Do you have your own tips and strategies to share for the novice first-person shooter player heading online? Check out games.macnn.com's Beginner's Guide to Online Play in First-Person Shooters and then share your own tips and strategies.

It's always best to learn the feel of EVERY weapon. not just the best or most powerful ones. This is because some maps don't have the biggest weapons available or the server may remove one or two of them in order to make it more fair.

For example. the BFG from Quake 2/3 is nice, and easy to use, but not one map that is commonly used in multiplayer has it. Also the server may remove the railgun so that you can't be a camper and to make it fair for the dialup users, and not an easy picking zone type game for the DSL/Cable players.

-DREDD

[Scott_H]

Always run, always shoot, always kill.


You never know when that guy with the rocket launcher is on his last legs and a single bullet will take him down.

Load up completely before you go out hunting. I can't tell you how many newbies I've seen respawn in front of me at our base who immedially charge back into battle or after the flag... often even running right by waiting armor or thigh pads. After I wait for the armor to reappear, I catch up to them real quickly ... they're usually splattered into 30 pieces not far from the base.

So, like your mother taught you ... before you go out, load up on armor, weapons and ammo to the max.

[seanyepez]

Quake III: Arena tips:

• use "/cl_timenudge -x" (where x is your ping)
  
  Don't forget the minus, otherwise you will be adding latency.
  
• change your sensitivity to 4.5 ("/sensitivity 4.5") and use mouse accelleration ("/cl_mouseaccel 1.2").
  
  Those settings (or slight variations of each) work wonders for railing and cursor control!
  
• camping sucks (and doesn't get you nearly as many frags as the classic rocket-launching technique)
  
  People will not like you, either. Even if you stop camping, they might (I know I do) hold a grudge against a former camper. You get killed more.

[This message has been edited by seanyepez (edited 11-02-2000).]

[druber]

Learn your maps. Know where guns and ammo are, figure out where the powerups are and construct a route. When you don't know where the fighting's going on, just run your path between powerups (and always run, no time for strolling) and when you do run into a firefight, you'll be prepared.

Also, if you see two or three people duking it out, don't wait for a one on one match. I've seen newbies who wanted to wait their turn. Jump in and smeg the guy who's focussed on someone else. If you see one guy who's getting hurt more, shoot at him and steal the kill before you go after the others. And if you've got the time, pick your shots. Like the rocket launcher lock on, use the shock rifle's alt fire, aim for the head and watch 'em fall (or rather, ignore them completely and go after the other guy who's turning to pound on you!)