__ __ |\/| _|_ _ | / _ _ _ _ / \ _ |. _ _ | |(-|_(_|| \__)(-(_|| \__/| )||| )(- __ __ __ __ /\ _| _ _ _ _ _| / / \/ / _ . _| _ /--\(_|\/(_|| )(_(-(_| \__\_\/\__ \__)|_||(_|(- |_ _. _ |_)\/ (_||_) / | .?7TMMQtrrgMM9T7! `JHqHNN8:! HWW##C .zzugN#MMMHH#MMMNNmyXfJ. .z1;g##9!MV7?yZXHH:?7WMTHHHkkg. .z;;d##9` yZXHH: ?HHHH@M. .z;dHHM!` ZZXH@: ?H@@HHHM O?d@@@8! XuX@@: .HmmMHHb .==X@@HC ZuX@H: WHHHHHl dllXqqH: XzX@@: jyZWHHb. ,tOXppbl urw@@: XuuWHHM` vzzppp. wrwg@: 0vrM##C ?ZyyyyW. wrwgg: zllHN#9: .WppkzX, wtwgg: .v1HN#MC! `WpkkOZ+. OtOmm: .1uM##MC! ?W?WH@gHmmg&zzkmggQMHHMMY!`!` ?7TUUWHz?1bbc`9UU7?! .+?jpfn ..Jug@@@@@mw&... ,MMM``MM`MMMMMMM` Version 1.1 - 09.07.2010 Version 1.0 - 16.05.2010 Content 0. Disclaimer 1. Intro 2. Pros and Cons for using CQC 3. The correct mindset for CQC 4. Environmental considerations 5. CQC and teamwork 6. CQC execution ....a) Standing versus crouching ....b) Timing ....c) The box ....d) The Rifle Slam ....e) Slam and Mk.2 (CQC EX) 7. CQC Skills ....a) CQC 3 + Scanner 3 ....b) CQC EX 8. CQC defense 9. CQC versus two and more enemies 10. Appendix 0. Disclaimer I'm cip from hewhodares.com. Please leave me feedback by either going to my YouTube profile (www.youtube.com/cip314), where you can also find my videos, or by joining me at the clans website (http://hewhodares.com/forum/index.php?showuser=239316). This is an early version of the guide and I'm not a native English speaker, so please go easy on my spelling and wording. If you want to distribute this faq or parts of it to a third party, please credit me. 1. Intro In this guide I will try and explain my style and thoughts concerning CQC in Metal Gear Online. I’m not going to handle the fundamentals, so I assume you know all technical things that are to know about CQC. If you don’t know you’re way around the basics, please check out Travis Rappa’s Knife and CQC Guide on gamefaqs.com. Having played over 600 hours of MGO, I am at level 14-15 using almost exclusively CQC related skills. Since the beginning I have focused my style of play heavily on using CQC, and I would calculate that I have used CQC3+Scanner or CQC EX in at least 80% of all my games. That being said, I’m not puffing myself to be a CQC guru or anything, but I have gained some knowledge that I would like to share with you, the reader. 2. Pros and Cons for using CQC When you’re thinking about using CQC, the first thing you need to do is ask yourself what you want. Do you want to make as many points as possible, do you want to help your team or do you just want to have fun and screw around with some CQC action? CQC is very situational, so at higher level of play you can’t expect to make many points in all games across the board. It’s a high risk, medium high reward kind of play, so if you’re looking for long term efficiency, CQC is not the way to go. Especially against a well organized team or strong players in general, CQC becomes less and less effective. Although it’s still doable and emotionally rewarding sometimes, in the long run you will find yourself on a lower level than you would be using a run & gun style, even if you have horrible aiming (like I do). This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t go CQC. Depending on your level of play, your teamwork and situational variables, you can score tremendous amounts of points and even turn entire matches in seconds. This can be very rewarding and fun, if you have the patience to learn, die and loose. One goal of this guide is to shorten that learning, dying and loosing time period. So if you accepted that you’re probably going to drop a level or two and that you’re going to die and look stupid more often than you’re used to, you get some unforgettable and awesome CQC moments in return, you will turn the tide of some battles, you will help your team tremendously and at some point you will be even able to compete at higher level of play, albeit with a small but undeniable and ever present handicap. 3. The correct mindset for CQC Now that you know you’re not going to get the maximum number of points possible, it’s important to take a step back and analyze your new role on the battlefield. You are not the first line of defense, throwing grenades everywhere and shooting everything that moves with your assault rifle, running and gunning as effectively as you can. That’s the other guys. That’s the vast majority of MGO players, the enemy you have to analyze from a new perspective in order to fight him the best way you can. It’s a bit like playing the single player: Your Snake and you have this amazing tool at your disposal, CQC, which the PMCs don’t have. But in consideration for that you are not on par with them when it comes to open firefights, in which Run & Gunners will beat you with their skills in the long run. Therefore you should avoid open, short- and mid-ranged firefights. Instead you should adapt to a stealthy and slow style of play. Hide