Single player campaign is just a minor portion of ‘Battlefield Hardline’ experience – when it comes to veterans, multiplayer is the real deal. Going neck and neck against other human players, race to the highest rank, and earning new weapons and perks is true essence of Battlefield Hardline.
For more help on Battlefield Hardline, read our Operator Class Guide and Mechanic Class Guide.
Basics of Battlefield Hardline Multiplayer Tips
Battlefield Hardline is a tad different from its predecessors as it offers a handful of new things to learn – for both rookies and veterans.
Player Screen
Once you start a match, take a moment to absorb everything displayed on your screen – it will come in handy in future.
The top-right corner of the screen displays kill-feed, the lower-right corner shows player HP and ammunition, the very middle of the screen shows score, and lower-left of the screen displays mini-map.
It’s essential to familiarize yourself with everything and train yourself to always keep a close eye on each and everything.
Pre-Match Screen
Before a match start, you are presented with a Deployment Screen. Here you can choose your class, customize your loadout, and even choose your spawn location. You can spawn near a squad member, inside a squad vehicle, near capture points, or near a satellite phone.
It’s important to choose your spawn location wisely. It’s always a good choice to spawn near squad members who can back you up. The Deployment Screen also shows if some of your squad members are under enemy fire so you can spawn there and provide support.
Finally, there is a small waiting time between continuous spawns. Once you have decided where you want to spawn, click Deploy and you will appear in that location.
Movement
Movement in ‘Battlefield Hardline’ is pretty similar to other mainstream shooters. You can walk, sprint, crouch, prone, and jump to maneuver a multiplayer map. There are a few things to note when it comes to movement; you cannot shoot while sprinting, but you can do so while jumping.
Shooting while crouching or while in prone drastically improves accuracy, but reduces mobility. Like in any other shooter, the idea is to run less and aim more.
If you are ever caught sprinting, your enemy will have to better chance to kill you before you even ADS, though, firing from the hip may still save your skin.
Swimming
Aside from land movement, you can also swim in ‘Battlefield Hardline’. You can swim faster just like sprinting and swim underwater just as crouching, but none of this can save you from enemy bullets or explosives.
It’s generally better to avoid swimming as much as possible and seek cover on the ground. Lastly, you can access your handgun while swimming, but the shots will be highly inaccurate.
Furthermore, you cannot swim underwater for indefinite period of time.
Using Parachutes
You can also use parachutes to land on ground from a damaged aircraft or rooftop of a building. Unlike swimming, you can use your primary weapon while using a parachute, but your shots will be highly inaccurate.
It’s a good idea to throw some explosives on the ground before landing to clear your path off any enemies lurking nearby. In order to use a parachute, simply press jump button while still in the air.
Combat Fundamentals
Providing Support by Spotting
‘Battlefield Hardline’ is not all about running and shooting enemies. As soon as you see an enemy, press ‘spot’ button to mark that enemy for your teammates for 5 seconds – both human players and vehicles can be marked.
A target can be marked more than once and if a teammate manages to score a kill, you will receive +25 support points for marking the target. By spotting enemies, you can also provide support to friendly aircrafts and ensure their survival for longer durations of time.
However, do not attempt to overuse this feature, especially during close-quarter combat.
Melee Attacks and Non-Lethal Takedowns
In case your run out of ammo and explosives (which is very rare), you can always sneak behind an unaware enemy and score a melee kill – the same can also be done from front, though, it’s difficult.
You can also buy new melee weapons to add more variety to your melee takedowns.
One good advantage of using melee takedowns is interrogations. After incapacitating an enemy, you can interrogate him or her which leaves you vulnerable for a couple of seconds.
At the end of an interrogation, locations of all enemy players will appear on your and your teammates’ mini-map for a short duration of time.
