Call of Duty: Black Ops features extensive multiplayer experience after you get out of the awesomeness of the most engaging singleplayer storyline. If you are new to Call of Duty franchise or an average FPS fan, you can read the following Call of Duty: Black Ops Multiplayer Strategy Guide to get your basics right.
Call of Duty: Black Ops Multiplayer Strategy
These are the basics that will improve your overall understanding of the game if you are new to Call of Duty: Black Ops Multiplayer. If you are a Call of Duty franchise follower, Skip to next section.
Tip #1. Train yourself. Put Training Ground to good use and try different weapons against AI bots and see which weapon suits you. You can use the maps, increase the AI difficulty and learn the weapon/perk combination, the advantages and disadvantages associated with each choice.
Tip #2. The game is new, but you will come across people with sick aims. These are guys you need to avoid right now but how ? get your ass in cover but don’t camp. Move from place to place, and always make sure you have something solid behind you so that you can focus upfront. Kill one, move to next spot and so on.
Tip #3. Communicate, if you are playing team based game like search and destroy, which requires tactical knowledge of the opponents every round. Share your thoughts, get feedback, listen to what your team says.
Just don’t be an individual in seek of kills – score, dying randomly off nades. In team based games, spawn points are very important especially in Search and Destroy, Only Rush if you have the top spawn. Otherwise, its best to wait for the nades, or change the route, cut them from the middle or flank them.
Tip #4. Keep trying different combinations as you are leveling up, try different guns, don’t stick to one gun, just because everyone else is using the same gun. It’s better to try every gun right now, and see what type of gameplay and gun suits you.
Tip #5. Patience is something you will learn as the time passes, but still, try to be patient. It’s always best to take a clear shot, if you know you can’t take a clear shot, just wait for the enemy to come in sight for the clear shot. The whole point of this fuss is that you don’t stupidly give your position away in an attempt to kill a running opponent.
Tip #6. Revenge is sweet, but don’t go mad at someone just because he fragged you once. Focus on the original game plan. There are probably half a dozen other guys you can frag, so why bother ?
Tip #6. Choose Killstreak Rewards wisely. If you know you won’t be able to get dozen kills, then don’t equip a reward that requires that many kills. You need a Killstreak Reward, doesn’t matter if its a lower level. Also as you are to do with guns, keep trying different Killstreaks and Rewards, and see what works best for you.
Tip #7. Take Cover. There are tons of things you can use to take cover, and hide behind. Learn how can you move from cover to cover. You can also take advantage of the spawn patterns but that would be too much for you at this stage of the game. Always get yourself behind hard cover, not something that is easily penetrable.
Tip #9. Take Cover, and Reload. Don’t Reload, while moving, you will die miserably and won’t even have a chance to react.
Tip #10. Use the Mini map. OH you knew that ? use it to your advantage. Red Dots on Mini-map are your enemies engaged in firefights. Now, that you know there location, why not finish them off. If you find a cluster of the enemies, try to flank and go for a safe route.
Tip #11. How you get fragged mostly ? ask this question to yourself and try not to. Try to keep your deaths below 10, it helps.
Playing Styles
There are several types of gameplay styles people have when it comes to FPS games. Run-and-Gun, the most famous and Camping, the most hated.
Run-and-Gun
Been doing that almost since my first First Person Shooter game. It involves constant search for opposing players and killing them, you keep moving all the time, hence Run-and-Gun. If you want to keep your deaths to minimum, this gameplay style isn’t for you. On a good day, you get the most kills, and on a bad day, the most deaths.
For those who like to rush, and attack, should opt for Run-and-Gun from the start, but keep in mind, it doesn’t mean you keep running all the time. You can really camp at opposite spawn if you happen to reach there early in the round. You can wreck havoc this way, just don’t be stupid and loose your advantageous position.
Initial Rush is the most important aspect in this gameplay style. Your focus should be on your initial burst, and reach the strategic spot of the map before the opposing attackers. Kill the opposing attackers and try to sneak into the opposite spawn, and then be patient and pick your opponents nice and easy.