behind corners and wait for them to come to you. Use the cardboard box and the magazine, listen to them shooting and running and don’t make noises yourself. Pay attention to details that would compromise your position, since you want as few open encounters as possible. However, just sitting and being stealthy won’t bring you closer to your goal. You have to make something happen. The good thing is you have more time than the others. The reason for that is that you need fewer successful actions than they do. Here’s some mathematics in an example: Some guy with a decent aim and lots of action gets 15 kills and 15 deaths in a TDM, all headshots and all in alternations (kill, death, kill death and so on). With this, he gets 15x3 -15x2 + 15x1 = 30 points in that round. However, a single string comprised of scan, choke and headshot gives you 7+2+3+1= 13 points, nearly half of what the other guy gets in the whole round. If you get 3 strings off in that round, you are free to die 4 times and still beat him by points. This is all for saying: Be patient, wait for your opportunity. Another argument for being stealthy is that you die less often. It may sound trivial but dying really should be avoided at all costs ( :) ). It not only makes you lose 2 points, you lose time, DP and most importantly you lose your streak. Streaks are somewhat unknown and underestimated in this game. It works like this: For every consecutive kill you are awarded extra points equal to the number of previous kills. So for 5 consecutive kills you get 1+2+3+4=10 so called “combo-points”. However, after the sixth consecutive kill the combo- points per kill are capped at 5 points. Playing stealthy and defensive has this huge benefit of being able to get very long streaks, awarding you with tons of extra points. Every kill after the fifth consecutive kill is worth 3+5=8 points total, nearly tripling the points you get. At that point it is absolutely imperative to try and stay alive as long as possible and not taking any unnecessary risks like one-on-one firefights. You should rather wait for the safe kill, which is another perk of CQC: Given you stay patient, stealthy and smart, every once in a while there are kills coming your way that are nearly 100% guaranteed. Given lag and whatnot it is far safer to grab an incoming enemy after camping behind a corner than stepping out and trying to headshot him. If you manage to get some of these “safe kills” in a row, you are about to get quite a few points. All of this is to say: A stealthy, defensive style of play is more beneficial than it may seem at first glance, especially when using CQC. You should get to the point where you reflect before every aggressive action, if you have a clear advantage in the upcoming engagement. If you don’t have the element of surprise at all or feel at a disadvantage in any other way, look for a way out of the situation. In order to optimize the stealthy gameplay, try to get as far into the enemy territory as you can without getting detected because your element of surprise will be even bigger and you can find other “safe kills” if you’re in the enemies back. You should also make use of a “camp and go” kind of paradigm. Don’t just sit in one spot for more than 10 seconds, but try to silently move to other nearby spots regularly, so you get more opportunities for a safe kill and cover a wider area. This is especially useful in smaller maps or areas with tight corridors, because you won’t be as vulnerable when you’re in transit to the next location. This way you can take advantage of unsuspecting enemies whenever they come into your area, because you have more information, experience in CQC and the environmental advantage. For this to work however, you should try to keep maximal awareness, always panning the camera in different directions looking for incoming enemies, maybe using traps and teammates as spotters. And if you feel the opposing team learns you’re style and position during the course of a match, or even if you think the guy you just killed twice is about to come back and hunt you, you should strongly consider changing your operating area because you wont have the element of surprise anymore. 