Tribes Ascend Prism Mines Placement Guide

Tribes Ascend Prism Mines Placement Guide by Cyanistic

I sure do love prism mines, great for defense and good for pissing off enemies!

However, some people seem to dislike them for being “weak” or “useless” when they can really be incredible handy.
Now don’t get me wrong, Sticky’s can be much better on offense and sometimes defense too, but these are very fun toys.

Let’s start off with some advice:
When you’re defending with your lovely Prism Mines, you’ll want to equip Safety Third as your primary perk:
Basic : +1 Belt Ammo
Upgrade 1 (2000) : +5% belt item radius.
Upgrade 2 (4000) : +5% belt item radius.
Upgrade 3 (11200) : +1 mine deployed.
You get to carry an extra mine with you at all times,
(Which is always great.)
and an extra mine deployed on the last upgrade.
(Which is pretty key.)

And after that’s all good and done, obviously upgrade your Prism Mines to full potential.
Upgrade 1 (1400) +1 Ammo
Upgrade 2 (2400) +10% Radius
Upgrade 3 (4200) +20% Damage vs. Armored

To be frank, I’m not sure how +20% damage vs armored is supposed to help you when using the Prism Mines, but it never hurts I suppose. In any case, with Safety Third and your Prism Mine upgrades, you’re capable of reaching a radius that’s 20% longer then what it was originally.
And range is crucial being that this mine does not catch anyone who flies over the green tripwire.

Well with all that said I think we’re ready to proceed aren’t we?

Let’s start with:

Arx Novena

Arx Novena is a Capture the Flag map in Tribes: Ascend. It features a grasslands landscape with some urban elements, as well as an aqueduct.
It was added to the game during beta.

Flag Defense:

Alrighty first off, let’s start with flag defense. This is the frontal area of the base.
Those two mines are long enough to meet in the middle.
Cappers coming from behind will more then likely touch the ground while swiping the flag causing them to run into the mines and either die or be seriously wounded.
On the plus side the probability of them being destroyed are slim unless people have a keen eye or come from the front.
You’ll also still have two mines to place, so you could probably place them in the hallways or put two in the back to try to prevent people coming from the front.

Issue with this one is it’s only capable of 800 damage no matter how they come in.
Even if they touch the very middle, they’ll activate them at the same time and only cause 800 damage, destroying both of them in the process.

To be honest. I don’t like this one.

Pretty well hidden and chances are the capper will most likely die or screw up the grab.
Placing these in the other hallway as well will further block off cappers and ensure that if they take that route, they’ll die.
More then likely they wont have their eyes on your mines when they come swooping in as most cappers shoot the stand to clear mines.
If they do happen to shoot one of your mines, you’ll have another one blocking their path.
(And two more if you’re blocking the whole hallway.)

Issue here is that there’s no defense for front or back cappers unless you place the other two prism mines in front and in back of the flag. But then you don’t have the hallways nailed down as tight as you could.

First and foremost. Biggest issue with this one:
Each hallway only does 800 damage due to the fact that they’ll explode together rather then doing separate damage.

This one protects all four areas: Left, Right, Behind, Front.
Each of the mines cross with one another creating a diamond shape defense.

However while it does provide good coverage, as you can guess it’s not as good for nailing down people. But hey, can’t have it all.
It protects well against hallway cappers considering one pop will deal 800 damage.
Chances of the capper shooting at the mines are pretty high so it’s not promised you’ll kill them with this design if they come from the hallway.
Not to mention if they shoot one, they’ll hit the other.

If they come from the front or back, it’s highly possible they’ll only hit one.
They may also set off the front two or the back two as well, which doesn’t help much.

All in all this is a wounding design then a design made to kill cappers.

Generator Defense:

(Now, generator defending is a bit more different. You can go rather crazy with placement and place them everywhere…
You’ll have a lot more freedom in generator rooms, usually.)

First up, Entrance Defense.
From what I understand these two mines are apparently invisible to pubs because I seem to always nail some kid with it.
I would have assumed the chances of them being destroyed are very high but I get a good amount of kills with them… (Why??)

