~B~0COMBINED ARMS ~BOfficial Starting Guide v.1 by ryanbe ~BINTRODUCTION~B This guide is written to cover the game topically, and presumes the player has no experience playing Infantry. You can skip around to different parts if you're just interested in one section. There are bits of wisdom to keep in mind for an experienced player in every section, but you'll most likely figure these out on your own. Though the game's content does change often, the systems tend to stay the same. This is the most important stuff to learn to be successful in understanding the game. A thing to remember about the game is just how customizable it is. It can be very difficult to offer direction without misleading someone. There are a of choices in the way of armor and weapons that offer very different results. So this guide is not going to tell you what armor to wear or what weapon to buy. If you want that, just ask a player. If they're experienced, though, usually they'll just say, "it depends". To be good at Combined Arms, it doesn't hurt to be a little creative or clever. ~BCONTENTS~B 1. CONTROLS 2. MACROS 3. WEIGHT 4. SPRINT/JUMP 5. ARMOR 6. WEAPONS 7. ENERGY CELLS 7. IMPLANTS & ARMOR ADDONS 8. VEHICLES ~B1. CONTROLS~B ################################ Let's get straight to the point. This is a complicated zone, and you're not going to be very good unless you have your keys setup well (and I gurantee you you'll get frustrated and quit if you keep using those default controls). If you're new to Infantry, you'll need to setup controls from the zone selection screen (exit the game after reading). It may helpful to use the online version of this guide for this part (http://www.. The two most common ways to do this are as follows: ~BFPS Style:~B (Recommended for players new to Infantry) ------------------------- *NOTE* I've set these up with the shift key being used. Some people find this uncomfortable, but I find you get twice the keys in half the area (which helps if you don't like to reach). This is more intended to be a template than a strict method of setting up your keys. Occasionally you may want to toy with them, you could find something that makes you much beter (or worse). View > Movement Configuration Movement Method > Mouse Mode Left Button, Right Button, Middle Button > Nothing (We'll set these in a different menu) Then hit OK View > Keyboard/Button Configuration Rotate Left/Right > , and . (You'll be using the mouse for this) Forward > W Backward > S Strafe Left > A Strafe Right > D Hyper Forward > Shift+W Hyper Backward > Shift+S Weapon 1 > Left Mouse Button (click it) Weapon 2 > Shift+Left Mouse Button Weapon 3 > Right Mouse Button Weapon 4 > Shift+Right Mouse Button Weapon 5 > Middle Mouse Button Weapon 6 > Shift+Middle Mouse Button *ADVANCED TIP* If you have more buttons on your mouse, you can use your software to assign them to keyboard keys you wouldn't otherwise use, then in the keyboard config, assign the keyboard key, and your mouse should trigger them. Weapon 7 > E Weapon 8 > Shift+E Weapon 9 > R Weapon 10 > Shift R Weapon 11 > Q Weapon 12 > Shift+Q Weapon 13 > Shift+1 Weapon 14 > Shift+2 Weapon 15 > Shift+3 Weapon 16 > Shift+4 Adjust View Out > V Adjust View In > F Make sure you hit the box below that says "Press enter to type messages". This should give you a control setup that may remind you of a FPS. While mouse aiming is typically much easier, and often more precise, dodging plays a major role in the game and using two keys to turn your character may prove to be worth trying to learn eventually. ~BAll Keyboard Style:~B *NOTE* This is my personal setup. You may or may not like it (feel free to tweak it or come up with your own scheme). I designed it especially with CA in mind. It gives you access to all keys in a way that I think feels comfortable and natural, though it may take some time to get used to. View > Keyboard/Button Configuration Rotate Left > J Rotate Right > L Forward > W Backward > S Strafe Left > A Strafe Right > D Hyper Forward > Shift+W Hyper Backward > Shift+S Weapon 1 > I Weapon 2 > Shift+I Weapon 3 > K Weapon 4 > Shift+K Weapon 5 > O Weapon 6 > Shift+O Weapon 7 > U Weapon 8 > Shift+U Weapon 9 > E Weapon 10 > Shift+E Weapon 11 > Q Weapon 12 > Shift+Q Weapon 13 > Shift+1 Weapon 14 > Shift+2 Weapon 15 > Shift+3 Weapon 16 > Shift+4 Adjust View Out > V Adjust View In > F Make sure you hit the box below that says "Press enter to type messages". ~B2. MACROS~B ################################ Macros are easiest thing to pass up when you start playing Infantry. It's an annoying thing to have to type in macros, but like any good habit, they're far more often than not worth the initial time investment. The main purpose of macros is for buying ammo and single use items like grenades. These will not only help you on the battlefield, if you stick with a given setup for a while, you'll get better and better with your primary weapon, and you'll have saved yourself a lot of time of manually buying everything in the store (F10). A typical buy macro might look like this: ?buy Ammo - Rifle:#350 This will purchase 350 rifle caliber ammo. However, the # in the macro will make sure that when you trigger the macro, so if you already have 100, it will buy 250. So the format is ?buy itemname:#amount. To make this command a macro, before hitting enter to send it, press Shift+F1. Now, whenever you press Shift+F1 it will perform the purchase. The macro keys are by default Shift+(F1-F12) and Alt+(A-L). You can change these in the keyboard configuration menu. ~B3. WEIGHT~B ################################ The weight system in Combined Arms can be very tricky. Weight attempts to capture a sense of realism. The main thing to understand about the weight system is that the more you carry, the slower you will move. The limit on how much you can carry is very high (120kg), and the low number (20kg) is ~bnot~b used as an average. In fact 20kg is a ~bvery~b light setup, where 30-40kg is an average setup. The advantage of this system is that a player can customize ~bany~b class to play lighter or heavier. The thing to