What bot do you open with?

It actually depends on what I have in my hangar. It's usually the Plasma Gareth or the Plasma Galahad, but I sometimes use the Orkan Pinata Galahad to take down enemy starter Galahads. In squad battles, I drop a midranger first, preferable the Trident Fury.

It depends on the map and what the reds drop in. I never drop in before I see my teammates and/or the whatever I can see of the red starting lineup.

I hate when I see 3-4 pure beacon runners on our side, as it means that my teammates didn't check to see what was dropped before dropping in a runner that is redundant.

If I do see runners employed at the start in both sides, I'll drop an MRS bot like my Quad Tul Doc (or TT Fury - whichever I'm using at the moment). This will allow me to support the blue runners by crippling/killing the red runners so that their effort to take the beacon isn't wasted.

If the blues are mostly knifers and no Ancilot is present, then I'll drop an Ancilot and Rush to protect them from Tridents or RDBs.

If we have at least 2 MRS at the start, I'll drop an Plasma Lance and let the blue MRS cover my on my way to my target.

See, there's no reason to start with a set bot - it makes no sense to throw away your 1st bot when all it takes is 10-15 seconds of observation prior to dropping in to assess the situation.

Depend on the map. On Moon and Canyon I will drop Ancilot first to capture home beacon under trident and tulu fire. On Powerplant, Dead City and Yamantau, Stuka-Griff is the best choice because there are a lot of cover to use.

I usually don't use ranged bots as the first one unless I saw there were more than 2 red TT Furies, then I will drop my trident Carnage to clear them out.

Yamantau: Zeus-trident carnage
Shenzhen, springfield, powerplant, canyon: orkan rogatka
Moon, dead city: plasma galahad or orkan rogatka - these two maps, I haven't yet established the starting move (and I think the win% the worst) ... maybe I should try starting thunder carnage?

maybe I should check blue bot composition before starting, but the thing is someone should drop it first.  it would be great if we can change the first bot until the end of the countdown, 

I don't often start with a bot other than my RDB Griffin, but when I do... I lose the match.

I chose RDB griff, but it's really map dependant. On larger maps I prefer to use Thunder/Pin Leo so I can test the waters and knock out any ancile-runners shields if I should see them on the beginning rush.
In smaller maps I'd run Thunder/Pinata Leo for the same reason. On medium maps, or if I see a bunch of brits drop in, RDB all the way.

A few updates back, the camera position was changed so that other than moon and some spawn points on other maps, its exceedingly difficult to see what is dropped. Is there some way to adjust the camera that I am missing out on?

Relish Dill BBQ sauce.

I like starting with Zeus Fury on Shenzhen. Can often discourage Fujins and Carnages from leaving home beacon, taking them out of the battle. Works great against Griffs jumping out of spawn too.

Anything, as long as it's beacon runner, but it should have enough punch to defend (DB Gareth/Rog/Galahad comes to mind).

I like my team to take initiative, draining the opponent's dominance bar from the start. Then anticipation game begins.

depends on the Map and my teammates. but mostly either Plasma Gareth or plasma Rog.

Doc .. not in the List.

On Yam, SF (river bed spawns and some bots on City spawn), Canyon, PP, and little of Shentzen, you can see the red bot configurations as they drop if you turn towards their spawn.  You can't see all of them, but you'll get enough to know what you use to fight a decent number of them.  PP and Canyon are really clear and you can see most if the red team and what weapons they are using. Yam and SF are far away, but you can get the see the outlines enough to distinguish the bot types and sometimes their weapons.  For the most part, I want to see if the reds MRS (if they even start with any), their runners, and what their weapon bias is between Plasma and Splash.  For DC and Moon, there is no way to see the reds before the start other than the pilot names (which is helpful because certain clans tend to start with the same lineups on certain maps).

You can always just wait to drop after the start, but that could cause your teammates to think they are short-handed and they may ditch.  This happens often enough, so don't spectate too long after the start.

Also, its always a good tactic to run through the bots on the field after you die so you can drop in the best next bot.

Sorry for the stupid noob question but how can you tell what you team has before you drop in?  I just pick my fav and stand around waiting to see what turns up?  Clearly missing a trick?