Weapons
There is a host of weapons in ‘Battlefield Hardline’ to use. From Assault Rifles to Bolt-Action Sniper Rifles, following is everything you can acquire in the game:
- Assault Rifles – work well on medium range and are equipped by operator class
- Carbines – carried by operator class and work on both medium and close range
- SMGs – carried by mechanic class, these weapons work exceedingly well on close-quarter combat
- Shotguns – carried by enforcer class, these weapons are specifically designed for CQC
- Battle Rifles – carried by enforcer class, these weapons are like ARs but with more damage and range
- Bolt-Action Sniper Rifles – carried by professional class and offers amazing long-range coverage
- Semi-Auto Sniper Rifles – carried by professional class, these weapons provide both of ARs and Bolt-Action SRs
- Handguns – available to every class, these weapons range from semi-auto to fully-auto
- Grenade Launcher – carried by mechanic class, these launchers can be used to destroy enemy vehicles and break walls and doors to create new areas
- Explosives – available to every class, explosives can be used to control points, destroy vehicles, and to clear a path
Weapons Attachments
Each weapon in the game can be equipped with attachment which offers customization and uniqueness. The attachments must be purchased before you can use them:
- Optics – a range of optics which can be applied on weapons to gain better accuracy
- Accessory – these items vary from mount flashlights, extra magazines, to iron-sights (for weapons with built-in optics)
- Muzzle – these attachments allow you to suppress your weapon’s sound, muzzle break, or a heavy barrel
- Grip – these attachments make it easier for you to control recoil
- Camo – these are only there for customization purposes
Weapons Basics
Recoil, reloading, and aiming-down-sights should not be new to anyone with any experience with first-person shooters.
Recoil is highly unavoidable in ‘Battlefield Hardline’ but you can control it using different attachments. The worst of recoil is experienced during long-range engagements and with fully-auto rifles.
You can also control or even reduce recoil by firing while you are in prone state or crouched. Furthermore, you can also reduce recoil by firing in short bursts.
Aiming-down-sights increase your accuracy, but takes a while. It’s important to ADS while engaging a target on medium-to-long range, but on CQC; it’s better to stick with hip-fire instead of ADS.
As for reloading, try and do away with the habit of reloading after every kill. The process takes some time and leaves you vulnerable, therefore; always find some cover when reloading. Always remember that handguns also kill in this game and it’s quicker to swap in your sidearm than reloading a primary weapon.
Progression System and Rewards
Rewards and Character Progression
Everything you do in multiplayer modes earns you cash – cash is Battlefield Hardline’s idea of XP. You can spend cash to buy new weapons, attachments, gadgets, and more. You can see how much cash you earned on ‘End of Round Details’ screen.
In addition to this, there are other rewards which are shared below:
- Rank – these are unlocked by playing the game
- Coins – these are received after completing certain in-game challenges such as ‘scoring x number of headshots’
- Bounties – these are received after you have acquired certain number of Coins
- Assignments – these are similar to Coins/Bounties and award you with new weapons or patches
- Patches – similar to Dogtags, these are for customization purposes only
- Service Stars – there are Bronze, Silver, and Gold stars and help you level up fast
- Battlepacks – these can be bought and are randomly awarded packs which offers various rewards
Reputation Perks and Boosts
Each class in ‘Battlefield Hardline’ has four reputation levels, each contains two perks per level. While you are in a match, the more reputation points you score, the more reputation level you unlock.
There are perks such as Extra Magazines and Fast Climb which can turn the tides during a match. Boosts, on the other hand, are unlocked from Battlepacks and can be equipped before the start of a multiplayer match.
Each Boost only stays for 30 minutes and offers increased XP. There are a total of 7 Boosts in ‘Battlefield Hardline’ and all are provided below:
- Quick Draw – boost score from a kill modifier by 25%, 50%, or 100%
- Assistant – boost score from any assist by 25%, 50%, or 100%
- Gearhead – boost score from vehicular activities by 25%, 50%, or 100%
- Elimination – boost score from a kill by 25%, 50%, or 100%
- Objective – boost score from objectives by 25%, 50%, or 100%
- Reputation – speed up the Reputation Perks earning process by 25%, 50%, or 100%
- Teamplay – boost score from teamplay actions by 25%, 50%, or 100%
General Multiplayer Tactics
I cannot put enough emphasis on the importance of playing the objective. Unless you are going ham with your primary weapon – scoring at least 20-40 kills with respectable K/D ration – you should always consider playing the objective.