Sniper
If you are Snipe, know the maps, know the spots, and be patient. Patience is important, you only got one shot and you need to pull it off accurately. Go for accuracy during your initial phase. During early phase, you may only be killing opposing Snipers, and Campers, but after sometime you will start picking up moving targets and may start attacking with sniper.
Stealth
Gameplay style I hate the most, they are silent, no footsteps noise, probably will use silencer to suppress the gun, and come close to campers. You need one Stealth guy in your team, it helps, these are the guys that pop out of anywhere, they move slow, sneak in behind enemy lines and you can’t even spot them, because of the holy Silencer. If this is your style of play, you know now, what you need to do.
Camping
As I said, the most hated gameplay style. Why is this the most hated gameplay style ? because these guys have the ability to pop out of the rather absurd spots. They can be found lying on the ground on a common alley, on stairs, and in the room corners.
They move less, but can make life miserable for everyone, even if they don’t kill you. If you are to camp, find the spot that gets most traffic, and blast every enemy that comes in your line of sight.
People will hate you though, but campers are more like defenders and in team-based matches, you need at least 2 defenders. By time, you will refine your camping skills, and learn to move, and everything will be fine. Campers learn the game fast by the way.
Mixed Style
Its your own unique approach to the game, that basically will be hybrid of the above gameplay styles.
Weapons
Choice of weapon is dependent upon your gameplay style, but you can go off the traditional route and do Run-and-Gun with Sniper. Oh Yeah! I have seen people doing it and they actually were pretty damn good at that.
Assault Rifles
Assault seems easy at start, but becomes the most tricky when it comes to team-based matches. They are the support guys, which provide support to attackers.
There are many assault rifles you can pick, semi-auto, automatic and with burst fire options. It all depends on your taste really, but as per the 10 tips above, keep changing the guns to find out the strength and weaknesses of these weapons.
Assault weapons are advantageous at long range but have disadvantage in close quarters, also the sprint is slow. So you probably reach the strategic spot slow or late as compared to SMG guys.
Remember to use the small bursts when you are to shoot at distance. You only need two to three bullets to kill and if you fire constantly, the large recoil of assault weapons will come in the way. If you fire in small bursts you can hopefully land two three bullets on the target and get the kill. That doesn’t mean you save bullets. Remember, bullets are free in videogames so you can waste few.
Submachine Guns
Light weapons with insane rate of fire. You can run pretty fast, and if you are to rush, take SMG. SMG’s are sick in close quarters due to their high hip-fire accuracy, and you can jump, do a 360 with ease, and can spray all around.
Your ability to shoot at distance is compromised though, so don’t try, you are only good in close range. You will need good reflexes, as sometimes you get dropped in the middle of the 4 – 5 opponents and your best survival is your ability to respond quickly.
You will learn this by time, but for a starter, learn to time your run, if you reach the strategic spot first, you will probably kill few easily.
SMG’s insane fire rate means you are in danger of getting out of ammo. Timing your reload, and not wasting ammo are among other things you need to work on.
Light Machine Guns
Large Magazine, lot of bullets to kill enemies and so you can keep firing constantly at enemy bases, and these guns have considerably deeper bullet penetration. Your enemies will find it hard to escape the mighty spray of these guns.The last thing, I would want is, that I come out of base, and get fragged by someone firing blindly at spawn points with Light Machine Gun.
You got the point right ? may be noob thing to do but works well somehow in Team Death Match. But, one of the miserable deaths are, dying while reloading and you are going to have lot of these deaths with Light Machine Gun.
Large mag, takes a while to reload. Shoot through walls, buildings, you have no one to stop you but Sniper.
Or may be while you are busy firing blindly someone out of anger comes and knifes your arse, that can also happen depending on how much you have pissed other players.
LMG’s can hold 200 rounds, so Sleight of Hand becomes necessity to balance the reload time. Heavy Gun, you will run slow, and you won’t be able to aim as quickly as you can do with other guns. Your Sprint time while carrying LMG is also reduced.
Sniper Rifles
Sniper are long range assassins, and you would be surprised to know there isn’t any map where you can’t one shot kill another player across the map using a sniper rifle and scope.
