Gameplay Tips Megathread: Redux

So yes, I know that there have already been approximately ten to twenty threads made on this topic, but I figured that I'd start another one, because, hey, why not. The goal of this thread is to be a place where people can share advice and tips about how they play Empires, and such. I'll start!

1. Do not use your flashlight. It makes it easy for the enemy to see where you are.

2. Learn to tell the difference between the sound of NF weapons and BE weapons. It's satisfying to immediately ping in to the location of a hide enemy scout after he misses a mid to close range shot.

3. Watch bullet tracers. If a bullet tracer whizzes past you, hit shift, jump forward, crouch, spin around in midair, and you'll hit the ground ready to open fire on whomever was shooting at you.

4. Sound is key in Empires. If you hear bullets hitting the ground around you, strafe around like a madman. If you hear a vehicle approaching you, run out of the way immediately; don't just stand there and assume that it's a friendly vehicle. If you hear footsteps, or see someone's shadow on the wall, toss your nade into them.

5. When fighting a grenadier, do not stop moving. Try to fake them out into firing their mortar shot prematurely. For instance, if you're an engineer, even if you don't have revive, take out your calculator and pretend to run towards a dead person on your team if you're facing a good grenadier. The grenadier will likely expect you to attempt to revive that person, but at the last second, jump back, take out your weapon, and kill him. The worst thing you can do is stand still, even for a second. It's especially easy to hit targets who are crouched uphill who think that direct hitting with the mortar is made more difficult with a height advantage.

6. Try not to use any commands from the f d menu (taunting, for instance), if the enemy doesn't know where you are. Taunts, move up orders, and the like can be heard in-game by the enemy team, and used to pinpoint your location.

7. If you're killspawning, don't make it too obvious that you are. Type something in all chat like "WTF HOW DID I MORTAR MYSELF", or even better, get yourself killed running at the enemy.

8a. Deny the enemy kills. If you have 15 hp and you know you're going to die, press the key you bound to kill. Not only does it prevent the enemy from getting their third or fourth skills as quickly, it also has a psychological effect on them.
8b. This is a gay thing to do ~DZ
8c. Follow this tip to become hated in the Empires community ~Candles

9. Watch the killfeed. If you see someone who you know is in your vicinity die, be alert to enemies in the area.

10a. If you're on low hp and you're near someone who you know has revive, press whatever key you have bound to kill. It's much quicker (and safer) to revive someone instead of pausing for a few seconds to heal them up to full health.
b. Take care that you do not do this excessively, lest you run into trouble for farming squad points. ~Wealthysoup
c. Do not spam this if you're in the middle of a firefight. You'll run out of calculator charge far too quickly ~DDD Destroyer

11. Bind a key to force kill, something that you're not liable to hit; I personally have force kill bound to "o". If a killspawn is absolutely necessary, use force kill, and laugh as unaware engineers attempt to revive you.

12. Please, please, please, use your squad points. If 3 people in your squad are at low hp, just do a squad heal. If two good players in your squad are dead, and you're in a good position, do the squad revive. Ideally, no one should be ending the game with any squad points.

13. A common mistake I see a lot of people make is to run directly at my tank with a grenade in their hand, thinking that I'll just sit there and let them sticky me. Learn to fake out tanks. For instance, if an apc is shooting at you, zig zag its shots, but pretend to be firing at something else. Once you get close, sticky it. This still won't work against good tank drivers, but it's less stupid than simply blatantly running at a tank. This leads me to my next point...

14. Vehicle machine guns do a shit ton of damage to infantry who are not running perpendicular to the vehicle machine guns. If you want to avoid vehicle mg fire, do not run directly away from or directly at the tank, and of course, do not stand still, and you should be fine.

15. Learn to defuse vf mines quickly. If the enemy gren dropped the mines at the mouth of a vf, build a jeep, turbo, jump out, and defuse the mines. Alternatively, you could ask the commander to drive into the vf to "defuse" the mines quickly.

