First Person Shooters: Netiquette and Tactics

Korin Hasegawa-John - 2001.11.19

This is a continuation of my earlier article on first person shooters. This article deals with netiquette for shooters and improving your skills.

Netiquette

The biggest problem that most people have is "camping." Camping is parking yourself at the end of a totally unimportant hallway with a shock rifle, rocket launcher, or railgun. A camper will then proceed to sit there without moving and shoot people who come down the hall. It is very tempting to do this, especially if you are scared of the people leaping around and hitting their targets while moving. Try to avoid it, however, because people will not be very happy with you. Being called a camper is considered an insult.

Sniping is similar. It's the same practice, although it involves being parked above a strategic intersection such as the intersection of three passages where there are a lot of weapons. This is considered legitimate, especially in team games. It's not so nice in free-for-all-games.

Swearing is also frowned upon in general. If you must call someone a name, do it like this. "Die, %&@*$!" Also, whining isn't very nice. Just because someone kills you, that doesn't mean that they're a lame little hack of a camper or that they're cheating or that they're a piece of lowlife. Everyone dies sometimes.

Tactics

The best tactic is jumping. It makes you a harder target to hit, especially with a single shot accurate weapon. It also makes it harder for you to hit anything, but it's usually easier to aim at someone when you know you are going to be jumping than it is for the other person to get a good shot at you.

Strafing is also good. It allows you to move laterally (side to side) without turning and screwing up your aim. If you see a bunch of people having it out in a big mass, get a rapid-fire weapon such as a minigun or plasma gun and strafe across while firing. It's a good strategy. Also, you can strafe back and forth quickly to ensure that you get more hits even if the person moves slightly.

Don't be afraid to run. If you have an Enforcer or other weak weapon and you're going against an opponent with a rocket launcher, run like the wind. If you're playing a team game, call for backup. Always try to use your teammates in a team game - and don't forget to support them.

If you're in a team game and see one of your guys and an opponent close together, unless you are using a very accurate weapon pass up the opportunity. If you hit your teammates, they won't be happy. They might even shoot at you in revenge. Also, if you kill a teammate you get a negative point, which doesn't help at all.

Coming up next: My choices for FPS games and some hardware picks.