It’s also important to see where your teammates and enemies are spawning and then plan things accordingly. Playing the objective is important, but you should not be giving away free kills to your enemies during the process.
The importance of cover in ‘Battlefield Hardline’ is highly undermined. Cover is the fine line between life and death and you should always choose to stay alive as much as possible.
While traversing through the map, you will come across multiple positions to use as cover – such as mounds, rocks, walls, trees, and more. While taking cover, it’s important to realize that not every cover position can save you from bullets or explosives as they can easily penetrate through some objects.
If you wish to be a better Battlefield player, you need to train your mind so as to process whatever is happening on the game, enemies’ position, cover locations, and objectives at hand – all at the same time!
Once again, always stay behind the cover and only leave it while leaving for another cover. Like I have mentioned earlier, run less and aim more and you should be fine! Lastly, stick to the outer skirts of the map and never jump right into an engagement.
Levolution is nothing new any Battlefield player. Levolution is basically a term used to explain dynamic events – both small and large – which change the layout of a multiplayer map, forcing players to change their strategy.
Small events include opening/closing of doors and elevators, whereas; large events include a large storm, sandstorm, destruction of a buildings and things like that.
A good player always takes these game-changing mechanics in mind and use them to his or her advantage. For more information on these events and how to trigger them, check our Battlefield Hardline Levolution Guide.
Lastly, always know when to ADS and when to stick to hip-fire. Do not sprint unless it’s absolutely necessary and keep you gun up most of the times. Never over-reload and swap to your side-arm whenever you are required to reload during one-on-one engagements.
Multiplayer Game Modes
There are a total of 7 game modes in ‘Battlefield Hardline’ out of which Heist, Blood Money, Hotwire, Crosshair, and Rescue are completely new. In this section, I am not going to provide an introduction of each game mode, but share a few handy tips that might help you in any way:
Heist
During this gamemode, always use zipline for a quick escape to the extraction zone. Most of the Heist multiplayer maps have more than one entrance and exit points so make sure to keep your enemies guessing as you escape with the loot.
As soon as a criminal drops a bag, a timer is kicked off – have a chunk of your squad near the bag and do not let any criminal near it to see it safely back to the vault. Always deploy a satellite phone near the very center of the map to keep your enemies pinned down.
Blood Money
Never, I say never leave your vault unguarded in Blood Money as enemies can grab most of the loot with a single raid. Communicate with your teammates and never stay alone, especially during attacking enemy vaults.
Furthermore, it’s always better to run away with vehicles than on foot.
Hotwire
Remember that you can deploy inside a controlled Hotwire vehicle and protect the vehicle. Always communicate with your teammates and hacker to know enemies’ location so as to escape an ambush – saving your skin and the objecive.
Always rely on Grenade Launchers and other explosives to destroy an enemy-controlled Hotwire vehicle. Aside from killing, always make sure to capture Hotwire vehicles.
Conquest
If you see that an enemy team has already controlled a point, never try and control it unless you are backed up by some teammates. Always make sure to choose your spawning location carefully – you may not know, but spawning costs your team one ticket. It’s also important to keep your team well-equipped and healthy at all costs.
Crosshair
Never leave the VIP alone and always have one police officer assigned to him or her. While extracting the VIP, make sure to cause distractions to keep enemies away from the VIP as much as possible.
From criminal’s perspective, never give away your position to police officers and always keep an eye out on the VIP. Never rush in blindly and get the VIP killed – the VIP is to key to success in Crosshair.
Rescue
Specifically for Rescue, always make sure to strike as a team, but never bunch up – by doing this, you will giving your enemies the chance to wipe out the entire team in one go. You only have three minutes in a round so make sure to keep every second count.
Always pay close attention to how many enemy players remain on the battleground to aid you in making crucial decisions. Finally, always remember that you only need to one hostage to win the mode so pick the one who is easiest to extract.
Share your own tips and strategies with us in the Comments Section below.