4. Environmental considerations There are four big variables that you should consider before deciding what skills and style of play you want to use. They are: map, mode, enemy skill level and number of players. Some maps are very good for CQC all around. Examples are AA, HH, RR and WW. They all feature corridors and close quarters. In these narrow places CQC really shines, not only because it’s very hard to shoot at those close distances but they offer many places to hide and takeout enemies without much fear of interception. HH is a prime example of this, since especially at the top floor the hallways are very narrow and the map is very hard to view as a hole because of the 3 levels, so that the icons on the map aren’t as much of a help to the teammates of the guy you just choked out. The next list contains maps which have some areas in which CQC is very strong, if you avoid the wide open areas: CC (the underground area), GG (the small house and some corridors), MM (the house, the corridor on the left), OO (many doors, but pretty wide corridors), SS (in the middle), TT and UU. However there are some maps where it’s very hard to make CQC a vital part of your strategy. Those are FF, BB and especially II and VV. These maps feature wide areas and very few ambush points so you are not likely to get many grabs or are just too small (BB). If you really want to go CQC on these maps, I suggest CQC 3 + Scanner, because grabs won't be as frequent as you'd like and that way you will get more points using the scanning ability. The next point to consider is the mode in which you are playing. Fast paced modes like RACE, BOMB, BASE and CAP are generally not suited for CQC, because you need to help your team and can’t afford the time to be sneaky and use CQC a lot. Also the team organization often times is a lot tighter in these matches, making enemies help each other against your CQC attacks a much more common occurrence. Even if you are playing as a defender and your goal is to slow down the enemy, it’s generally a better idea to use mags and Mk.2 or the knife in these modes. RES, TSNE, TDM and SNE however are very much suited for CQC. Especially scanning in RES and TSNE can be devastating to the enemy and playing sneaky and slow should be something you’re very familiar with and play right in your hands. To me TDM and SNE are kind of the default modes, so everything I say about CQC normally accounts for them. Now the level of your opponents is a very crucial factor as well. I don’t mean to generalize or speak ill of anyone, but as a rule of thumb players with a level <13 have relatively poor teamwork and don’t have the mechanisms against CQC (see 8. CQC defense) down that high level players have. This makes going CQC against them a very valid option. Your grabs will probably be safer and you can try more risky stuff, like running 3, 4 steps towards someone in order to grab. With higher levels, say 13-15, you have to be more careful. You have to use the sneaky and slow style of play mentioned earlier if you want to get solid results. Even higher levels have one of two things: Either they have so good aim and reaction, that you will probably only get them in a classy ambush, like camping behind a corner, or they have really good teamwork. And teamwork destroys CQC. Period. There’s nearly no way you will consistently beat even groups of two with CQC. It can happen once in a great while, but under normal circumstances teamwork can only be beat with teamwork. With this thought in mind, the last point is fairly simple: The more players on a map, the less effective CQC gets, because the chance of an enemies teammate coming by and saving him is higher. 5. CQC and teamwork The worst thing that can happen is that you have stealers in your own team, which makes getting streaks, points and having fun nearly impossible. How you deal with them is up to you, but I suggest not playing CQC style in such a team for long as its just going to test your patience that much more. The best case scenario is you’re in a clan and people know what you’re doing and help you. I’m very fortunate to be in this position and I can tell you that teamwork increases the effectiveness of CQC dramatically. The most fundamental thing about it is getting cover while you choke someone. The 4 seconds it takes to grab, scan, choke and kill an enemy are the most vulnerable you’ll ever get in MGO, so a buddy standing near you and looking for incoming enemies – not looking at the guy youre choking!  is pure gold. Other nice tactics include the good old decoy: As soon as someone in your team is in a firefight with an enemy, you should see if you can use that distraction in order to get to the enemy’s location, if you can stop any reinforcements coming to him or if you can block secondary routes from the enemy to your teammate that any enemies might take. It goes without saying that if there is any other immediate or better way to help your teammate, take it. Don’t let him die just so you can try and CQC someone a bit later. But if you and your teammate trust each other, he can try and stall time for you in the firefight by pulling back more often and distracting the enemy as long as he can, while you try to get in a better position. For this tactic SOP helps tremendously and even outside of his context I strongly recommend you always being proactive about SOPing, especially when youre going CQC. Another great use of teamwork with CQC is to have one guy go CQC EX and the other Scanner EX. If those two people stay together they can wreak havoc and be very time- and point efficient, especially in RES