In any case, keep one of them there if you want, it can warn you of someone intruding into the generator room right of the bat, even if they don’t get hit by it, by destroying it, you’ll easily know.

Covers a nice line room and is pretty concealed from people coming from the back entrance unlike the side entrance.
It’ll definitely snag someone if they’re coming from the back and you might push an enemy into it from the other way if you’re in mid battle with them.
With how this one is set up you’re capable of 1600 damage.
If they don’t walk in the center you’ll still be promised a nice 800.

Flaw is that it won’t completely guard the room as it has a giant hole, however, the chances of the enemy walking through the gap to avoid your mines are extremely slim. And there’s always the issue of them jetting over your mines as always. Not to mention they’re easy to notice in my opinion if you’re coming from the side entrances.

For this one, you might wanna design it a bit better then I did. Make one point out more into the middle of the room and one point more so that it’s flat against the wall.
That’ll cause the enemy to take 1600 damage (Theoretically… I’m pretty sure it will.)
It’s good for killing lights and mediums in a quick snap considering they usually wont expect it and by the time the first one hits them, they wouldn’t have stopped to asses what hit them.

Issue is if they come from either side, they can easily shoot those ones and surely expect more from the side they’re coming from so they could easily avoid the whole thing.
That is if you follow this to the dot rather then experimenting to see what works best for your current situation.

As for this one you can either place it like how I have it or against the wall pointing straight into the other one. Both are fine.

You’ll snag them as they come in as they usually wont expect it, and somehow they don’t seem to expect it while walking out either.
It’s a pretty promised hit, they almost never jet through this area unless there’s fighting going on, in which case it’d be a bad area for the mine due to grenades and other explosives that’d set it off prematurely.

This is a favorite spot of mine because it’s another 1600 damage mine if you combo it up with the next one.

Easy to see why this would get you a 1600 damage hit right?
Pretty obvious that it’s bad if there’s fighting around this area, like any area really.
I don’t have too much to say against this, but this is one of the ones I encourage, just like the previous one.

This particular one is nice considering you’re guarding both entrances and the fact that they aren’t obvious and out in the open.

The tree one was me kinda experimenting.. I think it’d get avoided easily or destroyed easily… But you never know. If it works; 1600 damage.

Personally? I like my Prisms inside or close to me at least… I don’t know why I just don’t like putting them outside or close to the entrances of the base.
Still, it isn’t an awful spot.

Miscellaneous:

Well, not my particular thing but you can be a infil-dick and just go ahead and throw prisms on the enemy vehicle pad and around the turrets so that when they go for a vehicle or go to repair, they get a nice prism blast in their face.
Inventory stations are fun too I guess.

Raindance
 
The Raindance map is an almost exact duplicate of one of the most popular capture the flag maps of the original Tribes game.
The wide-open landscape and large, rolling hills allow for excellent skiing and a wide variety of flag capping and base destruction routes.

Flag Defense:

Raindance.

Fuck.

I’ll be honest with you. I don’t like playing Flag Defense with my Prism Mines on Raindance.
The flag stand gets MIRV’d and shot at to hell to the point where I’m putting them up every 5 bloody seconds.
But whatever I plan to cover this map the best I can.

As for this one, the mine is in it’s little shell and it pokes the green tripwire out. It can still be blown to pieces very easily, but most cappers wont notice it.
Try to put it more so in the middle of the little room so that it extends a bit past the flag. I’ve had issues with people flying jjjuuusst above the tripwire.

I don’t like flag defense on this map and I never will.

These guys will hopefully tag incoming cappers. The one on the ledge will catch the people flying just above ground level and the one on the actual floor would catch people coming straight from the right (in the image that is).
You can also place the ledge mines straight instead of pointing towards the flag to catch people coming from behind the base and off to the left or right.
Same thing for the other side. There is really NOT much you can do for the flag stand here…

Generator Defense:

MUCH LESS OF A PAIN.
I will never flag defense on this map but I might generator defend.
C&H; is fun on this map too.

You will constantly get people if you place your mine here, I’m not kidding.
And even though you may only get 800 damage off them, I could almost swear you’ll always get them. Unless they’re either smart or have ran into the same mine 4 times now and is starting to catch on.

