Guide:- Battlefield Bad Company 2 Multiplayer

Tomorrow sees the release of the Ultimate Collection of Battlefield Bad Company 2, a new retail package that comes with all of the downloadable content and a download code for Battlefield 1943. As you can imagine this may lead to an influx of new players, so we here at The Newb Review thought it was time for our resident Battlefield Bad Company 2 Expert, Steve Garrett, to share his sagely advice.

For God’s sake.  If you’re in a squad, play to the squads objectives.  If you want to play “lone wolf”, don’t join a freakin’ squad.

The end.

By Steve Garrett: age 35

Ok, so maybe that’s not a substantial enough look at the intricacies of Dice’s amazing first-person shooter, but it’s an accurate way to sum up some of my multiplayer frustrations with this title. If you want to, you can run and gun your way through this game forgetting every objective, forsaking every team mate in pursuit of the mighty Kill: Death ratio. Do that and you’ll be ignoring a MASSIVE element of the game.  It’s akin to picking up the latest FIFA title and spending the whole game just passing the ball around your defenders; playing for a nil-nil draw. Sure, it’s part of the game but it’s a lesser experience. With that in mind the following paragraphs will cover what I believe is the most rewarding way to play the game (all controls are for the PS3).

Squad Play

Playing as a squad will help you progress

Battlefield Bad Company 2 is designed to be played as a squad-based shooter typified by (if nothing else) the fact that whenever you die, you can re-spawn on any of your squad-mates. As I said in the intro, you can play on your own if you want to but if you do chose to play as a squad you will score far more points during your average game. A medic who revives a fallen team mate scores 50 points whereas if you revive a squad-mate you score 80. This works for all types of tactical co-operation: re-supplying, repairing, healing, spotting will all yield significant point bonuses and what do points make? PRIZEZZZZZZZZ! The quicker you collect the points, the sooner you’ll have access to the awesome arsenal of the latter levels.

As well as generally playing with your squad, don’t forget to issue squad objective orders. Simply aim your reticule at a Rush or Conquest objective, hit the select button and you’ll have issued an instruction to your squad-mates to attack or defend that objective. Sure, you can do this over voice-chat but using this in-game mechanic is another way to score bonus points. Anytime you heal or re-supply a squad-mate near the designated squad objective, you score additional 10 point bonuses. One of my favourite plays as a medic is to gather the squad together, set a defend order on an M-Com station in Rush mode, drop a Medi-Kit around the objective and watch the points roll in as our squad starts to take fire. You can very easily amass 300+ points in just a few seconds using this technique (especially if you have the improved Medi-Kit specialization).

In short, squad play will help you progress through the game a lot quicker than if you run around like Rambo. However you decide to play, you need to first work out what character class is the one for you. Here’s a brief run-down of the kits on offer and some general gameplay advice for each.

Character Classes

Assault

Assault at the pointy end of the action

The grunt, the foot soldier, the man at the sharp end; however you want to describe him, the Assault class is an essential member of any squad, on any map, in any game-mode. Carrying an assault rifle, ammo box and 40mm under-barrel weapon, this guy can lead from the front. As you progress through the points, you will unlock weapons with various levels of accuracy, damage and fire rate. You will also access various specializations to further enhance your weapon. Red Dot or 4 x Sight, Marksman Training for greater accuracy are just a couple of the options available. The 40mm under-barrel weapon is also interchangeable as you can switch between smoke-grenades, shot-gun rounds or a grenade launcher once a sufficient point level has been reached.

My load-out of choice is to use the AN-94 Abakan rifle which has high accuracy and damage, along with the 40mm grenade launcher, 4 x Sight and Magnum Ammo for even greater accuracy. This lets me take out the enemy from near-sniper range whilst still maintaining strong close-quarter combat – you can shoot people in their face-hole if you’re the other side of the map, or straight up in their grill.