and TSNE. 6. CQC execution Now that we’ve got our theoretical background down, it’s time to focus on some CQC mechanics. Again, I’m not going to explain the basic movements here, but instead I want to share some tips and tricks that help a great deal in CQCing. a) Standing versus crouching The most important thing first: Don’t ever grab while standing. Your character makes a sound, the grab comes out later, disarming and dropping after the choke takes longer, you’re much more visible and you don’t grab crouching enemies. These are all deal breakers. The only pros for grabbing while standing are the slightly longer range, the fact that rolls don’t knock you down and the easier transition after running, i.e. if you run towards someone, it’s kind of tricky to push x for crouching without executing a roll by accident. But that’s what the box is for, see 6c) The box. All these pros don’t even come close to outweighing the cons, so always grab while crouching. b) Timing Perhaps the most crucial part of CQC’ing is correct timing. Failing to grab someone most often results in your death. So when you push R1, you should be sure you are within reach and that your opponent is “grabable”, i.e. he’s not performing any kind of roll, is in a box or barrel or is lying prone. In fact, when an enemy near you rolls or side rolls, anticipate the location where he’s going to land and grab him at the exact moment his movement is finished. At that instant, he can’t do anything against your grab if your timing is correct. With some practice this can result in you almost hoping your enemy performs a roll or side roll, since you can punish him easily. If you’re not sure whether you are close enough to him so you can get to his destination in time, you can try running standing for a second or use the box to get some extra speed. However, be sure to grab him while crouching, since the delay for standing grabs is hard to calculate in with timing as strict as in this scenario. Rifle slams are a bit safer, but I would only do those as a measure of desperation (see 6d) The rifle slam). Another important aspect of timing comes to play when in a camping position. If you’re behind a corner and see an enemy coming towards you, don’t wait for him to literally pass you by, but instead get out of your corner when he’s about 2 to 3 meters away and meet him before the corner. This way you can make use of the split second it takes for him to realize what is happening and catch him completely by surprise. If you wait until he’s right at the corner, you risk him rolling around the corner or using a box, which is what some people do in order to protect themselves from these kinds of ambushes. And even if he doesn’t do that, he’s surely going to be more concentrated and paying attention to what might be behind this corner. Coming towards him two seconds earlier screws up his timing and is generally a very safe thing to do if you practiced it. There are some exceptions to this rule, like if you see the enemy is covered by his teammate and you want to grab him and get him behind the corner, so his teammate won’t safe him. However at higher levels of play this kind of 2v1 scenario nearly never works out for the CQC’er (see 9. CQC versus two and more enemies). c) The box The box is a tremendously helpful tool when using CQC. It’s got 2 purposes related to CQC execution, the first of which is run canceling into a crouched position without performing a roll. This is very useful for when you want to get a short distance to an unsuspecting enemy ASAP in order to grab him. You can run towards him and then hit R2 two times very quickly when you’re nearly in grabbing distance in order to get into the crouching position immediately, granting you a safe grab. You want to get crouching as late as possible for maximum speed, but you have to be sure you won’t bump into him with your box, because this delays you and leaves you standing, becoming incredibly vulnerable to a counter attack. You can practice this kind of speedy approach against the AI dolls until you get the timing right. It’s very helpful. In fact I often use the box to get to a crouching position instead of the x button, just to make sure I dont roll. As you know, the box is the fastest silent way to travel and you can transition into the crouching position easily as described above. Also it makes you more difficult to hit, especially when you run towards an enemy, like in the corner ambush scenario described in the last chapter. If you run towards a guy and use the box a beat later, just to unbox right in front of him and grab him, you’re enemy might be surprised and it’s surely pretty hard to headshot you. The trick is you have to know what you’re doing beforehand and train this algorithm, so that you enter this situation with both more information and experience. However don’t abuse this strategy as it is pretty easy to counter