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Battlefield 1

Battlefield 1 Multiplayer Guide

Nine handy tips to get you up to speed on the field of battle.

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Battlefield 1 is out in the wild and since there's a lot more to take into consideration to be successful in this game than in, say, Call of Duty, we thought that we'd throw a beginner's guide together for those of you who are newcomers to the series.

So without further ado, here's nine tips that will help you become a better player in Battlefield 1!

Work as a squad

In Battlefield 1 you can, just like in previous titles in the series, play in a squad of up to five players, and working closely and in coordination with your squad mates is the number one key to success in Battlefield 1. As squad leader you can easily point out which objective you want your squad to focus on, for instance.

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Squad members that follows your orders will be rewarded with points for doing so and if you're not the leader you can request an order via an on-screen wheel, accessible by holding down the right bumper button on the controller. Assists and spotting gives more points when they're done within the squad, so playing tightly with your squad mates is a good way of earning experience points. You can even spawn in on a buddy when they're not in open combat, which is obviously handy too. And try to always join a squad with as much players in it as possible. Three groups with five players will do much more harm to the enemy team than five groups of two.

Vehicles can be repaired from the inside

In previous Battlefield entries, someone with the right repair tool had to repair damaged vehicles from the outside. That works here as well - the Support class is equipped with the wrench, which provides the fastest way of making a disabled tank operational and ready to fight another day - but in Battlefield 1 the vehicles can be repaired from within by the driver as well.

When you spawn in a tank, for example, you will automatically play as a special driver class and by holding down on the d-pad you can slowly start repairing your vehicle without the need to disembark and put yourself in immediate danger. This can't be done while under enemy fire, however, so you'll need to back away into safety before the repairing process can begin. The Scout class also has special armour piercing rounds to prevent enemy vehicles from being able to "heal", so keep an eye out for these too.

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Classes now come with three loadouts

The different soldier classes in Battlefield 1 serve different purposes and therefore it comes down to picking the right class for the right situation, but within these classes there's enough customisation options to keep things interesting. For the Scout class, for instance, a class mainly reserved for sniping, it is now able to function in other contexts as well. If you are the Support, you can switch out your wrench in favour of the sticky mines and it will change your role on the battlefield drastically. In other words, there's a wide range of roles to fill within every given class depending on the gear you decide to take with you.

And in Battlefield 1 it's easier than ever to switch between these sub roles, as every class comes with three customisable loadouts. If you'd like to, say, have a shotgun loadout and a machine gun loadout at the ready within the Assault class, you can now do that so you can easily switch between them in the spawn screen without too much menu navigation.

Spot enemies

The ability to spot enemies isn't new to Battlefield 1, but it may be more important than before since your minimap doesn't point out enemy threats as reliably as in the predecessors. Spotting is done by aiming at an enemy and pressing the right bumper, and then your whole team will be able to see the spotted enemy's position - which is vitally important.

Do you see a tank rolling at the horizon? Spot it so that your team will have a chance to prepare with rocket launchers and anti-tank grenades. If an enemy that you've spotted gets killed, you'll even get a small bonus in points, however it's important to note that these spot markers won't last as long as in previous games and the distance at which you can spot enemies depends on the weapon you're currently wielding. As such a sniper can spot enemies at greater distances than you can with your shotgun, for instance.

Keep an eye out for Elite classes

There's three Elite classes to play as in Battlefield 1, and all of them need to be found and picked up by hand when they appear on the map. When this happens you'll hear a voice that says "a Sentry kit has been spotted nearby" and you'll see an icon on your HUD. These classes give you access to heavy weaponry and better damage resistance.

The already mentioned Sentry kit, for example, gives you a huge - but not very accurate - machine gun that's highly effective at closer ranges. There's also a class with a flamethrower that also packs quite a punch for anything that's unfortunate enough to be within its range, and the last class, the Tank Hunter, equips you with a heavy sniper rifle that's so powerful that it can take out armored vehicles. On top of that, regular infantry gets to bite the dust with a single bullet from this beast.

Put the bayonet to clever use

In Battlefield 1 you can attach bayonets to your weapons. By holding down the melee button with a bayonet fitted weapon you'll hold it up and charge forward maniacally in high speed. A common misconception, however, is that it can help you cover long distances quicker since you charge much faster than you sprint. After a charge, however, you'll have to recover for a few seconds and during this time you're slower than usual. So someone who's just running regularly will make it to their destination faster than a charging player.

But on the other hand it can be useful to use this initial boost to make a quick escape in sticky situations. If you suddenly find yourself under sniper fire while out on the open field you can use the bayonet charge to make it to the nearest piece of cover, and then recover safely. This recover time actually won't be needed if you actually pierce an enemy with the blade, though. All kinds of infantry will be killed with a bayonet through the chest, and that includes the Elite classes.

Get to know the different weapon variants

In terms of weapon attachments, Battlefield 1 is a little more basic than its closest predecessors. Rather than being able to choose between five different silencers, three laser sights, different gun barrels and a plethora of indistinguishable attachments you'll get to choose to put a bayonet on your gun, choose between some optics and different skins. Here the weapon variety comes in the form of different gun models. You'll see the Factory, Storm and Trench variants of different guns early on.

Factory means that the gun in question weighs less and will recover faster from recoil and regain accuracy quicker while Storm simply has less aggressive recoil. Trench, on the other hand, means that the weapon is more accurate when fired from the hip, which - as the naming implies - comes quite in handy in the tight spaces of the trenches. Then there's other models like Extended, which gives you a larger magazine, and Experimental which makes an automatic weapon fire in three-round-bursts with higher accuracy. It's a little much to take in for the beginners, but there are detailed descriptions of all the gun models, as well as graphs that show statistics. The best way to find your favorite gun is by just trying them all out.

Flank the enemy

This may seem like common sense but according to our experience most players will take the straightest, fastest way to every given destination. Especially in modes like Rush of the new Operations, where one team attacks and one defends, this becomes a problem. When your team just runs straight ahead in a straight line to the objective they're trying to capture it'll be significantly easier for the defending team to pick them off and steadily drain your ticket bank (when an attacker dies the team loses one ticket - when all tickets are out the match is lost).

Don't be that guy - be smart and flank the enemy's position instead. Take the long way around and assault the enemy from the side, where their defence isn't as strong. One single squad that pulls this off can turn the tides of battle and when the enemy realises they've got you at their flanks they are forced to back off and deal with you - instantly making it easier for the rest of the team to charge the front. Think before you act (we can't stress this enough) and refrain from serving your head on a silver platter to your enemy.

Medics - revive your fallen brethren

Yet another point that may seem obvious to many of you, but it needs stressing - a team that is consistent in reviving their dead troops will have a much easier time winning than a team that doesn't. Besides the obvious advantage of medics being able to revive teammates so that they don't have to wait to respawn there's also the fact that you, in doing so, will regain a ticket for your team.

Having good medics on the attacker side in Rush, for instance, is vital as it means that you simply will have more time to blow up the telegraph posts needed to proceed into the next phase. And we've lost count of how many times we've cleared out a room of five or six enemies just to be shot in the back by a medic who then proceeds with reviving every single one of our victims - effectively resetting the progress we've just made.

Do you have any tips of your own that we've missed? Make your voice heard in the comment section!

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"You can spot elements of the best parts of almost every Battlefield title in there, and when it's at its best it feels better than ever."



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