The AN94 is a great all-round weapon

When playing as the Assault class make sure to drop ammo crates whenever you can (remembering that every time you drop a new one, the old one magically disappears). If you spawn in on a Recon class playing as a Sniper, drop one for him immediately and run off to engage the enemy all the time making comments about your colleague not wanting to get his hands dirty and not have the balls to get in a REAL fight. The Sniper will run through ammo quite quickly and if they’re staying on the periphery of the warzone, they’re not going to be able to pick up any spare ammo. You should also stay close to your Engineers as they will run dry even quicker than the Sniper. You want their rocket launcher ready to go should the enemy roll in with an armoured vehicle – harsh words and insults will not scratch that armour. Medics carry a massive amount of ammo so don’t worry about them and other Assault classes can take care of themselves.

Don’t forget about your grenade launcher. It won’t do any real damage to tanks (unless you shoot them in the arse) but it’s fantastic for breaking down the environment or taking out lightly armoured vehicles.

If the enemy are taking cover behind a wall keeping you suppressed, just blow the crap out of the wall with your grenade launcher and you’ll probably take them out at the same time. If you’re playing on a map full of Snipers, then try using the smoke grenade option to help cover you and your squad from long range assassination. The Assault class is the one to go for if you like getting your hands dirty and requires less thought or strategy to get the most out of him.

Medic

The medic should hang back a little

The Medic carries a light machinegun with a huge clip capacity – 100 rounds - which is balanced against the painfully slow reload that most of their weapons have. When you hit reload you could in theory drop the controller, walk to the fridge and crack open a bottle of Corona, realise you’ve got no lime so jump in the car, zip over to Tesco Express, get a lime, head home, cut off a slice and jam it in the bottle, getting a squirt of the juice in the eye, run around the kitchen crying like a baby until your wife comes along and helps you rinse out your eye, compose yourself, grab your beer, return to the game, pick up your controller and wait another five seconds before the reload animation finishes.

Along with your LMG you carry Medi-Kits and Defibrillator units. The Medi-Kits can be enhanced through Specialisations unlocked as you work your way through the levels, improving the speed at which they heal players and the effective range of the kits (obviously not NHS issue then).

Medic is my favourite class to play and my load out varies depending on the maps or game format. I normally stick with the M60 as it had high range, power and accuracy, although it lacks mobility, although on some maps with a large number of close quarter battles (White Pass, Melson Bay etc) I will switch to a shotgun – more often the SPAS-12 Combat Shotgun for strong defensive play. If playing as the defending team in Rush, I will usually go for the Medi-Kit improved range and Medi-Kit improved heal as my specialisations which help keep my team-mates alive as long as possible whilst defending an M-Com station. If playing as the attacking team I will switch out the Medi-Kit upgrades in favour of improved range via the 4 x Sight perk and either Body Armour or Magnum Ammo. As an attacking force your squad mates won’t stay in one place for as long so the Medi-Kits lose their effectiveness. Instead the medic can provide supporting fire whilst maintaining a safe distance thanks to the improved weapon characteristics.

The M60 always gets the job done for me

The Medic is arguably the best points scoring class in the game. If you want to progress through the early levels as quickly as you can, then you should probably choose the Medic to specialise with at first as the points you can accumulate through reviving and healing squad or team-mates are substantial. You could very easily finish a round as the top-scoring player without ever having fired a shot but that is where some people have a problem playing with this class. If you play as a Medic you have to get your brain-box around the fact that you are a support player, not the spear-head of an assault. You want to hang back a little, providing Medi-Kits to the frontline troops and reviving fallen comrades – you know, the ones who aren’t good enough at the game to stay alive for more than five seconds. You definitely should not play this class if you’re worried about your Kill: Death ratio though as we may mock the brainless, meat-sack Assault types for constantly dying but as a medic, you’ll probably end up K.I.A more often than you will register a kill.

Recon

Sneaky, sneaky Sniper

The Recon, or Sniper is quite possibly the best class to go for if all you’re worried about is your Kill: Death ratio. With your trusty Sniper rifle you will be able to pick out a nice quiet spot on the map, well away from all the scary stuff and give a slew of people some nice, free, brain ventilation. If you like to play on the edge of the map picking off people from huge distances you’ll probably want to take the mortar strike as your gadget.  The line of sight system lets you tag a target and call the rain and watch the thunderous artillery rip your target apart. A few good mortar strikes will demolish most buildings from a safe distance but you can take out a tank with just one well placed strike. If you like to get up close and personal, hiding in plain sight to take out your unsuspecting prey you might want to opt for the C4 gadget instead of the Mortar. Drop a couple of stick C4 charges on a target, retreat to a safe distance and then detonate. Boom!

