'Skill Cuts' How many in total, are they really any use?

[Rapier Racer]

So far I've found 2

Outpost 7 White/Black: The bridge, this is supposed to be one yes, no?

De Konstruct Black: Right hand side of the track with no mag strip, ship floats up to a higher section.

Anymore? I'm still waiting for the shortcut thats actually a shortcut. So far the two above are just a waste of time seemingly only cutting your chances of winning if you use them.

Remember Anulpha Pass, thats a shortcut, so what went wrong?

[guillaume]

I disagree :)

I only raced offline, but on several occasions, I overtook one or two ships by taking these two shortcuts.
I think they're designed just like the one in Anulpha Pass, hard to achieve but rewarding, which makes sense :)
The difference I guess is that they're harder to use. Anulpha was just a straight line. With these two, it will be trickier to get all the speed pads to make them worthwhile.

[Rapier Racer]

Did you race against any human opposition offline? Keep in mind the AI are not as fast as a good human player they won't necessarily hit an obvious speed pad and so fourth. If we take the De Konstruct one, you have to slow down a bit in order to get up there correctly else you end up hitting the ceiling/cage even with extreme nose downing, what am I doing wrong here? Even if all the speed pads are hit, the guy taking the other route doesn't need to slow down at all, the lower route has some speed pads of its own and in addition weapons pads so when the guy above drops down from above after gaining his half second you can shoot him right away even of they do a barrel roll.

Anulpha Pass isn't as easy to to use as you think I saw plenty folk struggling to stay on it. The Outpost bridge isn't hard to stay on at all.

[Asayyeah]

True RR, you can also have a BR produced by going up on the little low wall when you get through the ramp itself and BR again when you land on the track after jumping from the bridge. Before really mastering this in phantom time will flow

[guillaume]

Damn, I'm lost :)
Should I edit my previous post with "I agree" instead? ;)

Actually I've not raced phantom yet on Pulse, I've only raced against AI, and until now I've had a hard time taking advantage of the two shortcuts we're talking about.
And I fell off Anulpha Pass bridge countless times, I didn't mean it was easy.
But I just reckoned the new shorcuts would be harder. I should play more Pulse, play Anulpha again at phantom speed, and get back to you on this one! :D

[Tomahawk]

The De Konstruct Black Shortcut only makes sense to me when you do a BR while going up. I've never mastered this technique in Speed Lap or TT when I tried it on my very few rapier sessions, but I've been successful quiet a few times on the slower classes. Never played this track on phantom before. In single race mode it's easy to do with the help of an AP... 8) If you manage to pull off a BR while going down, too, then this skill cut is definately faster than using the other route I'd say.

I use the bridge at Outpost 7 only to gain an extra BR. I drop my ship off it at the right spot by purpose and BR while falling down to the tack below. I think you can be a tad faster with this technique if you do this just at the right moment. It still needs to be proven if it really is faster, though, as I've not have any chance to properly test this technique against skilled human opponents...

[Rapier Racer]

Yeah if you can pull off a good <---keyword, double barrel roll then it would be faster. I've tried this 4 or so times and fell off the side mostly, if I don't go over the side the ship takes off the track and floats through the air at a funny angle which slows it down somewhat bringing me to the conclusion that doing a barrel roll on the way up was a poor idea. After that you still need to line up to hit the speed pads. They should have made that ledge a magstrip.

[phl0w]

I use the bridge at Outpost 7 only to gain an extra BR.The path under the bridge is so bumpy you can easily do a BR there too, no need to take the slower path- especially on Phantom.

[Frances_Penfold]

My experience is similar to others' here.

The De Konstruct Black is definitely worth it if you can perform the two barrel rolls (one up, one down) and hit the turbo pads while on the shortcut route-- without falling off the outer edge in the process :)

At Venom and Flash speeds, in Time Trials or Speed Laps, this is a no-brainer. In multiplayer, it's a tougher call-- frame rate drops make it harder to execute the barrel rolls, while weapons fire and bombs/mines make you more likely to fly off the edge. I haven't played enough Rapier and Phantom speed to comment about that-- I'm sure it's pretty risky.

I was initially really excited about using the bridge in Outpost 7 to link together multiple barrel rolls-- but now I don't think it's actually worth, as Phl0w says. Too much airtime, too much that can go wrong-- better to use the topography under the bridge to pull a barrel roll.

As an aside, I really love the De Konstruct tracks for their crazy and smart designs-- the end section (beginning in Black) with the one-half magnetic track is brilliant, as is the shortcut route. For whatever reason, though, I rarely see De Konstruct selected in online play... :?:

[Mad-Ice]

On De Konstruct Black you can even do two BR's going up and one going down. So this skillcut is also a shortcut, but very difficult to master.

On Outpost 7 White and Black the skillcut is only a shortcut on the slower classes. On Venom and Flash you can do a BR when going up the skillcut on the left or right side. Grind these sides and BR. When you are leaving the skillcut at the end you can also grind the left or right side and do a BR.

On Phantom the skillcut is not a shortcut. It is faster to do a BR on the bumpy track under the skillcut. About Rapier I am not sure, time will tell.

We need more skillcuts that are shortcuts in the next edition of tracks!!

[Chrono]

It's not really a skillcut, but on phantom, think it's Plat Rush Black, you can skip a whole corner, right after crossing the finish line. Just race and you'll prob do it on accident.