you will need the energy for the shields.
If you have a missile locked on you, you should remember the magic number: 288, for this is the speed at which missiles travel at. If you fly faster, you will simply outrun the missile, if not, you should! To gain some speed you can either use the aferburner, or dive. If there is water on the map - submerge, the missile will lose track! This can spare the tailgunner some important flares. Also notice, that if energy is full, shields can bear a missile impact with the vehicle not injured.
If you have a SHRIKE (the most annoying pests) locked on your tails, then it's fair to say you suck. Now this is very important: DON'T PANIC! So dont try to run away by using afrerburn - the shrike is faster, and it will just trigger its most innate instincts. Besides, you will need the energy for the sields - though it wont last long if you begin to receive shoots. In fact, your only hope is the tailgunner and the bomber. The tailgunner will try to launch a missile on the shike, so DONT TUG THE DAMN MOUSE, try help the tailgunner and the bomber in aiming, and keep the vehicle's movement as straight and smooth as possible, and use the strafe left/right buttons to confuse the shrike instead of the mouse. Dive slowly and gently, so that the bomber can use the blaster - it wont help much, but will confuse the shrike a little bit. And pray. In fact, taking out a shrike is not that impossible, I've had an experienced crew once, and we succeeded to blow up two chasing shrikes. And yeah, you can ask for "vehicle escort" any time 
Bomber
Always be prepared. Dont bomb if flying too low, it'll destroy the vehicle. Use the targeting laser: it will give a special waypoint to the pilot for high altitude bombing. Enjoy the sight (and you will get all the scores for the kills
Tailgunner
Without a tailgunner, the thsworder will not stand a chance. Its a very important position. As a tailgunner you should equip heavy armour, missile launcher, chaingun, ELF projector, a repair pack and FLARE GRENADES. Your task is: watch the sky, if you see an enemy shrike, lock your missile on it, out of missiles: use your chaingun, out of chaingun, use your ELF. Drop flare grenades if one or more missiles are heading towards you. Dont drop flares if the ship seems to outrun the missile (at 288km/h), or if there is only one missile following you. You have a repair pack, so you will be able to repair the veh in mid air even if it suffers a missile impact. Be clever when using the repair pack, the repair ray also inherits velocity from the bomber, so be patient. Some will say to use sensor jammer pack instead of repair. Dont listen to them, i fount it quite unnecessary, and useless compared to the advantages of the repair pack.
And Good hunting to you all!
So I take the courage now, for the shake of newbies who just dont know the how-to for using this most powerful weapon of tribes 2 - the Thundersword bomber!
(its a very good idea to have the pilotmodII script, its very useful, get it from here: http://www.astrolorf.com/t2scripts.htm)
Pilot
First of all, use your command hud, set a waypoint at the enemy vehicle station in order not to miss it. For the most successful bombing run, pilot should achieve a good positional advantage.
Its like this: you should fly at high altitude, attack from behind the base and keep the Thsword's energy at maximum when time comes to bombing, for the vehicle is most vulnerable when above the enemy base, and you will need the energy for the shields.
If you have a missile locked on you, you should remember the magic number: 288, for this is the speed at which missiles travel at. If you fly faster, you will simply outrun the missile, if not, you should! To gain some speed you can either use the aferburner, or dive. If there is water on the map - submerge, the missile will lose track! This can spare the tailgunner some important flares. Also notice, that if energy is full, shields can bear a missile impact with the vehicle not injured.
If you have a SHRIKE (the most annoying pests) locked on your tails, then it's fair to say you suck. Now this is very important: DON'T PANIC! So dont try to run away by using afrerburn - the shrike is faster, and it will just trigger its most innate instincts. Besides, you will need the energy for the sields - though it wont last long if you begin to receive shoots. In fact, your only hope is the tailgunner and the bomber. The tailgunner will try to launch a missile on the shike, so DONT TUG THE DAMN MOUSE, try help the tailgunner and the bomber in aiming, and keep the vehicle's movement as straight and smooth as possible, and use the strafe left/right buttons to confuse the shrike instead of the mouse. Dive slowly and gently, so that the bomber can use the blaster - it wont help much, but will confuse the shrike a little bit. And pray. In fact, taking out a shrike is not that impossible, I've had an experienced crew once, and we succeeded to blow up two chasing shrikes.
And yeah, you can ask for "vehicle escort" any time Bomber
Always be prepared. Dont bomb if flying too low, it'll destroy the vehicle. Use the targeting laser: it will give a special waypoint to the pilot for high altitude bombing. Enjoy the sight
(and you will get all the scores for the kills Tailgunner
Without a tailgunner, the thsworder will not stand a chance. Its a very important position. As a tailgunner you should equip heavy armour, missile launcher, chaingun, ELF projector, a repair pack and FLARE GRENADES. Your task is: watch the sky, if you see an enemy shrike, lock your missile on it, out of missiles: use your chaingun, out of chaingun, use your ELF. Drop flare grenades if one or more missiles are heading towards you. Dont drop flares if the ship seems to outrun the missile (at 288km/h), or if there is only one missile following you. You have a repair pack, so you will be able to repair the veh in mid air even if it suffers a missile impact. Be clever when using the repair pack, the repair ray also inherits velocity from the bomber, so be patient. Some will say to use sensor jammer pack instead of repair. Dont listen to them, i fount it quite unnecessary, and useless compared to the advantages of the repair pack.