Again, you expect these to be destroyed the second an enemy visits your base, but surprisingly that’s not the case. The image above is a good way to deal 800 damage. I’m not too sure if the radius is large enough for them to not destroy each other. But if that’s the case, you’re capable of 1800 and then 2600 if they tap the previous mine trap.
All in all you can put em here or just one even, you should be nicely set generator wise.
That’d come up with 2 or 3 so far that are set out.
Where else?

Here of course!
(Yes, I do get kills this way… Somehow.)

I think people tend to believe the radius isn’t gigantic or simply don’t notice it with the way it slightly blends in… Whatever the case, it’ll give you 800 damage and if not, it’ll serve as a nice warning that the enemy is making a move into your gen room.

Alternatively you could put it here, or put both of them close to one another.

The only flaw to both of them is the fact that they can only manage half the path or 75% of it.
This one being the half.

I’m not too sure how they play out well in CTF, but in C&H; I’d snag people easily and it’d be hilarious.

Miscellaneous:

Offense-wise you could just follow the Gen defense guide.
You can also place one of these around the generator to nail a techie. Then you could finish him off with whatever weapon you may have at the time.

That’s all I really have for this map though.

Crossfire
 
Crossfire takes place on a lush tropical island where each team has a well protected base ship at opposite ends of the map.
It is unrelated to the Tribes 2 map of the same name.

Flag Defense:

For people coming in from the sides… This is the best you’re gonna do.

This is behind the Crossfire base. Really really good spot for defending your base and defending the flag. Putting it all the way back there is an issue however.

If you put it back there then it can’t cover the full length but it’ll be safe from attackers and what not.

However you could always put another mine next to it to make it a full line.

This one is more in the open but it’ll cover the entire pathway, which is rather good.
It’ll block cappers from the back and front usually unless they jet through the entire room.

You can do this same tactic to the other side which is closer to the flag. Combining them makes it difficult for cappers to not take 800 damage or die.

Issue is that the ones close to the flag will most likely get destroyed by mortars.

Base Defense:

Now, protecting indoors is a lot more easier. Crossfire seemed to be made just for prism mines because they go so well in this map.

I don’t particularly like placing this one here, but you’re bound to get someone walking in. Combined with the other traps you could set up.

Flaw here is that it’s pretty out in the open and if it’s in the enemy base, it’s going to be rather obvious.

Either one of these are perfect for defending a teammate who has the flag and is hiding in that little hold up. It’s also good for general base defense.

First one isn’t reccomended considering that they could easily destroy it while trying to get in and get their flag back, but it’s not a bad spot if nobody’s camping that area with the flag.
On the plus side, anyone flying up that shoot will take 1600 damage more then likely due to hitting on and then hitting the other. Assuming the mine doesn’t blow up the other one.
Not a good place for offense tactics obviously.

Issue with this if you’re using both is that they can easily be destroyed with any form of explosive in the middle. Not to mention it’ll only do 800 damage again and you’ll lose 2 mines if they come from the sides.

Both of these are good for defending this back area. The first one you can design to point outwards so that when they jet up, they’ll hit it and the other one you can point more into the room or just line it up against the wall.
You don’t have to use both of them, considering you wanna keep your base safe in other areas but it’s a good place to consider and use.

Very well hidden and it covers the doorway if I recall right.

It’s bound to get someone unless they’re constantly wasting energy jetting in the room. It’s hard to destroy too usually.

Ones like this are good for defense and offense.

Of course there’s always this area that could use defending. It should cover the whole pathway and as always it should be a promised hit assuming they don’t keep jetting as they move it.

Don’t particularly like this one but I can imagine it getting a few kills or seriously wounding other players.
It’s out in the open which is a big issue in offense, I wouldn’t recommend this. But hey, you never know.

Another good spot as you can see, it’ll defend the whole path way is is concealed by crates. You can also put them on the other side of the entrance but that puts the mine out in the open.


Generator Defense:

Not my ideal placement but I’m fairly sure you could get an unlucky fellow, however I believe it’d be better if it was on the other side of the door way, it keeps it from being notice when just walking in if you do it that way. But that’s something to experiment after all.
Issue is that they can easily avoid it assuming they walk against the walls or fly above it, however this usually only happens if they’re expecting it.
(Or a really sneaky infiltrator)

You can do this same tactic for the opposite side at the other entrance as well.

