Beginner's Guide

Introduction

Welcome to Fortress Forever! This little tutorial should give you an overview of the game and provide a link to a more detailed description of the abilities, tactics and features in FF.

Basic Gameplay Overview

In Fortress Forever, 2 teams (averaging 5-10 players on each team) compete to capture each others flag (and other gameplay types). Each player can choose his character class, out of nine possible classes. Each class has different speed, armor, health, weapons and abilities. If you die in fortress forever, you can respawn back into battle immediately - no waiting around like other games! In addition to using a primary weapon, players can simultaneously throw grenades. Each class has a different set of grenades with different abilities, and most classes have primary and secondary grenades. In Fortress Forever, maintaining speed is key for some attacking players. You can speed yourself up by 'Weapons Jumping', which means shooting the floor, and the explosion propels you forwards. Since Fortress Forever is not a realistic game, you take little damage from such explosions. Another key feature is that, if you jump as soon as you hit the floor, you will maintain some of your speed (if you are going fast from a weapons jump). The most powerful weapons jump is the concussion grenade, which medics and scouts both posess, and can send themselves flying high into the air with little damage. This, combined with the ability to turn in the air, makes moving around Fortress Forever fun in itself, even when there are no enemies to shoot.

Summary:

• 2 teams (usually), competing to capture each others flag (more on CTF and other gametypes)
• 9 Classes of player - each with strengths / weaknesses (e.g. Spy can turn invisible, Engineer can build sentry guns)
• Instant respawning - If you die, you can respawn instantly back inside your base. no loss of time getting back to the action
• Using grenades whilst firing (different from other FPS's)
• Weapons jumping, movement techniques (maintaining speed)

Basic Controls

By default Fortress Forever has basic controls which are similar to other Half-life / HL2 games where WASD moves you, control ducks, and space jumps. There are however a few extra controls that have been added to Fortress Forever:

• To talk: [Y] to everyone, [U]: Team-only chat, [k] Team Voice Chat.
• A few weapons have two modes of fire. [mouse1] Primary fire, [mouse2] secondary fire.
• Throwing grenades: [F] Frag Grenade (or caltrop for scout), [G] Special class grenades. Most characters have two types of grenades, which can be primed and thrown at any time. Depending on your setup you either hold down the button, then release to throw the grenade, or if you wish to free up your fingers for movement while the grenade is primed, using 'Toggle grenade' means one press to prime, press again to throw.
• Change class / team: [n] Change team, [b] Change class. Remember auto-select is your friend!
• Selecting weapons : [1] - [6]. The higher the number, the more powerful the weapon, in general. For example, the demoman's detpack is weapon [6] (kills everyone it hits in one shot), and his crowbar is on [1]. The most powerful weapon in the engineer's arsenal is the Sentry Gun, which is built by weapon slot [5].

Advanced Controls

• Throw the flag [C]
• Discard ammo [X]
• Call for medic [Z]
• Bring down console [~]

Note, while by default reloading is done manually, or when your gun runs out of it is possible to set the game to automatically reload for you constantly. Open up the console by pressing [~] and type "cl_autoreload 1".

Game Types

There are potentially an unlimited amount of game types in Fortress Forever, limited only by mappers imaginations. However, here are some of the main types that are available at this point:

• CTF - Capture the Flag - Your team must go into the enemy base, steal their flag, and bring it back to the capture point in your base. All while preventing the enemy team from doing the same with your flag. Different to other CTF games (e.g. quake 3), in Fortress Forever, you cannot return your flag by touching it. Rather, the flag returns on its own after 60 seconds of not being touched. - eg. ff_crossover
  • Security - Some maps may have additional security placed in the enemy base which needs to be turned off before you can access the flag. - eg. ff_shutdown2

• AD - Attack & Defend - The attackers must bring their flag to the capture point to advance through the map. The defending team tries to prevent the attackers from doing this until the time runs out. - eg. ff_dustbowl

• Push - Fight against the opposing team to bring the ball from the center of the map to the capture point inside of their base. - eg. ff_push

• RCTF - Reverse CTF - Bring the flag from your base to the capture point inside the enemy base, while keeping the enemy team from bringing their flag to the capture point in your base.

• ID - Invade and Defend - Invaders must capture each point sequentially, while the defenders try to stop them. Once the invaders capture all the points the map rests and the teams switch roles. - Eg. ff_cornfield

• Hunted - The bodyguards try to escort the civilian to the escape point, and the assassins try stop the civilian from getting there. - eg. ff_hunted

Full list here: http://beta.fortress-forever.com/wiki/Category:Game_Types

Quick guide to classes

Scout

Very fast, and very weak. TODO: Describe:

• concing
• radar

Sniper

Long range killer. TODO: Describe:

• Zooming, tagging, legshots

Soldier

Slow, massive firepower at short range. TODO: Describe:

• Nail grenades, rocket launcher

Demolitions Man (Demoman)

Lots of explosives, can lay traps in key areas. TODO: Describe:

• detpacks, pipe trap
• the MIRV

Medic

2nd Fastest class, strong arsenal of weapons, can heal friendly players. TODO: Describe:

• Healing people, infecting, concing (link to scouts section)

Heavy Weapons Guy

Slowest, most heavily armored class. Powerful chaingun best used at medium range. TODO: Describe:

• using the AC
• the MIRV (link to demo)

Pyro

Lights people on fire, spreads chaos. Also a fast class with his weapons jump. TODO: Describe:

• using flamethrower / IC / napalm gren

Spy

Sneaky, assassin class. Can turn invisible and hack into enemy sentry guns. TODO: Describe:

• Disguising
• cloaking
• sabotaging

Engineer

Can build sentry guns, ammo dispensers and repair teammates armor. TODO: Describe:

• building SG
• repairing, upgrading, filling with ammo (whacking with wrench basically)
• ammo dispenser
• Repairing armor
• using railgun and emp