it (e.g. moving backwards and shooting, rolling into you or crouching and shooting at your head level), and don’t overestimate the distance you can travel with this. I feel about 2 seconds are the absolute maximum you can get away with moving this way. The second use of the box is defending against CQC. You can’t be grabbed while in a box. However this doesn’t make you invulnerable to CQC as any movement against an enemy will cause you to unequip the box, stand up and dizzy for a second. The idea is to use the box very late and provoke a false grab by the enemy without bumping into him, so you can unbox and grab him yourself. But the extremely short distances leave a tiny margin of error on this so that I generally suggest other methods of defending against CQC, as described in 8. CQC defense. d) The Rifle Slam In my opinion the rifle slam is very situational. There are very few situations in which a rifle slam is better than a normal grab and choke. The reason for this is again its delay and noisiness, appearing in contrast to our preferred safe and stealthy approach. Also you’re operating at a standing level so someone firing at you the second you rifle slam him, chances are he’s going to get a headshot off. However there are some pros, the most obvious being you get the fastest CQC stun possible, discounting Snakes and Liquids CQC. Also the range and priority are pretty good. With these considerations, it’s good to think about the kind of situations in which a rifle slam might be better than a normal grab and choke so you make full use of the tools at your disposal. In my experience, rifle slams work well as a last resort measure in pretty open firefights, when your cover is blown either way and you get the feeling you will be killed in the next few seconds and want to get of one last stun before you die. Also it’s a way to take on very risky 2v1 situations, when you need to take one guy out ASAP, before his teammate gets around the corner. But these are situations we don’t want to be in in the first place, so we’ll try and avoid them and therefore we won’t use the rifle slam that often. With CQC Ex, slam + auto aimed Mk2. shot becomes a very good alternative to the rifle slam, because its nearly as fast and a lot safer. More on that in the next chapter. e) Slam and Mk.2 (CQC EX) In general, grab and choke should be preferred to slamming and shooting with the Mk.2. With CQC EX the choke is ridiculously fast, plus it’s much safer in general, since a slam gives the opponent an opportunity to react at all, although his alternatives are very constricted. But like described above there are some very time sensitive situations in which slam and Mk.2 might be beneficial, and sometimes you will slam by accident because you released the analog stick too late. In these situations you got three options after the slam: You can shoot manually with the Mk.2, you can use auto aim and you can shoot at him with your normal weapon and wait for him to stand up, so you can roll into him, rendering him unconscious. I myself prefer auto-aiming, because it’s very safe. If he plays dead, you won’t lock onto him, but he can’t shoot you as well. So the second he aims or moves you can shoot him and there is very little risk in you getting hit more than once. Normally he will move right away, trying to dodge a knife attack, so you can get him stunned instantly most of the time. If you have the ease of mind and confidence, you can shoot him manually, which is pretty safe as well. But if you miss that one shot, you can be in pretty big trouble, considering you pretty much had him in the beginning. 7. CQC Skills Now it’s time to discuss the CQC skills available in order to determine what should be used in any given situation. I am going to skip CQC 0-2, since they are not beneficial to the kind of heavily CQC focused style of play I am presenting here. That leaves us with two options really: CQC 3 + Scanner 3 and CQC EX. a) CQC 3 + Scanner 3 This skill set has the potential for huge point output and turning games. If you manage to get a scan off in a TSNE or RES game, with the whole enemy team having SOP linked, you will most likely be the first in the roster and have your team win. However especially in RES there are other skills that you would probably like to have as well, like trap detection or SOP stealth. This is the only situation I consider using CQC2 + Scanner, freeing up one slot for an extra skill. However, with this setup you have to play differently: If you want to grab and choke someone, be sure he’s alone or that you yourself got backup, because a choke takes considerably longer and leaves you very vulnerable. Generally speaking, CQC3 + Scanner is even slower and stealthier than CQC EX. All the points I made in the chapter about the right mindset for CQC are very true for this skill set: Since you can get so many points with just few successful