Basic combat strategy for any FPS

All FPS games involve at least two skills that must be mastered: movement, and aiming. Both tie into each other, this is how its done...

Movement may seem simple, but when trying to win a death match game, if you walk straight at the enemy while shooting, you will most likely not succeed.

If you die, do not make the same mistake twice, go another direction. I see this mistake made repeatedly by players who ruin the game for their whole team, for example I lost because a person on my team was trying to snipe and he had 0 kills 20 deaths. If you cant change your path then either change your gun or throw a smoke grenade depending on the game.

Strafing, which is side to side movement is very important because it may throw off an opponents aim, making it easier for you to kill them.

Change directions often if being shot at erratic movements may frustrate players using a high look sensitivity at long range. Think about how predictable your strafing is, often moving left then right quickly is enough to win a firefight against one person.

Left-right-left-right movements are still predictable, but do work especially at medium range and even when using zoomed or sighted weapons. Changing direction, then stopping and then moving the same direction again is sure to be more unpredictable if you find yourself getting shot.

Strafing is also moves your reticle so it is useful to assist in aiming, as long as you can compensate with your mouse/right stick.

Strafing adds to the accuracy of aiming and acquiring targets by fine tuning your shots horizontally and avoiding fire.

That's me, double headshot down map.

This is great for head shots but may require practice.
However in some games like counter-strike, call of duty, or crossfire, moving side to side effects the accuracy of your shots, forcing you to stop moving or crouch for accuracy, but never stay in one place too long, especially if you killed an enemy, they could just come back and already know your position.

At close range, strafing should be wider then at long range, aim in the opposite direction that you are moving as if you were walking around the enemy in a circle while facing them.

At medium/long range, strafing should have shorter movements as a kind of fake out technique, because moving one direction is very predictable and by leading(aiming ahead of you and then waiting for you to reach that point). Strafing the same way as you they wont have any trouble killing you.

Advanced strafing, I use this to look in all directions while moving one direction. Strafing to the side while looking the other way will be the same as walking forward except you are looking right. Coordinating transitions between looking right and left while moving forward could take come practice, because you have to walk diagonally (A+D or North east on the left stick for a controller) at a point while you are turned 45 degrees left so you continue to go one direction.It's useful to run-and-gun and have fluid running motion while turning in most games, but being in the open is always risky, so you must use cover to your advantage.

Halo 3's scorpion tank, it can aim to the left or right while moving forward. And you must lead your shots , I shoot down hornets with it.

How to look around going in one direction:

• Strafe left while still walking forward and beginning to turn right
• Half way to turning completely right, stop holding forward and strafe left only, and finish looking right
  
• Then turn left 180 degrees and strafe right while holding forward for the 90 degrees in front of you
• Now you can strafe right and look by holding forward in the beginning of the turn

Jumping is used in a variety of ways depending on the game you play, to get to higher places, or even to avoid fire as a last ditch effort. Crouch jumping is when you jump, then crouch mid air pulling your legs up to jump over taller objects or to jump further. In Halo 3, you can even jump and repeatedly hit the crouch button, which is called the gandhi-jump, it is useful because it makes your head harder to hit because oddly your head is going up and down in mid air. In call of duty, Jumping followed by going prone is called a belly flop and makes it significantly harder for you to be shot then if you were just standing upright. Some games like Halo allows you to jump up and shoot while maintaining accuracy, which can be useful as well.

That's me, jumping up in the air, boom headshot.

Knowing how to use cover, using cover is very useful. Choosing your cover is very important, pick something that you can fire at the enemy but either duck or move behind when reloading or avoiding gunfire. An example of good cover is a box or concrete fence that lets you see a hot spot in front of you when standing, but conceals you when crouched. Jumping up to look over an obstruction can help you by knowing where the enemy is, and then you can either wait for the enemy, or pop out from behind the object and have a fire fight, or you can throw a frag grenade at them and hope it kills them.

When you're not moving, crouch, it allows you to be a smaller target, and it also increases accuracy in many games. Crouching behind a corner and/or peeking out is good for surprise attacks for two reasons, the enemy wont expect you to be crouching and will have to look down, and as long as you haven't been seen behind the corner, you will have the element of surprise on your side.

Aiming

Always Pre-aim! I cant stress this more, when on the move around the map, keep looking around and aiming where the enemy is most likely to be.

When walking inside a building check your corners and then pre-aim at doorways where the enemy could come in, but avoid running directly into a doorway the enemy will see you immediately, look out of the door from the left or right side, because the enemy could be right outside the doorway, or they could check the inside of the doorway and they cant check both corners at once.

Be careful searching for enemies out windows, rooftops, or bridges, make sure you aren't too visible and if possible crouch, often only your head will be exposed depending on the height of window sill. If you cant crouch strafe back and forth behind the side of the window to scan the area out the window without being visible from all 180 degrees of battlefield.

Whatever you can see out the window you must cover, since the building you are in is a very obvious place of cover, and speed is of the essence and if you have been seen. If you didn't take out all the targets, immediately get out of view of the window, and run if there is risk of grenades, especially if the enemy is now seeking revenge.