One shot kill means huge damage, anything above the abdominal area and its a kill. Accuracy is the core ingredient in Sniping, so be sure to take your time during initial phase to get a good grip of Sniping. After some time you would be shooting people in air and moving with ease.
The trick is to, let go the fear that you would miss, you are bound to miss few shots, but you will also take some very good shots. If you find someone running behind the wall, try to anticipate where he will be and shoot there before hand, try to shoot blindly in the path of the coming rushers.
Note the sniper positions, the usual ones, and shoot there blindly, someone may come there and become your prey.
Sniper is vulnerable in close quarters but this disadvantage can be minimized by practicing your hand gun, Pistol, or infamous Deagle.
Desert Eagle can be Sniper’s best friend when it comes to defending himself in close quarters, but one thing for sure; you are bound to die few times now and then by a coming attacker towards your base.
Best strategy can be to have someone defending you during the initial phase in a team based match. Just nade the areas to stop them for a brief time when you are to do your business then go behind solid cover.
Conclusion would be, if you have the patience to sit and wait you can make good use of the range, accuracy and power of these weapons. If you are a fan of Quick Scope Technique, you can watch this tutorial on how to pull that off.
Shotguns
Shotguns ? Well, they are powerful, close quarter kings. There aren’t accurate but with a single burst that covers a wide area, you don’t need accuracy in the close range.
There range is also limited, you may not be able to hit the enemies further then 10 feet away. Once shotgun rounds go too far, they just get stranded in air, the dispersion is too wide to hit the target. You can use Dual Wield, to dual wield some of these.
Requires a constant reload, longer reload as compared to most of the weapons. Shotguns are taken as fun only stuff, but the interesting part is you can use them to your advantage tactically in team-based matches.
Yes, like in Search and Destroy, you can defend the Bomb well with Shotgun, you can see off the upcoming rusher with Shotgun, as you run as fast as these guys. You should try these, and you would know the tactical importance of Shotgun.
Launchers
Poor accuracy, I have almost failed to hit anything long distance with these. But, you can get lucky if you fire these at spawn from mid range. Explosive damage is high, and you can get multiple kills with a single rocket fired.
Low ammo but you can use Scavenger Perk, to take get the ammo on the go, if you are to use them. Heavy weapon, so mobility is compromised.
Arguably one of the most hated guns, you will instantly be tagged “Noob Tuber” and get a whole lot of abuse. Its just the way it is, but you can’t take out the fun in using this weapon.
Attachments
Red Dot Sight
Red Laser Sight that makes it easier for you to aim. Red Dot Sight or the Reflex Sight both work the same way, use one that suits you. Advantage of having these over Iron Sight is that you can take the moving target with ease, but that itself is debatable.
Silencer
Suppresses your fire so that you don’t show up on enemy radar. Silencer is good for kills, you don’t get spotted and get your business going.
Its Camper’s biggest weapon and can be used tactically in team-based matches. How about rushing with an SMG with suppressed fire, getting on their spawn and finishing the whole team off while they are wondering where the hell are you.
Grenade Launcher
Allows you to shoot grenades over distance, Noob Tube. Get Scavenger perk, so that you don’t get out of ammo, and take ammo on the go.
Now, when you spawn, jump up and fire these at the opposite spawn, and let the abuse begin. Its use is similar to Launcher, low accuracy, and random hits, can take multiple targets in a single blast.
Reflex Sight
Similar to the Red Dot Sight.
ACOG Scope
Mid range scope, more accurate, if you want to Run-and-Gun with Sniper, use ACOG Scope. Using ACOG Scope also unlocks IR Scope.
IR Scope
You can view through smoke, heat signatures. You can locate a camper, or a sniper hiding behind a solid cover using this attachment.
Dual Wield
Let’s you dual wield SMG’s and secondary weapons. You can’t aim down sight, but will have to use long crosshair in the middle of the screen.
Each weapon is controlled by the corresponding trigger on your controller, left trigger to fire left weapon and right trigger to fire right weapon. Pretty inaccurate in long distance, your best shot lies within 10 feet.
