Tribes Ascend Pathfinder Flag Chaser Guide

Tribes Ascend Pathfinder Flag Chaser Guide by Bazzy

Hey Guys,
My name is Blinks, I play LD / Chase for team Egocentric, and I wanted to make this guide because I think Chase is the most exciting position to play in the game and I wanted to show you guys how I think it should be done.

Loadout

Bolt Launcher
For chasing, this is a clear choice over the spinfusor. The 910 damage on direct hits will 1-shot a capper coming into the stand and the bolt launcher’s aoe damage is simply superior to the Spinfusor.

Light Assault Rifle
Superior to the shotgun in every single way when it comes to chasing. You will almost never be close enough to a flag capper to be able to shotgun them for any significant damage, so the LAR is the clear choice here. I can’t stress how many times I’ve gotten a kill on a capper when they are ~10 feet from their flagstand because of the LAR, it has its issues (burst fire, high spread, have to keep clicking) but even with them it is WAY better than the shotgun.

Impact Nitron
The important thing in CTF is the flags and not the frags. Impact nitrons are absolutely essential for those times that a capper somehow gets your flag with full health, and you are the only one on your team in position to stop them. Usually they mean the difference between a point for the enemy team and an easy return for you. I know it may be tempting to go for the explosive nitrons with the mentality “well I can just kill them and make them drop the flag” but trust me, Impact Nitrons are the way to go.

Thrust Pack
This is probably the most essential part of being a chaser, having a thrust-pack lets you get from 0-200kph in under 3 seconds. I will cover this more in the “How to Play Chase” section.

Pathfinder Armor
yup.

Primary Perk: Reach
Your job as a chaser is to protect the flag. Most of the time this involves scrambling for the flag trying desperately to touch it while 3 enemies are doing the exact same thing. At this point tribes becomes a game of inches, and Reach gives you those extra inches you need to win.

Secondary Perk: Egocentric
This is also a very important perk to run, because it is the difference between being able to nitron yourself three times and getting up to 300kph for an emergency flag grab, or nitroning yourself twice and only getting to ~240kph. Nitron jumps are very important for the chase position and will be covered further in the “How to Play” Section

Anyway, this is how I run Chase, there are a few people that are better than me who may have different opinions on some things, and I encourage them to voice their opinions here.

How to Play Chase

Chase is an incredibly fun and fluid position. You have to worry about killing incoming enemies who are trying to distract your defense so the capper can get in safely, damaging the capper on the stand, bodyblocking the capper, and chasing the capper down if he gets out. I will not cover bodyblocking or how to deal effectively with offense in this guide, as I feel like those things are difficult to work on in public games.

Protecting the Stand

As a defensive player in CTF, you always always always always always want to be looking for flag cappers. Memorize the locations that most cappers are likely to come from, and KEEP LOOKING at those locations until you see a capper. I promise you, one will come eventually =D

After you see the capper coming in, you want to time your bolt-launcher shot to hit your flagstand at the same time as the flag capper does. It is important to land the shot in front of him rather than behind him, as a behind-shot will speed him up rather than slow him down. Once you feel you can hit your shots on stand pretty reliably, start trying to aim for where you think the capper will land, and trying to shoot the capper himself. If you land a shot, the 910 damage will instantly kill an incoming pathfinder, or leave a medium with about 400 health 1 snipe will kill him) and significantly decreased speed.

If you miss the burst on the stand, immediately turn to face the capper, fire your jump pack, and get going after him. If he is going slow, and you think you can catch him, go ahead and chase right behind him, but otherwise try to go for a cutoff point where you can land a nitron, bolt shot, or just AR him to death. Using nitron jumps with egocentric while chasing is very important, and if you land one just right, you can get a 50~60kph increase in speed, which is pretty huge when you are trying to get the flag back. Take a look at some of my vods below as I do this in every single game I play.