When looking out a window know your limitations, using a light machine gun or sub machine gun out a window to a place where there are snipers or riflemen, will get most likely get you killed due to the poor range and accuracy of some weapons.

Scan around, and then zoom in if you have a long range weapon, looking at one place too long will leave you venerable . You must keep an eye on every corner, pathway, or building. When you see the enemy, roughly aim at them then zoom in. Know where they are most likely to come from and remember any dangerous areas to be.

Shooting warthog drivers is hard enough in an open field.

Tweak your sensitivity for the task, For consoles, I often use 1 sensitivity being the lowest for maximum accuracy, and for PC I often use a sensitivity in the lower range, but not too low as to not be able to turn quickly enough at close range. Either way, strafing can assist in turning faster as well as keeping you a moving target, just strafe the opposite way you are aiming and it will speed up your turning.

My ninja emblem gave me power to snipe fools who take the warthog alone

If you use a PC for gaming, make sure your mouse pad surface is low friction if you prefer low sensitivity, or medium friction if you prefer high sensitivity. I have owned about 3 different gaming mouse pads, and I have enjoyed Teflon feet that wore away on my Logitech MX518 which has lasted years and years, and before that I had a MX 500 which is the same shape, just on the fly sensitivity adjustments. There are some good mouse pads for 10 dollars, the fragmat is very good, also ones that are made of plastic of aluminum which have two sides are also good, but spending 20 dollars on a mouse pad could be worth it sometimes. I've had a hard plastic mouse pad a while back, I believe it was razer brand and it wore out in the middle causing the motion to not be uniform due to a smoother circle in the middle.

For the MX 518 0n newegg click here they have always been quick to ship things, they take paypal, and they have had great service over the years, selling me mice, computer parts, mouse pads, and even halo 3 for 40 dollars after my replacement copy from Microsoft broke.

If you use a console for gaming, its not completely necessary to have a brand new controller, but grip is a major factor, I recommend getting geltabz for your controller ($5 at gamestop), they go on top of the thumb sticks and provide well needed grip and added accuracy to your game. If that's not your thing, you could take thumb sticks from an original Xbox controller like I did for this one, I put duke sticks on a halo 3 edition controller but you need to sand down part of the skirt of the thumb stick in order for it to fit. You can also use controller-s sticks in the same way, they are slightly taller then 360 sticks so they do provide a slight bit better leverage. You can check out my more detailed guide on this at: http://diy360controllermods.blogspot.com/2009/03/diy-duke-or-s-sticks-on-360.html


Using sound to locate the enemy

If you play FPS, not matter on a PC playing counter-strike or crossfire, or on console games such as Halo, Call of Duty, Killzone, Vegas, or whatever game you can think of, take my advice and use headphones! If you use speakers you are at a much higher risk of getting snuck up on, and hearing is almost as important as seeings, especially when you cant see the enemy its a huge advantage!

A good example was that I would call out enemy positions to teammates in Halo very accurately, even if I couldn't see them, even if they were on the other side of the sniper base/spawn called "camp froman" on the map called last resort.he weapons in Halo 3 have 3 different sounds you can hear depending on their distance from you, and your mind learns quick at picking up a warthog at long range, as turning will change the intensity of the sound, you will know which direction the shots are being fired from. In Call of Duty, you can hear peoples footsteps on different materials, such as metal walkways and wooden floors, as long as you know the map you can be positive of their location just by looking at the radar on the HUD to see if your teammates are there or not.


Just use a 3.5mm 2 way stereo splitter 1 way to your headphones, 1 way to a 3.5mm stereo male to female RCA adapter, and hook red and white from your console up to the corresponding colors. If this doesn't turn out loud enough, hook it up to a receiver that has a headphone jack or buy a headphone amplifier and blow your eardrums out in enjoyment. The best headphones for the job are skullcandy skullcrushers, which are very rare and mine are in disrepair at the moment, the have 2 40mm headphone drivers and 2 40mm vibration drivers, aka sub woofers on your head with a sub woofer amplifier, and they sure do have amazing bass that drowns out everything else in the world.

Happy fragging!

My Youtube videos for Call of Duty 4 and Halo 3


My first Call of Duty 4 montage, Earning my Tenth Prestige level on Monday march 3, 2009. This one has annotations and my bands music.


This is my montage for Double EXP free for all during thanksgiving, sword killtrocity right in the beginning. All taken in one day of playing i got 220xp in all in only 4 days during this event.


Team snipers and Shotty snipers games from August 21-25th during double exp snipers, I didnt go to sleep until 7AM because I was playing halo. I was good at it, and I made a movie of it. Massive amounts of headshots!



Playing on DLC big team, owning everything I see.

4 Cameras, 1 flag capture, 3 dudes, great team work, and some sick driving.


The best of the best play from me november 12th, I had a 12 game streak in team snipers heres a bunch of headshots. Oh yeah and a funny Halo 2 rap from a while back.


The third part of my long halo film that I split up, this is the funny part that I added sound clips to from my Counter-strike sounds folder.