actions, you don’t need to play risky at all. That a string consisting of grab, scan, choke and hs takes quite long is another argument for playing safe, because the chance of you slipping a string in while in a time sensitive situation is very slim compared to CQC EX. Like I said above, in those situations the rifle slam can be useful in giving you the time you need to focus the next threat. However, your margin of error and your chance to get away with risky stuff is quite a bit smaller than with CQC EX. As a result of that your killstreaks will be shorter on average and you rely more on teamwork than you do with CQC EX. One aspect of that is you have to be vigilant about SOP’ing with your teammates. SOP at the beginning of every match and do so whenever you see a teammate close by. Without it, your scans become just so much less powerful. Remember that even after your own death all your teammates you have been linked to still benefit from the scan the whole 90 seconds, and if you respawn and link to them again, you will too. You will continue to get assist points and of course your team will be at a huge advantage, seeing every enemy, where they’re aiming at and where they laid traps. After a while in a bigger match, when people know what you’re doing and in certain modes like especially TSNE, some enemies opt to not link specifically to render scans useless. There’s nothing you can do about that and you should do the same if you’re on the other side of the scanner. Even if you go for scanning, I recommend not SOP’ing with your mates in a TSNE game, because it’s just too risky. Instead, if you got a scan off, SOP with your mates quickly in order to benefit from it. With adequate teamwork you can generally SOP with everyone in a matter of seconds. b) CQC EX On the EU servers this is a pretty controversial skill, as many people dismiss it for various reasons, banning it from their free games as a result. Don’t use CQC EX if you know people on a server don’t want it. Although I don’t agree with banning a skill and this skill in particular, the most important thing is for everyone to be having a good time. The aspect of CQC EX that seems to be hated the most is its counter, which in my opinion isn’t nearly as strong as most people make it out to be. There are some reasons for that. Firstly, you can only counter attacks from the front. In any ambush scenario the sneaky guy can pretty much choose from which side he wants to grab you so he will try to be in your back. Secondly, even if you counter someone’s attack, there is no safe follow-up for you (at least not to my knowledge). You can’t safely knife him and Mk.2 won’t help either. So the most adequate thing is to shoot him with your main gun as best as you can, which is far from being safe or stealthy for that matter, contradicting the play-style I recommend for CQC’ing. The whole animation takes time and is noisy due to the sound you’re enemy makes and the exclamation mark. So the bottom line is: You don’t want to counter, because it’s messy. If you can, always grab instead and don’t run through levels, hoping you’ll get a counter grab off. The third reason is that knife still works against CQC EX, causing most people to stab or stun you with a knife if they have the opportunity in order to be safe. Of course there are some benefits however. The most obvious being you won’t get countered yourself, ever. You can even grab Snake and Liquid. This very much plays into the safety aspect, especially when doing the corner ambush trick described in 6b), in which you have to attack from the front and against which you will be immune from if attacked by someone without CQC EX equipped. Also in matches like TSNE and RES and in CQC friendly maps, when CQC is more common and can turn the tide of match, you will occasionally be saved by the counter. In my experience however, it’s very rare that you counter a grab which you didn’t anticipate at all. And if you do anticipate it, there are better options for defending yourself even without CQC EX, as described in 8. CQC defense. Now, the most important advantage of CQC EX is not the counter, it’s speed. Choking is almost instant, you can perform the slam and Mk.2 (see 6e)), and all your CQC movements are faster. This speed provides new tactics and possibilities that are very valuable, especially for more experienced CQC players. It’s very hard to distinguish situations in which a grab should be done with CQC EX but not with CQC 3, but generally speaking you can be more offensive with CQC EX. You will get away with more daring maneuvers, you will be able to live longer when behind the enemy lines, you are not as dependent on teamwork as you are with CQC 3 and if you ever have to fight more than one enemy, CQC EX dramatically increases your chances of survival from nonexistent to very low :) (see 9. CQC versus more two and more enemies). The bottom line is that you will be able to get more stuns and kills than with CQC3. However only advanced CQC’ers will be able to take advantage of the speed so that it justifies for not having the ability to scan. You have to have routine, presence of mind, good execution and a good sense for your surroundings to handle the faster pace of the CQC EX style appropriately. It’s very tough to get more points than with CQC3 + Scanner, but it is possible and in my opinion CQC EX is so much fun because it makes for some unforgettable fights. 