Optimizing the Recon class to the map you’re playing on is an essential skill. Not every map is perfect for sitting back picking off people from a distance so I vary my choices depending on where the current round is set. If I’m on a nice, open map I will take the M95 Sniper Rifle with the 12 x sight and Improved Demolitions combined with the Mortar Strike. If it’s a tighter, smaller map I will use either the VSS Snaiperskaya Special or the SPAS-12 Combat Shotgun with C4 Charges and Improved Demolitions. The VSS almost acts as a SMG type weapon with automatic fire but will run through ammo very quickly just like an SMG.

The M95 will score devastating head-shots from extreme range

The Recon is the class which requires the most variation in play style. Some maps just don’t support long-range sniping. Melson Bay on Rush is a typical example. Set in the middle of a forest, there are too few clear lines of sight to effectively snipe. Because of this most experienced players know exactly where a sniper is likely to be and will ambush you if you’re not careful. The Motion Sensor mines are a very important part of your kit and you should use them wisely. You can set them around your perch to alert you if someone is being a sneaky bastard; trying to creep up and knife you when your sights are trained on the distant enemy. This sort of selfish play doesn’t contribute a lot to your teams overall effectiveness though, so your mines are far more effectively deployed at key points on the map. When defending an M-Com station, set them around the target to alert your team-mates to nearby insurgents. Remember, you get points if someone kills and enemy that your Proximity Mine spotted (you get bonus points if a squad-member bags the body).

C4 is a hugely effective weapon that can be used in a variety ways. You can lob it like a grenade (although you might get injured in the residual blast) to take out a group of bunched up enemies. You can place several charges on a Quad bike, ride it at high-speed at an enemy target, jump off and detonate the charges as the vehicle steams into the unsuspecting chumps. One very sneaky tactic – an exploit of sorts is to work with a squad mate who jumps on the UAV controls. You load up the UAV with C4, your squad-mate flies it into an enemy target and gives you the nod at which point you detonate the charges. If you’re in any mode except hardcore, this will leave the UAV unharmed thanks to the no friendly-fire rule. If you can get the UAV back to base, you can reload it with more charges and repeat the process until the enemy shoot it down (*). Another clever ploy when attacking in Rush mode is to quickly surround the target station with C4 while a squad-mate arms the M-Com charge. Then run off to a safe distance and wait for the enemy to frantically try to disarm the charge – BOOM! Watch the bodies fly. I like C4.

Engineer

Engineers make things go boom

The final character class in the game can often be the most important – the Engineer. This class is the most reliable way to take down enemy armour – you never want to face a tank without one of these guys by your side. Armed with an SMG and either a Rocket Launcher of some description or an Anti-Tank mine, these guys can turn the tide of a battle in a map populated with vehicles. A repair tool is also part of the kit and the Engineer uses this to keep your own heavy metal on the road and blowing the crap out of the enemy. Be careful what you shoot at though as the SMG’s are the most ammo hungry guns in the game, you will run short of rounds very quickly if you want to get into a front line fire-fight with enemy soldiers.

I prefer to wield UMP-45 SMG when running as an Engineer. Although some have
slightly different characteristics, most of the SMG’s are pretty similar. On very open maps I will use one of the rocket launchers as my secondary weapon as you can hit targets from long range and don’t have to risk venturing out into the open. This also applies on maps with little or no armour. On the tighter maps with narrow roads and plenty of cover I switch to the anti tank mines which are more effective and efficient and neutralising heavy tanks. You can place a mine, run off and five minutes later see the Vehicle Destruction points click up on your screen as some unsuspecting boy racer trundles over a long forgotten mine. I often opt for the extra ammo perk as running empty after a couple of minutes in the heat of battle is not uncommon. I also like to utilize the extra explosive damage specialization to maximize the efficiency of my explosive ordinance. Using one mine to take out a tank is far better than having to use a pair right?

