BF2:General tactics

From BattleWiki

Contents 1 Movement 2 Damage and aiming 3 Teamplay, squads, and communication 4 Vehicles 5 Surviving against death from above

Movement

• Always use cover. Whether it's moving running from flag to flag, or a slower assault on a flag, use as much of the available cover as possible. Even if it might take a little longer, you'll probably live much longer.
• Try using that junk you learned in Full Spectrum Warrior, or Brothers in Arms. Move in units. Cover each other. Chances are, if everyone is running, no one is covering your ass. This takes an insane amount of cooperation w/in your squad.
• Assault kits have smoke for a reason. Use them to cover retreats, or to serve as distractions. Example: Your tank has just had a shootout with an opposing team's armor, and your tank is low on health. Use the smoke from one or two assaulters to help cover the tank's retreat, so it can be repaired close to the front lines rather than being taken out in the incoming barrage most opponents will direct at deeply advanced armor.

• Example of uses of smoke. In city maps when firefights are hot ands heavy, try laying smoke while having some members of your squad flank. Also use it when you have multiple squad members down so your medic can revive them.
• If your pinned down by a emplaced machine gun try throwing smoke awayt from you but still in the machine gunners line of sight. Any good player should start to fire into the smoke, to defend their flag, which gives you time to make your eacape or kill the guy.

• (LastBeer) we have used smoke when attacking a flag for cover from infantry or armor. Just wish it lasted a few more seconds.

• The parachute is quite versatile. You can use it to jump off most buildings and high ledges (5 meters or so? I can't judge heights) and float down the last meter or two. A much easier key to bind it to is "X".
  • The parachute will fail to open if you are jumping into a narrow alley way or other location which doesn't allow the chute to fully open.

Damage and aiming

• Grenades aren't as good in Battlefield 2 as they were in Battlefield 1942. They have a more limited damage range. Still, they can kill people, so use them. Your throwing angle and momentum (running and/or jumping) dramatically affect how far the grenade travels. Keep in mind that you cannot throw grenades while sprinting.
• Damage is location-based, so hitting someone in the head works much better than the chest. Note that many of the guns, even the spec ops gun, are inaccurate when being fired full-auto or while moving, so try to stay still, crouch or lie prone, burst fire, etc. Running and gunning is a good way to hit nothing even when 5 feet from your target (sadly), while a well-aimed pop to the head can drop your foe (yay!)
• Some of the weapons kits come with body armor so are thus harder to kill. These include the Anti Tank, Assault, and Support kits. Engineers, Medics, Special Ops, and Snipers have no body armor.
• As you might expect, you are much more difficult to see while prone, particularly in areas with vegetation. A patch of tall grass can be an ideal place to lie in wait while defending or capturing a flag point.
• When spawning while under fire, immediately dropping to a prone position can improve your chances of survival. An inattentive opponent may fail to notice you, giving you extra time to relocate or line up a headshot.
• Using your primary weapon's ironsights (alt-fire) can greatly improve your accuracy at the expense of mobility and field of view. While this is obviously most beneficial at medium range and long range, do not underestimate the advantage it gives in close combat.
• Three round burst and full auto are useless beyond close/medium range. Single shot and iron sights are needed to engage opponents further away.