8. CQC defense Approaching the end of this guide, I want to spend some time talking about the most advanced CQC techniques I know, which are CQC defense and taking on more than one enemy. These situations are very rare (or at least they should be) and risky, since usually one mistake will cost you your life. Defending against CQC translates to shooting to most people. It’s the most direct and natural way to Run & Gunners, but it’s not always the best. Of course if you know that your opponent is trying to CQC you and you’re still at a proper distance to him, walking back and shooting him is very easy and you should take the safe kill in most situations. But if you’re feeling safe and superior or if your opponent is too close to you or you can’t shoot at him for some reason (e.g. you’re out of ammo, without a weapon or locked from enemy fire) you should try to engage in the upcoming CQC battle, relying on your experience to get the upper hand. The most important thing in a straight CQC 1 on 1 battle is timing. Whatever you do, your timing has to be precise and you should always keep the camera on your opponent so you can punish him if he screws up his timing. Your general options to defend yourself from very close CQC attacks are the following: You can use your box (see 6c)), you can lay down prone, you can roll, side roll, back step, use your knife, arm a grenade or grab him yourself. Using the box is very difficult and risky, since a bump in leaves you wide open, as does a side roll that is anticipated by the enemy. So let’s have a look at the other options. Lying down is the most defensive option of all. If you feel the enemy is very focused on CQC, this is the way to go. Just lie down and shoot at him. Especially versus CQC EX players and Snake and Liquid this turns out to be quite viable. Remember also that you get about 2 seconds grab invincibility after standing up, so you can counterattack him with a grab right after standing up if you’re feeling like it. Another way to go is just rolling sideways away from him after lying down. This way he can’t auto-aim you or grab you and has to shoot you directly, which isn’t that easy at close range. Use this if reinforcements are in the vicinity, since this is a good way to stall time. Rolling into someone should only be considered if you’re positive you’ll hit him and he is crouched. If you don’t hit him he can retaliate and grab you safely if you land near him, and a roll into a standing person pretty much does nothing to change the odds. Knocking him over however is an okay last resort kind of measure, giving you some time to decide what to do next. Stepping back (with this I mean L1, back + x) is a great defensive tool everyone should consider for getting out of CQC situations. You get CQC- invincible for the entire duration of the back step so it’s very safe and the CQC’er won’t have time to get to you quickly enough to throw you at the end or even catch up with you really. This is very helpful. I pretty much left the knife out of this guide, because it’s not my kind of style. But it is quite effective to counter someone you know is going to CQC you. Although the timing is kind of strict, knife-stunning someone who wants to CQC you is kind of rewarding. But I wouldn’t recommend you do this on a regular basis. Arming a grenade is an unconventional but interesting method to counter an incoming CQC grab. 3 seconds after you get grabbed the explosion will knock down both you and the CQC’er, evening the odds instantly. It’s not optimal, since you will get damage too and with CQC EX the choke is faster than the grenade timer, but it is most likely to surprise your enemy. On the other hand, never grab someone, who’s got an armed grenade in his hand. You should either wait for him to throw it, if he hasn’t spotted you, or just follow him very closely, since he can’t run with his grenade armed and wait for the right time to grab him. Last but not least, CQC’ing him yourself is the epitome of defending a CQC attack. Obviously CQC EX gives a huge advantage with this approach, but all in all CQC on CQC comes down to timing and experience. And sometimes lag. Occasionally you will grab each other at the same moment, causing one character to abort the animation and let go of the other. If you can, immediately switch to the knife and stun him while his recovery animation goes on. Otherwise, try and provoke your enemy to do a whiff, grabbing thin air, by walking towards him and then suddenly turning back, or using the box. If he whiffs, grab him yourself. And always stay crouched. 