Some people wont bother to walk into that one way room but if they do you’re sure to kill them assuming their medium or light due to the two mines set up in the image. It’s great for offense and defense and I prefer these over setting them up elsewhere. It seems to cover the entire pathway from what I recall, so it’s all good.

Doesn’t block the entire pathway but the chances of them walking against the walls like this are slim.
It’s good for nailing techies going to repair or infiltrators/other players trying to hide. However chances are it’d be destroyed in the explosion of projectiles.

Perfect spot for hiding it, most techies like to hide behind the generator when they repair it so if they’re wounded already from you or something else, they’ll quickly die to this well placed mine.
It may also hurt infiltrators or such if they wanna hide behind the generator or hide behind those little wall parts.

Stretches about half way into the room and covers quite the large area, if people aren’t paying mind, it’ll give them a good sting.
But it’s also out in the open and can easily be destroyed.

Miscellaneous:

People tend to like skiing in between the crates here, it’s better for an offensive tactic then a defensive one considering that they almost never skii through the one closest to your base when they’re skiing to it.

Drydock

Drydock features open terrain with a towering cliff separating the opposing bases.

Flag Defense:

Drydock.

God dammit.

There’s really no true design you can make except by placing them in common areas that people will ski through, chances are they’re destroy it so you’re out of luck.

I don’t like flag defense on this map.

Generator Defense:

First and foremost, there’s these placements. You’ll most likely catch someone who doesn’t realize they’re their and most of the time they wont bother with destroying the one on the other side if there’s two.

Simple and easy.

There’s better places you can put your mines but if you wanna put one in either area, you’re free to. It doesn’t provide good coverage even if it has a large radius because most people jet into the hole or stay close to the walls rather then the middle of the room.

I didn’t seem to catch the green tripwire in this one but it covers the entire pathway. It’s an okay spot but again most people just jet into there.
However for those who don’t they’ll likely die before even stepping foot into the generator room if you set up the mines near the entrances.

Putting them on either side is good, putting them both there is a waste.
I’d suggest putting them on the left rather then the right side but that’s up to you. It’ll snag someone coming in more then likely unless they’re expecting it.

If you wanna defend the back entrance these two are good options. There’s not much you can do otherwise so this is kinda your ONLY options…

If you wanna defend even further back (for whatever reason, you can put a mine in any area shown here. I don’t like putting them this far away or near entrances like this as I said. I prefer letting them walk in where I can finish them off myself or not let them get a chance to regenerate or get away.

Another good are to place them, you can place them on either side to ensure you wound them or at least notice them coming.
Covers the whole pathway and blocks off the area that they need to enter from the other entrance or destroy a prism mine themselves and alert you.

Mines in the doorway will give people a nice sting they usually don’t expect. The second image is more promised to deal damage then the first one is, but they’re both nice spots either way.

Getting mighty close to the generator, aren’t we? I place them in this design so that if a person walks in and notices one of the mines on the other side, they’ll think there’s another mine in the same position on the door they’re entering and shoot to destroy it.
Chances are they won’t hit anything and continue walking only to get hit.
I would have assumed they’d destroy the mine regardless but somehow they don’t…
*Shrug*

POP.
KILL CREDIT.
As you know most techies like to hide behind the generator and so do infiltrators and other enemies. with the black smoke the broken generator gives off, your mines will be easily hidden. And even if it’s not broken it’ll still be very useful.
It’ll either kill them or make them fall into the pit, assuming they don’t have quick reflexes.

Katabatic

Katabatic is a map that originally appeared in Tribes 2. It takes place in an icy mountainous terrain and has exposed flag capture points.

Flag Defense:

Why.



Why.

You’re beginning to realize I’m not good at flag defense and I don’t like it on most maps. My only suggestion is to place them in the path cappers usually ski through.

Generator Defense:

Lets… Let’s just skip to the generator defense.
I’d call this base defense but the only reason anyone would be in here is to destroy your generator.