Grip
If you add the Grip to your weapon, it reduces recoil. Grip on Shotgun is sick.
Extended Mags
More ammo for your weapons, good for SMG guys.
Rapid Fire
Rapid fire allows a higher fire rate. Use it with Scavenger Perk or Extra Magazines, or you are bound to run out of ammo. Increased fire rate also increases the recoil so it would be hard to control the gun, and be accurate.
Equipment, and Killstreaks
Frag Grenades
You can throw these grenades across the map if you can get your timing right. They bounce, and roll just like real grenades. You can use walls, and other hard surface to make them fall on the target.
You can hold a grenade for couple of seconds then throw it in front of the enemy nearby – Cooking the Grenade.
The idea is to get them exploded when they fall, giving the target no time to react or save himself. They can throw them back to you if they have enough time. You can avoid grenades by focusing on the sound as they fall.
Semtex or Stick Grenades
These things stick to anything they hit when thrown. It can be an opponent, wall, or any surface. You can try these on doors and camping spots.
Again, you can avoid these by focusing on the sound, beeping countdown before they explode. It requires accurate throw as they will just stick to everything they first encounter, so there is very low margin of error and you can’t cook them so your best shot is to you stick them on your opponents.
Tomahawk
You can throw these ballistic knives, one hit kill. You can pick them up again, and re-use. Again, not really accurate.
Tactical Insertion
Tactical insertion gets you respawn at your specified location. Good for camping and sniping as you won’t have to go back to the same spot running across the map.
You can only drop these on your exact location as soon as the flare is lit. Flare gives an indication of your position to your opponents though, they can either destroy the flare or kill you then wait for another easy kill as you respawn there.
Claymore
Plant these at strategic spots, and make sure your opponent don’t get to see before it gets activated. Used by Snipers normally, for an indication of someone coming their way, as a protection.
C4
Explosives that can be planted on the strategic spots. They will explode only when you detonate these. Can be used effectively in Headquarters, and Search and Destroy.
Concussion
You can stun your victims with these. Throw a stun grenade towards the waiting camper, and melee em. You can throw them towards the coming attackers to stop them so that you can reach the strategic spot first.
In team-based matches, they can be used effectively to get the strategic spots or to provide support to the attackers by blocking the vision of the opponents. Throw a stun towards the upcoming attackers, blind them, and wait as your team mate kills him.
Flashbang
Flash Grenades are similar to Stun Grenades, your opponents go blind “White Screen” but they can move and fire their weapon. So, make sure you don’t get killed by the blind fire of the flashed victim. They are more tricky to use and should be used only for the distraction purposes.
Willy Pete
You can throw them to the opposite end of the map, subjected it doesn’t hit anything on the way. You can avoid snipers, using smokes. Throw them in their line of sight, that would blind them to give your attackers enough time to reach the strategic spot.
Through them off the roofs to make way for your team to rush. Strategically very important in team-based games. Provides you cover if you need to move through an area that is being watched by enemies.
Duration of the smoke is enough for your whole team to pass through the area and get into cover. But, IR Scopes can see right through smoke and if you your enemies have Thermal Scope equipped, using smoke becomes useless.
Killstreak Rewards
Killstreaks rewards become available after you kill certain number of people. The best part is you can customize your killstreak rewards in Call of Duty: Black Ops. You can read our Call of Duty: Black Ops Killstreak Rewards Walkthrough for this purpose.
Remember, kills earned with Killstreak Rewards won’t count towards the kills needed for the next Killstreak Reward. Therefore, don’t ‘camp for killstreaks’. And as I have stated earlier, don’t set Killstreak Rewards too high in the start, get to know the game, less is better then nothing.
3 Kills – Spy Plane
This deploys a Spy Plane, that reveals your enemies on radar for 30 second. Spy planes fly around the map and enemies can shot it down.
They have a week armor so rather then taking them out with a missile, use your primary weapon.