16. Avoid meeting BE jeeps as an NF APC, BE heavy/medium tank. You might end up underwater or simply lose your vehicle. ~Reznov

17. Chill ~DZ

18. Learn to zoom in to the minimap with the [ and ] keys ~Senor Awesome

19. Never deplete your stamina bar, it is faster to regenerate a couple of stamina "blocks" than wait until your character catches his breath. ~DDD Destroyer

20. If you're desperate to spawn, hold down m1 instead of m2, so you don't end up firing all over the rax upon your spawn ~AZK

21a. It's dangerous to go solo. Better take a w00kie with you. ~w00kie
b. w00kie is too stupid to not run out of stamina ~w00kie

22. Refs are important (unless you have a team strategy that everyone is following to the heart) ~w00kie

23. In order to win easily, avoid the enemy and take down (and over) his shit when he is building up and fighting somewhere else. Chances are good you will run into the enemy CV left alone in the enemy main base. ~w00kie

24. join the losing team. You learn a lot more from turning tides than from stomping noobs. ~w00kie

25. Stay together ffs, don't dick around and expect to have an impact by going solo. ~Z100000M

26. Don't hog the freaking main base. ~Z100000M

27. When someone goes for a last ditch effort apc rush and drives around the enemy com for a total of 4 minutes, maybe you should consider doing something about that. ~Z100000M

28a. "Stfu faggot" is not a valid response for a call for a killspawn. ~Z100000M
b. However, "Stfu faggot" is a typical response to many things in Empires. ~DDD Destroyer

29. Play engy. Don't bother with anything but the calculator. ~Spartacus

30. Play engy again. ~Spartacus

31. Repeat #30 until you earn Pacifist. ~Spartacus

So, that's all I have for now. Anyone else have any other tips that they'd like to share?

 

Deny the enemy kills. If you have 15 hp and you know you're going to die, press the key you bound to kill. Not only does it prevent the enemy from getting their third or fourth skills as quickly, it also has a psychological effect on them.

While useful, it's just gay. In all games.

Rest is good.

 

Psychological warfare! :D

 

Gay Gay Gay Gay Gay Gay!!

 

This could result in getting in trouble for "farming squad points" if your not careful/ do it all the time

 

Protip: Avoid meeting BE jeeps as an NF APC, BE heavy/medium tank. You might end up underwater or simply lose your vehicle.

...I can't think of any serious tips although I know much about Empires...

 

17. Chill

 

Something that not everybody knows about (or forgets about) is that you can zoom in on the mini-map with ], and zoom out with [. I find it very useful on escort, I zoom in so that I only see the two currently relevant flags and that helps me see more accurately where my enemies are. I also use it when I'm defending the dam on mvalley, but I don't leave it zoomed in all the time like I do on escort. I might have other, actually useful tips, but I can't think of them right now.

 

HeXi's Guide To Becoming Hated

 

Are you serious?

 

I'll update the OP with addenda and the like as they come through.

 

Desperate to spawn? Hold Mouse2 not Mouse1, that way you don't immediately waste a bullet & it also helps keep the barracks tidy. Would you discharge a deadly weapon in your own home? No - so don't do it here. It is rude.

 

YES if I had one. I have a particularly bitchy/winy/crybaby/bipolar sister in law in mind as a target.

You know whats worst about bipolar people? They won't admit they are bipolar and always go full rage when you try to tell them that they are.

 

This just in: 30 year-old man shoots mentally-ill sister

 

20. It's dangerous to go solo. Better take a w00kie with you.

I'm too stupid to not run out of stamina

21. Refs are important (unless you have a team strategy that everyone is following to the heart)

22. In order to win easily, avoid the enemy and take down (and over) his shit when he is building up and fighting somewhere else. Chances are good you will run into the enemy CV left alone in the enemy main base.

23. join the losing team. You learn a lot more from turning tides than from stomping noobs.

 

So, after a really fucking terrible round of cyclopean last night

24. Stay together ffs, dont dick around and expect to have an impact by going solo.
25. Dont hog the freaking main base.
26. When someone goes for a last ditch effort apc rush and drives around the enemy com for a total of 4 minutes, maybe you should consider doing something about that.
27. "Stfu faggot" is not a valid response for a call for a killspawn.