Duel Guide for Beginners

Originally posted by ThAtSmAtT

I.  Setting up
    In this first section I'll talk about which settings you need to change and which ones are just preference.  If there's a setting that I don't mention, then just a**ume that it should be left default.

INPUT

    Sensitivity - Obviously this is just a matter of preference.  I use 13 when I'm playing 1v1 and 15 during team games.

    Turn Acceleration - This option doesn't really affect the "acceleration", it's just the  sensitivity of the X axis.  In most console shooters, the X axis moves faster than the Y axis, so if you're comfortable with Halo or Call of Duty or something like that, you should set this anywhere from 8 to 10.  I use 10.

    Look Centering (walking) - Turn this off

    Buttons - *press triangle to bring up the button mapping. 

    Jumping - The general consensus is that jumping by pressing the left thumbstick is the best way to jump.  I've tried setting jump to L1 and I think it's better to have it on the Left Stick.  Of course, this could just be a matter of preference but I think Left Stick is the way to go.

    Weapon Picker - In the console version of UT3 there's a nifty little feature that allows you to quickly switch between all 9 weapons without cycling through.  Basically you hold down a certain button and it brings up a menu that lets you flick the right stick in the direction of whichever weapon you want.  Theoretically this should be better than pressing a button to cycle through the whole list, but the only problem with weapon picker is that you lose control of your character temporarily;  Meaning, you cant turn or look around while you're picking a weapon.  When I first started playing I used weapon picker, then I switched to button cycling, then I switched again to weapon picker.  After all that, I concluded that cycling is the best way to go.  Right now I'm doing a hybrid of both where I set L1 and R1 to cycle and triangle to weapon picker.  That way if I really need to use weapon picker I can bring my right index finger down to triangle (aka Clawing) and pick my weapon that way.

My current button scheme:
L1 - Previous Weapon
L2 - Alt-Fire
L3 - Jump
R1 - Next Weapon
R2 - Fire
R3 - Best Weapon
Triangle - Weapon Picker
Square - Use/Hoverboard
Circle - Toggle Melee

WEAPONS

    Crosshair Type - You can change the cursor to "Simple" if you want to, this will give you a generic cross for a cursor, some people think that using "Simple" is better but I think this option is just preference.  I use simple crosshairs.

    Weapon switch on pickup - Turn this off

    Weapon hand - Turn this to "Hidden". This option will hide the weapon models from the screen so you can have a better field of view.

    Weapon Priority - * press triangle to bring up the weapon priority list
When you're playing a game and you have multiple weapons on hand, you can press the "Best Weapon" button and it will switch strait to whatever weapon you have that is highest on this list.  This might be a matter of preference, but I think the Shock Rifle should be first because it fires the quickest off the draw.  Then from there, I would put all the long range weapons next because there will be times when your opponent will run away and you need to bring out a long range weapon so you can hopefully hit them with at least one shot before they get away. I have mine set up like this  :

Shock Rifle
Sniper Rile
Minigun
Link gun
Flak Cannon
Rocket Launcher
Bio Rifle
Enforcer
Redeemer
Longbow Avril

    HUD - Turn on "Show Clock" and turn everything else off.

    VIDEO - Turn "Brightness" all the way up so you can see better when there's dark corners on a map, and use "Intense" Processing so you can see your opponent(s) more clearly.

    AUDIO - You definitely want to turn off "Voice Volume" and "Ambiance Volume".  I would also turn off "Announcer Volume" and enable "Mute Voice".   

    PLAYER - Turn "Allow Custom Characters" to "No"

II.  Miscellaneous Info
    Just a bunch of random info you need to know before you start playing online.

Unwritten Rules
    No U-Damage or Redeemer when playing Duel.  U-Damage is the little purple powerup that  makes a loud buzzing sound when you get near it.  Redeemer is a nuclear missile launcher  that may be hard to identify if you're new to the game.  Don't worry about it if you  accidentally pick one of these up and someone gets mad at you.  Those people probably have  anger issues that need to be resolved.  I just think it's funny when people pick them up and  most people wont get mad.  Now, when you start to get better at dueling and you're playing  serious matches then obviously you shouldn't pick them up, for the sake of a good game.   NOTE- During team games, you can pick up whatever you want.

Glitches
    The only glitch that's really do-able in an actual game is the taunt glitch.  Basically,  you just spam the taunt feature, and every once in a while your opponent's audio will cut out, enabling you to move around freely without them hearing you for a few seconds, then their audio turns back on.  The majority of the community thinks that this is cheap so nobody does it.  I personally don't think it's cheap but the only reason I don't do it is because it's ridiculously hard to do, and it's totally random, so you could spend the whole match spamming taunt and never see the glitch.  So to me it's just not worth it.

Best Maps
    Duel - Deck, Shangri-La, and Sentinel.  You can also use Diesel and Heatray, but they're  slightly unbalanced.
    Custom Duel Maps - see this thread

Match Settings
    Change "Time Limit" to "10 Minutes" and leave everything else on default.  If you want to, you can put the "Kill Limit" to 10, that way if a really good player is demolishing a bad player, you won't have to wait the whole ten minutes until the next match.

Item Spawn Times
    Shield Belt - 60 seconds
    Jump Boots - 30 seconds
    Body Armor - 30 seconds
    Helmet - 30 seconds
    Health Vials - 30 seconds
    Health Bubbles - 30 seconds
    All weapons/ammo - 30 seconds 

Section II will be coming soon.  In it I will talk about how to train yourself to move around quickly and learn which weapons to use in which situations.  As well as other things that will help you become a decent player.


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