And Good hunting to you all!
Comments
Open Command Circut "CC" (defauld key "C") > find place you want to waypoint > now 2 options:
1. If you see on CC icon of a vpad, turret, sensor etc you can select it by right click > select one of this: attack/bomb/mortar/laze, than quickly hit VCA, now you should not hit VCC or VCD (you delete waipoint by doing that). Waypoint will be marked red.
2. If you can't see any icons, you can set waypoint too in a simillar technique like in 1 option. Waypoint will be marked green.
Bomber guide was wrote here:
http://www.tribesnext.com/forum/index.php?topic=2215.0
and here:
http://goonhaven.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=1280
Btw sometimes is better to attack frontally, to evade behind enmy lines. If you attack from behind, when you're outbound, enemy can easier aim at you, and you're at their sight for longer time. You just giving enemy more time to react against bomber presence in air.
Of course, im always glad to hear experienced players sharing their opinion on the subject!
I wrote guide (links in my pervious post) also to bring some info about bombing to newbies, but especially to clarify some points for more advanced pilots, bombardiers and tailgunners wich with I spend more time in air.
Honestly, there just some few nicks wich I like to bomb with, but its number growing after posting guide. Check guide thread on goons forum, it's rather expanded.
Something about escorting bomber:
Just do not stick close to bomber, make some distance between you and bomber to let enemy fly between. In that way you will attack shriker from behind when he's chasing bomber in quite straight line, so he's an easy target. Why? Cause bomber always is priority target.
During an escort it is not important to fly with bomber above enemy base. It is good to omit that area, and join to bomber at outbound. In that way we avoid enemy turret/missle range, so we do not have to eg outrun missles witch causes we're loosing our bomber, leaving it without escort at outbound/banking (most risky stage related with enemy shrikes).
Just make waypoint at escorted pilot/bomber to easily find them after disconneting with.
btw as a noob (wich i'm still) i saw user signature sometime with bomber with crew, dripping with the awesomes. I couldn't figure out what was so awesome about it, after hours spend in bomber i find it out
And I also encountered a very nice (and most practical) thing during that session: I was also in TG position (my favourite place!
Scripts:
For Tailgunners: you can use the "flare say" script ( http://www.tribaloutpost.com/search/results/query:tailgunner ), which says your amount of flares in teamchat just by a single keybind.
For Pilots: TinkLook is also an essential script, it enables you a quick 3rd person+free look in vehicles by a single keybind. ( http://www.fabriceroux.com/tribes/scripts.html )
Was that ADiDaSWaRRiOR?
1) While being chased by a shrike, go underwater and BOMB
2) Tailgunner/bomber can sometimes consider EJECTING, in order to get a clear shot on the chasing shrike (if the pilot makes unexpected moves to dodge enemy fire, it's almost impossible to lock on the shrike)
[/quote]
Oh, im not sure who it was, Shadowrath was part of the team then, I can remember that much
I'd advise against passengers ejecting. A hotshot shrike jock will ram the ex-passenger instinctively.
Be sure to ditch the bomber after a few runs though so you don't get banned.
Thundersword skin.
If you're stoned, use MS Paint.
Edit: I take that back. Paint can be useful for alpha, but only when used in conjuction with something else. By itself, MS paint is a pile of shit.
This should be helpful...
Alpha Channels and how to use them
Statistically, a skilled bomber crew can get in 3 to 4 good passes over the enemy base before being destroyed, without repair. Thats why I say the TG should choose the Ammo pack. You may lose the ability to repair mid-air, but you gain the ability to ward off missile and shrike attacks for a longer amount of time.
First run is to establish a forward repair/rearm base some where behind enemy or out of bounds.
A remote base and having a competent crew will keep a Thundersword in operation the entier game.
BOMBS AWAY!
I agree here, It's usually a good idea to suit up with a remote inventory. Have the tailgunner set up the exterior outpost while the other two bomb the enemy base, while the enemy is focused on the bomber, take whatever objective is needed.
It's all about the moment, and setting up the perfect time slot for attacking.
Well, missile turrets an AA turrets can cause quite a trouble on some maps, in which case a Sensor Jammer comes quite handy. As for flares - the pilot or the bombardier can always toss ammo to the tailgunner, and thats a much faster process than repairing the vehicle on the ground. Furthermore, the midair repair ability came quite handy in many times, especially when being AA/chaingunned, not to mention that it, again, saves a lots of time, which is quite important cuz collecting crew for the TSW is most often a pain...
just sayin.