Spray and pray with the UMP

Engineer seems to be a very popular class as nearly every map has a fleet of armoured vehicles at various points throughout the stage. The engineer’s role is most effective when played as a supporting class. Either take control of a vehicle yourself or hitch a ride as a gunner. When your vehicle starts to take a worrying level of damage then hop out, position yourself so the tank is between you and the attacking force, then whip out your repair tool and keep the vehicle on the road. The repair tool is best used in a sort of “burst fire” mode otherwise it will quickly overheat and you face a period of time where the tool has to cool down. In a rather unsporting move the attacking force won’t wait for you to be ready to resume your mechanical duties and will continue to cane your vehicle with everything they’ve got. If you’ve run out of your favourite brand of explosives then you can use the repair tool as a potent destructive weapon against enemy vehicles – just watch your back as the tell-tale metallic screech that accompanies this form of attack will alert the vehicle’s crew to what you’re doing and if they’re quick enough they will stab you in the back of the neck before you manage to escape with their alloys.

When trying to take out heavy armour with your rocket launcher of choice, it’s important to always try and shoot them in the arse. The armour on the front and flanks can take several shots at close range before any real damage is done but a couple up the exhaust pipe is normally enough to destroy the vehicle. If you prefer the anti-tank mines then be smart with their deployment. Lay them on typical traffic routes but be sure to space them out. If you drop three mines in one spot they will all go off together when a vehicle triggers them, yet perhaps only one would be required to take the vehicle down. Spread them out and you’ll get a far healthier return on your landmine investment. The exact placement of the mine is important as well. If you lay them out in strong sunlight they will be very visible to those driving the vehicles. Instead place them in shadows, blast-craters or just over the brow of a hill. If you start taking fire, stop placing the mines. These babies can be triggered by an errant bullet and if one goes off as you’re placing it, the game thinks you’ve killed yourself and you’ll be deducted points. The movie-esque trigger by bullet can be useful offensively as well. Throw a couple of mines up against the foot of a building, retreat to a safe distance and explode them with your sidearm. Their explosive power is amazing and very useful for bringing down buildings in stunning style. The engineer is definitely the king of making things go bang.

General Play

The biggest piece of advice I will give is to try and not pigeon-hole yourself into just one class. Some character classes are simply not particularly effective on certain maps. Sure there are all-class weapons and specialisations that can help tweak your favourite character type to most maps but these won’t make a major contribution to your teams objectives. Whenever you re-spawn you get the option to change your class or load out. Use this opportunity to think about your performance and your team’s current situation. Ask not what you character can do for you but what your character can do for your team.
For example, in the first stage of an Africa Harbour Rush game the map is extremely biased toward armour, so engineers are strong selections. Also there a many long-range sniper hideouts for the attacking force to use to great effect. However as the game progresses to the second stage in the town, combat becomes less armour-centric and close quarter elements come into play. The Recon and Engineer are still valid but Assault and Medic become arguable more viable. This trend continues down this path through to the end of the map.

Consider what the rest of your team / squad are doing with their character selection. You might favour the recon class but a squad of four snipers is not really going to achieve a hell of a lot. Who is going to re-supply you with your ammo? Who is going to revive you? I can’t tell you how many times I’ve started a Rush game on Port Valdez as a defending recon class and instantly mortared the mountain top that overlooks the first stage. You almost always get 3 or 4 kills simply because too many people want to play as a sniper from that strong position overlooking the M-Com stations below. If they used their noggin a bit and thought ‘you know what, we only need a couple of guys up here keeping the defenders suppressed’, it would be a much tougher proposition defending that first stage.

My final general word of advice – don’t jump in a vehicle and tear off on your own. Most have several seats in. Wait a few seconds to see if anyone needs a lift or you’ll find that you rush into the heart of battle and get quickly overwhelmed because guess what, the defenders aren’t being glory hound dicks. Patience is a virtue my fellow virtual warriors. This game is something special when played with thought and consideration rather than a mindless run-and-gun approach. If you like the idea of playing that way, feel free to send me a message (kamiza989 on PSN) to meet up for a game. If you want to play the other way, lets set the game to hardcore mode so I can slice your Achilles tendons off when I get super-frustrated with you.

(* Credit for that goes to Hendrix and Bloodshot Robot over at www.shfts.com for that one)

Tags: Assault, Battlefield Bad Company 2, DICE, EA, First Person Shooter, FPS, Guide, kamiza, multiplayer, Recon, strategy, tactics, Tips, Weapons

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