Anyways, First off, you can create a defense for this frontal area. But to tie this are down tight enough to be useful, you kind of have to apply 3 or 4 mines there. If you have people defending the cave entrance then you could place your mines here. It’s also great for offense to tie down this area.

If you wanna defend closer to the doors, this is the ideal placements for both of them. You could combo them with the previous mine and you might get 1600 damage on them, but don’t rely on it too heavily. Regardless, great indicators and enemy has entered the base and good for wounding/killing them.

If you wanna defend these shoots, these would be ideal placements.
Or if you’re picky you can put the mine on the side rather then in the middle like the third image shows.
They’ll drop down and lose 800 health easy but if there’s no other traps laid out or nobody keeping the generator guarded, the mine is a waste and wont aid in any way.

Katabatic’s insides are… Large. And it’s kinda tough to keep and area nicely guarded. So you end up with mines like this, only guarding half the area.
You can always put another on the other side but that’s two guarding just one entrance when the enemy can come in from 3 other areas.

The Prism Mine in this image is at the bottom right.
For some reason Prism Mines don’t have a indicator when they’re at the bottom right of your screen.
In any case, hiding your prisms behind these walls bits are the best you can do, from my experience… You can try experimenting and post if you find something else is useful, but this is as best as I could manage.

Same goes for here as you can see.

Now, let’s try to defend the tunnel area mo-

Uh. Let’s try that ag-

…
So yeah.

Only area worth defending in the tunnel-cave.

Miscellaneous:

The best place for trapping and what not in my opinion.
It does a spectacular job at flag defense and gen defense.
A+++

Sunstar

Sunstar is a Capture the Flag map added to Tribes: Ascend in patch 0.1.848.0.

Flag Defense:

Possibly the best defense you could make for this map. Each mine reaches the middle and a little more so. It’s too much for a single light to take out when they’re speeding in. However the flagstand can easily be sniped out and the mines wont last a great deal of time.

Generator Defense:

Simple and easy, although I don’t prefer this.
This will guard your entrances quite nicely but as always enemies can fly over your tripwires.
I don’t particularly like this because chances are they wont be coming in from every hole.

I prefer to defend the inside rather then the outside-ish.

Same goes with this, however you can block the most right path as it’s the front doorway that most people take if they go through that way.

I don’t really think I need to suggest where to put them on the inside. I mean they have the same column wall pieces that katabatic did.
Put them where you believe they will be fit.
Think like the enemy and try to imagine what paths you’d take while inside and block them off with traps.

You can also put them behind these rocks, but they are more obvious and don’t do as good as a job, imo.

This is something I was experimenting with. I do not know if this will work.
You’re free to try it if you wish.
The aim is to pull a behind the generator type thing like some other maps.
The two on the left should kill anyone who walks to where my character’s position is. (Ideally)

But like I said this is experimental, I haven’t tried this out at all.

Temple Ruins
Temple Ruins is a CTF map added in the 0.1.789 patch. It takes place in a volcanic region with two abandoned Children of Phoenix temples converted into bases.

Flag Defense:

Finally we’ve come to the last map in our guide. Temple Ruins.
The design above is another diamond shaped defense and will guard the whole flag stand. Each mine reaches one another.
As said previously, the mines on the bottom right do not like to show for some reason.
You can experiment with what you think may be a better flag defense if you wish just like I stated previously.

If you for whatever reason need to protect this gigantic ramp instead, then this design should do quite nicely. Two of them are needed to cover the whole thing however. You can also place them out in the open but in front of one another to increase the possibly of doing 1600 damage rather then 800.
Issue with that is they’re probably going to shoot it once they see it, possibly getting rid of one if not both, nullifying your defense.

Generator Defense:

For the generator room you can either put the two there like such (on both sides mind you.)
Or

Put only one on each side and use the other two to defend the rest of the gen room.
There’s not much place to put it though except the following.

This will defend anyone who manages to sneak in because more often then not, they’ll jump over your mines and proceed to destroy your generator.
If they take the shoot in any way, they’ll take 800 damage…
It’s the best I can come up with for this room. It’s kind of hard to defend with prism mines.

Phew. You get all that?