Month: January 2013

The more I play squad rush the more I think that each mcom area is acceptable for 4v4 in BF3. This means that each mcom/flag accommodates around 4 players attacking and 4 defending, maybe 5-6 max per team before it an area becomes over crowded. The team interplay of defending or attacking an mcom is awesome – and this is because there are only just enough people to cover each approach, or possibly not enough so responding to threats is important. If the enemy tries to push hard on one approach this must be communicated in order for the rest of the team to assist.

If you can cover all entrances with players then the “teamwork” aspect becomes less important. This is seen in the popular infantry heavy BF3 maps. Metro 64 in particular highlights this. When there is a stalemate at lockers/frontstairs/backstairs progressing becomes very difficult because there are so few ways to attack and all the avenues for pushing are covered. The same can be seen in Seine crossing, grand bazaar, the close quarters maps as well as the new Aftermath maps. There is no teamwork required when all approaches are heavily covered.

Too many players on a map lead to the death of teamplay and Battlefield 3, or any game, it becomes a zerg without structure. This is problematic but quite often cited as “good teamplay”, if only because everyone runs around together / gets stuck at the same point. Once again playing near each other is not playing together nor does it necessarily mean that good teamplay will be seen in action. **Read below for clarification.

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Lets back up a bit and look at what I consider to be teamplay. Other people might consider it dropping ammo or health or reviving but I think teamplay is making plays/decisions with your teammates actions in mind.

A basic example : two members on your team as RU are covering lockers on metro. They spot several enemies at the US end of lockers but cannot kill them – they revive or hang back and heal. Pushing lockers is probably not a great call so they hang back. If you were hanging around the stairs a really excellent bit of teamplay would be pushing up past the gardenbeds/backstairs and shooting the players at US lockers in the face. You could delay entering until you see your teammates engage (using mini map/audio) the pair at US lockers, then engage.

This is teamplay at its core. Just because a player is in a jet does not mean this sort of thing is not happening. In fact with a scoreline of 60-2 I think it would be hard that these sort of player ARE happening regularly, even if he is not deliberately doing it. He would be assisting players on the ground that need assistance and he would be locking out the enemy air assets.

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At the same time wide open maps just fail for dynamic team play that is good. The problem is not as obvious but the amount of communication due to the more open nature of the map will work the same way. Maps need definition, pathways, walls, chokepoints and flaking routes. Having none of these is the same as not giving enough options. An example of this would be Antenna on Caspian. Generally you can cover everything easily. I think older BF players would point out that you could flank a really really long way around and come from behind. To be fair this is probably possible but I would say it is a bad choice and you are letting your team down if you opt for this. Your team would be playing down 1/2/3/flanking players.

Good teamplay at its core is the interaction between players. It is not dropping health or ammo.

I put it to you – Battlefield maps are the wrong shape. All the maps start narrow, go to one point then maybe out to 2-4. This is wrong, especially for pub gaming because it funnels the team that plays offensively onto one point, then the base. The BF3 maps are also setup so once you have pushed a team back to its base there is very little chance to push out due to narrow approaches out of the base. In my opinion, instead of funneling all resources out through a narrow passage the map designers at DICE should give bases many, many more escape routes to easily attack more than the first flag. This allows more teamplay because of the above mentioned “too many player” syndrome. Designing a map this way also allows comebacks.

I think DICE have partially learnt this lesson, Talah Market has many approaches for the attackers in conquest assault

Ah mouse sensitivity, the bane of almost every gamer out there who is trying to improve.

Mice and pads are also chopped and changed with such regularity that it is hard to imagine the users even get used to them. Is this needed or is this almost compulsive changing a products of the mouse/pad industry.

What is the best sensitivity for bf3?

If you look on the web for Battlefield 3 or any other game you will find two sides to this argument. One side knows what they are talking about and the other side does not. Unsurprisingly the side that does not know what they are doing like new mice and tend to spout the rubbish mice manufactures say.

Selecting a reliable mouse is a large part of mouse sensitivity. Without a reliable sensor you cannot perform.

• Lack of unremoveable negative or positive acceleration
• Malfunction speed (important for low sensitivity)
• Lift off Distance (Distance at which the mouse stops tracking when picked up)
• Prediction or angel snapping (smooths out bumps)

Picking the best mice is for another time, however the most important thing is a reliable sensor so you can run a lowish sensitivity. Correct, low sens is the best for almost everyone. This applies to most FPS. Sensitivity numbers and DPI are not needed here. Basically use anything over 400DPI – Not sure you can buy a mouse with lower sensitivity than that anymore. Any gaming mouse will do it. Next up you want to set sens low enough, set it somewhere above 30cm.

Some mice with good sensors: Razer Deathadder, Zowie AM, Microsoft Wheelmouse optical/explorer V3/intellimouse, Razer Abyssus (tape the sensor to fix the lift off distance issue), Logitech 518. This is not the be all end all list but it is something to start on.

Why low mouse sensitivity for Battlefield 3 / FPS?

Gaming is about being consistent. Sure some players perform well with high sens but generally you should use medium, or even better, low. Low sensitivity provides more consistent performance and aim. Your reaction time and close in aim can suffer, but if your objective is to improve your game, reaction is not a huge issue. You should be situationally aware at all times and not reacting to split second changes too often.

Low sensitivity also smooths out problems such as nerves and cold hands. Having low sens is a benefit if you are planning to start playing competitively and suffer from jitters.

I started writing this about three weeks ago and after reading to here can’t remember where I was planning to go with it. At any rate, if you are not awesome (and even if you are), lowering your sensitivity is probably a good idea. After that stop screwing with it and build the muscle memory for good snapping.

On top of this you should pick a scope type and stick to it. The red dots and holo sights have different sensitivity multipliers (yeah you are retarded DICE) so using one and sticking with it would be best. It would be nice to try something along the lines of changing DPI to get a real zoom fov sensitivity multiplier but really at this point in the game with my interest waning I CBF.

Low sensitivity needs a low sensitivity mouse mat

Get something big. I like the Razer Goliathus Extended because it is gigantic. The Extended costs a little more than the other Razer mats but you get two for the price of one. Simply cut it in half when you receive it, twice as long until you need to replace it! Speed has more friction and control has less, go figure. Chopping one of these in half gives you a wide and slightly narrow mat compared to the largest Razer pads. This is a good budget solution.

Before buying or ordering a mousemat I strongly suggest googling for your mouse + mat. Some mice have issues tracking on specific pads.