Orbital (Full-Court) Fling Proof-of-Concept

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This is about as fast as you could possibly do this strat, and it only saves ≈6 seconds compared to the half-court fling (https://youtu.be/DwZgKl-lFAE), and ≈21 seconds compared to the standard three-point fling. In fact, in this particular instance, I positioned the crate much faster than in any other attempt because I knew there was an NK helo approaching, which would have aggro'd the Mafia thug. I was shocked I hit the target.

In ≈3 hours of testing, I had 3 successes. Practice may be able to improve the hit rate, but - unfortunately - neither the full-court nor half-court fling is currently practical for full-game runs.

This strat also requires that you have the Surgical Strike unlocked. Sounds simple enough, but - believe it or not - no one in the Mercenaries community actually knows what specifically unlocks it. Yup, you read that correctly. We know that it's typically unlocked after completing Foothold, and typically not unlocked if you warp out of Foothold. However, *sometimes it is unlocked* after warping out of Foothold, and we have no idea why. We'd need to figure this out to have any hope of implementing this strat, and the solution could cost valuable time, potentially rendering the discovery useless.

Either way, it's a nice PoC to have for posterity's sake.

*Edit:*
We did a deep-dive investigation into unlocking the Surgical Strike. Medivacing, dying, saving/loading, or verifying number card(s) before completing Stem the Tide consistently prevents the Surgical Strike from being unlocked.

On the other hand, if you go straight from the AN HQ to SK HQ after Ante Up, and complete Stem the Tide, the Surgical Strike will unlock in the background (even though Merchant of Menace isn't yet available). This makes it available after Foothold regardless of whether you do a warp.

Our best guess is that there's a bug in how the game is caching the Surgical Strike unlock after completing Ante Up, and - while the aforementioned actions clear that cache 100% of the time - there may be other ways to clear it.

Unfortunately, that means that this strat is almost completely useless.
- Any%: Current route medivacs before Stem the Tide
- NG+: Layup is faster than Full-Court Fling
- ACC: Current route verifies number cards before Stem the Tide
- 100%: 3-Point Fling is faster than Full-Court Fling
- Pacifist: 3-Point Fling is faster than Full-Court Fling
- Garrett's Coffee: Layup is faster than Full-Court Fling
- Golf%: Current route doesn't include Gimme My Money

If No Helo were re-routed, it could benefit from this strat in a big way, saving much more than just 6 seconds. However, that category isn't very competitive at the moment, so it'd be counterproductive for WR attempts.

Видео Orbital (Full-Court) Fling Proof-of-Concept канала Escargot