3 Kills – RC-XD (RC bomb)
4 Kills – Counter Spy Plane
Scrambles the enemy radar for a short period of time, even if they don’t have a Spy Plane in the air.Counter Spy Planes also fly around the map, so they can also be shot down.
4 Kills – SAM Turret
5 Kills – Care Package
Drops a random package which can contain ammo, which can be robbed by anyone. Just throw the red signal flare and wait for the helicopter to drop the package.
5 Kills – Napalm Strike
Its an Air Strike, and you can control the direction of the Airstrike for more accurate kills.
6 Kills – Sentry Gun
Airdrops a deployable XM312 Sentry Gun. A helicopter will drop the weapon, which you can pick up and place anywhere you want. The Sentry Gun can be stolen by anyone, just like the Care Package, so be sure to pick it up straight away. You can move the Sentry Gun around even after you’ve deployed it, but it won’t fire until it’s placed.
It has a 180 degree turn on its turret and can pitch up and down, but it can’t detect players using the Cold-Blooded perk. They are most effective when placed in high places.
Sentry Guns can be temporarily disabled with Flash Grenades and Stun Grenades. Normal weapons don’t do much damage to it, so use explosives instead. The turret can over-heat if it’s fired for too long, so use that to your advantage. The Sentry Gun will disable itself after 90 seconds.
6 Kills – Mortar Team
7 Kills – Attack Helicopter
Deploys a Attack Helicopter to the map. Which will circle around the map and automatically attack enemies for 60 seconds. You can use the launcher to destroy the helicopter.
7 Kills – Valkyrie Rockets
8 Kills – Blackbird
8 Kills – ‘Rolling Thunder’
Calls in a Stealthy Rolling Thunder to carpet bomb the selected area. You can also control the direction, just like with the Napalm Airstrike. Doesn’t show on enemy radar.
9 Kills – Chopper Gunner
Be the gunner of an attack helicopter. Your screen changes to the gunners view and the helicopter will fly around the map. The helicopter flies around for 40 seconds before it leaves, which does not include the time it takes to travel to the map.
The 25mm gun doesn’t need to be reloaded, so you can easily kill multiple enemies. Enemies that don’t have the Cold-Blooded perk will appear with a red box around them. You are also vulnerable while using this killstreak, but if you get killed on the ground, you can still continue your session. The helicopter has 1 set of flares, so the first locked-on missile won’t hit it.
Perks
You can read our Call of Duty: Black Ops Perks Guide, for full list of perks and how to use them to your advantage.
Flak Jacket
Equip this and you will take less damage from explosives such as Frag Grenades, Semtex, C4, and Claymores. It also limits your field of vision to count for the helmet you are wearing.
Weapon Classes
You need to create class that suits your game style, as I have stated clearly above. You can even go for a hybrid class if that suits you. You need to find the best combination of weapon and perks that suits your game style, let the experiment begin. You can do the following to get started:
Assault
Primary Weapons: Assault Rifles or Light Machine Guns
Secondary Weapons: Pistol
Equipment: Frag Grenades or Semtex
Perks: Sleight of Hand or Scavenger, Hardened, Steady Aim, or Ninja
Run-and-Gun
Primary Weapons: Submachine Guns
Secondary Weapons: Pistol
Equipment: Semtex, Tomahawk, Concussion, or Flashbangs
Perks: Marathon or Sleight of Hand, Lightweight, or Hardline, Steady Aim, Ninja, Hacker
Sniping
Primary Weapons: Sniper Rifle or ACOG/IR
Secondary Weapons: Pistol
Equipment: Tactical Insertion, Smoke Grenades, Claymores, or C4
Perks: Marathon or Warlord, Scout, Lightweight, Ninja, Steady Aim Pro
Stealth
Primary Weapons: Assault Rifles or SMGs (All silenced)
Secondary Weapons: Pistol
Equipment: Semtex, C4, Claymores, or Throwing Knife
Perks: Marathon, Ghost, Ninja Pro
Play with every weapon and try to complete all the challenges to rank up. Doing that will also enable you to understand the advantages and disadvantages associated with all these weapons. Headshot challenges are harder to compete, if you are having tough time to complete these challenges, its better you switch the weapon.
