PlanetSide 2: Alerts

I have seen a lot of confusion in-game and on Discord for how to start and win PlanetSide 2 alerts.

There are two phases of an unlocked continent battle:

This is why a lot of times you will hear people say they always lose when they start the alert.

Usually, that's because you've captured a major facility or the center base to start things during the first phase.

Then in the second phase you're going for hard to capture bases when they're all worth the same to win.

PlanetSide 2: Start an Alert

When there are fewer than 800 players on a PlanetSide 2 server such as Connery, there will be one unlocked continent.

When total player count goes over 800, a second continent unlocks for play.

A Meltdown Alert lasts 90 minutes, or 45 if population is low, and the allowed territory shrinks to a Condensed Alert.

Before a continent starts an alert, each faction battles for strategic objectives to get things going.

The first faction to have 100 Empire Strength begins the Meltdown Alert.

As you can see from the NC Path to Victory some bases are worth more than others.

50 Maintain link to enemy Warpgate
20-25 Maintain link to center base
15 Maintain ownership of major facility
10 Maintain ownership of construction sites (Lowland Trading Post, Sunken Relay Station, etc...)
5 Maintain Territory Control over 41%
5 Maintain Territory Control over 44%
5 Maintain Territory Control over 48%
5 Maintain Territory Control over 52%
5 Maintain Territory Control over 56%
5 Maintain Territory Control over 60%

When a faction hits 100 Empire Strength you will see the alert start, and a countdown timer.

Once a Meltdown Alert has begun, you have 90 minutes to have the most Territory Control.

When all factions are mostly even, controlling 34% of territory secures a win.

You can also go for a domination win by controlling 94% of all territory. This stops the alert before the timer.

You simply take the number of capturable regions on a continent into account when calculating a win condition.

You should check out fisu's PlanetSide 2 stuff which includes real-time alert status, and other API stats.

He was nice enough to comment on Reddit about Territory Control %, and did the math for everyone.

I have simply copied his table here below as well:

Continent	Regions	Value	34%	94%
Indar	92	1.09%	32	87
Hossin	85	1.18%	29	80
Amerish	77	1.30%	27	73
Esamir	58	1.72%	20	55

So get in the habit of going for more bases during an alert, instead of big battles.

There was another great Reddit post about stats for capturing vs defending bases by u/Arklur I've included below.

You can see for instance on Indar that 94.06% of base Defends for Crossroads Watchtower are successful.

So don't wait till the last 15 minutes of an alert, and think your 6% chance of flipping that base is gonna win.