understand is that while the available weapons and armor for normally "heavy" classes (like heavy weapons or demolitions) are usually heavier, there are still a lot of ways to play them as light weight fast moving classes. ~B4. SPRINT/JUMP~B ################################ One of the most important keys to set, is your sprint key. Make sure it's something very easy to get to, because this is probably the key you will hit the most. Sprinting is not just for covering distance, or getting to and from cover, or even just for escaping your enemy. Using sprint within combat at just the right time can make or break a fight. A well timed sprint will let you dodge the seemingly indodgable, move out of the way of grenades, or move in for a melee attack. Because you can not fire while sprinting, it's important to time your sprint appropriately. Sprinting at a bad time can leave you defenseless and weak. The only real way to get better is to practice and get used to using it often. Jump is used to move onto very low objects. From a low object you can get a little higher. If you want to see the physics tiles and how they match up with the objects on the map, you can type ?showphysics. Green is very low, about knee height; the jump everyone has can jump onto green. Yellow is about waist height, and because most projectiles in the zone have gravity, they make good cover to fire from if your opponent is at enough of a distance. You can jump over/onto yellow physics with the thrust boots. Orange is a little taller than the character, any object about this height you can toss grenades over. The Mobile Infantry can get on top of and over orange physics. *NOTE* Directional physics are set to a height equal to yellow ~bfor anything travelling against the direction~b. So if you walk or shoot in same direction as the directional physic, it's as if it isn't there. This makes cliffs not only a good defensive position, but also dangerous if you aren't careful around the ledge, because you wont be able to climb back up. ~B5. ARMOR~B ################################ Armor can be very tricky. The numbers are important but you shouldn't bother calculating the absolute best armor, the differences are often hairline, and once you get used to the different properties, you should be able to pick out a suitable armor for a setup. Setups are a big part of the fun in CA. If you know what you have while your fighting, and can guess what the enemy has, you should be able to find a way to win. The first, and main thing to consider, is the Armor's weight. If you're trying to make a lightweight setup, you definitely do not want something like Power Armor which weighs 30kg (remember the lightest and fastest is 20kg total). An armor's weight is usually directly proportional to its Thickness and Anti-Multihit. Think of thickness as protection for heavy weapons like large machine guns and cannons, and Anti-multihit as how much repeat fire it can take (and since usually if this is higher, thickness is lower, it means you will stand up more to higher rate of fire weapons). Next are the armor's damage resistance properties. There are three main types of damage resist to look for in an armor. Kinetic covers most Rifles, Machine Guns, and Cannons, so if you think you're mostly going to be fighting against these weapons, such as fighting outdoors, you might want to focus on these. Explosive/Shock damage you will mostly encounter indoors. It's hard to get good explosive protection, but if you don't have any, shockwaves (which are on almost all explosions) will eat you alive. If you're assaulting or defending a base, having some explosive protection will help a lot. The last of the basic damage types is Electronic/Plasma which covers Lasers, Plasma weapons, and other Energy weapons. Most people focus on Kinetic and forget all about Electronic. Having just one point of electric ignore can do a lot to reduce the effectiveness of Lasers. In Combined Arms, Stealth and Cloaks are built right into the armor. If you're new to Infantry, Stealth will hide your character on the Radar and Cloaks will make your character invisible. To figure out how the Cloak and Stealth will work, when you read the info section, it has a pair of numbers written this way: Cloak 0/250 Stealth 3/500. The number on the left is how long the Cloak or Stealth will be disabled for after you fire a weapon. The number on the right is how far (the radius of pixels) the Cloak or Stealth becomes useless. This can be tricky to explain to someone new. If you know your screen resolution, you can compare it to that and then think of it as a radius where if an enemy is within it, the effects of your stealth/cloak are ignored. Keep in mind a 0 value for the left means your cloak or stealth will not disable when you fire, which can make it much harder for the enemy to find you in conjunction with stealth weaponry. ~B6. WEAPONS~B ################################ Oh weapons! Combined arms offers its greatest flexibility when it comes to weapons. There's a lot to choose from, and it's always difficult to decide exactly what the best weapon would be best for a situation. When you play the game, you'll notice something that seems to be effective if you use it a certain way. Knowing the ins and outs of all the weapons is going to take a while, but it's fun if you're willing to try. I always reccomend a primary weapons, and ~ba sidearm~b. Typically the primary is heavier, deals more hurt per shot or fires much faster. It's the more effective. The biggest mistake a new player will make is not carrying a weapon which balances out their primary. If your primary is mostly effective at long range, and particularly slow firing, a Shotgun or SMG will give you a little protection at close range. It wont make you invincible, but if you at least land a few with your primary, you should be able to finish them off if they get too close. Secondaries are also fairly effective for chasing off stealth units like BlackOps and Commandos. To be continued... ~B7. BASING~B ################################ ?Structures To be continued...