9. CQC versus two and more enemies The first rule concerning taking on multiple enemies is the simplest and most important: Don’t do it. The risk versus reward factor is very bad when doing this, as even with good execution you always need luck in order to succeed, because with two enemies there are just too many variables you cannot control. However, if you want to do the brave thing and engage more than one enemy using CQC tactics, either because you feel you can do it, you want to try it for fun or you don’t see any other way, I will try and give you some useful tips in this section. The first 2v1 situation I want to discuss is the ambush scenario described earlier. When you’re camping behind a corner near a small corridor and you see an enemy coming towards you with backup, there aren’t many options you can choose from. Essentially you can run away, step out and try to shoot them or you can decide to quickly take down one of them with CQC, hoping you can get the second one shortly thereafter. The first two are kind of obvious, so let’s have a look at the third option. When you try to CQC the first guy, you have to be as quick as possible. That means doing either a rifle slam, a choke out with CQC EX or a slam and Mk.2. Out of these options I prefer the slam and Mk.2, because it lets you take on the other guy as fast as possible. Even just slamming the first and then immediately trying to get the third is a viable option, since the first guy will be on the ground and with CQC EX he is only a touch away from sleeping. So you could throw the first and grab the second, using him as a shield to shoot the first one. Obviously timing is crucial in this situation and it wont succeed on a regular basis. Grabbing the first one and using him as a shield may only be a viable option if there is a longer distance to his partner, because only then he won’t be able to shoot you safely, or even roll into you. Using the shield is very risky in general and simply comes down to your first shot. If you miss that, you’re usually done so you have to be as quick and safe as possible and both at the same time. Another option is grabbing him and pulling him into your corner, taking him out behind cover. Although this does sound relatively safe, it again can only be pulled off if the partner is a bit away and a single grenade from him will ruin your plan. Against two relatively close enemies, 2 fast slams can sometimes work. In this execution you just slam the first one as soon as you can, immediately focusing the second enemy and slamming him as well. Then, you again focus on the first guy who hopefully only now will be able to react. If he stands up slowly (i.e. just pressing x), slam him again, if he shoots at you, try to shoot him with the Mk. 2 and if he stands up fast (i.e. pushing forward and then x) roll into him. You have to take him out ASAP, so you can concentrate on the second enemy when he reacts. It’s very important the first two slams happen very fast after each other, as otherwise the first guy will have too much of an opening to foil your plan and you have to make full use of the surprise element and your experience and timing for this to be able to work. You can find some examples of this method in my CQC compilation in my YouTube account (see 10. Appendix). If you want to fight with CQC against more than two enemies it gets exponentially more difficult. The only way to really fight multiple enemies is to implement a “divide and conquer”-strategy. Take out your enemies one by one, pulling back from the reinforcements, taking cover behind the next wall and forcing them to come to you. You have to be as fast as you can and you have to make use of the environment, such as small alleys and corners you can take cover behind after each choke. If you’re faced with the decision to hs someone you just choked or to run for cover, consider how many people are coming your way and how you calculate the odds of you being able to deal with them before the first guy will wake up. If you feel there is only one teammate coming and he’s very near you, concentrate on him first as the time it takes for you to aim and hs the sleeping enemy may be needed to get the upper hand in the next combat. However if you don’t feel secure in your ability to handle the next fight or the reinforcements are going to be there in the next few seconds, you should take the free kill before you die. 10. Appendix I thank all my clan mates at HeWhoDares.com and EverlivingSouls for their awesomeness. I thank everyone who plays MGO fairly and helps everyone to have a good time. My YouTube account: www.youtube.com/cip314 My profile at HeWhoDares: http://hewhodares.com/forum/index.php?showuser=239316