Member
Ok, I'm going to pump out these tips as if you are and absolutely fresh level one to the game. You may already know this, if so I'm sorry. Hopefully you can get something out of it.
This isn't your typical multiplayer game where you can get nil deaths and 10 gazillion kills. You're gonna die. A lot. A lot. You're gonna die.
A lot
First of all, if you are doing so, do not run. You may want to after the awesome freerunning that the single player has taught you, but trust me. You'll get less points (approach meter) and you can easily be seen by both your target and pursuer.
Once you have that nailed down, try to look like an npc. There is safety in the crowds, try not to walk right out in the open on your own, with no crowd groups around. Walk naturally and smoothly, do not make sudden or jerky movements.
Next, you should be looking at kill bonuses. If you haven't done so already, watch loomer's video. Pretty much everything in there can be translated to AC3 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNfHBThDeTM This should help you get more points.
Finally, listen out for whispers. If you hear whispers, you should constantly be looking around for anything that doesn't look like an NPC. If you see personas that you know aren't NPCs (this applies to death match) then chances are they're your pursuer. If they're taking paths that NPC's don't take, then chances are, they're your pursuer. Generally, just try to use common sense for this one. As for actually stunning your pursuers, knifes work a lot of the time. You can chance running behind an object where your pursuer can't see you, then ambush them as they turn the corner, though this is risky.
Hope that helps.
Member
Deathmatch and Simple Deathmatch are the most basic and simple modes, but if you want to learn game mechanics play Wanted or Manhunt. Be aware the any time you press the RT and your pursuer is in line of sight, he will immediately be notified who you are by the game. Listen for whispers. Eventually they become unnecessary with a lot of experience but for now they should be quite useful. If you're playing Wanted, follow the compass and NEVER run while it's lit up bright blue. Any time it's a dull blue you can run until it lights up. In Deathmatch you have to find your target by figuring out when he's in your line of sight. The border of the portrait will light up just like a compass. At this stage most of your points will be determined by the horizontal approach bar under the target portrait. The higher that bar is filled, the more points you'll get for a kill. Running makes it go down. You need to always be watching for things like blend groups and walking into them to get a hidden bonus on your kill if your target doesn't clearly know who you are.
Locking is something you want to learn now in Deathmatch or Wanted before you consider playing Assassinate which is the most complex mode by far. And if you're in Deathmatch, you're probably going to score higher the LESS you run. It's a slow mode.
As for character customization, that should come AFTER buying all of the abilities, perks or streaks that you want. Customization provides no advantages, the only mechanical change to the game at all is a tiny one involving stun animations.
Good abilities for Free For All:
Throwing Knives - Y slot ability, most powerful and borderline broken ability in the game. Smoke bomb is great but the cooldown is enormous. If you tap the Y button to throw knives at your target or pursuer, he will be locked in place for between two and three seconds. During that time his kill and stun range is reduced. Hence, if you knife a target or pursuer and then stun or kill them from maximum range, you will get either a stun or an uncontested kill, until they start moving. Even after they start moving you can run away because they are drastically slowed for another five seconds.
Smoke Bomb - Best non-ranged ability in the game, costs a lot and you can't get it till level 20 or whatever. Unlike in Revelations you can not just camp or rely on smoke bomb to play the game for you. In Revelations it did everything it does in this game with a cooldown time of about half and it ruined the game. Since its cooldown is so high the way to use it in AC3 is to only use it when you absolutely have to, or when it'd be worth it. I'll give you an example. Let's say your target throws a knife at you and starts moving in to stun you. It is NOT worth dropping it to protect yourself from a stun unless you have an incognito and you're in a hidden group. If you drop your smoke to earn yourself a 150 point kill you'll be punished in the next 100 seconds.
Poison - Smaller range than a kill, long cooldown, kill is delayed after usage and the target can be killed by someone else. However when you use it there is no kill animation time, meaning you can immediately kill someone else (won't matter in Wanted or Deathmatch) and it will provide you a base 200 extra points, which you can make 300 if you like. If you combine a hidden incognito with a poison you may be looking at 1000 point kills and variety bonuses.
Disguise - Only useful as a defensive ability in free for all modes, because your target does not know what you look like anyway. It's used to surprise your pursuer but it's important that when it's active you walk around calmly and act like a civilian. If you run or climb the disguise is utterly pointless.
Decoy - Not a very powerful ability but can fool your pursuer if you're in a blend group. More useful for fun. Bodyguard is similar.
There are other good abilities but their usage is more advanced. Don't ever bother with the gun. It is only useful in modes where points don't matter which are Domination and Artifact Assault. All the gun will do is make your targets angry and it will probably make you lose because you don't have knives.