Teamplay, squads, and communication

• Join squads. Make sure your squad members play different classes. See Squad member for more.
• Follow your commander's/squad leader's orders. This is fairly easy as there are indicators on the mini-map. See Colors and Minimap for more information.
• Communicate with your team. Warn them of incoming vehicles, troops, etc. It is always better to point out too many things than nothing at all. Use the Q-Spot menu liberally. If you see a tank coming, look right at it, hold down Q, click the mouse button. Everyone on your team will see the tank on their maps for 15 seconds or so. No need to type, no need to say anything on a mic, one keypress, one click, and everyone can see. Q-Spot is everyone's friend.
• Get a mic and talk with your squad members. You'll be able to communicate and work as a team better when the rest of your squad knows what you're planning. Games in which you talk to your squad member are often more productive than games in which you do not, as it keeps the squad together and working better.
• Destroy the enemy artillery (and other equipment)! See the Special Forces page for more. If lucky, you can take out your enemy's artillery with your own; it may require multiple strikes, however.
• By the same token, repair your artillery (and other equipment)! Engineers can repair broken equipment to working order. Commanders can repair equipment by calling in a supply drop near the destroyed equipment.
• A black skull on red on your HUD (it appears in the same area of the screen as the lock-on warning) indicates that there are friendly mines or C4 in the vicinity, and you should practice extreme caution. The mines and C4 will have small red skulls above them so you can see them. Chances are you don't want to die and your poor teammate certainly doesn't want to lose 20+ points and get booted because you drove your full APC over his AT mine.
• If you see an artillery icon on the minimap, STAY OUT OF THE AREA. Friendly artillery will kill you too. Try and time things so you race in right after the artillery gets finished, as that's the easiest time to overwhelm existing defenders. See Colors and Minimap for more information.
• Tanks and APCs won't take much damage when you hit the vehicle's body. However, the turrets are MUCH more vulnerable. If you have the extra split second, tilt up a hair and hit that turret!
• When using the assault kit grenade launcher, don't bother actually trying to hit enemy infantry. Instead hit the environment around them - the ground at their feet, a wall beside their head etc. Direct hits to the enemy's body do nothing because the grenade does splash damage.
• Be very, very cautious when working with a sniper as squad leader. A dug-in sniper will plant some claymores to cover his/her flanks, but that also means that you could respawn in the mines' vicinity.

Vehicles

• If you're driving a vehicle, stop to pick up other soldiers on foot. You may want to honk your horn (if your vehicle has a horn) to make them aware of your presence. Honk with the primary fire button, which is the left mouse button by default. Be careful not to run them over. Having other soldiers with you means you can bring a lot more firepower to your destination at once, and quickly. It also means you'll have some defensive gunners along the way, and depending on the soldier's kits, you might get free healing, resupply, etc.
• Be careful near moving vehicles, even your own team's. You will die if they run into you, even if they are barely moving at all. Do not jump on top of vehicles to ride them, like in Battlefield 1942 (or Unreal Tournament 2004). When the vehicle moves it will most likely kill you. See Unable to ride on top of vehicles without getting teamkilled.
• If your vehicle is close to being destroyed and you have to bail in open terrain, quickly pop smoke before you exit. This, and the explosion, should conceal you as you head for the nearest bit of cover/concealment.

Surviving against death from above

• Man the AA guns! Enemy helicopters and planes can be a real threat, so at every flag you're defending, someone should be sitting in the AA. The AA will lock on to enemy aircraft if you keep them in the sights long enough. Once locked, you can fire stingers at them. Stingers have a limited range (I think) so firing at planes 400 meters away is probably not going to work. Also vehicles can dodge.
• It takes multiple hits to down anything (the exact number can be seen here: The Giant Grid O' Death). Helicopters are usually easier targets than jets; if you see one hovering take it out. Note that the enemy pilots can hear the missile lock tones just like you can, so they'll know when someone is locked on them. The bad part about the AA is that it takes a LONG time to reload after its two shots.
• You can take out ground vehicles and even infantry with the stingers, but they won't get a lock, so it's kind of a point-blank dead-aiming thing. Another thing to keep in mind when using the AA, your stingers will have a much better chance of hitting a fleeing target than an aircraft that is incoming for a bomb/missile run.
• When firing at aircraft, wait till they have launched their flares (as there is a limit on how much they can launch in a certain time limit) before firing. Also try to fire when they are moving away, rather than approaching you.
• (need more information on this) It is entirely possible to kill chopper pilots with small arms (i.e. rifles, carbines, LMGs) targeting the pilots in the cockpit. It takes approximately a full M4 clip (30 shots) to kill a pilot while he's in the chopper, assuming neither is a medic. It's not practical (and better pilots know never to foolishly hover for more than a couple seconds over a target) but it has worked several times. Note that the helicopter does not explode but with no pilot it will wander recklessly in the air and eventually crash. .50 Caliber machineguns can appreciably damage the chopper with sustained fire but they are more effective against the cockpits.
• The M95 (the unlockable sniper rifle) can kill the gunner/pilot in one headshot through the glass, the other rifles don't stand much chance, better to hide from the enemy helicopter, then try to kill the pilot with anything other then the M95. Be warned though, you need to be either very lucky, or to have incredable skill to hit the pilot/gunner in a moving helicopter - wait 'till they hover over a flag, then take the gunner 1st, then the pilot - just hope they don't see you first.
• Often times the easiest way to down an enemy chopper isn't with the static AA. Try using the .50 cals mounted on the FAVs or buggys. You'll be surprised at how fast they can take down a helicopter.