by OptimusMime
Aurora Nova is a diverse clan with heavy-hitters from around the globe. While the clan celebrates and upholds its core values of maturity, family, and teamwork, each chapter within the clan has developed its own esprit de corps, motto, and focus. This month’s segment is on two members from different Aurora chapters who have developed distinct, noteworthy styles of play.
Luc Best's main hangar ( when the article was written )
Fred is a congenial South African whose nome de guerre, ‘Luc Best’ fittingly contains a superlative that is descriptive of both his exemplary leadership, magnetic Discord presence, and surgical playing style. By day the 47 year-old works in IT development and design. More importantly, Luc Best is the leader of Aurora Excelsis, the Aurora iOS chapter intent on climbing and staying on top of the Champion League. AuEx is Aurora’s aggressive, upwardly mobile chapter of the clan whose roster boasts luminaries like RumRunner, Chronos, and BUNZ OF STEEL.
Luc went from casual player to clan leader when the old leader needed to step-down from his position. Luc filled the vacancy with a cheerful readiness, and quickly took up the office and responsibilities of chapter leader. He is a staple on voice comms, and can be dependably found there at all hours, ready for a friendly game or beer-soaked conversation. He is your favorite regular and wise sage at the local bar. He is the boss you’d want to hang out with after work. AuEx hangars typically feature top-of-the-line, current meta bots and Luc is no exception.
Q: Can you tell about your transition from Expert to Champion league?
A: I had saved 10,000 in gold and 900 million in silver by this point, so I quickly bought an Ares. I spent $1–$5 on the gold deals, but grinded for the rest.
Q: What’s your top lineup right now?
A: I have a shotgun Ares, shotgun Pursuer, Orkan Specter, Dragoon Bulwark, and a plasma Ao Jun.
Q: Was it worth climbing up to the Champion League? That’s a very lofty height these days.
A: It was absolutely worth climbing to Champs. It just happened, partly because I had saved so much silver. I lost 500 league points in my first month which was brutal, but everything has been great since.
Q: What behaviors and habits have been critical in getting you to the Champion League?
A: Squadding is so important. While you squad you both teach and learn teamwork. Communication is really important. It’s actually better if you are the worst person on your squad, which drives you to be better. When I am not sure which robot to buy, I ask Rumrunner who is clued-up. He visits the forums and the Reddit threads and tells me what to purchase next. You need a clan with a good Discord group. The people around you will support you in your climb. Whales are really fun to play with but so are the regular people in it just for fun.
Q: any closing words of wisdom?
A: it’s only a game ☺
Angry Honey Badger's main hangar ( at the time of writing )
Angry Honey Badger hails from Aurora Tolero, the fraternity famed for its eccentric leaders and fanatic devotion to teamwork, trolling, and family. Angry is the self-described anti-mascot of the team, a blazing example of what not to do in life, and in war robots. In squad, Angry is a solid teammate, dependable and stable in every desperate situation, but when left to his own devices he favors guerilla tactics, gangster hit-and-runs, and more complex flavors of infuriating ****ery. Despite this, Angry Honey Badger is by all accounts a valued team member, brother, and tactician. Honey Badger’s stealthy, all-Stalker/Pursuer hangar is both a symptom of his pathological need to troll everything, and an indication of the acute skills needed to pilot such robots effectively.
*This portion of the article has been heavily redacted to ensure that all Aurora Nova content is family-friendly.
Q: Tell me about yourself!
A: Oh **** I started playing a long time ago and then I took about a year off and then started playing again in 2016. A little bit about me...I guess I never really liked going for what the meta was except during the Mag Gep days--that was fun [chuckles sinisterly]. I started seeing the game changing and I wasn’t a fan of what was going on, so I just started finding the bots and weapons I liked and I had fun playing, and started to figure out ways to make them work for me.
Q: What advice can you give us about building and using this type of hangar?
Hit and run or drive by. You use stealth and speed with weapons that can do a lot of damage quickly. Time out your attack to where someone’s in the right spot at the right time. You hit the stealth, run in unload everything you got, and then run back out and hopefully without getting caught. Works better on some maps than others. Try to avoid big open spaces without any cover because you don’t have a lotta hit points. Use what you got to your advantage, and use what your enemies got to your advantage. Some bots are slow and can’t traverse fast enough - use it.
Q: Why haven’t you made a meta hangar with current robots and weapons? Can you give advice to players looking for different ways to play the game?
A: Where is the fun in that? Where is the challenge? What I really want is a challenge. Play what you like, whether [it’s because] you like what [the build/robot] can do, or because you just like the way it looks, and wherever you land [in the leagues] doesn’t really matter. Challenge yourself--it makes things more interesting and keeps your attention. Try running things that you don’t see, or try builds that are not being used. Change things up and see if you can do better, or how you like that bot or build. Challenge yourself. Don’t be a sheep 🐑.
Also, if you see somebody in a game that should be in master or champ and he’s sitting down there in silver don’t try to avoid him. Take every single robot you have and hunt that guy down, You may not win, but maybe you’re pissed him off enough to where he stops being a giant **** and goes back to where he belongs.
Q: Any closing comments or advice you want to give?
Have fun and don’t be a dick 🍆
And there you have it!
-Fin