Poison Dart is even worse than gun. Disruption has its uses.
I'm sure other people will talk about abilities and perks more.
Senior Member
Hey Iceman, most your points have been covered but let me tell you how I got into AC MP. Like many on here I've been playing the multiplayer since AC Brotherhood, I jumped into my first match, the match being Wanted, and had no clue what was going on. I didn't know how to read the compass, spot pursuers or even know how to stun them so I stopped playing Wanted and moved on to Manhunt. I found that manhunt helped me a lot with the mechanics of the game because there are two rounds, one round you are a hunting people down (ie a pursuer) and must kill your targets but you have nobody pursuing you so this round helped me get use to using the compass to spot my targets as there was no added pressure of being hunted down myself. Then the other round you had to 'hide and survive' from your pursuers the entire round, this helped me spot human and NPC behaviour but also making use of whispers to spot pursuers. Once I got used to everything in the game I tried Wanted again and absolutely loved it, still play Wanted now!
AC3 has Manhunt but also has Deathmatch too which you are trying out, this mode was made with newcomers in mind to get used to the mechanics of the game and don't worry about getting more deaths than kills. The maps for Deathmatch are reduced in size so it is inevitable that you're going to die, even in Wanted where the maps are full sized I still tend to die more than I kill it's all about the quality of your kills at the end of the day.
Member
Member
I know a lot of ppl responded already, but dont worry about your kills to death, this isnt call of duty. The absolute main thing is to not make urself obvious and learn to lock. I play sometimes with something I call "passive aggression", ha. Ill go games in wanted without a single kill, only stuns and escapes and can win most of them, its all in how u play it. find what works for you, I could give you a 10 page essay, but i think u have enough to read.
Member
when i first started out, i shared my build with my friend and it really helped propel him to the higher point brackets along with me.
I feel like it helps out with understanding the mechanics and flow for deathmatch (we focused on deathmatch)
If you use smoke/poison/poison dart(knives)/blender/kill buffer/silent streak bonus (+250 or +550 up to you and what you think you can comfortably and consistently hit)/your pref for loss streak.
In ac3, i built two duplicate sets, and would start with poison dart, and try to poison dart my target right off the bat (this gives you the poison dart bonus, and you know no one will be able to intercept it) and then when i can switch to the one with knives. using knives on a pursuer and fast walking up to him while spamming stun will net you the stun. Be careful spamming stun/kill in any other situation besides that and in smoke clouds, your character makes a wrist flick animation everytime you press it not near anyone and it's a giveaway. Other than that, smoke acts as a defensive mechanism, but use it offensively as well. Especially when you see your target, in a crowd, you're his only pursuer, and poison is not on cooldown. Use poison whenever you can on targets where you're the only pursuer. By using smoke to get focus, you can easily get hidden, incog, focus, poison. Which totals up to 100, 300, 350, 150, 200 = 1000. If you get a savior bonus that's another 50 as well.
Remember your streak bonus always +1 whenever you get a silent kill or a stun, and -1 anytime you die, so always be on the lookout for pursuers and try to get kills only when you have silent. Even if the majority of your kills are silent, not hidden or focus, that'll help you gain more points as well. With blender you can either hang out in a moving crowd to catch your breath and get your bearings, or you can let it morph one npc in a standing crowd and try to act unassuming near the crowd, so you can move about and go for kills while hopefully getting lures. The game we (well him only now as i've changed my tactics a bit) played is one to try and get extreme variety. You keep a mental checklist in your head, the easiest are ground finish, poison dart, stun, reckless, discreet, and silent. Then if you do the smoke poison trick once, you can get hidden, incognito, focus, and poison. That's 10(greater variety) right there. If you get a lure, that's 11 (and I usually get at least one a game by being patient). The other two you can try for are acrobatic and aerial. The best way to get acrobatic is to climb up a wall after you've locked onto your target and press the kill button (follow them around, be sneaky, catch them near a wall obv). Those are 2 more to add to the 11, and then there's the chance you get savior, poacher, intercepted, grounded, or ambush (which is 5 more) (if you're good, you can get ambush on your own, ambush is only given when you kill/stun less than 2 seconds after entering their line of sight) . Out of the potential 18 bonuses, you only need 15 for extreme.
The extreme bonus has helped push me in first almost every other game (sometimes at the last second!)
The biggest key to being a pro in deathmatch are stuns, and I'm slowly realizing this. But with what I was doing above, by compensating for all the stuns with x3 silent kill streak bonuses, the greater and extreme variety bonuses (not a lot of people get greater). And the extra big point kills with focus and poison I was able to keep up with them, winning almost every match I play.