For ranking up, you can give Demolition and ‘Search and Destroy’ a try, these two are probably the fastest ways to level up. We will go in details over this in our Call of Duty: Black Ops Level Up Guide.
Prestige
You will get Prestige once you have leveled up normally. Once you get to Prestige, you start over from level 1. You keep everything you have unlocked but weapons and attachments. You have to unlock weapons and attachments from start.
Advanced Strategies
In this section we will discuss advanced strategies on how to play different modes in the game and how to devise your strategy for competitive multiplayer.
Every game type is different, and you need different approach for each. If you are playing in a competitive team match, then its whole different story. Public servers are to practice different things, not to unleash you skills.
Simply knowing each map can provide you with a huge advantage over another player.
Know your role, know what the team expects you to do, always be a team player. Though, this may be hard to grasp on if you are an individual.
But, supporting your team even if it means becoming a decoy, will result in the team victory or an advantage they can capitalize on. Communicate what is required for you do, what your team wants, and pull it off. Don’t be selfish, it will only hurt your team, when they are depending on you.
Tip #1. Kill one, move to the next spot and keep doing it. Be in cover, don’t stay at one spot far too long to get knifed. Always keep in mind that once you have killed someone, you have given away your position, and more you have killed from one spot, the more are coming your way for revenge kill.
Change your position, and pick these guys up, as they search for you. Learn to strafe, though I still have problems pulling it off, but your aim becomes so smooth, once you have learned this technique.
You are to come across several one-on-one’s now and then, and you are dead if you just stay still. Strafe gives you an important advantage in one-on-one’s.
Tip #2. Learn to control the recoil. Fire in bursts, there is reason, they have fire burst guns. These guns are far too accurate so only way to balance is to limit the fire rate. Fire your weapon in bursts, it will also help you shoot in the distance. If you fire constantly, your gun recoil upward. Now you can use it to your advantage, how ?.
Weapons recoil in an upward motion, usually causing you to spray bullets above your target. If you have the chance to aim at chest area, and if you time it right with recoil in mind, you can score a headshot by allowing your weapons recoil to direct the bullets upward.
Tip #3. Reload, while in cover. Especially when you don’t have Sleight of Hand.
Tip #4. Learn to throw Grenades. Seriously, I know a lot of people who suck at that, and sometimes it becomes their greatest disadvantage in competitive games. Lets take it this way, in 5-on-5 game, you kill two first 5 seconds with a grenade, easy for the remaining 5 to kill the remaining 3 ?, Right!
Now that you know the importance of Grenades in the game, learn to avoid grenades. Your opponents aren’t fools, they are probably on the same thing, and it would become very difficult for you to win a round if two of your team mates die off nades.
Get your timing right, watch the grenades falling, jump strafe to avoid the impact area. You can watch the grenades falling while running, you know. Try that!
If you have learned the grenades first, you will know where they fall, right ? now the next thing you need to practice is avoid these areas in the initial phase of the round and you are good.
Tip #5. Knife or Spray, Choose Your Best Shot. Sometimes you just run into an enemy when you were least expecting, they can pop up from anywhere. Learn to Knife, as it can save your arse in lot of these situations.
Like when you are engaged in close quarters and ran out of ammo, and much to your surprise and the other guy is reloading or just switched to secondary weapon.
You can be fast, and knife em. In other situations, you are running, just come close to an opponent, you don’t have time to aim, so what should you do ? press the trigger and spray.
You can spray at enemies behind the walls, when you can’t aim properly, helps sometimes and sometimes you alert your experienced opponent to get your butt kicked. But, that would also be valuable experience.
Tip #6. Choose your Favorite Map and Practice. Always choose the same map, make sure your team is comfortable with this map, the best way to find out is, play all the maps, and see which map you win most of the times.
Or comparatively more than other maps. Once you have figured it out, practice it with the team, use Gtactix, and draw strategies.
Tip #7. Mix it up. Game Style, Weapons, Perks, Runs, Routes, and every other you can mix really. Just don’t be too predictable.
