Vanu Rangers

Now that I have some time available with a lot more on the way, putting it to use comes to mind.

My thoughts lie on rebuilding, at least partially, the Vanu Rangers in Planetside.

While my outfit goals are not large, they are complex. I'd like to re-establish the Vanu Rangers as leaders in tactics and strategies that are effective in Planetside. For those familiar with Planetside, I'm not talking about being the best of the 'bailures' crowd. I am talking about putting teamwork and numbers to work to create a group that can effectively engage the opposition in a situation that leaves the Vanu Rangers outnumbered.

Remember the unnofficial motto I went by? "Always outnumbered. Never out-gunned."

It's doable in Planetside, even with the reduced player population.

Starting out will be hard. It'll define the outfit both to itself and to other players - both friendly and enemy. Since numbers will be small, I plan on focusing on tactics that provide frontlines support to friendlies in the most effective way possible. What comes to mind is providing air support. Liberators, Vultures, and Galaxy Gunships, protected by Reavers, Mosquitos, and Wasps. Focusing on an entirely air mobile force will enable the Vanu Rangers to respond to calls for help on a global scale, sans any pop locks getting in our ability to move quickly between hotspots.

Air support roles, such as this, require very little personnel. A Liberator or Vulture only needs 2 to 3 players. A gunship needs 3 to 6 players. Properly operated and used in the right way, these vehicles can provide crucial support to friendlies on the ground, enabling the friendlies to advance more quickly because the enemy is being suppressed from above. Adding escorts and defense to bombers or gunships is easy and each escorting aircraft needs only one player per.

Additionally, the roles and responsibilities of such a force are simple to fill, easy to pick up, and have a vast potential for the proper application of tactics. If you can fly, then you fly escort. If you can't fly, then you can be a gunner or bombardier. The jobs are fun, too.

Vanu Rangers 2.0 (this renewal would be 3.0!) was flawed in that we jumped too quickly from focusing on air support to what we originally did - elite air mobile forces that specialized in unconventional tactics. While these unconventional tactics required less players than their conventional counterparts, they still required a lot of players to accomplish tasks of similar gravity to the air support option and at that point, it was stretching the outfit a little too thin.

That being said, expect at the very least, some activity from me this weekend within the Planetside Universe.

Now I must go read up on real world air escort, air interdiction, and AC-130 Gunship tactics!