I've been browsing these forums for a couple of days now and I'm finding it very odd that no-one has yet made a topic dedicated to turret strategy (or if they have, I am incompetent at searching). I was mostly looking for tips myself so I can't really offer much content of my own here. I know enough that turrets won't win you the match, but will help a great deal, as the pros can't be in all places at all times. What turret setups do you employ in your games? At what point in the match do you buy which turrets and when do you upgrade? And why does the nub placement on Steel Peel suck so much?
I have actually been trying this just to get the 5 mill healing protag(im at 2.7 mil) and what i do is when i spawn just do all 4 leval 2 lazer blazers, overheal them hack one of the front ones, and keep them healed. then i get them all to leval 3, then i get my hack to leval 3 and keep hacking if a one lazer dies i replace with whatever i can afford, usually another lazor or rockit then i upgrade the 2 rockits and keep healing. Using this strat i usually get 100k heals per game around 20 kills and 15 assists and, if done right and no cocky sins 1 or 2 deaths.
K, noaw. Firebase you should always place it where something is over it. Like a bridge or what not. Also for area denial place it by the side of doors, but leaves it vulnerable to mortar strikes. For turrets themselves. I would say go mortar on most levels except for SteelPeel stage, then I would go Lazer or Rocket. I prefer the rocket over the laser, since they are very powerful, last level shoots extremely fast, and if you got support hack level 3 on it. Ma gawd, no one is going to live if they get into your base. Lazers are hard to destroy, and cheap to build so they are alright at defense but other then that they are weak NEVER going to a guarantee a kill. The ice turret (which slows people down) is good for what it's for. Place by door ways, open spots that usually you would build mortar turrets. In combo with lazer, it can wreck people. Mortar is the best turret you could get I think. Place in a open spot with nothing blocking its range, and upgrade it all the way (real cheap by the way). They shoot up campers, and destroy turrets which nets you points without actually having to do anything. Put a firebase up by the mortar's and everything should be good.
I must be in the minority. Am I the only Support guy who sees how useful the level 3 fire base with the level 3 hack is? That thing is sweet. I usually start out by upgrading my fire base and hack to level 2. This leaves me a good amount of money for upgrades, so I can max my turret and hack pretty quick. After that, I usually put up lazer turrets first because they are fast and cheap. I overheal and hack every chance I get. As soon as I have a "secure" area, I'll put up a couple of long shots in hard to reach, or overlooked areas with clear overheads. These will help keep the cash flowing. After I have a good amount of money coming in, I like to let the lazer turrets from early on die, and replace with lvl 3 hacked rocket turrets. They are expensive and slow to build, but if you can get a few hacked, you've got some serious firepower. I move my fire base around based on needs. I usually don't have to move it much. Park it under cover, be sure to keep it hacked, and it'll keep you happy.
Heres my turret strategy which works on most arenas but only very well if you have a working team. Before the match start we choose which side we're going to push, this makes sure most of our players are on one side of the map which allows the other side to be the one we need to reinforce with defenses. We normally play 2 supports so keep that in mind! We have the 2 central rocket turrets which we expect our team to get to level 3 (they are out there pushing and getting more kills so they get the cash quicker to upgrade them). We have an Ice turret on the side that we're not pushing near a doorway or bridge and we have a lazer blazer upped to 3.3 near that. Further up on this side (on most arenas its just next to the bridge nearest your side) we have both of our firebases at 3.3 next to each other and under the bridge - only snipers and tanks pose a threat this way but as we're on hand either side behind the bridge we can heal without being sniped. We make sure we're close enough to get back and heal a turret before its taken out and we spot enemies coming through the middle so we're back in time to turret heal. Every other turret position is a longshot which just brings in the money. With alot of the money we spawn gapshot bots on the side that we're pushing as we know they can get a longer life and more shots off on that side (if we have loads of cash we always leave a spare 500 for juice!) As soon as the money ball is down we rush in with juice (and if we havent already got juice we usually have enough to purchase it) and run around the moneyball with the hurt beam whilst everyone else is destroying it too. Works quite well except the cloaked assassins with juice! those are the only real threat to this setup and you pretty much have to wait until their juice finishes so you can rebuild. This is the only time we call back our team and its all hands on deck!